Pasha Bailey Ben

A proud Pasha was BAILEY BEN,     His wives were three, his tails were ten;     His form was dignified, but stout,     Men called him "Little Roundabout."     His Importance     Pale Pilgrims came from o'er the sea     To wait on PASHA BAILEY B.,     All bearing presents in a crowd,     For B. was poor as well as proud.     His Presents     They brought him onions strung on ropes,     And cold boiled beef, and telescopes,     And balls of string, and shrimps, and guns,     And chops, and tacks, and hats, and buns.     More of them     They brought him white kid gloves, and pails,     And candlesticks, and potted quails,     And capstan-bars, and scales and weights,     And ornaments for empty grates.     Why I mention these     My tale is not of these oh no!     I only mention them to show     The divers gifts that divers men     Brought o'er the sea to BAILEY BEN.     His Confidant     A confidant had BAILEY B.,     A gay Mongolian dog was he;     I am not good at Turkish names,     And so I call him SIMPLE JAMES.     His Confidant's Countenance     A dreadful legend you might trace     In SIMPLE JAMES'S honest face,     For there you read, in Nature's print,     "A Scoundrel of the Deepest Tint."     His Character     A deed of blood, or fire, or flames,     Was meat and drink to SIMPLE JAMES:     To hide his guilt he did not plan,     But owned himself a bad young man.     The Author to his Reader     And why on earth good BAILEY BEN     (The wisest, noblest, best of men)     Made SIMPLE JAMES his right-hand man     Is quite beyond my mental span.     The same, continued     But there enough of gruesome deeds!     My heart, in thinking of them, bleeds;     And so let SIMPLE JAMES take wing,     'Tis not of him I'm going to sing.     The Pasha's Clerk     Good PASHA BAILEY kept a clerk     (For BAILEY only made his mark),     His name was MATTHEW WYCOMBE COO,     A man of nearly forty-two.     His Accomplishments     No person that I ever knew     Could "yodel" half as well as COO,     And Highlanders exclaimed, "Eh, weel!"     When COO began to dance a reel.     His Kindness to the Pasha's Wives     He used to dance and sing and play     In such an unaffected way,     He cheered the unexciting lives     Of PASHA BAILEY'S lovely wives.     The Author to his Reader     But why should I encumber you     With histories of MATTHEW COO?     Let MATTHEW COO at once take wing,     'Tis not of COO I'm going to sing.     The Author's Muse     Let me recall my wandering Muse;     She SHALL be steady if I choose     She roves, instead of helping me     To tell the deeds of BAILEY B.     The Pasha's Visitor     One morning knocked, at half-past eight,     A tall Red Indian at his gate.     In Turkey, as you're p'raps aware,     Red Indians are extremely rare.     The Visitor's Outfit     Mocassins decked his graceful legs,     His eyes were black, and round as eggs,     And on his neck, instead of beads,     Hung several Catawampous seeds.     What the Visitor said     "Ho, ho!" he said, "thou pale-faced one,     Poor offspring of an Eastern sun,     You've NEVER seen the Red Man skip     Upon the banks of Mississip!"     The Author's Moderation     To say that BAILEY oped his eyes     Would feebly paint his great surprise     To say it almost made him die     Would be to paint it much too high.     The Author to his Reader     But why should I ransack my head     To tell you all that Indian said;     We'll let the Indian man take wing,     'Tis not of him I'm going to sing.     The Reader to the Author     Come, come, I say, that's quite enough     Of this absurd disjointed stuff;     Now let's get on to that affair     About LIEUTENANT-COLONEL FLARE.