SONNET

TO HIMSELF.

FF! off! thou art an ass, thou art

an ass,

"Thou man of endless words and

little sense,

"Of pigmy powers and conceit im—

mense—

"Thou art a Donkey!

Take a bit of grass?"

Oh, Martin! Oh, my Tupper! thus exclaims

A groveling Age, grown envious of thy fames,—

Thy boundless sonnets, and Proverbial bays:

Blest Silence! lovéd Silence! thou art Heavn!—

(See my remarks in "Sonnet 47")—

Yet will I breathe my pleasant Poems forth

Innumerable. Hundreds more—ay tens

Of thousands! Sweet etherial rhymes,

I hold ye here! and hug ye—all the lot;—

A monstrous pile of quintessential rot!!