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Christina Georgina Rossetti - A Frog`s Fate
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Contemptuous of his home beyond 
The village and the village-pond, 
A large-souled Frog who spurned each byway 
Hopped along the imperial highway. 


Nor grunting pig nor barking dog 
Could disconcert so great a Frog. 
The morning dew was lingering yet, 
His sides to cool, his tongue to wet: 
The night-dew, when the night should come, 
A travelled Frog would send him home. 


Not so, alas! The wayside grass 
Sees him no more: not so, alas! 
A broad-wheeled waggon unawares 
Ran him down, his joys, his cares. 
From dying choke one feeble croak 
The Frog`s perpetual silence broke: - 
‘Ye buoyant Frogs, ye great and small, 
Even I am mortal after all! 
My road to fame turns out a wry way; 
I perish on the hideous highway; 
Oh for my old familiar byway!’ 


The choking Frog sobbed and was gone; 
The Waggoner strode whistling on. 
Unconscious of the carnage done, 
Whistling that Waggoner strode on - 
Whistling (it may have happened so) 
‘A froggy would a-wooing go.’ 
A hypothetic frog trolled he, 
Obtuse to a reality. 


O rich and poor, O great and small, 
Such oversights beset us all. 
The mangled Frog abides incog, 
The uninteresting actual frog: 
The hypothetic frog alone 
Is the one frog we dwell upon.
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