"Oh dear, what can the matter be?

Two old women got up in an apple-tree:

One came down,

And the other stayed up till Saturday."

I suppose you wonder how it should be

That two old ladies got up in a tree:

Did you never chance the exploit to see?

Perhaps you have noticed pussy-cat go,

With a wrathful look, and a way not

slow,

And a tail very big, and a back up—

so?

Original

Well, that is the type of the thing I mean;

And the apple-bearer, since earth was

green,

The tree of our trouble hath always been.

So when "human warious" fails to agree,

There stands the old stem of iniquity,

And one or both will be "up a tree."

Each in her style: some are stately and

stiff;

Some hiss and spit, and are up in a whiff;

And some hunch along in a moody miff.

It does n't much matter, however it be;

The best of people may get up the tree;

The question is, when they 'll come down,

you see!

An offenseless one will descend straightway;

One half in the wrong for a while may stay;

Clear curstness will roost till the judgment

day!