{
 "id": "james-mcintyre/potato-bug-exterminators",
 "title": "Potato Bug Exterminators",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "James McIntyre",
 "poet_slug": "james-mcintyre",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames",
 "book_slug": "musings-on-the-banks-of-canadian-thames",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 53,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1884,
  "venue": "Musings on the Banks of Canadian Thames (1884)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/james-mcintyre_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_09542",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/36068",
   "https://archive.org/details/cihm_11791"
  ],
  "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": 39,
  "max_indent": 0
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "When we do trace out nature’s laws,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And view effects, and muse on cause,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For the future there’s great hope",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If we our eyes do only ope.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With joy they will often glisten,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If to truth one doth but listen;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But people often turn deaf ear",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And what is useful will not hear.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Now for a minute, lend your luggs,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Our theme, it is potato bugs.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Just buy a pair of young peafowl,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Their voice may be like to screech owl,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But soon as the potato shows",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You there will find the peafowl goes,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Up one row and down the other",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Like loving sister with brother.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And you will find that down their muggs",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Have disappeared potato bugs,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "There’s no more need of Paris green",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For they will keep potatoes clean.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And faithful they will work all day,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For to them ’tis gay sport and play;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "No more you need their voice bewail,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "But admire beauties of the tail.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}