"And Croesus lifted up his voice and cried, 'Solon!
Solon!' And King Cyrus ordered that the fire be extinguished
and the captive released."--_Herodotus._
There's a basis for a thesis in the history of Croesus--
Mr. Croesus, Greece's captain of finance;
It contains an exegesis on the clippings of the fleeces
Of the lambs, when Wall Street's breezes are not tempered, and the
geese's
Ravished feathers pay the piper for the dance.
"In the days of old Rameses, this here story had paresis"--
So says Kipling, and what he says goes with me,
But old or new, it pleases me at times to save the pieces
Of the stories of the glories and the grandeurs that were Greece's,
When they prophesy a modern case, you see.
The capture of old Croesus was a stunt of the police's
That for up-to-dateness seizes me with joy.
He was roasted like a cheese is, out there on the Chersonesus,
Till he hollered for his lawyer--"Solon!"
Ay, that's where the squeeze is--
"Technicality"--trial ceases--"vindication"--this release is
What the grafters count on nowadays, my boy!
_Cleveland Leader._
The Devil and Tom Walker.