A Leap Year Episode.

Such oranges! so fresh and sweet,         So large and lovely - and so cheap!         They lay in one delicious heap,         And added to the sumptuous feast     For each and all in taste expert     The acme of all fine dessert;         So, singling out the very least     As in itself an ample treat,         While sparkling repartee and jest         Exhilarated host and guest,         Of rarity so delicate         In dreamy reverie I ate,     By magic pinions as it were         Transported from this realm of snows     To be a happy sojourner         Away down where the orange grows;     Amid the bloom, the verdure, and     The beauty of that tropic land,         While redolence seemed wafted in         From orchard-groves of Mandarin.     In dinner costume a la mode,         Expressing from the spongy skin         The nectar that ran down her chin         In little rills of lusciousness,     Sat Maud, the beautiful coquette;     Her dainty mouth, like "two lips" wet         With morning dew, her crimson dress,     A sad discoloration showed         Where orange-juice - it was a sin! -         A polka-dot had painted in;         Which moved the roguish girl to say         Half-ruefully (half-dcollet) -     "I'm glad it's Leap Year now, for I - "         Her voice was like a moistened lute     "Shall wear the flowers, by and by -         I do not like this leaky fruit!"     And looking straight and saucily     At cousin Ned, her vis-a-vis;         While Will, who never dared propose,         Was blushing like a red, red rose.     The company was large, and she         Touched elbows with the exquisite,         Gay Archibald, who took her wit         And pertness all as meant for him;     Who, thereby lifted some degrees     Above less-favored devotees,         With rainbow sails began to trim     His craft of sweet felicity;         So mirth in reckless afterlude         Convulsed the merry multitude,         Who laughed at Archie's self-esteem,         And pitied Will's long-cherished dream;     While all declared, for her and Ned -         His face was like a silver tray -     The wedding-banquet should be spread         Before a twelvemonth passed away.     But, ah, the sequel - blind were we     To woman and her strategy!         For he so long afraid to speak         Bore off the bride within a week.