StoryTitle("caps", "A Modest Wit") ?>
learned "A Modest Wit" as a reading-lesson when I was a child.
It has clung to me and so I cling to it. It is just as good as it ever
was. It is a sharp thrust at power that depends on externalities.
Selleck Osborne. (——.)
PoemStart() ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "A supercilious nabob of the East—", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Haughty, being great—purse-proud, being rich—", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "A governor, or general, at the least,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "I have forgotten which—", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Had in his family a humble youth,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Who went from England in his patron's suit,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "An unassuming boy, in truth", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "A lad of decent parts, and good repute.", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "This youth had sense and spirit;", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "But yet with all his sense,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Excessive diffidence", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Obscured his merit.", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "One day, at table, flushed with pride and wine,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "His honour, proudly free, severely merry,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Conceived it would be vastly fine", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "To crack a joke upon his secretary.", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"Young man,\" he said, \"by what art, craft, or trade,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Did your good father gain a livelihood?\"—", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"He was a saddler, sir,\" Modestus said,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "\"And in his time was reckon'd good.\"", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"A saddler, eh! and taught you Greek,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Instead of teaching you to sew!", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Pray, why did not your father make", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "A saddler, sir, of you?\"", "") ?>
PagePoem(166, "L0", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Each parasite, then, as in duty bound,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "The joke applauded, and the laugh went round.", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "At length Modestus, bowing low,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Said (craving pardon, if too free he made),", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "\"Sir, by your leave, I fain would know", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "Your father's trade!\"", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"My father's trade! by heaven, that's too bad!", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "My father's trade? Why, blockhead, are you mad?", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "My father, sir, did never stoop so low—", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "He was a gentleman, I'd have you know.\"", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"Excuse the liberty I take,\"", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "Modestus said, with archness on his brow,", "") ?>
PoemLine("L0", "", "\"Pray, why did not your father make", "") ?>
PoemLine("L2", "", "A gentleman of you?\"", "") ?>
PoemAttribution("100", SmallCapsText("Selleck Osborne.")) ?>
PoemEnd() ?>