SELECT POETRY. LIEUTENANT LUFF.

Daily Southern Cross, Volume XIV, Issue 1005, 13 February 1857, Page 4

SELECT POETRY. LIEUTENANT LUFF.

All you tTiat are fond of wine, Or any other stuff, Take warning by the dismal fate Of one Lieutenant Luff; A sober man he might have been, Except in one regard: He did not like soft wat°r, But took to drinking hard. Said he "Let others fancy slops, And talk in praise of tea ; But I am no Bohemian, So do not like Bohea ; If wind's poison, ao is tea, Though in another shape ; What matter whether one is killed By cannister or grape." According to this kind of taste Did he indulge his drouth, And being fond of Port, he made A port-hole of his mouth ; A single pinch he might have sipped, And not been out of sorts ; In "geologic' 1 phrase, the rock He split upon was quaitz I Full soon the sad effects of this His frame began to sh.3W, For that old enemy, the gout, Had taken him in toe ; And joined >vith this an evil came Of quite another sort ; For while he drunk himself, his purse Was getting "something short." For want of cash he soon had pawned One-half that he possessed ; And drinking showed him duplicates Beforehand of the leat ; So now his creditors resolved To seize on his assets ; For why, they found that his half-pay Did riot half pay his debts. But Luff contrived a novel mode His creditors to chouse ; For his own execution he Put into Irs own house, A pistol to the muzzle charged, He took devoid of fear : Said he, "This bairel is my last, So now for my last bier " Against his lungs he aimed the slugs, And not against his brain ; So he blew out his lights, and none Could blow them in again. A juiy for a venlict met, And gave it in these terms : "We tind as how as certain slugs Has sent him to the woims."

Thomas Ilood.