| Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). A Victorian Anthology, 1837–1895. 1895. |
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| A Portrait |
| | | Joseph Ashby-Sterry (b. 1838) |
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| IN sunny girlhood’s vernal life | |
| She caused no small sensation, | |
| But now the modest English wife | |
| To others leaves flirtation. | |
| She ’s young still, lovely, debonair, | 5 |
| Although sometimes her features | |
| Are clouded by a thought of care | |
| For those two tiny creatures. | |
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| Each tiny, toddling, mottled mite | |
| Asserts with voice emphatic, | 10 |
| In lisping accents, “Mite is right,”— | |
| Their rule is autocratic: | |
| The song becomes, that charm’d mankind, | |
| Their musical narcotic, | |
| And baby lips than Love, she’ll find, | 15 |
| Are even more despotic. | |
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| Soft lullaby when singing there, | |
| And castles ever building, | |
| Their destiny she’ll carve in air, | |
| Bright with maternal gilding: | 20 |
| Young Guy, a clever advocate, | |
| So eloquent and able! | |
| A powder’d wig upon his pate, | |
| A coronet for Mabel! | |
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