  “Il me faut des emotions.”—Blanche Amory YOU ask me, Lydia, “whether I, If you refuse my suit, shall die,” (Now pray don’t let this hurt you!) Although the time be out of joint, I should not think a bodkin’s point The sole resource of virtue; Nor shall I, though your mood endure, Attempt a final Water-cure Except against my wishes; For I respectfully decline To dignify the Serpentine, And make hors-d’oeuvres for fishes; But if you ask me whether I Composedly can go, Without a look, without a sigh, Why, then I answer—No. “You are assured,” you sadly say (If in this most considerate way To treat my suit your will is), That I shall “quickly find as fair Some new NeÆra’s tangled hair— Some easier Amaryllis.” I cannot promise to be cold If smiles are kind as yours of old Nor can I, if I would, forget The homage that is Nature’s debt, While man has social duties; But if you ask shall I prefer To you I honour so, A somewhat visionary Her, I answer truly—No. You fear, you frankly add, “to find In me too late the altered mind That altering Time estranges.” To this I make response that we (As physiologists agree) Must have septennial changes; This is a thing beyond control, And it were best upon the whole To try and find out whether We could not, by some means, arrange This not-to-be-avoided change So as to change together: But, had you asked me to allow That you could ever grow Less amiable than you are now,— Emphatically—No. But—to be serious—if you care To know how I shall really bear This much-discussed rejection, I answer you. As feeling men Behave, in best romances, when You outrage their affection;— By which, as melodramas show, Despair is indicated; Enforced by all the liquid grief Which hugest pocket-handkerchief Has ever simulated; And when, arrived so far, you say In tragic accents “Go,” Then, Lydia, then ... I still shall stay, And firmly answer—No. Austin Dobson. |
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