"I had a little pony,

His name was Dapple Gray:

I lent him to a lady

To ride a mile away.

She whipped him,

She lashed him,

She rode him through the mire;

I would n't lend my pony now,

For all the lady's hire."

Our hobbies, of whatever sort

They be, mine honest friend,

Of fancy, enterprise, or thought,

'T is hardly wise to lend.

Some fair imagination, shrined

In form poetic, maybe,

You fondly trusted to the World,—

That most capricious Lady.

Or a high, romantic theory,

Magnificently planned,

In flush of eager confidence

You bade her take in hand.

But she whipped it, and she lashed it,

And bespattered it with mire,

Till your very soul felt stained within,

And scourged with stripes of fire.

Yet take this thought, and hold it fast,

Ye Martyrs of To-day!

That same great World, with all its scorn,

You 've lifted on its way!