AVE you read B. P. Du Chaillu?

Chaillu of the Big Baboon?

He who slew the fierce Gorilla

In the Mountains of the Moon?

All day long that injured party

Rested on the boughs his chin;

Strangling spifflicated niggers

Just to keep his biceps in.

Nightly several score of lions

Yielded up their worthless lives;

And there was a cry in Mickbos,

For the King had lost his wives.

Wrathful was the sable monarch

At their unexpected hops;

For the brute had cook'd the gruel

Of the Nymphs who cook'd the chops!

Thro' this land of death and danger,

Mandrake-swamp and stagnant fen,—

Where the spiders look like asses,

And the asses grow like men,—

Where the Shniego-BmouvÉ sitteth

Hairless underneath his hat,

And a white man is a dainty

Irresistible if fat,—

Where the alligator gambols—

Whale like—in the black lagoon;—

Went unscathed B. P. Du Chaillu,

Chaillu of the Big Baboon!

Found the Shniego-BmouvÉ squatting,

Hairless,'neath the tropic moon

Saw the spiders—saw the asses—

(When he gazed in the Lagoon)—

Twigg'd the Crocodile stupendous,

Winking with ferocious eye,—

Met the Cannibals—the feasters

On cold missionary pie;—

Shot, and bagg'd, the fierce Gorilla,

To the music of the drum,—

Heard, fifteen miles off, his roaring,

Mellow'd to a gentle—hum!

What, you doubt me! gen'rous public,

Hear me swear it's no take in—

Owen says the throat's a larynx,

And look here's the beggar's skin!