A Chapter Of Froissart.

(Grandpapa Loquitur.)     You don't know Froissart now, young folks.     This age, I think, prefers recitals     Of high-spiced crime, with "slang" for jokes,     And startling titles;     But, in my time, when still some few     Loved "old Montaigne," and praised Pope's Homer     (Nay, thought to style him "poet" too,     Were scarce misnomer),     Sir John was less ignored. Indeed,     I can re-call how Some-one present     (Who spoils her grandson, Frank!) would read     And find him pleasant;     For,--by this copy,--hangs a Tale.     Long since, in an old house in Surrey,     Where men knew more of "morning ale"     Than "Lindley Murray,"     In a dim-lighted, whip-hung hall,     'Neath Hogarth's "Midnight Conversation,"     It stood; and oft 'twixt spring and fall,     With fond elation,     I turned the brown old leaves. For there     All through one hopeful happy summer,     At such a page (I well knew where),     Some secret comer,     Whom I can picture, 'Trix, like you     (Though scarcely such a colt unbroken),     Would sometimes place for private view     A certain token;--     A rose-leaf meaning "Garden Wall,"     An ivy-leaf for "Orchard corner,"     A thorn to say "Don't come at all,"--     Unwelcome warner!--     Not that, in truth, our friends gainsaid;     But then Romance required dissembling,     (Ann Radcliffe taught us that!) which bred     Some genuine trembling;     Though, as a rule, all used to end     In such kind confidential parley     As may to you kind Fortune send,     You long-legged Charlie,     When your time comes. How years slip on!     We had our crosses like our betters;     Fate sometimes looked askance upon     Those floral letters;     And once, for three long days disdained,     The dust upon the folio settled;     For some-one, in the right, was pained,     And some-one nettled,     That sure was in the wrong, but spake     Of fixed intent and purpose stony     To serve King George, enlist and make     Minced-meat of "Boney,"     Who yet survived--ten years at least.     And so, when she I mean came hither,     One day that need for letters ceased,     She brought this with her!     Here is the leaf-stained Chapter:--How     The English King laid Siege to Calais;     I think Gran. knows it even now,--     Go ask her, Alice.