To you in distant India, these I send across the seas, Nor count it far across. For which of us forgets The Indian cabinets, The bones of antelope, the wings of albatross, The pied and painted birds and beans, The junks and bangles, beads and screens, The gods and sacred bells, And the loud-humming, twisting shells! The level of the parlour floor Was honest, homely, Scottish shore; But when we climbed upon a chair, Behold the gorgeous East was there! Be this a fable; and behold Me in the parlour as of old, And Minnie just above me set In the quaint Indian cabinet! Smiling and kind, you grace a shelf Too high for me to reach myself. Reach down a hand, my dear, and take These rhymes for old acquaintance' sake!