TO A BRIAR-ROOT PIPE.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XIV, Issue XIII, 30 March 1895, Page 305

TO A BRIAR-ROOT PIPE.

Swkht companion of my whisky, Old and fragrant, burnt and ripe. Once I learnt thy charms were risky, So I bought a patent pipe. Bought a pipe whose dark interior. Labyrinthine, weirdly planned, Though, no doubt, to thine superior, I could never understand. Bought a pipe, peculiar, mystic, Witn a long and Curly snout ; And it made me pugilistic When I tried to clean it out. Long in simple faith I smoked it. When the cares of day were done. Never spluttered it, nor choked it, And I said, ‘ This is Al.' Briar-root old, though I forsook thee. Well art thou avenged 1 ween ! Nemesis at last o’ertook me In a lake of nicotine. And—O ! shade of Stuart Headlam !-— Wildly, madly, on my head Danced I hen a dance of Bedlam, And I wished that I was dead. So in sickness and dejection I this late-learned truth digest ; Though they may not be perfection, Oldest, simplest ways are best.