IN a dirty old house lived a Dirty Old Man; | |
| Soap, towels, or brushes were not in his plan. | |
| For forty long years, as the neighbors declared, | |
| His house never once had been cleaned or repaired. | |
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| ’T was a scandal and shame to the business-like street, | 5 |
| One terrible blot in a ledger so neat: | |
| The shop full of hardware, but black as a hearse, | |
| And the rest of the mansion a thousand times worse. | |
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| Outside, the old plaster, all spatter and stain, | |
| Looked spotty in sunshine and streaky in rain; | 10 |
| The window-sills sprouted with mildewy grass, | |
| And the panes from being broken were known to be glass. | |
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| On the rickety sign-board no learning could spell | |
| The merchant who sold, or the goods he ’d to sell; | |
| But for house and for man a new title took growth, | 15 |
| Like a fungus,—the Dirt gave its name to them both. | |
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| Within, there were carpets and cushions of dust, | |
| The wood was half rot, and the metal half rust, | |
| Old curtains, half cobwebs, hung grimly aloof; | |
| ’T was a Spiders’ Elysium from cellar to roof. | 20 |
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| There, king of the spiders, the Dirty Old Man | |
| Lives busy and dirty as ever he can; | |
| With dirt on his fingers and dirt on his face, | |
| For the Dirty Old Man thinks the dirt no disgrace. | |
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| From his wig to his shoes, from his coat to his shirt, | 25 |
| His clothes are a proverb, a marvel of dirt; | |
| The dirt is pervading, unfading, exceeding,— | |
| Yet the Dirty Old Man has both learning and breeding. | |
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| Fine dames from their carriages, noble and fair, | |
| Have entered his shop, less to buy than to stare; | 30 |
| And have afterwards said, though the dirt was so frightful, | |
| The Dirty Man’s manners were truly delightful. | |
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| Upstairs might they venture, in dirt and in gloom, | |
| To peep at the door of the wonderful room | |
| Such stories are told about, none of them true!— | 35 |
| The keyhole itself has no mortal seen through. | |
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| That room,—forty years since, folk settled and decked it. | |
| The luncheon ’s prepared, and the guests are expected, | |
| The handsome young host he is gallant and gay, | |
| For his love and her friends will be with him to-day. | 40 |
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| With solid and dainty the table is drest, | |
| The wine beams its brightest, the flowers bloom their best; | |
| Yet the host need not smile, and no guests will appear, | |
| For his sweetheart is dead, as he shortly shall hear. | |
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| Full forty years since turned the key in that door. | 45 |
| ’T is a room deaf and dumb mid the city’s uproar. | |
| The guests, for whose joyance that table was spread, | |
| May now enter as ghosts, for they ’re every one dead. | |
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| Through a chink in the shutter dim lights come and go; | |
| The seats are in order, the dishes a-row: | 50 |
| But the luncheon was wealth to the rat and the mouse | |
| Whose descendants have long left the Dirty Old House. | |
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| Cup and platter are masked in thick layers of dust; | |
| The flowers fallen to powder, the wine swathed in crust; | |
| A nosegay was laid before one special chair, | 55 |
| And the faded blue ribbon that bound it lies there. | |
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| The old man has played out his part in the scene. | |
| Wherever he now is, I hope he ’s more clean. | |
| Yet give we a thought free of scoffing or ban | |
| To that Dirty Old House and that Dirty Old Man. | 60 |
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