So our Grammarian, full of diseases,
paralysed from the waist down, the death rattle in his throat--what
does he say to the faithful watchers? What are his last words?
_He dictates Greek Grammar_.
The solitary student may be a paragon of courage, headstrong,
reckless, tenacious as a bulldog, with a resolution entirely beyond
the range of the children of this world.
* * * * *
SIBRANDUS SCHAFNABURGENSIS
1844
Plague take all your pedants, say I!
He who wrote what I hold in my hand,
Centuries back was so good as to die,
Leaving this rubbish to cumber the land;
This, that was a book in its time,
Printed on paper and bound in leather,
Last month in the white of a matin-prime,
Just when the birds sang all together.
Into the garden I brought it to read,
And under the arbute and laurustine
Read it, so help me grace in my need,
From title-page to closing line.
Chapter on chapter did I count,
As a curious traveller counts Stonehenge;
Added up the mortal amount;
And then proceeded to my revenge.
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