THE UNHAPPY LOT OF MR. KNOTT. ART I. SHOWING HOW HE BUILT HIS HOUSE AND HIS WIFE MOVED INTO IT. My worthy friend, A. Gordon Knott, Was much contented with a lot He had laid business on the shelf He called an architect in counsel; 66 "I want," said he, a-you know what, A thing complete from chimney-pot Here's a half-acre of good land; Just have it nicely mapped and planned D' (Perhaps the pump and trough would do, If painted a judicious blue?) The woodland I've attended to;" (He meant three pines stuck up askew, Two dead ones and a live one.) A pocket-full of rocks 'twould take To build a house of free-stone, But then it is not hard to make What now a-days is the stone; The cunning painter in a trice Your house's outside petrifies, And people think it very gneiss Without inquiring deeper; My money never shall be thrown Away on such a deal of stone, When stone of deal is cheaper.* And so the greenest of antiques Whatever any body had Out of the common, good or bad, Knott had it all worked well in, A donjon-keep, where clothes might dry, Too small to hang a bell in; All up and down and here and there, With Lord-knows-whats of round and square Stuck on at random every where, It was a house to make one stare, Like dogs let loose "pon a bear, Ten emulous styles staboyed with care, Were set upon the stables. Knott was delighted with a pile Yet better for this luckless man For, though to quit affairs his plan, The house, though painted stone to mock, When tempests (with petrific shock, So the wood shrank around the knots, That was not a rheumatic; And, what with points and squares and rounds The house at nights was full of pounds, وو Cried Knott, "this goes beyond all bounds, I do not deal in tougues and sounds, Nor have I let my house and grounds But, though Knott's house was full of airs, Z He had but one-a daughter ; And, as he owned much stocks and shares, Many who wished to render theirs Such vain, unsatisfying cares, And needed wives to sew their tears, In matrimony sought her; They vowed her gold they wanted not, Now Knott had quite made up his mind No beauty he, but oft we find Sweet kernels 'neath a roughish rind, So hoped his Jenny'd be resigned And make no more palaver; Glanced at the fact that love was blind, Then nosologically defined The rate at which the system pined Of dish-their own proboscis. But she, with many tears and moans, Said 'twas too much for flesh and bones To marry mortgages and loans, That fathers' hearts were stocks and stones And that she'd go, when Mrs. Jones, To Davy Jones's locker; Then gave her head a little toss That said as plain as ever was, |