{
 "id": "ambrose-bierce/to-colonel-dan-burns",
 "title": "To “Colonel” Dan Burns",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Ambrose Bierce",
 "poet_slug": "ambrose-bierce",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "book_slug": "black-beetles-in-amber",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": null,
 "container": "Black Beetles in Amber",
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1892,
  "venue": "Black Beetles in Amber (1892)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
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  "repo": "standardebooks/ambrose-bierce_poetry",
  "file": "black-beetles-in-amber.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/4793",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12658",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/12977",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/15599",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof04bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof05bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/collectedworksof08bierrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/shapesofclay00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/blackbeetlesinam00bier",
   "https://archive.org/details/literarycalifor05mighgoog",
   "https://archive.org/details/cali07webb"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 24,
  "n_stanzas": 3,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 49,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "They say, my lord, that you’re a Warwick. Well,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The title’s an absurd one, I believe:",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You make no kings, you have no kings to sell,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Though really ’twere easy to conceive",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "You stuffing half-a-dozen up your sleeve.",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "No, you’re no Warwick, skillful from the shell",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To hatch out sovereigns. On a mare’s nest, maybe,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You’d incubate a little jackass baby.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "I fancy, too, that it is naught but stuff,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This “power” that you’re said to be “behind",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The throne.” I’m sure ’twere accurate enough",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To represent you simply as inclined",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "To push poor Markham (ailing in his mind",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "And body, which were never very tough)",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Round in an invalid’s wheeled chair. Such menial",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Employment to low natures is congenial.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "No, Dan, you’re an impostor every way:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "A human bubble, for “the earth,” you know,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "“Hath bubbles, as the water hath.” Some day",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Some careless hand will prick your film, and O,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "How utterly you’ll vanish! Daniel, throw",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "(As fallen Woolsey might to Cromwell say)",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Your curst ambition to the pigs⁠—though truly",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "’Twould make them greater pigs, and more unruly.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}