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Shall comfort your declining years!
But having had your boom in oil,
And made your millions out of it,
Would you propose to cease from toil?
Great Vanderfeller! Not a bit!
You've got to labour, day and night,
Until you die – and serve you right!
Then, when you stop this frenzied race,
And others in your office sit,
You'll leave the world a better place,
– The better for your leaving it!
For there's a chance perhaps your heir
May spend what you've collected there.
Myself, how lucky I must be,
That need not fear so gross an end;
Since Fortune has not favoured me
With many million pounds to spend.
(Still, did that fickle Dame relent,
I'd show you how they should be spent!)
I am not saint enough to feel
My shoulder ripen to a wing,
Nor have I wits enough to steal
His title from the Copper King;
And there's a vasty gulf between
The Man I Am and Might Have Been;
But tho' at dinner I may take
Too much of Heidsieck (extra dry),
And underneath the table make
My simple couch just where I lie,
My mode of roosting on the floor
Is just a trick and nothing more.
And when, not Wisely but too Well,
My thirst I have contrived to quench,
The stories I am apt to tell
May be, perhaps, a trifle French;
(For 'tis in anecdote, no doubt,
That what's Bred in the Beaune comes out.)
It does not render me unfit
To give advice, both wise and right,
Because I do not follow it
Myself as closely as I might;
There's nothing that I wouldn't do
To point the proper road to you.
And this I'm sure of, more or less,
And trust that you will all agree,
The Elements of Happiness
Consist in being – just like Me;
No sinner, nor a saint perhaps,
But – well, the very best of chaps.
Share the Experience I have had,
Consider all I've known and seen,
And Don't be Good, and Don't be Bad,
But cultivate a Golden Mean.
* * * * * * *
What makes Existence really nice
Is Virtue – with a dash of Vice.
"Enough is as Good as a Feast."
What is Enough? An idle dream!
One cannot have enough, I swear,
Of Ices or Meringues-and-Cream,
Nougat or Chocolate Eclairs,
Of Oysters or of Caviar,
Of Prawns or Paté de Foie Grar!
Who would not willingly forsake
Kindred and Home, without a fuss,
For Icing from a Birthday Cake,
Or juicy fat Asparagus,
And journey over countless seas
For New Potatoes and Green Peas?
They say that a Contented Mind
Is a Continual Feast; – but where
The mental frame, and how to find,
Which can with Turtle Soup compare?
No mind, however full of Ease,
Could be Continual Toasted Cheese.
For dinner have a sole to eat,
(Some Perrier Jouet, '92,)
An Entrée then (and, with the meat,
A bottle of Lafitte will do),
A quail, a glass of port (just one),
Liqueurs and coffee, and you've done.
But should you want a hearty meal,
And not this gourmet's lightsome snack,
Fill up with terrapin and teal,
Clam chowder, crabs and canvasback;
With all varieties of sauce,
And diff'rent wines for ev'ry course.
Your tastes may be of simpler type; —
A homely glass of "half-and-half,"
An onion and a dish of tripe,
Or headpiece of the kindly calf.
(Cruel perhaps, but then, you know,
"'Faut tout souffrir pour être veau!")
'Tis a mistake to eat too much
Of any dishes but the best;
And you, of course, should never touch
A thing you know you can't digest;
For instance, lobster; – if you do,
Well, – I'm amayonnaised at you!
Let this be your heraldic crest,
A bottle (chargé) of Champagne,
A chicken (gorged) with salad (dress'd),
Below, this motto to explain —
"Enough is Very Good, may be;
Too Much is Good Enough for Me!"