I PROMISED SUE.

The night is waning—Good-night! Good-night! —I promised Sue to be home by nine: A sacred promise, though amber wine Sparkles and laughs in the crystal bright, But the hours fly by with an eerie flight When friends grow mellow and glasses clink, And I’ll venture not to the tempting brink When the night is waning—Good-night! Good-night! No, not another—the hop and vine May wilt and wither like western grass; Oh, well, if I must—in a final glass I will drink a toast to a girl divine, I will drink a toast to this wife of mine, A queen, enthroned in the hearts of men! Eh! What’s that striking? It can’t be ten, For I promised Sue to be home by nine. Pshaw! Sue is tucked in the sheets, I guess, And Towzer guards at my outer gate With a sleepless eye and a fang-girt pate, Cruel and callous and pitiless. Then, what of a night the more or less? Come, fill up the glasses from heel to brim! Till daylight nears and the stars grow dim, And the new day yawns from its drowsiness. For lives are merry while hearts are true, Though the sun may wink through the window pane And she’ll say “Algernon! drunk again!” With a limpid tear in her eyes of blue, But I’ll stroke her hair of a flaxen hue, And I’ll kiss her lips of a rosebud red And, harness and all, I will flop to bed And dream of the promise I made to Sue!