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TO "DUNK"

(An ancient elephant in the National Zoo, Washington, D. C.)

Bewrinkled ancient ! O'er thy warty crump
A hundred years pass lightly as a feather,

And, I opine, the angel Gabriel's trump,

Will find thee still alive and tough as leather ;

Thou and the shattered orb will take the count together.
What ancient wisdom hums in thy inside.
Of plashy Indus or Limpopo greasy ?
(Your poet has to go a trifle wide

In fixing local colour ; but it's easy,
To roll a frenzied eye from Ganges to Zambesi.)

And thou wast once a little chubby child.
Browsing on toothsome cane and ripe banana.
And hurling the detritus at the wild
Orang Utang or other Quadrumana ;

No dream of captive chains marred thy sublime manana.
And then came man, some BosTOCK lost to shame.
And thou about thy feet the hateful noose felt.
Or maybe it was Barnum dished thy game.
Or that intrepid Nimrod, Colonel Roosevelt,

Gave thee a private taste of how our own Bull Moose felt.
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They bound thee tightly with a captive's chain,
And drew thee bawling from thy native gorges,

And carried thee around upon a train,
A spectacle for rustic Bills and Georges,

The piece de resistance of Podunk's simple orgies.
And then some statesman took thee in his care,
Dubbed thee " deserving Democrat," or maybe

Thou, entertaining greatness unaware.
Toted some grateful Senator his baby,

Or, in some film by Vitagraph or Kay Bee,

Showed as the G. O. P.^ and made a hit ;

At any rate they put thee on a pension.
Plied thee with bales of hay and bade thee sit

Taking thine ease, like others I could mention
Who never voted wrong or bolted a convention.
