Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 126, No. 1. Whole No. 767, July 2005

He’d made the mistake of forgetting

That both were so sorely tried.

They shackled his legs with a clothesline

And fastened his arms to the chair.

He tried to escape, but he couldn’t—

The seemed to be everywhere!

A tap on the head with a hammer,

While they hoisted him up the wall,

And he sensed, as they started to plaster,

That their plan wasn’t funny at all!

Did they think — those silly females—

That though he was dizzy and sore,

An inveterate toper like he was

Had never been plastered before?

But they had him secure in their fortress,

And the barn-board was nailed in place,

And his rambling chatter subsided

As the plaster climbed his face.

And there they will keep him forever,

Yes — forever and a day,

Till the wall shall crumble to powder,

And the barn-board rots away.