[Sidenote: _First Day of Term._
[Illustration]
The
field-sports'
rule reversed
by legal
wags,
[Illustration]
_He clips._
Bags do not
bear
the fox,
but foxes,
bags.
[Illustration]
_Orange Lodge._]
Smoke rules the roast! November, foggy, drear;
Oh! when from darkness will its days desist?
Month of suspicion, that leaves all to clear,
For though nought's _stolen_, everything is _mist_!
It is a bully month, whose _vapouring_ flies
Wherever man is found, or woman walks;
An equal favourer of dis-_guise_ and _Guys_,
Assassin patron _both_ of knives and _Faukes_!
Densely impervious is its dark-winged air,
Driver of soot from roofs and chimney stacks,
London its fort—it is accounted there
_The Great Emancipator of the blacks!_
Smoke is its sister, and assister too;
Protean creature, taking every form,—
Now gently rising from an Irish stew,
Now rushing from a steamer in a storm!
Smoke; lo! it curleth from the Meersham fine,
Say it dissolves—so is _mere sham_ to boot—
Clearly _as_-cended from the female line,
At all events, it comes from a _she root_!
Now it runs up a pipe, with odorous charms,
Bringing effluvia from the flue: who dips
In heraldry, will see its coat of arms
Should bear the _barber's_ motto of "_Eclipse_."
Smoke will have sway; a very dingy yoke
It keeps us under, and 'tis time we broke it;
Alas! we can't, and e'en our very joke,
Reader, we find is nothing till you smoke it.
Smoke and November, then, go hand in hand,
Till time dismiss them thro' his "chaos" gates;
Time is a man of taste, he clears the land,
And just like smoke itself—_he vapour hates_!