|With the fullest intention to rise early the next morning, without
deliberating for a mortal half-hour whether or not to turn round and
take t' other nap, we retired to a tranquil pillow.
But what are all our good intentions?
Vexations, vanities, inventions!
Macadamizing what?--a certain spot,
To ears polite” politeness never mentions--
Tattoos, t' amuse, from empty drums.
Ah! who time's spectacles shall borrow?
And say, be gay to-day--to-morrow--
When query if to-morrow comes.
To-morrow came; so did to-morrow's bright sun; and so did Mr. Bosky's
brisk knock. Good report always preceded Mr. Bosky, like the bounce with
which champagne sends its cork out of the bottle! But (there are two
sides of the question to be considered--the _inside_ of the bed and
the _out!_) they found us in much such a brown study as we have just
described. Leaving the Lauréat to enjoy his triumph of punctuality, (an
“alderman's virtue!”) we lost no time in equipping ourselves, and were
soon seated with him at breakfast. He was in the happiest spirits.
“'Tis your birthday, Eugenio! Wear this ring for my sake; let it be
friendship's * talisman to unite our hearts in one. Here,” presenting
some tablets beautifully wrought, “is Uncle Timothy's offering. Mark,”
pointing to the following inscription engraved on the cover, “by what
poetical alchemy he hath transmuted the silver into gold!”
* Bonaparte did not believe in friendship: “Friendship is
but a word. I love no one--no, not even my brothers; Joseph,
perhaps, a little. Still, if I do love him, it is from
habit, because he is the eldest of us. Duroc! Yes, Mm I
certainly love: but why? His character suits me: he is cold,
severe, unfeeling; and then, Duroc never weeps!” Bonaparte
counted his fortunate days by his victories, Titus by his
good actions.
“Friendship, peculiar boon of Heaven,
The noble mind's delight and pride,
To men and angels only given,
To all the lower world denied.”--Dr. Johnson.
Life is short, the wings of time
Bear away our early prime,
Swift with them our spirits fly,
The heart grows chill, and dim the eye.----
Seize the moment I snatch the treasure!
Sober haste is wisdom's leisure.
Summer blossoms soon decay;
“Gather the rose-buds while you may!”
Barter not for sordid store
Health and peace; nor covet more
Than may serve for frugal fare
With some chosen friend to share!
Not for others toil and heap,
But yourself the harvest reap;
Nature smiling, seems to say,
“Gather the rose-buds while you may!”
Learning, science, truth sublime,
Fairy fancies, lofty rhyme,
Flowers of exquisite perfume!
Blossoms of immortal bloom!
With the gentle virtues twin'd,
In a beauteous garland bind
For your youthful brow to-day,--
“Gather the rose-buds while you may!”
Life is short--but not to those
Who early, wisely pluck the rose.
Time he flies--to us 'tis given
On his wings to fly to Heaven.
Ah! to reach those realms of light,
Nothing must impede our flight;
Cast we all but Hope away!
“Gather the rose-buds while we may!”
Now a sail up or down the river has always been pleasant to us in
proportion as it has proved barren of adventure. A collision with a
coal-barge or steam-packet,--a squall off Chelsea Reach, may do vastly
well to relieve its monotony: but we had rather be dull than be ducked.
We were therefore glad to find the water smooth, the wind and tide in
our favour, and no particular disposition on the part of the larger
vessels to run us down. Mr. Bosky, thinking that at some former period
of our lives we might have beheld the masts and sails of a ship,
the steeple of a church, the smoke of a patent shot manufactory,
the coal-whippers weighing out their black diamonds, a palace, and
a penitentiary, forbore to expatiate on the picturesque objects that
presented themselves to our passing view; and, presuming that our vision
had extended beyond some score or two of garden-pots “all a-growing,
all a-blow-ing,” and as much sky as would cover half-a-crown, he was not
over profuse of vernal description. But, knowing that there are as many
kinds of minds as moss, he opened his inquisitorial battery upon the
waterman. At first Barney Binnacle, though a pundit among the wet wags
of Wapping Old Stairs, fought shy; but there is a freemasonry in fun;
and by degrees he ran through all the changes from the simple leer to
the broad grin and horse-laugh, as Mr. Bosky “poked” his droll sayings
into him. He had his predilections and prejudices. The former were for
potations drawn from a case-bottle presented to him by Mr. Bosky, that
made his large blue lips smack, and his eyes wink again; the latter were
against steamers, the projectors of which he would have placed at the
disposal of their boilers! His tirade against the Thames Tunnel was
hardly less severe; but he reserved the magnums of his wrath for the
Greenwich railroad. What in some degree reconciled us to Barney's
anathemas, were his wife and children, to whom his wherry gave their
daily bread: and though these gigantic monopolies might feather the
nests of wealthy proprietors, they would not let poor Barney Binnacle
feather either his nest or his oar.
“There's truth in what you say, Master Barney,” observed the Lauréat;
“the stones went merrily into the pond, but the foolish frogs could not
fish out the fun. I am no advocate for the philosophy of expediency.”
“Surely, Mr. Bosky, you would never think of putting a stop to
_improvement!_”
“My good friends, I would not have man become the victim of his
ingenuity--a mechanical suicide! Where brass and iron, hot water and
cold, can be made to mitigate the wear and tear of his thews and sinews,
let them be adopted as auxiliaries, not as principals. I am no political
economist. I despise the muddle-headed dreamers, and their unfeeling
crudities. But for them the heart of England would have remained
uncorrupted and sound. * Trifle not with suffering. Impunity has its
limit. A flint will show fire when you strike it.
* We quite agree with Mr. Bosky. Cant and utilitarianism
have produced an insipid uniformity of character, a money-
grubbing, care-worn monotony, that cry aloof to eccentricity
and whim. Men are thinking of “stratagems and wars,” the
inevitable consequence of lots of logic, lack of amusement,
and lean diet. No man is a traitor over turtle, or hatches
plots with good store of capon and claret in his stomach.
Had Cassius been a better feeder he had never conspired
against Cæsar. Three meals a day, and supper at night, are
four substantial reasons for not being disloyal, lank, or
lachrymose.
“In this world ninety-nine persons out of one hundred must toil for their
bread before they eat it; _ask leave_ to toil,--some philanthropists
say, even before they hunger for it. I have therefore yet to learn how
that which makes human labour a drug in the market can be called, an
_improvement_. The stewardships of this world are vilely performed. What
blessings would be conferred, what wrongs prevented, were it not for the
neglect of opportunities and the prostitution of means. Is it our own
merit that we have more? our neighbour's delinquency that he has less?
The infant is born to luxury;--calculate his claims! Virtue draws its
last sigh in a dungeon; Vice receives its tardy summons on a bed of
down! The titled and the rich, the purse-proud nobodies, the noble
nothings, occupy their vantage ground, not from any merit of their own;
but from that lucky or unlucky chance which might have brought them into
this breathing world with two heads on their shoulders instead of one! I
believe in the theoretical benevolence, and practical malignity of man.”
We never knew Mr. Bosky so eloquent before; the boat became lop-sided
under the fervent thump that he gave as a clencher to his oration.
Barney Binnacle stared; but with no vacant expression.
His rugged features softened into a look of grateful approval, mingled
with surprise.
“God bless your honour!”
“Thank you, Barney Some people's celestial blessings save their earthly
breeches-pockets. But a poor mans blessing is a treasure of which Heaven
keeps the register and the key.”
Barney Binnacle bent on Mr. Bosky another inquiring look, that seemed to
say, “Mayhap I've got a _bishop_ on board.”
“If every gentleman was like your honour,” replied Barney, “we should
have better times; and a poor fellow wouldn't pull up and down this
blessed river sometimes for days together, without yarning a copper to
carry home to his hungry wife and children.” And he dropped his oar, and
drew the sleeve of his threadbare blue jacket across his weather-beaten
cheek.
This was a result that Mr. Bosky had not anticipated.
“How biting,” he remarked, “is the breeze! Egad, my teeth feel an
inclination to be so too!” The fresh air gave him the wind in his
stomach; a sufficient apology for the introduction of a cold pigeon-pie,
and some piquant etceteras that he had provided as a whet to the
entertainment in agreeable perspective at Battersea Rise. Opining that
the undulation of the boat was likely to prevent “good digestion,”
which--though everybody here helped himself--should “wait on appetite,”
he ordered Barney to moor it in some convenient creek; and as Barney,
not having been polished in the Chesterfield school, seemed mightily at
a loss how to dispose of his hands, Mr. Bosky, who was well-bred, and
eschewed idleness, found them suitable employment, by inviting their
owner to fall to. And what a merry party were we! Barney Binnacle
made no more bones of a pigeon than he would of a lark; swallowed the
forced-meat balls as if they had been not bigger than Morrison's pills;
demolished the tender rump-steak and flaky pie-crust with a relish as
sweet as the satisfaction that glowed in Mr. Bosky's benevolent heart
and countenance, and buzzed the pale brandy (of which he could drink any
given quantity) like sugared cream! The Lauréat was magnificently jolly.
He proposed the good healths of Mrs. Binnacle and the Binnacles major
and minor; toasted old Father Thames and his Tributaries; and made the
welkin ring with
MRS. GRADY'S SAINT MONDAY VOYAGE TO BATTERSEA.
Six-foot Timothy Glover,
Son of the brandy-nos'd bugleman,
He was a general lover,
Though he was only a fugleman;
Ogling Misses and Ma'ams,
Listing, drilling, drumming'em--
Quick they shoulder'd his arms--
Argumentum ad humming'em!
Mrs. Grady, in bonnet and scarf,
Gave Thady the slip on Saint Monday,
With Timothy tripp'd to Hore's wharf,
Which is close to the Glasgow and Dundee.
The river look'd swelling and rough,
A waterman plump did invite her;
“One heavy swell is enough;
I'm up to your craft--bring a lighter!”
They bargain'd for skipper and skiff,
Cry'd Timothy, “This is a windy go!”
It soon blew a hurricane stiff,
And blue look'd their noses as indigo!
“Lack-a-daisy! we're in for a souse!
The fish won't to-day see a rummer set;
Land us at Somerset House,
Or else we shall both have a summerset!”
They through the bridge Waterloo whirl'd
To Lambeth, a finer and fatter see!
Their shoulder-of-mutton sail furl'd,
For a shoulder of mutton at Battersea.
Tim then rang for coffee and tea,
Two Sally Luns and a crumpet.
“I don't like _brown_ sugar,” said he.
“If you don't,” thought the lad, “you may _lump_ it.”
To crown this delightful regale,
Waiter! your stumps, jolly boy, stir;
A crown's worth of oysters and ale,
Ere we give the sail homeward a hoister!”
“Of ale in a boiling-hot vat,
My dear daddy dropp'd, and was, Ah! boil'd.”
“A drop I can't relish of that
In which your papa, boy, was parboil'd.”
Fresh was the breeze, so was Tim:
How pleasant the life of a Midge is;
King Neptune, my service to him!
But I'll shoot Father Thames and his bridges!
His levee's a frosty-faced fair,
When Jack freezes him and his flounders;
His river-horse is but a may'r,
And his Tritons are cockney ten-pounders!
“Tim Glover, my tale is a trite'un;
I owe you a very small matter, see;
The shot I'll discharge, my polite'un,
You paid for the wherry to Battersea.
“With powder I've just fill'd my horn;
See this pocket-pistol! enough is it?
You'll twig, if a gentleman born,
And say, f Mr. Grady, quant. sujfficit.'”
Mrs. Grady, as other wives do,
Before my Lord May'r in his glory,
Brought Thady and Timothy too.
Cry'd Hobler, “O what a lame story!
“You cruel Teague, lest there accrue ill,
We'll just bind you over, Sir Thady,
To keep the peace.”--“Keep the peace, jewel
Not that piece of work, Mrs. Grady!”
His Lordship he gaped with surprise,
And gave the go-by to his gravity;
His cheeks swallow'd up his two eyes,
And lost in a laugh their concavity.
Then Grady gave Glover his fist,
With, f 1{ Truce to the shindy between us I”
Each lad, when the ladies had kiss'd,
Cut off with his hatchet-faced Venus!
Ogling misses and ma'ams,
Listing, drilling, drumming'em--
Quick they shoulder'd his arms--
Argumentum ad humming 'em.
The concluding chorus found us at the end of our excursion. Barney
Binnacle was liberally rewarded by Mr. Bosky; to each of his children
he was made the bearer of some little friendly token; and with a
heart lighter than it had been for many a weary day, he plied his oars
homeward, contented and grateful.
“Talk of brimming measure,” cried the Lauréat exultingly, “I go to a
better market. The overflowings of an honest heart for _my_ money!”
In former days undertakers would hire sundry pairs of skulls, and row to
Death's Door * for a day's pleasure.
* “The Search after Claret, or a Visitation of the Vintners”
4to. 1691, names the principal London Taverns and their
Signs, as they then existed. But the most curious account is
contained in an old ballad called “London's Ordinary: or
every Man in his Humour” printed before 1600. There is not
only a humorous list of the taverns but of the persons who
frequented them. In those days the gentry patronised the
King's Head (in July 1664, Pepys dined at the “Ordinary”
there, when he went to Hyde Park to see the cavaliers of
Charles
II. in grand review); the nobles, the Crown: the knights,
the Golden Fleece; the clergy, the Mitre; the vintners, the
Three Tuns; the usurers, the Devil; the friars, the Nuns;
the ladies, the Feathers; the huntsmen, the Greyhound; the
citizens, the Horn; the cooks, the Holy Lamb; the drunkards,
the Man in the Moon; the cuckolds, the Ram; the watermen,
the Old Swan; the mariners, the Ship; the beggars, the Egg-
Shell and Whip; the butchers, the Bull; the fishmongers, the
Dolphin; the bakers, the Cheat Loaf; the tailors, the
Shears; the shoemakers, the Boot; the hosiers, the Leg; the
fletchers, the Robin Hood; the spendthrift, the Beggar's
Bush; the Goldsmiths, the Three Cups; the papists, the
Cross; the porters, the Labour in vain; the horse-coursers,
the White Nag. He that had no money might dine at the sign
of the Mouth; while
“The cheater will dine at the Checquer;
The pickpocket at the Blind Alehouse;
'Till taken and try'd, up Holborn they ride,
And make their end at the gallows.”
Then it was not thought infra dig. (in for a dig?) to invite the
grave-digger: the mutes were the noisiest of the party; nothing palled
on the senses; and to rehearse the good things that were said and sung
would add some pungent pages to the variorum editions of Joe Miller.
But undertakers are grown gentlemanlike and unjolly, and Death's Door
exhibits but a skeleton of what it was in the merry old times.
We were cordially received by their president, the comical coffin-maker,
who, attired in his “Entertaining Gown” (a mourning cloak), introduced
us to Mr. Crape, of Blackwall; Mr. Sable, of Blackman-street; Mr.
Furnish of Blackfriars; and Mr. Blue-mould, of Blackheath: four truant
teetotallers, who had obtained a furlough from their head-quarters,
the Tea-Kettle and Toast-Rack at Aldgate pump. Messrs. Hatband and
Stiflegig, and Mr. Shovelton, hailed us with a friendly grin, as
if desirous of burying in oblivion the recent émeute at the Pig and
Tinder-Box. The club were dressed in black (from Blackwell Hall), with
white neckcloths and high shirt-collars; their clothes, from a peculiar
and professional cut, seemed all to have been turned out by the same
tailor; they marched with a measured step, and looked exceedingly grave
and venerable. Dinner being announced, we were placed in the vicinity
of the chair. On the table were black game and black currant-jelly; the
blackstrap was brought up in the black bottle; the knives and forks
had black handles; and Mr. Rasp, the shroud-raaker, who acted as vice,
recommended, from his end of the festive board, some black pudding, or
polony in mourning. The desert included black grapes and blackberries;
the rules of the club were printed in black-letter; the toasts were
written in black and white; the pictures that hung round the room were
in black frames; a well-thummed Sir Richard Blackmore and Blackwood's
Magazine lay on the mantel; the stove was radiant with black-lead; the
old clock-case was ebony; and among the after-dinner chants “Black-ey'd
Susan” was not forgotten. The host, Mr. Robert Death, had black
whiskers, and the hostess some pretty black ringlets; the surly cook
looked black because the dinner had been kept waiting; the waiter was
a nigger; and the barmaid had given boots (a ci-devant blackleg at
a billiard-table) a black eye. A black cat purred before the fire; a
black-thorn grew opposite the door; the creaking old sign was blackened
by the weather; and to complete the sable picture, three little
blackguards spent their half-holiday in pelting at it! The banquet came
off pleasantly. Mr. Merripall, whose humour was rich as crusted port,
and lively as champagne, did the honours with his usual suaviter in
modo, and was admirably supported by his two mutes from Turnagain-lane;
by Mr. Catchpenny Crambo, the bard of Bleeding-Hart-Yard, who supplied
“the trade” with epitaphs at the shortest notice; Mr. Sexton
Shovelton, and Professor Nogo, F.R.S., F.S.A., M.R.S.L., LL.B., a
learned lecturer on Egyptian mummies.
“Our duty,” whispered Mr. Bosky, “is to
Hear, see, and say nothing.
Eat, drink, and pay nothing!”
After the usual round of loyal and patriotic toasts, Mr. Merripall
called the attention of the brethren to the standing toast of the day.
“High Cockolorums and gentlemen! 'Tis easy to say 'live and let
live;' but if everybody were to live we must die. Life is short.
I wish--present company always excepted--it was as short as my
speech!----The grim tyrant!”
_Verbum sat._; and there rose a cheer loud enough to have made Death
demand what meant those noisy doings at his door.
“Silence, gentlemen, for a duet from brothers Hatband and Stiflegig.”
Had toast-master Toole * bespoke the attention of the Guildhall grandees
for the like musical treat from Gog and Magog, we should hardly have
been more surprised. Mr. Bosky looked the incarnation of incredulity.
* This eminent professor, whose sobriquet is “Lungs” having
to shout the health of “the three present Consuls,” at my
Lord Mayor's feast, proclaimed the health of the “Three per
Cent. Consols,”
After a few preliminary openings and shuttings of the eyes and mouth,
similar to those of a wooden Scaramouch when we pull the wires, Brothers
Hatband and Stiflegig began (chromatique),
Hatband. When poor mutes and sextons have nothing
to do,
What should we do, brother?
Stiflegig. Look very blue I
Hatband. Gravediggers too?
Stiflegig. Sigh “malheureux!”
Hatband. Funerals few?
Stiflegig. Put on the screw!
Hatband. But when fevers flourish of bright scarlet
hue,
What should we do, brother?
Stiflegig. Dance fillalloo! ----
Both. Winter to us is a jolly trump card, fine hot May makes a fat
churchyard!
Stiflegig. Should all the world die, what the deuce
should we do?
Hatband. I'll bury you, brother!
Stiflegig. I'll bury you!
Hatband. I'll lay you out.
Stiflegig. No doubt! no doubt!
Hatband. I'll make your shroud.
Stiflegig. You do me proud!
Hatband. I'll turn the screw.
Stiflegig. The same to you!
Hatband. When you're past ailing,
I'll knock a nail in!
Last of the quorum,
Ultimus Cockolorum!
When you're all dead and buried, zooks! what
shall I do?
Cockolorums in full chorus.
Sing High Cockolorum, and dance fillalloo!
“Gentlemen,” said Mr. Merripall, again rising, “all charged?
_Mulligrum's Pill!_”
Doctor Dose, a disciple of that art which is founded in conjecture and
improved by murder, returned thanks on the part of Messrs. Mulligrum,
Thorogonimble and Co. It was a proud day for the pill; which through
good report and evil report had worked its way, and fulfilled his
predictions that it would take and be taken. He would not ask the
Cockolorums to swallow one.--Here the mutes made horribly wry faces, and
shook their heads, as much as to say it would be of very little use
if he did.--It was sufficient that the pill bore the stamp of their
approbation, and the government three-halfpenny one; and he begged to
add, that all pills without the latter, and the initials of Mulligrum,
Thorogonimble, and Dose, were counterfeits.
The table sparkled with wit. Mr. Merripall cracked his walnuts and
jokes, and was furiously facetious on Mr. Rasp, a rough diamond, who
stood, or rather sat his horse-play raillery with dignified composure.
But Lumber Troopers * are men, and Ralph Rasp was a past Colonel of that
ancient and honourable corps. He grew more rosy about the gills, and
discharged sundry short coughs and hysterical chuckles, that betokened
a speedy ebullition. His preliminary remark merely hinted that
no gentleman would think of firing off Joe Millers at the Lumber
Troop:--Ergo, Mr. Merripall was no gentleman. The comical coffin-maker
quietly responded that the troop was a nut which everybody was at
liberty to crack for the sake of the _kernel_!
* This club was originally held at the Gentleman and Porter,
New-street Square, and the Eagle and Child, Shoe Lane. The
members were an awkward squad to the redoubtable City
Trained Bands. It being found double hazardous to trust any
one of them with a pinch of powder in his cartouch-box, and
the points of their bayonets not unfrequently coming in
sanguinary contact with each other's noses and eyes, their
muskets were prudently changed for tobacco pipes, and their
cartouches for papers of right Virginia. The privileges of
the Lumber Trooper are great and manifold. He may sleep on
any bulk not already occupied; he may knock down any
watchman, provided the watchman does not knock him down
first; and he is not obliged to walk home straight, if he be
tipsy. The troop are supported by Bacchus and Ceres; their
crest is an Owl; the shield is charged with a Punch Bowl
between a moon, a star, and a lantern. The punch is to
drink, and the moon and star are to light them home, or for
lack of either, the lantern. Their motto is, In Node
Lcetamur.
A quip that induced on the part of Mr. Hatband a loud laugh, while the
more sombre features of brother Stiflegig volunteered convulsions, as if
they had been acted upon by a galvanic battery. Mr. Rasp coolly
reminded Mr. Merripall that the grapes were sour, Brother Pledge having
black-balled him. This drew forth a retort courteous, delivered with
provoking serenity, that the fiction of the ball came most opportunely
from a gentleman who had always three blue ones at everybody's service!
The furnace that glowed in Mr. Rasp's two eyes, and the hearings of his
bosom discovered the volcano that burned beneath his black velvet
vest. His waistband seemed ready to burst. Never before did he look so
belicose! Now, Mr. Bosky, who loved fun much, but harmony more, thinking
the joke had been carried quite far enough, threw in a conciliatory word
by way of soothing angry feelings, which so won the Lumber Trooper's
naturally kind heart, that he rose from his seat.
“Brother Merripall, you are a chartered libertine, and enjoy the
privilege of saying what you will. But--you were a little too hard upon
the troop--indeed you were! My grandfather was a Lumber Trooper--my
father, too--you knew my father, Marmaduke Merripall.”
“And I knew a right honourable man! And I know another right honourable
man, my very good friend, his son! And--but------”
'Tis an old saying and a true one, that adversity tries friends. So does
a momentary quarrel, or what is more germane to our present purpose,
a mischievous badinage, in which great wits and small ones too, will
occasionally indulge. Mr. Merripall had been wront--good naturedly!--to
make Mr. Rasp his butt; who, though he was quite big enough for one,
sometimes felt the sharp arrows of the comical coffin-maker's wit a
thorn in his “too--too solid flesh.” The troop was his tender point.
“And who has not his tender point?” said Mr. Bosky, “except the man that
caught cold of his own heart, and died of it!”
The hand of Mr. Rasp was instantly stretched forth, and met more than
half way by that of Mr. Merripall.
“Brother,” said the president, “let me make amends to the troop by
requesting you will propose me as a member. Only,” and he shot a sly
glance from his eye, “save me from the balls, black and blue, of that
Presbyterian pawnbroker, Posthumus Pledge of Pye-corner.”
Mr. Rasp promised to comply, and moreover to set forth his friend's
military prowess to the best advantage.
“I think,” said he, “your division stormed the Press-yard, and captured
the whipping-post, during the Aldersgate Street Volunteer campaigning in
1805.”
“Right, brother Ralph, and when the Finsbury awkward squad routed your
left wing in the City Road, and you all ran helter-skelter into the
boiled buttock of beef shop in the Old Bailey, we valiant sharp-shooters
protected your flank, and covered your inglorious retreat!” And he
entertained the company with this appropriate recitation:--
When all were in alarms,
(Boney threat'ning to invade us,)
And (“See the Conquering Hero comes!”)
General Wheeler, general dealer
In coffee, treacle, tea, tobacco, plums,
Snuff, sugar, spices, at wholesale prices,
And figs--(which, 's life!
At Fife
He sold in drums!)--
Would up and down parade us,
And cry, “Present!” and “Shoulder arms!”
When pert apprentices, God bless us!
And tailors did address and dress us,
With “Stand at ease!” (up to your knees
In mud and mire) “Make ready! Fire!”
Singeing the curls of Moses Muggs, Esquire--
A Briton, hot for fight and fame,
Burning to give the foes of Bull
Their belly-full,
Limp'd forth--but no admission!--he was lame.
“Lame!” cried the Briton; “zounds! I say,
I came to fight, and not to run away!”
“The red-coat,” continued Mr. Merripall, “has no vision beyond '_eyes
right_' He would march till doomsday, unless commanded to halt, and
everlastingly maintain the same poker-like position, if the word were
not given him to stand at ease. He goes forth to kill at a great rate,”
( Dr. Dose pricked up his ears,) “and be killed at a small one per diem
(the mutes looked glum,) “carrying into battle a heart of oak, and out
of it a timber toe!”
“Our visitors,” was the next toast.
“Gentlemen,” said the president, “we cannot afford the expensive luxury
of drinking your healths; but we sincerely join in 'my service to you.'”
Here Dr. Dose passed over to us his box--not for a pinch, but a pill!
which pill, though we might drink, we declined to swallow. Mr. Rasp was
in high feather, and plied the four teetotallers very liberally with
wine. Seeing the comical coffin-maker in committee with his two mutes,
he chirruped joyously,
Mr. Chairman, I'll thank you not
Thus to keep the wine in the pound;
Better by half a cannon shot
Stop than the bottle!--so push it round.
Summer is past, and the chilling blast
Of winter fades the red red rose;
But wine sheds perfume, and its purple bloom
All the year round like the ruby glows!
Fill what you like, but drink what you fill,
Though it must be a bumper, a bumper, or nil.
Water congeals in frost and snows,
But summer and winter the red wine flows!
Now, my Cockolorums, for a volley in platoons!
Chorus.
The blossoms fall, and the leaves are sear,
And merry merry Christmas will soon be here;
I wish you, gentles, a happy new year,
A pocket full of money, and a barrel full of beer!
A messenger arrived with a despatch for Mr. Merripall, announcing the
demise of Alderman Callipash. There was an immediate movement on the
part of the mutes.
“Gentlemen,” said the president, “no such violent hurry; the alderman
will wait for us. Our parting toast first--_The Dance of Death!_ Come,
brother Crape, strike up the tune, and lead the carant.”
[Illustration: 0090]
Mr. Crape practised an introductory caper, in the process of which he
kicked the shins of one Cockolorum, trod upon the gouty toe of another,
and then led off, the club keeping the figure with becoming gravity, and
chanting in full chorus:
Undertakers, hand in hand,
Are a jovial merry band;
Tho' their looks are lamentable,
And their outward man is sable,
Who on this side Charon's ferry
Are so blythe as those that bury?
Hark! hark! the Parish Clerk
Tunes his pitch-pipe for a lark!
As we gaily trip along
Booms the bell's deep, dull ding-dong!
Freaking, screaking, out of breath,
Thus we dance the _Dance of Death!_
The cricket cries, the owl it hoots,
Music meet for dancing mutes!
When burns brightly blue the taper,
Sextons, 'tis your time to caper.
Now our song and dance are done,
Home we hasten every one.
Messrs. Crape, Crambo, Sable, Shovelton, Hatband, and Stiflegig, joined
a pleasant party outside of a hearse that had been doing duty in the
neighbourhood; and an empty mourning-coach accommodated Mr. Rasp, Mr.
Bluemould, Dr. Dose, and Professor Nogo. Mr. Furnish, and a few, heated
with wine, took water; but as the moon had just emerged from behind
a black cloud, and shone with mild lustre, we preferred walking,
particularly with the jocular companionship of Mr. Bosky and Mr.
Merripall. And Death's door was closed for the night.