The season - 1861 Author:Alfred Austin Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE SEASON, I Sing the Season. Muse ! whose sway extends Where Hyde begins beyond where Tyburn ends : Muse! not like vulgar Muses, known and nude, Who look th... more »e trollop yet who act the prude, But draped discreetly in a skirt and vest Which just withhold the secrets they suggest: Muse, at whose toilet (sure the sweetest shrine) Rimmel presents his last " pommade divine :" Mistress avowed where'er Man's lofty brain Invents a colour or conceals a stain : Muse, earth-begot! equipped from hip to heel In loose array of penetrable steel: Fashion yclept! without whose granted spell No critic praises and no verses sell, Accept my couplets; make my strains select, Parade each beauty, powder each defect; So that my lines, quick, sparkling as your eyes, Storm the Town's Circles with a swift surprise! Why sing the Season ? cautious critics say: Why write a Satire ?—only Epics pay. The world grows earnest, and no more endures A dilettante flippant pen like yours. Sing of the Zodiac! the Creator's Mind ! The past—the future—Mansions of Mankind ! The secret spheres of blessedness or woe! Sing all, sing any—save the one you know. Shriek—start—pant—palpitate—pause—prove to men There is some splendid purpose in your pen.Convert your cut-throats, leave your Phrynes chaste; Flaunt moral diamonds (who will know they're paste ?) : Compete with Meredith :" discreetly steal Your plot, your apophthegms, and top " Lucile! " I would point out to Mr. Owen Meredith, that in one serious particular he has overlooked parental admonition. In one of those charming conversations, prefixed to each Book of " My Novel," Pisistratus Caxton combats the idea of his relations, that he can make the personages of his story act and talk just as it pleases him. He urges with admirable f...« less