Frederick Locker-Lampson

Lightly I sped when hope was high And youth beguiled the chase,— I follow, follow still: But I Shall never see her face.

The world's as ugly, ay, as Sin,— And almost as delightful.

What an arm—what a waist For an arm!

"Vanitas vanitatum" has rung in the ears Of gentle and simple for thousands of years; The wail still is heard, yet its notes never scare Either simple or gentle from Vanity Fair.

And this was your Cradle? Why, surely, my Jenny, Such cozy dimensions go clearly to show You were an exceedingly small pickaninny, Some nineteen or twenty short summers ago.