THE CANE-BOTTOM'D CHAIR.

In tattered old slippers that toast at the bars,

And a ragged old jacket perfumed with cigars,

Away from the world and its toils and its cares,

I've a snug little kingdom up four pair of stairs.

To mount to this realm is a toil, to be sure,

But the fire there is bright and the air rather pure;

And the view I behold on a sunshiny day

Is grand through the chimney-pots over the way.

This snug little chamber is cramm'd in all nooks

With worthless old knick-knacks and silly old books,

And foolish old odds and foolish old ends,

Crack'd bargains from brokers, cheap keepsakes from friends.

Old armor, prints, pictures, pipes, china, ( all crack'd,)

Old rickety tables, and chairs broken-backed;

A twopenny treasury, wondrous to see;

What matter?‘ tis pleasant to you, friend, and me.

No better divan need the Sultan require,

Than the creaking old sofa that basks by the fire;

And‘ tis wonderful, surely, what music you get

From the rickety, ramshackle, wheezy spinet.

That praying-rug came from a Turcoman's camp;

By Tiber once twinkled that brazen old lamp;

A mameluke fierce yonder dagger has drawn:

‘ Tis a murderous knife to toast muffins upon.

Long, long through the hours, and the night, and the chimes,

Here we talk of old books, and old friends, and old times;

As we sit in a fog made of rich Latakie

This chamber is pleasant to you, friend, and me.

But of all the cheap treasures that garnish my nest,

There's one that I love and I cherish the best:

For the finest of couches that's padded with hair

I never would change thee, my cane-bottom'd chair.

‘ Tis a bandy-legg'd, high-shoulder'd, worm-eaten seat,

With a creaking old back, and twisted old feet;

But since the fair morning when Fanny sat there,

I bless thee and love thee, old cane-bottom'd chair.

If chairs have but feeling, in holding such charms,

A thrill must have pass'd through your wither'd old arms!

I look'd, and I long'd, and I wish'd in despair;

I wish'd myself turn'd to a cane-bottom'd chair.

It was but a moment she sat in this place,

She'd a scarf on her neck, and a smile on her face!

A smile on her face, and a rose in her hair,

And she sat there, and bloom'd in my cane-bottom'd chair.

And so I have valued my chair ever since,

Like the shrine of a saint, or the throne of a prince;

Saint Fanny, my patroness sweet I declare,

The queen of my heart and my cane-bottom'd chair.

When the candles burn low, and the company's gone,

In the silence of night as I sit here alone —

I sit here alone, but we yet are a pair —

My Fanny I see in my cane-bottom'd chair.

She comes from the past and revisits my room;

She looks as she then did, all beauty and bloom;

So smiling and tender, so fresh and so fair,

And yonder she sits in my cane-bottom'd chair.