The Elephant and the Ape of Jupiter

'Twixt elephant and beast of horned nose / About precedence a dispute arose, / Which they determined to decide by blows. / The day was fix'd, when came a messenger / To say the ape of Jupiter / Was swiftly earthward seen to bear / His bright caduceus through the air. / This monkey, named in history Gill, / The elephant at once believed / A high commission had received / To witness, by his sovereign's will, / The aforesaid battle fought. / Uplifted by the glorious thought, / The beast was prompt on Monsieur Gill to wait, / But found him slow, in usual forms of state, / His high credentials to present. / The ape, however, ere he went, / Bestow'd a passing salutation. / His excellency would have heard / The subject matter of legation: / But not a word! / His fight, so far from stirring heaven, -- / The news was not received there, even! / What difference sees the impartial sky / Between an elephant and fly? / Our monarch, doting on his object, / Was forced himself to break the subject. / 'My cousin Jupiter,' said he, / 'Will shortly, from his throne supreme, / A most important combat see, / For all his court a thrilling theme. ' / 'What combat? ' said the ape, with serious face. / 'Is't possible you should not know the case? -- ' / The elephant exclaim'd -- 'not know, dear sir, / That Lord Rhinoceros disputes / With me precedence of the brutes? / That Elephantis is at war / With savage hosts of Rhinocer? / You know these realms, not void of fame? ' / 'I joy to learn them now by name,' / Return'd Sir Gill, 'for, first or last, / No lisp of them has ever pass'd / Throughout our dome so blue and vast. ' / Abash'd, the elephant replied, / 'What came you, then, to do? -- ' / 'Between two emmets to divide / A spire of grass in two. / We take of all a care; / And, as to your affair, / Before the gods, who view with equal eyes / The small and great, it hath not chanced to rise. '