I Macaulay, who made it
Pour, varlet,
pour the water,
The water steaming hot!
A spoonful for
each man of us,
Another for the pot!
We shall not
drink from amber,
No Capuan slave shall mix
For us the snows
of Athos
With port at thirty-six;
Whiter than snow
the crystals
Grown sweet ‘neath tropic fires
More rich the
herb of China’s field,
For
pasture-lands more fragrance yield;
For ever let
Britannia wield
The teapot of her sires!
II Tennyson, who took it hot
I think that I
am drawing to an end:
For on a sudden
came a gasp for breath,
And stretching
of the hands, and blinded eyes,
And a great
darkness falling on my soul.
O Hallelujah! …
Kindly pass the milk.
III Swinburne, who let it get cold
As the sin that
was sweet in the sinning
Is foul in the ending thereof,
As the heat of
the summer’s beginning
Is past in the winter of love:
O purity,
painful and pleading!
O coldness, ineffably grey!
O hear us, our
handmaid unheeding,
And take it away!
IV Cowper, who thoroughly enjoyed it
The cosy fire is
bright and gay,
The merry kettle
boils away
And
hums a cheerful song.
I sing the
saucer and the cup;
Pray, Mary, fill
the teapot up,
And
do not make it strong.
V Browning, who treated it allegorically
Tst! Bah! We
take as another case—
Pass the pills on the window-sill; notice
the capsule
(A sick man’s
fancy, no doubt, but I place
Reliance on trade-marks, Sir)—so perhaps
you’ll
Excuse the
digression—this cup which I hold
Light-poised—Bah, its spilt in the
bed!—well, let’s on go—
Held Bohea and
sugar, Sir; if you were told
The sugar was salt, would the Bohea be
Congo?
VI Wordsworth, who gave it away
“Come, little
cottage girl, you seem
To want my cup of tea;
And will you
take a little cream?
Now tell the truth to me.”
She had a
rustic, woodland grin,
Her cheek was soft as silk,
And she replied,
“Sir, please put in
A little drop of milk.”
“Why, what put
milk into your head?
‘Tis cream my cows supply;”
And five times
to the child I said,
“Why, pig-head, tell me, why?”
“You call me
pig-head,” she replied;
“My proper name is Ruth.
“I call that
milk”—she blushed with pride—
“You bade me speak the truth.”
VII Poe, who got excited over it
Here’s a mellow
cup of tea—golden tea!
What a world of
rapturous thought its fragrance brings to me!
Oh, from out the silver cells
How it wells!
How it smells!
Keeping tune,
tune, tune, tune
To the
tintinnabulation of the spoon.
And the kettle
on the fire
Boils its spout
off with desire,
With a desperate
desire
And a
crystalline endeavour
Now, now to sit,
or never,
On the top of
the pale-faced moon,
But he always
came home to tea, tea, tea, tea, tea,
Tea
to the n—th.
VIII Rossetti, who took six cups of it
The lilies lie in my lady’s bower
(O weary mother, drive the cows to
roost),
They faintly
droop for a little hour;
My lady’s head
droops like a flower.
She took the
porcelain in her hand
(O weary mother, drive the cows to
roost);
She poured; I
drank at her command;
Drank deep, and
now—you understand!
(O weary mother, drive the cows to
roost).
IX Burns, who liked it adulterated
Weel, gin ye
speir, I’m no inclined,
Whusky or tay—to
state my mind
For ane or ither;
For, gin I tak
the first, I’m fou,
And gin the
next, I’m dull as you,
Mix a’ thegither.
X Walt Whitman, who didn’t stay more than a
minute
One cup for my
self-hood,
Many for you. Allons,
camerados, we will drink together
O hand-in-hand!
That tea-spoon, please, when you’ve done with it.
What butter-colour’d
hair you’ve got. I don’t want to be personal.
All right, then,
you needn’t—you’re a stale—cadaver.
Eighteen-pence
if the bottles are returned,
Allons, from all bat-eyed formules.
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