Like an epileptic dervish in the books, Foam, fling myself flat, rend my clothes to shreds ; No matter lovers, friends and countrymen Will lay down spiritual laws, read wrong things right By the rule of reverse. If Francis Verulam Is hard to put in evidence: they incline To gibe and jeer, these undeveloped sorts. THE MEDIUM. Up in his place jumps Barnum-'I'm your man, Or else it 's-"What 's a' medium'? He's a means, Stutter and stammer,-he 's their Sludge and drudge, Comes from the hopper as bran-new Sludge, nought else, The Shakers' Hymn in G, with a natural F, Or the Stars and Stripes' set to consecutive fourths." Sir, where's the scrape you did not help me through, THE MEDIUM. Prove your madeira red-ink and gamboge,— Your Sludge, a cheat-then, somebody's a goose fear! They'll make a wry face, nor too much of that, And leave you in your glory. "No, sometimes They doubt and say as much!" doubt" Ay, doubt they do! "Of course they (You triumph) "that explains the hitch at once! Doubt posed our 'medium,' puddled his pure mind; He gave them back their rubbish pitch chaff in, Could flour come out o' the honest mill?" So, prompt Applaud the faithful: cases flock in point, 66 How, when a mocker willed a 'medium' once Should name a spirit James whose name was George, 'James' cried the 'medium,'-'twas the test of truth!" In short, a hit proves much, a miss proves more. Time for the double-shotted broadside, then The grand means, last resource. Look black and big! "You style us idiots, therefore-why stop short? In our own house, from our invited guest heard? Have you been Now, then, hear us; one man's not quite worth twelve. You see a cheat? Here's some twelve see an ass: Excuse me if I calculate: good day!" Out slinks the sceptic, all the laughs explode, Sludge waves his hat in triumph! Or he don't. There's something in real truth (explain who can !) One casts a wistful eye at, like the horse Who mopes beneath stuffed hay-racks and won't munch Because he spies a corn-bag: hang that truth, That, dandled soft by nurse, aunt, grandmother, Who keep him from the kennel, sun and wind, Good fun and wholesome mud,-enjoined be sweet, And comely and superior,-eyes askance The ragged sons of the gutter at their game, Fain would be down with them i̇' the thick of the filth, Making dirt-pies, laughing free, speaking plain, I've felt a spite, I say, at you, at them, Huggings and humbug-gnashed my teeth to mark But what 's "so," what 's fixed, Where may one stop? Nowhere! The cheating 's nursed Out of the lying, softly and surely spun To just your length, sir! But you 're for progress. I'd stop soon enough: "All old, nothing new? Only the usual talking through the mouth, Make doubt absurd, give figures we might see, Flowers we might touch. There's no one doubts you, Sludge ! You dream the dreams, you see the spiritual sights, |