Food The doctor is sure that my health is poor, he says that I waste away; so bring me a can of the shredded bran, and a bale of the toasted hay; O feed me on rice and denatured ice, and the oats that the horses chew, and a peck of slaw and a load of straw and a turnip and squash or two. The doctor cries that it won't be wise to eat of the things I like; if I make a break at a sirloin steak, my stomach is sure to strike; I dare not reach for the luscious peach, or stab at the lemon pie; if I make a pass at the stew, alas! I'm sure to curl up and die. If a thing looks good, it must be eschewed, if bad, I may eat it down; so bring me a jar of the rich pine tar from the Health Food works up town; and bring me a bag of your basic slag, and a sack of your bolted prunes, and a bowl of slop from the doctor's shop, and ladle it in with spoons! I will have to feed on the jimson weed, and the grass that the cows may leave, for the doctor's sure that my health is poor, and I know that he'd not deceive. [Pg 42] [Pg 42] “O, it may be all right for a woman so old, to leap o'er the table and chairs.” [Pg 43] [Pg 43] Physical Culture My grandmother suffered and languished in pain, till she read in a magazine ad, that a woman should put on a sweater and train, and help the Delsartean fad. And now when I go to my midday repast, no meal is made ready for me; my grandmother's climbing a forty-foot mast or shinning up into a tree. The house has a stairway that she will not use she always slides down on the rail; she's spoiled all the floors with her spiked sprinting shoes, and she laughs when I put up a wail. O, it may be all right for a woman so old, to leap o'er the table and chairs, while I try to fill up on the grub that is cold, with the dishes all piled on the stairs. Today I protested with many a tear, made a moan like a maundering dunce; and she kicked all the lights from the brass chandelier, and turned forty handsprings at once. I told her I never could prosper and thrive, on victuals unfit for a man; she offered to throw me three falls out of five, Graeco-Roman or catch-as-catch-can. [Pg 44] [Pg 44] The Nine Kings Nine monarchs followed in the gloom when Edward journeyed to the tomb; nine
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