Madame La Grippe

by James Ryder Randall

Where the seas meet the land, and the land quits the seas, The universe shakes with a terrible sneeze, The Czar in his palace, the serf in his hut, Explode all alike when the nostril is shut, The saint's holy person is no more exempt Than the sinner whom Satan refuses to tempt. The pest of the air takes a world-waking trip, And its banners are blazoned: “Beware of La Grippe.”

We heard of it first where Peter the Great Made the marsh of the Neva the heart of his State. It crumpled the Cossack, and then, in the morn, Crossed the Balkan and captured the fair Golden Horn. The Sultan dropped down with a bigness of head That made his whole harem afraid of the dead, For a microbic Skobeleff rushed with a skip And held old Byzantium fast in his grip.

From the dome of Sophia to Stephen's tall spire It swept in its fury and coughed in its ire. The Kaiser succumbed before set of sun And cried: “Better far Kossuth or the Hun!” But the Hun was himself loaded up with quinine, While Bismarck felt humbled at Canossa's shrine, For the head of the haughty takes a cyclonic dip When it feels the congestion of Madame La grippe!

The Berlin professors went down in despair And their scholars tore Greek, by the roots, from their hair, The Titans who humbled the nations are weak, While their battle-cry sinks to a sad nasal squeak. The Emperor William grows weary of beer, And wiltedly “ambles away on his ear.” The White Lady scare and the pale Phantom Ship Are nothing in horror like Madame La Grippe!

It tweaked the Republic of France by the nose, And a new reign of terror insistently rose. The dust of Napoleon quivered perhaps With the cruel, catarrhal, convulsive collapse. The Socialist demon declined to conspire, For his backbone was seared by St. Anthony's fire. The sirens who smile to beguile on the road Felt their jewels a curse, like the head of a toad And the doctor alone, who is sure of his tip, Stood firm in the presence of Madame La Grippe!

Zigzagging along the Baltic's bleak strand, It crossed the grim channel to sturdy England. The eloquent Gladstone lost power of speech And Salisbury took to his bed with a screech. The Queen drank hot toddy of fine Irish make, And dreamed that Parnell was attending her wake With a dark, scowling visage and sinister lip, Disguised in the raiment of Madame La Grippe!

Astride of the cable, by British emprise, It shot to the land of the free and the wise. The Bostonese stomach disdained pork and beans, And lived on a diet of antipyrines. New York heard the figure of Liberty whoop Like a child in the robust embrace of the croup. Mr. Chauncey Depew wrote funeral verse While the Negro Problem passed by in a hearse. The scissors were dropped from Coupon's keen clip As Wall Street went mad in the waltz of La Grippe!

On the wings of a blizzard, it flew to the West, With a wild and a woolly rheumatic behest. Chicago surrendered at once the World's Fair And took a first prize in the Prince of the Air. Mr. Ingall's trumpet made all Kansas wheeze As Washington answered his cynical sneeze. The big bulk of Barnes was a rampart of might, But it sunk at the shock of this malefic sprite. East and West, West and East, with a roar and a rip, Crashed the thunderous footfall of Madame La Grippe!

You may hear that this imp is a myth at the South, But this is a pleasant romance of the mouth. By the river St. John, at a place they call Jax, This writer first felt the prelude of attacks. Very mild was the touch, but as he fared forth, A little more near to the stars of the North, It kicked and it cuffed and it swirled him about Until he resembled a famous dish-clout. And now, as he takes his medicinal nip, He bows out, most humbly, this Madame La Grippe!

The moral, perchance, is not proper to hide, It levels at once our poor human pride. We are all in the clutch of invisible foes, And the elements fill us with blessings and woes. We have brotherhood bonds to pay at our ease, In all the vast circle of health and disease. We are saved by the self-same Omnipotent Power, While none is too poor to escape from its dower; And little it matters, whatever may slip, So God's buckler shield us from Satanic grip!