Explore "The Doings of Delsarte" by Eugene Field on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
IN former times my numerous rhymes excited general mirth, / And I was then of all good men the merriest man on earth; / And my career / From year to year / Was full of cheer / And things, / Despite a few regrets, perdieu! which grim dyspepsia brings; / But now how strange and harsh a change has come upon the scene! / Horrors appall the life where all was formerly so serene: / Yes, wasting care hath cast its snare about my honest heart, / Because, alas! it hath come to pass my daughter's learned Delsarte.
In flesh and joint and every point the counterpart of me, / She grew so fast she grew at last a marvellous thing to see, -- / Long, gaunt, and slim, each gangling limb played stumbling-block to t'other, / The which excess of awkwardness quite mortified her mother.