Salad

TO make this condiment your poet begs

The pounded yellow of two hard boiled eggs;

Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen-sieve,

Smoothness and softness to the salad give;

Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl,

And, half-suspected, animate the whole.

Of mordant mustard add a single spoon,

Distrust the condiment that bites too soon;

But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault,

To add a double quantity of salt.

And, lastly, o'er the flavored compound toss

A magic soup-spoon of anchovy sauce.

O green and glorious!--O herbaceous treat!

'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat;

Back to the world he'd turn his fleeting soul,

And plunge his fingers in the salad-bowl!

Serenely full, the epicure would say,

Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day!