| WITHOUT the slightest basis | |
| For hypochondriasis | |
| A widow had forebodings | |
| which a cloud around her flung, | |
| And with expression cynical | 5 |
| For half the day a clinical | |
| Thermometer she held | |
| beneath her tongue. | |
| |
| Whene'er she read the papers | |
| She suffered from the vapors, | 10 |
| At every tale of malady | |
| or accident she'd groan; | |
| In every new and smart disease, | |
| From housemaid's knee to heart disease, | |
| She recognized the symptoms | 15 |
| as her own! | |
| |
| She had a yearning chronic | |
| To try each novel tonic, | |
| Elixir, panacea, lotion, | |
| opiate, and balm; | 20 |
| And from a homeopathist | |
| Would change to an hydropathist, | |
| And back again, | |
| with stupefying calm! | |
| |
| She was nervous, cataleptic, | 25 |
| And anemic, and dyspeptic: | |
| Though not convinced of apoplexy, | |
| yet she had her fears. | |
| She dwelt with force fanatical | |
| Upon a twinge rheumatical, | 30 |
| And said she had a | |
| buzzing in her ears! | |
| |
| Now all of this bemoaning | |
| And this grumbling and this groaning | |
| The mind of Jack, her son and heir, | 35 |
| unconscionably bored. | |
| His heart completely hardening, | |
| He gave his time to gardening, | |
| For raising beans was | |
| something he adored. | 40 |
| |
| Each hour in accents morbid | |
| This limp maternal bore bid | |
| Her callous son affectionate | |
| and lachrymose good-bys. | |
| She never granted Jack a day | 45 |
| Without some long "Alackaday!" | |
| Accompanied by | |
| rolling of the eyes. | |
| |
| But Jack, no panic showing, | |
| Just watched his beanstalk growing, | 50 |
| And twined with tender fingers | |
| the tendrils up the pole. | |
| At all her words funereal | |
| He smiled a smile ethereal, | |
| Or sighed an absent-minded | 55 |
| "Bless my soul!" | |
| |
| That hollow-hearted creature | |
| Would never change a feature: | |
| No tear bedimmed his eye, however | |
| touching was her talk. | 60 |
| She never fussed or flurried him, | |
| The only thing that worried him | |
| Was when no bean-pods | |
| grew upon the stalk! | |
| |
| But then he wabbled loosely | 65 |
| His head, and wept profusely, | |
| And, taking out his handkerchief | |
| to mop away his tears, | |
| |
| Exclaimed: "It hasn't got any!" | |
| He found this blow to botany | 70 |
| Was sadder than were all | |
| his mother's fears. | |
| |
| The Moral is that gardeners pine | |
| Whene'er no pods adorn the vine. | |
| Of all sad words experience gleans | 75 |
| The saddest are: "It might have beans." | |
| (I did not make this up myself: | |
| 'Twas in a book upon my shelf. | |
| It's witty, but I don't deny | |
| It's rather Whittier than I!) | 80 |
