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To My Absent Husband

Punch, XLIX - 14th October 1865



ell me, EDWARD, dost remember
  How at breakfast often we,
Put our bacon in the tea-pot
  While we took and fried our tea?

How we went to evening parties
  On gigantic brewer's drays?
How you wore your coats as trousers,
  In those happy, happy days?

How we used to pocket ices
  When a modest lunch we bought?
Quaff the foaming Abernethy,
  Masticate the crusty port?

How we fished in deep sea water
  For the barbel, tench, and carp?
Wore our rings upon our pencils
  While we cut our fingers sharp?

How we cleaned our boots with sherry
  While we drank the blacking dry?
How we quite forgot to pay for
  Articles we used to buy?

How, a ruffian prosecuting,
  Who'd been swindled, so he said,
We appeared at the Old Bailey,
  And were done ourselves instead?

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