THE inner life of a poet is an enigma to the ordinary mortal. He is regarded as a curious being who rarely descends to the commonplace things of earth, and when he does so, his visits are supposed to be of short duration. My own experiences on this subject may help to change this opinion in a slight degree.

My poems are usually written in a strain just the contrary of my feelings. For instance, just after a delightful dinner (and it takes a poet to appreciate the dainties that a good cook can prepare), when I felt perfectly at peace with man and beast, I wrote the following somewhat dolorous effusion: -

Ah! where are they, those days I long have cherished?

Why must I sit and weep my hapless lot?

The friends I loved too soon, alas! have perished,

And I am left deserted and forgot.

Amid my grief I feel the pangs of hunger,

And mourn the smiles that once shone round my board;

I gnaw my crust, and think, when I was younger,

Of all the gems bestowed from friendship's hoard.

Now, if I live, or if I die, what matter?

Fast swooping down I feel the bird of doom;

And I shall leave this world of wrong and clatter,

To rest unmourned for in the dismal tomb.

This was first published in the poetical columns of a country newspaper, and I shall not soon forget how I laughed in my sleeve, when my aunt, a dear sympathetic creature, read it to me, with tears in her eyes. "The author of that," said she, "must have been in deep affliction." I did not destroy the illusion for her by disclosing my hand in the affair.

Of course the first thing for a poet to do is to have a lady love. Now I never cared enough about the fair sex to get beyond a limited acquaintance with two or three of them, so I created a mistress in my fancy, and called her Belinda. Up to the present time I have written seventy-six poems to this fair one, in which I have traced all the incidents of an imaginary courtship. The first describes our meeting; we did not know each other, and I was struck with Cupid's dart at the outset. It begins thus: -

She was sitting at the winder,

My fair and frail Belinda,

And the golden sunbeams pinned her

Gaze up to the sky;

When, inflamed with ardent passion,

Like a bird of humble fashion,

I just wandered by.

And so on for forty stanzas. After a while I got an introduction; I did not dare to disclose my love, but feasted my eyes on the charms of her arms and the grace of her face. At length, after many trials and tribulations expressed in many mournful strains, my love is crowned with success, and I am about to lead her to the altar and live happily ever afterwards, when she discloses to me that in taking her I must also take her mother, two maiden aunts, a grandmother (paternal), and a little sister under my protection. This is too much, and I send Belinda the following farewell: -

Belinda dear, I sadly fear

Our love we now must sever;

For ne'er a chance shall tie two aunts

To my whole life, - no, never!

Your grandmamma - the chances are -

Will die in course of ages,

But I can't stand a ma-in-law,

And all her daily rages.

Your little sister I have liked,

And might indeed support her;

But I have said I 'll never wed

A mother with her daughter.

There ended my love affair, but not my poems, Like Wordsworth (pardon the apparently egotistical comparison), I write on every subject, no matter how commonplace it may be. Thus, one of my most popular sonnets is addressed to "My Dog, on Losing his Collar," while a lyrical poem, "To a Hole in my Shoe," has been ranked very high by competent critics, and was even mistaken by some for a posthumous production of the great "Lake" bard.

I manage to make my profession pay by writing rhymed advertisements for newspapers, and epitaphs, of which style of composition I will give specimens before closing: -

Paper collars, nice and neat,

At 47 Harvard Street;

Also ties of every kind

To suit the youthful student mind.

And we throw in coral studs

For our patronizing bloods.

The epitaph, written at the request of a grief-stricken family, was made, by command, short and realistic: -

Here lies John, our brother,

To the bottle addicted:

We ne'er shall get another, -

We, his afflicted

Father, sister, and mother.