Public-domain source text

The Following Pair

by Ambrose Bierce

From Standard Ebooks · standardebooks/ambrose-bierce_poetry

O very remarkable mortal, What food is engaging your jaws And staining with amber their portal? “It’s ’baccy I chaws.”
And why do you sway in your walking, To right and left many degrees, And hitch up your trousers when talking? “I follers the seas.”
Great indolent shark in the rollers, Is “ ’baccy,” too, one of your faults?⁠— You, too, display maculate molars. “I dines upon salts.”
Strange diet!⁠—intestinal pain it Is commonly given to nip. And how can you ever obtain it? “I follers the ship.”

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This is a source transcription from Standard Ebooks, published in Past Poetry’s public-domain archive without line-by-line editorial notes. Public-domain source edition. Availability can vary by territory.

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