Explore "The Tragic Mice" by Oliver Herford on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
It was a tragic little mouse / All bent on suicide / Because another little mouse / Refused to be his bride.
"Alas! " he squeaked, "I shall not wed!
My heart and paw she spurns; / I'll hie me to the cat instead, / From whence no mouse returns!"
The playful cat met him half way, / Said she, "I feel for you, / You're dying for a mouse, you say, / I'm dying for one, too!"
Now when Miss Mouse beheld his doom, / Struck with remorse, she cried, / "In death we'll meet! -- O cat! make room / For one more mouse inside."
The playful cat was charmed; said she, / "I shall be, in a sense, / Your pussy catafalque! " Ah me!
It was her last offence!
Reader, take warning from this tale, / And shun the punster's trick: / _Those mice, for fear lest cats might fail, / Had eaten arsenic_!