I.--INTRODUCTORY. TO MY LYRE.

["Smoothly written _vers de Société_, where a _boudoir_
decorum is, or ought always to be, preserved; where sentiment
never surges into passion, and where humour never overflows
into boisterous merriment."--_Frederick Locker's Preface to
"Lyra Elegantiarum."_]

[Illustration]

Dear Lyre, your duty now you know!
If one would sing with grace and glow
Songs of Society,
One must not dream of fire, or length,
Or vivid touch, or virile strength,
Or great variety.

Among the Muses of Mayfair
A Bacchanal with unbound hair,
And loosened girdle,
Would be as purely out of place
As Atalanta in a race
O'er hedge or hurdle:

Our Muse, dear Lyra, must be trim,
Must not indulge in vagrant whim,
Of voice or vesture.
Boudoir decorum will allow
No gleaming eye, no glowing brow,