Now PHAETHON begged of his doting old father,

To grant him a favor, and this the rather,

Since some one had hinted, the youth to annoy,

That he wasn't by any means PHOEBUS'S boy!

Intending, the rascally son of a gun,

To darken the brow of the son of the SUN!

"By the terrible Styx!" said the angry sire,

While his eyes flashed volumes of fury and fire,

"To prove your reviler an infamous liar,

I swear I will grant you whate'er you desire!"

"Then by my head,"

The youngster said,

"I'll mount the coach when the horses are fed!--

For there's nothing I'd choose, as I'm alive,

Like a seat on the box, and a dashing drive!"

"Nay, PHAETHON, don't--

I beg you won't--

Just stop a moment and think upon't!

You're quite too young," continued the sage,

"To tend a coach at your tender age!

Besides, you see,

'T will really be

Your first appearance on any stage!

Desist, my child,

The cattle are wild,

And when their mettle is thoroughly 'riled,'

Depend upon't, the coach'll be 'spiled'--

They're not the fellows to draw it mild!

Desist, I say,

You'll rue the day--

So mind, and don't be foolish, PHA!"

But the youth was proud,

And swore aloud,

'T was just the thing to astonish the crowd--

He'd have the horses and wouldn't be cowed!

In vain the boy was cautioned at large,

He called for the chargers, unheeding the charge,

And vowed that any young fellow of force,

Could manage a dozen coursers, of course!

Now PHOEBUS felt exceedingly sorry

He had given his word in such a hurry,

But having sworn by the Styx, no doubt

He was in for it now, and couldn't back out.

So calling Phaethon up in a trice,

He gave the youth a bit of advice:--

"'Parce stimulis, utere loris!'

(A "stage direction," of which the core is,

Don't use the whip--they're ticklish things--

But, whatever you do, hold on to the strings!)

Remember the rule of the Jehu-tribe is,

'Medio tutissimus ibis'

(As the Judge remarked to a rowdy Scotchman,

Who was going to quod between two watchmen!)

So mind your eye, and spare your goad,

Be shy of the stones, and keep in the road!"

Now Phaethon, perched in the coachman's place,

Drove off the steeds at a furious pace,

Fast as coursers running a race,

Or bounding along in a steeple-chase!

Of whip and shout there was no lack,

"Crack--whack--

Whack--crack"

Resounded along the horses' back!--

Frightened beneath the stinging lash,

Cutting their flanks in many a gash,

On--on they sped as swift as a flash,

Through thick and thin away they dash,

(Such rapid driving is always rash!)

When all at once, with a dreadful crash,

The whole "establishment" went to smash!

And Phaethon, he,

As all agree,

Off the coach was suddenly hurled,

Into a puddle, and out of the world!

MORAL.

Don't rashly take to dangerous courses--

Nor set it down in your table of forces,

That any one man equals any four horses!

Don't swear by the Styx!--

It's one of Old Nick's

Diabolical tricks

To get people into a regular "fix,"

And hold 'em there as fast as bricks!

THE SCHOOL-HOUSE.

[AFTER GOLDSMITH.]

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

Propt on the marsh, a dwelling now, I see

The humble school-house of my A, B, C,

Where well-drilled urchins, each behind his tire,

Waited in ranks the wished command to fire,

Then all together, when the signal came,

Discharged their A-B ABS against the dame,

Who, 'mid the volleyed learning, firm and calm,

Patted the furloughed ferule on her palm,

And, to our wonder, could detect at once

Who flashed the pan, and who was downright dunce.

There young Devotion learned to climb with ease

The gnarly limbs of Scripture family-trees,

And he was most commended and admired

Who soonest to the topmost twig perspired;

Each name was called as many various ways

As pleased the reader's ear on different days,

So that the weather, or the ferule's stings,

Colds in the head, or fifty other things,

Transformed the helpless Hebrew thrice a week

To guttural Pequot or resounding Greek,

The vibrant accent skipping here and there

Just as it pleased invention or despair;

No controversial Hebraist was the Dame;

With or without the points pleased her the same.

If any tyro found a name too tough,

And looked at her, pride furnished skill enough;

She nerved her larynx for the desperate thing,

And cleared the five-barred syllables at a spring.

Ah, dear old times! there once it was my hap,

Perched on a stool, to wear the long-eared cap;

From books degraded, there I sat at ease,

A drone, the envy of compulsory bees.

EPIGRAMMATIC

EPIGRAMS OF BEN JONSON.

TO FINE GRAND.

What is't Fine Grand, makes thee my friendship fly,

Or take an Epigram so fearfully,

As't were a challenge, or a borrower's letter?

The world must know your greatness is my debtor.

IMPRIMIS, Grand, you owe me for a jest

I lent you, on mere acquaintance, at a feast.

ITEM, a tale or two some fortnight after,

That yet maintains you, and your house in laughter.

ITEM, the Babylonian song you sing;

ITEM, a fair Greek poesy for a ring,

With which a learned madam you bely.

ITEM, a charm surrounding fearfully

Your partie-per-pale picture, one half drawn

In solemn cyprus, th' other cobweb lawn.

ITEM, a gulling impress for you, at tilt.

ITEM, your mistress' anagram, in your hilt.

ITEM, your own, sew'd in your mistress' smock.

ITEM, an epitaph on my lord's cock,

In most vile verses, and cost me more pain,

Than had I made 'em good, to fit your vein.

Forty things more, dear Grand, which you know true,

For which, or pay me quickly, or I'll pay you.

TO BRAINHARDY.

Hardy, thy brain is valiant, 'tis confest,

Thou more; that with it every day dar'st jest

Thyself into fresh brawls; when call'd upon,

Scarce thy week's swearing brings thee off of one;

So in short time, thou art in arrearage grown

Some hundred quarrels, yet dost thou fight none;

Nor need'st thou; for those few, by oath released,

Make good what thou dar'st in all the rest.

Keep thyself there, and think thy valor right,

He that dares damn himself, dares more than fight.

TO DOCTOR EMPIRIC.

When men a dangerous disease did 'scape,

Of old, they gave a cock to Aesculape;

Let me give two, that doubly am got free;

From my disease's danger, and from thee.

TO SIR ANNUAL FILTER.

Filter, the most may admire thee, though not I;

And thou, right guiltless, may'st plead to it, why?

For thy late sharp device. I say 'tis fit

All brains, at times of triumph, should run wit;

For then our water-conduits do run wine;

But that's put in, thou'lt say.

Why, so is thine.

ON BANKS THE USURER.

Banks feels no lameness of his knotty gout,

His moneys travel for him in and out,

And though the soundest legs go every day,

He toils to be at hell, as soon as they.

ON CHEVRIL THE LAWYER

No cause, nor client fat, will Cheveril leese,

But as they come, on both sides he takes fees,

And pleaseth both; for while he melts his grease

For this; that wins, for whom he holds his peace.

EPIGRAMATIC VERSES BY SAMUEL BUTLER.

OPINION.

Opinion governs all mankind,

Like the blind's leading of the blind;

For he that has no eyes in 's head,

Must be by a dog glad to be led;

And no beasts have so little in 'em

As that inhuman brute, Opinion.

"Tis an infectious pestilence,

The tokens upon wit and sense,

That with a venomous contagion

Invades the sick imagination:

And, when it seizes any part,

It strikes the poison to the heart."

This men of one another catch,

By contact, as the humors match.

And nothing's so perverse in nature

As a profound opiniator.

CRITICS.

Critics are like a kind of flies, that breed

In wild fig-trees, and when they're grown up, feed

Upon the raw fruit of the nobler kind,

And, by their nibbling on the outward rind,

Open the pores, and make way for the sun

To ripen it sooner than he would have done.

HYPOCRISY.

Hypocrisy will serve as well

To propagate a church, as zeal;

As persecution and promotion

Do equally advance devotion:

So round white stones will serve, they pay,

As well as eggs to make hens lay.

POLISH.

All wit and fancy, like a diamond,

The more exact and curious 'tis ground,

Is forced for every carat to abate,

As much in value as it wants in weight.

THE GODLY.

A godly man, that has served out his time

In holiness, may set up any crime;

As scholars, when they've taken their degrees

May set up any faculty they please.

PIETY.

Why should not piety be made,

As well as equity, a trade,

And men get money by devotion,

As well as making of a motion?

B' allow'd to pray upon conditions,

As well as suitors in petitions?

And in a congregation pray,

No less than Chancery, for pay?

MARRIAGE.

All sorts of vot'ries, that profess

To bind themselves apprentices

To Heaven, abjure, with solemn vows,

Not Cut and Long-tail, but a Spouse

As the worst of all impediments

To hinder their devout intents.

POETS.

It is not poetry that makes men poor;

For few do write that were not so before;

And those that have writ best, had they been rich.

Had ne'er been clapp'd with a poetic itch;

Had loved their ease too well to take the pains

To undergo that drudgery of brains;

But, being for all other trades unfit,

Only t' avoid being idle, set up wit.

PUFFING.

They that do write in authors' praises,

And freely give their friends their voices

Are not confined to what is true;

That's not to give, but pay a due:

For praise, that's due, does give no more

To worth, than what it had before;

But to commend without desert,

Requires a mastery of art,

That sets a gloss on what's amiss,

And writes what should be, not what is.

POLITICIANS.

All the politics of the great

Are like the cunning of a cheat,

That lets his false dice freely run,

And trusts them to themselves alone,

But never lets a true one stir,

Without some fingering trick or slur;

And, when the gamester doubts his play,

Conveys his false dice safe away,

And leaves the true ones in the lurch

T' endure the torture of the search.

FEAR.

There needs no other charm, nor conjurer

To raise infernal spirits up, but fear;

That makes men pull their horns in, like a snail

That's both a pris'ner to itself, and jail;

Draws more fantastic shapes, than in the grains

Of knotted wood, in some men's crazy brains;

When all the cocks they think they see, and bulls,

Are only in the insides of their skulls.

THE LAW.

The law can take a purse in open court

While it condemns a less delinquent for't.

THE SAME.

Who can deserve, for breaking of the laws,

A greater penance than an honest cause.

THE SAME.

All those that do but rob and steal enough,

Are punishment and court-of-justice proof,

And need not fear, nor be concerned a straw

In all the idle bugbears of the law;

But confidently rob the gallows too,

As well as other sufferers, of their due.

CONFESSION.

In the Church of Rome to go to shrift

Is but to put the soul on a clean shift.

SMATTERERS

All smatterers are more brisk and pert

Than those that understand an art;

As little sparkles shine more bright

Than glowing coals, that give them light.

BAD WRITERS.

As he that makes his mark is understood

To write his name, and 'tis in law as good,

So he, that can not write one word of sense

Believes he has as legal a pretense

To scribble what he does not understand,

As idiots have a title to their land.

THE OPINIONATIVE.

Opinionators naturally differ

From other men; as wooden legs are stiffer

Than those of pliant joints, to yield and bow,

Which way soever they're design'd to go.

LANGUAGE OF THE LEARNED.

Were Tully now alive, he'd be to seek

In all our Latin terms of art and Greek;

Would never understand one word of sense

The most irrefragable schoolman means:

As if the Schools design'd their terms of art,

Not to advance a science, but to divert;

As Hocus Pocus conjures to amuse

The rabble from observing what he does.

GOOD WRITING.

As 'tis a greater mystery in the art

Of painting, to foreshorten any part,

Than draw it out; so 'tis in books the chief

Of all perfections to be plain and brief.

COURTIERS.

As in all great and crowded fairs

Monsters and puppet-play are wares,

Which in the less will not go off,

Because they have not money enough;

So men in princes' courts will pass

That will not in another place.

INVENTIONS.

All the inventions that the world contains,

Were not by reason first found out, nor brains,

But pass for theirs who had the luck to light

Upon them by mistake or oversight.

LOGICIANS.

Logicians used to clap a proposition,

As justices do criminals, in prison,

And, in as learn'd authentic nonsense, writ

The names of all their moods and figures fit;

For a logician's one that has been broke

To ride and pace his reason by the book;

And by their rules, and precepts, and examples,

To put his wits into a kind of trammels.

LABORIOUS WRITERS.

Those get the least that take the greatest pains,

But most of all i' th' drudgery of the brains,

A natural sign of weakness, as an ant

Is more laborious than an elephant;

And children are more busy at their play,

Than those that wiseliest pass their time away.

ON A CLUB OF SOTS.

The jolly members of a toping club,

Like pipestaves, are but hoop'd into a tub;

And in a close confederacy link,

For nothing else but only to hold drink.

HOLLAND.

A country that draws fifty feet of water,

In which men live as in the hold of Nature;

And when the sea does in upon them break,

And drown a province, does but spring a leak;

That always ply the pump, and never think

They can be safe, but at the rate they stink;

That live as if they had been run a-ground,

And, when they die, are cast away and drown'd;

That dwell in ships, like swarms of rats, and prey

Upon the goods all nations' fleets convey;

And, when their merchants are blown up and cracked,

Whole towns are cast away and wrecked;

That feed, like cannibals, on other fishes,

And serve their cousin-germans up in dishes:

A land that rides at anchor, and is moor'd,

In which they do not live, but go a-board.

WOMEN.

The souls of women are so small,

That some believe they've none at all;

Or if they have, like cripples, still

They've but one faculty, the will;

The other two are quite laid by

To make up one great tyranny;

And though their passions have most pow'r,

They are, like Turks, but slaves the more

To th' abs'lute will, that with a breath

Has sovereign pow'r of life and death,

And, as its little int'rests move,

Can turn 'em all to hate or love;

For nothing, in a moment, turn

To frantic love, disdain, and scorn;

And make that love degenerate

T' as great extremity of hate;

And hate again, and scorn, and piques,

To flames, and raptures, and love-tricks.

EPIGRAMS OF EDMUND WALLEB.

A PAINTED LADY WITH ILL TEETH.

Were men so dull they could not see

That Lyce painted; should they flee,

Like simple birds, into a net,

So grossly woven, and ill set,

Her own teeth would undo the knot,

And let all go that she had got.

Those teeth fair Lyce must not show,

If she would bite: her lovers, though

Like birds they stoop at seeming grapes,

Are dis-abus'd, when first she gapes:

The rotten bones discover'd there,

Show 'tis a painted sepulcher.

OF THE MARRIAGE OF THE DWARFS.

Design, or chance, makes others wive;

But nature did this match contrive:

EVE might as well have ADAM fled,

As she denied her little bed

To him, for whom heav'n seem'd to frame,

And measure out, this only dame.

Thrice happy is that humble pair,

Beneath the level of all care!

Over whose heads those arrows fly

Of sad distrust, and jealousy:

Secured in as high extreme,

As if the world held none but them.

To him the fairest nymphs do show

Like moving mountains, topp'd with snow:

And ev'ry man a POLYPHEME

Does to his GALATEA seem;

None may presume her faith to prove;

He proffers death that proffers love.

Ah CHLORIS! that kind nature thus

From all the world had sever'd us:

Creating for ourselves us two,

As love has me for only you!

EPIGRAMS OF MATTHEW PRIOR.

A SIMILE.

Dear Thomas, didst thou never pop

Thy head into a tin-man's shop?

There, Thomas, didst thou never see

('Tis but by way of simile)

A squirrel spend his little rage,

In jumping round a rolling cage?

The cage, as either side turn'd up,

Striking a ring of bells a-top?--

Mov'd in the orb, pleas'd with the chimes,

The foolish creature thinks he climbs:

But here or there, turn wood or wire,

He never gets two inches higher.

So fares it with those merry blades,

That frisk it under Pindus' shades.

In noble songs, and lofty odes,

They tread on stars, and talk with gods;

Still dancing in an airy round,

Still pleased with their own verses' sound;

Brought back, how fast soe'er they go,

Always aspiring, always low.

THE FLIES.

Say, sire of insects, mighty Sol,

(A Fly upon the chariot pole

Cries out), what Blue-bottle alive

Did ever with such fury drive?

Tell Belzebub, great father, tell

(Says t' other, perch'd upon the wheel),

Did ever any mortal Fly

Raise such a cloud of dust as I?

My judgment turn'd the whole debate:

My valor sav'd the sinking state.

So talk two idle buzzing things;

Toss up their heads, and stretch their wings.

But let the truth to light be brought;

This neither spoke, nor t' other fought:

No merit in their own behavior:

Both rais'd, but by their party's favor.

PHILLIS'S AGE.

How old may Phillis be, you ask,

Whose beauty thus all hearts engages?

To answer is no easy task:

For she has really two ages.

Stiff in brocade, and pinch'd in stays,

Her patches, paint, and jewels on;

All day let envy view her face,

And Phillis is but twenty-one.

Paint, patches, jewels laid aside,

At night astronomers agree,

The evening has the day belied;

And Phillis is some forty-three.

TO THE DUKE DE NOALLES.

Vain the concern which you express,

That uncall'd Alard will possess

Your house and coach, both day and night,

And that Macbeth was haunted less

By Banquo's restless sprite.

With fifteen thousand pounds a-year,

Do you complain, you can not bear

An ill, you may so soon retrieve?

Good Alard, faith, is modester

By much, than you believe.

Lend him but fifty louis-d'or;

And you shall never see him more:

Take the advice; probatum est.

Why do the gods indulge our store,

But to secure our rest?

ON BISHOP ATTERBURY.

Meek Francis lies here, friend: without stop or stay,

As you value your peace, make the best of your way.

Though at present arrested by death's caitiff paw,

If he stirs, he may still have recourse to the law.

And in the King's Bench should a verdict be found,

That by livery and seisin his grave is his ground,

He will claim to himself what is strictly his due,

And an action of trespass will straightway ensue,

That you without right on his premises tread,

On a simple surmise that the owner is dead.

FORMA BONUM FRAGILE.

What a frail thing is beauty! says baron Le Cras,

Perceiving his mistress had one eye of glass:

And scarcely had he spoke it,

When she more confus'd as more angry she grew,

By a negligent rage prov'd the maxim too true:

She dropt the eye, and broke it.

EARNING A DINNER.

Full oft doth Mat. with Topaz dine,

Eateth baked meats, drinketh Greek wine;

But Topaz his own werke rehearseth;

And Mat. mote praise what Topaz verseth.

Now sure as priest did e'er shrive sinner,

Full hardly earneth Mat. his dinner.

BIBO AND CHARON.

When Bibo thought fit from the world to retreat,

And full of champagne as an egg's full of meat,

He waked in the boat; and to Charon he said,

He would be row'd back, for he was not yet dead.

Trim the boat, and sit quiet, stern Charon replied:

You may have forgot, you were drunk when you died.

THE PEDANT.

Lysander talks extremely well;

On any subject let him dwell,

His tropes and figures will content ye

He should possess to all degrees

The art of talk; he practices

Full fourteen hours in four-and-twenty

EPIGRAMS OF JOSEPH ADDISON.

THE COUNTESS OF MANCHESTER.

Written on his admission to the Kit-Cat Club, in compliance with the

rule that every new member should name his toast, and write a verse in

her praise.

While haughty Gallia's dames, that spread

O'er their pale cheeks an artful red,

Beheld this beauteous stranger there,

In nature's charms divinely fair;

Confusion in their looks they showed,

And with unborrowed blushes glowed.

TO AN ILL-FAVORED LADY.

[IMITATED FROM MARTIAL.]

While in the dark on thy soft hand I hung,

And heard the tempting syren in thy tongue,

What flames, what darts, what anguish I endured!

But when the candle entered I was cured.

TO A CAPBICIOUS FEIEND.

[IMITATED FROM MARTIAL.]

In all thy humors, whether grave or mellow,

Thou 'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow;

Hast so much wit, and mirth, and spleen about thee,

There is no living with thee, nor without thee.

TO A ROGUE.

[IMITATED FROM MARTIAL.]

Thy beard and head are of a different dye:

Short of one foot, distorted in an eye:

With all these tokens of a knave complete,

Should'st thou be honest, thou 'rt a dev'lish cheat.

EPIGRAMS OF ALEXANDER POPE.

ON MRS. TOFTS.

(A CELEBRATED OPERA SINGER.)

So bright is thy beauty, so charming thy song,

As had drawn both the beasts and their Orpheus along;

But such is thy avarice, and such is thy pride.

That the beasts must have starved, and the poet have died.

TO A BLOCKHEAD.

You beat your pate, and fancy wit will come:

Knock as you please, there's nobody at home.

THE FOOL AND THE POET.

Sir, I admit your general rule,

That every poet is a fool,

But you yourself may serve to show it,

That every fool is not a poet.

EPIGRAMS OF DEAN SWIFT.

ON BURNING A DULL POEM.

An ass's hoof alone can hold

That poisonous juice, which kills by cold.

Methought when I this poem read,

No vessel but an ass's head

Such frigid fustian could contain;

I mean the head without the brain.

The cold conceits, the chilling thoughts,

Went down like stupefying draughts;

I found my head begin to swim,

A numbness crept through every limb.

In haste, with imprecations dire,

I threw the volume in the fire;

When (who could think?) though cold as ice,

It burnt to ashes in a trice.

How could I more enhance its fame?

Though born in snow, it died in flame.

TO A LADY,

On hearing her praise her husband.

You always are making a god of your spouse;

But this neither Reason nor Conscience allows;

Perhaps you will say, 'tis in gratitude due,

And you adore him because he adores you.

Your argument's weak, and so you will find,

For you, by this rule, must adore all mankind.

THE CUDGELED HUSBAND.

As Thomas was cudgel'd one day by his wife,

He took to his heels and fled for his life:

Tom's three dearest friends came by in the squabble,

And saved him at once from the shrew and the rabble;

Then ventured to give him some sober advice-

But Tom is a person of honor so nice,

Too wise to take counsel, too proud to take warning,

That he sent to all three a challenge next morning.

Three duels he fought, thrice ventured his life;

Went home, and was cudgeled again by his wife.

ON SEEING VERSES WRITTEN UPON WINDOWS AT INNS

The sage, who said he should be proud

Of windows in his breast,

Because he ne'er a thought allow'd

That might not be confest;

His window scrawled by every rake,

His breast again would cover,

And fairly bid the devil take

The diamond and the lover.

ON SEEING THE BUSTS OP NEWTON, LOCKE, AND OTHERS,

Placed by Queen Caroline in Richmond Hermitage.

Louis the living learned fed,

And raised the scientific head;

Our frugal queen, to save her meat,

Exalts the heads that cannot eat.

ON THE CHURCH'S DANGER.

Good Halifax and pious Wharton cry,

The Church has vapors; there's no danger nigh.

In those we love not, we no danger see,

And were they hang'd, there would no danger be.

But we must silent be, amid our fears,

And not believe our senses, but the Peers.

So ravishers that know no sense of shame,

First stop her mouth, and then debauch the dame.

ON ONE DELACOURT'S COMPLIMENTING CARTHY ON HIS POETRY.

Carthy, you say, writes well--his genius true,

You pawn your word for him--he'll vouch for you.

So two poor knaves, who find their credit fail,

To cheat the world, become each other's bail.

ON A USURER.

Beneath this verdant hillock lies,

Demar, the wealthy and the wise.

His heirs, that he might safely rest,

Have put his carcass in a chest,

The very chest in which, they say,

His other self, his money lay.

And, if his heirs continue kind

To that dear self he left behind,

I dare believe, that four in five

Will think his better half alive.

TO MRS. BIDDY FLOYD;

OR, THE RECEIPT TO FORM A BEAUTY.

When Cupid did his grandsire Jove entreat

To form some Beauty by a new receipt,

Jove sent, and found, far in a country scene,

Truth, innocence, good nature, look serene:

From which ingredients first the dext'rous boy

Pick'd the demure, the awkward, and the coy.

The Graces from the court did next provide

Breeding, and wit, and air, and decent pride:

These Venus cleans from every spurious grain

Of nice coquet, affected, pert, and vain.

Jove mix'd up all, and the best clay employ'd;

Then call'd the happy composition FLOYD.

THE REVERSE;

OR, MRS. CLUDD.

Venus one day, as story goes,

But for what reason no man knows,

In sullen mood and grave deport,

Trudged it away to Jove's high court;

And there his Godship did entreat,

To look out for his best receipt:

And make a monster strange and odd,

Abhorr'd by man and every god.

Jove, ever kind to all the fair,

Nor e'er refused a lady's prayer,

Straight oped 'scrutoire, and forth he took

A neatly bound and well-gilt book;

Sure sign that nothing enter'd there,

But what was very choice and rare.

Scarce had he turn'd a page or two--

It might be more, for aught I know;

But, be the matter more or less,

'Mong friends 't will break no squares, I guess.

Then, smiling, to the dame quoth he,

Here's one will fit you to a T.

But, as the writing doth prescribe,

'Tis fit the ingredients we provide.

Away he went, and search'd the stews,

And every street about the Mews;

Diseases, impudence, and lies,

Are found and brought him in a trice

From Hackney then he did provide,

A clumsy air and awkward pride;

From lady's toilet next he brought

Noise, scandal, and malicious thought.

These Jove put in an old close-stool,

And with them mix'd the vain, the fool.

But now came on his greatest care,

Of what he should his paste prepare;

For common clay or finer mold

Was much too good, such stuff to hold

At last he wisely thought on mud;

So raised it up, and call'd it--CLUDD.

With this, the lady well content,

Low curtsey'd, and away she went.

THE PLACE OF THE DAMNED.

All folks who pretend to religion and grace,

Allow there's a HELL, but dispute of the place:

But if HELL may by logical rules be defined

The place of the damn'd--I'll tell you my mind.

Wherever the damn'd do chiefly abound,

Most certainly there is HELL to be found:

Damn'd poets, damn'd critics, damn'd blockheads, damn'd knaves;

Damn'd senators bribed, damn'd prostitute slaves;

Damn'd lawyers and judges, damn'd lords and damn'd squires;

Damn'd spies and informers, damn'd friends and damn'd liars;

Damn'd villains, corrupted in every station;

Dama'd time-serving priests all over the nation;

And into the bargain I'll readily give you

Damn'd ignorant prelates, and councillors privy.

Then let us no longer by parsons be flamm'd,

For we know by these marks the place of the damn'd:

And HELL to be sure is at Paris or Rome.

How happy for us that it is not at home!

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT.

With a world of thought oppress'd,

I sunk from reverie to rest.

A horrid vision seized my head,

I saw the graves give up their dead!

Jove, arm'd with terrors, bursts the skies,

And thunder roars and lightning flies;

Amazed, confused, its fate unknown,

The world stands trembling at his throne!

While each pale sinner hung his head,

Jove, nodding, shook the heavens, and said:

"Offending race of human kind,

By nature, reason, learning, blind;

You who, through frailty, stepp'd aside;

And you, who never fell from pride:

You who in different sects were shamm'd,

And come to see each other damn'd;

(So some folk told you, but they knew

No more of Jove's designs than you);

--The world's mad business now is o'er,

And I resent these pranks no more.

--I to such blockheads set my wit!

I damn such fools!--Go, go, you're bit."

PAULUS THE LAWYER.

LINDSAY.

"A slave to crowds, scorch'd with the summer's heats,

In courts the wretched lawyer toils and sweats;

While smiling Nature, in her best attire,

Regales each sense, and vernal joys inspire.

Can he, who knows that real good should please

Barter for gold his liberty and ease?"

This Paulus preach'd:--When, entering at the door,

Upon his board the client pours the ore:

He grasps the shining gifts, pores o'er the cause,

Forgets the sun, and dozes o'er the laws.

EPIGRAMS BY THOMAS SHERIDAN.

ON A CARICATURE.

If you say this was made for friend Dan, you belie it,

I'll swear he's so like it that he was made by it.

ON DEAN SWIFT'S PROPOSED HOSPITAL FOR LUNATICS

Great wits to madness nearly are allied,

This makes the Dean for kindred THUS provide.

TO A DUBLIN PUBLISHER.

Who displayed a bust of Dean Swift in his window, while publishing

Lord Orrery's offensive remarks upon the Dean.

Faulkner! for once thou hast some judgment shown,

By representing Swift transformed to stone;

For could he thy ingratitude have known,

Astonishment itself the work had done!

WHICH IS WHICH.

BYRON.

"God bless the King! God bless the faith's defender!

God bless--no harm in blessing--the Pretender.

But who that pretender is, and who that king,

God bless us all, is quite another thing."

ON SOME LINES OF LOPEZ DE VEGA.

DR. JOHNSON.

If the man who turnips cries,

Cry not when his father dies,

'Tis a proof that he had rather

Have a turnip than his father.

ON A FULL-LENGTH PORTRAIT OF BEAU MARSH.

Placed between the busts of Newton and Pope.

LORD CHESTERFIELD

"Immortal Newton never spoke

More truth than here you'll find;

Nor Pope himself e'er penn'd a joke

More cruel on mankind.

"The picture placed the busts between,

Gives satire all its strength;

Wisdom and Wit are little seen--

But Folly at full length."

ON SCOTLAND.

CLEVELAND.

"Had Cain been Scot, God would have changed his doom;

Nor forced him wander, but confined him home."

EPIGRAMS OF PETER PINDAR.

EDMUND BURKE'S ATTACK ON WARREN HASTINGS

Poor Edmund sees poor Britain's setting sun:

Poor Edmund GROANS--and Britain is UNDONE!

Reader! thou hast, I do presume (God knows though) been in a snug

room,

By coals or wood made comfortably warm,

And often fancied that a storm WITHOUT,

Hath made a diabolic rout--

Sunk ships, tore trees up--done a world of harm.

Yes, thou hast lifted up thy tearful eyes,

Fancying thou heardst of mariners the cries;

And sigh'd, "How wretched now must thousands be!

Oh! how I pity the poor souls at sea!"

When, lo! this dreadful tempest, and his roar,

A ZEPHYR--in the key-hole of the door!

Now may not Edmund's howlings be a sigh

Pressing through Edmund's lungs for loaves and fishes,

On which he long hath looked with LONGING eye

To fill poor Edmund's not o'erburden'd dishes?

Give Mun a sup--forgot will be complaint;

Britain be safe, and Hastings prove a SAINT.

ON AN ARTIST

Who boasted that his pictures had hung near those of Sir Joshua

Reynolds in the Exhibition.

A shabby fellow chanc'd one day to meet

The British Roscius in the street,

Garrick, on whom our nation justly brags--

The fellow hugg'd him with a kind embrace--

"Good sir, I do not recollect your face,"

Quoth Garrick--"No!" replied the man of rags.

"The boards of Drury you and I have trod

Full many a time together, I am sure--"

"When?" with an oath, cried Garrick--"for by G--

I never saw that face of yours before!--

What characters, I pray,

Did you and I together play?"

"Lord!" quoth the fellow, "think not that I mock--

When you play'd Hamlet, sir--I play'd the cock"

ON THE CONCLUSION OF HIS ODES

"FINISH'D!" a disappointed artist cries,

With open mouth, and straining eyes;

Gaping for praise like a young crow for meat--

"Lord! why have you not mentioned ME!"

Mention THEE!

Thy IMPUDENCE hath put me in a SWEAT--

What rage for fame attends both great and small

Better be D--N'D, than mention'd NOT AT ALL!

THE LEX TALIONIS UPON BENJAMIN WEST

West tells the world that Peter can not rhyme--

Peter declares, point blank, that West can't paint.

West swears I've not an atom of sublime--

I swear he hath no notion of a saint;

And that his cross-wing'd cherubim are fowls,

Baptized by naturalists, owls:

Half of the meek apostles, gangs of robbers;

His angels, sets of brazen-headed lubbers.

The Holy Scripture says, "All flesh is grass,"

With Mr. West, all flesh is brick and brass;

Except his horse-flesh, that I fairly own

Is often of the choicest Portland stone.

I've said it too, that this artist's faces

Ne'er paid a visit to the graces:

That on expression he can never brag:

Yet for this article hath he been studying,

But in it never could surpass a pudding-

No, gentle reader, nor a pudding-bag.

I dare not say, that Mr. West

Can not sound criticism impart:

I'm told the man with technicals is blest,

That he can talk a deal upon the art;

Yes, he can talk, I do not doubt it--

"About it, goddess, and about it."

Thus, then, is Mr. West deserving praise--

And let my justice the fair laud afford;

For, lo! this far-fam'd artist cuts both ways,

Exactly like the angel Gabriel's sword;

The beauties of the art his CONVERSE shows,

His CANVAS almost ev'ry thing that's bad!

Thus at th' Academy, we must suppose,

A man more useful never could be had:

Who in himself, a host, so much can do;

Who is both precept and example too!

BARRY'S ATTACK UPON SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS

When Barry dares the President to fly on,

'Tis like a mouse, that, work'd into a rage

Daring some dreadful war to wage,

Nibbles the tail of the Nemaean lion.

Or like a louse, of mettle full,

Nurs'd in some giant's skull--

Because Goliath scratch'd him as he fed,

Employs with vehemence his angry claws,

And gaping, grinning, formidable jaws,

To CARRY OFF the GIANT'S HEAD!

ON THE DEATH OP MR. HONE, R. A.

There's one R. A. more dead! stiff is poor Hone--

His works be with him under the same stone:

I think the sacred art will not bemoan 'em;

But, Muse!--DE MORTUIS NIL NISI BONUM--

As to his host, a TRAV'LER, with a sneer,

Said of his DEAD SMALL-BEER.

Go, then, poor Hone! and join a numerous train

Sunk in OBLIVION'S wide pacific ocean;

And may its WHALE-LIKE stomach feel no motion

To cast thee, like a Jonah, up again.

ON GEORGE THE THIRD'S PATRONAGE OF BENJAMIN WEST.

Thus have I seen a child, with smiling face,

A little daisy in the garden place,

And strut in triumph round its fav'rite flow'r;

Gaze on the leaves with infant admiration,

Thinking the flow'r the finest in the nation,

Then pay a visit to it ev'ry hour:

Lugging the wat'ring-pot about,

Which John the gard'ner was oblig'd to fill;

The child, so pleas'd, would pour the water out,

To show its marvelous gard'ning skill;

Then staring round, all wild for praises panting,

Tell all the world it was its own sweet planting;

And boast away, too happy elf,

How that it found the daisy all itself!

ANOTHER ON THE SAME.

In SIMILE if I may shine agen-

Thus have I seen a fond old hen

With one poor miserable chick,

Bustling about a farmer's yard;

Now on the dunghill laboring hard,

Scraping away through thin and thick,

Flutt'ring her feathers--making such a noise!

Cackling aloud such quantities of joys,

As if this chick, to which her egg gave birth,

Was born to deal prodigious knocks,

To shine the Broughton of game cocks,

And kill the fowls of all the earth!

EPITAPH ON PETER STAGGS.

Poor Peter Staggs, now rests beneath this rail,

Who loved his joke, his pipe, and mug of ale;

For twenty years he did the duties well,

Of ostler, boots, and waiter at the "Bell."

But Death stepp'd in, and order'd Peter Staggs

To feed his worms, and leave the farmers' nags.

The church clock struck one--alas! 't was Peter's knell,

Who sigh'd, "I'm coming--that's the ostler's bell!"

TRAY'S EPITAPH.

Here rest the relics of a friend below,

Blest with more sense than half the folks I know:

Fond of his ease, and to no parties prone,

He damn'd no sect, but calmly gnaw'd his bone;

Perform'd his functions well in ev'ry way-

Blush, CHRISTIANS, if you can, and copy Tray.

ON A STONE THROWN AT A VERY GREAT MAN, BUT WHICH MISSED HIM.

Talk no more of the lucky escape of the head

From a flint so unluckily thrown-

I think very different, with thousands indeed,

'T was a lucky escape for the stone.

[The following stanza, on the death of Lady Mount E---'s favorite pig

Cupid, is verily exceeded by nothing in the annals of

impertinence.--P. P.]

A CONSOLATORY STANZA

TO LADY MOUNT E---, ON THE DEATH OF HER PIG CUPID.

O dry that tear, so round and big,

Nor waste in sighs your precious wind!

Death only takes a single pig--

Your lord and son are still behind.

EPIGRAMS BY ROBERT BURNS.

THE POET'S CHOICE.

I murder hate, by field or flood,

Though glory's name may screen us;

In wars at hame I'll spend my blood,

Life-giving wars of Venus.

The Jeities that I adore,

Are social peace and plenty;

I'm better pleased to make one more,

Than be the death of twenty.

ON A CELEBRATED RULING ELDER.

Here souter Hood in death does sleep;--

To h-ll, if he's gane thither,

Satan, gie him thy gear to keep,

He'll haud it weel thegither.

ON JOHN DOVE

INNKEEPER OF MAUCHLINE.

Here lies Johnny Pidgeon;

What was his religion?

Wha e'er desires to ken,

To some other warl'

Maun follow the carl,

For here Johnny Pidgeon had nane!

Strong ale was ablution--

Small beer, persecution,

A dram was MEMENTO MORI:

But a full flowing bowl

Was the saving his soul,

And port was celestial glory.

ON ANDREW TURNER.

In se'enteen hunder an' forty-nine,

Satan took stuff to mak' a swine,

And cuist it in a corner;

But wilily he chang'd his plan,

And shaped it something like a man.

And ca'd it Andrew Turner.

ON A SCOTCH COXCOMB

Light lay the earth on Billy's breast,

His chicken heart so tender;

But build a castle on his head,

His skull will prop it under.

ON GRIZZEL GRIM.

Here lies with death auld Grizzel Grim.

Lineluden's ugly witch;

O death, how horrid is thy taste,

To lie with such a b----!

ON A WAG IN MAUCHLINE.

Lament him, Mauchline husbands a',

He aften did assist ye;

For had ye stayed whole years awa,

Your wives they ne'er had missed ye.

Ye Mauchline bairns, as on ye pass

To school in bands thegither,

O tread ye lightly on his grass--

Perhaps he was your father.

EPITAPH ON W---.

Stop, thief! dame Nature cried to Death,

As Willie drew his latest breath;

You have my choicest model ta'en;

How shall I make a fool again?

ON A SUICIDE.

Earth'd up here lies an imp o' hell,

Planted by Satan's dibble--

Poor silly wretch, he's damn'd himsel'

To save the Lord the trouble.

EPIGRAMS FROM THE GERMAN OF LESSING.

NIGER.

"He's gone at last--old Niger's dead!"

Last night 'twas said throughout the city;

Each quidnunc gravely shook his head,

And HALF the town cried, "What a pity!"

The news proved false--'t was all a cheat--

The morning came the fact denying;

And ALL the town to-day repeat

What HALF the town last night was crying.

A NICE POINT.

Say which enjoys the greater blisses,

John, who Dorinda's picture kisses,

Or Tom, his friend, the favor'd elf,

Who kisses fair Dorinda's self?

Faith, 'tis not easy to divine,

While both are thus with raptures fainting,

To which the balance should incline,

Since Tom and John both kiss a painting.

THE POINT DECIDED.

Nay, surely John's the happier of the twain,

Because--the picture can not kiss again!

TRUE NOBILITY.

Young Stirps as any lord is proud,

Vain, haughty, insolent, and loud,

Games, drinks, and in the full career

Of vice, may vie with any peer;

Seduces daughters, wives, and mothers,

Spends his own cash, and that of others,

Pays like a lord--that is to say,

He never condescends to pay,

But bangs his creditor in requital--

And yet this blockhead wants a title!

TO A LIAR.

Lie as long as you will, my fine fellow, believe me,

Your rhodomontading will never deceive me;

Though you took me in THEN, I confess, my good youth,

When moved by caprice you once told me the truth.

MENDAX.

See yonder goes old Mendax, telling lies

To that good easy man with whom he's walking;

How know I that? you ask, with some surprise;

Why, don't you see, my friend, the fellow's talking.

THE BAD-WIFE.

SAVANS have decided, that search the globe round,

One only bad wife in the world can be found;

The worst of it is, as her name is not known,

Not a husband but swears that bad wife is his own.

THE DEAD MISER.

From the grave where dead Gripeall, the miser, reposes,

What a villainous odor invades all our noses!

It can't be his BODY alone--in the hole

They have certainly buried the usurer's SOUL.

ON FELL.

While Fell was reposing himself on the hay,

A reptile conceal'd bit his leg as he lay;

But all venom himself, of the wound he made light,

And got well, while the scorpion died of the bite.

THE BAD ORATOR.

So vile your grimace, and so croaking your speech,

One scarcely can tell if you're laughing or crying;

Were you fix'd on one's funeral sermon to preach,

The bare apprehension would keep one from dying.

THE WISE CHILD.

How plain your little darling says "Mamma,"

But still she calls you "Doctor," not "Papa."

One thing is clear: your conscientious rib

Has not yet taught the pretty dear to fib.

SPECIMEN OF THE LACONIC.

"Be less prolix," says Grill. I like advice--

"Grill, you're an ass!" Now surely that's concise.

CUPID AND MERCURY, OR THE BARGAIN.

Sly Cupid late with Maia's son

Agreed to live as friend and brother;

In proof, his bow and shafts the one

Chang'd for the well-fill'd purse of t'other.

And now, the transfer duly made,

Together through the world they rove;

The thieving god in arms array'd,

And gold the panoply of love!

FRITZ.

Quoth gallant Fritz, "I ran away

To fight again another day."

The meaning of his speech is plain,

He only fled to fly again.

ON DORILIS.

That Dorilis thus, on her lap as he lies,

Should kiss little Pompey, excites no surprise;

But the lapdog whom thus she keeps fondling and praising,

Licks her face in return--that I own is amazing!

TO A SLOW WALKER AND QUICK EATER.

So slowly you walk, and so quickly you eat,

You should march with your mouth, and devour with your feet.

ON TWO BEAUTIFUL ONE-EYED SISTERS

Give up one eye, and make your sister's two,

Venus she then would be, and Cupid you.

THE PER-CONTRA, OR MATRIMONIAL BALANCE

How strange, a deaf wife to prefer!

True, but she's also dumb, good sir.

EPIGRAMS S. T. COLERIDGE.

AN EXPECTORATION,

Or Spienetic Extempore, on my joyful departure from the city of

Cologne.

As I am rhymer,

And now, at least, a merry one,

Mr. Mum's Eudesheimer,

And the church of St. Geryon,

Are the two things alone,

That deserve to be known,

In the body-and-soul-stinking town of Cologne.

EXPECTORATION THE SECOND.

In Clon, the town of monks and bones,

And pavements fanged with murderous stones,

And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches,

I counted two-and-seventy stenches,

All well defined and separate stinks!

Ye nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks,

The river Rhine, it is well known,

Doth wash your city of Cologne.

But tell me, nymphs, what power divine

Shall henceforth wash the river Rhine?

TO A LADY,

Offended by a sportive observation that women have no souls.

Nay, dearest Anna, why so grave?

I said you had no soul,'tis true,

For what you ARE you can not HAVE;

'Tis _I_ that have one since I first had you.

AVARO.

[STOLEN FROM LESSING.]

There comes from old Avaro's grave

A deadly stench--why sure they have

Immured his SOUL within his grave.

BEELZEBUB AND JOB.

Sly Beelzebub took all occasions

To try Job's constancy and patience.

He took his honor, took his health,

He took his children, took his wealth,

His servants, oxen, horses, cows--

But cunning Satan did not take his spouse.

But Heaven, that brings out good from evil,

And loves to disappoint the devil,

Had predetermined to restore

Twofold all he had before;

His servants, horses, oxen, cows--

Short-sighted devil, not to take his spouse!

SENTIMENTAL.

The rose that blushes like the morn,

Bedecks the valleys low:

And so dost thou, sweet infant corn,

My Angelina's toe.

But on the rose there grows a thorn,

That breeds disastrous woe:

And so dost thou, remorseless corn,

On Angelina's toe.

AN ETERNAL POEM.

Your poem must ETERNAL be,

Dear sir, it can not fail,

For 'tis incomprehensible,

And wants both head and tail.

BAD POETS.

Swans sing before they die--'t were no bad thing;

Did certain persons die before they sing.

TO MR. ALEXANDRE, THE VENTRILOQUIST.

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

Of yore, in Old England, it was not thought good,

To carry two visages under one hood:

What should folks say to YOU? who have faces so plenty,

That from under one hood you last night showed us twenty!

Stand forth, arch deceiver, and tell us in truth,

Are you handsome or ugly, in age or in youth?

Man, woman or child--a dog or a mouse?

Or are you, at once, each live thing in the house?

Each live thing did I ask?--each dead implement too,

A workshop in your person--saw, chisel, and screw!

Above all, are you one individual?--I know

You must be, at least, Alexandre and Co.

But I think you're a troop, an assemblage, a mob,

And that I, as the sheriff, should take up the job:

And, instead of rehearsing your wonders in verse,

Must read you the riot-act, and bid you disperse!

THE SWALLOWS.

R. BRINSLEY SHERIDAN.

The Prince of Wales came into Brooke's one day, and complained of

cold, but after drinking three glasses of brandy and water, said he

felt comfortable.

The prince came in and said't was cold,

Then put to his head the rummer,

Till SWALLOW after SWALLOW came,

When he pronounced it summer.

FRENCH AND ENGLISH.

ERSKINE

The French have taste in all they do, Which we are quite without;

For Nature, that to them gave GOUT

To us gave only gout.

EPIGRAMS BY THOMAS MOORE.

TO SIR HUDSON LOWE.

Sir Hudson Lowe, Sir Hudson LOW

(By name, and ah! by nature so),

As thou art fond of persecutions,

Perhaps thou'st read, or heard repeated,

How Captain Gulliver was treated,

When thrown among the Lilliputians.

They tied him down-these little men did--

And having valiantly ascended

Upon the Mighty Man's protuberance,

They did so strut!--upon my soul,

It must have been extremely droll

To see their pigmy pride's exuberance!

And how the doughty mannikins

Amused themselves with sticking pins

And needles in the great man's breeches;

And how some VERY little things,

That pass'd for Lords, on scaffoldings

Got up and worried him with speeches.

Alas! alas! that it should happen

To mighty men to be caught napping!--

Though different, too, these persecutions

For Gulliver, THERE, took the nap,

While, HERE, the NAP, oh sad mishap, Is taken by the Lilliputians!

DIALOGUE

BETWEEN A CATHOLIC DELEGATE AND HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS DUKE OF CUMBERLAND.

Said his Highness to NED, with that grim face of his,

"Why refuse us the VETO, dear Catholic NEDDY?"--

"Because, sir" said NED, looking full in his phiz,

"You're FORBIDDING enough, in all conscience, already!"

TO MISS -----

With woman's form and woman's tricks

So much of man you seem to mix,

One knows not where to take you;

I pray you, if 'tis not too far,

Go, ask of Nature WHICH you are,

Or what she meant to make you.

Yet stay--you need not take the pains

With neither beauty, youth, nor brains,

For man or maid's desiring:

Pert as female, fool as male,

As boy too green, as girl too stale

The thing's not worth inquiring!

TO -----

Die when you will, you need not wear

At heaven's court a form more fair

Than Beauty here on earth has given;

Keep but the lovely looks we see

The voice we hear and you will be

An angel READY-MADE for heaven!

UPON BEING OBLIGED TO LEAVE A PLEASANT PARTY

FROM THE WANT OF A PAIR OF BREECHES TO DRESS FOR DINNER IN.

Between Adam and me the great difference is,

Though a paradise each has been forced to resign,

That he never wore breeches till turn'd out of his,

While, for want of my breeches, I'm banish'd from mine

WHAT'S MY THOUGHT LIKE?

QUEST.-Why is a Pump like Viscount CASTLEREAGH?

ANSW.-Because it is a slender thing of wood,

That up and down its awkward arm doth sway,

And coolly spout, and spout, and spout away,

In one weak, washy, everlasting flood!

FROM THE FRENCH.

Of all the men one meets about,

There's none like Jack--he's everywhere:

At church--park--auction--dinner--rout--

Go when and where you will, he's there.

Try the West End, he's at your back--

Meets you, like Eurus, in the East--

You're call'd upon for "How do, Jack?"

One hundred times a-day, at least.

A friend of his one evening said,

As home he took his pensive way,

"Upon my soul, I fear Jack's dead--

I've seen him but three times to-day!"

A JOKE VERSIFIED.

"Come, come," said Tom's father, "at your time of life,

There's no longer excuse for thus playing the rake--

It is time you should think, boy, of taking a wife."--

"Why, so it is, father--whose wife shall I take?"

THE SURPRISE.

Doloris, I swear, by all I ever swore,

That from this hour I shall not love thee more.--

"What! love no more? Oh! why this alter'd vow?

Because I CAN NOT love thee MORE--than NOW!"

ON ----.

Like a snuffers, this loving old dame,

By a destiny grievous enough,

Though so oft she has snapp'd at the flame,

Hath never more than the snuff.

ON A SQUINTING POETESS.

To no ONE Muse does she her glance confine,

But has an eye, at once to ALL THE NINE!

ON A TUET-HUNTER.

Lament, lament, Sir Isaac Heard,

Put mourning round thy page, Debrett,

For here lies one, who ne'er preferr'd

A Viscount to a Marquis yet.

Beside his place the God of Wit,

Before him Beauty's rosiest girls,

Apollo for a STAR he'd quit,

And Love's own sister for an Earl's.

Did niggard fate no peers afford,

He took, of course, to peers' relations;

And, rather than not sport a lord,

Put up with even the last creations.

Even Irish names, could he but tag 'em

With "Lord" and "Duke," were sweet to call,

And, at a pinch, Lord Ballyraggum

Was better than no Lord at all.

Heaven grant him now some noble nook,

For, rest his soul, he'd rather be

Genteelly damn'd beside a Duke,

Than saved in vulgar company.

THE KISS.

Give me, my love, that billing kiss

I taught you one delicious night,

When, turning epicures in bliss,

We tried inventions of delight.

Come, gently steal my lips along,

And let your lips in murmurs move

Ah, no!--again--that kiss was wrong

How can you be so dull, my love?

"Cease, cease!" the blushing girl replied

And in her milky arms she caught me

"How can you thus your pupil chide;

You know 'T WAS IN THE DARK you taught me!"

EPITAPH ON A WELL-KNOWN POET--(ROBERT SOUTHEY.)

Beneath these poppies buried deep,

The bones of Bob the bard lie hid;

Peace to his manes; and may he sleep

As soundly as his readers did!

Through every sort of verse meandering,

Bob went without a hitch or fall,

Through Epic, Sapphic, Alexandrine,

To verse that was no verse at all;

Till fiction having done enough,

To make a bard at least absurd,

And give his readers QUANTUM SUFF.,

He took to praising George the Third:

And now, in virtue of his crown,

Dooms us, poor whigs, at once to slaughter,

Like Donellan of bad renown,

Poisoning us all with laurel-water.

And yet at times some awkward qualms he

Felt about leaving honor's track;

And though he's got a butt of Malmsey,

It may not save him from a sack.

Death, weary of so dull a writer,

Put to his works a FINIS thus.

Oh! may the earth on him lie lighter

Than did his quartos upon us!

WRITTEN IN A YOUNG LADY'S COMMON-PLACE BOOK,

Called the "Book of Follies."

This journal of folly's an emblem of me;

But what book shall we find emblematic of thee?

Oh! shall we not say thou art LOVE'S DUODECIMO?

None can be prettier, few can be less, you know.

Such a volume in SHEETS were a volume of charms;

Or if BOUND, it should only be BOUND IN OUR ARMS!

THE RABBINICAL ORIGIN OF WOMEN.

They tell us that Woman was made of a rib

Just pick'd from a corner so snug in the side;

But the Rabbins swear to you that this is a fib,

And 't was not so at all that the sex was supplied.

For old Adam was fashion'd, the first of his kind,

With a tail like a monkey, full a yard and a span;

And when Nature cut off this appendage behind,

Why--then woman was made of the tail of the man.

If such is the tie between women and men,

The ninny who weds is a pitiful elf;

For he takes to his tail, like an idiot, again,

And makes a most damnable ape of himself!

Yet, if we may judge as the fashions prevail,

Every husband remembers the original plan,

And, knowing his wife is no more than his tail,

Why--he leaves her behind him as much as he can.

ANACREONTIQUE.

Press the grape, and let it pour

Around the board its purple shower;

And while the drops my goblet steep,

I'll think--in WOE the clusters weep.

Weep on, weep on, my pouting vine!

Heaven grant no tears but tears of wine.

Weep on; and, as thy sorrows flow,

I'll taste the LUXURY OF WOE!

SPECULATION.

Of all speculations the market holds forth,

The best that I know for a lover of pelf,

Is to buy --- up at the price he is worth,

And then sell him at that which he sets on himself.

ON BUTLER'S MONUMENT.

REV. SAMUEL WESLEY.

While Butler, needy wretch, was yet alive,

No generous patron would a dinner give.

See him, when starved to death and turn'd to dust,

Presented with a monumental bust.

The poet's fate is here in emblem shown--

He ask'd for BREAD, and he received a STONE.

ON THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF THE WHIG ASSOCIATES OP THE PRINCE REGENT, AT

NOT OBTAINING OFFICE.

CHARLES LAMB.

Ye politicians, tell me, pray,

Why thus with woe and care rent?

This is the worst that you can say,

Some wind has blown the wig away,

And left the HAIR APPARENT.

TO PROFESSOR AIREY,

On his marrying a beautiful woman.

SIDNEY SMITH

Airey alone has gained that double prize,

Which forced musicians to divide the crown;

His works have raised a mortal to the skies,

His marriage-vows have drawn a mortal down.

ON LORD DUDLEY AND WARD.

SAMUEL ROGERS

"They say Ward has no heart, but I deny it;

He has a heart--and gets his speeches by it."

EPIGRAMS OF LORD BYRON.

TO THE AUTHOR OF A SONNET BEGINNING

"'SAD IS MY VERSE,' YOU SAY, 'AND YET NO TEAR.'"

Thy verse is "sad" enough, no doubt,

A devilish deal more sad than witty!

Why should we weep, I can't find out,

Unless for THEE we weep in pity.

Yet there is one I pity more,

And much, alas! I think he needs it--

For he, I'm sure, will suffer sore,

Who, to his own misfortune, reads it.

The rhymes, without the aid of magic,

May ONCE be read--but never after;

Yet their effect's by no means tragic,

Although by far too dull for laughter.

But would you make our bosoms bleed,

And of no common pang complain?

If you would make us weep indeed,

Tell us you'll read them o'er again.

WINDSOR POETICS.

On the Prince Regent being seen standing between the coffins of Henry

VIII. and Charles I, in the royal vault at Windsor.

Famed for contemptuous breach of sacred ties,

By headless Charles see heartless Henry lies;

Between them stands another sceptered thing--

It moves, it reigns--in all but name, a king;

Charles to his people, Henry to his wife,

--In him the double tyrant starts to life;

Justice and death have mixed their dust in vain,

Each royal vampyre wakes to life again.

Ah! what can tombs avail, since these disgorge

The blood and dust of both to mold a George?

ON A CARRIER WHO DIED OF DRUNKENNESS.

John Adams lies here, of the parish of Southwell,

A carrier who carried his can to his mouth well;

He carried so much, and he carried so fast,

He could carry no more--so was carried at last;

For the liquor he drank, being too much for one,

He could not carry off--so he's now carriON.

EPIGRAMS OF BARHAM.

ON THE WINDOWS OF KING'S COLLEGE REMAINING BOARDED.

Loquitur Discipulus Esuriens.

Professors, in your plan there seems

A something not quite right:

'Tis queer to cherish learning's beams

By shutting out the light.

While thus we see your windows block'd,

If nobody complains;

Yet everybody must be shock'd,

To see you don't take pains.

And tell me why should bodily

Succumb to mental meat?

Or why should Pi-ra, Beta Pi-ra, Pi-c,

Be all the pie we eat?

No HELLUO LIBRORUM I,

No literary glutton,

Would veal with Virgil like to try,

With metaphysics, mutton.

Leave us no longer in the lurch,

With Romans, Greeks, and Hindoos:

But give us beef instead of birch,

And BOARD US--not your windows.

NEW-MADE HONOR.

[IMITATED FROM MARTIAL.]

A friend I met, some half hour since--

"GOOD-MORROW JACK!" quoth I;

The new-made Knight, like any Prince,

Frown'd, nodded, and pass'd by;

When up came Jem--"Sir John, your slave!"

"Ah, James; we dine at eight--

Fail not--(low bows the supple knave)

Don't make my lady wait."

The king can do no wrong? As I'm a sinner,

He's spoilt an honest tradesman and my dinner.

EHEU FUGACES.

What Horace says is,

Eheu fugaces

Anni labunter, Postume, Postume!

Years glide away, and are lost to me, lost to me I

Now, when the folks in the dance sport their merry toes,

Taglionis, and Ellslers, Duvernays and Ceritos,

Sighing, I murmur, "O mihi praeteritos !"

ANONYMOUS EPIGRAMS

ON A PALE LADY WITH A RED-NOSED HUSBAND.

Whence comes it that, in Clara's face,

The lily only has its place?

Is it because the absent rose

Has gone to paint her husband's nose?

UPON POPE'S TRANSLATION OF HOMER

So much, dear Pope, thy English Homer charms,

As pity melts us, or as passion warms,

That after ages will with wonder seek

Who 'twas translated Homer into Greek.

RECIPE FOR A MODERN BONNET.

Two scraps of foundation, some fragments of lace,

A shower of French rose-buds to droop o'er the face;

Fine ribbons and feathers, with crage and illusions,

Then mix and DErange them in graceful confusion;

Inveigle some fairy, out roaming for pleasure,

And beg the slight favor of taking her measure,

The length and the breadth of her dear little pate,

And hasten a miniature frame to create;

Then pour, as above, the bright mixture upon it,

And lo! you possess "such a love of a bonnet!"

MY WIFE AND I

As my wife and I, at the window one day,

Stood watching a man with a monkey,

A cart came by, with a "broth of a boy,"

Who was driving a stout little donkey.

To my wife I then spoke, by way of a joke,

"There's a relation of yours in that carriage."

To which she replied, as the donkey she spied,

"Ah, yes, a relation--BY MARRIAGE!"

ON TWO GENTLEMEN,

One of whom, O'Connell, delayed a duel on the plea of his wife's

illness; the other declined on account of the illness of his daughter.

Some men, with a horror of slaughter,

Improve on the Scripture command,

And honor their wife and their daughter,

That their days may be long in the land.

WELLINGTON'S NOSE.

"Pray, why does the great Captain's nose

Resemble Venice?" Duncomb cries.

"Why," quoth Sam Rogers, "I suppose.

Because it has a bridge of size (sighs)."

THE SMOKER.

All dainty meats I do defy

Which feed men fat as swine,

He is a frugal man indeed

That on a leaf can dine!

He needs no napkin for his hands,

His finger's ends to wipe,

That keeps his kitchen in a box,

And roast meat in his pipe!

AN ESSAY ON THE UNDERSTANDING.

"Harry, I can not think," says Dick,

"What makes my ANKLES grow so thick:"

"You do not recollect," says Harry,

"How great a CALF they have to carry."

TO A LIVING AUTHOR.

Your comedy I've read, my friend,

And like the half you pilfer'd best;

But sure the piece you yet may mend:

Take courage, man! and steal the rest.

EPIGRAMS BY THOMAS HOOD.

ON THE ART-UNIONS.

That picture-raffles will conduce to nourish

Design, or cause good coloring to flourish,

Admits of logic-chopping and wise sawing,

But surely lotteries encourage drawing.

THE SUPERIORITY OF MACHINERY.

A mechanic his labor will often discard

If the rate of his pay he dislikes:

But a clock--and its case is uncommonly hard--

Will continue to work though it STRIKES.

EPIGRAMS BY W. SAVAGE LANDOR

ON OBSERVING A VULGAR NAME ON THE PLINTH OF AN ANCIENT STATUE.

Barbarians must we always be?

Wild hunters in pursuit of fame?

Must there be nowhere stone or tree

Ungashed with some ignoble name.

O Venus! in thy Tuscan dome

May every god watch over thee!

Apollo I bend thy bow o'er Rome,

And guard thy sister's chastity.

Let Britons paint their bodies blue

As formerly, but touch not you.

LYING IN STATE.

Now from the chamber all are gone

Who gazed and wept o'er Wellington;

Derby and Dis do all they can

To emulate so great a man:

If neither can be quite so great,

Resolved is each to LIE IN STATE.

[Illustration: LANDOR]

EPIGRAMS FROM PUNCH.

THE CAUSE.

Lisette has lost her wanton wiles--

What secret care consumes her youth,

And circumscribes her smiles?--

A SPECK ON A FRONT TOOTH?

IRISH PARTICULAR.

Shiel's oratory's like bottled Dublin stout--

For, draw the cork, and only froth comes out.

ONE GOOD TURN DESERVES ANOTHER

A poor man went to hang himself,

But treasure chanced to find:

He pocketed the miser's pelf

And left the rope behind.

His money gone, the miser hung

Himself in sheer despair:

Thus each the other's wants supplied,

And that was surely fair.

STICKY.

I'm going to seal a letter, Dick,

Some WAX pray give to me.

I have not got a SINGLE STICK,

Or WHACKS I'd give to thee.

THE POET FOILED.

To win the maid the poet tries,

And sometimes writes to Julia's eye

She likes a VERSE--but, cruel whim,

She still appears A-VERSE to him.

BLACK AND WHITE

The Tories vow the Whigs are black as night,

And boast that they are only blessed with light.

Peel's politics to both sides so incline,

His may be called the EQUINOCTIAL LINE.

INQUEST--NOT EXTRAORDINARY.

Great Bulwer's works fell on Miss Basbleu's head,

And, in a moment, lo! the maid was dead!

A jury sat, and found the verdict plain--

She died of MILK and WATER ON THE BRAIN.

DOMESTIC ECONOMY.

Said Stiggins to his wife, one day,

"We've nothing left to eat;

If things go on in this queer way,

We shan't make BOTH ENDS MEET."

The dame replied, in words discreet,

"We're not so badly fed,

If we can make but ONE end MEAT,

And make the other BREAD."

ON SEEING AN EXECUTION.

One morn, two friends before the Newgate drop,

To see a culprit throttled, chanced to stop:

"Alas!" cried one, as round in air he spun,

"That miserable wretch's RACE IS RUN."

"True," said the other, drily, "to his cost,

The race is run--but, by a NECK 'tis lost."

A VOICE, AND NOTHING ELSE.

"I wonder if Brougham thinks as much as he talks,"

Said a punster, perusing a trial:

"I vow, since his lordship was made Baron Vaux,

He's been VAUX ET PRAETEREA NIHIL!"

THE AMENDE HONORABLE.

Quoth Will, "On that young servant-maid

My heart its life-string stakes."

"Quite safe!" cries Dick, "don't be afraid--

She pays for all she breaks."

THE CZAR.

CZAR NICHOLAS is so devout, they say,

His majesty does nothing else than prey.

BAS BLEU.

Ma'amselle Bas Bleu, erudite virgin,

With learned zeal is ever urging

The love and reverence due

From modern men to things antique,

Egyptian, British, Roman, Greek,

Relic of Gaul or Jew.

No wonder that, Ma'amselle, the love

Due to antiquity to prove

And urge is ever prone;

She knows where'er there cease to be

Admirers of Antiquity,

She needs must lose her own!

TO A RICH YOUNG WIDOW.

I will not ask if thou canst touch

The tuneful ivory key?

Those silent notes of thine are such

As quite suffice for me.

I'll make no question if thy skill

The pencil comprehends,

Enough for me, love, if thou still

Canst draw thy dividends!

THE RAILWAY OP LIFE.

Short was the passage through this earthly vale,

By turnpike roads when mortals used to wend;

But now we travel by the way of rail,

As soon again we reach the journey's end.

A CONJUGAL CONUNDRUM.

Which is of greater value, prythee, say,

The Bride or Bridegroom?--must the truth be told?

Alas, it must! The Bride is given away--

The Bridegroom's often regularly sold.

NUMBERS ALTERED.

The lounger must oft, as he walks through the streets,

Be struck with the grace of some girl that he meets;

So graceful behind in dress--ringlets--all that--

But one gaze at the front--what a horrid old cat!

You then think of the notice you've seen on a door,

Which informs you, of "70 late 24."

GRAMMAR FOR THE COURT OF BERLIN

His majesty you should not say of FRITZ,

That king is neuter; so for HIS, use ITS.

THE EMPTY BOTTLE.

WILLIAM AYTOUN

Ah, liberty! how like thou art

To this large bottle lying here,

Which yesterday from foreign mart,

Came filled with potent English beer!

A touch of steel--a hand--a gush--

A pop that sounded far and near--

A wild emotion--liquid rush--

And I had drunk that English beer!

And what remains?--An empty shell!

A lifeless form both sad and queer,

A temple where no god doth dwell--

The simple memory of beer!

THE DEATH OF DOCTOR MORRISON.

BENTLEY'S MISCELLANY.

What's the news?--Why, they say Death has killed Dr. Morrison.

The Pill-maker? Yes. Then Death will be sorry soon.

EPIGRAMS BY JOHN G. SAXE.

ON A RECENT CLASSIC CONTROVERSY.

Nay, marvel not to see these scholars fight,

In brave disdain of certain scath and scar;

'Tis but the genuine, old, Hellenic spite,--

"When Greek meets Greek, then comes the tug of war!"

ANOTHER.

Quoth David to Daniel--"Why is it these scholars

Abuse one another whenever they speak?"

Quoth Daniel to David--"it nat'rally follers

Folks come to hard words if they meddle with Greek!"

ON AN ILL-READ LAWYER.

An idle attorney besought a brother

For "something to read--some novel or other,

That was really fresh and new."

"Take Chitty!" replied his legal friend,

"There isn't a book that I could lend

Would prove more 'novel' to you!"

ON AN UGLY PERSON SITTING FOR A DAGUERREOTYPE

Here Nature in her glass--the wanton elf--

Sits gravely making faces at herself;

And while she scans each clumsy feature o'er,

Repeats the blunders that she made before!

WOMAN'S WILL.

Men dying make their wills--but wives

Escape a work so sad;

Why should they make what all their lives

The gentle dames have had?

FAMILY QUARRELS.

"A fool," said Jeanette, "is a creature I hate!"

"But hating," quoth John, "is immoral;

Besides, my dear girl, it's a terrible fate

To be found in a family quarrel!"

A REVOLUTIONARY HERO.

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

Old Joe is gone, who saw hot Percy goad

His slow artillery up the Concord road,

A tale which grew in wonder year by year;

As every time he told it, Joe drew near

To the main fight, till faded and grown gray,

The original scene to bolder tints gave way;

Then Joe had heard the foe's scared double-quick

Beat on stove drum with one uncaptured stick,

And, ere death came the lengthening tale to lop,

Himself had fired, and seen a red-coat drop;

Had Joe lived long enough, that scrambling fight

Had squared more nearly to his sense of right,

And vanquished Perry, to complete the tale,

Had hammered stone for life in Concord jail.

EPIGRAMS OF HALPIN

THE LAST RESORT.

A dramatist declared he had got

So many people in his plot,

That what to do with half he had

Was like to drive him drama-mad!

"The hero and the heroine

Of course are married--very fine!

But with the others, what to do

Is more than I can tell--can you?"

His friend replied--"'Tis hard to say,

But yet I think there is a way.

The married couple, thank their stars

And half the 'others' take the cars,

The other half you put on board

An Erie steamboat--take my word,

They'll never trouble you again!"

The dramatist resumed his pen.

FEMININE ARITHMETIC.

LAURA.

On me he shall ne'er put a ring,

So, mamma, 'tis in vain to take trouble--

For I was but eighteen in spring,

While his age exactly is double.

MAMMA

He's but in his thirty-sixth year,

Tall, handsome, good-natured and witty,

And should you refuse him, my dear,

May you die an old maid without pity!

LAURA

His figure, I grant you, will pass,

And at present he's young enough plenty;

But when I am sixty, alas!

Will not he be a hundred and twenty?

THE MUSHROOM HUNT.

In early days, ere Common Sense

And Genius had in anger parted,

They made to friendship some pretense,

Though each, Heaven knows! diversely hearted.

To hunt for mushrooms once they went,

Through nibbled sheepwalks straying onward,

Sense with his dull eyes earthward bent,

While Genius shot his glances sunward!

Away they go! On roll the hours,

And toward the west the day-god edges;

See! Genius holds a wreath of flowers,

Fresh culled from all the neighboring hedges!

Alas! ere eve their bright hues flit,

While Common Sense (whom I so doat on!)

Thanked God "that he had little wit,"

And drank his ketchup with his mutton.

JUPITER AMANS.

DEDICATED TO VICTOR HUGO.

LONDON LEADER

"Le petit" call not him who by one act

Has turned old fable into modern fact

Nap Louis courted Europe: Europe shied:

Th' imperial purple was too newly dyed.

"I'll have her though," thought he, "by rape or rapine;

Jove nods sometimes, but catch a Nap a napping!

And now I think of Jove, 't was Jove's own fix,

And so I'll borrow one of Jove's own tricks:

Old itching Palm I'll tickle with a joke,

And he shall lend me England's decent cloak."

'Twas said and done, and his success was full;

He won Europa with the guise of Bull!

THE ORATOR'S EPITAPH.

LORD BROUGHAM.

"Here, reader, turn your weeping eyes,

My fate a useful moral teaches;

The hole in which my body lies

Would not contain one-half my speeches."

ECCENTRIC AND NONDESCRIPT.

THE JOVIAL PRIEST'S CONFESSION.

TRANSLATED FROM THE LATIN OF WALTER DE MAPES,

TIME OF HENRY II.

LEIGH HUNT.

I devise to end my days--in a tavern drinking,

May some Christian hold for me--the glass when I am shrinking.

That the cherubim may cry--when they see me sinking,

God be merciful to a soul--of this gentleman's way of thinking.

A glass of wine amazingly--enlighteneth one's intervals;

'Tis wings bedewed with nectar--that fly up to supernals;

Bottles cracked in taverns--have much the sweeter kernels,

Than the sups allowed to us--in the college journals.

Every one by nature hath--a mold which he was cast in;

I happen to be one of those--who never could write fasting;

By a single little boy--I should be surpass'd in

Writing so: I'd just as lief--be buried; tomb'd and grass'd in.

Every one by nature hath--a gift too, a dotation:

I, when I make verses--do get the inspiration

Of the very best of wine--that comes into the nation:

It maketh sermons to astound--for edification.

Just as liquor floeth good--floweth forth my lay so;

But I must moreover eat--or I could not say so;

Naught it availeth inwardly--should I write all day so;

But with God's grace after meat--I beat Ovidius Naso.

Neither is there given to me--prophetic animation,

Unless when I have eat and drank--yea, ev'n to saturation,

Then in my upper story--hath Bacchus domination

And Phoebus rushes into me, and beggareth all relation.

TONIS AD RESTO MARE.

ANONYMOUS

AIR--"Oh, Mary, heave a sigh for me."

O MARE aeva si forme;

Forme ure tonitru;

Iambicum as amandum,

Olet Hymen promptu;

Mihi is vetas an ne se,

As humano erebi;

Olet mecum marito te,

Or eta beta pi.

Alas, plano more meretrix,

Mi ardor vel uno;

Inferiam ure artis base,

Tolerat me urebo.

Ah me ve ara silicet,

Vi laudu vimin thus?

Hiatu as arandum sex--

Illuc Ionicus.

Heu sed heu vix en imago,

My missis mare sta;

O cantu redit in mihi

Hibernas arida?

A veri vafer heri si,

Mihi resolves indu:

Totius olet Hymen cum--

Accepta tonitru.

DIC.

DEAN SWIFT.

Dic, heris agro at, an da quar to fine ale,

Fora ringat ure nos, an da stringat ure tale.

[Footnote: Dick, here is a groat, a quart o' fine ale.

For a ring at your nose, and a string at your tail.]

MOLL.

DEAN SWIFT.

Mollis abuti,

Has an acuti,

No lasso finis,

Molli divinis.

[Footnote: Moll is a beauty,

Has an acute eye;

No lass so fine is,

Molly divine is.]

TO MY MISTRESS.

DEAN SWIFT.

O mi de armis tres,

Imi na dis tres.

Cantu disco ver

Meas alo ver?

[Footnote: O my dear mistress

I am in a distress.

Can't you discover

Me as a lover?]

A LOVE SONG.

DEAN SWIFT.

Apud in is almi de si re,

Mimis tres I ne ver re qui re,

Alo veri findit a gestis,

His miseri ne ver at restis.

[Footnote: A pudding is all my desire,

My mistress I never require;

A lover I find it a jest is,

His misery never at rest is.]

A GENTLE ECHO ON WOMAN.

IN THE DORIC MANNER.

DEAN SWIFT.

Shepherd. Echo, I ween, will in the woods reply,

And quaintly answer questions: shall I try?

Echo. Try.

Shepherd. What must we do our passion to express?

Echo. Press.

Shepherd. How shall I please her, who ne'er loved before?

Echo. Before.

Shepherd. What most moves women when we them address?

Echo. A dress.

Shepherd. Say, what can keep her chaste whom I adore?

Echo. A door.

Shepherd. If music softens rocks, love tunes my lyre.

Echo. Liar.

Shepherd. Then teach me, Echo, how shall I come by her?

Echo. Buy her.

Shepherd. When bought, no question I shall be her dear?

Echo. Her deer.

Shepherd. But deer have horns: how must I keep her under?

Echo. Keep her under.

Shepherd. But what can glad me when she's laid on bier?

Echo. Beer.

Shepherd. What must I do when women will be kind?

Echo. Be kind.

Shepherd. What must I do when women will be cross?

Echo. Be cross.

Shepherd. Lord, what is she that can so turn and wind?

Echo. Wind.

Shepherd. If she be wind, what stills her when she blows?

Echo. Blows.

Shepherd. But if she bang again, still should I bang her?

Echo. Bang her.

Shepherd. Is there no way to moderate her anger?

Echo. Hang her.

Shepherd. Thanks, gentle Echo! right thy answers tell

What woman is and how to guard her well.

Echo. Guard her well.

TO MY NOSE.

ANONYMOUS.

Knows he that never took a pinch,

Nosey! the pleasure thence which flows?

Knows he the titillating joy

Which my nose knows?

Oh, nose! I am as fond of thee

As any mountain of its snows!

I gaze on thee, and feel that pride

A Roman knows!

ROGER AND DOLLY.

BLACKWOOD.

Young Roger came tapping at Dolly's window--

Thumpaty, thumpaty, thump;

He begg'd for admittance--she answered him no--

Glumpaty, glumpaty, glump.

No, no, Roger, no--as you came you may go--

Stumpaty, stumpaty, stump.

O what is the reason, dear Dolly? he cried--

Humpaty, humpaty, hump--

That thus I'm cast off and unkindly denied?--

Trumpaty, trumpaty, trump--

Some rival more dear, I guess, has been here--

Crumpaty, crumpaty, crump--

Suppose there's been two, sir, pray what's that to you, sir

Numpaty, numpaty, nump--

Wi' a disconsolate look his sad farewell he took--

Trumpaty, trumputy, trump--

And all in despair jump'd into a brook--

Jumpaty, jumpaty, jump--

His courage did cool in a filthy green pool--

Slumpaty, slumpaty, slump--

So he swam to the shore, but saw Dolly no more--

Dumpaty, dumpaty, dump--

He did speedily find one more fat and more kind--

Plumpaty, plumpaty, plump--

But poor Dolly's afraid she must die an old maid--

Mumpaty, mumpaty, mump.

THE IRISHMAN.

BLACKWOOD.

I.

There was a lady lived at Leith,

A lady very stylish, man,

And yet, in spite of all her teeth,

She fell in love with an Irishman,

A nasty, ugly Irishman,

A wild tremendous Irishman,

A tearing, swearing, thumping, bumping, ranting, roaring Irishman.

II.

His face was no ways beautiful,

For with small-pox 't was scarred across:

And the shoulders of the ugly dog

Were almost doubled a yard across.

O the lump of an Irishman,

The whiskey devouring Irishman--

The great he-rogue with his wonderful brogue, the fighting, rioting

Irishman.

III.

One of his eyes was bottle green,

And the other eye was out, my dear;

And the calves of his wicked-looking legs

Were more than two feet about, my dear,

O, the great big Irishman,

The rattling, battling Irishman--

The stamping, ramping, swaggering, staggering, leathering swash of an

Irishman.

IV.

He took so much of Lundy-foot,

That he used to snort and snuffle--O,

And in shape and size the fellow's neck

Was as bad as the neck of a buffalo.

O, the horrible Irishman,

The thundering, blundering Irishman--

The slashing, dashing, smashing, lashing, thrashing, hashing Irishman.

V.

His name was a terrible name, indeed,

Being Timothy Thady Mulligan;

And whenever he emptied his tumbler of punch,

He'd not rest till he fill'd it full again,

The boozing, bruising Irishman,

The 'toxicated Irishman--

The whiskey, frisky, rummy, gummy, brandy, no dandy Irishman.

VI.

This was the lad the lady loved,

Like all the girls of quality;

And he broke the skulls of the men of Leith,

Just by the way of jollity,

O, the leathering Irishman,

The barbarous, savage Irishman--

The hearts of the maids and the gentlemen's heads were bothered

I'm sure by this Irishman.

A _CAT_ALECTIC MONODY!

CRUIKSHANK'S OMNIBUS.

A CAT I sing, of famous memory,

Though CATachrestical my song may be;

In a small garden CATacomb she lies,

And CATaclysms fill her comrades' eyes;

Borne on the air, the CATacoustic song

Swells with her virtues' CATalogue along;

No CATaplasm could lengthen out her years,

Though mourning friends shed CATaracts of tears.

Once loud and strong her CATachist-like voice

It dwindled to a CATcall's squeaking noise;

Most CATegorical her virtues shone,

By CATenation join'd each one to one;--

But a vile CATchpoll dog, with cruel bite,

Like CATling's cut, her strength disabled quite;

Her CATerwauling pierced the heavy air,

As CATaphracts their arms through legions bear;

'Tis vain! as CATerpillars drag away

Their lengths, like CATtle after busy day,

She ling'ring died, nor left in kit KAT the

Embodyment of this CATastrophe.

A NEW SONG

OF NEW SIMILES.

JOHN BAY

My passion is as mustard strong;

I sit all sober sad;

Drunk as a piper all day long,

Or like a March-hare mad.

Round as a hoop the bumpers flow;

I drink, yet can't forget her;

For though as drunk as David's sow

I love her still the better.

Pert as a pear-monger I'd be,

If Molly were but kind;

Cool as a cucumber could see

The rest of womankind.

Like a stuck pig I gaping stare,

And eye her o'er and o'er;

Lean as a rake, with sighs and care,

Sleek as a mouse before.

Plump as a partridge was I known,

And soft as silk my skin;

My cheeks as fat as butter grown,

But as a goat now thin!

I melancholy as a cat,

Am kept awake to weep;

But she, insensible of that,

Sound as a top can sleep.

Hard is her heart as flint or stone,

She laughs to see me pale;

And merry as a grig is grown,

And brisk as bottled ale.

The god of Love at her approach

Is busy as a bee;

Hearts sound as any bell or roach,

Are smit and sigh like me.

Ah me! as thick as hops or hail

The fine men crowd about her;

But soon as dead as a door-nail

Shall I be, if without her.

Straight as my leg her shape appears,

O were we join'd together!

My heart would be scot-free from cares

And lighter than a feather.

As fine as five-pence is her mien,

No drum was ever tighter;

Her glance is as the razor keen,

And not the sun is brighter

As soft as pap her kisses are,

Methinks I taste them yet;

Brown as a berry is her hair,

Her eyes as black as jet.

As smooth as glass, as white as curds

Her pretty hand invites;

Sharp as her needle are her words,

Her wit like pepper bites.

Brisk as a body-louse she trips,

Clean as a penny drest;

Sweet as a rose her breath and lips,

Round as the globe her breast.

Full as an egg was I with glee,

And happy as a king:

Good Lord! how all men envied me!

She loved like any thing.

But false as hell, she, like the wind,

Chang'd, as her sex must do;

Though seeming as the turtle kind,

And like the gospel true.

If I and Molly could agree,

Let who would take Peru!

Great as an Emperor should I be,

And richer than a Jew.

Till you grow tender as a chick,

I'm dull as any post;

Let us like burs together stick,

And warm as any toast.

You'll know me truer than a die,

And wish me better sped;

Flat as a flounder when I lie,

And as a herring dead.

Sure as a gun she'll drop a tear

And sigh, perhaps, and wish,

When I am rotten as a pear,

And mute as any fish.

REMINISCENCES OP A SENTIMENTALIST.

THOMAS HOOD.

"My TABLES! MEAT it is, _I_ SET IT down!"--Hamlet

I think it was Spring--but not certain I am--

When my passion began first to work;

But I know we were certainly looking for lamb,

And the season was over for pork.

'T was at Christmas, I think, when I met with Miss Chase,

Yes--for Morris had asked me to dine--

And I thought I had never beheld such a face,

Or so noble a turkey and chine.

Placed close by her side, it made others quite wild

With sheer envy, to witness my luck;

How she blushed as I gave her some turtle, and smiled

As I afterward offered some duck.

I looked and I languished, alas! to my cost,

Through three courses of dishes and meats;

Getting deeper in love--but my heart was quite lost

When it came to the trifle and sweets.

With a rent-roll that told of my houses and land,

To her parents I told my designs--

And then to herself I presented my hand,

With a very fine pottle of pines!

I asked her to have me for weal or for woe,

And she did not object in the least;--

I can't tell the date--but we married I know

Just in time to have game at the feast.

We went to ----, it certainly was the sea-side;

For the next, the most blessed of morns,

I remember how fondly I gazed at my bride,

Sitting down to a plateful of prawns.

O, never may memory lose sight of that year,

But still hallow the time as it ought!

That season the "grass" was remarkably dear,

And the peas at a guinea a quart.

So happy, like hours, all our days seemed to haste,

A fond pair, such as poets have drawn,

So united in heart--so congenial in taste--

We were both of us partial to brawn!

A long life I looked for of bliss with my bride,

But then Death--I ne'er dreamt about that!

O, there's nothing is certain in life, as I cried

When my turbot eloped with the cat!

My dearest took ill at the turn of the year,

But the cause no physician could nab;

But something, it seemed like consumption, I fear--

It was just after supping on crab.

In vain she was doctored, in vain she was dosed,

Still her strength and her appetite pined;

She lost relish for what she had relished the most,

Even salmon she deeply declined!

For months still I lingered in hope and in doubt,

While her form it grew wasted and thin;

But the last dying spark of existence went out.

As the oysters were just coming in!

She died, and she left me the saddest of men,

To indulge in a widower's moan;

Oh! I felt all the power of solitude then,

As I ate my first "natives" alone!

But when I beheld Virtue's friends in their cloaks,

And with sorrowful crape on their hats,

O my grief poured a flood! and the out-of-door folks

Were all crying--I think it was sprats!

FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY.

A PATHETIC BALLAD.

THOMAS HOOD.

Ben Battle was a soldier bold,

And used to war's alarms;

But a cannon-ball took off his legs,

So he laid down his arms!

Now, as they bore him off the field,

Said he, "Let others shoot,

For here I leave my second leg,

And the Forty-second Foot!"

The army-surgeons made him limbs:

Said he, "they're only pegs:

But there's as wooden members quite

As represent my legs!"

Now, Ben he loved a pretty maid,

Her name was Nelly Gray;

So he went up to pay his devours,

When he devoured his pay!

But when he called on Nelly Gray,

She made him quite a scoff;

And when she saw his wooden legs,

Began to take them off!

"O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray

Is this your love so warm?

The love that loves a scarlet coat

Should be more uniform!"

Said she, "I loved a soldier once

For he was blithe and brave

But I will never have a man

With both legs in the grave!

"Before you had those timber toes,

Your love I did allow,

But then, you know, you stand upon

Another footing now!"

"O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray!

For all your jeering speeches,

At duty's call I left my legs,

In Badajos's BREACHES!"

"Why then," said she, "you've lost the feet

Of legs in war's alarms,

And now you can not wear your shoes

Upon your feats of arms!"

"O, false and fickle Nelly Gray!

I know why you refuse:--

Though I've no feet--some other man

Is standing in my shoes!

"I wish I ne'er had seen your face;

But now, a long farewell!

For you will be my death;--alas

You will not be my NELL!"

Now, when he went from Nelly Gray,

His heart so heavy got,

And life was such a burden grown,

It made him take a knot!

So round his melancholy neck

A rope he did entwine,

And, for his second time in life,

Enlisted in the Line.

One end he tied around a beam,

And then removed his pegs,

And, as his legs were off--of course,

He soon was off his legs!

And there he hung, till he was dead

As any nail in town--

For, though distress had cut him up,

It could not cut him down!

A dozen men sat on his corpse,

To find out why he died--

And they buried Ben in four cross-roads,

With a STAKE in his inside!

NO!

THOMAS HOOD.

No sun--no moon!

No morn--no noon--

No dawn--no dusk--no proper time of day--

No sky--no earthly view--

No distance looking blue--

No road--no street--no "t' other side the way"--

No end to any Row--

No indications where the Crescents go--

No top to any steeple--

No recognitions of familiar people--

No courtesies for showing 'em--

No knowing 'em!

To traveling at all--no locomotion,

No inkling of the way--no notion--

No go--by land or ocean--

No mail--no post--

No news from any foreign coast--

No park--no ring--no afternoon gentility--

No company--no nobility--

No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,

No comfortable feel in any member--

No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees.

No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds.

November!

JACOB OMNIUM'S HOSS

A NEW PALLICE COURT CHANT.

W. MAKEPEACE THACKERAY

One sees in Viteall Yard,

Vere pleacemen do resort.

A wenerable hinstitute,

'Tis called the Pallis Court

A gent as got his i on it,

I think will make some sport

The natur of this Court

My hindignation riles:

A few fat legal spiders

Here set & spin their viles;

To rob the town theyr privlege is,

In a hayrea of twelve miles.

The Judge of this year Court

Is a mellitary beak.

He knows no more of Lor

Than praps he does of Greek,

And prowides hisself a deputy

Because he can not speak.

Four counsel in this Court--

Misnamed of Justice--sits;

These lawyers owes their places to

Their money, not their wits;

And there's six attornies under them,

As here their living gits.

These lawyers, six and four,

Was a livin at their ease,

A sendin of their writs abowt,

And droring in the fees,

When their erose a cirkimstance

As is like to make a breeze.

It now is some monce since,

A gent both good and trew

Possest a ansum oss vith vich

He didn know what to do:

Peraps he did not like the oss,

Perhaps he was a scru.

This gentleman his oss

At Tattersall's did lodge;

There came a wulgar oss-dealer,

This gentleman's name did fodge,

And took the oss from Tattersall's:

Wasn that a artful dodge?

One day this gentleman's groom

This willain did spy out,

A mounted on this oss,

A ridin him about;

"Get out of that there oss, you rogue,"

Speaks up the groom so stout.

The thief was cruel whex'd

To find hisself so pinn'd;

The oss began to whinny,

The honest groom he grinn'd;

And the raskle thief got off the oss

And cut avay like vind.

And phansy with what joy

The master did regard

His dearly bluvd lost oss again

Trot in the stable yard!

Who was this master good

Of whomb I makes these rhymes?

His name is Jacob Homnium, Exquire;

And if _I_'d committed crimes,

Good Lord! I wouldn't ave that mann

Attack me in the TIMES!

Now, shortly after the groomb

His master's oss did take up,

There came a livery-man

This gentleman to wake up;

And he handed in a little bill,

Which hanger'd Mr. Jacob.

For two pound seventeen

This livery-man eplied,

For the keep of Mr. Jacob's oss,

Which the thief had took to ride.

"Do you see any think green in me?"

Mr. Jacob Homnium cried.

"Because a raskle chews

My oss away to robb,

And goes tick at your Mews

For seven-and-fifty bobb,

Shall _I_ be called to pay?--It is

A iniquitious Jobb."

Thus Mr. Jacob cut

The conwasation short;

The livery-man went ome,

Detummingd to ave sport,

And summingsd Jacob Homnium, Exquire,

Into the Pallis Court

Pore Jacob went to Court,

A Counsel for to fix,

And choose a barrister out of the four,

An attorney of the six;

And there he sor these men of Lor,

And watched 'em at their tricks.

The dreadful day of trile

In the Pallis Court did come;

The lawyers said their say,

The Judge looked wery glum,

And then the British Jury cast

Pore Jacob Hom-ni-um.

O, a weary day was that

For Jacob to go through;

The debt was two seventeen

(Which he no mor owed than you).

And then there was the plaintives costs,

Eleven pound six and two.

And then there was his own,

Which the lawyers they did fix

At the wery moderit figgar

Of ten pound one and six.

Now Evins bless the Pallis Court,

And all its bold ver-dicks!

I can not settingly tell

If Jacob swaw and cust,

At aving for to pay this sumb,

But I should think he must,

And av drawm a cheque for L24 4s. 8d.

With most igstreme disgust.

O Pallis Court, you move

My pitty most profound.

A most emusing sport

You thought it, I'll be bound,

To saddle hup a three-pound debt,

With two-and-twenty pound.

Good sport it is to you,

To grind the honest pore;

To puy their just or unjust debts

With eight hundred per cent, for Lor;

Make haste and git your costes in,

They will not last much mor!

Come down from that tribewn,

Thou Shameless and Unjust;

Thou Swindle, picking pockets in

The name of Truth, august;

Come down, thou hoary Blasphemy,

For die thou shalt and must.

And go it, Jacob Homnium,

And ply your iron pen,

And rise up Sir John Jervis,

And shut me up that den;

That sty for fattening lawyers in,

On the bones of honest men.

PLEACEMAN X.

THE WOFLE NEW BALLAD OF JANE RONEY AND MARY BROWN.

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY.

An igstrawnary tail I vill tell you this veek--

I stood in the Court of A'Beckett the Beak,

Vere Mrs. Jane Roney, a vidow, I see,

Who charged Mary Brown with a robbin' of she.

This Mary was pore and in misery once,

And she came to Mrs. Roney it's more than twelve monce

She adn't got no bed, nor no dinner, nor no tea,

And kind Mrs. Roney gave Mary all three.

Mrs. Roney kep Mary for ever so many veeks

(Her conduct disgusted the best of all Beax),

She kept her for nothink, as kind as could be,

Never thinking that this Mary was a traitor to she.

"Mrs. Roney, O Mrs. Roney, I feel very ill;

Will you jest step to the doctor's for to fetch me a pill?"

"That I will, my pore Mary," Mrs. Roney says she:

And she goes off to the doctor's as quickly as may be.

No sooner on this message Mrs. Roney was sped,

Than hup gits vicked Mary, and jumps out a bed;

She hopens all the trunks without never a key--

She bustes all the boxes, and vith them makes free.

Mrs. Roney's best linning gownds, petticoats, and close,

Her children's little coats and things, her boots and her hose,

She packed them, and she stole 'em, and avay vith them did flee

Mrs. Roney's situation--you may think vat it vould be!

Of Mary, ungrateful, who had served her this vay,

Mrs. Roney heard nothink for a long year and a day,

Till last Thursday, in Lambeth, ven whom should she see?

But this Mary, as had acted so ungrateful to she.

She was leaning on the helbo of a worthy young man;

They were going to be married, and were walkin hand in hand;

And the church-bells was a ringing for Mary and he,

And the parson was ready, and a waitin' for his fee.

When up comes Mrs. Roney, and faces Mary Brown,

Who trembles, and castes her eyes upon the ground.

She calls a jolly pleaseman, it happens to be me;

I charge this young woman, Mr. Pleaseman, says she.

Mrs. Roney, o, Mrs. Roney, o, do let me go,

I acted most ungrateful I own, and I know,

But the marriage bell is a ringin, and the ring you may see,

And this young man is a waitin, says Mary, says she.

I don't care three fardens for the parson and clark,

And the bell may keep ringing from noon day to dark.

Mary Brown, Mary Brown, you must come along with me.

And I think this young man is lucky to be free.

So, in spite of the tears which bejewed Mary's cheek,

I took that young gurl to A'Beckett the Beak;

That exlent justice demanded her plea--

But never a sullable said Mary said she.

On account of her conduck so base and so vile,

That wicked young gurl is committed for trile,

And if she's transpawted beyond the salt sea,

It's a proper reward for such willians as she.

Now, yon young gurls of Southwark for Mary who veep,

From pickin and stealin your ands you must keep,

Or it may be my dooty, as it was Thursday veek

To pull you all hup to A'Beckett the Beak.

PLEACEMAN X

THE BALLAD OF ELIZA DAVIS.

W. MAKEPEACE THACKERAY

Galliant gents and lovely ladies,

List a tail vich late befel,

Vich I heard it, bein on duty,

At the Pleace Hoffice, Clerkenwell.

Praps you know the Fondling Chapel,

Vere the little children sings:

(Lord I likes to hear on Sundies

Them there pooty little things!)

In this street there lived a housemaid,

If you particklarly ask me where--

Vy, it was at four-and-tventy,

Guilford Street, by Brunsvick Square

Vich her name was Eliza Davis,

And she went to fetch the beer:

In the street she met a party

As was quite surprized to see her.