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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 82
Riddles.*
Riddles.*
1. What is the difference between six dozen dozen and half-a-dozen dozen?
2. What is it which lives in winter dies in summer, and grows with its roots upwards?
3. What notorious scoundrel of ancient history does this represent the name of :—
Five hundreds begins it, five hundred ends it,
A five in the middle is seen,
The first of all figures and first of all letters
Take up their stations between.
4. What is it that the dead eat, and, if the living eat, they die?
"Twas whispered in heaven, "twas muttered in hell,
And echo caught faintly the sound as it fell :
On the confines of earth "twas permitted to rest,
And the depths of the ocean its presence confessed,
"Twill be found in the sphere when 'tis riven asunder,
Be seen in the lightning, and heard in the thunder.
'Twas allotted to man with his earliest breath,
Attends at his birth, and awaits him in death;
It presides o'er his happiness, honor, and health,
Is the prop of his house, and the end of his wealth.
Without it the soldier and seaman may roam,
But woe to the wretch who expels it from home.
In the whispers of conscience its voice will be found,
Nor e'en in the whirlwind of passion be drowned.
'Twill not soften the heart, and though deaf to the ear,
'Twill make it acutely and instantly hear.
But in shade let it rest, like a delicate flower—
Oh, breathe on it softly—it dies in an hour.
* "The answer to Riddles, &c., will appear in the next number.