But what was I saying of a world free from care,
Of eating and drinking and dresses to wear?
Where women by husbands are never tormented,
And never asked money where husbands dissented?
And never see others, their rivals, in fashion ahead,
And never have doctors--a woman's great dread--
And nothing, I hope, like my own indigestion,
To torment and starve them, as this one does me,
And keep them from sipping--forgive the suggestion--
The nectar etherial they drink for their tea.
Mrs. Merdle Suggesteth that Dinner being finished, the Gentlement
will Smoke. In the meantime, she Discourseth.
"Now Merdle--now Colonel--I know you are waiting.
And thinking my talking to eating's a bar,
Still hoping, by tasting, my appetite sating,
Will give you the license to smoke a cigar.
[Illustration: "WILL GIVE YOU THE LICENSE TO SMOKE A CIGAR"]
Well then, I've done now, and hope too you've dined,
As well as down town where you dine for a shilling,
At Taylor's, or Thompson's, or one of the kind,
Where mortals are flocking each day for their filling;
Or else at the Astor where bachelors quarter,
Where port holes for windows give light to the room,
Far out of the region of Eve's every daughter,
So high they are stuck up away toward the moon.
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