SCHOOL AND SCHOOLFELLOWS. "Floreat Etona.” By W, MACKWORTH PRAED. TWELVE years ago I made a mock I wondered what they meant by stock; I knew the streets of Rome and Troy, I supped with Fates and Furies,— Twelve years ago I was a boy A happy boy, at Drury's. Twelve years ago !—how many a thought Of faded pains and pleasures Those whispered syllables have brought From Memory's hoarded treasures! The fields, the farms, the bats, the books, The glories and disgraces, The voices of dear friends, the looks Of old familiar faces! Kind Mater smiles again to me, And shunning every warning; Now stopping Harry Vernon's ball That rattled like a rocket; Now hearing Wentworth's "Fourteen all!" And striking for the pocket; Now feasting on a cheese and flitch,— Where are my friends? I am alone ; And some compose a tragedy, Tom Mill was used to blacken eyes Charles Medlar loathed false quantities, Now Mill keeps order in the land, A magistrate pedantic; And Medlar's feet repose unscanned Beneath the wide Atlantic. Wild Nick, whose oaths made such a din, Does Dr. Martext's duty; And Mullion with that monstrous chin, Is married to a Beauty; And Darrell studies, week by week, And Ball, who was but poor at Greek, And I am eight-and-twenty now; The world's cold chains have bound me ; And darker shades are on my brow, And sadder scenes around me : In Parliament I fill my seat, With many other noodles; And lay my head in Jermyn Street, And sip my hock at Boodle's. But often, when the cares of life When Lady Jane is in a pet, When Captain Hazard wins a bet, For hours and hours I think and talk Of each remembered hobby; I long to lounge in Poets' Walk, To shiver in the lobby; |