MY ULTIMATUM.

HO speaks to me of "giving up,"

Or thinks about despairing?

Who says the bitter in his cup

Is bitter past the bearing?

For may I feel the thing to do

(Let Fate be hard or tender)

Is—like La Garde at Waterloo—

To die and not surrender.

What struggles I myself have had;

Escapes how very narrow!

My first affray was with a lad

Who bore a bow and arrow.

If I should ever meet again

That young and old offender,

I see my course before me plain—

To die and not surrender.

In youth I ran a race to snatch

A laurel from Apollo,

Whom very few contrive to catch

Though very many follow.

Amid the throng in search of song—

With bards of either gender—

E'en yet I pant and limp along,

To die and not surrender.

I strove with Plutus day and night,

But left the field in dudgeon;

And now I wage a fiercer fight

With Tempus. old curmudgeon.

Go on, Destroyer; you destroy,

But Art shall be the mender.

"Gray hair?" I 'll get a wig, old boy,

Or dye and not surrender!