| |
| BEST of artists! mark for me, | |
| On my trusty alpenstock, | |
| All the proper things, d’ ye see, | |
| Every mountain, every rock: | |
| |
| That when I go home therewith, | 5 |
| Friends may know that I have been | |
| Quite as high as Albert Smith, | |
| Or balloon of Mr. Green. | |
| |
| Mark it with the Righi first; | |
| Some say that ’s an easy hill, | 10 |
| Yet I own the place accurst | |
| Found me at the bottom still. | |
| |
| Then the Brunig, mark it strong, | |
| Truth itself can’t take offence, | |
| All that height I came along, | 15 |
| Rattling in the diligence. | |
| |
| Mark it with the Yungfrau next, | |
| Very few have ventured on her; | |
| That I did not I am vext, | |
| For I meant it, on my honor! | 20 |
| |
| From Martigny by Tête Noir, | |
| Or the Col de Balme they pace; | |
| I said only “au revoir,” | |
| When I saw the kind of place: | |
| |
| But I saw it; therefore paint it, | 25 |
| Paint in letters bold and broad; | |
| ’T is a pleasant proverb, ain’t it, | |
| That a wink ’s as good ’s a nod. | |
| |
| Artist, deeply now indent | |
| Scheideck where I played the fool, | 30 |
| Sore and saddle-sick I went | |
| Up and down upon a mule. | |
| |
| Mark the Ghemmi; all confess, | |
| He who has ascended it | |
| Need not talk of breathlessness, | 35 |
| Is for any mountain fit: | |
| |
| I went there and hired my guide, | |
| With a fear I don’t conceal, | |
| But the scheme went all aside, | |
| For a nail ran up my heel. | 40 |
| |
| Mark it lastly with Mont Blanc, | |
| Though it made me gasp and quake, | |
| With a kind of mortal pang, | |
| Just to view it from the lake. | |
| |
| Thanks, my artist! now I go | 45 |
| Back to London with delight, | |
| For my alpenstock will show | |
| What becomes a man of might. | |
| |
| When I take it to my club, | |
| Jones himself will cease to sneer; | 50 |
| Brown will own, the spiteful cub, | |
| That my legs are no small beer. | |
| |
