--risum _tenaetis, amici_
"The longer one lives, the more one learns,"
Said I, as off to sleep I went,
Bemused with thinking of Tithe concerns,
And reading a book by the Bishop of FERNS,[1]
On the Irish Church Establishment.
But lo! in sleep not long I lay,
When Fancy her usual tricks began,
And I found myself bewitched away
To a goodly city in Hindostan--
A city where he who dares to dine
On aught but rice is deemed a sinner;
Where sheep and kine are held divine,
And accordingly--never drest for dinner.
"But how is this?" I wondering cried--
As I walkt that city fair and wide,
And saw, in every marble street,
A row of beautiful butchers' shops--
"What means, for men who don't eat meat,
"This grand display of loins and chops?"
In vain I askt--'twas plain to see
That nobody dared to answer me.
So on from street to street I strode:
And you can't conceive how vastly odd
The butchers lookt--a roseate crew,
Inshrined in _stalls_ with naught to do;
While some on a _bench_, half dozing, sat,
And the Sacred Cows were not more fat.
Still posed to think what all this scene
Of sinecure trade was _meant_ to mean,
"And, pray," askt I--"by whom is paid
The expense of this strange masquerade?"--
"The expense!--oh! that's of course defrayed
(Said one of these well-fed Hecatombers)
"By yonder rascally rice-consumers."
"What! _they_ who mustn't eat meat!"--
No matter--
(And while he spoke his cheeks grew fatter,)
"The rogues may munch their _Paddy_ crop,
"But the rogues must still support _our_ shop,
"And depend upon it, the way to treat
"Heretical stomachs that thus dissent,
"Is to burden all that won't eat meat,
"With a costly MEAT ESTABLISHMENT."
On hearing these words so gravely said,
With a volley of laughter loud I shook,
And my slumber fled and my dream was sped,
And I found I was lying snug in bed,
With my nose in the Bishop of FERNS'S book.
[1] An indefatigable scribbler of anti-Catholic pamphlets.