NEW YEAR GREETING.

W. A. CROFFUT.

NEW YEAR hail and greeting to Esthetic!
A right-down, earnest hail and friendly greeting!
As the old year is silently retreating,

Its blind eyes shut, its pulses scarcely beating,
May this "preliminary monthly meeting,"
As Quakers call it, prove to be prophetic.
Of humorous recitals, songs pathetic,
And speeches analytic and synthetic,
To keep alive the spirit of Esthetic.

A new year hail and greeting to Esthetic!

I speak but as a guest, whose little leisure,

Finds here such entertainment, rest and pleasure,
Flavorous and fine, in overwhelming measure,
As e'en a cynic might esteem a treasure,

Deep problems geologic, arithmetic,
Conclusions proved, or merely hypothetic,
And dissertations, prosy or poetic,
Obeying regulations dietetic,

Give varied bill of fare to the Esthetic.

A new year hail and greeting to Esthetic!
Fair blossom of the Lafayette Smithsonian,
Whose fossil fauna from the depths Devonian,
From ocean beds and barriers Caledonian,
With here a polyp form, and there a bony 'un,
Urge each itinerant and peripatetic,
Made wise by hearing lectures theoretic,
To put forth efforts very energetic
To add to this display of the Esthetic.

A new year hail and greeting to Esthetic! Said thrice before, it nobly bears resaying! Who, led by curiosity, comes straying Within its mystic walls, is fond of staying; And soon you'll find him gratefully obeying The gifted priestess, as with nod magnetic, Without a syllable apologetic,

She drags her intellectual athletic

Into the ruthless forum of Esthetic.

A new year hail and greeting to Esthetic!
It might be echoed o'er and o'er forever!

Such ladies-whose accomplishments-I never !
Vivacious, learned, pretty, piquant, clever,
Bright without art, they please without endeavor.
No place for anchorite or grim ascetic!

No place for those whose hearts are sealed hermetic!
Nought but the pliant lip and sympathetic

Should touch the bubbling chalice of Esthetic.