PARODIES
OF THE WORKS OF
ENGLISH AND AMERICAN AUTHORS,
COLLECTED AND ANNOTATED BY
WALTER HAMILTON,
_Fellow of the Royal Geographical, and Royal Historical Societies;
Author of “A History of National Patriotic Songs,” “A Memoir of
George Cruikshank,” “The Poets Laureate of England,” “The Æsthetic
Movement in England,” etc._
VOLUME VI.
CONTAINING PARODIES OF
A. C. Swinburne. G. R. Sims. Robert Browning.
F. Locker-Lampson. Austin Dobson. Dante G. Rossetti.
OSCAR WILDE. J. DRYDEN. A. POPE. MARTIN F. TUPPER.
BALLADES, RONDEAUS, VILLANELLES, TRIOLETS.
NURSERY RHYMES AND CHILDREN’S SONGS.
PARODIES AND POEMS IN PRAISE OF TOBACCO.
PROSE PARODIES.
SLANG, FLASH, AND CANT SONGS.
RELIGIOUS AND POLITICAL PARODIES.
_Bibliography of Parody, and Dramatic Burlesques_
Some things are very good, pick out the best,
Good wits compiled them, and I wrote the rest;
If thou dost buy it, it will quit the cost,
Read it, and all thy labour is not lost.
JOHN TAYLOR, _the Water Poet_.
REEVES & TURNER, 196, STRAND, LONDON, W.C.
――
1889.
PREFACE.
[Illustration: I]t is now a little more than six years since this
publication was commenced, and the completion of the Sixth Volume
enables me to say that nearly every Parody of literary merit, or
importance, has been mentioned in its pages, whilst some _thousands_
of the best have been given in full.
To form such a collection required not only an intimate knowledge of
English Poetical Literature, but involved the reference to many very
rare and scarce books, English, American, and Colonial.
I beg to offer my sincere thanks to the Authors who kindly permitted
their copyright poems to be inserted in this volume, particularly to
F. Locker-Lampson, Esq., and G. R. Sims, Esq., as well as to the
following gentlemen, for copies of Parodies and other information they
have afforded――Messrs. Cuthbert Bede, G. H. Brierley, of Cardiff; F.
W. Crawford, T. F. Dillon Croker, Frank Howell, J. H. Ingram, Walter
Parke, F. B. Perkins, of San Francisco; C. H. Stephenson, C. H.
Waring, and Gleeson White.
In nearly every case the permission of the authors has been obtained
for the re-publication of their Parodies; in the few instances where
this was not done, it was owing to the impossibility of finding the
author’s address.
During the progress of the work, some further Parodies appeared of
Authors already dealt with, it is proposed to include these in a
supplementary volume, which will be published at some future date.
It is believed that the ample Bibliographical information relating to
Parodies and Burlesques contained in this volume will be specially
useful to Librarians, Managers of Penny Readings, and Professors of
Elocution.
Editors of Provincial Papers who offer prizes for Literary
compositions should be on their guard against unscrupulous persons who
copy Parodies from this Collection, and send them in as _original
compositions_.
In much of the compilation, and especially those portions requiring
the exercise of taste, and in the somewhat dreary process of proof
reading, I have been greatly assisted by my wife, whose cheerful
co-operation in all my labours adds just the zest which renders Life
worth living.
Whilst bidding my subscribers _Farewell_, I wish to add that the
subject of Parodies will continue to engage my attention, and that I
shall always be grateful for any information, or examples, that may be
sent to me, addressed to the care of Messrs. Reeves and Turner.
WALTER HAMILTON.
CHRISTMAS, 1889.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
――――
[Illustration: M]r. Swinburne, son of Admiral Charles Henry Swinburne,
and grandson of Sir John Edward Swinburne, sixth baronet, was born in
1838, and educated first at Eton, and afterwards at Oxford.
Despite his ancient pedigree, his aristocratic connections, and his
university education, the early writings of Mr. A. C. Swinburne, both
in prose and verse, were coloured by Radical opinions of the most
advanced description. Byron, Shelley, Wordsworth and Southey commenced
thus, with results which should have taught him how unwise it is for a
poet, who wishes to be widely read, to descend into the heated
atmosphere of political strife.
_The Undergraduate Papers_, published by Mr. Mansell, Oxford, 1857-8,
contained some of Mr. Swinburne’s earliest poems, these were followed
by “Atalanta in Calydon,” “Chastelard,” and “Poems and Ballads.”
It will be readily understood that only a few brief extracts can be
given from Mr. Swinburne’s poems, sufficient merely to strike the key
notes of the Parodies.
――――
THE CREATION OF MAN.
Before the beginning of years
There came to the making of man
Time, with a gift of tears;
Grief, with a glass that ran;
Pleasure, with pain for leaven!
Summer, with flowers that fell;
Remembrance fallen from heaven,
And madness risen from hell;
Strength without hands to smite:
Love that endures for a breath;
Night, the shadow of light,
And life the shadow of death.
And the high gods took in hand
Fire, and the falling of tears,
And a measure of sliding sand
From under the feet of the years:
And froth and drift of the sea;
And dust of the labouring earth;
And bodies of things to be
In the houses of death and of birth;
And wrought with weeping and laughter,
And fashioned with loathing and love.
With life before and after,
And death beneath and above,
For a day and a night and a morrow,
That his strength might endure for a span
With travail and heavy sorrow,
The holy spirit of man.
For the winds of the north and the south
They gathered as into strife;
They breathed upon his mouth,
They filled his body with life;
Eyesight and speech they wrought
For the veils of the soul therein,
A time for labour and thought,
A time to serve and to sin;
They gave him light in his ways,
And love, and a space for delight,
And beauty and length of days,
And night, and sleep in the night.
His speech is a burning fire;
With his lips he travaileth;
In his heart is a blind desire,
In his eyes foreknowledge of death;
He weaves, and is clothed with derision;
Sows, and he shall not reap;
His life is a watch or a vision
Between a sleep and a sleep.
* * * * *
A. C. SWINBURNE.
――――
AMERICAN PARODY.
Before the beginning of years,
There went to the making of man
Nine tailors with their shears,
A coupe and a tiger and span,
Umbrellas and neckties and canes,
An ulster, a coat, and all that――
But the crowning glory remains,
His last best gift was his hat.
And the mad hatters took in hand
Skins of the beaver, and felt,
And straw from the isthmus land,
And silk and black bear’s pelt:
And wrought with prophetic passion,
Designed on the newest plan,
They made in the height of fashion
The hat for the wearing of man.
――――
A POET’S VALENTINE.
Before the beginning of post
There came to the making of love
Rhyme and of follies a host;
Ducks with a dart and a dove;
Flow’rs with initials beneath,
Cupid conceal’d in a cell,
Lovers alone on a heath.
A Parson pulling a bell.
Follies all fetched afar,
Mirth for a maid and a man,
Jokes that jingle and jar,
And lines refusing to scan.
And still with the change of things
The annual craze comes back
With knocks and riotous rings
From the post piled up with a pack.
Still letters of love and laughter,
And verse in various time,
With roars that reach to the rafter,
And sheets of scurrilous rhyme.
Of old we counted our money
And played but a note for a kiss,
But now we send hampers of honey
And boxes of boisterous bliss.
_Fun._ February 15, 1868.
――――
SHILLING DREADFULS.
“A nervous and well red-wigged gentleman, Mr. Allburnon-Charles
Swingbun, ran excitedly to our rescue, and rhapsodically chaunted the
following chorus from his ‘Atlas in Paddington’:
“Now in the railway years
There come to the making of books
Crime with its gift of fears,
Dream with mesmeric looks,
Nihilist Czar-abhorrence,
Acres of ‘snowy sward,’
Ouida, bottled in Florence,
And Broughton in Oxenforde;
Length, to deserve twelve pence;
Plot, to atone for pith;
Not a shadow of sense,
And boys the shadows of Smith.
And the tourist takes in hand
Paper with creasy back,
And a type he can understand,
As he sways with his rolling rack,
And froth and drift of the French,
And mirth that is meet to sell,
And bodies of things that drench
The diversions of Max O’Rell.
They are wrought with weeping for laughter,
And in fashion for chap and cove,
With _Life_ before and after,
And _Truth_ beneath and above.
For a day, for a night, for a nuisance
That the novice may fling his flukes,
And the publisher reap his usance――
The ‘Shillingsworth’ plague of books.”
Christmas Number of _The World_. 1885.
――――
A chorus in “Atalanta in Calydon” commences:――
“For winter’s rains and ruins are over,
And all the season of snows and sins;
The days dividing lover and lover,
The light that loses, the night that wins.”
This passage was thus parodied by Mr. Austin Dobson:――
“For Mayfair’s balls and ballets are over,
And all the ‘Season’ of drums and dins;
The maids dividing lover and lover,
The wight that loses, the knight that wins;
And last month’s life is a leaf that’s rotten,
And flasks are filled and game bags gotten,
And from green underwood and cover
Pheasant on Pheasant his flight begins.”
――――:o:――――
The peculiar metre in which “Dolores” and the Dedication of the “Poems
and Ballads” Volume are written, although it invites parody, is
difficult to imitate successfully. The ending line of each stanza
abruptly cut short is a trick in composition which few but Mr.
Swinburne himself have thoroughly mastered.
The following stanzas from the Dedication will enable readers to
perceive how closely they have been parodied by Mr. Pollock.
The sea gives her shells to the shingle,
The earth gives her streams to the sea;
They are many, but my gift is single,
My verses, the first-fruits of me.
Let the wind take the green and the grey leaf,
Cast forth without fruit upon air;
Take rose-leaf and vine-leaf and bay-leaf
Blown loose from the hair.
* * * * *
Though the world of your hands be more gracious
And lovelier in lordship of things,
Clothed round by sweet art with the spacious
Warm heaven of her imminent wings;
Let them enter, unfledged and nigh fainting,
For the love of old loves and lost times,
And receive in your palace of painting
This revel of rhymes.
* * * * *
Though the many lights dwindle to one light,
There is help if the heaven has one;
Though the skies be discrowned of the sunlight,
And the earth dispossessed of the sun,
They have moonlight and sleep for repayment
When refreshed as a bride, and set free,
With stars and sea-winds in her raiment,
Night sinks on the sea.
――――
“DEDICATION TO J. S.”
This parody, dedicated to the notorious “John Stiles,” of the old
law-books, was written by Mr. Pollock, and originally appeared in _The
Pall Mall Gazette_. It has since been included in a small volume
(published by Macmillan & Co., London, 1875) entitled “Leading Cases
done into English,” by an apprentice of Lincoln’s Inn.
When waters are rent with commotion
Of storms, or with sunlight made whole,
The river still pours to the ocean
The stream of its effluent soul;
You, too, from all lips of all living
Of worship disthroned and discrowned,
Shall know by these gifts of my giving
That faith is yet found.
By the sight of my song-flight of cases
That bears on wings woven of rhyme
Names set for a sign in high places
By sentence of men of old time;
From all counties they meet and they mingle,
Dead suitors whom Westminster saw;
There are many, but your name is single,
The flower of pure law.
When bounty of grantors was gracious
To enfeoff you in fee and in tail,
The bounds of your land were made spacious
With lordship from Sale unto Dale;
Trusts had you, and services loyal,
Lips sovereign for ending of strife,
And the names of the world’s names most royal
For light of your life.
Ah desire that was urgent to Romeward,
And feet that were swifter than fate’s,
And the noise of the speed of them homeward
For mutation and fall of estates!
Ah the days when your riding to Dover
Was prayed for and precious as gold,
The journeys, the deeds that are over,
The praise of them told.
But the days of your reign are departed,
And our fathers that fed on your looks
Have begotten a folk feeble-hearted,
That seek not your name in their books;
And against you is risen a new foeman,
To storm with strange engines your home,
We wax pale at the name of him Roman,
His coming from Rome.
* * * * *
Yet I pour you this drink of my verses,
Of learning made lovely with lays,
Song bitter and sweet that rehearses
The deeds of your eminent days;
Yea, in these evil days from their reading
Some profit a student shall draw,
Though some points are of obsolete pleading,
And some are not law.
Though the Courts that were manifold dwindle
To divers Divisions of one,
And no fire from your face may rekindle
The light of old learning undone;
We have suitors and briefs for our payment,
While so long as a Court shall hold pleas,
We talk moonshine, with wigs for our raiment,
Not sinking the fees.
This “J. S.” was a mythical person introduced for the purposes of
illustration, and constantly met with in old law books and reports.
His devotion to Rome is shown by his desperate attempts to get there
in three days: “If J. S. shall go to Rome in three days,” was then a
standing example of an impossible condition, which modern science has
robbed of most of its point.
――――:o:――――
THE BALLAD OF BURDENS.
This poem will be found on page 144 of Mr. Swinburne’s _Poems and
Ballads_ (first series). It is one of his best known ballads, and in
1879 it was chosen by the editor of _The World_ as the model on which
to found parodies describing the wet and gloomy summer of that year.
The successful poems in the competition were printed in _The World_,
July 16, 1879. The first prize was won by a well known London
Architect, the second by a Dublin gentleman who has since published
several amusing Volumes of light poems.
FIRST PRIZE.
A burden of foul weathers. Dim daylight
And summer slain in some sad sloppy way,
And pitiless downpour that comes by night,
And watery gleam that has no heart by day,
And change from gray to black, from black to gray,
And weariness that doth at each repine;
Grief in all work, and pleasure in no play――
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of vain blossoms. This is sore
A burden of false hope in fruit-bearing:
Upon thy strawberry-bed, behold, threescore――
Threescore dead blooms for one that’s ripening;
And if that one to fulness thou dost bring,
Thy shuddering lips the scanty feast decline,
For ’tis a pallid and insipid thing――
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of set phrases. Thou shalt hear
The same drear murmurs breathed from every side:
‘Something is wrong with the Gulf Stream, I fear.’
‘Through cycle wet the decade now doth glide.’
‘The sun is “spot”-less, and ashamed would hide.’
Dull ign’rance with long words did aye combine!
And thou shalt half believe and half deride
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of lost leisure. Thou shalt grieve
By rain-vexed stream, drenched moor, or seashore dead;
And say at night, ‘Would I had had no leave!’
And say at dawn, ‘Would that my leave were sped!’
The water of affliction and the bread
For food and for attire shall then be thine,
Goloshed beneath, umbrellaed overhead,
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of cold hearthstones. Thou shalt see
Pale willow shreds and gold above the green;
And as the willow so thy face shall be,
And no more as the thing before-time seen.
And thou shalt say of sunshine, ‘It hath been,’
And, chilling, watch the chilly light decline;
And shivering-fits shall take thy breath between
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of sad sayings. In that day
Thou shalt tell all thy summers o’er, and tell
Thy joys and thy delights in each, and say
How one was calm and one was changeable,
And sweet were all to hear and sweet to smell;
But now of passing hours scarce one doth shine
Of twenty. In the rest deep gloom doth dwell.
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of mixed seasons. Snow in spring,
Thaw, and then frost, with each its miseries;
No summer, though the days be shortening;
No autumn-promise from the fields and trees;
With sad face turned towards Christmas, that foresees
Huge bills for fuel, (and yet for fires doth pine;)
Rheumatics, pleurisy, and lung-disease,
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of umbrellas. In thy sight
Dawn’s gray or vesper’s red may promise much,
Yet shalt thou never venture day nor night
Without that ‘little shadow’ in thy clutch.
Horn of rhinoceros and ebon crutch
Shall unmolested in their stand recline;
Thy trusty Penang shall forget thy touch,
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
The burden of sham gladness. In desire
(The substance lost) for shadows of delight,
Though underfoot the trodden lawn be mire,
Tea, tennis, and Terpsichore invite.
Go, then! and let thy face with smiles be dight,
To hollow joy’s ordeal thyself resign
Till dreary daylight yield to drearier night,
Anno Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
L’ENVOY.
Brave hearts, and ye whom hope yet quickeneth,
Hope on; next summer may perchance be fine.
The life grows short, and soon will come the death
Anni Salutis eighteen seventy-nine.
ZIEGELSTEIN. (_Goymour Cuthbert._)
――――
SECOND PRIZE.
The burden of strange seasons. Rain all night,
Blown-rain and wind co-mingling all the day;
Perchance we say the morrow will be bright;
But lo, the morrow is as yesterday:
With sullen skies and sunsets cold and gray,
With lights reverse, the heavy hours retire;
And so the strange sad season slips away――
I pray thee put fresh coals upon the fire.
The burden of rheumatics. This is sore
Damp, and east wind maketh it past bearing;
When thy life’s span has stretched to threescore,
No rest hast thou at dawn or evening.
The shivering in thy bones, the shivering
In all thy marrows through this season dire,
Makes summer seem a shameful wretched thing――
For God’s love put fresh coals upon the fire.
The burden of dead apples. Lo, their doom,
Decay and blight upon the tender trees,
All fruit made fruitless, blossom bloomless bloom
An eastern wind of many miseries.
Naught has survived save pale-green gooseberries,
The food in fools, of fools, who such desire.
God wot, no lack have we of fooleries――
I prithee put fresh coals upon the fire.
The burden of bad harvests. For the gods,
Who change the springing corn from green to red,
Have scourged us for our sins with many rods,
And left our grain and oil ungarnerèd.
The market-men heap ashes on their head,
And cry aloud and rend their best attire;
The gods are just, prayers are unanswerèd――
I pray thee put fresh coals upon the fire.
The burden of lost peaches. Ah, my sweet,
This year I seek them in the sunny South,
To press them to thy sharp white tooth to eat,
To kiss thy amorous hair and curled-up mouth.
Lust and desire are dust and deadly drouth,
For lust is dust and deadly drouth desire,
And time creeps over all with wingèd feet――
For love’s sake put fresh coals upon the fire.
The burden of dull colours. Thou shalt see
Strange harmonies in brown and olive-green,
In curious costumes fashioned cunningly,
And all unlike the things in summer seen;
And thou shalt say of summer, it hath been.
Or if unconsciously thou wouldst inquire
What these my mournful music-measures mean,
I bid thee heap fresh coals upon the fire.
L’ENVOY.
Tourists and ye whom Cook accomp’nies,
Heed well before from him ye tickets hire――
This season is a mist of miseries;
So once more heap fresh coals upon the fire.
FLOREANT-LAURI (_J. M. Lowry_).
This parody was afterwards included in _A Book of Jousts_, edited by
James M. Lowry. London, Field and Tuer.
――――
BALLADE OF CRICKET.
The burden of long fielding: when the clay
Clings to thy shoon, in sudden shower’s down-pour,
And running still thou stumblest; or the ray
Of fervent suns doth bite and burn thee sore,
And blind thee, till, forgetful of thy lore,
Thou dost most mournfully misjudge a skyer,
And lose a match the gods cannot restore――
This is the end of every man’s desire!
The burden of loose bowling: when the stay
Of all thy team is collared――swift or slower――
When bowlers break not in the wonted way
And “yorkers” come not off as heretofore;
When length-balls shoot no more, ah! never more,
And all deliveries lose their wonted fire,
When bats seem broader than the broad barn-door――
This is the end of every man’s desire!
The burden of free hitting; slog away,
Here shalt thou make a five, and there a four.
And then thy heart unto thy heart shall say
That thou art in for an exceeding score;
Yea, the loud Ring, applauding thee shall roar.
And thou to rival HORNBY shalt aspire,
And lo! the Umpire gives thee “leg before.”
This is the end of every man’s desire!
ENVOY.
Alas, yet rather on youth’s hither shore
Would I be some poor player, on scant hire,
Than King among the old, who play no more.
_This_ is the end of every man’s desire.
A. L.
_St. James’s Gazette._ June 27, 1881.
BALLADE OF CRICKET.
(To T. W. Lang.)
The burden of hard hitting: slog away!
Here shalt thou make a “five” and there a “four,”
And then upon thy bat shalt lean and say,
That thou art in for an uncommon score.
Yea, the loud ring applauding thee shall roar,
And thou to rival THORNTON shalt aspire,
When low, the Umpire gives thee “leg before,”――
“This is the end of every man’s desire!”
The burden of much bowling, when the stay
Of all thy team is “collared,” swift or slower,
When “bailers” break not in their wonted way,
And “yorkers” come not off as heretofore.
When length balls shoot no more, ah never more,
When all deliveries lose their former fire,
When bats seem broader than the broad barn-door,――
“This is the end of every man’s desire!”
The burden of long fielding, when the clay
Clings to thy shoon in sudden showers downpour,
And running still thou stumblest, or the ray
Of blazing suns doth bite and burn thee sore,
And blind thee till, forgetful of thy lore,
Thou dost most mournfully misjudge a “skyer”
And lose a match the Fates cannot restore,――
“This is the end of every man’s desire!”
_Envoy._
Alas, yet liefer on youth’s hither shore
Would I be some poor Player on scant hire
Than king among the old who play no more,――
“_This_ is the end of every man’s desire!”
ANDREW LANG.
This second _Ballade of Cricket_ was included in a collection of
“_Ballades and Rondeaus_” edited by Mr. Gleeson White, and published
by Walter Scott, London, 1887.
――――
A BALLAD OF BURDENS.
The burden of Old Women. They delight
In bulky bundles, always in the way;
In ’busses close they wedge you tight at night,
In railway trains they jam you up by day.
Plump dames with pulpy cheeks and locks of grey,
In weariness they waddle, puff, perspire.
To banish them for ever one would say,
This must be every busy man’s desire.
* * * * *
The burden of Sad Colours. Thou shalt see
Gold tarnished, ghostly grey, and livid green,
And lank and languorous thy face must be
To harmonise with the lugubrious scene.
And thou shalt say of scarlet, “It have been,”
And sighing of old tints and tones shalt tire.
To bring back brightness and to banish spleen,
This must be every cheerful man’s desire.
The burden of Smart Sayings. In this day
All wish as cynic wits to bear the bell.
Men mock at honour, justice, love, and say
_The_ end of life “good stories” is to tell.
The cad’s coarse jest, the cackle of the swell
Are much alike, things that the most admire.
To patter slang and tell side-splitters well,
This is the end of every fool’s desire.
The burden of Bad Seasons. Rain in Spring,
Chill rain and wind among the budding trees,
A Summer of grey storm-clouds gathering,
Damp Autumn one dull mist of miseries,
With showers that soak, and blasts that bite and freeze;
A drenching Winter with north-easters dire.
To make an end of seasons such as these,
This must be every suffering man’s desire.
The burden of Strange Crazes. Woman’s right
To throng the polls, and join the spouting bands;
Theosophy and astral bodies, sleight
Of cunning jugglers from far foreign lands;
Buddhistic bosh which no one understands,
A thousand fads that ’gainst good sense conspire.
To gag the crotcheteers and tie their hands,
This must be every sober man’s desire.
L’ENVOY.
Donkeys, and ye whom frenzy quickeneth,
Heed well this rhyme. Life’s many burdens tire.
To lighten them a little, ere our death,
This must be every kindly man’s desire.
_Punch._ August 7, 1886.
――――:o:――――
PARODIES OF
DOLORES.
PAIN AND TRAVEL.
Perpetual swaying of steamers,
Oh, terrible tumble of tides――
More dear than the drowsing of dreamers,
Who ramble by rustic road-sides!
Oh, lips that are pale with the anguish,
Let me see you again and again;
They are yours when so seasick they languish,
Our Lady of Pain!
I gloat on the grins and the groaning,
The torments that torture――not kill:
And music to me is the moaning
Of travellers terribly ill.
A rapture I cannot unravel,
Their throes set a-thrill in my brain:
These――these are _my_ pleasures of travel,
Our Lady of Pain!
And on landing I lose not the longing,
That mingles my manhood with mud:
For the merry mosquitos come thronging,
With lips that laugh blithely in blood:
And fleas, with their kisses that burn me,
Bite till cruel red mouths show the stain――
Into poesy passionate turn me,
Our Lady of Pain!
And the donkeys Egyptian and spiteful
Shall share in the shame of my hymns,
For the jolting that brands the delightful
Dark bruises on delicate limbs.
And the Alps shall be ranked with the asses
For the fracture, the frostbite, the sprain,
And the mangling of flesh in crevasses,
Our Lady of Pain!
And if――leaving me, though, unshattered――
An accident fell should betide,
And the train that I ride in is scattered
In ruin on every side――
Dislocations and discolourations,
And gush of bright gore, not in vain
Shall awake in me languid sensations,
Our Lady of Pain!
Thus I roam through the universe vasty,
O’er mountain, vale, meadow, and wood;
And I venerate all that is nasty,
And gird against all that is good;
In the mire my delight is to linger,
Although I to the heights might attain:
But you don’t catch me scratching my finger,
Our Lady of Pain!
_Fun._ October 12, 1867.
――――
MY LADY CHAMPAGNE.
Wayward, soft, luscious, and tender,
Lightsome, and spotless from stain,
Graceful of figure and slender,
Decked with a golden crown’s splendour――
Our Lady Champagne.
Brilliantly sparkling and creaming,
Haughty and lovely and vain,
Gay ’midst the froth lightly beaming,
Swift o’er the crystal edge streaming――
Our Lady Champagne.
Bubbling and seething and springing,
Solace and soother of pain,
Joys of an outer world bringing,
Sweets to the air gaily flinging――
Our Lady Champagne.
Proud in the depth of deep scorning,
Haughty and grand with disdain,
Rosy as soft clouds at dawning,
Fresh as the breeze of the morning――
Our Lady Champagne.
Kisses seductive in greeting,
Falling like soft summer rain,
Rapturous bliss of lips meeting,
Sighing a woe at retreating――
Our Lady Champagne.
Frothy, light, bubbly and beady,
Life to the overworked brain;
Beer for the humble and needy,
Wine for the wealthy and greedy――
Our Lady Champagne!
_Judy._ May 26, 1880.
――――
THE SOUTHERN CROSS.
_A Frustration._
Four stars on Night’s brow, or Night’s bosom,
Whichever the reader prefers;
Or Night without either may do some,
Each one to his taste or to hers.
Four stars――to continue inditing,
So long as I feel in the vein――
Hullo! what the deuce is that biting?
Mosquitos again!
Oh glories not gilded but golden,
Oh daughters of Night unexcelled,
By the sons of the North unbeholden,
By our sons (if we have them) beheld;
Oh jewels the midnight enriching,
Oh four which are double of twain!
Oh mystical――bother the itching!
Mosquitos again!
You alone I can anchor my eye on,
Of you and you only I’ll write,
And I now look awry on Orion,
That once was my chiefest delight.
Ye exalt me high over the petty
Conditions of pleasure and pain,
Oh Heaven! Here are these maladetti
Mosquitos again!
The poet should ever be placid.
Oh vex not his soul or his skin!
Shall I stink them with carbolic acid?
It is done and afresh I begin.
Lucid orbs!――that last sting very sore is;
I am fain to leave off, I am fain;
It has given me uncommon dolores――
The Latin for pain.
Not quite what the shape of a cross is――
A little lop-sided, I own――
Confound your infernal proboscis,
Inserted well nigh to the bone!
Queen-lights of the heights of high heaven,
Ensconced in the crystal inane――
Oh me, here are seventy times seven
Mosquitos again.
Oh horns of a mighty trapezium!
Quadrilatoral area, hail!
Oh bright is the light of magnesium!――
Oh hang them all, female and male!
At the end of an hour of their stinging,
What shall rest of me then, what remain?
I shall die as the swan dieth, singing,
Mosquitos again!
Shock keen as the stroke of the leven!
They sting, and I change as a flash
From the peace and the poppies of heaven
To the flame and the firewood of――dash!
Oh Cross of the South, I forgot you!
These demons have addled my brain.
Once more I look upward――――Od rot you!
You’re at it again.
There! stick in your pitiless brad-awl,
And do your malevolent worst!
Dine on me and when you have had all,
Let others go in for a burst!
Oh silent and pure constellation,
Can you pardon my fretful refrain?
Forgive, oh forgive my vexation――
They’re at it again!
Oh imps that provoke to mad laughter,
Winged fiends that are fed from my brow,
Bite hard! let your neighbours come after,
And sting where you stung me just now!
Red brands on it smitten and bitten,
Round blotches I rub at in vain!
Oh Crux! whatsoever I’ve written,
I’ve written in pain.
Ye chrysolite crystalline creatures,
Wan watchers the fairest afield,
Stars, and garters, are these my own features
In the merciless mirror revealed?
They are mine, even mine and none other,
And my hands how they slacken and strain!
Oh my sister, my spouse, and my mother!
I’m going insane!
From _Miscellaneous Poems_, by J. BRUNTON STEPHENS.
――――
BRANDY AND SODA.
Mine eyes to mine eyelids cling thickly;
My tongue feels a mouthful and more;
My senses are sluggish and sickly;
To live and to breathe is a bore.
My head weighs a ton and a quarter,
By pains and by pangs ever split,
Which manifold washings with water
Relieve not a bit.
My longings of thirst are unlawful,
And vain to console or control,
The aroma of coffee is awful,
Repulsive the sight of the roll.
I take my matutinal journal,
And strive my dull wits to engage,
But cannot endure the infernal
Sharp crack of its page.
What bad luck my soul had bedevilled,
What demon of spleen and of spite,
That I rashly went forth, and I revelled
In riotous living last night?
Had the fumes of the goblet no odour
That well might repulse or restrain?
O insidious brandy and soda,
Our Lady of Pain.
Thou art golden of gleam as the summer
That smiled o’er a tropical sod,
O daughter of Bacchus, the bummer,
A foamer, a volatile tod!
But thy froth is a serpent that hisses,
And thy gold as a balefire doth shine,
And the lovers who rise from thy kisses
Can’t walk a straight line.
I recall, with a flush and a flutter,
That orgie whose end is unknown;
Did they bear me to bed on a shutter,
Or did I reel home all alone?
Was I frequent in screams and in screeches?
Did I swear with a forcéd affright?
Did I perpetrate numerous speeches?
Did I get in a fight?
Of the secrets I treasure and prize most
Did I empty my bacchanal breast?
Did I button-hole men I despise most,
And frown upon those I like best?
Did I play the low farmer and flunkey
With people I always ignore?
Did I caricole round like a monkey?
Did I sit on the floor?
O longing no research may satiate――
No aim to exhume what is hid!
For falsehood were vain to expatiate
On deeds more depraved than I did;
And though friendly faith I would flout not
On this it were rash to rely,
Since the friends who beheld me, I doubt not,
Were drunker than I.
Thou hast lured me to passionate pastime,
Dread goddess, whose smile is a snare!
Yet I swear thou hast tempted me the last time――
I swear it; I mean what I swear!
And thy beaker shall always forebode a
Disgust ’twere not wise to disdain,
O luxurious brandy-and-soda;
Our Lady of Pain.
HUGH HOWARD. 1882.
――――
DOLORES.
[MISS DOLORES LLEONART-Y-CASANOVAS, M.D., has just, at the age of 19,
taken her doctor’s degree at Barcelona. July, 1886.]
With dark eyes that flash like a jewel,
And red lips that flame like a flower
Capricious, coquettish and cruel,
When flirting in boudoir or bower;
So shine Spanish girls in old stories.
But thou’rt of a different strain,
Oh learned and lucky DOLORES,
Our M.D. of Spain.
Thy studies commencing, sweet virgin,
At College when scarce more than seven,
Now past mistress scalpel and purge in
A full-blown Physician! Great Heaven!
Sangrados no more to our sorrow
Our veins shall deplete; the control
Of our hearts goes to girls, whence we borrow
Much hope――on the whole.
It startles us, though, the reflection
That you are not twenty to-day,
Yet our tongues may invite your inspection,
Our pulses your touch may assay.
Thou, a girlish she-Galen, arisest:
In faith thou may’st fairly feel vain,
O young among women yet wisest,
Our M.D. of Spain!
Will you “fee” in the fearless old fashion,
And dose like a horse-drenching Vet.?
Ah! it is not alone the Caucasian
Who’s nearly played out, I regret.
However, unless luck desert you,
Barcelona its fame may regain.
Let us hope HAHNEMANN mayn’t convert you,
Our M.D. of Spain.
(_Five verses omitted._)
_Punch._ July 31, 1886.
――――
OCTOPUS.[1]
Strange beauty, eight-limbed and eight-handed,
Whence camest to dazzle our eyes?
With thy bosom bespangled and branded
With the hues of the seas and the skies;
Is thy home European or Asian,
Oh mystical monster marine?
Part molluscous and partly crustacean,
Betwixt and between.
Wast thou born to the sound of sea trumpets?
Hast thou eaten and drunk to excess
Of the sponges――thy muffins and crumpets,
Of the seaweed――thy mustard and cress?
Wast thou nurtured in caverns of coral,
Remote from reproof or restraint?
Art thou innocent, art thou immoral,
Sinburnian or Saint?
Lithe limbs, curling free, as a creeper
That creeps in a desolate place,
To enrol and envelop the sleeper
In a silent and stealthy embrace;
Cruel beak craning forward to bite us,
Our juices to drain and to drink,
Or to whelm us in waves of Cocytus,
Indelible ink!
Oh breast, that ’twere rapture to writhe on!
Oh arms ’twere delicious to feel
Clinging close with the crush of the Python,
When she maketh her murderous meal;
In thy eight-fold embraces enfolden,
Let our empty existence escape;
Give us death that is glorious and golden,
Crushed all out of shape!
Ah thy red lips, lascivious and luscious,
With death in their amorous kiss!
Cling round us, and clasp us, and crush us,
With bitings of agonised bliss!
We are sick with the poison of pleasure,
Dispense us the potion of pain;
Ope thy mouth to its uttermost measure,
And bite us again!
_The Light Green._ Cambridge, 1872.
――――
PROCURATORES.
O vestment of velvet and virtue,
O venomous victors of vice,
Who hurt men who never have hurt you,
Oh, calm, cruel, colder than ice;
Why wilfully wage ye this war? Is
Pure pity purged out of your breast?
O purse-prigging Procuratores,
O pitiless pest!
Do you dream of what was and no more is,
When fresher and freer than air?
Does it pain you, proud Procuratores,
These badges of bondage to bear?
In your youth were you greener than grass is,
And fearful of infinite fines,
Or casual, careless of classes,
Frequenters of wines?
Was it woe for a woman who jilted,
Or dread of your debts or a dun?
Or was it your nose was tip-tilted,
Or a frivolous fancy for fun?
Did duty, dark despot, decide you,
That fame to the dogs must be hurled
Or was it a whim, woe betide you,
To worry the world?
Five shillings ye fine the frail freshmen,
Five shillings, which cads call a crown,
Men caught in your merciless mesh, men
Who care not for cap or for gown.
When ye go grandly garbed in your glories,
With your coarse, callous crew of canines,
O pitiless Procuratores,
Inflictors of fines.
We have smote and made redder than roses,
With juice not of fruit nor of bud,
The truculent town’s-people’s noses,
And bathed brutal butchers in blood;
And we, all aglow with our glories,
Heard you not in the deafening din,
And ye came, O ye Procuratores,
And ran us all in.
I write not as one with no knowledge,
Unaware of your weird, wily ways,
For you’ve often inquired my college,
And fined me on subsequent days.
Oft stopped, I have stuffed you with stories,
When wandering wildly from wines;
Pawned property, Procuratores,
To find you your fines.
E. B. IWAN-MÜLLER.
This parody originally appeared, anonymously, in “_The Shotover
Papers_, or, Echoes from Oxford.” 1874.
――――
A SONG.
Oh, vanished benevolent Bobby!
Ah, beautiful wearisome beats,
Where rascals range, ready to rob ye,
In dim and disconsolate streets!
When I meet with a murderous nature,
And welcome thy bludgeon would be,
Two dirty hens tearing a ’tatur
Are all that I see.
In cosy recesses of kitchens,
Secure from the shrieking of slums;
Where cook’s so uncommon bewitching,
And the infinite tea kettle hums.
Yet art thou misled and mistaken,
Though served with celestial cheer,
Though feasted on liver and bacon,
And beauty and beer.
Oh, leisurely, helmeted Bobby!
Hast never with jealousy shook;
Lest Mercury, Jeames in the lobby,
Should chisel thee out of thy cook?
Ah, mark thou what mischief is hatching,
By love who doth nothing by halves;
What chance hast thou, Bobby, of matching
Those marvellous calves!
Oh, there are more perilous places
Than horrible hovering seas!
Come! Radiant the area space is
With the beams of the emerald cheese.
Thou art bold and thy uniform nobby,
But subtle are Syrens, and sweet!
Oh, fiery, melodious Bobby,
Come back to thy beat!
_The Figaro._ October 11, 1876.
――――
FOAM AND FANGS.
O, Nymph with the nicest of noses;
And finest and fairest of forms;
Lips ruddy and ripe as the roses
That sway and that surge in the storms;
O, buoyant and blooming Bacchante,
Of fairer than feminine face,
Rush, raging as demon of Dante――
To this, my embrace!
The foam, and the fangs, and the flowers,
The raving and ravenous rage,
Of a poet as pinion’d in powers,
As condor confined in a cage!
My heart in a haystack I’ve hidden,
As loving and longing I lie,
Kiss open thine eyelids unbidden――
I gaze and I die!
I’ve wander’d the wild waste of slaughter,
I’ve sniff’d up the sepulchre’s scent,
I’ve doated on devilry’s daughter,
And murmur’d much more than I meant;
I’ve paused at Penelope’s portal,
So strange are the sights that I’ve seen,
And mighty’s the mind of the mortal,
Who knows what I mean!
From _Patter Poems_, by WALTER PARKE,
London, VIZETELLY & CO., 1885.
――――:o:――――
A MATCH.
One of the cleverest parodies on Swinburne was written by the late Mr.
Tom Hood, the younger, on the above named poem, and first appeared in
_Fun_, whence it has frequently been copied without proper
acknowledgment.
The parody will be better appreciated after reading a few stanzas of
the original which, as will be observed, is written in a difficult and
very uncommon metre:
If love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf,
Our lives would grow together
In sad or singing weather,
Blown fields or flowerful closes,
Green pleasure or gray grief;
If love were what the rose is,
And I were like the leaf.
If I were what the words are,
And love were like the tune,
With double sound and single
Delight our lips would mingle,
With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon;
If I were what the words are,
And love were like the tune.
* * * * *
If you were April’s lady,
And I were lord in May,
We’d throw with leaves for hours
And draw for days with flowers,
Till day like night were shady,
And night were bright like day;
If you were April’s lady,
And I were lord in May.
If you were queen of pleasure,
And I were king of pain,
We’d hunt down love together,
Pluck out his flying-feather,
And teach his feet a measure,
And find his mouth a rein;
If you were queen of pleasure,
And I were king of pain.
A. C. SWINBURNE.
――――
A CATCH.
(_By a Mimic of Modern Melody._)
If you were queen of bloaters,
And I were king of soles,
The sea we’d wag our fins in
Nor heed the crooked pins in
The water dropt by boaters,
To catch our heedless joles;
If you were queen of bloaters
And I were king of soles.
If you were LADY MILE-END,
And I were DUKE OF BOW,
We’d marry and we’d quarrel,
And then, to point the moral
Should LORD PENZANCE his file lend,
Our chains to overthrow;
If you were LADY MILE-END,
And I were DUKE OF BOW.
If you were chill November,
And I were sunny June;
I’d not with love pursue you;
For I should be to woo you
(You’re foggy, pray remember)
A most egregious spoon;
If you were chill November,
And I were sunny June.
If you were cook to Venus
And I were J. 19;
When missus was out dining,
Our suppetites combining,
We’d oft contrive between us
To keep the patter clean;
If you were cook to Venus
And I were J. 19.
If you were but a jingle,
And I were but a rhyme;
We’d keep this up for ever,
Nor think it very clever,
A grain of sense to mingle
At times with simple chime;
If you were but a jingle
And I were but a rhyme.
TOM HOOD, the younger.
_Fun._ December 30, 1871.
――――
IF!
If life were never bitter,
And love were always sweet,
Then who would care to borrow
A moral from to morrow――
If Thames would always glitter,
And joy would ne’er retreat,
If life were never bitter,
And love were always sweet!
If care were not the waiter
Behind a fellow’s chair,
When easy-going sinners
Sit down to Richmond dinners,
And life’s swift stream flows straighter――
By Jove, it would be rare,
If care were not the waiter
Behind a fellow’s chair.
If wit were always radiant,
And wine were always iced,
And bores were kicked out straightway
Through a convenient gateway;
Then down the year’s long gradient
’Twere sad to be enticed,
If wit were always radiant,
And wine were always iced.
MORTIMER COLLINS.
As a parody this is scarcely inferior to that of Mr. Tom Hood, but the
poet has let the sound run away from the sense, and has forgotten that
a wit who is _always_ a radiant wit is apt to become tiresome; whilst
if “wine were always iced,” all red wines would greatly suffer,
especially Port and Burgundy.
――――
THE UNIVERSITY ELECTION.
_A Candidates Carol._
If you were an elector,
And I a candidate,
I’d send you round a notice,
And say “I trust your vote is
A thing I may expect, or
Request at any rate.”
If you were an elector,
And I a candidate.
If you were influential,
And I of no renown,
I’d say, “It is a pity
You’re not on my committee,
Your name is consequential
So let me put it down,”
If you were influential,
And I of no renown.
If I were well supported,
And you of little weight,
I’d say, “I hope to rank you
Among my voters――thank you.”
Your promise once extorted,
I’d leave you to your fate;
If I were well supported,
And you of little weight.
If you were at the polling,
And I were in the booth,
And if your vote you gave, or
Recorded in my favour,
I’d find it both consoling,
And powerful to soothe,
If you were at the polling,
And I were in the booth.
If you should vote against me,
And I were standing by,
I might be forced to fell you,
And then should simply tell you
That having so incensed me
You ought to mind your eye;
If you should vote against me,
And I were standing by.
If I were not elected,
And you would keep alive,
You oughtn’t to come nigh me,
But shun, avoid, and fly me,
And go about protected
(For _vide_ stanza 5).
If I were not elected,
And you would keep alive.
If you were not a voter,
Nor I a candidate,
I would not give a penny,
To know your views (if any),
Contingency remoter
I can’t enunciate,
If you were not a voter,
Nor I a candidate.
From _Dublin Doggerels_, by Edwin Hamilton, M.A. Dublin. C. Smyth,
Dame Street. 1877.
――――
A MATCHER.
If you were what your nose is,
And I were like the red,
Then should we glow together,
Sunned in the singing weather,
Blown well as winter closes,
And colds come in the head――
If you were what your nose is,
And I were like the red.
If I were what your words are,
And you H aspirate,
We ne’er should dwell together;
For you would snap your tether,
And leave me where the birds are,
And drop at hailstone rate――
If I were what your words are,
And you H aspirate,
If you were “call to-morrow,”
And I an unpaid bill,
You’d meet me at all seasons,
With plaintive looks and reasons,
And leave me then to sorrow,
And all _unsettled_ still――
If you were “call to-morrow.”
And I an unpaid bill,
If you were what’s called “shady,”
And I were quarter-day,
You’d take French leave some hours
Ere I arrived; no powers,
Could make you _meet_ me, Lady,
Nor make me stay away――
If you were what’s termed “shady”
And I were quarter-day.
If you were Queen of Pleasure,
And I were King Champagne,
We’d hunt the bard together,
Pluck out his inked goose-feather,
And leave him “feet” and “measure,”
But muddle his poor brain――
If you were Queen of Pleasure,
And I were King Champagne.
From _Lunatic Lyrics_, by Alfred Greenland, Junior. London, Tinsley
Brothers. 1882.
――――
A PHILISTINE TO AN ÆSTHETE.
(_By an Oxford Under grad who “makes hay” in an
Æsthete’s room “while the sun shines.”_)
If I were big NAT LANGHAM,
And you the Suffolk Pet,
I’d strike out from the shoulder,
Between your eyes, you’ll bet,
And give you such a drubbing,
As you would not forget;
If I were big NAT LANGHAM,
And you the Suffolk Pet.
If I were Jockey ARCHER,
And you my racing horse,
I’d give you such a breather
Across a stiff race-course,
That you would think your fortunes
Had altered for the worse;
If I were Jockey Archer,
And you my racing-horse.
* * * * *
If I were a wild Indian,
And you were my canoe,
I’d shoot with you the rapids,
Like the wild Indians do,
And care not if by drowning
Myself I could drown you;
If I were a wild Indian,
And you were my canoe.
_Punch._ April 1, 1882.
――――
In _Pictures at Play_, by two Art-Critics, illustrated by Harry
Furniss (Longmans, Green & Co.), a dialogue is given between a
portrait of Mr. Gladstone by Frank Holl (No. 499), and a bust of the
same gentleman by Albert Toft (No. 1,928). The Bust (supposed to
represent Mr. Gladstone in his younger days) thus addresses the
Portrait:――
I am your Dr. Jekyll
And you’re my Mr. Hyde,
On _my_ head mortals wreak ill,
(I am your Dr. Jekyll)
Of _me_ they often speak ill,
By _you_ left undenied,――
I am your Dr. Jekyll
And you’re my Mr. Hyde!
They say _I’ve_ turned my coat, sir,
’Tis _you_ should bear the blame,
Sold England for a vote, sir,
They say _I’ve_ turned my coat, sir,
Made friends with “Skin the Goat,” sir.
Or Ford, who’s much the same;
They say _I’ve_ turned my coat, sir,
’Tis _you_ should bear the blame.
Be either you or I, sir,
Be Jekyll please, or Hyde,
The Statesman pure and high, sir,
(Be either you or I, sir)
Or cast your virtues by, sir,
And take the darker side,
Be either you or I, sir,
Be Jekyll, please, or Hyde.
――――:o:――――
In October 1885 the _English Illustrated Magazine_ published a short
poem by Mr. Swinburne, which the Editor of the _Weekly Dispatch_
shortly afterwards reprinted, in his competition column, and invited
Parodies upon it:――
THE INTERPRETERS.
Days dawn on us that make amends for many
Sometimes,
When heaven and earth seem sweeter even than any
Man’s rhymes,
Light had not all been quenched in France, or quelled
In Greece,
Had Homer sung not, or had Hugo held
His peace,
Had Sappho’s self not left her word thus long
For token,
The sea round Lesbos yet in waves of song
Had spoken.
And yet these days of subtler air and finer
Delight,
When lovelier looks the darkness, and diviner
The light,
The gift they give of all these golden hours,
Whose urn
Pours forth reverberate rays or shadowing showers
In turn,
Clouds, beams, and winds that make the live day’s track
Seem living――
What were they did no spirit give them back
Thanksgiving?
Dead air, dead fire, dead shapes and shadows, telling
Time nought,
Man gives them sense and soul by song, and dwelling
In thought.
In human thought their being endures, their power
Abides:
Else were their life a thing that each light hour
Derides.
The years live, work, sigh, smile, and die, with all
They cherish;
The soul endures, though dreams that fed it fall
And perish.
In human thought have all things habitation;
Our days
Laugh, lower, and lighten past, and find no station
That stays.
But thought and faith are mightier things than time
Can wrong,
Made splendid once with speech, or made sublime
By song,
Remembrance, though the tide of change that rolls
Wax hoary,
Gives earth and heaven, for song’s sake and the soul’s
Their glory.
A. C. SWINBURNE.
Three of the competition poems were printed in the _Weekly Dispatch_,
October, 18, 1885, the first prize was awarded to the following:――
Lays dawn on us that have few charms for many,
Sometimes,
Sure heaven and earth were seldom rack’d for any
Worse rhymes.
Light would not all be quench’d were bards compelled
To cease,
Had Tennyson sung not, or Swinburne held
His peace――
Had Algy’s self not writ these lines so long
And broken:
’Tis sad to see our Swinny rave in song
Mad spoken!
And yet few lays or subtler airs give finer
Delight,
Or soar from out the darkness with diviner
A flight,
Than his whose gift, in his most golden hours,
Can earn
Reverberate praise for all his varied powers
In turn;
Grand, grave or gay, that make his verse at times
Seem living,
But where are they who yield him for these rhymes
Thanksgiving?
Dull verse, queer style, dim tropes and rhythm, telling
Us nought;
One looks for sense and shape in song, compelling
Sweet thought!
In this what thought there is all clouded o’er
Abides,
And ev’ry one the more he reads the more
Derides!
The words start, jump and jerk, and rise and fall
So funny,
That one endures, yet deems such stuff is all
For money!
A poet’s thoughts should please in all their stages.
This lay
Seems cobbled up to find a home in pages
That pay.
But thought and rhythm flighty have this time
Gone wrong,
Though splendid once his speech, and oft sublime
His song!
(Remembrance tells the powers of poet-souls
Wax hoary)
This song may give him guineas, but enrols
No glory!
HERBERT L. GOULD.
Highly commended:――
THE LADIES.
Faces we see that make amends for many
Most plain,
When English girls seem sweeter e’en than any
From Spain,
Beauty had not been rare with us, or quelled
In Greece,
Had Tom Moore sung not, or Anacreon held
His peace.
Had Aphrodite never cleft the sea,
In splendour,
Our modern belles would still as winsome be
And tender.
And so these girls of gentle air and manner
Delight:
Who lovelier looks than Hilda, as you scan her?
Sweet sight!
The gleam that shines from every golden tress,
Whose wealth
The sunbeam kisses, or the winds caress
By stealth.
Hair, lips, and eyes, with which our nymphs prepare
For action――
What were they, did no _esprit_ give them rare
Attraction?
Dead lips, dead eyes, dead silken tresses, telling
Men nought;
Wit only gives them life and soul and dwelling
In thought.
In memory must their grace endure, their spell
Abide:
Else were their sway a thing that we might well
Deride.
The “darlings” flirt, sigh, smile, wax old, with none
To cherish;
Their hope endures, though charms fail one by one
And perish.
In faces sweet seek all men consolation;
Our “fair”
Laugh, lisp, and lighten life, and find flirtation
A snare.
But wit and soul are mightier things than Time
Can wrong,
Linked with a silv’ry voice that is sublime
In song.
Dreams of fair girls illume, like stars on pall,
Life’s story;
Give rapture rare, and our soft slumbers all
Their glory.
F. B. DOVETON.
Truths take live forms that make a hope for labour,
Though rare,
When life seems sweeter with each bright hope’s neighbour――
Dreams fair.
Progress had not been crushed nor lost its spell
For men,
Had Rousseau never found the tyrant’s knell,
His pen.
Had Gladstone’s self ne’er poured the words that burn
For token,
The voice of Right for myriads who earn
Had spoken.
And yet these truths which show to us immortal
To-day,
When swart Injustice sees through its last portal
Decay;
The joy these truths can give to heart and soul,
And pour
Glory on prophets gone who filled the roll
Of yore;
Truths, gifts, and hopes that make our life’s hard track
Worth living――
What were they did no voices thunder back
Thanksgiving?
Mere thoughts, mere hopes, mere dreams, mere visions showing
No form;
The statesman gives their shape in language glowing
Heart-warm.
In deathless speech their life is found, their power
Is seen,
Else were their names the shadows of an hour
That’s been.
Mere theories rise, fall, and fade, though all
May cherish.
The fact endures, free speech forbids its fall
To perish.
In champions’ tongues has truth its full progression:
Bare thought
Dawns, shines, and fades, through finding no expression,
Though sought.
But speech and Press are mightier than all sway
Can bind,
Made potent by wide utterance their way
To find.
Progress and Freedom, though Time’s tide that rolls
Wax hoary,
Give to a nation’s life, both mind’s and soul’s,
Its glory.
A. PRATT.
――――:o:――――
LOFTY LINES.
(_By a Swinburnean Lofty Liner._)
Imparadised by my environment,
In rhymes impeccably good,
Let me scribble, as poor proud Byron meant
To have scribbled, if he could!
I’ll strain, as the sinuous cameleopard
Strains after the blossomy bough,
And with faculties that develop hard
Let me write――I can’t say how.
Impish idiom’s idiosyncrasy
Shall my verse festoon with flowers;
In a kingdom of pen-and-inkrasy
I shall wield prosodian powers.
Through innumerous apotheoses
The future my name shall learn,
And like passionate plethoric peonies
My perpetual poems burn.
Let my glory grow as the icicle
Accrues between night and morn;
As the bicyclist rides his bicycle
Let me on my metre be borne.
Flashing thus on verses vehicular,
With Pegasus ’neath my touch,
My method can’t be too particular,
Nor the public see too much.
The critics are all anthropophagous,
And feed on poetic flesh;
My heart nestles in my esophagous,
To think I’ve been in their mesh.
As vessels that sail on the Bosphorus
Catch Constantinople’s beams,
So my soul from prosody’s phosphorus
Still gathers Dædalian gleams.
_Funny Folks_, May 11, 1878.
――――
_The Family Herald_ (London) for July 28, 1888, contained an amusing
article on _Parodies_, from which the following is an extract:
“But we wish to get away from well-trodden tracks, and we
will for once forsake our usual purely didactic groove in
order that we may give our readers an idea of what we regard
as artistic drollery, Take this dreadful imitation of Mr.
Swinburne’s manner. The parodist seems to have genuinely
enjoyed his work; and we have no doubt but that Mr.
Swinburne laughed as heartily as anybody. The poet is
supposed to be attending a wedding of distinguished persons
in Westminster Abbey, and the naughty scoffer represents him
as bursting forth with the following rather alarming clarion
call――
There is glee in the groves of the Galilean――
The groves that were wont to be gray and glum――
And a sound goes forth to the dim Ægean,
To Helen hopeless and Dido dumb――
The sound of a noise of cab or carriage,
A rhythm of rapture, a mode of marriage.
Sing “Hallelujah!” Shout “Io Pæan!”
Hymen――O Hymen, behold, they come!
What shall I sing to them? How shall I speak to them?
Whose is the speech that a groom thinks good?
Oh that a while I might gabble in Greek to them――
Gabble and gush and be understood,
Gush and glow and be understanded,
Apprehended and shaken-handed!
Yea, though a minute should seem a week to them,
I would utter such words as I might or could!
For winter’s coughs and cossets are over,
And all the season of sniffs and snows,
The rheums that ravish lover from lover,
The eyes that water, the nose that blows;
And time forgotten is not remembered,
And cards are wedded and cake dismembered,
And in the Abbey, closed, under cover,
Blooms and blossoms and breaks love’s rose.
A masterpiece! And there is not a touch of malignity in the
lines; the poet’s curious way of writing occasionally in the
Hebraic style, his vagueness, his peculiar mode of procuring
musical effects, are all picked out and shown with a smile.
No one has quite equalled Caldecott, but this anonymous wit
runs him hard.”
Unfortunately the author of the article omits to state the source from
whence he derived the parody he praises so highly.
――――
HOME, SWEET HOME.
As Algernon Charles Swinburne might have wrapped
it up in Variations.
(’_Mid pleasures and palaces_――)
As sea-foam blown of the winds, as blossom of brine that is drifted
Hither and yon on the barren breast of the breeze,
Though we wander on gusts of a god’s breast shaken and shifted,
The salt of us stings, and is sore for the sobbing seas.
For home’s sake hungry at heart, we sicken in pillared porches
Of bliss made sick for a life that is barren of bliss,
For the place whereon is a light out of heaven that sears not nor
scorches,
Nor elsewhere than this.
(_An exile from home, splendour dazzles in vain_――)
For here we know shall no gold thing glisten
No bright thing burn, and no sweet thing shine;
Nor Love lower never an ear to listen
To words that work in the heart like wine.
What time we are set from our land apart,
For pain of passion and hunger of heart,
Though we walk with exiles fame faints to christen,
Or sing at the Cytherean’s shrine.
(VARIATION: _An exile from home_.)
Whether with him whose head of gods is honorèd
With song made splendent in the sight of men
Whose heart most sweetly stout,
From ravished France cast out,
Bring firstly hers, was hers most wholly then――
Or where on shining seas like wine
The dove’s wings draw the drooping Erycine.
(_Give me my lowly thatched cottage_――)
For Joy finds Love grow bitter,
And spreads his wings to quit her,
At thoughts of birds that twitter
Beneath the roof-tree’s straw――
Of birds that come for calling,
No fear or fright appalling,
When dews of dusk are falling,
Or day light’s draperies draw.
(_Give me them, and the peace of mind._)
Give me these things then back, though the giving
Be at cost of earth’s garner of gold;
There is no life without these worth living,
No treasure where these are not told.
For the heart give the hope that it knows not,
Give the balm for the burn of the breast――
For the soul and the mind that repose not,
O, give us a rest!
H. C. BUNNER.
This Parody originally appeared in _Scribner’s Monthly_, May, 1881,
with imitations of Bret Harte, Austin Dobson, Oliver Goldsmith, and
Walt Whitman. They were afterwards republished in a volume, entitled
_Airs from Arcady_, by H. C. Bunner. London, Charles Hutt, 1885.
――――:o:――――
A SWINBURNIAN INTERLUDE.
Short space shall be hereafter
Ere April brings the hour
Of weeping and of laughter,
Of sunshine and of shower,
Of groaning and of gladness,
Of singing and of sadness,
Of melody and madness,
Of all sweet things and sour.
Sweet to the blithe bucolic
Who knows nor cribs nor crams,
Who sees the frisky frolic
Of lanky little lambs:
But sour beyond expression
To one in deep depression
Who sees the closing session,
And imminent exams.
He cannot hear the singing
Of birds upon the bents.
Nor watch the wild-flowers springing.
Nor smell the April scents.
He gathers grief with grinding,
Foul food of sorrow finding
In books of beastly binding
And beastlier contents.
Our hope alone sustains him,
And no more hopes beside,
One only trust restrains him
From shocking suicide:
He will not play nor palter
With hemlock or with halter,
He will not fear nor falter,
Whatever chance betide.
He knows examinations
Like all things else have ends,
And then come vast vacations
And visits to his friends:
And youth with pleasure yoking,
And joyfulness and joking,
And smilingness and smoking,
For grief to make amends.
_The University News Sheet._ St. Andrews, N. B. March 31, 1886.
――――:o:――――
VACCINE.
_Written after reading “Faustine.”_
Hail! sacred salutary nymph,
Fair freckless queen;
Pure and translucent flows thy lymph,
Potent Vaccine!
“Each shapely silver arm” receives
The lancet keen;
E’en warriors trembling raise their sleeves
For thee, Vaccine.
“Let me go over your good gifts,”
That plain are seen;
Thou sav’st the face from scars and rifts,
Clear-browed Vaccine.
Belovèd maid of many charms,
Calm and serene,
Fondly we take thee _in our arms_,
Lovely Vaccine!
Virtue of inoculation,
To try we mean;
We’re _now_ a humour-us nation,
You’ll own, Vaccine.
Doctors, like ancient knights again,
With lances keen,
Daily go “pricking o’er the plain,”
With thee, Vaccine.
It would have gladdened Jenner’s heart,
Could he have seen
Such thousands suffering from the smart
Of thee, Vaccine.
And _Jenner-ations_ yet to be
Seen on life’s scene,
Shall pæans sing in praise of thee,
Saving Vaccine!
_The Day’s Doings._ March 4, 1871.
――――:o:――――
LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI
(A.D. 1875).
Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
Alone, and idly loitering?
The season’s o’er――at operas
No “stars” now sing.
Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
So moody! in the dumps so down?
Why linger here when all the world
Is “out of town?”
I see black care upon thy brow,
Tell me, are I.O.U.’s now due?
And in thy pouch, I fear thy purse
Is empty, too.
“I met a lady at a ball,
Full beautiful――a fairy bright;
Her hair was golden (dyed, I find!)
Struck by the sight――
“I gazed, and long’d to know her then:
So I entreated the M.C.
To introduce me――and he did!
Sad hour for me.
“We paced the mazy dance, and too,
We talked thro’ that sweet evening long,
And to her――it came to pass,
I breathed Love’s song.
“She promised me her lily hand,
She seemed particularly cool:
No warning voice then whispered low,
‘Thou art a fool!’
“Next day I found I lov’d her not,
And then she wept and sigh’d full sore,
Went to her lawyer, on the spot,
And talked it o’er
“She brought an action, too, for breach
Of promise――’tis the fashion――zounds!
The jury brought in damages
Five thousand pounds!
“And this is why I sojourn here
Alone, and idly loitering,
Tho’ all the season’s through and tho’
No ‘stars’ now sing!”
_The Figaro._ September 15, 1875.
――――:o:――――
A SONG AFTER SUNSET.
The breeze o’er the bridge was a-blowing,
O’er wicked and wan Waterloo,
The busses buzzed, coming and going,
As busses will do.
Amid the cold coigns of the causeway.
I secretly, silently sat,
Aloof, out of laughter’s and law’s way,
Hard-holding my hat.
In crowds that seemed never to cease, men
Heaved, hurtled, home-hurried and howled,
While pestilent prigs of policemen,
Persistently prowled.
From pockets that penniless sounded
Two tickets I’d drearily drawn,
They prated of pledges impounded
In pitiless pawn.
They seemed with a cynical sorrow,
To sing the same sedulous strain:
“Pay up, and redeem us to-morrow,
Your watch and your chain!
We know you of old, sworn tormentor!
You thriver on thriftless and thief!
Spout-spider!――on spoiling intent, or
Rapacious relief!
Avuncular author of anguish,
We damn you with deepest disdain!
We linger, we long, and we languish
For freedom again.”
I smiled on the speakers unheeding,
I grinned at their garrulous games――
When the breeze blew them, splendidly speeding,
Right into the Thames.
They scattered, as seed that is sown, or
The fringe of the fast flowing foam,
And their hungry, hysterical owner
Went hopelessly home.
_Judy._ June, 16, 1880.
――――:o:――――
THE MAD, MAD MUSE.
Out on the margin of moonshine land,
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs,
Out where the whing-whang loves to stand,
Writing his name with his tail on the sand,
And wipes it out with his oogerish hand;
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.
Is it the gibber of gungs and keeks?
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs,
Or what is the sound the whing-whang seeks,
Crouching low by winding creeks,
And holding his breath for weeks and weeks?
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.
Anoint him the wealthiest of wealthy things!
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.
’Tis a fair whing-whangess with phosphor rings,
And bridal jewels of fangs and stings,
And she sits and as sadly and softly sings;
As the mildewed whir of her own dead wings;
Tickle me, dear; tickle me here;
Tickle me, love, in these lonesome ribs.
ROBERT J. BURDETTE.
From S. Thompson’s _Collection of Poems_. Chicago. 1886.
――――
STUDIES IN EXOTIC VERSE.
_A Ballade of the Nurserie._
(After Mr. Swinburne’s “Dreamland.”)
She hid herself in the _soirée_ kettle
Out of her Ma’s way, wise wee maid!
Wan was her lip as the lily’s petal,
Sad was the smile that over it played.
Why doth she warble not? Is she afraid
Of the hound that howls, or the moaning mole?
Can it be on an errand she hath delayed?
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul!
The nightingale sings to the nodding nettle
In the gloom o’ the gloaming athwart the glade:
The zephyr sighs soft on Popòcatapètl,
And Auster is taking it cool in the shade:
Sing, hey for a _gutta serenade_!
Not mine to stir up a storied pole,
No noses snip with a bluggy blade――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul?
Shall I bribe with a store of minted metal?
With Everton toffee thee persuade?
That thou in a kettle thyself should’st settle,
When grandly and gaudily all arrayed!
Thy flounces ’ill foul and fangles fade.
Come out, and Algernon Charles ’ill roll
Thee safe and snug in Plutonian plaid――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul.
ENVOI.
When nap is none and raiment frayed,
And winter crowns the puddered poll,
A kettle sings ane soote ballade――
Hush thee, hush thee, dear little soul.
JOHN TWIG.
――――:o:――――
ON MARRIAGE WITH A DECEASED WIFE’S SISTER.
O blood-bitten lip all aflame,
O Dolores and also Faustine,
O aunts of the world worried shame,
Lo your hair with its amorous sheen
Meshes man in its tangles of gold;
O aunts of the tremulous thrill,
We are pining――we long to enfold
The Deceased Wife’s Fair Relative Bill.
G. R. SIMS.
――――:o:――――
A PARODY.
If it be but a dream or a vision,
The life which is after the grave,
The moil of the metaphysician
Is vain,――but an answer I crave,
Amid bright intellectual flambeaux
I shall find no light clearer than thee,
O sable and sensual Sambo,
The servant of me!
I beheld thee beholding the ballet,
Dumps doleful display’d deep despair,
Thou didst think of thine own land, my valet,
The land in which nought thou didst wear.
* * * * *
O statue, us Philistines loathing,
Of Phœbus!――our tailors we fear,
Come down, and redeem us from clothing,
O nude Belvidere!
We are wise――and we make ourselves hazy,
We are foolish――and, so, go to church;
While Sambo but laughs, and is lazy,
(Vile Discipline! lend me thy birch);
He dreams of no life save the present,
His virtue is but when it suits;
Sometimes, which is not quite so pleasant,
I miss coat or boots.
ANONYMOUS.
_Once a Week._ January 16, 1869.
――――:o:――――
GILLIAN.
_Jacke and Jille_
I have made me an end of the moods of maidens,
I have loosed me, and leapt from the links of love;
From the kiss that cloys and desire that deadens,
The woes that madden, the words that move.
In the dim last days of a spent September,
When fruits are fallen, and flies are fain;
Before you forget, and while I remember,
I cry as I shall cry never again.
_Went up a hylle_
Where the strong fell faints in the lazy levels
Of misty meadows, and streams that stray;
We raised us at eve from our rosy revels,
With faces aflame for the death of the day;
With pale lips parted, and sighs that shiver,
Low lids that cling to the last of love:
We left the levels, we left the river,
And turned us and toiled to the air above.
_to fetch a paile of water_,
By the sad sweet springs that have salved our sorrow,
The fates that haunt us, the grief that grips――
Where we walk not to-day nor shall walk to-morrow――
The wells of lethe for wearied lips.
With souls nor shaken with tears nor laughter,
With limp knees loosed as of priests that pray,
We bowed us and bent to the white well-water,
We dipped and we drank it and bore away.
_Jacke felle downe_
The low light trembled on languid lashes,
The haze of your hair on my mouth was blown,
Our love flashed fierce from its fading ashes,
As night’s dim net on the day was thrown.
What was it meant for, or made for, that minute,
But that our lives in delight should be dipt?
Was it yours, or my fault, or fate’s, that in it
Our frail feet faltered, our steep steps slipt?
_And brake his crowne, and Jille came tumblynge after_.
Our linked hands loosened and lapsed in sunder,
Love from our limbs as a shift was shed,
But paused a moment, to watch with wonder
The pale pained body, the bursten head.
While our sad souls still with regrets are riven,
While the blood burns bright on our bruisèd brows,
I have set you free, and I stand forgiven――
And now I had better go and call my cows.
From a scarce little pamphlet entitled “_Poems and Parodies_, by Two
Undergrads.” Oxford. B. H. Blackwell, 1880. Price one shilling.
HOW JACK HARRIS BECAME ÆSTHETIC.
Ye Muses nine that in Arcadia dwell,
Quit Pindus and the cold Castalian well,
And me your lowliest follower inspire
With such clear flame as long ago did fire
The mighty lips of Blackstone; so may I,
A feeble trump of truth that cannot die,
Clearly proclaim and on the roll of fame
Inscribe, however humbly, my poor name.
_Jack Harris before his Conversion._
Come down to me, cling to me, lay thy red lips on me, love,
Let me drown in thy bountiful beauty, O glorious consecrate dove,
Made fit for the vigil of Venus, made fair by the Cyprian dame,
Made fair in the form of a maiden, a medley of music and flame;
For the world grows giddy around us, and swoons, and the pale souls
preach
Poor fables of sorrow and virtue, and all that the grey gods teach,
But we clasp and we bite and we madden, and I worship your throat
and your hair.
We have strayed in the cold sea places, we have laughed on the altar
stair,
We have eaten and drunken of love, and the lesson of living is this,
That the high sky bends above us, and life is a curse and a kiss.
Make me glad, O thou rare hand-maiden, with the sound of thy
passionate sighs,
While I sing of thy body’s white beauty and live in the light of
thine eyes,
For save me there’s no man living made worthy to utter thy praise,
Who art come as new moon to our night-tide, new sun toour days.
_Jack Harris after his Conversion._
From an article by Mr. Justin H. McCarthy, which appeared in
_Belgravia_ (London). March, 1880.
――――:o:――――
THE LAY OF MACARONI.
As a wave that steals when the winds are stormy
From creek to cove of the curving shore,
Buffeted, blown, and broken before me,
Scattered and spread to its sunlit core:
As a dove that dips in the dark of maples
To sip the sweetness of shelter and shade,
I kneel in thy nimbus, O noon of Naples,
I bathe in thine beauty, by thee embayed.
What is it ails me that I should sing of her?
The queen of the flashes and flames that were!
Yea, I have felt the shuddering sting of her,
The flower-sweet throat and the hands of her!
I have swayed and sung to the sound of her psalters,
I have danced her dances of dizzy delight,
I have hallowed mine hair to the horns of her altars,
Between the nightingale’s song and the night!
What is it, Queen, that now I should do for thee?
What is it now I should ask at thine hands?
Blow of the trumpets thine children once blew for thee?
Break from thine feet and thine bosom the bands?
Nay, as sweet as the songs of Leone Leoni,
And gay as her garments of gem-sprinkled gold,
She gives me mellifluous, mild macaroni,
The choice of her children when cheeses are old!
And over me hover, as if by the wings of it,
Frayed in the furnace by flame that is fleet,
The curious coils and the strenuous strings of it,
Dropping, diminishing down, as I eat:
Lo! and the beautiful Queen, as she brings of it,
Lifts me the links of the limitless chain,
Bidding mine mouth chant the splendidest things of it,
Out of the wealth of my wonderful brain!
Behold! I have done it: my stomach is smitten
With sweets of the surfeit her hands have unrolled.
Italia, mine cheeks with thine kisses are bitten:
I am broken with beauty, stabbed, slaughtered, and sold!
No man of thy millions is more macaronied,
Save mighty Mazzini, than musical Me:
The souls of the Ages shall stand as astonied,
And faint in the flame I am fanning for thee!
From _Diversions of the Echo Club_, by Bayard Taylor.
――――:o:――――
BALLAD OF DREAMLAND.
I.
I hid my heart in a nest of roses,
Out of the sun’s way, hidden apart;
In a softer bed than the soft white snow’s is,
Under the roses I hid my heart.
Why should it sleep not? why should it start,
When never a leaf of the rose tree stirred?
What made sleep flutter his wings and part?
Only the song of a secret bird.
* * * * *
III.
The green land’s name that a charm encloses,
It never was writ in the traveller’s chart,
And sweet as the fruit on its tree that grows is,
It never was sold in the merchants’ mart.
The swallows of dreams through its dim fields dart,
And sleep’s are the tunes in its tree tops heard;
No hound’s note wakens the wild wood hart,
Only the song of a secret bird.
* * * * *
A. C. SWINBURNE.
――――
A BALLAD OF AFTER DINNER.
_A Month after Swinburne._
I hid my head in a rug from Moses,
From the clatter of moving dishes apart,
And curled up my feet for forty dozes,
Just for to soothe my beating heart.
Why did it sleep not? Why did it start,
When never a dish remained to shock?
What made the fluttering doze depart?
Only the tick of an eight day clock.
Be still, I said, for hope pre-supposes
A still mild mood for the sleep-slain hart;
Be still, for the wind, with its curled-up toes, is
Silent and quieter yet than thou art.
Doth a wound in thee deep as a thorn’s wound smart?
Dost thou fretfully languish for Clicquot and hock?
What bids the lids of thy sleep dispart;
Only the tick of an eight-day clock.
I wait in vain for the charm that encloses
The green land of dreams in sleep’s mystical chart,
For the fruit of its trees and the breath of its roses,
More sweet than are sold in the merchants’ mart.
So close to its border, why fails my heart?
What holdeth it back, tho’ my dim brain rock?
Without, the noise of the nightman’s cart,
Within, the tick of an eight-day clock.
_Envoi._
Erewhile in hope I had chosen my part,
To sleep for a season as sound as a block,
With never a thought of a nightman’s cart,
Or the hateful tick of an eight-day clock.
――――
A BALLAD OF DREAMLAND.
The sorest stress of the Season’s over;
Out of it’s crush I am lying alone,
My face to the sky, and my back in the clover.
Hark to that lark! Its jubilant tone
Is a cheery change from St. Stephen’s drone;
And ah! that whift from the wind-swept brine!
With nought to do but absorb ozone――
Should there be ballad more blythe than mine?
Song of a haven-welcoming lover!
Rare rose-scents from our garden blown
Reach me here, and my eyes discover,
Shimmering there, in a tangle thrown,
Sunny locks. “She is coming, my own!”
The green bowers sever, her blue eyes shine.
Sweet love nearing, sore labour flown,――
Should there be ballad more blythe than mine?
What to me though weariness hover
Still o’er Town where the toilers groan?
Lazy lounger, leisurely lover,
What care I for the Members’ moan
At the Irish incubus, heavy as stone?
For Biggar’s bullying, Whalley’s whine?
Peace unchequered, and care unknown,
Should there be ballad more blithe than mine?
ENVOI.
Eh! What! Drowsing? A dream? Ochone!
St. Patrick’s curse on those Irish swine,
Who have burst the bubble by slumber blown,
And broken a ballad so blithe as mine!
_Punch._ August 11, 1877.
――――:o:――――
The following parody appeared in _The Tomahawk_ (London) on the
occasion of a visit paid by Ada Isaacs Menken to M. Alexandre Dumas,
in Paris. “Miss Menken,” who was really the wife of John C. Heenan the
pugilist, will be best remembered for her appearance (in very scanty
attire) as “Mazeppa,” at Astley’s Theatre. She had a fine stage
appearance, but was a very indifferent actress. She published a small
volume of poems, entitled _Infelicia_, which is now eagerly sought
after by collectors, because it contains an introduction written by
Charles Dickens.
TO ADA.
So must the sinewy Centaur snort and rear,
As some sweet maiden-mare trots wickedly
Across his pagan path, burning his very heart;
Flicking the flies from off her heaving flanks,
The amorous flies who fill their lips with blood;
And while his life-blood riots in his hocks,
She spreads her cunning heels and whisks her tail;
Then kicks the bitter sand into his eyes,
Still gazing smarting on the supple form――
For I have felt a joy new-born to pain!
For I have seen that silken syren glide
Across the desert, hight old Astley’s Fane.
My breast could hardly flutter as she came
Bare-backed before my timorous sight; my nails
Curved inward to my palms, and such a sweet
Soft tremor crept around my nervous knees.
I swooned but for the kindly guardian of the box,
Who brought me welcome water at my wish,
And damped my throbbing temples.
On my bed
I rolled and rioted in frenzied fret,
For turn howe’er I would, upon the walls,
Across the sheets, the beauteous Ada rode,
Scenting the air with black-head clustering hair,
Loading the senses with soft-thrilling sighs;
While through the rosy lips pale pearls of teeth
Flashed hungrily. Strapped to her showy steed,
She bites her charger in the side, till lips
Run red with the brave beast’s blood; and as the sting
Of her small fangs urges his wild career,
So this hot flame that chars me to the bones,
Spreads out the fire of jealousy, and cries,
Mazeppa flies across the sea to greet
Great Athos-Porthos-Aramis.
――――:o:――――
On page 9, an imitation of Mr. Swinburne’s style written by Mr. Walter
Parke, was given; the following, which is a parody of _Dolores_,
appears in “Lays of the Saintly,” (London, Vizetelly & Co.), a clever
work written by the same gentleman:――
ST. SIMEON STYLITES.
* * * * *
Talking of bards, one day a pagan poet
Approach’d the pillar, and began to sing;
The blessed Simeon could not choose but know it,
So high the minstrel pitch’d his voice and string.
This bard was Greek in sentiment and style;
A Venus-worshipper――profuse of curses
On those who deem’d his ethics loose and vile:
I give you a translation of his verses:――
_Stylites._
“Closed eyelids that hide like a shutter,
Hard eyes that have visions apart,
The grisly gaunt limbs, and the utter
And deadly abstraction of heart;
Whence all that is joyous and bright is
Expell’d as both vicious and vain
O, stony and stolid Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“There can be but warfare between us,
For thine is a spiritual creed,
And mine is the worship of Venus,
On “raptures and roses” I feed;
Self-torture’s thine only employment,
We both feel the bliss and the bane,
For woe will oft spring from enjoyment,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“Can joys be of Martyrdom’s giving?
Men seek them, and change at a breath
The leisures and labours of living,
For the ravings and rackings of death:
To stand all alone on that height is
An action unsought and insane,
O, moveless and morbid Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“There are those who still offer to Bacchus,
There are men who Love’s goddess still own,
What right have new faiths to attack us?
And why are our shrines overthrown?
There are poets, inspired by Castalia,
Whose lyres have Anacreon’s strain,
Whose lives are one long saturnalia,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“We sing of voluptuous blisses,
Of all that thy rigour would spurn,
Of “biting” and “ravenous” kisses,
Of bosoms that beat and that burn;
To all that is earthy and carnal,
Our votaries’ souls we would chain,
We breathe of the chamber and charnel
Our Patron of Pain!”
“Oho! for the days of sweet vices,
The glory of goddess and Greek!
(For all that most naughty and nice is
Most purely and surely antique).
Oho! for the days when Endymion
Thro’ love o’er Diana did reign!
These, these were Elysian, St. Simeon,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“We’ll crown us with myrtle and laurel,
We’ll wreathe us in Paphian flowers,
To be and make others immoral,
We’ll ply our poetical powers;
Our worship shall be Aphrodite’s,
To woman the wine we will drain,
O, loveless and lonely Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”
“By the hunger thine abstinence causes,
By the thirst of unbearable heat,
By thy pray’rs which have very few pauses,
By thy lodging devoid of a seat,
By sleep that so meagre at night is,
’Twere better awake to remain,
Come down from thy pillar, Stylites,
Our Patron of Pain!”
The holy man, it need not be remark’d,
Turn’d as deaf ear to such lascivious singing
As when a serpent hiss’d or wild dog barked,
Or raven croak’d around his column winging;
Immovable in body as in mind,
He bore his life’s insufferable tedium,
It seems a pity that he could not find
’Twixt vice and virtue’s height some “happy medium.”
――――:o:――――
In 1872, the late Mr. Mortimer Collins published “_The British Birds_,
a communication from the Ghost of Aristophanes.” Extracts from this
very clever satire are still often quoted. The following passages
contain parodies of A. C. Swinburne, Robert Browning, and Alfred
Tennyson, whose identities are thinly veiled under the names of Brow,
Beard, and Hair.
SCENE. _In the Clouds._
PEISTHETAIRUS, _discovered_.
(Enter three Poets, all handsome. One hath redundant hair, a second
redundant beard, a third redundant brow. They present a letter of
introduction from an eminent London publisher, stating that they are
candidates for the important post of Poet Laureate to the New
Municipality which the Birds are about to create.)
PEISTHETAIRUS. Gentlemen:
Happy to see you in the Realms of Air
As yet the worthy Mayor and Aldermen
And Councillors of the Town have not decided
Whether they want a Poet Laureate.
But, if ’twill ease your minds to sing a little,
I’ll try and listen. As my memory
Fails me entirely in regard to names,
Let me without the least discourtesy
Name you by your appearance. Amorous Naso
Was named from his chief feature. So I beg
To call you HAIR, and BEARD, and BROW.
THE THREE POETS. Agreed.
EUELPIDES.
For this delightful tourney of rhyme I hunger:
Who’s to begin, my master?
PEISTHETAIRUS. Why, the younger.
For the topic――as ’tis tropic
Heat at present――perhaps ’twere pleasant
If each Paladin
His ballad in
Put salad in.
But there must be no single metre, please
That’s not allowed by Dr. Guest, of Caius,
BROW. (_Swinburne._)
“O cool in the summer is salad,
And warm in the winter is love;
And a poet shall sing you a ballad
Delicious thereon and thereof.
A singer am I, if no sinner,
My Muse has a marvellous wing,
And I willingly worship at dinner
The Sirens of Spring.
Take endive――like love it is bitter;
Take beet――for like love it is red;
Crisp leaf of the lettuce shall glitter,
And cress from the rivulet’s bed:
Anchovies foam-born, like the lady
Whose beauty has maddened this bard,
And olives, from groves that are shady;
And eggs――boil ’em hard.”
BEARD. (_Browning._)
Waitress, with eyes so marvellous black,
And the blackest possible lustrous gay tress,
This is the month of the Zodiac
When I want a pretty deft-handed waitress.
Bring a china-bowl, you merry young soul;
Bring anything green, from worsted to celery;
Bring pure olive-oil from Italy’s soil――
Then your china-bowl we’ll well array.
When the time arrives chip choicest chives,
And administer quietly chili and capsicum――
Young girls do not quite know what’s what
’Till as a Poet into their laps I come).
Then a lobster fresh as fresh can be
(When it screams in the pot I feel a murderer);
After which I fancy we
Shall want a few bottles of Heidsieck or Roederer.
HAIR. (_Tennyson._)
King Arthur, growing very tired indeed
Of wild Tintagel, now that Launcelot
Had gone to Jersey or to Jericho,
And there was nobody to make a rhyme,
And Cornish girls were christened Jennifer,
And the Round Table had grown rickety,
Said unto Merlin (who had been asleep
For a few centuries in Broceliande,
But woke, and had a bath, and felt refreshed):
“What shall I do to pull myself together?”
Quoth Merlin, “Salad is the very thing,
And you can get it at the _Cheshire Cheese_”
King Arthur went there; _verily_, I believe
That he has dined there every day since then.
Have you not marked the portly gentleman
In his cool corner, with his plate of greens?
The great knight Launcelot prefers the _Cock_,
Where port is excellent (in pints), and waiters
Are portlier than kings, and steaks are tender,
And poets have been known to meditate――
Ox-fed orating ominous ostasticks.
* * * * *
The first edition of _The British Birds_ soon went out of print, and
became very scarce. But in December, 1885, Mrs. Mortimer Collins wrote
a letter to the editor of Parodies, which has now a melancholy
interest:――“I believe copies of British Birds can still be had at Mr.
Bentley’s, as I brought out a second edition there some eight years
ago. Yes, there are some parodies of Swinburne, Tennyson and Browning.
But the best known bits of the book are not parodies, unless you call
the whole book a parody of Aristophanes.
“The ‘Positivists’ is the most famous piece in the book, containing
the lines:――
“There was an APE in the days that were earlier;
Centuries passed, and his hair became curlier;
Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist――
Then he was MAN, and a Positivist.”
“and ‘Skymaking’ is another oft quoted bit. I thought, perhaps, that
you had written parodies on these; though it seemed unlikely, because
satiric verse does not lend itself to parody. I am always interested
in anything connected with my husband’s works, because I truly believe
in his genius. I may perhaps be somewhat partial in my judgment, for
Mortimer was a more brilliant talker than writer. Day after day I
enjoyed his wit, and I used to be so sorry there were not more to hear
it: but he was quite content with his audience of one.
“My husband has written many parodies. If you would like to quote them
I can refer you to them.”
But this kind offer of assistance was not to be fulfilled, for Mrs.
Collins complained at the end of the letter of her failing strength,
and in less than three months she passed away.
――――:o:――――
A MATCH.
(_Matched._)
If I were Anglo-Saxon,
And you were Japanese,
We’d study storks together,
Pluck out the peacock’s feather
And lean our languid backs on
The stiffest of settees;
If I were Anglo-Saxon,
And you were Japanese.
If you were Della-Cruscan,
And I were A.-Mooresque,
We’d make our limbs look less in
Artistic folds, and dress in
What once were tunics Tuscan
In DANTE’S days grotesque;
If you were Della-Cruscan,
And I were A.-Mooresque.
If I were mock Pompeian,
And you Belgravian Greek,
We’d glide ’mid gaping Vandals
In shapeless sheets and sandals,
Like shades in Tartarean
Dim ways remote and bleak;
If I were mock Pompeian,
And you Belgravian Greek.
If you were Culture’s scarecrow,
And I the guy of Art
I’d learn in latest phrases
Of either’s quaintest crazes
To lisp, and let my hair grow,
While yours you’d cease to part;
If you were Culture’s scarecrow,
And I the guy of Art.
If I’d a Botticelli,
And you’d a new Burne-Jones,
We’d doat for days and days on
Their mystic hues, and gaze on
With lowering looks that felly
We’d fix upon their tones;
If I’d a Botticelli,
And you’d a new Burne-Jones.
If you were skilled at crewels,
And I, a dab at rhymes,
I’d write delirious “ballads,”
While you your bilious salads
Where stitching upon two ells
Of coarsest crass, at times;
If you were skilled at crewels,
And I, a dab at rhymes.
If I were what’s “consummate,”
And you were quite “too too,”
’Twould be our Eldorado
To have a yellow dado,
Our happiness to hum at
A teapot tinted blue;
If I were what’s “consummate,”
And you were quite “too too.”
If you were what “intense” is,
And I were like “decay,”
We’d mutely muse or mutter
In terms distinctly utter,
And find out what the sense is
Of this Æsthetic lay;
If you were what “intense” is,
And I were like “decay.”
If you were wan, my lady,
And I, your lover, weird,
We’d sit and wink for hours
At languid lily-flowers,
Till, fain of all things fady,
We faintly――disappeared!
If you were wan, my lady,
And I, your lover, weird.
This Parody appeared in _Punch_, (June 18, 1881), at the time when the
Æsthetic revival in art and literature was the subject of much
undeserved ridicule, because of the absurd extent to which it was
carried by a few senseless fanatics.
――――:o:――――
BETWEEN THE SUNSET AND THE SEA.
_An American Imitation._
Between the gate post and the gate
I lingered with my love till late;
And what cared I for time of night
Till wakened by the watch dogs bite,
And thud of leathering boxtoed fate
Between the gate post and the gate.
Between the seaside and the sea
I kissed my love and she kissed me;
But rapturous day was grewsome night
And what is love but bloom and blight?
And what is kiss of mine to thee
Between the seaside and the sea.
Between the sunshine and the sun
I saw a face that hinted fun;
But what is fun and what is face
When driven at life’s killing pace?
I simply say that I have none
Between the sunshade and the sun.
Between the bumble and the bee
Full many a soul has had to flee;
And what is love may I inquire
When asked to build the kitchen fire?
Or who would not leap in the sea
Between the bumble and the bee.
Between the tea store and the tea
There is a wide immensity;
A dollar twenty five a pound
And not a nickel to be found;
Then what has fate in store for thee
Between the tea store and the tea.
R. W. ANSWELL.
――――:o:――――
A SONG AFTER SUNSET.
(_Being a Word from the Hanley Dog by the Cynic Poet Laureate_,
ALG-RN-N SW-NB-RNE.)
Lo, from my Black Country flung for thee,
Raving, red-eyed, scarred and seared;
To a bran-new sensation tune sung for thee,
With red lips, white teeth, underhung for thee,
Beauty begrimed and blood-smeared!
Vice-jawed, retractile, snub-snouted――
Tushes for fists swift to smite;
Round by round felled but not routed,
Rare of bark, bitter of bite!
If with grapplings and pluckings asunder――
If with throat-thirst for worry unslaked――
If with rush on growl, flash on low thunder――
Knocked over, but ne’er knocking under――
With cash on me lavishly staked――
If eye against eye glimly glaring,
Biped BRUMMY could quadruped scan,
Ring and chain with me, blood with me, sharing,――
Say which was brute, which was man?
* * * * *
_Punch._ August 1, 1874.
――――:o:――――
The following is a parody of another favourite metre of Mr. Swinburne,
which has been sent in, unfortunately without any information as to
when and where it originally appeared:――
APRIL SHOWERS.
Oh, April showers
Are good for flowers,
And fill the bowers
With perfumes rare;
But twinge erratic,
And pang rheumatic
And not ecstatic
Do they prepare!
And though the leanness
And arid meanness
Of lawns with greenness
They hide and clothe;
They, past disputing,
Set corns a-shooting,
Which makes your booting
A thing to loathe!
And of the Future
Although they suit your
Bright dreams, compute you’re
The Past’s sad prey;
The while you yell a
Vain ritornello
For that umbrella
That’s stolen away!
――――:o:――――
In 1880, Messrs. Chatto and Windus, of Piccadilly, published an
anonymous volume of Poems, entitled “_The Heptalogia_, or the seven
against sense, a cap with Seven Bells.” In this there are parodies of
Robert Browning, Tennyson, Coventry Patmore, and others, but it is
more than doubtful whether the general public appreciated the sarcasm
of these clever skits. Amongst reading men much curiosity was felt as
to the author, but in answer to enquiries on the subject, the
publishers replied they were not at liberty to mention the author’s
name. Eventually public opinion assigned the work to Mr. Swinburne,
although it contains an exquisite parody on his own style, entitled
_Nephelidia_. This is a charming specimen of rhythmical, musical
nonsense. A few of the opening lines may be quoted, without injury to
themselves, or to the rest of the poem, as the conclusion is perfectly
irrelevant to the beginning, or to anything else:――
NEPHELIDIA.
From the depth of the dreamy decline of the dawn through a notable
nimbus of nebulous noonshine,
Pallid and pink as the palm of the flag-flower that flickers with
fear of the flies as they float,
Are they looks of our lovers that lustrously lean from a marvel of
mystic miraculous moonshine,
These that we feel in the blood of our blushes that thicken and
threaten with throbs through the throat?
Thicken and thrill as a theatre thronged at appeal of an actor’s
appalled agitation,
Fainter with fear of the fires of the future than pale with the
promise of pride in the past;
Flushed with the famishing fullness of fever that reddens with
radiance of rathe recreation,
Gaunt as the ghastliest of glimpses that gleam through the gloom
of the gloaming when ghosts go aghast?
Nay, for the nick of the tick of the time is a tremulous touch on
the temples of terror,
Strained as the sinews yet strenuous with strife of the dead who
is dumb as the dust-heaps of death:
Surely no soul is it, sweet as the spasm of erotic emotional
exquisite error,
Bathed in the balms of beatified bliss, beatific itself by
beatitude’s breath.
Surely no spirit or sense of a soul that was soft to the spirit
and soul of our senses
Sweetens the stress of suspiring suspicion that sobs in the
semblance and sound of a sigh;
Only this oracle opens Olympian, in mystical moods and triangular
tenses――
‘Life is the lust of a lamp for the light that is dark till the
dawn of the day when we die.’
Another parody, which was generally attributed to Mr. Swinburne,
appeared in _The Fortnightly Review_ for December, 1881. It was
entitled “_Disgust_; a Dramatic Monologue,” and was a parody of
Tennyson’s “_Despair_, a Dramatic Monologue” published in _The
Nineteenth Century_, November, 1881.
The original poem contained arguments of a most unpleasant and absurd
description, these were ably ridiculed in the burlesque, which will be
found on page 184, Volume 1, of this collection.
The following parody was also printed with the initials “A. C. S.,”
but clever as it is, few would venture to assert that it was actually
written by Mr. Swinburne.
THE TOPER’S LAMENT.
Oh, my memory lovingly lingers
Around the sweet sound of thy name,
And the spell of those magical fingers
That kindled my heart into flame;
But the joy that I think on no more is,
And my throat feels an ominous lump,
As I muse o’er the wreck of thy glories,
Thou Magpie and Stump!
For day after day have I sought thee,
As flowers are sought by the gale;
And night after night have I brought thee
A lip for thine exquisite ale.
Thy portals have welcomed me ever,
Mine hostess was pleasant and plump,
And her handmaids attentive and clever,
O Magpie and Stump!
Did I rage with the thirst of a Hector
(A thirst that she nimbly foresaw)
For a cup of thy ravishing nectar,
Who drew it as Nancy could draw?
While for grilling a steak that was juicy,
Or a chop that was chopped from the chump,
Had’st thou ever an equal to Lucy,
My Magpie and Stump?
Ah! thy votaries flocked beyond number,
And worshipped full oft at thy shrine;
And we poured forth libations to slumber,
And we censed with tobacco divine;
And then haply some bibulous fellow
Would fall to the floor with a bump――
For thy potions were potently mellow,
Our Magpie and Stump.
But I rave――for the past of my pleasure
Has left me a little intense,
And the lolloping lilt of my measure
Is stronger in sound than in sense.
Yet an ecstasy must have its morrow,
And an ace may succumb to a trump;
So my spirit is sunken in sorrow,
Dear Magpie and Stump.
Farewell! nevermore shall thy chalice
Of barleycorn bubble for me;
They have altered thee into a palace
Devoted to coffee and tea.
Thy courts are now trod by the teacher,
Thy fountains the cow and the pump,
And thy priest is a temperance preacher,
Poor Magpie and Stump!
Farewell! But if e’er in the distance
Of time that we cannot foresee,
Thou return to thy pristine existence――
For I cannot, alas! come to thee!
As the prodigal found from his father
Forgiveness, again shalt thou jump
To the height of my patronage――rather!
Rare Magpie and Stump!
A. C. S.
_St. James’s Gazette._ March 19, 1881.
――――:o:――――
SONG OF THE SPRINGTIDE.
O Season supposed of all free flowers,
Made lovely by light of the sun,
Of garden, of field, and of tree-flowers,
Thy singers are surely in fun!
Or what is it wholly unsettles
Thy sequence of shower and shine,
And maketh thy pushings and petals
To shrivel and pine?
Why is it that o’er the wild waters
That beastly North-Easter still blows,
Dust-dimming the eyes of our daughters,
Blue-nipping each nice little nose?
Why is it these sea-skirted islands
Are plagued with perpetual chills,
Driving men to Italian or Nile-lands
From Albion’s ills?
Happy he, O Springtide, who hath found thee,
All sunlit, in luckier lands,
With thy garment of greenery round thee,
And belted with blossomy bands.
From us by the blast thou art drifted.
All brag of thy beauties is bosh;
When the songs of thy singers are sifted,
They simply won’t wash.
* * * * *
What lunatic lune, what vain vision,
Thy laureate, Springtide, may move
To sing thee――oh, bitter derision!――
As season of laughter and love?
You make a man mad beyond measure,
O Spring, and thy lauders like thee:
Thy flowers, thy pastimes and pleasures,
Are fiddlededee!
_Punch._ May 22, 1880.
――――:o:――――
SWINBURNISM.
I trow, wild friends, God’s soul wots well by rote
My sweet soft strains and lovely lays of love,
And all the white ways of her sweet sharp throat,
Which, not right yet, I have waxed weary of.
* * * * *
I never left off kissing her, I well think,
But wrapped in rich red raiment of her hair,
Kissed her all day, till her lips parch’d for drink
As the parch’d often lips of a flute-player.
No maid of a king’s blood, but held right high
In God’s sharp sight, from whom no things are hid.
“You must not tell,” she sighed and turned to cry.
“That I should tell your mother, God forbid!”
Said so I kept my word, I never told her
You drink pure water? I, sir, I drink wine!
Your cool clear brain must needs yield verse-water,
But, sweet strong drunken maniac music, mine.
S. K. COWAN.
From _A Book of Jousts_. London, Field and Tuer.
――――
A VALENTINE.
Ah, Love! if love lie still betwixt us twain,
Through all these years――yea, love, before love wane
Lift up thine eyes and slay me; the desire
Of death consumes me, like the sun-god’s fire.
Slay me, and kill me, dearest, deal me death.
Lo! I will murmur with my latest breath,
Laying this lily at thy gracious feet,
How precious, nay, how _utter_ art thou, sweet.
J. M. LOWRY.
――――
SWINBURNESE.
Also thine eyes were mild as a lowlit flame of fire,
When thou wovest the web whereof wiles were the woof and the warp
was my heart.
Why left’st thou the fertile field whence thou reapedst the fruit of
desire?
For the change of the face of thy colour I know thee not whence
thou art!
Alas for the going of swiftness, for the feet of the running of thee,
When thou wentest among the swords, and the shoutings of Captain’s
made shrill!
Woe is me for the pleasant places! yea, one shall say of thy glee,
“It is not,” and as for delight the feet of thy dancing are still.
_Translation._
Where are those eyes that were so mild
When of my heart you me beguiled?
Why did you skedaddle from me and the child?
O, Johnnie, I hardly knew you.
Where are those legs with which you run
When first you went to shoulder the gun?
Indeed, your dancing days are done――
O, Johnnie, I hardly knew you.
R. Y. TYRRELL.
From _A Book of Jousts_. London, Field and Tuer.
――――
In _The World_ Christmas Number, 1879, there was an exquisite satire
on Mr. Burne Jones’s art entitled “The God and the Damosel”; it was
accompanied by the following verses, and a prose criticism (too long
to quote in full) written in imitation of the intensely Æsthetic
jargon familiar to the frequenters of the Grosvenor Gallery. To fully
appreciate the poem and the criticism, the burlesque picture by Mr. E.
B. T. Burnt Bones should be seen, once seen it could never be
forgotten.
THE GOD AND THE DAMOSEL.
_By A. C. Sinburn._
THE GOD.
Look in my face, and know me who I am.
I smite and save; I bless, and, lo, I damn.
Incline thine head, thy browless brow incline;
I touch thee, and I tap thee, and proclaim,
For ever and for ever thou art mine!
O long as grief, and leaner than desire!
O sweet retreating breasts and amorous-kissing knees!
O grace and goodliness of strait attire!
A robe of them who sport in summer seas.
By these, and by the eyelids of thine eyes,
Ringed round with darkness, swollen weeper-wise,
By these I know thee; these are for a sign,
Surer, yea, even than thy most splendid size
Of spreaden hands: I know thee, thou art mine.
THE DAMOSEL.
Master and lord, I know thee who thou art;
Lo, and with homage of the stricken heart,
I hail thee, I adore thee, and obtest:
I am thine own, I know no better part;
Do with me, master, as thee seemeth best.
O loose as thought and bodiless as dream!
O globular grand eyes, a bane of maidenhood!
O miracle of tunic-folds, that seem
Self-balanced, firm, a glory of carven wood!
By these, and by the crown thy temples wear,
Holy, a cauline flower of wondrous hair;
By thy red mouth, a bow without a chord,
And shaftless, yea, but deadly, O most fair,
I knew thee, and I know thee for my lord!
THE GOD.
Ay, now the flicker of a nauseate smile
Bestirs thy cheek and wan lips imbecile;
Thy pale plucked blossom droops; its day is done.
THE DAMOSEL.
Nay, let me deck my bosom therewithal,
It were ill-ominous to let it fall,
The faithful mistress of Hyperion Sun.
THE GOD.
Stoop thou, what ails thee, child, to shudder? stoop and brush
Hair with tow-towzled hair, that for a space
I breathe my godhead through thy thirsting veins, and flush
The soft submalar hollows of thy face,
And thrill thee, crown to sole, till that in downward rush
Of eager ecstasy with fair flat feet thou crush
The beetle, Virtue, in the lowly place.
THE DAMOSEL.
Ah, master and lord, I feel it; the wind of thy fierce delight,
Hell-hot as the blast from the furnace, sea-cold as a gust of
the sea.
O deaf blind Love, that art deaf as a poker and blind as the night!
O my flushed faint cheeks and my chin! O mine eye and the elbow
of me!
I bow to thy might, O my lord, to the keen blown breath of thy lips,
With a loathing of love that longs, and a longing of love that
loathes,
With shiver of angular shoulders, and shake of invisible hips,
As boweth the light slight stake in the torture of wind-whirled
clothes!
Thou hast rent me enough, O Divine! … and behold, thou stayest thine
hand,
And leavest me crushed as a reed, that I wot not whether I tread
Upon Earth, our holy old mother, with feet down-pressing, or stand
Inverse, in a fearless new fashion, uplift on my passionate head!
_The Criticism._――“I have judged it good and helpful to prefix to my
few words in appreciation of Mr. Bones’s noble picture this exquisite
lyric of Mr. Sinburn’s. It may serve to a better understanding of the
one master’s work to note in what wise it has inspired the other. The
scene of Mr. Bones’s picture is a garden; the time, high noon. A
damosel, tall and gracious, stands before us, clad, but ‘more
expressed than hidden,’ in a robe of subtle tissue; which, loyal
through three parts of its length to the lines of her sinuous figure,
breaks loose round her finely-modelled knees into a riot of enchanting
curves and folds; yet, withal, an orderly revolt, and obedient to its
own higher law of rebellious grace. At her side stands the fatal Eros,
the divine, the immortal, bow in hand, a glory of great light about
his head. Behind him rise his outspread wings, which, by one of those
eloquently significant touches whereof this painter possesses, one
must think, the exclusive secret, are made to simulate the expanded
tail of the bird of Heré. What he has here set down for us, in
reporting of the lower limbs of this Immortal, he may well have
noticed when he himself was last set down at his own house-door; since
we see that for the knees of the young Eros of the ancients he has not
disdained to study from the ancient Kab-os of the moderns. In the form
of the maiden who bends towards him, quivering like a shot bird at the
touch of his long lithe finger, we have another triumph of the
master’s unique powers. The mere volume of her frame is, let us allow
it, spare to the verge of the penurious; its curves are sudden to
precipitancy, abrupt even to _brusquerie_; without being at all
exaggerated, the charm of _morbidezza_ is certainly insisted upon to
the full limits of the admissible; but the charm is there, victorious
and exultant, a voluptuousness not of the flesh, nor appealing
thereto, yet a voluptuousness the more subtle and penetrating,
perhaps, for that very reason. One sees that the burden of the great
mystery has passed upon this woman; one sees it in the heavy-lidded
eyes, in the chastened, even ascetic, lines of the face, and above
all, in the thin, almost fleshless, figure consumed by inner fires, a
conception only capable, perhaps, of being realised in the sympathetic
imagination of a Burnt Bones. To the colour-harmonies of the whole
picture I despair of doing justice. It may be remembered that I
likened Mr. Bones’s last work to a cantata; this one is an oratorio,
full of exquisitely tuneful fancies, grand instrumental combinations,
profound contrapuntal erudition.”
――――
DREAM POEM A LA SWINBURNE.
(_After a Supper of Pork Chops._)
Soft is the smell of it, sweet the sad sound of it,
Mournfully mingled on yon mountain’s top,
Grateful, and green, and caressing the ground of it,
Calm as a calyx, and deep as a drop.
Ah! the enlivenment, dark as the distance!
Ah! the allurements that lavish and lave!
Is there no sound but the sun’s sweet insistance,
Night in the forest, and noon on the wave?
Fierce as a festival, fragrant and fading――
Grim as the grandeur that dreams of a day――
Is there no balm in Love’s lavish unlading,
Born in the brightness, and grieving, and gray?
Lo! in the glimmering, sweet Aphrodite,
Ghastly and gracious, and groaning and grave,
Brilliant in banishment, mournful and mighty,
Soft as the samite that sinks in the wave!
Light are the longings that listen and linger:
Ah! the sick kingdoms that grapple and groan
Red as Republics that point the far finger,
Or hail the horizon, aghast and alone.
Sinks in the distance the Dream and the Dreaming,
Leaves the wide world to its pining and pain;
From the great Universe, lo! in the gleaming,
Blazes the bandersnatch, faithless and fain!
――――
PARODY ON A POEM IN MR. SWINBURNE’S TRAGEDY “ERECHTHEUS.”
I see the sad sorrow that hangs like a shadow
From ocean to ocean obscuring the light,
Till hamlet and farm upon mountain and meadow
Are blasted and bare with the blight.
O, Erin, to me as my mother,
O, Irishmen, each one a brother,
Whose wrongs are remembered to-day,
Whose tyrants their terrors betray;
O, Erin, the fairest outvying,
Quail not at their fearfullest frown;
Hear this that I breathe to thee dying,
O land of renown.
Though landlord and agent with breathings of slaughter
Unite to assail and oppress thee again,
Secure thou shalt stand in the midst of the water,
The hate of their hearts shall be vain.
For their power shall be past and made idle,
And their pride shall be checked with a bridle,
And the height of their heads bow down
At the loss of their rents and renown.
Be cherished and loved as I love thee,
Of all that to thee owe their breath;
Be thy life like the stars up above thee――
Now, come to me, death.
D. EVANS.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ June 25, 1882.
――――
LES POETES S’AMUSENT.
_Swinburne chez Hugo._
The Banquet of the two distinct demigods is over. The dinner, a
two-franc Palais Royal feast fit for Parnassus, came off last night;
and I was there ready to watch and to wink at the matchless mouthfuls
of the two mighty Masters. As these disappeared amidst rich rhythm and
rhapsody, I stood in a corner, note-book in hand, mutely worshipful.
There was a hungry hush, the Elder Master had a message to deliver,
and catching the reporter’s eye, did not halt or hesitate.
“What,” he asked, addressing the lady presiding at the _bureau_ behind
the little plated saucers of sugar, “what is Swinburne? Is he,” he
proceeded, “a costermonger? No. What then. A sweep? You cannot be a
sweep without singing a _Song before Sunrise_. But this Swinburne has
written _Chastelard_. That sounds like Bacon. Is he then a
philosopher? Yes, and No. Which? Never mind. But there is this
remarkable thing about a philosopher: he produces fruits. Sometimes
they are nuts to crack, and when Civilisation has a nut to crack it
holds its jaw. This is a paradox, and suggests the question, ‘Am I
Civilisation?’ To this there is an answer. It is again ‘No and Yes.’
Last time it was ‘Yes and No.’ Now it is ‘No and Yes.’ Why? Is there a
reason for this? None. And when there is no reason for anything, it
becomes a subject of reference. To whom? To the Marines: and you
cannot refer a subject to the Marines without asking them a riddle.
And this is the riddle that posterity will ask them: ‘What is Victor
Hugo?’”
There was a pause; but in an instant the Younger Master had sprung on
to a velvet _fauteuil_, and, thrumming the back of an _entrée_ dish as
an impromptu lyre, with a high-piped treble cry of “I’ll tell you,”
had soon sufficiently and signally silenced the Elder with the
following unsung and understudied Ode:――
“You are he who,――ere upon my noisome nurses
Large limbèd lap
I coughed my first shrieked shrill-throated choke of curses,
In pulp of pap,――
Rose in reek made rich of decomposing matter
Round kinglets curled,
To greet with white-soul’d yell of ‘Yah!――who’s your hatter?’
An out-wash’d world:
“You who, with a wind of words in thuds of thunder,
Of sense made hash;
Blind, yet bleating in the blaze of your own blunder
Whole yards of trash;
By your posing――your back somersaults of error
That no one fire,――
By the frenzy and the cry of loud-tongued terror
Your jokes inspire;
By the promise of your early dawn reversèd
Clean upside down,
By your curst cloy of Pantomime, and thrice accursèd
Cat-call for Clown;
“By the pasteboard heads that, beaten in in places,
Smile on in pain,
By sightless eyes and worsted hair, by large, mild faces,――
By Drury Lane;
By all frolic, freak and fooling, food for laughter,
Nor said nor sung,
When next on spouting bent――pity your hereafter,
_And hold your tongue!_”
* * * * *
_Punch._ December 2, 1882.
――――:o:――――
In 1883, Messrs. Chatto and Windus published a small quarto volume,
entitled “_A Century of Roundels_,” by Algernon Charles Swinburne.
Very soon afterwards, there was a parody competition on these little
poems in _The Weekly Dispatch_, which published the following
imitations on July 1, 1883.
The prize of two guineas was awarded to Mr. Henry William Hancock
for:――
FAR-FETCHED AND DEAR-BOUGHT!
Far-fetched and dear-bought, sure this volume of verse is,
Tho’ ever as clever in rhythm and thought;
And yet tho’ a master each roundel rehearses,
Far-fetched and dear-bought!
Tho’ perfect in beauty each ditty is wrought,
Monotony much admiration disperses;
Ye gods! a whole hundred! Is Swinburne distraught?
The appetite cloyed e’er with dainties far worse is
Than hunger that waits till one’s dinner is caught;
So this is my verdict condemning these verses――
Far-fetched and dear-bought!
_Highly commended._
ULYSSES.
What gain were mine if I should anchor cast
And soothe my senses with these songs divine
When I had wearied of the sweet repast,
What gain were mine?
Save for my skill, ye yet were Circe’s swine,
And barking Scylla safe I led you past――
And past Charybdis, ambushed in the brine.
Then faithful comrades bind, and bind me fast――
My lips are fain for kisses and for wine;
But so I fail of Ithaca at last,
What gain were mine?
GOSSAMER.
TO ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
Magician of song and of sound that enslaves the ear,
Subtle and sweet are the arts which to thee belong;
Varied thy chant as the lark’s which is heard so clear,
Magician of song.
Divine as the sound of billows that swell and throng
And crash with a music that gods might love to hear;
So gather thy waves of language rapid and strong,
Bursting in pæans of Love, and of Joy, and Fear,
Welcome thy strain as a bird’s the flowers among,
Welcome thy notes as blossoms that light the year,
Magician of song.
APSLEY ROBERTS.
――――:o:――――
A TRIO OF ROUNDELS.
I was born like other men,
And at last shall die.
Who will live for ever then?
Just a smile, a sigh,
Tears a few, a smile again,
Some endeavours high.
Who shines grander, truer, when
Placed in contrast by
Grunting swine or clucking hen?
Half-a-crown, that cannot last for ever,
Yet who is there takes it with a frown?
Who seeks not with passionate endeavour
Half-a-crown?
Who despises it, in all the town,
You shall find a human being never
From the tinselled monarch to the clown.
Let a man be dull of brain or clever,
Be his lot, or up in life or down,
Easily from him you shall not sever
Half-a-crown.
Around and about the singer his song disperses
He flings to the heavens a crashing mellifluous shout.
Vast harmonies mingled for ever of blessings and curses
Around and about.
In melody filling and thrilling his voice rings out
In strivings splendidly human. Better or worse is
The joy of the poor or the rich, of the lord or the lout;
What sirens ever sang sweeter? What wine of Circe’s,
More quickly dispelled the fumes of a priestly doubt,
Than this of the bay-crowned Man who is flinging his verses
Around and about?
_St. James’s Gazette._
――――:o:――――
THE NEW JACK HORNER.
The pigmy and portative Horner,
Whom all men denominate Jack,
Against an approximate corner
Had set his exiguous back.
On his knee, formed of paste that was puffy,
Was a pie they for Yule-tide had made;
Into which his fat fingers to stuff he
No palpable moment delayed.
And his voice told of raptures and roses,
As, plucking a plum from that pie,
He cried (as the legend discloses),
“What a plump pie-ous urchin am I!”
_Funny Folks Annual._ 1884.
――――
CHRISTMAS MOTTOES.
(_By Eminent Hands._)
OUR LADY CHAMPAGNE.
_By A.C.S._
A Maiden makes moan, “Oh my motto
Lies lost with its love-litten lay:
’Twas something on ‘green in a grotto,’
And ‘sad seas were sweeter than spray.’”
O theme for the scorn of the scoffer,
I hear my own verses again,
And she ogles me well as I offer
My Lady――Champagne.
THE BLOOMING DAMOZEL.
_By D.G.R._
The blooming damozel leaned o’er
The station bar at even,
And she was deeper than the depths
Of water at Lochleven;
She kept my change within her purse,
It came to one-and-seven.
THE VOLSUNG TALE.
_By W.M._
Oh, fain for the wine was Sigurd, and wild were the songs he sang,
Like the words from the Halls of Music, for glamour was on his
tongue,
And he dropped the sword of the Branstock, that trembled in his
clutch,
And said Gudrun, “Son of the Volsungs, methinks thou has ta’en too
much.”
Then up rose the King of Men-folk, and vowed he had drunk no ale;
And that was the story of Sigurd――lo!――that was the Volsung tale!
THE MOTTO.
_By R.B._
A Motto! Just a catch-word such as lies
Betwixt _Imprimis_ and the colophon;
French _mot_, Italian _motto_: for the rest
Latin _mutire_. Body o’ me――the Greek
Gives _muthos_. So this poem I write and leave
To Jansenists, to lie i’ the brains o’ men,
I sell you for a _lira_, eight pence just,
Then home to Casa Guidi, by the Church.
And, British Public, ye who like me not,
I think i’ faith I’ve got the best of it!
――――:o:――――
MARCH: AN ODE.
Ere frost-flower and snow blossom faded and fell, and the splendour
of winter had passed out of sight,
The ways of the woodlands were fairer and stranger than dreams that
fulfil us in sleep with delight;
The breath of the mouths of the winds had hardened on tree-tops and
branches that glittered and swayed.
Such wonders and glories of blossomlike snow or of frost that
outlightens all flowers till it fade.
That the sea was not lovelier than here was the land, nor the night
than the day, nor the day than the night,
Nor the winter sublimer with storm than the spring: such mirth had
the madness and might in thee made,
March, master of winds, bright minstrel and marshal of storms that
enkindle the season they smite.
And now that the rage of thy rapture is satiate with revel and ravin
and spoil of the snow,
And the branches it brightened are broken, and shattered the tree-tops
that only thy wrath could lay low,
How should not thy lovers rejoice in thee, leader and lord of the year
that exults to be born.
So strong in thy strength and so glad of thy gladness, whose laughter
puts winter and sorrow to scorn?
Thou hast shaken the snows from thy wings, and the frost on thy
forehead is molten: thy lips are aglow
As a lover’s that kindle with kissing, and earth, with her raiment and
tresses yet wasted and torn,
Takes breath as she smiles in the grasp of thy passion to feel through
her spirit the sense of thee flow.
* * * * *
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
_The Nineteenth Century._ March, 1888.
――――
ANOTHER ODE TO MARCH.
(_Being a Counterblast to Mr. A. C. Swinburne’s rhythmical rhapsody
in the “Nineteenth Century.” By one who has certainly “learned
in suffering” what he endeavours to “teach in song.”_)
Ere frost-slush and snow-slopping dried up and went, and the horrors
of Winter had slid out of sight,
The ways of the wood pavement fouler were far than a clay-country lane
on a mucky March night.
The breath of the month of the winds had stabbed us through top-coats
and mufflers, and made us afraid.
Such bronchial bothers, such blossomy noses, such frostbitten fingers
for man and for maid!
The sea was not lovelier then than the land, each appeared in a dismal
and desolate plight;
But the Winter is not so much worse than the Spring-time; each plays
up the mischief with pleasure and trade.
March, master of winds, is a flatulent fraud, a marshal of banes and
a bringer of blight.
And now that the rage of your rhythmical rapture, your revel of
rhyming has finished its flow,
Oh, incontinent ALGERNON CHARLES, what the dickens you mean by such
rubbish I _should_ like to know.
How, how can you love and rejoice, you, leader and lord of the
lyrists of curses and scorn,
In a beast of a month that half drives one to madness, and makes a
man wish he had never been born?
_Have_ you shaken the snow from your shoes on a doormat, with frost
have your nose and your lips been aglow?
_Have_ you met a March wind coming sharp round a corner, your
mackintosh drenched and your gingham all torn,
And tried to take breath in the nip of North-Easters? No, ALGERNON
CHARLES, or you’d never talk _so_!
(_Four verses omitted._)
The body is drenched one dismal moment, the next one’s skin is as
dry as starch.
Its rains that chill us are most disgusting, and equally so are its
gales that parch.
What! kindle mortals to love and laughter by lauding the beastliest
winds that blow?
Arouse our fondness for wintry wetness, for choking dust or for
blinding snow?
No, no, your lips are eloquent, ALGERNON, set in Apollo’s own genuine
arch;
But neither the flame that fires your tropes, nor the fervour that
setteth your figures aglow,
Shall gammon us into the fatuous folly of making a god of the wind
of March!
_Punch._ March 17, 1888.
――――
LINES A LA SWINBURNE.
I sing of the months of the whirligig years that are fading far out
of sight and of sound and of motionless mind;
Of the days without dreams and the dreams without days, and the days
and the dreams and the dreams and the days grown silent and blind;
Gone mad with the vigor of spring and the blush of the radish new
blown in the meadows far kissed by the lips of the Sound:
The maddest and gladdest and saddest and baddest and sweetest,
completest and fleetest and neatest of days ever found.
I sing of them often in words that are winding, in adjectives
blinding, in dactyles and trochees with cunning combined,
In lines that are long as a sentence of Evarts, in lines on the plan
of the Washington Monument deftly designed;
With wildering fancy of words and of musical syllables weighted with
little of thought and with much less of rhyme,
I cover ten pages a sitting with verse that has value in market, and
readily getteth there every time.
And when the idea is the thinnest, new burst from the void of the
infinite nothing, the zenith of space where the nebulous ether is
pregnant with cobwebs of fancy bestrewn with the dew-drops of
slush,
I build up long lines such as never a poet, who was not a crank on
the subject of versification, built up for the purpose of drowning
a suffering public with torrents of stupid and meaningless
gibbering gush.
If the wind and the sunlight of April and August had made of the past
and hereafter a single adorable season whose life was a rapture of
love and of laughter for all of the maidens and lads,
I’d write you a poem with lines like the city of Rome, and with rhymes
on beholders and shoulders; on measure and pleasure; on closes and
roses; on sterile, imperil; remember, September; and hither and
thither and whither; on slacken and bracken; on season and reason;
defrauded, applauded; on dwindled, rekindled; on giving and
living; on slumbers and numbers; beholden and golden; on glory and
story and Morey; on wizard and gizzard and blizzard; on Blaine and
on Maine; and each rhyme would be stuck on the end of a line just
like this one I’m writing; and oh, and heyday, and yea, marry,
they’d run about eight to the page, and they’d collar the scads.
TRICOTRIN.
_Harper’s Monthly Magazine_, June, 1888.
――――:o:――――
In _Pictures at Play_ (London, Longmans, Green and Co., 1888), a
picture by J. W. Waterhouse, A.R.A., is supposed to sing the following
parody of the “Masque of Queen Bersabe”:――
I am the Lady of Shalott,
And if you say you love me not,
I shall reply, I wis,
That Bastien-Lepage has been
Much marked of Waterhouse, I ween,
And the result is――this!
The A.R.A. who painted me
Is young and popular, and free
To gratify his whim;
Where on a couch of pain I lay,
He came and called me up one day,
And bade me follow him.
In strange attire he vestured me,
Yea, in the silks of Liberty,
He set me thus afloat;
He bade me seem to have the shakes,
And ope my mouth as one that takes
A high and hopeless note.
And painting merely what he saw,
According to the last-found law
Of values and of tones,
He made me, much to my amaze,
A thing whereon the public gaze,
And mock me for the nones.
I am the Lady of Shalott
And if you tell me I am _not_,
I say but this one thing:
That here be “Values” rare and quaint,
A goodly “quality of paint,”
And “workmanlike hand-ling.”
I am the Lady of Shalott,
And, though you recognize me not,
Denied it may not be
That I am of the things right good,
Albeit scantly understood,
In this Acadamee.
――――:o:――――
STROPHES FROM A SONG AFTER MOONRISE.
_Strophe I._
I bowed my laurel’d head
Above my lyre and said:――
“What new song shall I sing across the strings?
Madden’d for whose new sake
What new noise shall I make?”
And I answered: “Lo, I will sing of no new things,
I will turn to her once more,
I have sung so oft before――
Freedom! and worship her, and curse some Kings.”
Set on her motherly knee,
Her nursing arms round me,
I will cling about her neck as a child clings,
Re-wounding with my kiss
Each scarce-healed cicatrice
Doing to her divers and disgusting things
Whilst in her ears my chaunt,
Re-risen and reboant,
Sounds as one sounds, who, being senseless, sings.
_Strophe II._
On one cant name of many names I have chosen――
Freedom――lo, once again I call to thee;
By the cold earth’s iron-bound ends and oceans frozen,
By the rivers that run billowing to the sea,
By the lisp and laughter of spring in leafy places,
By the storms that follow and the calms that flee,
By the pale light flung in men’s funeral faces
From holocausts of kings we burn to thee;
By the seas that link us and the lands that sever
By the foes upon our weather-side and lee――
By all these things and all other things whatever,
We call, and howl, and squeak, and shriek to thee,
Calling thee early and late,
Wild, inarticulate,
Calling and bawling that thou set something free.
_Strophe III._
But where is the something――a land
In the east or the uttermost west――
A land with a grievance, a curse?
I heed not her name or her place.
So shame on her brow be a brand,
So she have but a scourged white breast,
And a name that will scan in verse;
And I ask for the royal race,
For the land opprest.
But where shall I find her――where?
I mean the land with a wrong
Not already outworn
By those that have sung for her sake
For Byron and bards that were,
Were singing of Freedom long
Before I was thought of or born,
And they plucked all the plums from the cake
From the cake of song.
_Strophe IV._
Ah, but would that I
Had been the first of these!
I would have drained them dry,
These themes of war and peace,
Nor have left one song to sing of Italy,
Nor a poet’s picking on the bones of Greece.
Then with flowers and fire,
And bitter foam and wine,
And fangs and fierce desire,
And things I call divine,
would nauseate so the world that no man’s lyre
Should again be struck to a note I had once made mine.
* * * * *
_Epode._
I hung my laurel’d head,
Down on my lyre and said:
“What answer does my sovereign, Freedom, make?”
And in the air I heard
Not even a whisper’d word
From her for whom my very lungs do ache,
And as an addled egg is, is my brain:
Wherefore for her most royal and holy sake
I think I will behowl her once again.
“Hear me, O goddess! for it indeed is I
That call thee, at thy knees,
And don’t be frightened, please,
At the many things I shall adjure thee by.
Come to us, bright, in clear re-arisen ascendency,
Loosen o’er us all thine orient oriflamme!
By the power Mat Arnold calls: ‘A stream of tendency,’
By the Christianity we have proved a sham,
By the lowering name that darkened Hebrew story
We have turned to ‘Thou art not,’ that was once ‘I Am;’
We thy singers, we thy sons that work thee glory
With the unburnt offerings of our worthless verses
Heaped on thy shrine, adjure thee and adore thee:
I, the clamouring herd’s choragus, I implore thee:
By all the things that we bemire with curses――
That is, by all the holy things that are,
Rise and make manifest upon us thy mercies,
Rise o’er us all a large and lonely star.
For the night is now far spent: the air gives warning
With a dewy stir and chillness of the morning,
And the wan dark whitens on the eastern hill.
Burn through the east, grow large, and lighten, until
In the saffron of the sunrise we discern thee
Shining and trembling like a tear of gladness.
Draw near to us, we will love thee, we will learn thee――
Learn thee to the heart, and love thee even to madness,
If thou wilt only hear us in our crying
Across the night,
Conjuring thee by this our rhythmic sighing――
Our songs which might
Have many senses but which have not one sense
A man may see;
By the sounding and the fluent form of nonsense
We shower on thee;
By the shallow and the babbling things, our mothers,
From whom we spring;
By the barking and the braying things, our brothers
Like whom we sing;
By all the fatuous things, our near relations,
That chaunt and cheer us;
By Leeds, and Liberal associations
Oh, Freedom, hear us!”
_St. James’s Gazette._
――――:o:――――
PARODIES OF MR. SWINBURNE’S POLITICAL POEMS.
Numerous parodies have been written of Mr. Swinburne’s political
poems, and of these some have already appeared in this collection.
Thus, in Volume III (p. 187), will be found Swinburne’s _The
Commonweal_, which had originally appeared in _The Times_ of July 1,
1886, together with four parodies upon it. And, in Volume IV. (p.
147), Swinburne’s _The Question_, from _The Daily Telegraph_, April
29, 1887, was given, together with the caustic _Answer_, which
appeared in _The Daily News_ of April 30, 1887.
The following parody is from _Truth_ May 5, 1887:――
MR. SWINBURNE’S “QUESTION” ANSWERED.
Come, frenzied poet, first, then, pray
Just tell us what those verses meant
Which to the _Telegraph_ you sent
Last Thursday; since we, sad to say,
Can’t fathom their intent,
That you were very wild, ’twas clear,
With some one; for you were profuse
In that alliterative abuse,
And in those epithets severe
You aptly can produce.
But who it was you wished to curse,
Or what it was had roused your ire,
Or why you wrote, with wroth so dire,
So much involved Swinburnian verse,
Why, that did _not_ transpire
Something, of course, had put you out,
Or, otherwise, why did you deem
It meet to wildly rave and scream,
And throw those adjectives about
With which your stanzas teem?
And as you always in past time
Have been a struggling nation’s friend,
And hastened Freedom to defend,
So doubtless now your angry rhyme
Has the same worthy end.
And, granting this, we then can find
Who are the men you would asperse,
And why you wrote such raving verse:――
Of course, it must have been designed
To Ireland’s tyrants curse!
“The clamorous crew” you write about;
The fierce “blood-mongers” you decry;
The men who “stand in shame so high”
These are the landlord-set, no doubt,
Who pity’s plea deny.
The men who “steal and skulk and flee”――
Why, it is plain you mean by these
Those heartless, greedy absentees,
Who, to live on in luxury,
Their cruel rack-rents seize.
These are the “shameless gang,” ’tis clear,
From whose “red hands” nor “dew nor rain”
Can ever “cleanse the blood again”;
And to whose hearts, so hard and sere,
Appealing is in vain.
Yes, ’tis these landlords, who disdain
To pity, though poor “children die
Starved”; and though helpless women lie
On the hill-side, ’neath sleet and rain,
Thrust from their homes hard by.
And ’tis their tenants, too, who fight
Vainly against the ruthless power
That leaves their lives “no joyful hour,”
Nor gives them e’en the “natural right
To claim life’s natural dower.”
Well may you ask, with stern surprise,
Why men, who thus their duty shirk,
And do, in sooth, “a murderous work,”
Do not seem “hideous in our eyes
As Austrian or as Turk?”
Well may you call the landlord crew,
“The cowardliest hounds that blood e’er lapp’d;”
And hint they should be “track’d and trapp’d,”
Whilst we that “woful past undo,”
Which chains on Erin clapp’d.
With reason you bid “England bow,
Lest worst befall her yet”; and swear
That nought, save pity, conscience, care,
Truth and mercy, should be now
Her sister Erin’s share.
But, frantic poet, none the less,
When next your angry feelings egg
You into verse like Silas Wegg,
Do try your meaning to express
More clearly, let us beg.
’Tis vain, in fact, for you to use
Such very gory epithets,
And terms involved, and sounding threats,
If all the time your shrieking Muse
Sense utterly forgets.
And truly, if you thus again
Should in the _Telegraph_ break out,
Its readers, there is little doubt,
When they have tried to find in vain
Whom ’tis you fain would flout.
Will bid you to the fact recall
That empty sound and fury blind,
And words ambitiously designed,
Must needs be worthless, one and all,
Unless with sense combined.
And you will be assailed with blame,
“The lips of all will laugh you dead,”
“And mockery shriek round your head,”
Whilst you live on to hear with shame
Your reputation’s fled!
――――:o:――――
CLEAR THE WAY!
Clear the way, my lords and lackeys! you have had your day.
Here you have your answer――England’s yea against your nay:
Long enough your House has held you: up, and clear the way!
Lust and falsehood, craft and traffic, precedent and gold,
Tongue of courtier, kiss of harlot, promise bought and sold,
Gave you heritage of empire over thralls of old.
Now that all these things are rotten, all their gold is rust,
Quenched the pride they lived by, dead the faith and cold the lust,
Shall their heritage not also turn again to dust?
By the grace of these they reigned, who left their sons their sway:
By the grace of these, what England says her lords unsay:
Till at last her cry go forth against them――Clear the way!
By the grace of trust in treason knaves have lived and lied!
By the force of fear and folly fools have fed their pride:
By the strength of sloth and custom reason stands defied.
Lest perchance your reckoning on some latter day be worse,
Halt and hearken, lords of land and princes of the purse,
Ere the tide be full that comes with blessing and with curse.
Where we stand, as where you sit, scarce falls a sprinkling spray;
But the wind that swells, the wave that follows, none shall stay:
Spread no more of sail for shipwreck: out, and clear the way!
ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE.
_The Pall Mall Gazette._ August 19, 1884.
――――
RAIL AWAY!
(Written by an aspiring young poet of the Neo-Billingsgate School in
humble imitation of the “Clear the Way!” contributed by Mr. Swinburne
to a recent number of the _Pall Mall Gazette_.)
Rail away, my budding bardlets! This hysteric day
Shrieking lives so shrieking answers,――Journals say not nay;
Long enough has reason held you: up and rail away!
Slang and slate, revile and bludgeon with assurance bold!
Tongue of gentle, style of scholar, now are far too cold
Go it like an angry fishwife when upon the scold.
Now that chivalry’s forgotten, knightly steel all rust
Quenched the pride old poets lived by, dead their grace as dust,
Shall their mild example bind _us_? Not a whit, I trust!
_Blow_ the grace of Gentle Spenser, courtesy’s soft sway!
_Hang_ the grace of Wordsworth, leaving nothing to unsay!
Let the Poet’s shriek go forth _falsetto_――Rail away!
By the grace of trust in reason dolts have lived and died
By the fear of noisy folly tongues have oft been tied,
By the strength of rabid ranting reason’s now defied.
Lest perchance your reckoning, with good manners mar your verse
Halt and hearken lords of language, who would plump your purse
Be not tied by taste’s restrictions; learn to howl and curse!
Where we stand of slang to come, scarce falls a sprinkling spray
But the wave of Billingsgate that’s coming who shall stay?
Spread your sails my budding bardlets,――up and rail away!
_Punch_, August 30, 1884.
It was formerly a frequent theme of Mr. Swinburne’s political verse,
this violent abuse of the House of Lords:――
“They are worthy to reign o’er their brothers,
To contemn them as clods and as carles,
Who are Graces by grace of such mothers
As brightened the bed of King Charles.”
Have the dukes of Buccleugh, Grafton, Richmond, and St. Albans
forgotten and forgiven this humorous and playful allusion to their
ancestresses, Lucy Waters, Lady Castlemaine, Louise de Querouaille,
and Nell Gwynne, to whom they owe their dignities and estates?
――――
A WORD FOR THE POET.
(_The Rebuke Parodic._)
[Mr. Swinburne’s latest effusion, which has been eagerly quoted by
Conservative journals, appears in “Sea Song and River Rhyme,” and is
entitled “A Word for the Navy.”]
The lords of thy fate and thy keepers,
O Swinburne, should padlock thy lips;
It leaves us for genius weepers
To hear thy Macdermottish tips.
Such crowing and blowing,
Such blatant British “side,”
Will scatter and shatter
Full soon thy poet’s pride.
“Smooth France, as a serpent for rancour”――
Fie! fie! what an insolent style!
Pray slip the Conservative anchor,
And be thy old self for awhile.
Men deem thee, or dream thee,
Less living now than dead;
The news is, thy Muse is
A little off her head.
Do thou, though the Blues should misdoubt thee,
Resume thy first _role_ on our boards;
Bind on former armour about thee,
And tilt at the “lackeys and lords.”
Where you stood, the True stood,
It stands not where you stand;
Quit Jingo, and in go
For Lib’ralism grand.
_Funny Folks_, March 5, 1887.
――――:o:――――
_The Banquet_, a Political Satire, by Mr. George Cotterell, was
published in 1885 by William Blackwood & Sons. Like most political
squibs its interest was somewhat ephemeral, but it contained several
amusing parodies of Tennyson, and of Swinburne. Some of those on
Tennyson have already been quoted, the following extracts are taken
from a parody of Swinburne’s “Dolores,” entitled
THE RADICAL PROGRAMME.
(_After the Franchise Bill._)
The days of the dunces are over,
The wiles of the Whigs are undone,
They shall lie nevermore in the clover,
And bask not again in the sun;
In hip and in thigh will we smite them,
Our rulers who ruled us of old,
And nothing shall raise them or right them,
Nor acres, nor gold.
They sought us with sweet condescension,
They pledged us, a hand for a hand――
We were snobs, it is needless to mention,
And they the best blood in the land:
They bartered for place and we gave it,
We staked for high game and we won,
But their place goes and nothing can save it――
Our day has begun.
When this beggarly bill they conceded
They thought we should ask for no more;
Poor fools! it was all that we needed
To make us more fierce than before:
Now the game is our own and we’ll make it,
Not a hand will we yield, not a trick;
Here’s a notice to all who will take it
To clear away quick.
To the Lords shall the mandate be spoken,
The people’s behest and decree;
For the bonds that have bound us are broken,
We are mighty at last, we are free!
Look, my lords, where the writing is written,
On the walls of your House, on the door,
You are weighed and found wanting, and smitten
Behind and before.
* * * * *
Then hurrah for the bill that we carried,
For the Caucus that carried the bill!
The Lords would have tampered and tarried,
But we swept them along with a will;
We swept them and sweep them before us,
The prize of our prowess to-day,
While we march to the lilt of the chorus
That bids us not stay.
It was time for another beginning,
So we started the world with a spin
And while it goes spinning and spinning
We will gather the spoils that we win;
For it spins out the Whigs and the Tories,
The Lords and the Church and the Crown
And it spins us this glory of glories――
To tread them all down.
――――:o:――――
HYMN TO GLADSTONIAN LIBERALS.
Is not this the First Lord of your choice?
Sure its time that you put him to bed,
For the kingdom is seared by his fires, O fools;
He was Lord, and is dead.
You will hear not again his fine speaking,
His sophistry now as before
And the tone of his wonderful lying will
Humbug your senses no more;
By the party he ruled as his slave, is he
Slain who was mighty to slay;
And the stigma that rests on his name
He can raise not, nor roll it away.
He is choked by his raiment of lies,
Now the wane of his power is come;
Truth hears he, and heeds not; and facts,
And he sees not; and taunts, and is dumb.
Power and will hath he none of it left him
Nor truth in his breath;
Till his name be struck out of the lists
Will ye know not the truth of his death!
Surely, ye say, he is strong, but the _Times_
Is ’gainst him and Parnell;
Wait a little, ye say――nay too long
He has made our fair island a hell;
Let him then die, as all must die, that
Use treason thus as a rod;
Let him fade from the ranks of his Party
Take his foot from the neck that he trod.
They cry out, his elect, his seekers for
Office, who cling to his shame,
They call him sweet light of his Party;
They call him their Lord, by his name;
The name that is written in Egypt,
And in Africa stained by retreat,
That name by our enemies loved, but
Scorned by our army and fleet.
He answers them not――he is fallen,
Political death his reward,
He is smitten! behold, he is smitten!
As though by the stroke of a sword.
The Conservative cause is triumphant,
And peace and prosperity brings
So glory to that in the highest,
The healer and mender of things.
F.A.C.
_The St. Stephen’s Review_, May 28, 1887.
――――:o:――――
In _Rhymes à la Mode_, by Mr. Andrew Lang (Kegan, Paul, Trench & Co.,
London, 1883), there are also two good parodies of Swinburne. In one,
the “Palace of Bric-à-Brac,” the exquisite diction and appropriate
rhythm of the “Garden of Proserpine,” are most amusingly
caricatured:――
“Here, where old Nankin glitters,
Here, where men’s tumult seems
As faint as feeble twitters
Of sparrows heard in dreams,
We watch Limoges enamel,
An old chased silver camel,
A shawl, the gift of Schamyl,
And manuscript in reams.
Here, where the hawthorn pattern
On flawless cup and plate
Need fear no housemaid slattern,
Fell minister of fate,
’Mid webs divinely woven,
And helms and hauberks cloven,
On music of Beethoven
We dream and meditate.”
* * * * *
But all lovers of dainty books and quaint old world _ballades_ will go
to the fountain head to taste this stream.
――――
Several excellent imitations of Swinburne’s style remain to be quoted
from _Punch_, one, which appeared January 7, 1882, entitled “_Clowning
and Classicism_,” contains some skits on Burne Jones, Oscar Wilde, and
John Ruskin; another, dated December 11, 1886, commences as follows:――
BABYDOM.
_A Contribution to the Poetry of Pap._
Baby, see the flowers!
――Baby sees
Other things than these.
Baby, our soft age’s first of powers.
Baby, hear the birds!
――Baby’s nose
Cocks at sounds like those.
Baby rules our deeds and thoughts and words.
Baby, want the moon?
――Baby’s eyes
Blink in blue surprise.
Baby is the boss of night and noon.
Baby, hear the sea!
――Baby’s face
Permeates all space,
Filled with noises of the nursery.
* * * * *
The next appeared on April 23, 1887:――
THE VULTURES; OR, WHAT OF THE FIGHT.
(_A Suggestion from Swinburne._)
England, what of the fight?――
The fight that may come again,
When the ridge of the battle-plain
By the last lurid sun-ray is lit,
And thou in thine armèd might
Hast fought the good fight, and thy men
Lie low where the night-birds flit,――
What then, oh land, what then?
Prophet, what of the fight?
What is the vision you see?
England the stubbornly free,
Erect, ’midst the whirl of her waves.
Harbours _she_ traitors and slaves,
Harpies, of gold-worship bred,
Who grope for their gain amongst graves
That hide the hosts of her dead?
(_Four verses omitted._)
Vultures, what of the fight?――
Ah! but ye crowd for gain.
Little care ye for the slain.
Only your maws to cram.
There they be in the night,
Sold for your sakes to death.
System? A scoundrel sham
That leaves ye with wings and breath!
England, what of that fight?――
Rouse you, and raise a hand.
These Vultures swarm in the land,
Incompetence, traitrous greed.
Scourge them to headlong flight,
Vermin of office and mart,
Ere the harpies batten indeed,
Their beaks in the nation’s heart.
――――
“According to a certain critic,” said the _Daily News_ in August,
1888, Mr. Swinburne “makes ‘services’ rhyme to ‘berries.’ How in the
world does he manage that? Can it be in a poem on Lawn Tennis?”
‘Oh, thy swift, subtle, slanting, services
That skim the net, and ’scape the racket of me,
Oh, thy rich, red, ripe, ruby raspberries,
Oh, thy straw hat, and dainty body of thee!’
Nothing _exactly_ like this occurs in the English edition of Mr.
Swinburne’s poems, but this, perhaps, shows how the thing could be
done, if the poet were so inclined.”
――――
In the course of a singularly brilliant career it is not surprising
that Mr. Swinburne should have been the subject of many fierce
literary attacks. The history of these feuds must await the advent of
another Isaac D’Israeli to add a Chapter to the “Calamities and
Quarrels of Authors”; interesting as the topic most certainly is, it
cannot be dealt with here. Suffice it to say that the principal
grounds for adverse criticism have been the asserted voluptuousness
and immoral tendency of his romantic poems, and the inconsistency of
his political writings. As an instance of the latter failing _The
Daily News_ of May 2, 1887, reprinted a poem Mr. Swinburne wrote for
_The Morning Star_ (a Radical paper, now defunct) in November 1867 in
favour of the Fenians then lying under sentence of death for the
murder of Serjeant Brett. This poem Mr. Swinburne had also included in
his volume, _Songs before Sunrise_, published in 1871, and it
certainly presents a marked contrast to his recent utterances on the
Irish question.
As to the alleged immoral tendency of his works much has been written,
and by many pens, one of the bitterest of his assailants being Mr.
Robert Williams Buchanan, whose own early writings were, most
assuredly, open to adverse criticism on the same ground.
In his little work entitled, “The Fleshly School of Poetry,” published
in 1872, Mr. Buchanan not only attacked Swinburne, but he was also
most malignant in his criticisms of the poems of Dante Gabriel
Rossetti, one of the kindest, gentlest, and purest of men. The
controversy this aroused raged for some years, and the last word was
only spoken when Mr. Edmund Yates published his article on “A
Scrofulous Scotch Poet,” severely castigating Mr. Buchanan, in _The
World_, September 26, 1877. Long prior to this, the following verses
relating to Swinburne, had been attributed to Buchanan. It is doubtful
whether in 1866 Mr. Swinburne’s name was sufficiently established to
entitle him to a place in such distinguished company as is here
mentioned.
THE SESSION OF THE POETS.
“_Di magni, salaputium disertum!_”――――CAT. LIB. LIII.
“At the Session of Poets held lately in London,
The Bard of Freshwater was voted the chair:
With his tresses unbrush’d, and his shirt-collar undone,
He loll’d at his ease like a good-humour’d Bear;
‘Come, boys!’ he exclaimed, ‘we’ll be merry together!’
And lit up his pipe with a smile on his cheek;
While with eye like a skipper’s cock’d up at the weather,
Sat the Vice-Chairman Browning, thinking in Greek.
“The company gather’d embraced great and small bards,
Both strong bards and weak bards, funny and grave,
Fat bards and lean bards, little and tall bards,
Bards who wear whiskers, and others who shave.
Of books, men, and things, was the bards’ conversation――
Some praised _Ecce Homo_, some deemed it so-so――
And then there was talk of the state of the nation,
And when the unwash’d would devour Mr. Lowe.
“Right stately sat Arnold――his black gown adjusted
Genteely, his Rhine wine deliciously iced,――
With puddingish England serenely disgusted,
And looking in vain (in the mirror) for ‘Geist;’
He heark’d to the Chairman, with ‘Surely!’ and ‘Really?’
Aghast at both collar and cutty of clay,――
Then felt in his pocket, and breath’d again freely,
On touching the leaves of his own classic play.
“Close at hand lingered Lytton, whose Icarus-winglets
Had often betrayed him in regions of rhyme――
How glitter’d the eye underneath his gray ringlets,
A hunger within it unlessened by time!
Remoter sat Bailey――satirical, surly――
Who studied the language of Goethe too soon,
Who sang himself hoarse to the stars very early,
And crack’d a weak voice with too lofty a tune.
“How name all that wonderful company over?――
Prim Patmore, mild Alford――and Kingsley also?
Among the small sparks who was realler than Lover?
Among misses, who sweeter than Miss Ingelow?
There sat, looking moony, conceited, and narrow,
Buchanan,――who, finding when foolish and young,
Apollo asleep on a coster-girl’s barrow,
Straight dragged him away to see somebody hung.
“What was said? what was done? was there prosing or rhyming?
Was nothing noteworthy in deed or in word?
Why, just as the hour for the supper was chiming,
The only event of the evening occurred.
Up jumped, with his neck stretching out like a gander,
Master Swinburne, and squeal’d, glaring out through his hair,
‘All Virtue is bosh! Hallelujah for Lander!
I disbelieve wholly in everything!――there!’
“With language so awful he dared then to treat ’em,――
Miss Ingelow fainted in Tennyson’s arms,
Poor Arnold rush’d out, crying ‘Sœcl’inficetum!’
And great bards and small bards were full of alarms;
Till Tennyson, flaming and red as a gipsy,
Struck his fist on the table and uttered a shout:
‘To the door with the boy! Call a cab! He is tipsy!’
And they carried the naughty young gentleman out.
“After that, all the pleasanter talking was done there――
Whoever had known such an insult before?
The Chairman tried hard to re-kindle the fun there,
But the Muses were shocked, and the pleasure was o’er.
Then ‘Ah!’ cried the Chairman, ‘this teaches me knowledge,
The future shall find me more wise, by the powers!’
This comes of assigning to yonkers from college
Too early a place in such meetings as ours!”
CALIBAN.
_The Spectator._ September 15. 1886.
――――:o:――――
Although this collection is avowedly confined to Parodies which have
previously appeared in print, it will be readily understood that
numbers of _original_ parodies are sent in, of which but a very small
proportion can be inserted.
Some amusing incidents occur, thus a short time ago a gentlemen sent
from Scotland the M.S.S. of new and original burlesques on _Hamlet_
and _Othello_, the first containing about 850 lines, and the second
about double that number. The author earnestly requested they should
be inserted in _Parodies_, but whether he had succeeded in getting any
“new and original” fun out of such fresh and lively topics as Hamlet
and Othello, the world will never be able to judge through this
medium.
Another, and almost equally humorous request was worded as
follows:――“I enclose a parody on Mr. Algernon Swinburne’s _Dolores_ in
the form of an encomium on ‘Someone’s Essence of Something’ which is
absurdly close to some of the original verses. If you accept it please
send proof and _remuneration_ to me at above address.”
It so happened that this parody was not devoid of literary merit, but
the author was presuming a little too much in expecting to get a puff
inserted gratis, and to be paid for it in the bargain.
A verse or two will suffice to indicate the author’s treatment of the
topic:――
All pale from the past we draw nigh thee,
And satiate with rollicking hours;
And we know thee how none can deny thee,
And we purchase the gift of new pow’rs,
The draught that allays and recovers,
The boons and the blessings that rain
On the livers and lungs of thy lovers,
Exorcist of Pain!
What care though disease be a fixture
Which for ages has baffled all skill,
Thou art more than the famous blood mixture,
Superior to Cockle’s best pill;
Thou canst cast out disordered secretion,
Reduce the swelled kidney, revive
The victim of constant depletion,
And keep him alive!
Fruits fail, Autumn dies, and Time ranges,
* * * have perpetual breath,
The price of its bottles ne’er changes,
Two-and-ninepence can wrestle with Death
Our lives are rekindled and rallied,
Our systems made wholesome and clean,
Relieved of Dyspepsia, that pallid,
And poisonous Queen!
Sick-headache, and sudden affliction,
Carbuncles, and feverish skin,
Epidemics, severe mental friction,
Too much of a favourite bin;
For these panacea thou devisest,
For these, and for all other bane,
O wise among chemists, and wisest,
Exorcist of Pain!
* * * * *
The remainder of this Poem will be inserted with full details as to
price, and number of cures effected, on receipt of the customary
advertisement fee.
Another correspondent kindly sent in a lengthy rhymed criticism of
Swinburne’s style, commencing as follows:――
PADDY BLAKE ON SWINBURNE.
Dear Bailey, I will not deny
That of Swinburne’s great merit I’m sensible,
But this one complaint I must cry――
“He’s exceedingly incomprehensible!”
He sings pretty songs about kisses,
He christens them “red,” also “white”;
I confess, in all lowliness, this is
Beyond my intelligence quite.
It may well be that I’m very silly,
But some of his songs seem to me
Like a mixture of very weak skilly
With ten times as much eau-de-vie.
His language is wrondrously charming,
And falls like a spell on the ear;
But there’s one thing that’s rather alarming――
Would it ever bring laughter or tear?
END OF PARODIES ON A. C. SWINBURNE.
VERNON AVICK.
_Dedicated without permission to the Author of “Father O’Flynn,” by
the Author of “The Blarney Ballads.”_
Of all the gay “scions” and sprigs of nobility,
Far renowned for their grace and agility,
Faix i’d advance you for sheer volatility
Vernon avick! as the flower of them all.
Here’s a health to you, Vernon avick!
Long may you flounder through thin and through thick,
Merriest mummer,
And burliest “bummer,”
And loudest big-drummer in Westminster Hall.
Don’t talk of your sages and seers of antiquity,
Famous for rectitude――or for obliquity,
Faix an’ the divils at mental ubiquity,
Vernon avick! would make hay of them all.
Come, I’ll wager that nobody quite
Aiquals his elegant blatherumskite,
Down from urbanity,
Into inanity,
Troth! and profanity――if he’d the call.
Arrah, Vernon machree! what were Bottom or Puck to you?
Falstaff himself was a harmless ould buck to you;
Look how you gather the Radical ruck to you;
Whisha, bad luck to you, Vernon avick!
Still, for all, you’re the prince of buffoons,
Gad! you’ve the dash of a troop of dragoons,
Firing the flagging ones,
Bolstering the bragging ones,
Leathering the lagging ones on wid the stick.
And though never crossing the confines of charity,
Still, in your moments of mammoth hilarity,
Who, without showing the widest disparity
Vies in vulgarity, Vernon with you?
Once Sir Ughtred was minded to frown,
Till this remark broke his prudery down――
“Is it lave jollity
All to the ‘quality,’
Cannot we masses be mountebanks too?”
Here’s a health to you, Vernon avick!
Long may you flounder, through thin and through thick,
Merriest mummer,
And burliest “bummer,”
And loudest big drummer in Westminster Hall.
_The Globe._ December 11, 1888.
[Illustration]
George R. Sims.
Mr. George R. Sims was born in London on September 2nd, 1847. He was
educated first, at Hanwell College, and subsequently at Bonn.
In 1874 Mr. Sims joined the staff of _Fun_, and about the same time he
also became connected with the _Weekly Dispatch_, to which he
communicated the humorous papers, entitled: “_Mary Jane’s Memoirs_.”
Since 1877 he has written much in _The Referee_, over the pseudonym of
“Dagonet,” and most of his Ballads, which have now a worldwide fame,
first appeared in the columns of that journal.
As a dramatic author Mr. Sims has also been both prolific and
successful. “Crutch and Toothpick,” “Mother-in-Law,” “The Member for
Slocum,” “The Gay City,” “The Half-Way House,” “The Lights o’ London,”
“The Romany Rye,” and “The Merry Duchess,” are titles well-known to
every modern play-goer.
Judging by the vast amount of work in essays, dramas, and poems,
produced by Mr. Sims, he must be possessed of extraordinary energy,
powerful imagination, and of rapid composition. Some of his prose
articles and ballads display an intimate knowledge of the inner life
of the miserable, and the poor of London, such as could only have been
acquired by one having keen powers of observation, after considerable
time spent in the haunts of dirt, danger, and disease.
In short, since Dickens left us, no writer has been so successful in
this difficult and trying branch of literature, and Dickens himself
was never so popular, nor were his works so widely read by the
_people_ as are those of Mr. Sims.
――――
Although there is much that is both droll and humorous in his prose
writings, the principal feature in his Ballads is homely pathos, of
which the following poem is one of the best known examples.
It is one of the _Ballads of Babylon_ (London. John P. Fuller, 1880),
and is given by Mr. Sims’s kind permission:――
OSTLER JOE.
I stood at eve, as the sun went down, by a grave where a woman lies,
Who lured men’s souls to the shores of sin with the light of her
wanton eyes,
Who sang the song that the Siren sung on the treacherous Lurley
height,
Whose face was as fair as a summer day, and whose heart was as black
as night.
Yet a blossom I fain would pluck to-day from the garden above her
dust;
Not the languorous lily of soulless sin nor the blood-red rose of
lust;
But a sweet white blossom of holy love that grew in the one green
spot
In the arid desert of Phryne’s life, where all was parched and hot.
* * * * *
In the summer, when the meadows were aglow with blue and red,
Joe, the ostler of the Magpie, and fair Annie Smith were wed.
Plump was Annie, plump and pretty, with a cheek as white as snow;
He was anything but handsome was the Magpie’s ostler, Joe.
But he won the winsome lassie. They’d a cottage and a cow,
And her matronhood sat lightly on the village beauty’s brow.
Sped the months and came a baby――such a blue-eyed baby boy!
Joe was working in the stables when they told him of his joy.
He was rubbing down the horses, and he gave them then and there
All a special feed of clover, just in honour of the heir:
It had been his great ambition, and he told the horses so,
That the Fates would send a baby who might bear the name of Joe.
Little Joe the child was christened, and, like babies, grew apace;
He’d his mother’s eyes of azure and his father’s honest face.
Swift the happy years went over, years of blue and cloudless sky;
Love was lord of that small cottage, and the tempests passed them
by.
Passed them by for years, then swiftly burst in fury o’er their home.
Down the lane by Annie’s cottage chanced a gentleman to roam;
Thrice he came and saw her sitting by the window with her child,
And he nodded to the baby, and the baby laughed and smiled.
So at last it grew to know him――little Joe was nearly four;
He would call the “pretty gemplun” as he passed the open door;
And one day he ran and caught him, and in child’s play pulled him in,
And the baby Joe had prayed for brought about the mother’s sin.
’Twas the same old wretched story that for ages bards have sung:
’Twas a woman weak and wanton and a villain’s tempting tongue;
’Twas a picture deftly painted for a silly creature’s eyes
Of the Babylonian wonders and the joy that in them lies.
Annie listened and was tempted; she was tempted and she fell,
As the angels fell from heaven to the blackest depths of hell;
She was promised wealth and splendour and a life of guilty sloth,
Yellow gold for child and husband,――and the woman left them both.
Home one eve came Joe the Ostler with a cheery cry of “Wife!”
Finding that which blurred for ever all the story of his life
She had left a silly letter,――through the cruel scrawl he spelt;
Then he sought the lonely bed-room, joined his horny hands and knelt.
“Now, O Lord, O God, forgive her, for she ain’t to blame!” he cried;
“For I owt t’a seen her trouble, and ’a gone away and died.
Why, a wench like her――God bless her!――’twasn’t likely as her’d rest
With that bonny head for ever on a ostler’s ragged vest.
“It was kind o’ her to bear me all this long and happy time,
So for my sake please to bless her, though you count her deed a crime;
If so be I don’t pray proper, Lord, forgive me; for you see
I can talk all right to ’osses, but I’m nervous like with Thee.”
Ne’er a line came to the cottage from the woman who had flown;
Joe the baby died that winter, and the man was left alone.
Ne’er a bitter word he uttered, but in silence kissed the rod,
Saving what he told his horses, saving what he told his God.
Far away in mighty London rose the woman into fame,
For her beauty won men’s homage, and she prospered in her shame;
Quick from lord to lord she flitted, higher still each prize she won,
And her rivals paled beside her, as the stars beside the sun.
Next she made the stage her market, and she dragged Art’s temple down
To the level of a show place for the outcasts of the town.
And the kisses she had given to poor Ostler Joe for nought
With their gold and costly jewels rich and titled lovers bought.
Went the years with flying footsteps while her star was at its height;
Then the darkness came on swiftly, and the gloaming turned to night.
Shattered strength and faded beauty tore the laurels from her brow;
Of the thousands who had worshipped never one came near her now.
Broken down in health and fortune, men forgot her very name,
Till the news that she was dying woke the echoes of her fame;
And the papers in their gossip mentioned how an “actress” lay
Sick to death in humble lodgings, growing weaker every day.
One there was who read the story in a far-off country place,
And that night the dying woman woke and looked upon his face.
Once again the strong arms clasped her that had clasped her long ago,
And the weary head lay pillowed on the breast of Ostler Joe.
All the past had he forgotten, all the sorrow and the shame;
He had found her sick and lonely, and his wife he now could claim.
Since the grand folks who had known her one and all had slunk away,
He could clasp his long-lost darling, and no man would say him nay.
In his arms death found her lying, in his arms her spirit fled;
And his tears came down in torrents, as he knelt beside her dead.
Never once his love had faltered through her base unhallowed life;
And the stone above her ashes bears the honoured name of wife.
* * * * *
That’s the blossom I fain would pluck to-day from the garden above
her dust;
Not the languorous lily of soulless sin nor the blood-red rose of
lust;
But a sweet white blossom of holy love that grew in the one green
spot
In the arid desert of Phryne’s life, where all was parched and hot.
In 1886, Mrs. James Brown Potter recited this poem at a soirée given
in the house of Mr. Secretary Whitney, in Washington, U.S.A., before a
large company of ladies and gentlemen. During the recital some of the
ladies rose and left the room; the New York papers spitefully remarked
of those ladies who remained to hear the poem to the end, that, being
in evening dress, they were observed to blush almost down to their
waists.
The poem was severely criticised in several of the prudish American
papers, and assigned by some of them to the pen of A. C. Swinburne,
although as unlike his style as anything could well be.
The controversy that arose created a tremendous demand for the poem,
and many thousands of copies were sold in a few days, from which
however, the author derived no benefit whatever, owing to the
disgraceful state of the international copyright, or want of
copyright.
As Mrs. Kendal has recited the poem in public on several occasions, it
may be taken for granted that it contains nothing indelicate, or
objectionable, although the outcry raised in the States was so great
that the principal newspapers took sides on the question, and debated
the merits of the poem with almost as much heat as a Presidential
Election. One well-known humorist attempted to ridicule “Ostler Joe”
in the following ballad:――
TEAMSTER JIM.
It ain’t jest the story, Parson, to tell in a crowd like this,
With the virtuous maiden a-frownin’ an’ chidin’ the giggling miss,
An’ the good old deacon a-noddin’, in time with his patient snores,
An’ the shocked elect of the Capital, stalkin’ away through the doors.
But then, it’s a story that happened, an’ every word of it’s true,
An’ sometimes we can’t help talkin’ of the things that we sometimes
do.
An’ though good society coldly shuts its door on to Teamster Jim,
I’m thinkin’ ther’s lots worse people, that’s better known than him.
I mind the day he was married, an’ I danced at the weddin’ too;
An’ I kissed the bride, sweet Maggie, daughter of Ben McGrew.
I mind how they set up housekeepin’ two young, poor, happy fools,
When Jim’s only stock was a heavy truck an’ four Kaintucky mules.
Well, they lived along contented, with their little joys an’ cares,
An’ every year a baby came, an’ twice they came in pairs;
Till the house was full of children, with their shoutin’ and playin’
and squalls,
An’ their singin’ an’ laughin’ an’ cryin’ made Bedlam within its
walls.
An’ Jim, he seemed to like it, an’ he spent all his evenin’s at home,
He said it was full of music, an’ light, an’ peace from pit to dome.
He joined the church, an’ he used to pray that his heart might be
kept from sin――
The stumblin’est prayin’――but heads and hearts used to bow when he’d
begin.
So, they lived along in that way, the same from day to day,
With plenty of time for drivin’ work, an’ a little time for play.
An’ growin’ around ’em the sweetest girls and the liveliest, manliest
boys,
Till the old gray heads of the two old folks was crowned with the
homeliest joys.
Eh? Come to my story? Well, that’s all. They’re livin’ just like I
said,
Only two of the girls is married, an’ one of the boys is dead,
An’ they’re honest, an’ decent, an’ happy, an’ the very best
Christians I know,
Though I reckon in brilliant comp’ny they’d be voted a leetle slow.
Oh! you’re pressed for time――excuse you? Sure, I’m sorry I kept you
so long;
Good-bye! Now he looked kind o’ bored like, an’ I reckon that I was
wrong
To tell such a commonplace story, of two such commonplace lives,
But we can’t all git drunk, an’ gamble, an’ fight, an’ run off with
other men’s wives.
ROBERT T. BURDETTE.
“OSTLER JOE” IN THE HANDS OF A “POTTER.”
She went into a soirée,
Where was many a spotter,
And she read of Ostler Joe,
――Naughty Mrs. Potter.
Ladies there “undressed by Worth,”
Scowled at the simple cotter
And his fickle wife, ha, ha!
――Wicked Mrs. Potter.
They might go to see Odette,
Or some play that’s hotter,
But Ostler Joe they wouldn’t stand,
――Horrid Mrs. Potter
_Boston Courier._
HUSTLER JIM.
There warn’t nothin’ so blamed angelic
Nor saintish-like about him;
But, pard,――ef ever yer needed a friend――
Yer could “tie” to “Hustler Jim.”
Perhaps, if ther ’casion required it――
He would “cuss” a bit, now and then;
But a tenderer, kinder heart nor Jim’s
Haint frequently found in men.
There warn’t one parsimonious hair
In that grizzled old mop o’his,
There warn’t one deceitful line
In his wizened and humbly phiz.
His sympathies at a dog-fight
Allers backed up the smallest pup,
And his last chaw of plug terbacker
With er stranger he’d “divey” up.
Ef I wuz ter live fer er hundred years,
I shell never fergit the night
When he cleaned out “Plug” Kimberley’s bar room,
A mile or so west of Fort White.
Ef I wuz ter live fer er thousand years,
I kin never fergit the fun
The two of us had when we broke up Smith’s Place
Jest this side of Poverty Run.
If I wuz ter live fer er million years――
(Who was it remarked: “Git out.” Was it you?
Bartender? all right――I’ll “skip”――Dont shove please,
I’ll travel without!)
* * * * *
Out in the dark, damp, dreary night,
They ruthlessly “hustled” him,――
Ere he had a chance his sad tale to recite,
Concerning “Hustler Jim.”
_Washington Hatchet_, 1886.
――――:o:――――
BILLY’S ROSE.
(_Inserted by Mr. Sims’s permission._)
Billy’s dead, and gone to glory, so is Billy’s sister Nell:
There’s a tale I know about them, were I poet I would tell;
Soft it comes, with perfume laden, like a breath of country air
Wafted down the filthy alley, bringing fragrant odours there.
In that vile and filthy alley, long ago, one winter’s day,
Dying quick of want and fever, hapless, patient Billy lay,
While beside him sat his sister, in the garret’s dismal gloom,
Cheering with her gentle presence Billy’s pathway to the tomb.
Many a tale of elf and fairy did she tell the dying child,
Till his eyes lost half their anguish, and his worn, wan features
smiled:
Tales herself had heard hap-hazard, caught amid the Babel roar,
Lisped about by tiny gossips playing round their mother’s door.
Then she felt his wasted fingers tighten feebly as she told
How beyond this dismal alley lay a land of shining gold,
Where, when all the pain was over――where, when all the tears were
shed――
He would be a white-frocked angel, with a gold thing on his head.
Then she told some garbled story of a kind-eyed Saviour’s love,
How He’d built for little children great big playgrounds up above,
Where they sang and played at hop-scotch, and at horses all the day,
And where beadles and policemen never frightened them away.
This was Nell’s idea of Heaven――just a bit of what she’d heard,
With a little bit invented and a little bit inferred.
But her brother lay and listened, and he seemed to understand,
For he closed his eyes and murmured he could see the Promised Land.
“Yes,” he whispered, “I can see it――I can see it, sister Nell;
Oh, the children look so happy, and they’re all so strong and well;
I can see them there with Jesus――He is playing with them, too!
Let us run away and join them, if there’s room for me and you.”
She was eight, this little maiden, and her life had all been spent
In the garret and the alley, where they starved to pay the rent;
Where a drunken father’s curses and a drunken mother’s blows
Drove her forth into the gutter from the day’s dawn to its close.
But she knew enough, this outcast, just to tell the sinking boy,
“You must die before you’re able all these blessings to enjoy.
You must die,” she whispered, “Billy, and I am not even ill;
But I’ll come to you, dear brother――yes, I promise that I will.
“You are dying, little brother,――you are dying, oh, so fast;
I heard father say to mother that he knew you could’nt last.
They will put you in a coffin, then you’ll wake and be up there,
While I’m left alone to suffer in this garret bleak and bare.”
“Yes, I know it,” answered Billy. “Ah, but, sister, I don’t mind,
Gentle Jesus will not beat me; He’s not cruel or unkind.
But I can’t help thinking, Nelly, I should like to take away
Something, sister, that you gave me, I might look at every day.
“In the summer you remember how the mission took us out
To a great green lovely meadow, where we played and ran about,
And the van that took us halted by a sweet bright patch of land,
Where the fine red blossoms grew, dear, half as big as mother’s hand.
“Nell, I asked the good kind teacher what they called such flowers
as those,
And he told me, I remember, that the pretty name was rose.
I have never seen them since, dear――how I wish that I had one!
Just to keep and think of you, Nell, when I’m up beyond the sun.”
Not a word said little Nelly; but at night when Billy slept,
On she flung her scanty garments, and then down the stairs she crept.
Through the silent streets of London she ran nimbly as a fawn,
Running on and running ever till the night had changed to dawn.
When the foggy sun had risen, and the mist had cleared away,
All around her, wrapped in snowdrift, there the open country lay.
She was tired, her limbs were frozen, and the roads had cut her feet,
But there came no flowery gardens her poor tearful eyes to greet.
She had traced the road by asking――she had learnt the way to go;
She had found the famous meadow――it was wrapt in cruel snow;
Not a buttercup or daisy, not a single verdant blade
Showed its head above its prison. Then she knelt her down and prayed.
With her eyes upcast to heaven, down she sank upon the ground,
And she prayed to God to tell her where the roses might be found.
Then the cold blast numbed her senses, and her sight grew strangely
dim;
And a sudden, awful tremor seemed to seize her every limb.
“Oh, a rose!” she moaned, “good Jesus――just a rose to take to Bill!”
And as she prayed a chariot came thundering down the hill;
And a lady sat there, toying with a red rose, rare and sweet;
As she passed she flung it from her, and it fell at Nelly’s feet.
Just a word her lord had spoken caused her ladyship to fret,
And the rose had been his present, so she flung it in a pet;
But the poor, half-blinded Nelly, thought it fallen from the skies,
And she murmured, “Thank you, Jesus!” as she clasped the dainty prize.
* * * * *
Lo that night from out the alley did a child’s soul pass away,
From dirt and sin and misery to where God’s children play.
Lo that night a wild, fierce snowstorm burst in fury o’er the land,
And at morn they found Nell frozen, with the red rose in her hand.
Billy’s dead, and gone to glory, so is Billy’s sister Nell;
I’m bold to say this happened in the land where angels dwell:――
That the children met in heaven, after all their earthly woes,
And that Nelly kissed her brother, and said, “Billy here’s your rose.”
G. R. SIMS.
BILLY’S NOSE.
Listen to a _striking_ story. Billy and his sister Nell
Were a pair of gutter youngsters, in an alley had to dwell
(I am not a noted poet, but to tell you I shall try,
Since it “comes with perfume laden”――as a moral――that is why.)
Simple toys had made them happy through a sultry summer day
(Two old boots and one dead kitten), then they quarrelled in their
play,
’Mid the grime on Billy’s visage shone in streaks the angry red,
And he seized a handy brickbat, which he threw at Nellie’s head.
Little boys should love their sisters――here I might have had to paint
How the pretty, hapless maiden suddenly grew pale and faint;
How anon she drooped and faded, looking dove-like all the while,
Rending Billy’s little bosom with the sweetness of her smile!
But she didn’t. Nellie started――darted up each creaking stair
Till she reached their dismal garret, for she knew a stick was there;
This she held behind her slyly, meaning to avenge her woes,
Sought the unsuspecting Billy, and she hit him on the nose.
Billy’s missile missed its object, Nellie’s stick descended hard,
And the boy from all his pleasures was for three whole weeks debarred;
Could he hop-scotch in the alley――in the gutter take his place,
With that lattice work of plaster――very dirty――on his face?
Little boys should love their sisters――that’s the moral that I meant,
Seeing Billy’s nasal feature now, alas! is sadly bent;
And he has a secret sorrow, for whene’er his temper glows,
Nellie stands with lean arms folded, saying “Billy, how’s your nose?”
FRED RAWKINS (HAROLD WYNN.)
_The Weekly Dispatch_, 25 June, 1882.
Another Parody of “Billy’s Rose” appeared in _The Umpire_
(Manchester) 30 September, 1888. But it does not follow the original
very closely, and is rather too coarse to be inserted.
――――:o:――――
“THE TRICYCLE.”
_A Parody upon “The Lifeboat,” by G. P. Sims._
Been out on the Tricycle often? Yes, sir, I ride a lot.
When it’s hotter than this? Lor’, bless you, this ain’t what we call
hot.
It’s when the sun is a-shining with a heat like a furnace strong,
When the air is close and stifling, and when for a breeze you long,
When a drink seems life’s sole object, and parched and dry is the
breath,
When the leader’s cry, “Spurt! Forward” sounds like a sentence of
death.
That’s when we call it hot, sir; but if we can manage a day,
There is always enough crack riders ready to pedal away.
You’ve heard of Tunbridge Wells, sir, down in the valley of Kent?
Here are the fellows who rode there――gone is the money we spent.
The day that we went was reckoned the hottest this summer has seen,
And this was a year when summer was hot as Egypt, I ween.
The trip was planned by the others, and two of them volunteered――
I only heard of it after, and then I was well-nigh skeered――
For roasting that day seemed certain, and I thought of the skin on
my nose;
I thought of the Bank in the City, the books I had to close.
We pedalled away in the heat, sir; the “Wells” was the goal in view,
And never a one but doubted if the riders could live it through.
Our Tricycles stood it bravely, and thirsty and hot and weak,
We drew in sight of the hopfields we had dared so much to seek;
And then we rested and turned, and homeward again we faced,
When one machine collapsed, sir, as down a hill we raced!
That was an awful moment, and the stoutest held his breath,
And watched the wreck on the road, sir, as if he looked on death.
The road was strewn with pieces, and, to tell you the truth, sir,
then
I thought of the Bank in London I never might see again.
I thought of the manager’s look, sir, if vacant my seat were seen
On the morrow when I was due there――and all through a friend’s
machine!
However, I thought I’d risk it; I couldn’t desert a friend,
So we set to work with a will, sir, the broken wheel to mend,
And after some skilful hammering our joy can well be guessed
When we saw the wheel go round again, though shaky at the best.
Well, we stopped at a neighbouring “public”――of the rest I know no
more;
But I spent next day at the Bank, sir, with limbs both tired and
sore,
And as I sat calm and quiet my memory clouded grew
As I thought of that awful journey, that ride I had just gone
through.
_Cassell’s Saturday Journal._ May 1, 1886.
――――:o:――――
THE TERROR OF TADGER’S RENTS.
_A “Dagonet Ballad” Gone Wrong._
Ain’t heard of Tadger’s Rents? My eye! where was you bred and born?
Such ignorance it do excite a feller-creature’s scorn.
The Rents is down the Dials way――a proper kind o’ lair,
Where happy dossers come each night, and doss upon the stair.
I’ve done it many times and oft;――but never mind ’bout me,
It’s of Bill Basher I would jaw this arternoon, d’ye see?
The “Terror o’ the Rents” he was, and well deserved the name,
And yet, I hold, his heart was soft and tender all the same.
He couldn’t bear no cant, poor Bill, and humbug driv him wild,
They made a savage of a chap as was by nature mild;
And so it came to pass as he would always have his knife
Into a cove as paid his way and lived a decent life.
Joe Tomkins, he was one o’ these――a mean and sneaking cuss,
Who for no sort o’ boose that’s brewed had ever been the wuss.
“Let’s have a wet,” said Bill one day. Said Joseph, “Not for Joe!”
No wonder Bill was riled at that――he would be, don’t you know.
So later on, when he’d got screwed, he made for Joseph’s room,
As sat at tea, all unprepared to meet his orful doom.
Bill landed him upon the nose a wunner, so he did,
And then perceeded for to kick Joe’s missis and his kid.
He jumped upon the three of them, and then he come away――
You can’t see where his heart was soft, I think I heard you say.
Hold on; don’t take a feller up so precious sharp as that――
_Bill came away and didn’t hurt the Tomkins’ tabby cat_.
I see that animile last week, a-looking sleek and well,
But Bill he’s picking of his hemp inside a prison cell.
A martyr’s crown? I guess you’re right, for his deserts is plain,
As does his best, when on the bust, to study the humane.
_Funny Folks’ Annual._
――――:o:――――
ANOTHER “BAGONET” BALLAD.
_Told by the One-armed Man._
What? A “queer place” to look for a hero?
A Seven Dials pothouse? No fear!
I’ll find heroes, I’ll bet, just as good as you’ll get,
Though perhaps they _may_ owe to their beer
A grain――just a grain――of the courage
That stamps them the bulldogs of war.
“But, lor, where’s the hurt in a pint or a quart?
And, blow you! whoever you are――
“If you rob a pore man of his lotion,
And go turning him out of his pubs,
Whilst, half Sunday, he sits on the kerbstone, and spits,
You’re a guzzlin’ champagne in your clubs.
“Go and ’ang yerself――d’yer――did ye ’ear me?
Why you ain’t fit to live with my moke!
Mr. Stead says the toffs is all cut-throats and toffs,
Go and bust yerself――go an’ eat coke!”
A hero has spoken, as valiant
A fellow as ever broke bread――
As fly as a cop. He could hammer a slop,
And then do his “month’s hard” on his head.
He’s a thorough-blown hero, I tell you
(Though I fear I’m not much at portraiture),
P’raps he’s rough in a tiff, but, good gracious me――if
There’s a “Mr. Hyde” side to his nature,
Sure it’s not to be wondered at greatly;
For Seven Dials air’s hardly otto
Of roses. And more――as he’s told you before――
You don’t uphold “Fair Play” as your motto.
But let him run loose. Over there, sir,
You see a man sit on the bench;
Not that one with the pot――he’s a terrible sot;
Nor that one that is kissing the wench;
But that grey-haired old chap, whose right sleeve, sir,
Is empty, and pinned to his breast;
And I’ll bet you he says that he’s seen better days.
I can see it. That fine manly chest
I’ll warrant has heaved ’neath the scarlet,
Those grey eyes, so earnest and grave,
That look full of scorn, ne’er in plebeian born;
He’s a soldier――or has been――and brave.
I wonder if, speaking politely,
I’m able to somewhat unmask him,
To learn ’bout his arm. He seems passive and calm,
There’s nothing like cheek――no――I’ll ask him.
* * * * *
“How did I lose my arm, sir?”
(The grey-headed veteran rose),
“Well, come, fill up my pot, I’d as lief tell as not,”
(And he fell in a “Bagonet” _pose_――
You know――stand at ease――right leg forward
The right arm――or sleeve――on the breast-ee’s,
The left hanging dead by the side. And the head
Thrown well back to give play to the chest-ee’s.)
“How did I lose my arm, sir?
Ah, that’s too long a story, I fear,
Though I don’t wish to brag, it was lost for the flag
Of the Queen――and for England so dear.
“It was lost, sir, upholding the honour
That means to an Englishman life.
In the thick of the battle, midst guns’ deathly rattle,
One last thought of home and of wife――”
Then he strikes. Hark, now “Up guards, and at ’em,
Bang! Victory! On Stanley, on!
Send a volley in there――on the point of the square,
So――another like that, and we’ve won.”
See your foemen and comrades all lying
On the blood-stained heath, gory and red,
Hear the groans and the prayers of the dying
And the agonised shrieks of the dead.
Poor Jack! What, a drink from my flask, son,
And leave you to die? Save myself?
You and I, who’ve been cronies together,
Have a pull at the brandy. A Guelph
Isn’t dearer to me at this moment――
My charger’s been shot in both flanks,
But we can both straddle somehow in the saddle,
And I’ll get you back to the ranks.
What’s this dark hull that looms up against us?
This great rush of steam, and this dash?
For the ones that we love all things earthly above
Great heavens! she’s on us! A crash――
Yes, we’re struck by the _Bywell Castle_.
She has cut us in two with her prow,
And our boat, _The Princess_, in five minutes, or less,
WILL SUCK THREE HUNDRED CREATURES BELOW!
“Let the women get into the boats there,
Stand back-let the critters get in!”
But some great hulking tramps crowd the boat, and she swamps,
And loud o’er the engines dim,
From the waves of the murky Thames, sir,
Come the wails of the souls in the stream.
“Keep afloat for God’s sake――sure some effort she’ll make,
No――one last shriek――one horrible scream;”
As our vessel she takes a plunge, sir,
Ah! it sickens my heart with fears;
The life-belts are thrown, as the vessel goes down,
AND THE OLD MAN SITS IN TEARS!
He looks at the glowing embers,
He watches the straggling flame;
But never a word from his lips is heard
As he thinks of his daughter’s shame.
How her sunny face, in the village,
As a ray of sunshine was shown;
Beloved by them all, both great and small,
Till――till the gay young squire came down.
Ah, me, ’twas the same old story,
Of the trusting girl and the scamp,
The careless miner――the unlit pipe――
AND THE UNCLOSED DAVY LAMP!
A flash and a terrible rumbling,
As loud of smoke from the shaft,
Of wailing dread at the grim pit’s head,
But along the wires was waft
A word from the junction signals,
“THE FLYING SCOTCHMAN’S THROUGH!
Clear the line; she’s late.” And the 12.48
Is ten minutes overdue!
I’ve hardly a second for thought, sir,
The 12.48’s in sight.
“Put steam, on, men, run her through, and then
We may still pull ye through all right.”
They hear my shout on the engine,
And they run her through at a rate
That the company never had dreamed about,
But alas! for it’s all too late.
But one more second and they’d have gained
The siding. But down she swept,
AND FEW IN THAT FATED HOUSE AFIRE
That knew――for most sound they slept.
The firemen hammered the door down.
Is there life to be saved, and where?
They plunge in the haze of the house ablaze;
Their helmets lit up with the glare.
A window opens above us,
That’s on the second floor.
And a maiden we sight――in the raiment of night――
And she calls midst the flaming roar――
“WILL NOBODY SAVE MY FATHER?”
We are turned near to stone at the shock.
We are glued to the street. I can hear my heart beat
Like a five-bob American clock.
A ladder is put to the window,
A young fellow pulls off his hat,
He springs up that ladder as lithe as an adder,
And climbs with the skill of a cat.
WE SWEEP LIKE A WAVE PAST THE RED POST!
It’s now that the battle begins.
Ev’ry eye’s on the blue. In a second or two
They’ll be shouting out “Kissing Cup wins!”
We’ve got ’em all settled, I think, sir,
No! Here comes the Captain’s colt,
He’s _us_ at five seven! He’ll beat us――Oh, heaven!
But no――he has shot his bolt.
I can see the face of a girl, sir,
A standing there in the ring,
She’s a maiden to meet――(out of Winchester Street),
And she’s “backed us like everyding.”
I must win this race FOR HER, sir,
For hereon there rests a name.
Her virgin caresses――her “Empire” dresses,
And Victoria Station’s shame.
THE AERONAUT CLINGS TO THE CORD, SIR,
And owns with too well shown fright
That he’s surely come to a chosen tomb
In the Channel’s billows so bright.
When we sailed from the Crystal Palace,
There was scarce a breath of air,
And the glitt’ring sun on our huge balloon
Made a picture divinely fair.
She looked like a golden ball, sir,
As she mounted into the skies.
Sailed from the crowds and sought the clouds
The cynosure of all eyes.
But two short hours have passed us,
And here we hang o’er the sea,
In a terrible plight――not a sail in sight,
And descending rapid-lee,
A few feet below us――THE OCEAN!
We are fully ten miles from the land.
Good God! see――she dies――not an inch can we rise
FOR WE’VE THROWN OUT THE LAST BAG OF SAND!
To recourse――ah, I had but an instant.
I leapt――with a cry――to the ground.
And, Heaven be praised for its mercy!
I stood with the girl safe and sound.
* * * * *
“And that’s how I lost my arm, sir.
If the thing don’t strike you as clear,
Put it down to a few o’ the trials I’ve gone through,
Or――perhaps it’s along o’ this beer.”
_The Sporting Times._ October 20, 1888.
――――:o:――――
THE LIGHTS OF LONDON TOWN.
The way was long and weary,
But gallantly they strode,
A country lad and lassie,
Along the heavy road.
The night was dark and stormy
But blithe of heart were they,
For shining in the distance
The Lights of London lay.
O gleaming lamps of London that gem the City’s crown,
What fortunes lie within you, O Lights of London Town.
* * * * *
GEORGE R. SIMS.
See _Ballads of Babylon._ London. John P. Fuller. 1880.
――――
THOSE WIGHTS OF LONDON TOWN.
_The Correct Version._
The way was long and dreary,
But jauntily they strode,
Bill Sikes and Jim the Leary
Along the frosty road.
The night was nice and dusky,
The sky was dark and grey;
And Bill, in accents husky,
Opined they’d fix the lay!
“O gleaming lamps of London! I’d like douse your glim,
What “crackings” lie within you when you are faint and dim!”
The hours passed on and found them
A-burgling of a “shop”
And scattered all around them,
They’d got a golden crop.
And from the office window,
That lonely moonless night
The “swag” they dropped, and grinn’d O!
It was a lovely sight!
“O sleepy slops of London, who crawl about the town,
I think you must be jolly green, for we have done you brown.”
With faces black with sorrow――
With words we dare not speak,
Upon the fateful morrow,
They stood before the beak.
The “slops” had watched their capers,
And soon their way had barred,
And, according to the papers,
They each got six months hard!
“Oh cruel lights of London, why do you shine so gay?
A-showing up poor burgulars, to steal their peace away.”
S. J. ADAIR FITZ-GERALD.
――――
THE LIGHTS O’ ASCOT HEATH.
The way was long and dusty,
But joyfully they drove,
A London lad and lassie,
Along the Ascot road;
The day was hot and muggy,
But blithe of heart were they,
For shining in his pocket
Some twenty dollars lay.
Oh! gleaming heath of Ascot,
That gem of racing sights,
What fortunes you could tell of;
What sad and sorry flights.
With faces torn and beery,
That told a loser’s load,
That day a man and woman
Crept up the London road:
They sought their native alley,
“Regular broke” from the fray,
Yet shining still behind them
The heath of Ascot lay.
Oh! cruel heath of Ascot,
If D’s your race could win,
Your victims’ mouths would yell them,
To get their favourite in.
_The Sporting Times._ June 20, 1885.
――――:o:――――
THE BALLAD MONGER.
It was a ballad monger,
Of the gruesome, morbid type,
And he told of cold and hunger,
“Little alls” sent “up the pipe.”
And he piled on high the agony,
As with sobs we gasped for breath,
When he sang us――_à la_ Dagonet,
Of murder, want, and death.
Doth a child convert a burglar,
Or that burglar kill that child,
Then this sentimental gurgler,
“Airs his slush”――to put it mild.
He will tell you how it’s mother――
Yes, the child’s of course not Sykes’――
Was a relative of t’other,
By a natural son of “Mike’s!”
How this “Mike” was Sykes’ father,
And the father himself betwixt
A duke and an earl――or rather,
When the parentage got mixed.
And so on and yet so forth,
Will this “poet” meander on,
Till he proves my Lord of Beauforth,
Was undoubtedly Mike’s son.
And the child was Sykes’s daughter,
And the mother wife to he,
Though their grandma wasn’t sorter,
Everything that she might be.
Yet the moral indicated,
In this tale that is bedeckt,
Troubles not this addle-pated,
Jerry-plotting architect.
Should occasion demand a sonnet,
On a “starve” or on a “freeze,”
Then our ballad monger is “on it,”
With his dismal, doleful, wheeze,
And he’s safe upon this track, sir,
To his muse he ne’er resorts,
For his scenes are based on facts, sir,
Solid facts from police reports.
Oh, the unction of this whiner,
Of a tune pitched in a key,
Which the clef is B flat minor,
And as dirge-like as can be.
Not content with dying father,
Teething babe and wasting wife,
With his licensed poetic lather,
He must needs call in the knife.
Need I wade through scenes of torture,
To the climax strong and hot,
When the son, himself a “scorcher,”
Takes and massacres the lot.
No! I needn’t, for it’s certain.
That in sympathy you’d choke,
With emotion at the burden,
Of this ballad-slinging bloke.
HEBER K. DANIELS.
From _The South Western Star_.
――――
_Truth_ for October 14th, 1886, contained half-a-dozen ballads written
in the style of Mr. Sims’s poems. The three following may be quoted as
interesting imitations, but it will be seen that they do not parody
any particular poem:――
LITTLE FLO.’
Tell you the tale o’ Flo, sir, and how she came to die?
’Twere a sad time in my life, tho’ it’s so long gone by.
I was a drunken brute then――never thought much o’ Flo;
Nearly al’ays in liquor――got jolly screwed, you know.
Yes, I treated her shockin’! life must ha’ been pretty bad,
She’d prom’sed her dyin’ mother al’ays to look after dad.
I used to laugh at her notions, she was but a gal o’ seven,
And ’ad got it fixed in her ’ead to bring me along to heaven.
“Dad!” she’d say to me sometimes, “it’s beau’ful bright in there;
Everyone’s al’ays ’appy, and got golden crowns to wear.”
How I laughed at the child then, to think o’ a crown on my head;
I told her to shut up cantin’, I didn’t want to be dead.
Still some’ow I wasn’t ’appy, for ’appen I’d got a fright,
And wondered whatever’ud’appen if I should die that night,
So to keep down her pleadin’s I off on a pretty good spree,
Down at the pub at the corner, along o’ my mates and me.
We was pretty gone on the wrong side, stagg’rin’ ’ome that night,
And there was Flo sittin’ and watchin’, with the room clean and
bright.
With a curse at her for waitin’ I flung myself on the bed,
Catchin’ the lamp with my arm, and pullin’ it down on my ’ead.
Flo flung herself down upon me, and then I woke from my daze,
We smoth’rd the flames with a rug, but Flo was all a blaze.
I flung the blanket upon her, I seemed to go off my ’ead;
But when I got back to my senses, they told me that Flo was dead.
She’d given her life for her father, for such a wretch as me,
And mainly because she knew, sir, that I warn’t fit to die.
When I got better they told me the last words ’o little Flo
“They wouldn’t have ’im in ’eaven, if he was drunk, you know.”
On my word, sir, that fetched me, I never drank since that night;
And I prays as I’ll follow Flo up to her ’ome ’o light.
For as that child forgave me, I believes by and by
As He’ll forgive me too, sir, who came for sinners to die.
So little Flo’s life warn’t lost, she showed me the way to live;
She showed me what goodness meant, the way that a girl can forgive.
When I am tempted to drink, I thinks o’ the last words o’ Flo,
“He couldn’t be let into ’eaven if he was drunk, you know.”
MAGNUM BONUM.
――――
THE COSTER’S PLEA.
What ’ave I got to say, Mr. Beak, about the row last night,
When I knocked the peeler down twice? Well, it was just a fight
For liberty for me, sir――me an’ me old dawg Jack;
The bobby tried to cop ’im, and I put ’im on ’is back.
I tried to fight ’im fair, sir, but ’e pulled ’is trunchin out
To brain my dear old dawg with, an’ the people round about
Cried “Shame!” but it ony made him madder like, yer see,
And then ’twas a matter ’o fists for to set my old dawg free.
Why did I fight for a dawg so an’ try to injer the perlice?
Well, cos if they ’ad took ’im I’d ’ave never ’ad no peace.
Just cos that faithful dawg years ago did that for me
What I could’nt, sir, forget if a ’underd I should be.
Twelve years ago old Jack, ’e, when not much mor’n a pup,
One night lay in ’is corner――’e’d ’ad neither bit nor sup;
For times ’ad bin rare bad――’e lay down an’ shet ’is eyes,
’E was ’ungry, an’ wet, an’ tired, an’ ’ad ’ardly strength to rise.
The missus an’ me went off up ter bed ter try ’an sleep,
But when your stummick’s empty, its apt yer awake to keep;
But at last we went sound off, an’ dead beat as we ’ad bin,
A sleep as ’eavy as death, by-an’-bye, we both was in.
I suppose we’d been asleep nigh upon a couple o’ hour,
When Jack ’e woke me barkin’, an’ I see ’is tew eyes glower,
Then I looked an’ missed our kiddy from ’er bed on the floor,
But I spied ’er little bed things layin’ close again the door.
I turned ter Poll to wake ’er, when I see a awful glare
Cornin’ in the bedroom winder, an’ the ’eat was ’ard to bear,
The ’ouse was all ablaze, an’ we’d dropped out ter the ground
’Bout ten minits, when it fell in scatt’rin fire all around.
Jumpin’ out Jack broke ’is leg bad, and our kiddy’s life he’d saved;
’E ’ad took ’er out in safety, an’ ’ere on me ’earts engraved,
The deed o’ that there dawg, who come back through fire to us,
An’ can ye wonder now, sir, that last night I made a fuss?
’E braved a burnin’ staircase, an’ ’ed stayed till we had dropped,
An’, when my Poll, soon after, straight away to glory popped,
She said, “Jim, keep our Jack safe,” an’ I’ve allus’ kep’ me vow,
An’ you’ll let me off, sir, won’t you, so that I don’t break it now;
The kid ’as gone to her mother, wi’ the angels up above,
An’ if I should lose old Jack, why, I’d nothin’ ave ter love,
Ah! don’t be ’ard, sir, this time――don’t break a poor cove’s ’eart;
What, sir? I’m free! God bless yer! me dawg an’ me won’t part!
AGLAUS.
――――
SALLY.
What’s the matter down the alley
Don’t yer know? I thought as ’ow
Every one ’ad ’eard of Sally――
Killed last week in a drunkin row.
Come aside, then, out of the mob, sir.
A drink? I don’t mind if I do.
I don’t like talkin’ of this job, sir;
But any ’ow I’ll tell it you.
Well, I think ’twas last December――
’Bout as near as I can tell――
Joe Hale, then a stiddy member,
Lost ’is wife an’ kid as well.
That upset ’im altogether,
Drove ’im nearly off ’is head;
Whether it was that, or whether
It was not, it’s what was said.
Fightin’ every night an’ boozin’,
Doin’ weeks an’ months in quod,
Sellin’ all ’is sticks, an’ losin’
All he ’ad, when on the cod;
An’ he’d leave pore little Sally
(Sally was ’is daughter, sir)
For days a starvin’ in the alley,
Givin’ not a thought to ’er.
This night Joe was fightin’ madly
In a gang of drunkin’ brutes,
Who, if things was goin’ badly,
’Ud down a man an’ use their boots;
An’ little Sally, screamin’ “Murder!”
With a face just like a sheet,
Rushed among the fightin’ herd, sir,
An’ fell down beneath their feet.
Trampled on, an’ crush’d, an’ moanin’,
They carried Sal out of the fight;
She lay a little while a groanin’,
An’ then she died the selfsame night.
An’ now they’re goin’ to bury Sally――
An’ Joe? Ah, Joe, too, ended bad,
For when he seed ’er dead in the alley,
He went stark, starin’ ravin’ mad.
PHIL. LASCELLES.
The pathetic ballads of Mr. Sims are frequently chosen for recitation,
and good parodies of them are much sought after, as a relief to the
overwrought feelings of the auditors.
There is a recitation written by Mr. Richard H. Douglass, which is
often given by him with success, entitled “Christmas Day in the
Beer-house.”
In its opening lines it somewhat resembles Mr. Sims’s “Christmas Day
in the Workhouse,” but it does not follow that poem sufficiently to be
styled a parody, and is, moreover, rather coarse in its style.
Every one remembers “The Manual for Young Reciters,” which appeared in
_Punch_ in 1887, and has since been issued in a small volume, entitled
“Burglar Bill,” by J. Anstey, (London, Bradbury, Agnew & Co.) Two of
the papers contained in this are imitations of Mr. Sims; _Burglar
Bill_ is one, but a far more amusing specimen is _A Coster’s
Conversion_. A poor harmless costermonger relates how he
“Give a copper a doin’,
As ’ad said my barrer was blockin’ the way,
And they took me afore a beak,
And he see what I wanted was change o’ hair,
So he sent me to quod fur a week.”
Whilst he is away in durance vile some well meaning, but mistaken,
philanthropist converts his wife to Æstheticism, and on his return to
his humble roof, he is much amazed, and by no means pleased, with the
alterations made in his home:――
“I’ll not ’ave none of it, Betsy,” I sez――and I chucked the lot of
it out,
And I did’nt recover my self-respeck till I see it go up the spout!
For we all on us has our feelings, Sir, and my pride it was cruel
’urt,
To think as a swell could ha’ gone so fur as to rob a poor man of
his dirt!
But I never ’anker for Culcher now, nor henvy no harristocrats,
For I’m cured fur life of the longing I ’ad fur a roomful of
brick-a-bats.
Of spadgers and pea-green paint you’ll find in the attic ’ardly a
trace,
And, when me and my old woman ’as words――there’s allus plenty o’
space!
* * * * *
This appeared originally in _Punch_, May 14, 1887.
Mr. Sims has recently published (London, Chatto and Windus) _The
Dagonet Reciter_, which contains most of the poems which have been
referred to in this Collection, “Ostler Joe,” “The Life-boat,”
“Keeping Christmas” etc., as well as a selection of his humorous prose
writings.
Before leaving this author, there remains a parody of his to be
quoted, it should have appeared in Volume IV., which contained other
parodies of “The Lost Chord.”
THE LOST CORD.
Seated one day in a carriage,
I was frightened and ill at ease,
For a fellow, behaving wildly,
Was up to his drunken sprees.
I knew not if he was playing,
Or what I was doing then,
But I pulled the cord like winking,
While the lunatic shrieked “Amen.”
It rattled against the ceiling
As I clasped it in my palm,
Then it broke and fell on the cushion,
Where it lay in a holy calm.
It startled the next compartment,
On the lunatic’s nerves it jarred;
It reached the length of the carriage,
But it never reached the guard.
It may be a grand invention
At the distant guard to get;
But I’ve tried it in twenty cases,
And I’ve never succeeded yet.
GEORGE R. SIMS.
From _The Lifeboat, and other Poems_. 1883.
The following Volunteer parody, of the same original, recently
appeared in the _First Lanark Gazette_.――
THE LOST SHOT.
Shooting one day at the targets,
In a steady three-o’clock breeze,
I watched my score rise quickly――
I was making bulls’-eyes with ease.
I knew well what I was doing,
And what I was thinking then,
As I fired my one last bullet,
And awaited the signal again.
It sped thro’ the Golden Ether,
With the speed of an angel’s wing,
And it must have reached the target,
For I’m certain I heard the “ping.”
I waited with utmost confidence
For the signal that never came;
I challenged, and paid my sixpence,
But the marker ignored my claim!
I raged with perplexed feelings,
And swore like a big dragoon;
Then I fretted away into silence
O’er the loss of the silver spoon.
I have sought, and I still seek vainly
The value of that one last shot,
For which I claimed a bull’s-eye,
Only the scorer said it was not.
It may be that playful zephyrs
Wafted it over the plain;
It may be that only in dreamland
I shall find my last shot again.
CORPORAL.
[Illustration]
CLEMENT W. SCOTT.
Many poems written by this distinguished dramatic critic are chosen
for recitation, notably “The Women of Mumbles Head” which is to be
found in “_Lays of a Londoner_” (London, Carson and Comerford, 1886.)
A very funny parody of this, entitled “The Wreck of the Steamship
‘Puffin,’” is in _Burglar Bill_, by J. Anstey, and would form an
amusing contrast to the original, in the second part of an
entertainment.
Another well-known poem by Mr. Clement Scott was the _Tale of the
Tenth Hussars_, in favour of the late Colonel Valentine Baker, which
originally appeared in _Punch_, and was quoted, with a parody on it,
on p. 87, vol. iv. _Parodies_.
THE GARDEN OF SLEEP.
(_With compliments to Messrs. Clement Scott and Isidore de Lara_)
There’s a crib in Whitechapel is used by a heap,
An’ the deppity calls it ’is Garden o’ Sleep!
Where the Heast Hend hexotics are bloomin’ in rows,
An’ the fake an’ the cadger find blameliss repose.
For a double or single you settles the boss,
An’ you dumps down your coppers an’ goes for your doss;
Though if turn out you won’t when your time’s fairly sped,
They’ve a ’abit of lettin’ you down by the ’ead,
An’ a bump on your Barnet you commonly keep
All the day hafter leavin’ the Garden o’ Sleep.
Sleep! sleep! Never mind things wot creep!
Sleep, my dossy ones, sleep!
If you’ve ’tecs on your track there’s but foppence to pay,
You can set in the kitching the ’ole of the day,
Smoke your clay, brile your bloater, or swill down the booze,
While you reads o’ your deeds in the _Hecko_ or _Noos_,
An’ you splits the bone buttons right orf of your west
Wen they brings you the word of your latest harrest;
An’ you larfs till the water runs out of your heyes
Wen you thinks of the slops goin’ round in disguise,
And the ’andsome reward as no cully won’t reap,
’Cept some pal blows the gaff in the Garden o’ Sleep!
Sleep! sleep! for the slops we’re too deep!
Sleep, my dossy ones, sleep!
Once a swell come a-slummin’ in second-’and slops,
And my pal, which is William, the needle ’e cops,
And ’e twigged ’im a-takin’ down notes on the sly,
An’ arranged for to cure ’im o’ doin’ Poll Pry;
For ’e kep’ on a-sniffin’ and saying, “Ho, dear!
There’s a state o’ things ’ighly deplorable ’ere!”
An’ ’e cussed at the blankits, which all was ’is spite,
As the gent as ’ad used ’em since Wensday fortnite
Was a gifted an’ ’ighly respectable sweep,
As is werry well known in the Garden o’ Sleep!
Sleep! sleep! A respectable sweep!
Sleep, my dossy ones, sleep!
Then my pal an’ me pulls that there swell out o’ bed,
An’ we gets a young lady to set on ’is ’ead,
An’ we searches ’is pockets and collars the mags,
Takes ’is coat an’ ’is weskit, and also ’is bags,
An’ we tenderly pitches ’im out in the street,
Where ’e is copped by the bobby as b’longs to the beat;
An’ we watches an’ watches, but watchin’ is wain,
’Cos that swell ’e won’t never try slummin’ again,
As a fine for disorderly drunks gets ’im cheap
Orf that night as ’e spent in the Garden o’ Sleep!
Sleep! sleep! Two ’arf bulls does it cheap!
Sleep, my dossy ones, sleep!
_Judy._ November 28, 1888.
ROBERT BROWNING.
In dealing with Parodies of the works of living authors, the chief
difficulty to contend with is, that some of the parodies may read
rather flat and uninteresting to those who are unacquainted with the
original poem.
Such familiar poems as Lord Tennyson’s “May Queen,” or “Lady Clara
Vere-de-Vere,” it would of course be quite unnecessary to reprint, but
now that more modern poems are under consideration it is desirable to
give such of the originals as can be inserted, with the authors’
express permission. Hitherto the necessary authority has been
gracefully accorded, and, in several instances, supplemented by
valuable bibliographical information. Thus showing that some of the
leading poets of the day recognise the value of this Collection as a
literary record, and fully appreciate the strict line that is drawn to
exclude vulgar, personal, or malicious lampoons.
In accordance therefore with the usual custom, a courteously worded
letter was sent to Mr. Robert Browning, asking his permission to quote
a few extracts from his shorter poems, with the assurance that no
offensive parody of his works should be inserted.
Mr. Browning’s reply was to the effect that as he disapproved of every
kind of Parody he refused permission to quote any of his poems, adding
in somewhat ungracious language, that his publishers would be
instructed to see that his wishes were complied with.
Perhaps the world does not greatly care whether Mr. Browning approves
of Parody, or does not; neither can he very well expect that the
completeness of this Collection should be sacrificed in deference to
his distaste for a harmless branch of literature which has amused many
of our greatest authors, and best of men. Byron and Scott could laugh
at the _Rejected Addresses_, and enjoy a merry jest, even at their own
expense, but let no dog bark when the great Sir Oracle opens his lips,
and no daring humourist venture to travesty the poems of Mr. Robert
Browning!
This injunction comes rather late, for numerous parodies of his works
have already been written, of which some of the best must be included
here. It is to be hoped that the perusal of them may induce some
readers to seek in the originals those beauties which herein are only
dimly shadowed forth.
Mr. Robert Browning was born at Camberwell in 1812, and educated at
the London University. In September 1846, he married Miss Elizabeth
Barrett, the poetess (who died in 1861), by whom he had one son, Mr.
Robert Browning, the well-known artist.
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX.
This is probably the best known of Mr. Browning’s earlier poems, it is
given in _Bell’s Standard Elocutionist_, and various other
collections.
On January 23, 1882, Mr. Browning wrote to the _Oracle_――“There is no
sort of historical foundation for the poem about ‘Good News from
Ghent.’ I wrote it under the bulwark of a vessel, off the African
coast, after I had been at sea long enough to appreciate even the
fancy of a gallop on the back of a certain good horse, ‘York,’ then in
my stable at home.
“It was written in pencil on the fly-leaf of Bartolio’s ‘Simboli,’ I
remember.”
This Poem was chosen as the original for a Parody Competition in _The
World_, and the two following parodies appeared in that entertaining
journal on August 13, 1879.
HOW THE GOOD NEWS WAS BROUGHT FROM ULUNDI TO LANDSMAN’S DRIFT.
_First Prize._
One turn in the saddle to look at the smoke,
Then into a canter the stout pony broke.
“All right!” cried the laager’s last picket; and I,
“Right!” cheerily answered, as, cantering by,
I took in the very last hole in my belt,
And, alone with my tidings, rode into the veldt.
Not a word from a comrade to cheer me, no beat
From an answering hoof to make him more fleet,
For the nag; but I gave, with the flat of my hand,
A friendly rib-binder he’d well understand.
Each strap was in place, each buckle was right,
As is custom with me ere I ride for the night.
I started at noon, and at Panda’s old kraal
We stayed, where there tinkled a thin waterfall,
To wash out our mouths; and I ran for a spell,
With my hand on the pommel, then into the selle――
The stouter the pair of us, so for the rest――
We swished through the grass to the crimsoning west.
By the river, and up through the pass in the range;
By track of the troops and trail that was strange
Down donga and drift, past koppie and stone,
We galloped while daylight should last all alone.
And thankful enough, God wot, too was I,
To be free from the Zulu and his company.
Babinango to northward, and south by the map
Must be Umblabankosi through yon azure gap.
“Half-way, my tough garron, half-way! We shall do
If the next merry moiety you’ll travel so!”
I groomed his hot legs with the African herb
And he snuffled responsive and rattled his curb.
Then a thick fog crawled to us and shut up the moon,
And the stars too; nor did I a minute too soon,
With compass and chart, once more strike the trail,
And shake the staunch pony together to sail――
Like a stout ship, keen watch at the bows, and steered small
Mid berg and mid mist――to a guessed-at landfall.
Well, we fetched it at last; nor did I refuse
A draught of good wine in return for my news.
The battle was fought, and the tidings were brought
By a man and a horse, thirty leagues at a bout.
I’ve no story to tell; it’s a matter of course
When a Briton on duty bestrides a good horse.
PLUNX (Mr. George Heaton).
_Second Prize._
I sprang to the stirrup; my friend the _D.T._
Should gallop right fast if he meant to beat me.
“Good luck!” cried the rearguard, as past them I sped.
“There are Zulus about; keep a bright look ahead!”
’Twas noontide, and near the full heat of the day,
As through the fierce sunlight I galloped away.
Not a being to speak to; I kept the great pace
Alone o’er the desolate grass-covered space;
Turned round in my saddle, and saw through the glare
The smoke of the burning kraals rise in the air;
Then again facing forward each tuft well I scanned,
And strapped my revolver more ready to hand.
Good news――over hill, over dale, speeding fast――
Ere sundown Fort Evelyn had heard as I past;
Then gratefully over us flew the cool spray,
As through Umlatoosi we splashed on our way:
With twilight there came a fresh breeze sweeping by,
And the bright stars peeped forth from the darkening sky.
At moonrise Fort Marshall lay close on the right,
And still my stout galloper sped through the night,
With nostrils dilated, stretched neck, and clenched teeth,
While his hoofs dashed the dew from the grass underneath
In ceaseless, monotonous, regular beat,
Till Sandwhlana lay steeped in white mist at my feet.
Rorke’s Drift and the Buffalo River were nigh,
When a bank of black clouds rose and darkened the sky;
The bright moon was hidden, and hidden each mark,
And I came near to missing the ford in the dark:
As we left the cold river I patted my steed,
And urged him again to his uttermost speed.
On, on still I rode, as the wild huntsman rides:
In the dawn I could just see the foam-covered sides,
See the head sinking low, see the staggering knees,
Feel the shudder that shook him as wind shakes the trees;
Yet onward he struggled with fast-failing strength,
And safe into Landsman’s Drift galloped at length.
And all I remembered was, “Now it is done;
I was first with the news of the victory won;
And no voice but will praise this long gallop of mine,
When ’tis talked of at breakfast or over the wine.”
ODD FISH (Mr. Charles McIntyre).
――――
HOW I WON THE CHALLENGE SHIELD.
I sprang to the saddle and Wheeler and Lea;
I treadled, Lea treadled, we treadled all three:
“Five mile!” cried the judge, decked in rosette of blue;
Whiz! went our front wheels as past him we flew:
And loud were the public with cheer and with jest,
As round the first lap we sped on abreast.
Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace
Yard by yard, wheel by wheel, never changing our place:
And firm in my saddle――prepared for each swerve――
I steadied each muscle and braced up my nerve,
Reserving my whole strength, kept pace with the two,
And neither was favourite, at least to the view.
We were scratch all at starting; but when we drew near
The first mile I led, amid deafening cheer;
At two the “crack” wheeler was the first of the three;
The third mile was led by the resolute Lea;
And from ropes and pavilion was heard the loud roar
As the judge’s gruff voice gave the mileage at “Four!”
At five miles I spurted and kept up the run,
And gained the lost lead that the others had won,
And bent o’er my wheel and went inch by inch past
My sturdy opponents and left them at last,
With sure-footed pedals each spinning away,
And still on the watch like a cat for its prey.
I now kept the inside and heard them at my back――
Saw their shadows athwart on the smooth cinder track,
And each eye’s sharp look-out lest they neared on the right,
Kept my bi. well in hand as each wheel came in sight;
And the roar of the people which aye and anon
Would quicken each pedal and hasten it on.
Next moment Lea fell; cried the judge, looking grim,
“Poor fellow, fought bravely, the fault’s not in him,
’Tis cursed ill-luck!” For he saw by his face,
Scarred and cut, and white lips, he was out of the race,
And carried him off to the shade of the tent
And came back to criticise us as we went.
So we were left treadling, Wheeler and I,
To spin for the prizes――no cloud in the sky;
The broad sun above shed its pitiless shine,
Down my face rolled the sweat and stung me like brine;
Then loudly the judge, coming near as we passed,
Said, “Go it, my hearties, this lap is the last!”
How they shouted! and all in a moment a spurt
Gave him an inch lead――but he found me alert,
And then was my stamina put to its test:
He and I fought the battle, and onlooked the rest,
With his head near the wheel, and his teeth firmly set,
He still kept my side and no farther could get.
Then I called up my energies; loud was the cry
That came from the thousands of spectators nigh;
Gripped firmly the handles, the grasp of grim death,
And steadied the pedals, then took a deep breath,
Clenched my teeth, gained a yard, as we flew down the track,
Till the shouts told me plainly I’d beaten the “crack.”
And all I remember, is friends flocking round,
Who bore us both shoulder high then off the ground,
And the club all _en masse_ cheered this record of mine,
And my health was the pretext for bumpers of wine.
And the fellows all voted three cheers from the field,
For the victor and vanquished, who fought for the shield.
W. H. SMITH.
_The Wheeling Annual._ 1885
――――:o:――――
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN.
This poem is given in full in _The Comic Poets of the Nineteenth
Century_, published by Routledge & Sons, London. It has been the
subject of several political parodies, one of the best being that
which appeared in Punch, May 1, 1880, entitled “The Bagpiper of
Midlothian.” This described how the Liberals in Midlothian despaired
of their cause, and the Tories were jubilant, when suddenly _Wandering
Willie_ the Piper appeared.
And “Please your Worships,” said he, “I’m able,
By means of a secret charm, to draw
All creatures――with ears――beneath the sun;
After me they are bound to run
In such a style as you never saw.
I’m willing,” said he, “to try my charm
On the Tories――they’re doing the country harm.
I’m also possessed of a spell, you’ll see,
To strengthen limp Libs, who’ve gone weak at the knee;
The time-serving Rat and the envious Viper;
And they call me Wandering WILLIE the Piper.”
And here they observed that he carried his pipes,
This man of the breeze-blown Galashiels stripes,
And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying,
As if impatient to be playing.
But the Big-Whigs looked just a little bit cool,
Inclined to believe that the man was a fool;
Whilst the Tories yelled “You may do your worst,
And blow away till your Bagpipes burst.”
Into the street the Piper stept,
Smiling a little sardonic smile,
As if he knew what music slept,
In his quiet pipes the while.
Then like a regular Scotch adept,
To blow the pipes his lips he bagged,
His fingers flew, ne’er a moment they lagged,
And e’er three notes the pipes had uttered
You heard as if all Scotland muttered;
And the muttering grew to a mighty roaring,
And out of their strongholds the Tories came pouring,
With many a grunt and many a groan:
And not the Tory hosts alone,
But the Liberal rats. There were swell rats, seedy rats,
Bold rats, timid rats, plump rats, greedy rats,
Nor the rats and the Tories alone came forth,
But the long-silent Radical hosts of the North,
Willingly, gleefully, shouting and cheering,
Heedless of “fagots,” of jibe, and of jeering,
Grave old plodders, and gay young friskers,
Grandfathers, fathers, sons, uncles, and cousins;
Greybeards, boys with scarce-budding whiskers,
Valiant voters, by twos, tens, dozens.
And as still that Piper (a plague on him!) played.
Not the North alone in his train was arrayed,
But the Voters flocked from east, west, south,
And the Midlands, witched by that magical mouth;
Voters from counties, and cities, and boroughs,
From toil at the furnace, from work at the furrows;
Voters from mansion, mart, meadow, and mine,
Voters of all sorts and sizes, in fine,
Rushing and crushing, ran eagerly after
That wonderful music, with shouting and laughter.
Then the Big-Whigs stared, and the Tories stood
As if they were changed into blocks of wood,
Unable to fashion a fetching cry
To rally those Voters hurrying by――
Could only follow with envious eye,
Hearts in the doldrums and heads on the rack,
That numberless crowd at the Piper’s back,
A mighty flood whose resistless roll
Swept that Piper’s foes from their place at the Poll.
* * * * *
OFF FOR THE HOLIDAYS.――THE PIED PIPER OF
WESTMINSTER LEADING THE WAY.
Have ye not in memory kept
How, when out into the street
Hamelin’s Pied Piper stept,
From his reed pass’d notes so sweet
That the children all came running,
Captivated by his cunning,
Follow’d at his heels, and then
Never more returned again?
A spectacle like to that kind of thing
At Westminster now is happening;
The piper there, thinking the time is ripe,
Tootles aloud on his festive pipe.
And at once there’s a bustling and scrambling and hustling
To flee in hot haste from debate and its tussling,
Peers’ shoes are pattering, Commons’ boots clattering,
All of them blithely of holidays chattering,
Eager to show they at least have a smattering
Of yachting or sport,
Or pursuits of a sort
That are currently thought to supply health and pleasure
To overworked statesmen whene’er they get leisure.
But here the case grows different;
For while these children of Parliament
Dance over the hills and far away
Directly they hear the Piper play,
Though they go to the mountain or up to the moon,
They’ll return to St. Stephen’s――and that pretty soon.
_Fun._ August, 1884.
――――:o:――――
POETS AND LINNETS.
_After Robert Browning._
Where’er there’s a thistle to feed a linnet
And linnets are plenty, thistles rife――
Or an acorn-cup to catch dew drops in it
There’s ample promise of further life
Now, mark how we begin it.
For linnets will follow, if linnets are minded,
As blows the white-feather parachute;
And ships will reel by the tempest blinded――
Ay, ships, and shiploads of men to boot!
How deep whole fleets you’ll find hid.
And we blow the thistle-down hither and thither
Forgetful of linnets, and men, and God.
The dew! for its want an oak will wither――
By the dull hoof into the dust is trod,
And then who strikes the cithar?
But thistles were only for donkeys intended,
And that donkeys are common enough is clear.
And that drop! what a vessel it might have befriended,
Does it add any favour to Glugabib’s beer?
Well, there’s my musing ended.
TOM HOOD, the younger.
_Fun._ September, 1865.
――――
THE QUEST OF BARPARLO.
So, gat me to the oaken, gnarlèd man,
That sat within the sounding-gate, half-wrapt,
Encumbered by three-cornered phantasies,
Hard-lipped, and low’ring like an autumn sky
When winter jostles in before his time,
Powdering his silvern breath against the brown.
Now, thought I, if mayhap by time or tide,
Or swiftly confluent imaginings,
Or great Potentialities (which thrive
On weakness,――for the doubtful gains on doubt
As doubt grows yet more weakly in its doubt!)
I may achieve to speech with this old man,
Tho’ barrel-hooped with yellow waistcloth,――propped
By king’s-cord on the nether, nerveless knees,
He seems yet unattainable: the sky,
Th’ imponderate vast æther――every star
Have by the climbing-ladder brain of man
Been searched and labelled. Nature, once so coy,
Has yielded to her noble ravisher,
And I, BARPARLO, in whose pulses run
The golden blood of fearless ancestors,
Will――must――bespeak this rustic sage, or die!
But now the old man sudden turned, and so
He spied me, and with scoop’d hand to his ear
Attentive listened, glow’ring as I spoke.
“Oh, age! Conglomerate youth! For such is age,
If age _be_ age amid the ages! For
The ages know not age, but ever run
In youth――yet youthless, for they bring us age――
Why sit you in the sun that sinks to show
Man’s self a parable; not inchoate
Like something self-revolving on itself
To something pre-sublime, co-ordinate
With the eternal justice of the Poles!”
To whom, with bitter smile, the enraptured sage
Curling a blue spire from his hollow clay――
“Oh, ax the Parson. _I_ don’t know no French!”
_Judy._ July 7, 1880.
――――:o:――――
Parodies of Mr. Browning’s poem “Wanting is――What?” in _Jocoseria_.
BROWNING IS――WHAT?
Browning is――what?
Talent redundant,
Verbiage abundant,
――Where is his blot?
Beaming his verses, but blank all the same.
――Framework that waits for some reason to frame:
What of his meaning?――Strive for an hour――
Posies unreal, grapes that are sour!
No neatness, completeness, O lyrical mummer!
Panting for vagueness, unmusical strummer!
Breathe o’er thy lyre,
Apollo! and thence
Into his mire
Throw life, throw sense,
Throw sense!
H. W. HANCOCK.
LOVING IS――WHAT?
Loving is――what?
Nothing material,
Essence ethereal.
――Say, is it not?
More than a myth, yet unreal all the same.
――Vapour electric with passion and flame;
What is love’s glory, what is love’s power?
Something devouring what nought can devour!
Love, then, content discontentment, O lover!
Feast on the phantom round which you hover!
Feed on the gleam
Revealed from above,
For youth’s fervid dream
Is life, is love,
Is love!
CHARLES A. COOPER.
Wanting is――what?
Lemon redundant,
Sugar abundant.
――Water made hot!
Shining the glass, yet a blank all the same.
――Framework that waits for a liquid to frame:
What of the whisky, what of its power?
Spirits devouring with nought they devour!
Come, then, O bright brain!――bewildering body,
Gleam through the goblet, and perfect the toddy!
Who drinks may remark
How all that was near
Grows distant and dark,
Grows dim, grows queer,
Grows――queer!
MYNIE.
WOOING IS――WHAT?
Wooing is――what?
Sighing redundant,
Blisses abundant.
――What is it not?
“Balmy”’s the word, yet it’s rough all the same.
――Fretwork which warps both the mind and the frame:
What of her temper, what of her dower?
Posers o’erpowering which come in a shower!
Come it, O pleasing perplexity, come it
A trifle less strong, while I venture to sum it
Up in one breath:
The absence of gold
To wooing is death――
Calf-love grows cold,
Grows cold!
EXE.
WANTING IS――WHAT?
(_A Billiard Mystery. From the new volume “Jomilleria.”_)
Wanting is――what?
Scoring addition,
Getting position,
Here on the spot?
Seamy his clothes, yet a crack at the game.
――Marker he knows, and addresses by name:
What of the sharper, what of his power?
Gloomily glowering with nought to devour!
Come then, complete ignoramus, O comer,
Flush in thy greenness, needy the bummer!
One game he lets
You make,――that’s enough!
Trebles the bets,
Goes slow, gives snuff,
Gives snuff!
A. S. W.
From _The Weekly Dispatch_, April 1, 1883.
――――
The following imitation, written by Miss Fitzpatrick, appeared in the
_Red Dragon Magazine_, (Cardiff), September, 1884:――
Come _is_ the Comer!
Wild Winter railing,
Snow storms prevailing,
Gone is the Summer!
Bleak looks the world,
Yet a something is here,
A Picture, but waiting the Frame to appear.
Bare are the branches,
Ne’er a flower blooms,
The Roses lie dead, unbemoaned in their tombs,
Yet come has Completion! that marvellous tinter,
That maketh a Paradise even in winter!
Happiness rife,
Though Death reigns around,
For sweeter than Life
Is Love when found,
Love’s found!
――――:o:――――
THE LOST LEADER
Just for a handful of silver he left us,
Just for a riband to stick in his coat――
Found the one gift of which fortune bereft us,
Lost all the others she lets us devote;
They, with the gold to give, doled him out silver,
So much was theirs who so little allow’d:
How all our copper had gone for his service!
Rags――were they purple, his heart had been proud!
We that had loved him so, follow’d him, honour’d him,
Lived in his mild and magnificent eye,
Learn’d his great language, caught his clear accents,
Made him our pattern to live and to die!
* * * * *
THE LATEST NEWS.
[The young ladies of Girton have given up their Browning Society, and
expended the funds thereof on the purchase of chocolate.]
They just for a handful of chocolate left us――
Just for some sweetmeats to put in their throats:
Of their sweet converse these girls have bereft us,
Scorning Bard Browning, the deepest of “potes,”
Once they professed they would worship the Master,
And help to expound him to lit’rature clubs;
But now――oh, most direful and dreadful disaster!――
Those girls have in chocolate spent all their “subs.”
Just for some mouthfuls of chocolate only,
Quit they the Browning Society’s fold;
Leaving their male fellow-worshippers lonely,
Puzzling out lines of mysterious mould.
Oh! say what is sweetstuff to sentences mystic,
That Girton girls should thus forsake the true “cult”?
Oh, when they might pore o’er B.’s lines aphoristic,
Wherein can “sweets” makes girl-graduates exult!
Oh! think what they might have taught Philistine readers,
Expounding, maybe, Browning’s foggiest line!
Instead of which _now_ of mere worldly joys heeders,
They look upon sweetmeats as something divine.
Once as apostles our teaching they aided――
Even contributing cash with much glee;
But now to mere chocolate-worship degraded,
On Sweets, not on song, do they spend £ s. d.!
_Fun._ March 31, 1886.
And on April 17, 1886 _Punch_ had also a parody founded on this topic
of the Girton Ladies, containing the following verses:――
A STORY OF GIRTON.
Oh, the scholary girls, too blue,
Who lived at Girton, down by the Cam,
Just where the Cam bids the town adieu!
And who would ever have thought them a sham――
These girls, and the lots they knew?
Too blue, for the colour of health is red;
And their eyes had the dull, boiled-gooseberry look
Of maids who are meant to go to bed
When down from their laps flops the out-spread book,
But consume night’s oil instead.
Yet I noticed, like a flowering shrub
A bloom in a desert, one striking grace:
They might “screw” like mad when afloat in a “tub,”
And never get up the ghost of a pace,
But they had a “BROWNING Club”!
So, when one waxed ill, it did not seem strange
That the Lady Principal sighed, and said,
“A stoppage of work I must arrange;
To studies recondite she’s too much wed,
And from books she needs a change.”
“Not my books,” the patient cried;
“Take not the desk that my books contains!
For o’er the ‘BROWNING Club’ I preside,
And the mystic masterly fruit of his brains
Is my solace, glory, and pride!”
Her request being granted, asleep fell she;
The Lady Principal joyed at that;
But when the Doctor dropped in, said he,
“It’s only a bilious attack, that’s flat.
Brain trouble? Fiddle-de-dee!”
The desk, it chanced, was not quite closed:
“Why does she clutch it so?” asked the leech;
The Lady Principal supposed
That to have her dear Bard within reach
Consoled her as she dozed.
“Let’s look inside!” And at once――oh, dreams
Of “Female Culture,” and the rest!
They found――no masterly mystic themes,
No _Pippa_, no _Duchess_, but――who would have guessed?――
A box of Chocolate Creams!
* * * * *
――――:o:――――
THE PATRIOT.
It was roses, roses all the way,
With myrtles mixed in my path like mad.
The house-roofs seemed to heave and sway,
The church-spires flamed, such flags they had,
A year ago on this very day.
The air broke into a mist with bells,
The old walls rocked with the crowd and cries.
Had I said, “Good folk, mere noise repels,
But give me your sun from yonder skies!”
They had answered “And afterward what else?”
* * * * *
A PARODY.
It was pouring, pouring, all the way,
As we scampered along the road like mad;
The trees were a mist of shadows grey
As past them we swept――such nags we had!――
A week ago, on the Gold Cup Day.
The air was rent with a myriad yells,
Our ears were shocked with the crowd and cries,
As they strained for the sound of the saddling bells;
The sun was a-sulk in the clouded skies,
Though he shone out afterward. What else?
What else? I know that the wrong horse won,
Though over the luncheon I fell asleep,
For I woke to find myself all undone;
I had sown the wind, and I needs must reap
The whirlwind after the race was run!
There’s nobody on the Grand Stand now,
Where a week ago such a concourse met;
The best of the sight after all, I vow,
Was the ladies lawn, with its luncheons set,
Though _that_ looks sad enough now, I trow!
GOSSAMER.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ June 25, 1882.
Another parody also appeared in _Punch_, July 24, 1886, entitled:――
THE PARTY LEADER.
_A very old story._
It was cheering, cheering, to the close
O’ my speech that day I launched the Bill:
From serried ranks the row uprose,
And hats are waved, and voices thrill;
And I!――I thought I’d dished my foes.
* * * * *
――――:o:――――
A PARLEYING WITH A CERTAIN PERSON OF NO
IMPORTANCE IN HIS DAY.
No, Joseph Chamberlain, near Premier, no.
_You_ promise Gladstone quarter? Not for Joe.
Perpend this allegory――pauca verba.
A vagrom Viper, latitans in herba,
Seeing a grand old Mongoose passing, cried,
“Come, let’s be amicable――side by side
Excogitate alliance――great and good,
Rule the whole roast, dukes of this wandering wood.”――
“With pleasure,” put in t’other. While they went
En camarade, ostensibly content,
Serpens, observing all associates own
Obedience to his brother-beast alone,
Waxed parlous wrath, within adumbrate Vale
Bit unsuspecting Mongoose sharp on tail.
“Excuse me Sir,” rejoinder came unshaken,
“Meseems such step’s _thaumaston hôs_ mistaken.
Quid hoc?”――one! two! a momentary flummock――
X (quadruped) sat an Y (snake) his stomach.
“Spt, spt――grr, grr――awk, awkrr,” spluttered latter,
“You mar my meaning monstrously. No matter.
Get off my epigastrium. Make amends.
Brr――give me breath (confound you, brute!)――Be friends.”
Verb. sap.――What quotha grand old Mongoose?――Oh,
Referred said reptile-thing to Jericho.――
Explain? Not I, save this much; then I’m dumb:
Snake, Mongoose, Vale, equal Joe, Gladstone, Brum.
_Pall Mall Gazette._ March 17, 1887.
――――:o:――――
TWO SIDES.
_Browning’s._
Love-making, how simple a matter! No depths to explore,
No heights in life to ascend――no disheartening before――
No affrighting hereafter. Love will be love evermore.
_Ours._
Love-making, how awful a matter! We’ve been there before;
The father determined we shouldn’t――the mother watching the door;
Till even the girl was affrighted, and wrote us to see her no more.
――――:o:――――
MY KATE.
(_On Miss Kate Vaughan’s quitting the Gaiety Company in order to come
out in a New and Serious Line._)
Her air has a meaning, her movements a grace,
You turn from the fairest to gaze at her face;
And when you have once seen her dance, ’tis a treat
That _you_ may _encore_, but which _she_ won’t repeat――
MY KATE!
Renouncing burlesque, she’s about to enact
The fair _Amy Robsart_――I hope ’twill attract.
And when thou art gone, who will here take your part,
While you’re starring the country as _Amy Robsart_,
MY KATE?
We praise you as charming, and ask if you mean
To give up burlesque and play Tragedy Queen?
The Mashers will cry, o’er this doleful event,
“The charm of her presence was felt when she went!”――
OUR KATE!
_Punch._ June 16, 1883.
――――:o:――――
LAYS OF A LOVER.
(_A Roasting, after Browning._)
Oh, to be out of London now that no one’s here,
For who ever sleeps in London dreams each morning of a pier,
And a flowing sail, and a burnished sea,
And an azure sky that is not for me,
While my darling sings at the _Seagul’s_ bow
In Venice now.
For after Goodwood, when Cowes follows,
And the blue-blood leaves us like the swallows,
Hark! where the blooming flower-cart in the street
Leans ’neath its weight and scatters for the drover
Petals and old clothes――’neath the bovine feet.
That’s the harsh voice: that cries each ware twice over
Lest you should miss the purport of his jargon,
And this cheap matchless bargain.
For though our streets are hot, and skies are blue,
The air is not so fresh as breathed by you;
The butterflies are thirsting for a shower;
The milk of human kindness turning sour.
_Fun._ August 13, 1884.
Two parodies of the same poem appeared in _Punch_, one on April 14,
1883, the other on June 7, 1888.
These can be readily obtained at _Punch_ office, as also the
following: “The Losing Leader” _Punch_, July 26, 1884. “Stanley,”
after Waring, _Punch_, June 2, 1888.
“Gladstone Unmasked” which appeared in _Punch_ as long ago as 1866,
was written by the late Shirley Brooks, as a parody on Browning. The
poem, which is long and quite out of date now, may be found in “Wit
and Humour” by Shirley Brooks, London, 1883.
――――:o:――――
POST CHRONOLOGY.
A chronologic skull sir! ’twas a poet’s;
But ’tother’s wasn’t my friend’s friend’s, I say.
Our first, a Lombard, were the wind to blow its
Loudest, could not daunt him, loved to pray
Too, in all the English language is no rhyme
Describes him thoroughly. You should have watched him knit
Those brows of his, black brows, sir, scarred by time
And scowling like a pent-house. But your sonnet
Should have a moral, let’s to it, tooth and nail.
You’d never catch it, were you to fall on it
Without premeditation. Work like a snail
Gnawing a lotus leaf, you’re on the brink of it――
How now Sir Numbskull turn and think of it.
The above burlesque sonnet is given in Mr. John H. Ingram’s biography
of “Oliver Madox Brown,” although it is doubtful whether that talented
young poet was the author of it or what it means.
――――:o:――――
Mr. Browning wrote the following elegant and luminous lines for the
window in honour of Her Majesty’s Jubilee, presented by the
parishioners to St. Margaret’s, Westminster:――
Fifty years’ flight! wherein should he rejoice
Who hailed their birth, who as they die decays?
This――England echoes his attesting voice;
Wondrous and well――thanks Ancient Thou of days.
A correspondent, who is not a member of the Browning Society, thinks
that the following quatrain might be substituted,――
Seventy-five years! Wherein do they rejoice
Who read his work, who, as he writes, decays?
This――plain folk echo their protesting voice――
“Wondrous! but _no more_, thanks! old thou of days.”
――――:o:――――
On page 103, Volume 5 of this Collection some extracts were given from
“The Poets at Tea” a series of short parodies which appeared in _The
Cambridge Fortnightly_, for February 7, 1888. The three following
verses, which were then omitted, may be given here:――
THE POETS AT TEA.
_Tennyson, who took it hot._
I think that I am drawing to an end,
For on a sudden came a gasp for breath,
And stretching of the hands, and blinded eyes,
And a great darkness falling on my soul.
O Hallelujah!... Kindly pass the milk.
_Swinburne, who let it get cold._
As the sin that was sweet in the sinning
Is foul in the ending thereof,
As the heat of the summer’s beginning
Is past in the winter of love:
O purity, painful and pleading!
O coldness, ineffably gray!
O hear us, our hand-maid unheeding,
And take it away!
_Browning, who treated it allegorically._
Tut! bah! We take as another case――
Pass the bills on the pills on the window-sill; notice the capsule.
(A sick man’s fancy, no doubt, but I place
Reliance on trade-marks, sir)――so perhaps you’ll
Excuse the digression――this cup which I hold
Light-poised――bah! its spilt in the bed――well, let’s on go――
Held Bohea and sugar, sir; if you were told
The sugar was salt would the Bohea be Congo?
* * * * *
――――:o:――――
Of Mr. Browning’s later poetry, or, what may be termed his involved
and complicated style, some excellent parodies exist. They are rather
long, and would be somewhat tedious reading to those who are
unfamiliar with the originals; as the books in which most of these
parodies occur are easily obtainable a few extracts will suffice.
First, may be mentioned _Diversions of the Echo Club_, an American
work written by the late Mr. Bayard Taylor, published, in London, by
Chatto and Windus.
This contains no less than four imitations of Robert Browning’s
poetry, they are all good, but perhaps the following is the most
characteristic in style:――
ANGELO ORDERS HIS DINNER.
I, Angelo, obese, black garmented,
Respectable, much in demand, well fed
With mine own larder’s dainties, where, indeed,
Such cakes of myrrh or fine alyssum seed,
Thin as a mallow-leaf, embrowned o’ the top,
Which, cracking, lets the ropy, trickling drop
Of sweetness touch your tongue, or potted nests
Which my recondite recipe invests
With cold conglomerate tidbits――ah, the bill!
(You say,) but given it were mine to fill
My chests, the case so put were yours, we’ll say,
(This counter, here, your post, as mine to-day,)
And you’ve an eye to luxuries, what harm
In smoothing down your palate with the charm
Yourself concocted? There we issue take;
And see! as thus across the rim I break
This puffy paunch of glazed embroidered cake,
So breaks, through use, the lust of watering chaps
And craveth plainness: do I so? Perhaps;
But that’s my secret. Find me such a man
As Lippo yonder, built upon the plan
Of heavy storage, double-navelled, fat
From his own giblets’ oils, an Ararat
Uplift o’er water, sucking rosy draughts
From Noah’s vineyard,――... crisp, enticing wafts
Yon kitchen now emits, which to your sense
Somewhat abate the fear of old events,
Qualms to the stomach,――I, you see, am slow
Unnecessary duties to forego,――
You understand? A venison haunch, _haut gout_,
Ducks that in Cimbrian olives mildly stew,
And sprigs of anise, might one’s teeth provoke
To taste, and so we wear the complex yoke
Just as it suits,――my liking, I confess,
More to receive, and to partake no less,
Still more obese, while through thick adipose
Sensation shoots, from testing tongue to toes
Far-off, dim-conscious, at the body’s verge,
Where the froth-whispers of its waves emerge
On the untasting sand. Stay, now! a seat
Is bare: I, Angelo, will sit and eat.
_Leading Cases done into English_, by an Apprentice of Lincoln’s Inn.
London, Macmillan & Co. 1876. This amusing little volume (said to be
the work of Mr. Pollock) contains a case, entitled Scott _v._
Shepherd, which is reported in true Browningese diction:――
ANY PLEADER TO ANY STUDENT.
Now, you’re my pupil!
On the good ancient plan I shall do what I can
For _your_ hundred guineas to give _my_ law’s blue pill
(Let high jurisprudence which thinks me and you dense,
Set posse of cooks to stir new Roman soup ill):
First volume of Smith shall give you the pith
Of leading decision that shows the division
Of action _on case_ from plain action of _trespass_
Where to count in assault law benignantly says “Pass.”
Facts o’ case first. At Milborne Port
Was fair-day, October the twenty and eight,
And folk in the market like fowls in a crate;
Shepherd, one of your town-fool sort,
(From Solomon’s time they call it sport,
Right to help holiday, just make fun louder),
Lights me a squib up of paper and powder,
(Find if you can the law-Latin for ’t)
And chucks it, to give their trading a rouse,
Full i’ the midst o’ the market-house.
It happ’d to fall on a stall where Yates
Sold gingerbread and gilded cates
(Small damage if _they_ should burn or fly all);
To save himself and said gingerbread loss
One Willis doth toss the thing across
To stall of one Ryall, who straight an espial
Of danger to _his_ wares, of selfsame worth,
Casts it in market-house farther forth.
And by two mesne tossings thus it got
To burst i’ the face of plaintiff Scott.
And now ’gainst Shepherd, for loss of eye,
The question is, whether _trespass_ shall lie.
* * * * *
Well――liquor’s out, why look more at old bottle?
Gulp down with gusto, you that are young,
These new Rules’ ferment, tastes ill in my throttle
Since Justice, _in nubibus_ no more on high sitter
Descends to speak laymen’s vulgar tongue.
So be it! _Explicit-parum feliciter._
It is usually considered that _The Cock and the Bull_, by the late C.
S. Calverley, is the best parody extant of Robert Browning’s “The Ring
and the Book,” the following are the opening lines:――
“THE COCK AND THE BULL.”
You see this pebble stone? It’s a thing I bought
Of a bit of a chit of a boy i’ the mid o’ the day.
I like to dock the smaller parts o’ speech,
As we curtail the already cur-tailed cur
(You catch the paronomasia-play ’po’ words?)
Did, rather, i’ the pre-Landseerian days.
Well, to my muttons! I purchased the concern,
And clapt it i’ my poke, having given for same
By way o’ chop, swop, barter or exchange――
“Chop” was my snickering dandiprat’s own term――
One shilling and fourpence, current coin o’ the realm.
O-n-e one and f-o-u-r four
Pence, one and fourpence――you are with me, sir?
What hour it skills not: ten or eleven o’ the clock,
One day (and what a roaring day it was
Go shop or sightsee――bard spit o’ rain!)
In February, eighteen sixty-nine,
Alexandrina Victoria, Fidei.
Hm――hm――how runs the jargon? being on the throne.
Such, sir, are all facts, succinctly put,
The basis or substratum――what you will――
Of the impending eighty thousand lines.
“Not much in ’em either,” quoth perhaps simple Hodge.
But there’s a superstructure. Wait a bit.
* * * * *
From _Fly Leaves_, by C. S. Calverley. London. George Bell & Sons.
――――:o:――――
In _The Heptalogia_ (Chatto and Windus, 1880) there is an imitation of
Browning, entitled “John Jones,” and in _Recaptured Rhymes_, by H. D.
Traill (W. Blackwood and Sons, 1882) there is a parody from “The Puss
and the Boots.” These cannot be quoted in full, and extracts would
convey little idea of the humour of the pieces. The latter (by Mr.
Traill) is modelled somewhat upon Mr. Calverley’s “Cock and the Bull.”
In July 1888, _The Family Herald_ (London) had a long article on
parodies, which contained some amusing examples, but the writer of the
article committed the unpardonable literary crime of not giving
references to the authorities from whom he quoted. His note on Robert
Browning’s poetry, and his parodies, is given below:――
“Mr. Browning is far too great a man to be mentioned lightly; but we
must own that to some natures his later work is distasteful, and even
repulsive. His early poetry ranks among the highest in English; and,
if we were compelled to write down the names of, say, six poems which
we regard as the best in the language, two of the six――“The Last Ride
Together” and “The Flight of the Duchess”――would be Mr. Browning’s.
Perhaps he is too great now to be content with mere brilliant work
that haunts the memory for life, and inspires the innermost soul. If
so, we are sorry, for we would not give the two poems which we have
named, with perhaps the “Ride from Ghent to Aix,” for a library of
exasperating _Sordellos_. We cannot cure Mr. Browning, and we must be
content to endure him for the sake of old times. The great, crabbed,
formless poet gives the buffoons a rare innings; for his jagged,
ramshackle blank verse, with its conjunctions protruding at the ends
of lines, its parentheses, its small jokes, its puns, its pedantic
display of useless learning, its aimless wanderings, its half-hints,
all tend to make the reader feel as if he were taking a little walk
with a halting cripple who persisted in digging him in the ribs, and
kicking up dust before his eyes. When we get a gleam of lucidity from
Browning, he is matchless; but he refuses to write plain English and
so the parodists have him on the hip. Here is a parody by a skilled
craftsman who handles the poet with affection――
_Not that I care for ceremonies――no;
But still there are occasions, as you see
(Observe the costumes――gallantly they show
To my poor judgment!), which, ’twixt you and me,
Not to come forth, one’s few remaining hairs
Or wig――it matters little――bravely brushed
And oiled, dress-coated, sprucely-clad, the tears
And tweaks and wrenches people overflushed
With――well, not wine――oh, no, we’ll rather say
Anticipation, the delight of seeing――
No matter what!――inflict upon you (pray
Remove your elbow, friend!), in spite of being
Not quite the man one used to be, and not
So young as once one was, would argue one
Churlish, indifferent, hipped, rheumatic, what
You please to say.
So, not to spoil the fun――_
Comprenez-vous?――_observe that lady there,
‘In native Worth.’ Aha, you see the jest?
Not bad, I think? My own too! Woman’s fair,
Or not――the odds, so long as she is dressed?
They’re coming! Soh! Ha, Bennett’s ‘Barcarole’――
A poor thing, but mine own! That minor third
Is not so bad, now! Mum, sirs! (Bless my soul,
I wonder what her veil cost?) Mum’s the word!_
The strange thing is that the rickety stuff above is a perfectly fair
burlesque. The cadence――or lack of cadence――the horrid involutions,
the breaks into bald dulness, are all Browning’s to the very essence.”
――――:o:――――
This is not the place in which to enter upon a dissertation on the
style of Mr. Robert Browning. Profundity of thought is not necessarily
accompanied by obscurity of language, and yet the admirers of Mr.
Browning contend that it is precisely in those poems which are the
most difficult to understand, that his chief excellencies are to be
found. Hence several “Browning Societies” have been started for the
express purpose of explaining this obscure writer to persons of only
_average_ intelligence. Now a Homer society, or a Shakespeare society,
one can understand, these poets are dead and cannot be appealed to,
for the solution of doubtful readings, or confused passages. But Mr.
Browning is alive and well, and should be able, if he were willing, to
clear up the meaning of any obscurity in his own writings. Were he to
do this, however, a few amiable hero-worshippers, and fussy founders
of Societies, would lose their vocation, and perhaps the public would
not greatly gain.
――――
Many anecdotes are told of Browning’s obscurity.
When Douglas Jerrold was recovering from a severe illness, Browning’s
“Sordello” was put into his hands. Line after line, page after page,
he read; but no consecutive idea could he get from the mystic
production. Mrs. Jerrold was out, and he had no one to whom to appeal.
The thought struck him that he had lost his reason during his illness,
and that he was so imbecile that he did not know it. A perspiration
burst from his brow, and he sat silent and thoughtful. As soon as his
wife returned he thrust the mysterious volume into her hands, crying
out: “Read this, my dear.” After several attempts to make any sense
out of the first page or so, she gave back the book, saying: “Bother
the gibberish! I don’t understand a word of it!” “Thank heaven!” cried
Jerrold, “then I am not an idiot!”
――――
THE BROWNING SOCIETY.
A BITTER ERROR.
A long haired man, with a look of unutterable yearning in his deep set
eyes, stole into the well filled auditorium, and took a seat in the
rear pew. He listened to the speaker with the closest attention, and
seemed to derive the most intense enjoyment from words which were
incomprehensible to the majority of the audience.
“Magnificent! sublime!” he was heard to murmur.
“You understand him, sir?” inquired the man next the long haired
stranger.
“Perfectly, perfectly. Did you ever hear anything more”――――
“But I can’t understand a word he says.”
“Indeed! You are to be pitied. Ah, this seems like home. You see, I
arrived from New York only an hour ago, and happening to hear of this
meeting came here at once.”
“It is not possible that you are a Chinaman?”
“A Chinaman! What do you mean, Sir? I am from Boston.”
“From Boston, eh? How is it that you understand Chinese?”
“I don’t understand Chinese, sir. What do you mean?”
“Why, the man who is speaking is a missionary who has just returned
from Hong Kong, and he is exhibiting his proficiency in the Chinese
language by reading a chapter in the Bible in that tongue.”
The Bostonian’s face paled.
“Why,” he gasped, “isn’t this a Browning Club?”
“Certainly not.”
“And isn’t he reading one of the great master’s”――――
“Great Scott, no! The Browning club is on the next floor.”
Then the sad eyed man arose and staggered thence, a hopeless,
despairing look in his fathomless orbs.
――――:o:――――
ONE WORD MORE.
(_Written in a Gift-copy of “Parodies,” by a
Contributor to its pages._)
Take them, Chum, the book and me together;
Where the heart goes, let the art go also.
Hamilton collated many verses,
Grouped and set them in sequential volumes,
Wrote them, may be, with the self-same stylus
Else he used for “The Æsthetic Movement.”
Good for most, save one who in this volume
(Who that one you ask?) did dreadful rhymings,
Take it then to treasure for a life-time,
Not to slumber, neighbour to my sonnets,
But at times brought out, to tell its story.
This is cheek, say you! Well, if it be so,
Cheek me back again in self-same fashion,
Then my cheek may turn _you_ to a poet.
You I think, would rather have this volume,
Even though I sadly mar its pages,
Would you not? Mate, linger over Ouida,
Yea, man read, those very red Gaboriaus,
Pall Malls, Globes, or blushing racy “Pink-un,”
Dear to travellers on the Inner Circle.
What of all this scribble? All this nonsense?
This; no rhymer lives that loves and longs not,
Often, more than once, yea, frequently,
(Like the Major-General to the “Pirates”)
To make fun, of stately solemn subjects,
Turning upside down what’s art to others,
Not, mind you, deriding its true nature,
But the while its maker truly loving.
Does he paint? then straight burlesque his picture,
Does he write? then parody his poems,
Show, as proof how well you know your author,
Once, or twice, and then the last time going
(Like an auction) then knock down your hero.
Gain the fool’s laugh, dare the author’s sorrow.
I shall never in the years remaining,
Paint you pictures, lucky _that_ for you, chum!
Nor make music, that would send your fingers
Straight to plug your ears, but my delusion
This of rhyming letters, bear in patience
Verse and worse, I have and still will send you,
Others’ rhymes and others’ poems twitting,
All their jokes and mine for you――my own chum.
J. W. G. W.
[Illustration]
Frederick Locker-Lampson.
The refinement of taste which has marked the second half of the
nineteenth century has been highly favourable to the production of the
lighter forms of poetry, and no other age has been so prolific in
writers of _vers-de-société_ and of those other more exotic forms of
composition known as _Ballades_, _Rondeaus_, and _Villanelles_.
It is true that Praed, who led the way as the writer of _vers-de-
société_, died fifty years ago, but for one who now reads Praed, there
are twenty who know by heart the poems of Frederick Locker.
And there can be no hesitation in assigning him the leading position
amongst those of our living Poets who write to please, and instruct,
by their playful wit, gentle satire, and tender pathos, without
deeming it necessary to compose sermons in epics, or poems which
require as much labour to disentangle as to solve a problem of Euclid.
――――
Mr. Frederick Locker, for in that name he achieved fame, was born in
1821, coming of an old and distinguished Kentish family. His father
was a Civil Commissioner of Greenwich Hospital, and his grandfather
was the Captain W. Locker, R. N., under whom both Lord Nelson and Lord
Collingwood served. Lord Nelson attributed much of his success in
battle to the maxim inculcated by his old commander, “Lay a Frenchman
close, and you will beat him.”
Captain Locker died Lieutenant-Governor of Greenwich Hospital.
The literary career of Mr. Frederick Locker has been so uniformly
successful that there is little to recount.
His original poems were mostly published in the magazines, until in
1857 he issued his volume entitled “London Lyrics.” The first edition,
which is now very scarce, and much sought after by collectors, had a
frontispiece by George Cruikshank. This book has passed through many
editions, and is now published by Kegan Paul, Trench and Co., London.
In 1867, Mr. Locker published “Lyra Elegantiarum,” containing a
collection of the best English _vers-de-société_, with an introduction
in which he enumerated the qualifications which should be possessed by
any poet who aspired to produce perfect specimens of _vers-de-société_.
Mr. Locker-Lampson has also written a few humorous parodies, one of
which, “Unfortunate Miss Bailey,” was given p. 47, Vol. I.,
_Parodies_.
It only remains to be said that in the following pages the extracts
from his poems are inserted by the kind permission of Mr.
Locker-Lampson.
One of his best known poems, “St. James’s Street,” was published in
1867. This was stolen, and spoiled in the stealing, by a piratical
editor, the two versions are here given side by side:――
ST. JAMES’S STREET.
St. James’s Street, of classic fame,
The finest people throng it.
St. James’s Street? I know the name,
I think I’ve passed along it!
Why, that’s where Sacharissa sigh’d
When Waller read his ditty;
Where Byron lived, and Gibbon died,
And Alvanley was witty.
A famous street! To yonder Park
Young Churchill stole in class-time;
Come, gaze on fifty men of mark,
And then recall the past time.
The _plats_ at White’s, the play at _Crock’s_,
The bumpers to Miss Gunning;
The _bonhomie_ of Charlie Fox,
And Selwyn’s ghastly funning.
The dear old street of clubs and _cribs_,
As north and south it stretches,
Still seems to smack of Rolliad squibs,
And Gillray’s fiercer sketches;
The quaint old dress, the grand old style,
The _mots_, the racy stories;
The wine, the dice, the wit, the bile――
The hate of Whigs and Tories.
At dusk, when I am strolling there,
Dim forms will rise around me;――
Lepel flits pass me in her chair,
And Congreve’s airs astound me!
And once Nell Gwynne, a frail young sprite,
Look’d kindly when I met her;
I shook my head, perhaps,――but quite
Forgot to quite forget her.
The street is still a lively tomb
For rich, and gay, and clever;
The crops of dandies bud and bloom,
And die as fast as ever.
Now gilded youth loves cutty pipes,
And slang that’s rather scaring,――
It can’t approach its prototypes
In taste, or tone, or bearing.
In Brummell’s day of buckle shoes,
Lawn cravats and roll collars,
They’d fight, and woo, and bet――and lose
Like gentlemen and scholars:
I’m glad young men should go the pace,
I half forgive _Old Rapid_;
These louts disgrace their name and race,――
So vicious and so vapid!
Worse times may come. _Bon ton_, indeed,
Will then be quite forgotten,
And all we much revere will speed
From ripe to worse than rotten:
Let grass then sprout between yon stones,
And owls then roost at Boodle’s,
For Echo will hurl back the tones
Of screaming _Yankee Doodles_.
I love the haunts of old Cockaigne,
Where wit and wealth were squander’d;
The halls that tell of hoop and train,
Where grace and rank have wander’d;
Those halls where ladies fair and leal
First ventured to adore me!
Something of that old love I feel
For this old street before me.
1867. FREDERICK LOCKER.
ST. JAMES’S STREET.
OLD BALLAD.
St. James’s-Street, of classic fame,
The finest people throng it!
St. James’s Street? I know the name!
I think I’ve passed along it!
Why, that’s where Sacharrissa sighed
When Waller read his ditty;
Where Byron lived, and Gibbon died,
And Alvanley was witty.
A famous street. It skirts the Park
Where Rogers took his pastime;
Come, gaze on fifty men of mark,
And then call up the fast time.
The _plâts_ at White’s, the play at Crock’s,
The bumpers to Miss Gunning;
The _bonhomie_ of Charlie Fox,
And Selwyn’s ghastly funning.
The dear old street of clubs and cribs,
As north and south it stretches,
Still smacks of William’s pungent squibs,
And Gilray’s fiercer sketches;
The quaint old dress, the grand old style,
The _mots_, the racy stories;
The wine, the dice; the wit, the bile,
The hate of Whigs and Tories.
At dusk, when I am strolling there,
Dim forms will rise around me;
Old Pepys creeps past me in his chair,
And Congreve’s airs astound me,
And once Nell Gwynne, a frail young sprite,
Looked kindly when I met her;
I shook my head, perhaps――but quite
Forgot to quite forget her.
The street is still a lively tomb
For rich and gay and clever;
The crops of dandies bud and bloom,
And die as fast as ever.
Now gilded youth loves cutty-pipes
And slang that’s rather rancid,
It can’t approach its prototypes
In tone――or so I’ve fancied.
In Brummel’s day of buckle-shoes,
Starch cravats, and roll collars,
They’d talk, and woo, and bet――and lose
Like gentlemen and scholars,
But now young nobles go the pace
With blacklegs, grooms, and tailors;
And scions soon of noblest race
May pass the night with jailors.
Worse times may come, _Bon ton_, alas,
Will then be quite forgotten,
And all we much revere will pass
From ripe to worse than rotten;
Rank weeds will sprout between yon stones,
And owls will roost at Boodle’s,
And shame will echo back the tones
Of Coachington, Lord Noodle.
F. L.
_The Queen’s Messenger._ August 12, 1869.
――――
ST. GILES.
A London poet sang of late
In exquisitely tender verses,
How in their whirl the wheels of Fate,
Changed cars of triumph into hearses.
He said St. James’s wit and smiles
Were trodden under foot by shoddy――
Bah! let me sing about St. Giles,
And chronicle the sin of toddy.
Long years ago, St. Martin’s Fields
Were ripe with grain and purple clover
Where grisly thieves the kitchen shields,
And yellow ’busses topple over.
The very spot, where rose the lark
To sing its song to all creation,
Is given over after dark
To deathly deeds and desolation.
Just where the parson from his door
Relieved the sorrows of the humble,
The workhouse shields the houseless poor,
Who execrate the mighty Bumble.
A thousand nightingales in song
Have warbled melodies for ages,
Where now canary-sellers throng,
And linnets chirp in tiny cages.
Where Strephon sighed and sighed to win,
And dainty Phyllis churned her butter,
The costermonger shrieks for gin,
And helpless rolls about the gutter;
Where Sacharissa ’neath her fan
Was smiling at his lordship’s raving,
The ragged wife adores the man,
Who beats her head against the paving.
There’s not a spot and not a stone,
But spoke a poem when we met it,
That does not echo to the moan
Of poverty――do we regret it?
If we have sorrow for St. James,
And sing about its loss of swelldom,
We needs must weep St. Giles’s shames,
Although we think about them seldom.
HENRY S. LEIGH.
_Fun._ November 16, 1867.
――――:o:――――
TEMPORA MUTANTUR!
Yes, here, once more a traveller,
I find the Angel Inn,
Where landlord, maids and serving-men
Receive me with a grin:
Surely they can’t remember Me,
My hair is grey and scanter;
I’m changed, so changed since I was here――
_O tempora mutantur!_
* * * * *
The curtains have been dyed; but there,
Unbroken, is the same,
The very same crack’d pane of glass
On which I scratch’d her name.
Yes, there’s her tiny flourish still;
It used to so enchant her
To link two happy names in one――
_O tempora mutantur!_
FREDERICK LOCKER.
――――
TEMPORA MUTANTUR!
No pea-shooters upon the way
No careless chaff and banter
No passing blows to take and pay!
_O Tempora mutantur!_
The traps go soberly along,
Scarce one is in a canter,
The language even isn’t strong――
_O Tempora mutantur!_
The times were very different when
I went with my enchanter;
Young men in those days were young men;
_O Tempora mutantur!_
Of course you’ll say its for the best
(My Boy, pass the decanter!)
But now your Derby’s lost its zest
_O Tempora mutantur!_
CATULLUS of Fleet Street.
――――:o:――――
BRAMBLE-RISE.
What changes meet my wistful eyes
In quiet little Bramble-Rise,
The pride of all the shire;
How alter’d is each pleasant nook;――
And used the dumpy church to look
So dumpy in the spire?
This village is no longer mine;
And though the Inn has changed its sign,
The beer may not be stronger;
The river, dwindled by degrees,
Is now a brook, the cottages
Are cottages no longer.
The mud is brick, the thatch is slate,
The pound has tumbled out of date,
And all the trees are stunted:
Surely these thistles once grew figs,
These geese were swans, and once these pigs
More musically grunted.
Where boys and girls pursued their sports
A locomotive puffs and snorts,
And gets my malediction;
The turf is dust――the elves are fled――
The ponds have shrunk――and tastes have spread
To photograph and fiction.
Ah! there’s a face I know again,
There’s Patty trotting down the lane
To fill her pail with water;
Yes, Patty! but I fear she’s not
The tricksey Pat that used to trot,
But Patty,――Patty’s daughter!
* * * * *
FREDERICK LOCKER.
――――
A SONG AT SIXTY.
My boyhood’s home! How clearly rise
Thy varied scenes before mine eyes
In fair perspective.
I hear the bull-frogs in the pond――
The whippoorwill’s weird notes respond
To thoughts reflective.
Again I see the old “worm fence,”
Around the pasture-lot from whence
The cows lowed over
At milking time, as if they smelled
The many-windowed barn, that held
The corn and clover.
I see, beyond the garden-gate
The gray bull-calf, that used to wait
To “hook” that gate off――
And flower-beds, where browsed the bees
’Neath overhanging cherry-trees
Whose twigs he ate off.
’Twas there, above the hollyhocks,
The blue birds thronged the martin-box
That wrongly housed them.
There too, from out the red oak grove,
Their brother bandits came and strove
In vain to oust them.
And there, a flock of noisy geese
Down to the brimming pond in peace
Would oft meander――
To come again when day declined,
Wide-waddling homeward, strung behind
Their valiant gander.
All’s past――I only thought to spin
Gold thread of sunny dreams within
This cushioned “rocker.”
My blood’s too slow――too weak my nerves
For poaching on the choice preserves
Of Frederick Locker.
C. H. L.
_The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin._
――――:o:――――
HIS GIRL.
Oh, she wears a sealskin sacque,
When it snows;
And her stunning suit is black
As a crow’s;
Short; and thinks it is a pity,
Charming, jolly, wise, and witty:
Has a retroussé――so pretty――
Little nose.
In her basket phaeton,
When it blows,
With her striking glasses on,
Out she goes;
And she’s just as sweet as stately,
And she sits there so sedately,
With her cheeks and lips so greatly
Like a rose.
She plays Chopin, Liszt, and Spohr
For her beaux.
And she speak of “Pinafore”――
Heaven knows!
With a naughty “D” and “Never!”
But she’s awful nice and clever;
If she liked me, I’d endeavour
To propose.
_Detroit Free Press._ 1882.
――――
AN INVITATION TO ROME
Oh, come to Rome, it is a pleasant place
Your London sun is here, and smiling brightly;
The Briton, too, puts on his cheery face,
And Mrs. Bull acquits herself politely.
The Romans are an easy going race,
With simple wives, more dignified than sprightly;
I see them at their doors, as day is closing,
Prouder than duchesses, and more imposing.
* * * * *
1863. FREDERICK LOCKER.
――――
MR. GLADSTONE IN ROME.
“_Caffè-latte!_ I call to the waiter,――_Non c’e latte_.
This is the answer he makes me, and this is the sign of a battle.”
CLOUGH in 1848.
1.
Old Rome in December. Take out your umbrella
For we picnic no more with CÆCILIA METELLA,
While flirtation is wholly unheard in the sheeny
And shadowy paths of the Aldobrandini.
MR. LOCKER, to Rome a poetical rover,
Has, sketched us the flirts, and the croquet moreover,
He’ll smile as he sees, in the shade of St. Peter’s
How coolly we’ve stolen his phrases and metres.
2.
But though English are few on the Pincian Hill,
One grave politician is lingering still;
From Montorio looks down on the Tiber, and thinks
That the problem of Rome beats the _crux_ of the Sphinx;
That no one can tell us the ultimate bias
Of the city of CÆSAR, and PASQUIN, and PIUS;
That the milk of the She Wolf meant bloodshed and sorrow;
And――will there be milk at the Caffè to-morrow?
_The Globe._ London.
――――:o:――――
FROM THE CRADLE.
They tell me I was born a long
Three months ago,
But whether they are right or wrong
I hardly know.
I sleep, I smile, I cannot crawl,
But I can cry――
At present I am rather small――
A babe am I.
The changing lights of sun and shade
Are baby toys;
The flowers and birds are not afraid
Of baby-boys.
Some day I’ll wish that I could be
A bird and fly;
At present I can’t wish――you see
A babe am I.
FREDERICK LOCKER.
――――
FROM THE CRADLE.
They tell me I was calved a long
Three weeks ago;
But whether they are right or wrong
I hardly know.
I sleep, I suck, I cannot bawl,
But I can cry;
At present I am rather small――
A calf am I.
With changing food from swede to blade,
My mammy toys,
Nor she nor I are yet afraid
Of butcher-boys.
Some day I’ll wish that I could be
A bird, and fly.
At present I can’t wish, you see――
A calf am I.
_Funny Folks_, May 15, 1880.
――――:o:――――
A GALLERY OF FAIR WOMEN.
_Mrs. Golightly._
Her piles of hair are ultra-blonde;
Her tints are ultra-splendid;
Her eyes are shallow, brilliant, fond,
And belladonna――friended.
An air of langorous command
About her always lingers.
She has a very shapely hand,
With long, bejewelled fingers.
Her foot is neat――not oversmall,
But exquisitely booted.
Her figure, faulty after all,
Is admirably suited.
Her teeth are good, and if her lip
Glow with a warmer crimson
Than lovers care to see or sip,
Why, blame her woman, Simson.
A bishop’s daughter, born to dare,
She made a reckless marriage.
She has a cottage in Mayfair,
No children, and a carriage,
And is an universal pet,
An innocent Bohemian,
A Dian feigning to forget
The legalised Endymion.
With many a bachelor she plays
A dainty little whimsy,
Like Musset’s acts, or Locker’s lays,
Brief, elegant, and flimsy.
She loves to woo, to win, to part;
Forsaken and forsaking,
Her heart――she says she has a heart――
Will bear a deal of breaking.
She shines in all things strange and new――
Plays, pictures, Prince’s, polo.
She gives the odds on either Blue,
She never answers “Nolo.”
To-day she raves of Rubinstein,
To-morrow of Albani;
To-day “Aïda” is divine,
To-morrow “Don Giovanni.”
But dress is, after all her dream,
Her veritable passion.
Her costume’s always an extreme,
A nightmare of the fashion.
The style that now-a-days we know,
Has from the first revealed her
As ruthlessly as long ago
Its opposite concealed her.
She waltzes well, she does not sing,
She loves to chatter, chatter
Of anything and everything――
It really doesn’t matter!
She skims a novel now and then
To get at the sensations,
And thinks Invention made the pen
To answer invitations.
Her little head’s so vain and light
It whirls in all directions,
And yet you smile on her, despite
Her host of imperfections.
Her heaven is one of summer skies,
And dreams that bloom to wither,
And like a love bird, when she dies,
Her little soul will thither.
_London_, 1877.
――――:o:――――
SOMETHING PRAEDESQUE.
I’ve many sweethearts; which shall I
Make just a pretty bit of rhyme to,
Now as the midnight moments fly,
And I have the caprice and time to?
“Be,” says my editor, “Praedesque:
That is, omit the fiery particle.”
He thinks my heart is in my desk――
Indeed, I have not such an article.
And of my sweethearts, one or two
Would almost fly into a passion,
If I desired their lips to woo
In that old easy worn-out fashion.
Praed, though no poet, had some power;
He is defaced by many a mocker:
I’m criminal this very hour,
And so is Dobson, so is Locker.
“O give us something new and fresh!”
The girls exclaim, they’re right, the beauties,
To catch their hearts in merrier mesh
Is chiefest of a lover’s duties.
How easy is this rambling rhyme!
Eight syllables, with rhymes that double;
It makes one fancy at the time
That neither rhyme nor love’s a trouble.
No trouble ’tis to scribble off
Verse to the girls you little care for;
To flatter, satirize, or scoff,
Amused, and hardly knowing wherefore.
But love――or hate――or be afraid
Of any woman … when you greet her,
It won’t be in the rhythm of Praed;
You’ll have to find Peculiar Metre.
MORTIMER COLLINS.
――――:o:――――
LONDON’S ‘SUEZ CANAL.’
What pretty girls one sees about
At rink and race, at ball and rout,
At drums and dinners!
In books, where Ænids find Geraints,
In pictures Mr. Millais paints
In church――I’m fond of such young saints
And sinners.
A score at least one’s sure to meet
From Charing Cross to Oxford Street,
Or climbing hilly
St. James’s, where of clubdom sick,
Old fogeys voted at old nick,
Fond glances turn at four towards Pic-
――cadilly.
Muse-favored haunt of all that’s gay!
Whose every stone has had its day
Of loves and graces!
Your triumphs many a bard can tell,
Fred Locker sings them passing well――
I know you bear away the bell
For faces.
Along your Strand converging flow
The social tides to Rotten Row,
Beloved and shady;
Old Gouty trundles with his pair,
De Bootle saunters, cane in air――
I’m wondering, who’s that golden hair-
’d young lady?
What fools we are!――_Le Follets’_ page
Makes yellow ringlets all the rage,
And willy nilly,
Poor ebon poles must cut their stick
And silver change its ‘plaiting’ quick,
Now only ‘gold’ is picked in Pic-
――cadilly!
But whether black or gold or grey
Fashion declares her slaves shall say
The _dernier goût_ is
You bear your motley freightage well,
And East and West your convoys swell――
A sort of Cockneyfied canal
Of Suez!
A neutral ‘cut’ where every man’s
A vessel bound to pay the trans-
――it dues and duty,――
Dues stricter than e’er Lesseps took――
Love’s tribute levied on a look,
And duly noted in the Book
Of Beauty.
* * * * *
And now whilst ice enwraps you still,
And snow’s on Constitution Hill――
Like some old Pharaoh,
Sun shaded ’mid the fervent rays
I bask away the balmy days,
And write these verses to your praise
In Cairo.
Across the desert ridges high
Long lines of camels track the sky,
The pink lights flicker,――
The day has run its golden race――
The Mussulman kneels in his place――
The pilgrim turns his patient face
To Mecca.…
All here’s aglow with summer sun;
_There_ hugs black frost his mantle dun
In winter chilly:
Yet could I stand on “Simla’s” deck
And Westward――ere this watch’s tick
Old England ho! for me, and Pic-
――cadilly!
H. CHOLMONDELEY PENNELL.
_Temple Bar_, January, 1876.
――――:o:――――
SONGSTERS OF THE DAY.
_The Bard of Society._
There, pay it, James! ’tis cheaply earned;
My conscience! how one’s cabman charges!
But never mind, so I’m returned
Safe to my native street of Clarges.
I’ve just an hour for one cigar
What style these Reinas have, and _what_ ash!),
One hour to watch the evening star,
With just one Curaçao-and-potash.
Ah me! that face beneath the leaves
And blossoms of its piquant bonnet!
Who would have thought that forty thieves
Of years had laid their fingers on it!
Could you have managed to enchant
At Lord’s to-day old lovers simple,
Had Robber Time not played gallant,
And spared you every youthful dimple!
That robber bold, like courtier Claude,
Who danced the gay coranto jesting,
By your bright beauty charmed and awed,
Has bowed and passed you unmolesting.
No feet of many-wintered crows
Have traced about your eyes a wrinkle;
Your sunny hair has thawed the snows
That other heads with silver sprinkle.
I wonder if that pair of gloves
I won of you you’ll ever pay me!
I wonder if our early loves
Were wise or foolish, cousin Amy!
I wonder if our childish tiff
Now seems to you, like me, a blunder!
I wonder if you wonder if
I ever wonder if you wonder!
I wonder if you’d think it bliss
Once more to be the fashion’s leader!
I wonder if the trick of this
Escapes the unsuspecting reader!
And as for him who does or can
Delight in it, I wonder whether
He knows that almost any man
Could reel it off by yards together!
I wonder if――What’s that? A knock?
Is that you, James? Eh? What? God bless me!
How time has flown! Its eight o’clock,
And here’s my fellow come to dress me.
Be quick, or I shall be the guest
Whom Lady Mary never pardons;
I trust you, James, to do your best
To save the soup at Grosvenor-gardens.
FRITTERIC LACQUER.
_Time_, June, 1880.
――――:o:――――
ON FREDERICK LOCKER.
Of Locker what? Apollo in the fashion.
Humour and pathos suits, no touch of passion.
From Suckling, Lovelace, Prior, Luttrell, Praed,
Locker inherits his inspiring Maid:
Not nude and passionate, not fast and flighty,
Like Swinburne’s rosy-bosomed Aphrodite;
Not icy-cold, as Parian sculpture is,
Like Tennyson’s blue-stockingéd Artemis:
Not erudite and sapient, grimly frowning,
Like the Athena that’s adored by Browning:
But just the Period’s girl, a pretty creature,
Of dainty style, though inexpressive feature,
Who carefully reserves her choice opinions
For length of petticoats and bulk of chignons,
In whom no tragic impulse ever rankles,
Who always says her prayers, and shows her ankles.
[Illustration]
AUSTIN DOBSON.
The proverb that “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery” is
somewhat the worse for wear, and perhaps Mr. Austin Dobson was not
altogether inclined to agree with it when he heard that the Puzzle
Editor of _Truth_ had published the following notification:
“TRUTH” PUZZLE, NO. 472.
Thanks to the efforts of Messrs. Austin Dobson, Andrew Lang,
and others, Triolets, Ballades, Rondeaux, Vilanelles, and
other metrical devices used by Villon and other French poets
of the past, have been freely adapted to English
verse-writing, and I am assured that I shall be setting
numerous competitors an agreeable task in asking them to
write a rhyming composition on one of the revived French
models now so fashionable.
The Prize of Two Guineas will accordingly be given for the
_Best Ballade_, written on any Social Subject, in accordance
with the following rules:――The _Ballade_ in its normal type,
consists of three stanzas of eight lines each, followed by a
verse of four lines, which is called the “envoy”――or of
three verses of ten lines, with an “envoy” of five lines,
each of the stanzas and the “envoy” closing with the same
line, known as the “refrain.” In this instance, a _Ballade_
of the former length is asked for――viz.; one with three
eight-lined stanzas and a four-lined “envoy.” But it will
be, perhaps, a better guide for competitors if I print here
a _Ballade_ as a model on which they are to form the ones
they compose. Here, then, is a well-known _Ballade_ by Mr.
Austin Dobson, which must be followed so far as the
arrangement of rhymes goes. The metre, though, of the
_Ballade_ often varies, and competitors are not bound to use
the same metre as that employed in the subjoined specimen.
ON A FAN THAT BELONGED TO THE MARQUISE DE POMPADOUR.
Chicken-skin, delicate, white,
Painted by Carlo Vanloo,
Loves in a riot of light,
Roses and vaporous blue;
Hark to the dainty _frou-frou_!
Picture above, if you can,
Eyes that could melt as the dew,
This was the Pompadour’s fan.
See how they rise at the sight,
Thronging the _Œil de Bœuf_ through.
Courtiers as butterflies bright.
Beauties that Fragonard drew,
_Talon-rouge_, falbala, queue,
Cardinal, Duke――to a man,
Eager to sigh or to sue――
This was the Pompadour’s fan.
Ah! but things more than polite
Hung on this toy, _voyez vous_!
Matters of state and of might,
Things that great Ministers do;
Things that, may be, overthrew
Those in whose brain they began,
Here was the sign and the cue,
This was the Pompadour’s fan!
_Envoy._
Where are the secrets it knew
Weavings of plot and of plan?
But where is the Pompadour too?――
_This_ was the Pompadour’s fan?
AUSTIN DOBSON.
A very large number of replies were sent in, and examples were
printed in _Truth_, February 23, and March 8, 1888. Although they
cannot be called true parodies, yet two of the _Ballades_ are so
interesting as imitations that they are inserted. The first being
that to which the prize was awarded, written by Mr. J. C. Woods,
of Swansea, and the second written by Mr. F. B. Doveton, of
Eastbourne.
A BALLADE OF THE GROSVENOR GALLERY.
Art, fled from earth, Sir Coutts and Co.
Lured back to hold her state benign,
With all the newest masters know
Of magic colour, nude design,
Set in soft shade or mellow shine
Of dexterous curtain, clouded pane,
And tricked men so to deem, in fine,
Restored her grand Saturnian reign.
Thus passed ten grey-green years, when, lo!
What gurgling as from flasks of wine;
What whirl of revellers to and fro;
What lust of eight per cent., or nine,
Or ninety, broke her dream divine,
Her reverie of æsthetic pain.
Musing――can any care of mine
Restore the grand Saturnian reign?
Then said she; “Shall they flout me so?
Shall mortals in my presence dine,
Nor heed, for molluscs and clicquot,
The masterpieces on the line?
Forth from the temple, Philistine!
Fling out the banner――Art, not gain!
Carr, Hallé, and Burne-Jones combine;
Restore my grand Saturnian reign!”
_Envoy._
Priest of the desecrated shrine,
Which drum and rout and dance profane,
Drive hence the Bacchant bands malign;
Restore the grand Saturnian reign!
ALLTIAGO (J. C. Woods.)
――――
A BALLADE OF FIVE O’CLOCK TEA.
Served in most delicate ware,
Dresden or Sévres――where you spy
Dainty devices and rare,
Hues that enrapture the eye:
Hands that are shapely and white,
Pour out the fragrant Bohea,
Beauty presides at this rite――
This is your Five O’clock Tea.
Perched in the midst of the fair,
Masher resplendent, yet shy,
Awkwardly shifts in his chair,
He will gain courage by and bye.
Beaux so antique, most polite,
Prattle in garrulous glee,
Here in their element quite――
This is your Five O’clock Tea.
Characters melt into air;
Good reputations must die;
Think you “My Lady” will spare
For all that you murmur, “Oh Fy?”
Colloquies vapid and trite,
Slanderous tongues running free,
Small emanations of spite――
This is your Five O’clock Tea.
_Envoy._
Sugar and cream can excite
Envy and malice, we see;
Satirists cry with delight――
“This is your Five O’clock Tea!”
ORCHIS (F. B. Doveton).
――――
BALLADE OF PÔT-POURRI.
Oriental, and fragile, and old
Is the pôt-pourri bowl you see there;
Dreamy odours――romances untold
It confides to this latter-day air.
Ghosts of laughter, of love, and despair,
Dim strains of a quaint minuet
And a gallant’s low words to his fair――
“Our Lady of Roses――Coquette!”
* * * * *
_Truth._ March 8, 1888. PREMIER PAS.
Of the other examples that were printed it must suffice to
mention the titles:――
Ballade of Five o’clock Tea――(Five thus).
Ballade of the Amateur Reciter.
Ballade of Leap year――(Two thus).
Fashion’s Fig-leaf.
Our Whistling Drawing-room Man.
Ballade of an Axe――(The G. O. M.’s Axe).
On the modern method of shaking hands.
Our grand Fancy Fair.
Pat the Patriot.
Ballade of a Primal cigar.
Ballade of a Programme.
A “Blue” Ballade――(“These are the ’Varsity Crews”).
Ballade of Pôt-Pourri.
Ballade for Diogenes.
A Ballade of Girls and Wedding.
Girls’ Gossip.
――――:o:――――
TU QUOQUE.
_An Idyll in the Conservatory._
(Inserted with the Author’s permission.)
_Nellie._ If I were you, when ladies at the play, Sir,
Beckon and nod, a melodrama through,
I would not turn abstractedly away, Sir,
If I were you!
_Frank._ If I were you, when persons I affected,
Wait for three hours to take me down to Kew,
I would at least pretend I recollected,
If I were you!
_Nellie._ If I were you, when ladies are so lavish,
Sir, as to keep me every waltz but two,
I would not dance with _odious_ Miss McTavish,
If I were you!
_Frank._ If I were you, who vow you cannot suffer
Whiff of the best,――the mildest “honey dew,”
I would not dance with smoke-consuming Puffer,
If I were you!
_Nellie._ If I were you, I would not, Sir, be bitter,
Even to write the “Cynical Review;”――
_Frank._ No, I should doubtless find flirtation fitter.
If I were you!
_Nellie._ Really! You would? Why, Frank, you’re quite delightful,――
Hot as Othello, and as black of hue;
Borrow my fan. I would not look so _frightful_,
If I were you!
_Frank._ “It is the cause.” I mean your chaperon is
Bringing some well-curled juvenile. Adieu!
I shall retire. I’d spare that poor Adonis,
If I were you!
_Nellie._ Go, if you will. At once! And by express, Sir;
Where shall it be? To China――or Peru?
Go. I should leave inquirers my address, Sir,
If I were you!
_Frank._ No――I remain. To stay and fight a duel
Seems, on the whole, the proper thing to do――
Ah, you are strong,――I would not then be cruel,
If I were you!
_Nellie._ One does not like one’s feelings to be doubted,――
_Frank._ One does not like one’s friends to misconstrue,――
_Nellie._ If I confess that I a wee-bit pouted?
_Frank._ I should admit that I was _piqué_, too.
_Nellie._ Ask me to dance. I’d say no more about it,
If I were you!
(Waltz. _Exeunt._)
AUSTIN DOBSON.
――――
AN IDYLL OF THE LOBBY.
_Liberal Seceder._
If I were you, when friends electioneering
Wish to preserve consistency of view,
I would forewarn when Hawarden gales are veering――
If I were you.
_Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone._
If I were you, when issuing addresses,
I would observe the simple rule of two
Meanings in a sentence――tip for safe successes――
If I were you.
_L. S._ If I were you, when older friends reveal a
Freedom in spending time and money too,
I would not rush to dance a jig with Healy――
If I were you.
_W. E. G._ If I were you, who swear you cannot suffer
Plutocrat and peer, landlord and Jew,
I would not tilt against the people like a duffer――
If I were you.
_L. S._ I would not go at such an awful rate, or
Friends may forsake you――thing they’re apt to do――
_W. E. G._ I would remember the fate of such a traitor――
If I were you.
_L. S._ Surely you never――call a party meeting;
Try to arrange that each may get his due;
Keep the dear Irish; I’d avoid a beating,
If I were you.
_W. E. G._ No, I depart, I must consult the people,
Chamberlain’s coming――Randolph with him too――
I wouldn’t pray ’neath Chamberlainic steeple,
If I were you.
_L. S._ Go, if you will; my faith is not so flabby;
Cowards in midlands happily are few.
Stay! I would take that little trick from Labby――
If I were you.
_W. E. G._ Done! I remain――Brummagem to pound well.
Leave it till autumn――now, of course, you’re true?
Wouldn’t smash the party (surely doesn’t sound well)
If I were you.
_L. S._ One does not like that Caucus-pressure leaning.
_W. E. G._ Yes, I was sorry――had to use the screw.
_L. S._ If I confess that I mistook your meaning――
_W. E. G._ I will allow ’twas fair to misconstrue.
_Late L. S._ Ask me to vote. You’ve got to put the green in,
And cannon off the blue: I’d chalk my cue
If I were you.
K.
_The Pall Mall Budget._ June 3, 1886.
――――:o:――――
THE PRODIGALS.
(_After Mr. Austin Dobson’s famous ballade._)
[Dedicated to Mr. Chaplin, M.P., and Mr. Richard Power, M.P., and
223 who followed them.]
Ministers!――you, most serious,
Critics and statesmen of all degrees,
Hearken awhile to the motion of us,――
Senators keen for the Epsom breeze!
Nothing we ask of posts or fees;
Worry us not with objections pray!
Lo,――for the Speaker’s wig we seize
Give us――ah! give us――the Derby Day.
Scots most prudent, penurious!
Irishmen busy as humblebees!
Hearken awhile to the motion of us,――
Senators keen for the Epsom breeze!
For Sir Joseph’s sake, and his owner’s, please!
(Solomon raced like fun, they say)
Lo for we beg on our bended knees,――
Give us――ah! give us――the Derby Day.
Campbell-Asheton be generous!
(But they voted such things were not the cheese)
Sullivan, hear us, magnanimous!
(But Sullivan thought with their enemies.)
And shortly they got both of help and ease
For a mad majority crowded to say――
“Debate we’ve drunk to the dregs and lees;
Give us――ah! give us――the Derby Day.”
_Envoi._
Prince, most just was the motion of these
And many were seen by the dusty way,
Shouting glad to the Epsom breeze
Give us――ah! give us――the Derby Day.
W. E. HENLEY.
[Illustration]
Ballades, Rondeaus and Villanelles.
The revival of the taste for these curious old French forms of poetry
has received a great impetus from the delightful examples produced by
Austin Dobson, Edmund Gosse, W. E. Henley, Andrew Lang, R. Le
Gallienne, J. Ashby-Sterry, A. C. Swinburne, C. H. Waring and Oscar
Wilde.
The composition of all poetry in the English language is governed by
clearly defined rules, and although a man ignorant of these rules, if
gifted with a fine ear, and original conceptions, may produce a pretty
song or ballad, it is very rare indeed that any truly great work is
composed, which is not written in accordance with certain regulations
as to metre and rhyme.
In ordinary poetry these restrictions allow of great variations in
style and treatment, but it is far otherwise when any of the old
French poetical fashions are selected; then the rules are exact and
peremptory, and for each of the following varieties, the form is
clearly defined, and perfectly distinct. They are the _Ballade_,
_Chant Royal_, _Kyrielle_, _Pantoum_, _Rondeau Redoublé_, _Rondel_,
_Rondeau_, _Sicilian Octave_, _Triolet_, and _Villanelle_, with a few
minor forms.
It is quite beyond the scope of this collection to formulate the rules
governing the composition of these poetic trifles, nor indeed is it
necessary, for Mr. Gleeson White’s charming little book on the subject
is readily accessible, and contains nearly all that can be said about
it. It is entitled _Ballades and Rondeaus_, selected, with a chapter
on the various forms, by Gleeson White. London, Walter Scott, 1887.
The editor’s name is sufficient to indicate that the selections are
the best that could be chosen, and the introductory essay is, in
itself, a distinct gain to our literature, treating as it does, of a
somewhat exotic branch of poetry. Mr. Gleeson White is very much in
earnest, and although he inserts a few burlesques it is evident that
he regards them as desecrations of his favourite metres.
To the Parodist nothing is sacred, but whilst some of the following
parodies are quoted from Mr. White’s collection, those who would wish
to read the originals must refer to the work itself.
In _Punch_ (October 22, 1887) there was a set of verses (in honour of
Mr. White’s book) written in the various metres described, and one of
each of these may fitly lead the several varieties here dealt with.
THE MUSE IN MANACLES.
(_By an Envious and Irritable Bard, after reading “Ballades and
Rondeaus,” just published, and wishing he could do anything like any
of them._)
Bored by the Ballade, vexed by Villanelle,
Of Rondeau tired, and Triolet as well!
THE BALLADE.
(_In Bad Weather_).
Oh! I’m in a terrible plight――
For how can I rhyme in the rain?
’Tis pouring from morn until night:
So bad is the weather again,
My language is almost profane!
Though shod with the useful galosh,
I’m racked with rheumatical pain――
I think that a Ballade is bosh
I know I am looking a fright;
That knowledge, I know, is in vain;
My “brolly” is not water-tight,
But hopelessly rended in twain
And spoilt by the rude hurri_cane_!
Though clad in a stout mackintosh,
My temper I scarce can restrain――
I think that a Ballade is bosh!
Oh, I’m an unfortunate wight!
The damp is affecting my brain;
My woes I would gladly recite,
In phrases emphatic and plain,
Your sympathy could I obtain.
I don’t think my verses will wash,
They’re somewhat effete and inane――
I think that a Ballade is bosh!
_Envoy._
I fancy I’m getting insane,
I’m over my ankles in slosh;
But let me repeat the refrain――
I think that a Ballade is bosh!
――――
A BALLADE OF OLD METRES.
When, in the merry realm of France,
Bluff Francis ruled and loved and laughed,
Now held the lists with knightly lance,
Anon the knightly beaker quaffed;
Where wit could wing his keenest shaft
With Villon’s verse or Montaigne’s prose,
Then poets exercised their craft
In ballades, triolets, rondeaux.
O quaint old times! O fitting chants!
With fluttering banners fore and aft,
With mirth of minstrelsy and dance,
Sped Poesy’s enchanted craft;
The odorous gale was blowing abaft
Her silken sails, as on she goes,
Doth still to us faint echoes waft
Of ballades, triolets, rondeaux.
But tell me with what countenance
Ye seek on modern rhymes to graft
Those tender shoots of old Romance――
Romance that now is only chaffed?
O iron days! O idle raft
Of rhymesters! they are ‘_peu de chose_,’
What Scott would call supremely “saft”
_Your_ ballades, triolets, rondeaux.
_Envoy._
Bards, in whose vein the maddening draught
Of Hippocrene so wildly glows,
Forbear, and do not drive us daft
With ballades, triolets, rondeaux.
_The Century._
――――
A YOUNG POET’S ADVICE.
You should study the bards of to-day
Who in England are now all the rage;
You should try to be piquant and gay;
Your lines are too solemn and sage.
You should try to fill only a page,
Or two at the most with your lay;
And revive the quaint verse of an age
That is fading forgotten away.
Study Lang, Gosse, and Dobson, I pray――
That their rhymes and their fancies engage
Your thought to be witty as they.
You must stand on the popular stage.
In the bars of an old fashioned cage
We must prison the birds of our May,
To carol the notes of an age
That is fading forgotten away.
Now this is a ‘Ballade’――I say,
So one stanza more to our page,
But the “Vers de Société,”
If you can are the best for your ‘wage.’
Though the purists may fall in a rage
That two rhymes go thrice in one lay,
You may passably echo an age
That is fading forgotten away.
_Envoy._
Bard――heed not the seer and the sage,
‘Afflatus’ and Nature don’t pay;
But stick to the forms of an age
That is fading forgotten away.
C. P. CRANCH.
――――:o:――――
In an amusing little collection of poems quite recently published,
there are several parodies and three ballades, all on legal topics,
from which the following extracts are quoted by the kind permission of
Messrs. Reeves and Turner. The title of the book is _The Lays of a
Limb of the Law_, by the late John Popplestone, Town Clerk of
Stourmouth, edited by Edmund B. V. Christian. London: Reeves and
Turner, 1889. It contains Law Reports in the shape of parodies of
Cowper’s “Alexander Selkirk;” of Pope’s translation of Homer, “The
Splendid Shilling,” and of other poems in a manner somewhat similar to
those contained in Professor Frederick Pollock’s well-known, but
scarce little work, “Leading Cases Done into English.”
Of the three ballades perhaps the following is the best:――
BALLADE OF OLD LAW BOOKS.
_“I am improving my legal knowledge, Master Copperfield, said Uriah.
‘I am going through Tidd’s Practice. Oh, what a writer Mr. Tidd is,
Master Copperfield.’”_
The law books are standing in dingy array,
They fill every shelf from ceiling to floor,
Old guides to a silent and grass-covered way
Which never a traveller now shall explore,
Save delvers for antiquarian lore,
Who painfully search where their treasures lie hid,
In pages that else had been closed evermore,
Forgotten for aye, like the wonderful TIDD!
Great Blackstone is put up aloft, far away
(The Whig, first edition, in calf, volumes four);
The Doctor and Student alike are at play;
And Perkins is now but a profitless bore.
Old Viner’s abridgment is over the door
’Mid dust-begrimed wines that fetch never a bid;
Even Fearne on Remainders we vainly deplore
Forgotten for aye, like the wonderful TIDD!
Oblivion has fallen on the frequent _Ca. sa._,
And Cursitor Street is untrod as of yore;
We turn not the leaves of Les Termes de la Ley,
Or these ancient Reports, ah, many a score,
Of a dulness as deadly as dread hellibore,
Of their Latin and law we are joyfully rid.
Let them stand, as we peacefully slumber and snore,
Forgotten for aye, like the wonderful Tidd.
_Envoy._
How quickly the summers and winters are o’er!
They linger not now as in childhood they did.
Soon _we_ shall be treading yon shadowy shore,
Forgotten for aye like the wonderful TIDD!
The first verse of each of the other two ballades will suffice:――
BALLADE OF THE HONEST LAWYER.
The “noble savage” of long ago
Within a hundred tomes we find;
The foreigner acute we know,
And “general readers,” looks resigned;
The “law of nature,” left behind
By a simpler age, has ceased to be
Aught but examination grind;
“The honest lawyer,” where is he?
* * * * *
BALLADE OF LEADING CASES.
When August crowns the legal year,
When clients leave an hour for play,
But――your examination near――
You’re doomed in London town to stay;
When, tired of our prosaic day,
You’d catch a glimpse of old-world faces,
Put statutes, text-books, all, away――
Read, mark, and learn the Leading Cases.
* * * * *
――――
BALLADE OF THE TIMID BARD.
(_To Angelica, who bids him publish._)
In Memory’s mystical hazes
I see a vast Gander and grey,
I see the small boy that he chases
At the head of a hissing array:
How I wept when they brought me to bay,
How I pleaded in vain for a truce!
Too frightened too shoo them away,
I could never say Boh to a Goose!
* * * * *
_Punch_, October 22, 1887.
――――:o:――――
THE VILLANELLE.
(_With Vexation._)
I do not like the Villanelle,
I think it somewhat of a bore――
This tinkle of a Muffin-bell!
The reason why I cannot tell;
Each day I fancy, more and more,
I do not like the Villanelle!
It makes me stamp and storm and yell,
It makes me wildly rage and roar:
This tinkle of a Muffin-bell!
I look upon it as a sell,
Its use I constantly deplore;
I do not like the Villanelle!
Poetic thoughts it must dispel,
It very often tries me sore:
This tinkle of a Muffin-bell!
For this I know, and know full well――
Let me repeat it o’er and o’er――
I do not like the Villanelle,
This tinkle of a Muffin-bell!
Such was _Mr. Punch’s_ opinion of this delicious form of verse, which
must be complete in nineteen lines, arranged as above. The accepted
model is the following old French _Villanelle_ by Jean Passerat:
_J’ay perdu ma tourterelle;
Est-ce-point ells que i’oy?[2]
Je veux aller après elle._
_Tu regrettes ta femelle;
Hélas! aussy fay-je moy:
J’ay perdu ma tourterelle._
_Si ton amour est fidèle,
Aussy est ferme ma foy;
Je veux aller après elle._
_Ta plainte se renouvelle?
Toujours plaindre je me doy:
J’ay perdu ma tourterelle._
_En ne voyant plus la belle
Plus rien de beau je ne voy:
Je veux aller après elle._
_Mort, que tant de fois j’appelle
Prens ce qui se donne à toy:
J’ai perdu ma tourterelle,
Je veux aller après elle._
Of modern English specimens one of the most beautiful is that by Mr.
Austin Dobson “When I saw you last, Rose,” which is given in Mr.
White’s book, together with a French translation of it by M. J.
Boulmier.
――――
A VILLANELLE.
(_After Mr. Oscar Wilde._)
Commissioner of Lunacee!
An _inquirendo_ come and hold;
For Oscar Wilde hath need of thee!
Flings to the world in wild frenz_ee_
A poem on “a wattled fold,”
Commissioner of Lunac_ee_.
In his strange verse none sense can see;
He raves of “limbs and beards of gold”;
He really hath great need of thee!
Anon he says, “A hell I see!”
And talks of satyrs dead and cold:
Commissioner of Lunac_ee_.
And many an untold idioc_ee_,
With little meaning, is enrolled:
He verily hath need of thee,
A Bedlamite as mad as he
No open doors should ever hold.
Commissioner of Lunac_ee_,
You see he has great need of thee!
FRANK DANBY.
_The Whitehall Review_, September 30, 1880.
――――
THE STREET SINGER.
(_Villanelle from my window._)
He stands at the kerb and sings.
’Tis a doleful tune and slow,
Ah me, if I had but wings!
He bends to the coin one flings,
But he never attempts to go,――
He stands at the kerb and sings.
The conjurer comes with his rings.
And the Punch-and-Judy show.
Ah me, if I had but wings!
They pass like all fugitive things――
They fade and they pass, but lo!
He stands at the kerb and sings.
All the magic that Music brings
Is lost when he mangles it so――
Ah me, if I had but wings!
But the worst is a thought that stings!
There is nothing at hand to throw!
He stands at the kerb and sings――
Ah me, if I had but wings!
AUSTIN DOBSON.
――――
CULTURE IN THE SLUMS.
Now ain’t they utterly too-too
(She ses, my missus mine,[3] ses she),
Them flymy little bits of Blue.
Joe, just you kool ’em――nice and skew
Upon our old meogginee,
Now ain’t they utterly too-too?
They’re better than a pot ’n’ a screw,
They’re equal to a Sunday spree,
Them flymy little bits of Blue!
Suppose I put ’em up the flue,
And booze the profits, Joe? Not me.
Now ain’t they utterly too-too?
I do the ’Igh Art fake, I do.
Joe, I’m consummate; and I _see_
Them flymy little bits of Blue.
Which, Joe, is why I ses te you――
Æsthetic-like, and limp, and free――
Now _ain’t_ they utterly too-too,
Them flymy little bits o’ Blue?
W. E. HENLEY.
――――
IN WAIN!
(_A Villanelle of Vexations. By B * * * y P * * g._)
Addressed to all true Jingoes.
In wain would I the British Lion wake!
In wain I’d rouge the brute to wilent springing;
His tail won’t wag, his mane declines to shake.
In wain my daily ’larum-bell I take,
Till his ears tingle with its brazen ringing
In wain would I the British Lion wake!
In wain I warn him of that Northern snake,
Who midst our Injun grass will soon be stinging;
His tail won’t wag, his mane declines to shake.
* * * * *
He sleeps as placid as a windless lake;
Cold water on my fire his calm is flinging.
His tail _won’t_ wag, his mane declines to shake;
In wain would I the British Lion wake!
_Punch._ August 11, 1877.
――――:o:――――
THE TRIOLET.
(_In a Temper._)
A Triolet’s scarcely the thing――
Unless you would carol in fetters!
If lark-like you freely would sing,
A Triolet’s scarcely the thing:
I miss the poetical ring,
I’m told that it has, by my betters!
A Triolet’s scarcely the thing――
Unless you would carol in fetters!
_Punch._
The _Triolet_, which should consist of eight lines, but only two
rhymes, is more often met with in French literature than in our own;
the following old specimen was christened by Ménage _le roi des
Triolets_:――
_Le premier jour du mois de mai
Fut le plus heureux de ma vie:
Le beau dessein que je formai,
Le premier jour du mois de mai!
Je vous vis et je vous aimai.
Si ce dessein vous plut, Sylvie,
Le premier jour du mois de mai
Fut le plus heureux de ma vie._
JACQUES RANCHIN.
――――
A TRIOLET,
(After Mr. Dobson’s “I intended an Ode”)
I wished to sing my love;
I cannot do so now.
(As I remarked above)
I wished to sing my love,
But Kate crossed with her cow
And gave my love a shove.
I wished to sing my love;
I cannot do so now.
JOHN TWIG.
――――
HOW TO FASHION A TRIOLET.
As triolets are now the “go,”
A charming one I’ll write,
Their little niceties to show,――
As triolets are now the “go,”――
I’m writing one (and _àpropos_,
By Webster, I am right);
As triolets are now the “go,”
A charming one I’ll write.
The dictionary teaches me
The triolet receipt:――
The verses of eight lines must be;
The dictionary teaches me
The first line, by the recipe,
Three times I must repeat.
The dictionary teaches me
The triolet receipt.
The second line must reappear
To form the final line;
No matter if it soundeth queer.
The second line must reappear;
When poetry is far from clear
It is considered fine!
The second line must reappear
To form the final line.
Now, do you like the triolet?
Your true opinion say.
It puts me in a horrid pet;
Now, do you like the triolet?
I wish your real thought to get,
So do be candid, pray.
Now _do_ you like the triolet?
Your true opinion say.
W. BEST.
_Detroit Free Press_, 1888.
――――:o:――――
THE RONDEAU.
(_In a Rage._)
Pray tell me why we can’t agree
To bid the merry Muse run free?
Pray tell me why we should incline
To see her in a Rondeau pine,
Or sigh in shackled minstrelsy?
Why can’t she sing with lark-like glee,
And revel in bright _jeux d’esprit_?
Where form can’t fetter or confine――
Pray tell me why?
Pray tell me why that frisky gee,
Called Pegasus, should harnessed be?
Why bit and bridle should combine
To all his liveliness consign,――
To deck the Rondeau’s narrow line――
Pray tell me why?
_Punch._
_RONDEAU._
_Ma foi, c’est fait de moi, car Isabeau
M a conjuré de lui faire un rondeau.
Cela me met en peine extrême
Quoi! treize vers, huit en_ eau, _cinq en_ eme!
_Je lui ferais aussitôt un bateau._
_En voilà cing pourtant en un monceau.
Faisons-en huit en invoquant Brodeau,
Et puis mettons, par quelque stratagème:
Ma foi, c est fait._
_Si je pouvais encor de mon cerveau
Tirer cinq vers l’ouvrage serait beau;
Mais cependant je suis dedans l’onzième;
Et ci je crois que je fais le douzième;
En voila treize ajustés au niveau.
Ma foi, c’est fait._
――VOITURE.
The following humorous paraphrase was written, some years since, by
Mr. Austin Dobson:――
You bid me try, BLUE-EYES, to write
A Rondeau. What! forthwith?――to-night?
Reflect. Some skill I have, ’tis true;
But thirteen lines!-and rhymed on two!――
“Refrain,” as well. Ah, hapless plight!
Still there are five lines――ranged aright.
These Gallic bonds, I feared, would fright
My easy Muse. They did, till you――
_You_ bid me try!
“That makes them eight.――The port’s in sight:
Tis all because your eyes are bright!
Now just a pair to end in “oo,”――
When maids command, what can’t we do!
Behold! The RONDEAU――tasteful, light――
You bid me try!”
――――
A RONDEAU.
(After Voiture’s “_Ma foy c’est fait_.”)
Why do I wander wildly to and fro?
My tyrant bade me twist her a rondeau.
Methinks ’twas deleterious to my brain!
I loved her (though her name was Mary Jane):
She died of D. T. many years ago.
A Rondeau? Humph! Ha, hum! Egad, just so!
“Five rhymes in ain and eight remain in O.”
Eh, no, Voiture! For they be all inane.
Why do I wander?
White though the head be, red’s the nose below――
(Bright beams a light-house spite a roof of snow)――
“Why wander goose-like?” doth my love complain?
Ah, dear, dead love! Ah, Marie! Ah, ma reine!
(Meaning M. J. of course.) Hullo! Gee Wo!
Why do I wander?
――――
CULTURE IN THE SLUMS.
(_Inscribed to an Intense Poet._)
“O Crikey, Bill!” she ses to me, she ses.
“Look sharp,” ses she, “with them there sossiges.
Yea! sharp with them there bags of mysteree!
For lo!” she ses, “for lo! old pal,” ses she,
“I’m blooming peckish, neither more nor less.”
Was it not prime――I leave you all to guess
How prime!――to have a jude in love’s distress
Come spooning round, and murmuring balmilee,
“O crikey, Bill!”
For in such rorty wise doth Love express
His blooming views, and asks for your address,
And makes it right, and does the gay and free.
I kissed her――I did so! And her and me
Was pals. And if that ain’t good business,
O crikey, Bill!
W. E. HENLEY.
――――
A RONDEL.
(After Mr. Dobson’s “_Too hard it is to sing_.”)
Too hard it is to pipe
To an untuneful herd!
And berries, while unripe,
Repel the _prudent_ bird!
The wildly warbling snipe
You may, perhaps, have heard――
(Too hard it is to pipe
To an _untuneful_ herd!)
It rarely fed on tripe
But mushroom much preferred
Lest folk its tail should gripe
And salt (which were absurd!)
Too hard it is to pipe
To an untuneful herd!
――――
RONDEL.
(_Adapted, for the use of the Order of Our Lady of Pain._)
Kissing the Heir, I saw him at my feet,
Wound round my finger, found him soft and sweet;
Made fast his feeble hands, dazzled his eyes,――
Like fishes’ optics, no ways clear or wise.
With my best dresses made him find me fair――
Kissing the Heir!
Deep the resources drained by him and me,
Deep as DISRAELI, or the deeper sea.
What wife could draw him thus for her and her’s?
What charm have made him more for me disburse?――
Ah! if his guardian had not caught me there
Kissing the Heir!
_The Hornet_, July 26, 1871.
――――
BEHOLD THE DEEDS!
(_Chant Royal._)
An American Parody.
[Being the Plaint of Adolphe Culpepper Ferguson, Salesman of Fancy
Notions, held in durance of his Landlady for a failure to connect on
Saturday night.]
I.
I would that all men my hard case might know;
How grievously I suffer for no sin:
I, Adolphe Culpepper Ferguson, for lo!
I, of my landlady am locked in.
For being short on this sad Saturday,
Nor having shekels of silver wherewith to pay;
She has turned and is departed with my key;
Wherefore, not even as other boarders free,
I sing (as prisoners to their dungeon stones
When for ten days they expiate a spree):
Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
II.
One night and one day have I wept my woe;
Nor wot I when the morrow doth begin,
If I shall have to write to Briggs & Co.,
To pray them to advance the requisite tin
For ransom of their salesman, that he may
Go forth as other boarders go alway――――
As those I hear now flocking from their tea,
Led by the daughter of my landlady
Piano-ward. This day for all my moans,
Dry bread and water have been servéd me.
Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
III.
Miss Amabel Jones is musical, and so
The heart of the young he-boardér doth win,
Playing “The Maiden’s Prayer,” _adagio_――
That fetcheth him, as fetcheth the banco skin
The innocent rustic. For my part, I pray:
That Badarjewska maid may wait for aye
Ere sits she with a lover, as did we
Once sit together, Amabel! Can it be
That all that arduous wooing not atones
For Saturday shortness of trade dollars three?
_Behold_ the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
IV.
Yea! she forgets the arm was wont to go
Around her waist. She wears a buckle whose pin
Galleth the crook of the young man’s elbow;
_I_ forget not, for I that youth have been.
Smith was aforetime the Lothario gay.
Yet once, I mind me, Smith was forced to stay
Close in his room. Not calm, as I, was he;
But his noise brought no pleasaunce, verily.
Small ease he gat of playing on the bones,
Or hammering on his stove-pipe, that I see.
Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
V.
Thou, for whose fear the figurative crow
I eat, accursed be thou and all thy kin!
Thee will I show up――yea, up will I shew
Thy too thick buckwheats, and thy tea too thin.
Ay! here I dare thee, ready for the fray!
Thou dost _not_ “keep a first-class house,” I say!
It does not with the advertisements agree.
Thou lodgest a Briton with a puggaree,
And thou hast harboured Jacobses and Cohns,
Also a Mulligan. Thus denounce I thee!
Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
_Envoy._
Boarders! the worst I have not told to ye:
She hath stolen my trousers, that I may not flee
Privily by the window. Hence these groans,
There is no fleeing in a _robe de nuit_.
Behold the deeds that are done of Mrs. Jones!
H. C. BUNNER.
――――:o:――――
Poets of the Æsthetic School
About ten years ago London Society was divided into two hostile Camps,
one known as the _Æsthetes_, the other as the _Philistines_. Neither
title was correct, nor very expressive, but each conveyed a certain
meaning which even now could not be briefly expressed in more simple
language.
The _Æsthetes_ were originally a small body of artists and poets,
belonging to what was called the Pre-Raphaelite school, who strove to
educate the English people up to a certain standard in art and
culture.
All the men who founded this school subsequently became eminent in
their professions, but they were, for many years, subjected to the
ridicule and criticisms of the Philistines.
Yet it is probable that most of this opposition was directed less
against the men of genius who actually created Pre-Raphaelitism, than
against those too ardent devotees of the new fashion, who carried all
its dictates to the extreme, and frequently turned the true and the
beautiful into the absurd and grotesque by their exaggerations in
dress, language, and deportment.
On the other hand many of the opponents of Æstheticism were those who
having seen Du Maurier’s caricatures in _Punch_, and witnessed
Burnand’s vamped up old comedy _The Colonel_, or Gilbert & Sullivan’s
_Patience_, thought themselves fully qualified to jeer at the
“consummate” the “utter” and the “too-too,” without having either read
a poem by Swinburne, or Morris, or having seen a painting by
Burne-Jones or Dante Gabriel Rossetti.
This opposition did some good in its day, for although _Æstheticism_
eventually triumphed, only the beautiful that it created has survived,
the lank and melancholy maidens, and the “Grosvenor-Gallery” young
men, have departed, but the revival――the _Renaissance_ in fact――of
British Art in Painting, poetry, dress, decoration, and even in house
furniture, is an accomplished fact. Much has been written, and remains
to be written, on this fascinating topic, but this collection cannot
be made the medium for Lectures on Art.
At the risk of appearing egotistical the following little work can be
mentioned as conveying useful information on a subject which is
certainly worthy of some little study:――
“_The Æsthetic Movement in England_,” by Walter Hamilton. Third
edition――London. Reeves and Turner, 1882.
Without further preface a selection of parodies will be given on the
works of Rossetti, who was not only a founder of the school, but also
one of its most eminent exponents.
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI
BORN May 12, 1828. | DIED April 9, 1882.
There was a particular metre much affected by this great artist and
poet, of which perhaps the best example to be found is in his weird
“Sister Helen,” which has been frequently parodied. It commences
thus:――
“Why did you melt your waxen man,
Sister Helen?
To-day is the third since you began.”
“The time was long, yet the time ran,
Little brother.”
(_O Mother, Mary Mother,
Three days to-day, between Hell and Heaven!_)
“But if you have done your work aright,
Sister Helen,
You’ll let me play, for you said I might.”
“Be very still in your play to-night,
Little brother.”
(_O Mother, Mary Mother,
Third night, to-night, between Hell and Heaven!_)
“Oh, the waxen knave was plump to-day,
Sister Helen;
How like dead folk he has dropped away!”
“Nay now, of the dead what can you say,
Little brother?”
(_O Mother, Mary Mother,
What of the dead, between Hell and Heaven?_)
* * * * *
“Ah! what white thing at the door has cross’d,
Sister Helen?
Ah! what is this that sighs in the frost?”
“A soul that’s lost as mine is lost,
Little brother!”
(_O Mother, Mary Mother,
Lost, lost, all lost, between Hell and Heaven!_)
This, and other poems by Rossetti, such as _Eden Bower_, and _Troy
Town_, only revived a very old fashion――the ballad with a refrain or
burden.
But when once it _was_ revived so many indifferent poets attempted to
utter their little insipidities in the ballad style, that the
parodists soon caught the infection. One gentleman furbished up a
tremendous ballad which resembled nothing so much as the cry of a
costermonger, for its burden, oft repeated, was――
“Apple, and orange, and nectarine,”
whilst one of the evening papers published the following satire on
Rossetti’s style:――
AFTER DILETTANTE CONCETTI.
“Why do you wear your hair like a man,
Sister Helen?
This week is the third since you began.”
“I’m writing a ballad; be still if you can,
Little brother,
(_O Mother Carey, mother!
What chickens are these between sea and heaven?_”)
“But why does your figure appear so lean,
Sister Helen?
And why do you dress in sage sage, green?”
“Children should never be heard, if seen,
Little brother!
(_O Mother Carey, mother!
What fowls are a-wing in the stormy heaven!_”
“But why is your face so yellowy white,
Sister Helen?
And why are your skirts so funnily tight?”
“Be quiet you torment, or how can I write,
Little brother?
(_O Mother Carey, mother!
How gathers thy train to the sea from the heaven._”)
“And who’s Mother Carey, and what is her train,
Sister Helen?
And why do you call her again and again?”
“You troublesome boy, why that’s the refrain,
Little brother!
_O Mother Carey, mother!
What work is toward in the startled heaven?_”)
“And what’s a refrain? What a curious word,
Sister Helen;
Is the ballad you’re writing about a sea-bird?”
“Not at all! why should it be? Don’t be absurd,
Little brother.
(_O Mother Carey, mother!
Thy brood flies lower as lowers the heaven._)”
(_A big brother speaketh_:)
“The refrain you’ve studied a meaning had,
Sister Helen!
It gave strange force to a weird ballàd.
But refrains have become a ridiculous ‘fad,’
Little brother.
And _Mother Carey, mother_,
Has a bearing on nothing in earth or heaven.”
* * * * *
For the remainder of this exquisite parody, readers are referred to
Mr. H. D. Traill’s _Recaptured Rhymes_ (London, W, Blackwood & Sons,
1882), in which work it was republished.
――――
EVE.
(_An Imitation._)
“Dasz ich genossen des Wissens Frucht,
Das kannst du nicht mehr aendern.”――[H. Heine.]
The serpent tempted thee to shame,
Mother Eve.
God’s direst vengeance on thee came,
Mother Eve.
And never may we hope to win
That golden garden close hedged in
From toil and tempest, strife and sin,
Mother Eve.
Before thy wondering, wakened eyes,
Mother Eve.
Clashed shut the gates of Paradise,
Mother Eve.
Thy wandering feet, thy hands were torn,
By briar, wayside weed and thorn,
Thy babes in anguish great were born,
Mother Eve.
And yet God’s vengeance knew no stay,
Mother Eve.
Thy first-born did his brother slay,
Mother Eve.
Died not thy heart for woe and dread,
When Abel in thine arms lay dead,
And Cain red-handed turned and fled,
Mother Eve?
Methinks I hear thee murmur “Nay,”
Mother Eve.
“Evil and bitter was my day,”
Mother Eve.
“Evil and full of pain, but still
I am Thy judge――work all Thy will――
I judge Thee knowing good from ill.”
Mother Eve.
“I stretched mine hand unto Thy tree――”
Mother Eve.
“Not as the sightless beasts are we――”
Mother Eve.
“The curse has fallen――let it bide――
I and my children open-eyed
Know Thee, and judge, whate’er betide,”
Mother Eve.
MABEL PEACOCK.
_Detroit Free Press_, December 5, 1885.
――――
THE POETS AT TEA.
_Rossetti, who took six cups of it._
The lilies lie in my lady’s bower,
(O weary mother, drive the cows to roost),
They faintly droop for a little hour;
My lady’s head droops like a flower.
She took the porcelain in her hand,
(O weary mother, drive the cows to roost),
She poured; I drank at her command;
Drank deep, and now-you understand!
(O weary mother, drive the cows to roost).
* * * * *
_The Cambridge Fortnightly._ February, 1888.
――――
A TWILIGHT FANTASY.
A woman stood at a garden gate
(_Sing hey, for the distant spreading sail_!)
Sing hey, for the dog that hurried by
With a kettle tied to his tail.
My goodman skurried adown the road.
(_Sing hey, for the joyous drinking bout_!)
And after the ochre cur he sped
With many a gruesome shout.
“Now why this haste, good neighbour?” she cried;
“Why after the dog of the umber tint?”
But, waking the echoes with yells, he sped
Through the twilight’s gleam and glint.
A smug-face lad looked over the fence
(_Sing hey, where the birdlings sing and chirp_,)
“Why laughest, good mother!” “I laugh,” said she,
“To see yon _ecru_ purp.”
A smile then smilèd the smug-faced lad.
(_Sing lack-a-day, for the sunset red_,)
“Then laugh no more, good gossip, because
The kettle is your’n,” he said.
_The Shooting Times._ February 11, 1887.
――――
THE LAUNDRESS AND THE LAIDY.
All on a sofa fair Ada lay,
(_O, for a brandy and soda, she sighed_),
It was four in the afternoon, and gay
Was the outside world, but Ada must stay
In her room, and thus she cried,
“Could I but join the happy throng.”
(_And O, for a brandy and soda she sighed_),
“That under my windows pass along
To Short’s, or to Finch’s, I’d soon be gone,
Or to the Inventions glide.”
She took down an “afternoon tea-book” to read,
(_O, for a brandy and soda she sighed_),
But it interested her little indeed,
Such books are tame if you haven’t “teaed.”
And no one sat by her side.
She went to the window and gazed at the sky,
(_O, for a brandy and soda she sighed_),
Then she saw her particular mash pass by,
To attract his attention did she try,
But in vain, tho’ hard she tried.
Her chloral bottle she took in her hand,
(_O, for a brandy and soda she sighed_),
“To sleep till the evening will be grand;”
And she slept through the strains of a German band,
Which was playing in all its pride.
“Why didn’t she go for a stroll?” you say,
But, reader, I beg you pause;
Her friends on a visit were all away,
And her laundress forgot to send home that day
Her petticoats, stockings, and pockethandkerchiefs.
_The Sporting Times._ June 20, 1885.
The same paper, for May 23, 1885, contained another very funny parody
of Rossetti; but unfortunately it was too suggestive to bear
republication here.
It was reserved, however, for that prince of Parodists, Charles S.
Calverley, to make the ballad with a refrain supremely ridiculous:――
The auld wife sat at her ivied door,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
A thing she had frequently done before;
And her spectacles lay on her apron’d knees.
The piper he piped on the hill-top high,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
Till the cow said “I die,” and the goose ask’d “Why?”
And the dog said nothing, but search’d for fleas.
The farmer he strode through the square farm-yard;
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
His last brew of ale was a trifle hard――
The connexion of which with the plot one sees.
The farmer’s daughter hath frank blue eyes;
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
She hears the rooks caw in the windy skies,
As she sits at her lattice and shells her peas.
The farmer’s daughter hath ripe red lips;
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
If you try to approach her, away she skips
Over tables and chairs with apparent ease.
The farmer’s daughter hath soft brown hair;
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
And I met with a ballad, I can’t say where,
Which wholly consisted of lines like these.
In the second part of this pathetic composition the poet thus
describes the melancholy sequel:――
She sat with her hands ’neath her burning cheeks,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
And gazed at the piper for thirteen weeks;
Then she follow’d him out o’er the misty leas.
Her sheep follow’d her, as their tails did them,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese_)
And this song is consider’d a perfect gem,
And as to the meaning, it’s what you please.
When Mr. Calverley composed this burlesque Ballad (which is to be
found in full in his _Fly Leaves_, published by G. Bell & Sons), it is
probable that he was thinking of one by Mr. Morris, entitled “Two Red
Roses across the Moon” commencing “There was a lady liv’d in a hall,”
and ending with the refrain which forms the title.
Having once shown how it could be done, other comic writers followed
suit, and the burlesque ballads in this style are almost too numerous
to be quoted.
YOU, I, AND THE POST.
YOU,――_the British Public_; _I_,――_W. E. G._
_The Post_――_G. P. O._
A statesman sits at Hawarden gate,
(_Paper and pens and a bottle of ink_.)
A stalwart man with a shapely pate,
And brains to spare, as you rightly think.
The live-long day he’s been hacking down trees,
(_Paper and pens and two bottles of ink_.)
Toughish work, yet he does it with ease,
Nor e’en doth, as Milton would phrase it, “swink.”
Who is’t approacheth? ha! ha! The post!
(_Paper and pens and a pint of ink._)
Of letters and post-cards bearing a host――
Beneath the load he seems ready to sink.
The Statesman opens and reads them all,
(_Paper and pens and a quart of ink_.)
Quoth he, “I’ll answer them great and small,
This very night ere I sleep a wink.”
In he strides to his big bureau,
(_Paper and pens and a gallon of ink_.)
And answers fourscore letters or so――
(Fourscore’s the minimum number, I think);
Some answered by note, and some by card,
(_Paper and pens and a barrel of ink_.)
But when the question’s uncommonly hard,
The point of the query he’ll deftly shrink.
Oh, the postman puffs, and the postman swears,
(_Paper and pens and a sheet of stamps_.)
At the load of letters and cards he bears
To Hawarden gate in his daily tramps.
Oh, you who of letters and answers are fond,
(_Paper and pens and a grey goose quill_.)
Write to Hawarden, there beyond――
And an answer you’ll get from the People’s Will!
HUBERT JOHN DE BURGH.
(This talented young author died in 1877, at the early age of
thirty-two. The above parody originally appeared in _Yorick_, to
accompany a cartoon by Harry Furniss.)
――――
As recently as October 20, 1888, _Punch_ had a similar parody entitled
AGRICULTURE’S LATEST RÔLE.
(_A Bucolic Ballad, with a Borrowed Refrain, Dedicated
to the British Dairy Farmers’ Association_,)
“Where are you going to, my pretty Maid?”
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
“I’m going a-milking, Sir;” she said;
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
“For times are bad, and the farm don’t pay.
’Tis Pasture _v._ Arable so men say.
If still I’d be prosperous _this_ is the way.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
“I’m tired of corn-growing that brings little cash,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
The old business of Ceres seems going to smash.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
Free Trade and the Yankee have finished her clean.
From furrow and sheaf there seems little to glean,
From ploughed land to pasture I’m changing the scene.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
“I hope you’ll allow I look fetching like this,
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
A Dairymaid’s dress suits me sweetly, I wis.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
Just twig my short petticoats, look at my pail!
The bards are all ready a Milkmaid to hail!
I mean making prettiness pay,――shall I fail?
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
“You’ve been to the Dairy Show, Sir, have you not?
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
Those churners competitive were a sweet lot.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)
Miss HOLMES, and Miss KEEL, and Miss BARRON, who won,
Seemed not a bit fagged when the business was done.
I’m sure Butter-making _looks_ capital fun.
(_Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese!_)”
* * * * *
――――
A CHRISTMAS WAIL.
(_Not by Dante Gabriel Rossetti._)
On Christmas day I dined with Brown.
(_O the dinner was fine to see!_)
I drove to his house, right merrily down
To a western square of London town.
(_And I moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
We dined off turkey and Christmas beef;
(_O the dinner was fine to see!_)
My anguish is sore and my comfort brief,
And nought but blue pills can ease my grief,
(_As I moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
We gorged plum-pudding and hot mince pies,
(_O the dinner was fine to see!_)
And other nameless atrocities,
The weight of which on my――bosom lies.
(_And I moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
We drank dry Clicquot and rare old port,
(_O the dinner was fine to see!_)
And I pledged my host for a right good sort
In bumpers of both, for I never thought
(_I should moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
* * * * *
But I woke next day with a fearful head,
(_O that dinner so fine to see!_)
And on my chest is a weight like lead,
And I frequently wish that I were dead,
(_And I moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
And as for Brown――why the truth to tell――
(_O that dinner so fine to see!_)
I hate him now with the hate of hell,
Though before I loved him passing well,
(_And I moan and I cry woe’s me!_)
_Truth._ December 27, 1883.
――――
One of the most ridiculous features of the so-called Æsthetic movement
was, that a number of brainless noodles set to work to write poetry in
_serious_ imitation of Swinburne, Rossetti, and Oscar Wilde. The style
was a mixture of mediæval Italian and middle English, and the one
principle which guided the dolorous singers was, “We must not have any
meaning, or, at any rate, the less the better.” “My lady” was
addressed in all kinds of rhymes, “Love” was held responsible for
legions of complicated woes, green eyes, golden eyes――even orbs “like
a cat’s splendid circled eye” were quite in fashion. The recipe for
this description of poetry was――Begin with an address to your lady;
never mind if you have not one, for that is a mere detail. Represent
her as bewitching you with the unutterably weary gaze of her eyes――or
eyne――“eyne” is preferable; stick in an old word like “teen” or
“drouth” or “wot” or “sooth” or “wearyhead” or “wanhope;” break out
with “Lo!” and “Yea!” and “Nay!” and “Ah!” at brief intervals, and be
sure to have a weird refrain. This humbug held its own for a while,
but a few unsparing satirists dealt with this dreary small-fry of art,
and the following, one of the most delightful modern jests was
prompted by the school:――
MADONNA MIA.
I would I were a cigarette
Between my lady’s lithe sad lips
Where Death, like Love, divinely set,
With exquisite sighs and sips,
Feeds and is fed and is not fain,
And Memory married with Regret,
And Pleasure amorous of red Pain,
In moon-wise musing wax and wane;
That with the bitter sweetness of her breath
I might somewhile remember and forget
(For Life is Love, and Love is Death!)
It was my hap――ah well-a-way――
To burn my little hour away!
I would I were a gold jewèl
To fleck my lady’s soft lean throat,
Where Love, like Death, lies throned to swell
A strange and tremulous note
Of yearning vague and void and vain,
Delight on flame Desire to quell,
And Pleasure fearful of red Pain,
And dreams fall in to sear and stain;
That in the barren blossom of her breath
I might be glad we were not one, but twain
(For Love is Life, and Life is Death!)
And that without me, well-a-way,
She could not choose but pass away.
This masterly balderdash has imposed on many people; and the most
comic thing in the world is to see an earnest person endeavouring to
discover hidden meanings in it.
――――
“_John Bull_” (a London newspaper) for November 8, 1879, contained a
long article from which only the following brief notes can be
quoted:――
IMMORTAL PICTURES.
Mr. Rossetti has painted a picture, and in an unguarded moment
permitted the _Athenæum_ to describe it in the following
language.――[_Extract given in full._]
_Apropos_ of the above fragment of art-criticism, a correspondent
sends us the following analysis (clipped from a rival journal) of
another remarkable picture:――
“It is better to speak the truth at once, and to say that we
have in Mr. Symphony Priggins a master as great as the
greatest; and in this picture the master-piece of a master;
and in this episode of a picture the masterstroke of a
master’s master-piece. The sublimity of Buonaroti, the
poetic fervour of Raffaelle, the tremulous intensity of
Sandro Botticelli, the correggiosity of Correggio have never
raised these masters to higher heights than our own Priggins
has attained in this transcendent rendering of the Dish
running away with the Spoon.
“The artist, like some others of his craft, is, as is known,
a poet of no mean pretensions; and he has set forth the
inner meaning of his picture in the following lines, which
form the motto on its frame:――”
_A Ballad of High Endeavour._
Ah night! blind germ of days to be,
Ah me! ah me!
(Sweet Venus, mother!)
What wail of smitten strings hear we?
(Ah me; ah me!
_Hey diddle dee_!)
Ravished by clouds our Lady Moon,
Ah me! ah me!
(Sweet Venus, mother!)
Sinks swooning in a lady-swoon
(Ah me! ah me!
_Dum diddle dee_!)
What profits it to rise i’ the dark?
Ah me! ah me!
(Sweet Venus, mother!)
If love but over-soar its mark
(Ah me! ah me!
_Hey diddle dee_!)
What boots to fall again forlorn?
Ah me! ah me;
(Sweet Venus, mother!)
Scorned by the grinning hound of scorn,
(Ah me! ah me!
_Dum diddle dee_!)
Art thou not greater who art less?
Ah me! ah me!
(Sweet Venus, mother!)
Low love fulfilled of low success?
(Ah me! ah me!
_Hey diddle dee_!)
No one we imagine, would have been dull enough to have
missed the allegory of Mr. Priggins’ great picture even
without such exposition; but many, perhaps, will only feel
it after this its setting forth in “perfect music matched
with noble words.”
――――
SONG BY MR. JOSEPH HUBERT HILLYER.
Art is to me no intellectual fad;
(_A goodly balance is fair to see_!)
You don’t catch me o’er culture going mad.
(_The rarest of letters are £ s. d.!_)
As soon as I could paint I set my heart
On making money (else what good is Art?);
In painting show-bills ’twas I made my start.
(_O, sweet is the chink of cash to me!_)
I found the public vulgar scenes liked best,
(_A goodly balance is fair to see_!)
And so I painted my great “Crowner’s Quest;”
(_The rarest of letters are £ s. d._!)
And when its sordid realism took,
I gave them next my “Fair at Donnybrook.”
And “Tourists up the Rhine with Mr. Cook.”
(_O, sweet is the chink of cash to me!_)
These made my name, and then the Starch firm, Plums,
(_A goodly balance is fair to see_!)
To paint them posters gave me lordly sums;
(_The rarest of letters are £ s. d._!)
And there was not a hoarding but did bear
(Above my name, writ large,) a dainty pair
Of damsels, who starched collarettes did wear.
(_O, sweet is the chink of cash to me!_)
Since then I’ve turned my art to fresh accounts,
(_A goodly balance is fair to see_!)
And rival razors puffed for large amounts.
(_O, rarest of letters are £ s. d._!)
I’ve painted, too, with realistic tricks,
“The Penny Steamboat’s Progress” (set of six),
From Old Swan Pier, till at Vauxhall she sticks!
(_O, sweet is the chink of cash to me!_)
_Truth._ Christmas Number, 1882.
――――
LONDON TOWN.
_A Lyric à la Mode._
Kent-born HELEN, England’s pride,
(_O London Town_!)
Had a waist a world too wide
For the height of her heart’s desire.
Vinegar she in vain had tried.
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire_!)
HELEN knelt at Fashion’s shrine,
(_O London Town_!)
Saying, “A little boon is mine,
A little boon, but my heart’s desire.
Here me speak, and make me a sign!
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire!_)
“Look! my waist is in excess,
(_O London Town_!)
I would die to have it less.
Shape it to my heart’s desire.
Fit for fashionable dress.
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire!_)
“It is moulded like a Greek’s,
(_O London Town_!)
One of Nature’s spiteful freaks.
Pinch it to my heart’s desire:
I am full of pains and piques.
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire!_)
“See BELL FANE’S, how slim it is!
(_O London Town_!)
Eighteen inches at most, I wis!
Poisons the cup of my heart’s desire.
O that _I_ should suffer this!
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire!_)
“Yea, for straitness here I sue!
(_O London Town!_)
Antifat I find won’t do;
Give me, give me, my heart’s desire,
Three inches less, or at least full two.”
(_O London Town!
Fashion’s thralls ne’er tire!_)
(_Eight verses omitted._)
_Punch._ April 24, 1880.
――――
The following rather more serious imitation of Rossetti is from “_The
Diversions of the Echo Club_” by Bayard Taylor. Mr. Taylor remarks
that Rossetti’s poetry is encumbered with the burden of colour,
sensuous expression, and mediæval imagery and drapery; but he forgot
to mention that Rossetti wrote as an artist, and that some of his
finest poems were written to accompany, and to elucidate, certain of
his own pictures.
CIMABUELLA.
I.
Fair-tinted cheeks, clear eyelids drawn
In crescent curves above the light
Of eyes, whose dim, uncertain dawn
Becomes not day: a forehead white
Beneath long yellow heaps of hair:
She is so strange she must be fair.
II.
Had she sharp, slant-wise wings outspread,
She were an angel; but she stands
With flat dead gold behind her head,
And lilies in her long thin hands:
Her folded mantle, gathered in,
Falls to her feet as it were tin.
III.
Her nose is keen as pointed flame;
Her crimson lips no thing express;
And never dread of saintly blame
Held down her heavy eyelashes:
To guess what she were thinking of,
Precludeth any meaner love.
IV.
An azure carpet, fringed with gold,
Sprinkled with scarlet spots, I laid
Before her straight, cool feet unrolled:
But she nor sound nor movement made
(Albeit, I heard a soft, shy smile,
Printing her neck a moment’s while);
V.
And I was shamed through all my mind
For that she spake not, neither kissed,
But stared right past me. Lo! behind
Me stood, in pink and amethyst,
Sword-girt and velvet-doubleted,
A tall, gaunt youth, with frowzy head,
VI.
Wide nostrils in the air, dull eyes,
Thick lips that simpered, but, ah me!
I saw, with most forlorn surprise,
He was the Thirteenth Century,
I but the Nineteenth: then despair
Curdled beneath my curling hair.
VII.
O, Love and Fate! How could she choose
My rounded outlines, broader brain,
And my resuscitated Muse?
Some tears she shed, but whether pain
Or joy in him unlocked their source,
I could not fathom which, of course.
VIII.
But I from missals, quaintly bound,
With either and with clavichord
Will sing her songs of sovran sound:
Belike her pity will afford
Such faint return as suits a saint
So sweetly done in verse and paint.
――――:o:――――
THE LEAF.
Those who have read Rossetti’s lines, commencing
“Torn from your parent bough,
Poor leaf, all withered now,
Where go you?”
will remember that he gives them as translated from Leopardi. It is,
however, rather curious that Rossetti does not seem to have noticed
that Leopardi headed his little poem “Imitazione” thus distinctly
disclaiming the authorship.
The following is Leopardi’s version:――
IMITAZIONE.
Lungi dal proprio ramo,
Povera foglia frale
Dove vai tu? Dal faggio
Là dov’ io nacqui, mi divise il vento.
Esso, tornando, a volo
Dal bosco alla campagna,
Dalla valle mi porta alla montagna
Seco perpetuamente;
Vo pellegrino, e tutto l’altro ignoro.
Vo dove ogni altra cosa
Dove naturalmente
Va la foglia di rosa
E la foglia d’alloro.
Leopardi translated these lines from a collection of fables by A. V.
Arnault, Paris, 1826, where they are styled:――
DE LA TIGE DÉTACHÉE.
Pauvre feuille desséchée,
Ou vas-tu? Je n’en sais rien.
L’orage a brisé le chêne
Qui seul etait mon soutien.
De son inconstante haleine
Le zéphir ou l’acquilon
Depuis ce jour me promène
De la montagne à la plaine,
De la forêt au vallon,
Je vais où le vent me mène,
Hélas! sans trop m’effrayer;
Je vais où va toute chose,
Où va la feuille de rose,
Où va la feuille de laurier.
These lines had been previously translated into English, before
Rossetti, by Macaulay, as follows:――
Thou poor leaf, so sear and frail,
Sport of every wanton gale,
Whence and whither dost thou fly
Through this bleak autumnal sky?
On a noble oak I grew,
Green and broad and fair to view;
But the monarch of the shade
By the tempest low was laid.
From that time I wandered o’er
Wood and valley, hill and moor;
Wheresoe’er the wind is blowing,
Nothing caring, nothing knowing.
Thither go I whither goes
Glory’s laurel, Beauty’s rose.
Before leaving Rossetti mention must be made of a singular series of
illustrated parodies which appeared in _Punch_, March 3, 10, 17, 24
and 31, 1866. The illustrations, by Du Maurier, seem to have been
intended partly to ridicule Burne Jones’s style, and partly that of
Rossetti; as to the poem, it is of the ultra weird and sensational
ballad form, with a slight dash of the “Lady of Shalott” thrown in,
and the inevitable refrain, popularly supposed to be inseparable from
Pre-raffaelite art.
A LEGEND OF CAMELOT.
Tall _Braunighrindas_ left her bed
At cock-crow with an aching head,
_O Miserie!_
“I yearn to suffer and to do,”
She cried, “ere sunset, something new!
_O Miserie!_
“To do and suffer, ere I die,
I care not what. I know not why.
_O Miserie!_
“Some quest I crave to undertake,
Or burden bear, or trouble make.”
_O Miserie!_
She shook her hair about her form
In waves of colour bright and warm.
_O Miserie!_
It rolled and writhed and reached the floor;
A silver wedding-ring she wore.
_O Miserie!_
She left her tower, and wandered down
Into the High street of the town.
_O Miserie!_
Her pale feet glimmered, in and out,
Like tombstones as she went about.
_O Miserie!_
From right to left, and left to right;
And blue veins streakt her insteps white;
_O Miserie!_
And folks did ask her in the street
“How fared it with her long pale feet?”
_O Miserie!_
And blinkt, as though ’twere hard to bear
The red-heat of her blazing hair!
_O Miserie!_
Sir Galahad and Sir Launcelot
Came hand in hand down Camelot;
_O Miserie!_
Sir Gauwaine followed close behind;
A weight hung heavy on his mind.
_O Miserie!_
“Who knows this damsel, burning bright,”
Quoth Launcelot “like a northern light?”
_O Miserie!_
Quoth Sir Gauwaine: “I know her not!”
“Who quoth you _did_?” Quoth Launcelot.
_O Miserie!_
Then quoth the pure Sir Galahad;
“She seems, methinks, but lightly clad!”
_O Miserie!_
“Ah me!” sighed Launcelot where he stood,
“I cannot fathom it!” … (Who could?)
_O Miserie!_
* * * * *
――――:o:――――
The following beautiful sonnet written by Miss Christina Rossetti,
sister of D. G. Rossetti, appears in “_Goblin Market and other
Poems_,” published by Macmillan & Co., 1879:
REMEMBER.
Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for awhile
And afterwards remember, do not grieve;
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.
This appears to be almost the only poem by Miss Rossetti which has
tempted the mocking-bird to sing.
REMEMBER.
Remember it, although you’re far away――
Too far away more fivers yet to land,
When you no more can proffer notes of hand,
Nor I half yearn to change my yea to nay.
Remember, when no more in airy way,
You tell me of repayment sagely planned:
Only remember it, you understand!
It’s rather late to counsel you to pay;
Yet if you should remember for awhile,
And then forget it wholly, I should grieve;
For, though your light procrastinations leave
Small remnants of the hope that once I had,
Than that you should forget your debt and smile,
I’d rather you’d remember and be sad.
_Judy._ April 18, 1888.
――――
DING DONG.
_By Rosina Christelli._
Ding Dong, Ding Dong,
There goes the gong,
Dick, come along,
’Tis time for dinner.
Wash your face,
Take your place,
Where’s your grace
You little sinner?
“Like an apple?”
“Yes, I should.
Nice, nice, nicey!
Good, good, good!”
“Manners, Miss,
Please behave.
Those you ask
Shan’t have.”
“Those who don’t,
Don’t want.
I’ll eat it,
You shan’t.”
Baby cry,
Wipe his eye.
Baby good,
Give him food.
Baby sleepy,
Go to bed.
Baby naughty,
Smack his head!
Poor little thrush,
Found dead in a bush!
When did he die?
He is rather high.
Bury him deep,
He won’t keep.
Bury him well,
Or he’ll smell.
What have horns? Cows and moons.
What have crests? Cocks and spoons.
What are nice? Ducks and peas.
What are nasty? Bites of fleas.
What are fast? Tides and times.
What are slow? Nursery Rhymes.
From _The Light Green_. Cambridge, W. Metcalf and Sons, 1872.
[Illustration]
WILLIAM MORRIS.
The author of “The Earthly Paradise” is much more than a mere poet, he
is a thorough man of business, who works as an art designer, and
lectures on the social improvement of the people. His poetry was thus
amusingly criticised in _London_, 1877:――
RONDEL.
Behold the works of W. Morris,
Epics, and here and there wall-papery,
Mild, mooney, melancholy vapoury.
A sort of Chaucer _minus_ Horace.
Spun out like those of William Loris,
Who wrote of amourous red-tapery,
Behold the works of W. Morris,
Epics, and here and there wall-papery!
Long ladies, knights, and earles and choris-
ters in the most appropriate drapery,
Samite and silk and spotless napery,
Sunflowers and apple-blossoms and orris,
Behold the works of W. Morris!
――――
There are not many good parodies of Mr. Morris, the following is one
of the best, though where it first appeared, or by whom it was
written, cannot be stated:――
In the cushioned Abbey pew
There is space for Me and You.
Twine the blossoms in my hair;
Never mind if people stare――
Never mind, for none knowèth
If one flirteth after death!
Hark――the organ shakes the pew!
Would it were for Me and You!
Yea, I would indeed it were!
Are they staring? Let them stare!
Never mind, for none knowèth
If one laugheth after death!
We will slumber in the pew――
I am weary, so are you,
And the cushions in repair!
Let the British public stare!
Never mind, for none knowèth
If one sleepeth after death!
――――
ALL SIDES OF THE RIVER.
_The Maidens._
We, with distaste, across the water wan,
The broadcloth of our modern lovers scan;
We each prefer a mediæval man.
_The Youths._
We would not reach you, if we could dry-shod;
Not one of us would change, for even, his odd;
The Girl we like not of the Period.
_The Mothers._
O daughters! make your markets while you can,
For bloom soon groweth like the water wan;
The early bird picks up the marrying man.
_The Maidens._
Perhaps, O lovers, if we did our hair
_A la_ Medea, and if our garments were
Draped classically, we should seem more fair.
_The Youths._
By doing this ye would not us befool;
Medea! the idea makes our blood run cool,
Besides of classics we’d enough at school.
_The Boys._
Come, I say, now, the girls can darn, and hem,
And cook a chop, and clean a meerschaum-stem;
Our sisters take, we are so tired of them.
_The Maidens._
Perhaps if ruffs around our necks were tied,
Or you with idiotic stare we eyed
All angles, with our heads upon one side,
In short, the middle age style――
_The Widows._
Suitors! stay,
We are less far from middle age than they.
_The Youths._
Maidens, we then to you would make our way.
_The Maidens_,
Cross ye the water wan, then,――
_Mr. Swinburne._
I demur
To “water wan,” it comes too often, sir;
Write next, as I should, rhyming, “wan water,”
_The Maidens._
Lovers, we pray you, gaining our consents,
Let us, too, have _our_ mediæval bents,
Give us, for cricket-matches, tournaments.
_The Widowers._
We are stout, nor will uncomfortably truss
Our arms and legs, like fowls; no jousts for us,
In armour we should look ridiculous.
_The Fathers._
Of money, tournaments would cost a heap:
Humour your sweethearts, sons, with something cheap
But look to settlements before you leap.
_The Youths._
O maidens! we in verse will call you queens,
And publicly extol your minds and miens,
Sending our poems to the magazines.
_The Maidens._
Sith of Life’s arches bloom hath shortest span,
We will give up our mediæval man,
And meet you half way in the water wan.
_The Editors._
Alas! the maidens have removed their ban,
We, vex’d with verses vile, e’en when they scan,
Shall very soon be as the water wan.
ANONYMOUS.
_Once a Week._ February 20, 1869.
――――
THE MONTHLY PARODIES.
AN APOLOGY.
_After William Morris’s “Earthly Paradise.”_
Of Love or War this is no hour to sing,
But I may ease the burden of your fears
(Lest you think death to mirth is happening),
And quote from wit of past and present years,
Till o’er these pages you forget your tears,
And smile again, as presently you say
Some idle jingle――or forgotten lay.
But when a-weary of the hunt for mirth
Thro’ comic journals, with a doleful sigh,
You feel unkindly unto all the earth,
And grudge the pennies that they cost to buy
These “weakly comics,” lingering like to die,
Remember, then, a little while, I pray,
The clever singers of a former day.
The pomp and power and grand majestic air
That marches thro’ their poems’ stately tread,
These idle verses may catch unaware,
And by burlesque call back remembered
Some rhymes “that living not can ne’er be dead,”
Though what is meant by that I cannot say――
But Mr. Morris wrote it one fine day.
Here grouped are strains of parody in rhyme,
Now classified and placed in order straight,
Let it suffice it for the present time
That some be old, while some are born but late,
A careful choice, from all the crowd that wait,
Of those that in forgotten serials stay,
Or are, in passing journals, tossed away.
Folks say a wizard to a common King,
One April-tide such wondrous jest did show
That in a mirror men beheld each thing,
Like, yet unlike, and saw the pale nose glow,
While rosy face looked white as fallen snow,
Each visage altered in such comic way
That those who came to court, remain’d to play.
So with these many Parodies it is,
If you will read aright and carefully,
Not scathing satire, nor malicious hiss
For lack of beauty in the themes to see;
Nor jeerings coarse, at what men prize, as we
But jest to make some little changeling play
Its pranks in classic robes, all crowned with bay.
GLEESON WHITE.
[Illustration]
OSCAR WILDE.
It would be useless to attempt to give any parodies on the poems of
Mr. Oscar Wilde without prefacing them with some account, however
brief, of his career. In a few of the skits the allusions are already
out of date, and in a short time the reasons will be quite forgotten
that led to the silly ridicule and misrepresentations of which Mr.
Oscar Wilde, as the Apostle of Æstheticism, was formerly the object.
Mr. Oscar O’Flahertie Wills Wilde was born in Dublin on October 15,
1856. His father, Sir William R. Wilde, was an eminent surgeon, and a
man of literary tastes and great archæological learning.
In 1851 Sir William (then Mr.) Wilde married a granddaughter of
Archdeacon Elgee, of Wexford, a lady well known in literary circles in
Dublin as having written many poems which were published in the
_Nation_ newspaper at the time of the political excitement in 1848.
They appeared over the _nom de plume_ “Speranza,” and were afterwards
published in a collected form, entitled “Poems by Speranza.”
Mr. Oscar Wilde early developed talents such as might have been
expected in the son of highly gifted parents. Having spent about a
year at Portora Royal School, Enniskillen, Mr. Wilde studied for a
year at Trinity College, Dublin, where he obtained a classical
scholarship at the early age of sixteen, and in 1874, won the Berkeley
Gold Medal for Greek, the topic selected for that year being the Greek
Comic Poets. Thence he went to Magdalen College, Oxford, where he
obtained a first scholarship.
He soon began to show his taste for art and china, and before he had
been at Oxford very long, his rooms were the show of the college, and
of the university too. He was fortunate enough to obtain the best
situated rooms in the college, on what is called the kitchen
staircase, having a lovely view over the river Cherwell and the
beautiful Magdalen walks, and Magdalen bridge. His rooms were three in
number, and the walls were entirely panelled. The two sitting rooms
were connected by an arch, where folding doors had at one time stood.
His blue china was supposed by connoisseurs to be very valuable and
fine, and there was plenty of it. He was hospitable, and on Sunday
nights after “Common Room,” his rooms were generally the scene of
conviviality, where undergraduates of all descriptions and tastes were
to be met, drinking punch, or a B. and S. with their cigars. It was at
one of these entertainments that he made his well-known remark, “Oh,
that I could live up to my blue china!”
Besides minor scholarships, he took the Newdigate, a prize for English
verse, in 1878, and a first in _Literis Humanioribus_, after which he
took his degree.
During this period he produced a number of poems, these were
published, some in _The Month_, others in the _Catholic Monitor_, and
the _Irish Monthly_. A number of his short poems also appeared in
_Kottabos_, a small magazine written by members of Trinity College,
Dublin.
The first number of Mr. Edmund Yates’s _Time_, April 1879, contained a
short poem by Oscar Wilde, entitled “The Conqueror of Time,” and to
the July number he contributed “The New Helen.” Some of the foregoing
poems, with others not previously published, appeared in a volume,
entitled “Poems” by Oscar Wilde, published in 1881 by David Bogue,
which speedily ran through several editions.
When referring to this volume in “The Æsthetic Movement in England”
mention was made of Mr. Wilde’s exquisite little poem
REQUIESCAT.
Tread lightly, she is near,
Under the snow,
Speak gently, she can hear
The daises grow.
All her bright golden hair
Tarnished with rust,
She that was young and fair,
Fallen to dust.
Lily-like, white as snow,
She hardly knew
She was a woman, so
Sweetly she grew.
Coffin board, heavy stone,
Lie on her breast,
I vex my heart alone,
SHE is at rest.
Peace, peace, she cannot hear
Lyre or sonnet,
All my life’s buried here,
Heap earth upon it.
concerning which Mr. G. A. Sala wrote to the Editor (on August 17,
1882.) “I note your book for a proximate ‘Echo.’ I have not read Oscar
Wilde’s poems, but in the very sweet stanzas (‘Requiescat’) which you
quote, I mark a singular passage:――
“All her bright golden air,
Tarnished with rust.”
Golden hair (_experto crede_) does _not_ tarnish in the tomb. Read the
last paragraph in Zola’s _Nana_, which physiologically, is
astoundingly accurate.”
Faithfully always,
_George Augustus Sala_.
The passage relating to the death of _Nana_ runs thus:―― “Et, sur ce
masque horrible et grotesque du néant, les cheveux, les beaux cheveux
gardant leur flambée de soleil, coulaient en un ruissellement d’or,
Vénus se décomposait.”
It is also necessary to refer, here to Mr. Wilde’s career in the two
other capacities he has assumed of _Art Lecturer_, and _Dress
Reformer_.
The interest in the Æsthetic School had sometime since spread to the
United States, and when the opera of _Patience_ was produced it
occurred to Mr. Wilde that a visit to the States to give some
lectures, explanatory of _real Æstheticism_ as it exists amongst us,
might interest and possibly instruct and elevate our transatlantic
cousins.
In some of his early utterances he was unguarded; he admitted, for
instance, that he was not strongly impressed with the mighty ocean,
and great was the flow of wit from this small cause:――
“There’s _Oscar Wilde_, that gifted chylde,
Fair Poesie’s anointed,
Has, like a brick, the Atlantic
Crossed, to be disappointed.
Poor Oscar Wilde, æsthetic chylde;
The Atlantic ought to know it!
A fault so grave to misbehave,
And disappoint a poet!”
He went to Omaha, where, under the auspices of the Social Art Club, he
delivered a lecture on “Decorative Art,” in the course of which he
described his impressions of many American houses as being “illy
designed, decorated shabbily, and in bad taste, and filled with
furniture that was not honestly made, and was out of character.” This
statement gave rise to the following verses:――
“What a shame and what a pity,
In the streets of London City
_Mr. Wilde_ is seen no more.
Far from Piccadilly banished,
He to Omaha has vanished,
Horrid place, which _swells_ ignore.
On his back a coat he beareth,
Such as Sir John Bennett weareth,
Made of velvet――strange array!
Legs _Apollo_ might have sighed for,
Or great _Hercules_ have died for,
His knee breeches now display.
Waving sunflower and lily,
He calls all the houses “illy”
Decorated and designed.
For of taste they’ve not a tittle;
They may chew and they may whittle;
But they are all born colour blind!”
From the States he went to Canada, and thence to Nova Scotia, the
Halifax _Morning Herald_ of October 10, 1882, gave an amusing account
of an interview held with him by their own “Interviewer.” “The apostle
had no lily, nor yet a sunflower. He wore a velvet jacket which seemed
to be a good jacket. He had an ordinary necktie and wore a linen
collar about number eighteen on a neck half a dozen sizes smaller. His
legs were in trousers, and his boots were apparently the product of
New York art, judging by their pointed toes. His hair is the colour of
straw, slightly leonine, and when not looked after, goes climbing all
over his features. Mr. Wilde was communicative and genial; he said he
found Canada pleasant, but in answer to a question as to whether
European or American women were the more beautiful, he dexterously
evaded his querist.”
The remainder of the conversation was devoted to poetry; he expressed
his opinion that Poe was the greatest American poet, and that Walt
Whitman, if not a poet, is a man who sounds a strong note, perhaps
neither prose nor poetry, but something of his own that is grand,
original and unique.
On this topic _The Century_, for November, 1882, contained an
exquisitely humorous poem written by Helen Gray Cone, describing an
imaginary interview between Oscar Wilde and the great poetical
Egotist――Walt Whitman. The style and diction of both are admirably hit
off. The parody of Whitman reads, indeed, like an excerpt from his
works.
Unfortunately, as the poem is very long, only an extract can be
given:――
NARCISSUS IN CAMDEN.
(“_In the course of his lecture, Mr. Wilde remarked that the most
impressive room he had yet entered in America was the one in Camden
Town, where he met Walt Whitman. It contained plenty of fresh air and
sunlight. On the table was a simple cruse of water._”)
_Paumanokides. Narcissus._
_Paumanokides_:
Who may this be?
This young man clad unusually with loose locks, languorous, glidingly
toward me advancing,
Toward the ceiling of my chamber his orbic and expressive eyeballs
uprolling,
As I have seen the green-necked wild fowl, the mallard, in the
thunderings of the storm,
By the weedy shore of Paumanok my fish-shaped island,
Sit down, young man!
I do not know you, but I love you with burning intensity,
I am he that loves the young men, whosoever and wheresoever they are
or may be hereafter, or may have been any time in the past,
Loves the eye-glassed literat, loves also and probably more the
vendor of clams, raucous-throated, monotonous chanting,
Loves the elevated Railroad employée of Manahatta,
My city;
I suppress the rest of the list of the persons I love, solely because
I love you,
Sit down, _élève_, I receive you!
_Narcissus._
O clarion, from whose brazen throat
Strange sounds across the seas are blown,
Where England, girt as with a moat,
A strong sea-lion sits alone!
A pilgrim from that white-cliffed shore,
What joy, large flower of Western land!
To seek thy democratic door,
With eager hand to clasp thy hand!
_Paumanokides._
Right you are!
Take then the electric pressure of these fingers,
O my Comrade!
* * * * *
Dear son, I have learned the secret of the Universe,
I learned it from my original _bonne_, the white-capped ocean,
The secret of the Universe is not Beauty, dear son,
Nor is it Art, the perpetuator of Beauty,
The secret of the Universe is to admire one’s self.
Camerado, you hear me!
_Narcissus._
Ah, I too loitering on an eve of June
Where one wan narciss leaned above a pool,
While overhead Queen Dian rose too soon,
And through the Tyrian clematis the cool
Night avis came wandering wearily, I too,
Beholding that pale flower, beheld Life’s key at last, and knew
That love of one’s fair self were but indeed
Just worship of pure Beauty; and I gave
One sweet sad sigh, then bade my fond eyes feed
Upon the mirrored treasure of the wave,
Like that lithe beauteous boy in Tempe’s vale,
Whom hapless Echo loved――thou knowest the Heliconian tale!
And while heaven’s harmony in lake and gold
Changed to a faint nocturne in silvern gray,
Like rising sea-mists from my spirit rolled
The grievous vapors of this Age of Clay,
Beholding Beauty’s re-arisen Shrine,
And the white glory of this precious loveliness of mine!
* * * * *
Haply in the far, the orient future,
In the dawn we herald like the birds,
Men shall read the legend of our meeting,
Linger o’er the music of our words;
Haply coming poets shall compare me
Then to Milton in his lovely youth,
Sitting in the cell of Galileo,
Learning at his elder’s lips the truth.
Haply they shall liken these dear moments,
Safely held in History’s amber clear,
Unto Dante’s converse bland with Virgil,
On the margin of that gloomy mere!
_Paumanokides._
Do not be deceived, dear son;
Amid the chorusses of the morn of progress, roaring, hilarious, those
names will be heard no longer.
Galileo was admirable once, Milton was admirable,
Dante the _I_-talian was a cute man in his way,
But he was not the maker of poems, the answerer!
I, Paumanokides, am the maker of poems, the answerer,
And I calculate to chant as long as the earth revolves,
To an interminable audience of haughty, effusive, copious, gritty,
and chipper Americanos!
_Narcissus._
What more is left to say or do?
Our minds have met; our hands must part.
I go to plant in pastures new
The love of Beauty and of Art,
I’ll shortly start.
One town is rather small for two
Like me and you!
_Paumanokides._
So long!
――――
_Punch_ also had a very funny burlesque description of
“OSCAR INTERVIEWED.
“_New York, Jan._, 1882.
“Determined to anticipate the rabble of penny-a-liners ready
to pounce upon any distinguished foreigner who approaches
our shores, and eager to assist a sensitive Poet in avoiding
the impertinent curiosity and ill-bred insolence of the
Professional Reporter, I took the fastest pilot-boat on the
station, and boarded the splendid Cunard steamer, _The
Boshnia_, in the shucking of a pea-nut.
“HIS ÆSTHETIC APPEARANCE.
“He stood, with his large hand passed through his long hair,
against a high chimney-piece――which had been painted
pea-green, with panels of peacock blue pottery let in at
uneven intervals――one elbow on the high ledge, the other
hand on his hip. He was dressed in a long, snuff-coloured,
single-breasted coat, which reached to his heels, and was
relieved with a seal-skin collar and cuffs rather the worse
for wear. Frayed linen, and an orange silk handkerchief gave
a note to the generally artistic colouring of the
_ensemble_, while one small daisy drooped despondently in
his button-hole.
“HIS GLORIOUS PAST.
“Precisely――I took the Newdigate. Oh! no doubt, every year
some man gets the Newdigate; but not every year does
Newdigate get an Oscar. Since then――barely three years, but
centuries to such as I am――I have stood upon the steps of
London Palaces――in South Kensington――and preached Æsthetic
art. I have taught the wan beauty to wear nameless robes,
have guided her limp limbs into sightless knots and curving
festoons, while we sang of the sweet sad sin of Swinburne,
or the lone delight of soft communion with Burne-Jones.
Swinburne had made a name, and Burne-Jones had copied
illuminations e’er the first silky down had fringed my upper
lip, but the Trinity of Inner Brotherhood was not complete
till I came forward, like the Asphodel from the wilds of
Arcady, to join in sweet antiphonal counterchanges with the
Elder Seers. We are a Beautiful Family――we are, we are, we
are!”
“Yes; I expect my Lecture will be a success. So does Dollar
Carte――I mean D’Oyly Carte. Too-Toothless Senility may jeer,
and poor positive Propriety may shake her rusty curls; but I
am here, to pipe of Passion’s venturous Poesy, and reap the
scorching harvest of Self-Love! I am not quite sure what I
mean. The true Poet never is. In fact, true Poetry is
nothing if it is intelligible.
“HIS KOSMIC SOUL.
“Oh, yes! I speak most languages; in the sweet honey-tinted
brogue my own land lends me. _La bella Donna della mia
Mente_ exists, but she is not the Jersey Lily, though I have
grovelled at her feet; she is not the Juno Countess, though
I have twisted my limbs all over her sofas; she is not the
Polish Actress, though I have sighed and wept over all the
boxes of the Court Theatre; she is not the diaphanous Sarah,
though I have crawled after her footsteps through the heavy
fields of scentless Asphodel; she is not the golden haired
Ellen, more fair than any woman Veronesé looked upon, though
I have left my _Impressions_ on many and many a seat in the
Lyceum Temple, where she is High Priestess; nor is she one
of the little Nameless Naiads I have met in Lotus-haunts,
who, with longing eyes, watch the sweet bubble of the
frenzied grape. No, Sir, my real Love is my own Kosmic Soul,
enthroned in its flawless essence; and when America can
grasp the supreme whole I sing in too-too utterance for
vulgar lips, then soul and body will blend in mystic
symphonies; then, crowned with bellamours and wanton
flower-de-luce, I shall be hailed Lord of a new Empery, and
as I stain my lips in the bleeding wounds of the
Pomegranate, and wreathe my o’ergrown limbs with the
burnished disk of the Sunflower, Apollo will turn pale and
lashing the restive horses of the Sun, the tamer chariot of
a forgotten god will make way for the glorious zenith of the
one Oscar Wilde.”
Since his return from America Mr. Oscar Wilde has settled in London,
and is known in society as a genial and witty gentleman, and a
particularly graceful after-dinner speaker. He is the Editor of _The
Woman’s World_, a very high class magazine, published by Cassell and
Co., in which he has ample opportunities of advocating his favourite
_cult_, the worship of the beautiful in Nature and in Art.
――――
SAINTE MARGÉRIE.
_An Imitation._
Slim feet than lilies tenderer,――
_Margérie!_
That scarce upbore the body of her,
Naked upon the stones they were;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
White as a shroud the silken gown,――
_Margérie!_
That flowed from shoulder to ankle down,
With clear blue shadows along it thrown;
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
On back and bosom withouten braid,――
_Margérie!_
In crisped glory of darkling red,
Round creamy temples her hair was shed;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
Eyes like a dim sea, viewed from far,――
_Margérie!_
Lips that no earthly love shall mar,
More sweet than lips of mortals are;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
The chamber walls are cracked and bare;――
_Margérie!_
Without the gossips stood astare
At men her bed away that bare;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
Five pennies lay her hand within,――
_Margérie!_
So she her fair soul’s weal might win,
Little she recked of dule or teen;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
Dank straw from dunghill gathered,
_Margérie!_
Where fragrant swine have made their bed,
Thereon her body shall be laid;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
Three pennies to the poor in dole,――
_Margérie!_
One to the clerk her knell shall toll,
And one to masses for her soul;――
_C’est ça Sainte Margérie!_
From _Poems and Parodies_. By Two Undergrads. Oxford. B. H. Blackwell,
1880.
(This little paper-covered pamphlet was originally published at the
price of one shilling; it was withdrawn from circulation, and is
consequently very scarce.)
――――
SITTING UP ALL NIGHT WITH A LILY.
Oh, fulsome the joy of the fading light!
_Oh, fainting of lilies with broken stem!_
When you feel too utterly almost quite,
_The sunflowers love, yet love not them_!
Oh, weird is the feeling of thoughtsome doubt
When candles, and lamps, and gas are out,
And burglarious Philistines prowl about,
_Chill is the air at four a.m._!
Oh, mystic the eyelids all drowsy grown!
_Oh, fainting of lilies with broken stem!_
Oh, twitching of limbs that are scarce your own,
_The sunflowers love, yet love not them_!
Oh, baleful blessing, the wistful wist
Of matters that have not, nor can exist!
Oh, say, have you noticed the gladsome list?
_Chill is the air at four a.m.!_
You think of your bed with remorseful tears,
_Oh, fainting of lilies with broken stem_!
While sounds of the silence attack your ears,
_The sunflowers love, yet love not them_!
Oh, mythic deeds by the sightless seen!
Oh, lovely past of the has not been!
Oh, what in the world do I chance to mean?
_Chill is the air at four a.m.!_
_Fun’s Academy Skits_. 1882.
――――
AN UTTER PASSION UTTERED UTTERLY.
Meseem’d that Love, with swifter feet than fire,
Brought me my Lady crown’d with amorous burs,
And drapen in tear-collar’d minivers,
Sloped saltire wise in token of desire;
My heart she soak’d in tears, and on a pyre
Laid, for Love’s sake, in folds of fragrant perse,
The while her face, more fair than sunflowers,
She gave mine eyes for pasture most entire.
Sicklike she seem’d, as with wan-carven smiles
Some deal she moved anear, and thereunto
Thrice paler wox, and weaker than blown sand
Upon the passioning ocean’s beached miles;
And as her motion’s music nearer drew
My starved lips play’d the vampyre with her hand.
JOHN TODHUNTER.
_Kottabos._ Dublin, William McGee. 1882.
――――
AN ÆSTHETE’S RHAPSODY.
Consummate Dish! full many an ancient crack
Is seamed across thy venerable back;
And even through to thine æsthetic face
Cracks run to lend a more enchanting grace!
What matter though the epicure now loses
The juice which through thy gaping fissures oozes?
Thrice happy Table-cloth, thou knowest not
The too-_too_ beauty of yon greasy spot,
To think that with a little vulgar butter,
This High Art Dish can make thee look so utter.
_Harper’s Bazaar._
――――
In 1881 and 1882 _Punch_ teemed with parodies on Oscar Wilde, one of
the best appeared May 28, 1881:――
MORE IMPRESSIONS.
(_By Oscuro Wildegoose._)
_La Fuite des Oies._
To outer senses they are geese,
Dull drowsing by a weedy pool;
But try the impression trick, Cool! Cool!
Snow-slumbering sentinels of Peace!
Deep silence on the shadowy flood
Save rare sharp stridence (_that means “quack”_).
Low amber light in Ariel track
Athwart the dun (_that means the mud_).
And suddenly subsides the sun,
Bulks mystic, ghostly, thrid the gloom
(_That means the white geese waddling home_),
And darkness reigns! (_See how it’s done?_)
The titles of some others are;――
April 9, 1881. _A Maudle-in Ballad to his Lily._
June 23, 1881. _Maunderings at Marlow._
October 1, 1881. _The Æsthete to the Rose._
November 26, 1881. _The Downfall of the Dado._
January 14, 1882. _Murder made Easy._
March 31, 1883. _Sage Green, by a Fading-out Æsthete._
this latter contained the following verses:――
My love is as fair as a lily flower.
(_The Peacock Hue has a sacred sheen!_)
Oh, bright are the blooms in her maiden bower.
(_Sing Hey! Sing Ho! for the sweet Sage Green!_)
Her face is as wan as the water white.
(_The Peacock blue has a sacred sheen!_)
Her eyes are as stars on a moonlit night.
(_Sing Hey! Sing Ho! for the sweet Sage Green!_)
The China plate it is pure on the wall.
(_The Peacock blue has a sacred sheen!_)
Alack! she heedeth it never at all.
(_Sing Hey! Sing Ho! for the sweet Sage Green!_)
* * * * *
――――
THE PUBLIC HOUSE.
(_With apologies to Oscar Wilde’s “The Harlot’s House.”_)
We wandered home with weary feet,
We lumbered down the lamp-lit street,
And stopped beneath a public-house.
Outside, in just the usual way,
We heard the grand old cornet play
A carol to the _wild_ carouse.
Like smell of spirits came the blast
Of heated air that streetward passed,
As “Out yer go” were shoved “the blind.”
We watched the reeling roysterers spin
From scene of revelry within,
Like those who’d left their legs behind.
Like idiots they, of foolish face,
With grinning, ghastly-pale grimace,
They looked so very, very ill!
They took each other by the arm,
As if in that there were a charm,
In short they had had quite their fill.
Sometimes a man who out was set
Went through the swearing alphabet.
Or p’r’aps he’d homeward start and sing.
Then turning round to go, I said,
“It’s after hours, I’ll home to bed,
I will not wait the outward rush!”
Just then the Bobby heard the din,
And after knocking, entered in,
Law passed into the House of Sin.
Then suddenly the cornet stopped,
The thrumming harp’s drear music dropped,
The house it seemed its sails to furl.
And down the long and noisy street
The staggering legs of “whisky neat”
Crawled headlong in a whirl.
TRAMWAY TAME.
_The Sporting Times._ June 13, 1885.
――――
A “ROSE” BALL.
A Rose, or Maidens’ Ball took place, in July 1885, at Hyde Park House,
which was lent for the occasion by Mrs. Naylor-Leyland. It was a
complete success, in spite of the absence of Royalty. As a social
gathering, it was the smartest dance of the season, while, from a
girl’s point of view, there has been no ball in London to equal it for
many a day. Each fair donor paid five pounds, for which she was
allowed to ask five men, and in almost every case the favoured five
put in an appearance; so instead of the dancing-rooms being filled
with girls anxiously looking for partners, the tables were turned, and
the black coats had to take their turn at playing wallflowers――an
amusement, to judge from some of their remarks, that they did not all
appreciate. Each maiden carried a bouquet of roses, and almost all the
floral decorations were confined to various varieties of the same
flower.
Five-and-seventy maidens, free,
Bent on dancing, one and all,
Did some weeks ago decree
They, themselves, would give a ball.
Each, they said, would ask five men
Who at waltzing were _au fait_.
Settled was their project then,
They had even fixed the day!
Ah, miserie!
For these dancing maidens found
That a certain potent Prince,
When he heard their details, frowned,
His displeasure to evince.
“This,” said he, “must not be so!”
“That,” he quoth, “should not be thus!”
Till the maidens’ tears did flow,
As they murmured “Woe to us!
Ah, miserie!”
These same maidens, though, were wise,
And soon ceased to weep or wince;
Nor would they their plans revise,
E’en to please a potent Prince,
But resolved to merry be,
Even though he would not come,
Much enjoyed their dance, whilst he
Had to moan in accents glum――
“Ah, miserie!”
_Truth._ July 16, 1885.
――――
AN UN-ÆSTHETIC LOVE SONG.
A barrel of beer and a glass of gin hot
Are goodly gifts for me;
For my own true love a half-gallon pot
Filled to the brim with tea.
For thee a bloater from Yarmouth town
(Fresh, O fresh, is a fish of the sea!);
For me some beef, and, to wash it down,
A pint of porter (ah me! ah me!).
Sherbet and zoedone for thee
(Teetotal drinks have taking names!);
A cup of claret and pink for me
(O! men are stronger than dames!)
From _Ballades of a Country Bookworm_, by Thomas Hutchinson. London,
Stanesby & Co. 1888.
――――
QUITE THE CHEESE.
_By a Wilde Æsthete._
There once was a maiden who loved a cheese
_Sing, hey! potatoes and paint!_
She could eat a pound and a half with ease!
_O the odorous air was faint!_
What was the cheese that she loved the best?
_Sing, hey! red pepper and rags!_
You will find it out if you read the rest;
_Oh, the horror of frowning crags!_
Came lovers to woo her from ev’ry land――
_Sing, hey! fried bacon and files!_
They asked for her heart, but they meant her hand,
_O the joy of the Happy Isles._
A haughty old Don from Oporto came;
_Sing, hey! new carrots and nails!_
The Duke GORGONZOLA his famous name
_O the lusciously-scented gales!_
LORD STILTON belonged to a mighty line!
_Sing, hey! salt herrings and stones!_
He was “Blue” as china――his taste divine!
_O the sweetness of dulcet tones._
Came stout DOUBLE GLO’STER――a man and wife
_Sing, hey! post pillars and pies!_
And the son was SINGLE, and fair as fate;
_O the purple of sunset skies!_
DE CAMEMBERT came from his sunny France
_Sing, hey! pork cutlets and pearls!_
He would talk sweet nothings, and sing and dance
_O the sighs of the soft sweet girls._
Came GRUYERE so pale! a most hole-y-man!
_Sing, hey! red sandstone and rice!_
But the world saw through him as worldlings can
_O the breezes from Isles of Spice._
But the maiden fair loved no cheese but one
_Sing, hey! acrostics and ale!_
Save for single Glo’ster she love had none!
_O the roses on fair cheeks pale!_
He was fair and single――and so was she!
_Sing hey! tomatoes and tar!_
And so _now_ you know which it is to be!
_O the aid of a lucky star!_
They toasted the couple the livelong night
_Sing hey! cast-iron and carp!_
And engaged a poet this song to write.
_O the breathing Æolian harp!_
So he wrote this ballad at vast expense!
_Sing, hey! pump-handles and peas!_
And, though _you_ may think it devoid of sense,
O _he_ fancies it QUITE THE CHEESE!
H. C. WARING.
[Illustration]
ARTHUR W. E. O’SHAUGHNESSY.
Was born in 1844, and at the age of twenty obtained a position in the
Natural History Department of the British Museum. In 1873 he married
Miss Eleanor Marston, who assisted her husband in some of his early
works, especially in a volume entitled “Toyland,” published in 1875.
But Mrs. O’Shaughnessy and her two children all died in 1879, and the
unfortunate young poet did not long survive them, he dying in London
early in 1881.
His early books――“An Epic of Women” (1870); and “Lays of France”
(1872), were successful, but “Music and Moonlight” (1874), was coldly
received.
BLUE MOONSHINE.
_By O’pshawnessy._
Mingled aye with fragrant yearnings,
Throbbing in the mellow glow,
Glint the silvery spirit burnings,
Pearly blandishments of woe.
Ay! for ever and for ever,
Whilst the love-lorn censers sweep,
Whilst the jasper winds dissever,
Amber-like, the crystal deep;
Shall the soul’s delirious slumber,
Sea-green vengeance of a kiss,
Teach despairing crags to number
Blue infinities of bliss.
FRANCIS G. STOKES.
This parody originally appeared in _The Shotover Papers_, Oxford, May
1874.
――――
“FRANGIPANNI.”
_By O’Sh******sy._
Untwine those ringlets! Ev’ry dainty clasp
That shines like twisted sunlight in my eye
Is but the coiling of the jewelled asp
That smiles to see men die.
Oh, cobra-curlèd! Fierce-fanged fair one! Draw
Night’s curtain o’er the landscape of thy hair!
I yield! I kneel! I own, I bless thy law
That dooms me to despair.
I mark the crimson ruby of thy lips,
I feel the witching weirdness of thy breath!
I droop! I sink into my soul’s eclipse,――
I fall in love with death!
And yet, vouchsafe a moment! I would gaze
Once more into those sweetly-murderous eyes,
Soft glimmering athwart the pearly haze
That smites to dusk the skies!
Hast thou no pity? Must I darkly tread
The unknown paths that lead me wide from thee?
Hast though no garland for this aching head
That soon so low must be?
No sound? No sigh? No smile? Is _all_ forgot?
Then spin my shroud out of that golden skein
Thou call’st thy tresses! _I_ shall stay thee not――
My struggles were but vain!
But shall I see thee far beyond the sun,
When the new dawn lights empyrean scenes?
What matters now? I know the poem’s done,
And wonder what the dickens it all means!
_Judy._ July 21, 1880.
[Illustration]
Here is another parody of Mr. C. S. Calverley’s style:――
ON THE RIVER.
It is sweet to sip the breezes
In September; and it pleases
Folks like me, whose work decreases
When its hot,
To depart from one’s landlady,
Very shortly after pay-day,
And to settle in some shady
Kind of spot.
In September I am lazy,
And my thoughts are rather mazy,
So I love the aspect hazy
Of some glade,
When the autumn moon uprises
O’er the hill, and me surprises,
Talking trash that full of sighs is,
To that maid.
She has eyes that seem to twinkle,
Like the pin-impaled winkle,
When the fish-wife dares to sprinkle
It with spice;
And her chestnut-tinted tresses,
That provoke a man’s caresses,
Haunt her swain till he confesses
She _is_ nice.
Sometimes, when the day has faded,
And the moonbeams have invaded
Every nook that is unshaded
From their gleam,
Chloe, who is very knowing
In the noble art of rowing,
Vaguely drops a hint of going
Down the stream.
’Neath the branches of a willow,
With the drifted sedge for pillow,
Cradled on the silver billow
Lies a boat,
Which I speedily untether,
And we drift away together,
Like two beetles on a feather
That’s afloat.
Couched in shadow that so still is,
Dreamy, large-eyed waterlilies
Stare astonished at us sillies
Up above:
Doubtless, with a timid flutter
Of propriety, they mutter
Sentiments I dare not utter,
About love.
Wretched things! with no affections,
And with very bad complexions;
We can suffer your objections
And your snubs;
By your taunts we won’t be maddened,
And shall be surprised and gladdened,
If our true love be not saddened
By worse rubs.
ANONYMOUS.
[Illustration]
“GEORGY.”
(_After J. Ashby-Sterry._)
I know you, little winsome sweet,
You heroine of childish orgy;
What dance would ever be complete
Without our rosy, romping Georgy?
Straight as a dart, of which the sting
Lurks in a pair of pearl-gray eyes;
Slight, but the roundest lissome thing
As o’er the well-chalked floor she flies.
Nor can I say there is concealed
At ev’ry airy pirouette
The frill (not often so revealed!)
Of such a dainty pantalette!
Her little boots with silver heels
Ring on the boards as round she whirls――
I wonder if the darling feels
She cuts out all the other girls?
There is a saucy cock of chin,
A semblance of a conscious power
To stake (with ev’ry chance to win!)
The bud against the fallen flower.
Who knows these little maidens’ dreams?
Unsullied,――but with mischief fraught:
How like a woman Georgy seems,
Yet by what subtle instinct taught?
The question’s vague!――some day, perhaps,
She’ll find the answer, for the rogue is
A match, at twelve, for most young chaps,
And right away beyond us fogies.
For _me_,――I sit and watch her twirls,
Then wend me home and smoke my pipe,
That whispers “These delightful girls,
Thank goodness are in _Sterry-o-type_!”
R. REECE.
_Judy._ June 30, 1880.
It should be mentioned, in connection with Mr. J. Ashby-Sterry, that
_The Muse in Manacles_, quoted on page 64, was from his pen.
FREDERICK LOCKER-LAMPSON.
It should have been mentioned, in connection with the poems of this
gentleman, that illustrated articles concerning his life and works
appeared in _Once a Week_, September 7, 1872, and _The Century_,
February, 1883. Both contained portraits, the one in _The Century_
having been drawn by Mr. George Du Maurier. Mr. Locker’s poem “St.
James’s Street,” (see page 56) originally appeared in _The Times_, in
1867.
[Illustration]
BALLADES, RONDEAUS, AND VILLANELLES.
Since the last part was published several parodies on these exotics
have been sent in by various correspondents, and it would be
ungracious not to include them, indeed, the collection would be
incomplete without them. The first humorous Ballade, aptly enough, is
from the pen of Mr. Gleeson White, whose book on _Ballades and
Rondeaus_ has already been alluded to:――
BALLADE OF A BALLADE MONGER.
You start ahead in splendid style,
No stint of rhymes appear in view,
With many a happy thought the while――
You dash away as though you knew
Enough to fill the thirty-two.
Those lines, that need such careful filling,
Yet you are lucky if you do――
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Now on your face may dawn a smile,
To think that rhymes both neat and new,
To end your stanzas will beguile
Your pen――till “envoy” you must brew;
But half the poem yet is due.
And though she ready be and willing,
To your shy muse you yet must sue――
For ballade-mongering is killing.
Here’s stanza three, and now they rile,
Those end words that of every hue
And form, all seem so poor and vile,
You, weary of the hackneyed crew
This one suggests the other’s cue.
As fresh as――twelve pence for a shilling,
No, never change can you renew,
For ballade-mongering is killing.
_Envoy._
Rhymesters! The Envoy you will rue,
Since it should be supreme and thrilling;
It’s ended, tamely it is true,
For ballade-mongering is killing.
GLEESON WHITE.
_Judy._ October 5, 1887.
――――
The following well known _Ballade_ originally appeared in Mr. Andrew
Lang’s _Ballades in Blue China_, the first (1880) edition of which is
so much prized by collectors.
BALLADE OF PRIMITIVE MAN.
He lived in a cave by the seas,
He lived upon oysters and foes,
But his list of forbidden degrees
An extensive morality shows;
Geological evidence goes
To prove he had never a pan,
But he shaved with a shell when he chose,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
He worshipp’d the rain and the breeze,
He worshipped the river that flows,
And the Dawn, and the Moon, and the trees,
And bogies, and serpents, and crows;
He buried his dead with their toes
Tucked up, an original plan,
Till their knees came right under their nose,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
His communal wives, at his ease,
He would curb with occasional blows;
Or his State had a queen, like the bees
(As another philosopher trows):
When he spoke it was never in prose:
But he sang in a strain that would scan,
For (to doubt it, perchance, were morose)
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
(_Three verses omitted._)
_Envoy._
Max, proudly your Aryans pose,
But their rigs they undoubtedly ran,
For, as every Darwinian knows,
’Twas the manner of Primitive Man!
ANDREW LANG.
A BALLADE OF PRIMITIVE WOMAN.
_An American Parody._
She lived in a primitive way,
She lived in a hut made of trees,
With never a moving in May,
Unless when invaded by bees,
Her husband had never night keys,
Lodge nights were not then to deceive;
Nor was he addicted to sprees――
What a life led our relative, Eve!
He hadn’t for bonnets to pay,
Which accounts for his efforts to please;
Nor did he growl round every day,
O’er his trousers that bagged at the knees,
Unheard of were fashion’s decrees
Her dolmans she knew how to weave
From grape-leaves with greatest of ease,
What a life led our relative, Eve!
Her stew-pans she wrought out of clay
Her knives were the shells of the seas,
And she dined on a spicy _entrée_
Of grapes and some ape-fricassees.
To sleep with the toes to the breeze
Was considered the cheese, I believe,
Which was healthy, no one but agrees――
What a life lead our relative, Eve.
_Envoy._
Cast off fashions gay panoplies,
“Sassiety” maiden, retrieve;
Learn, while apeing our “first familees,”
What a life led our relative, Eve!
ANONYMOUS.
――――
_The Universal Review_, for December, 1888, contained a peculiar
article by Mr. H. D. Traill, entitled “The Doom of the Muses,” in
which he satirically describes the present position of the Fine Arts.
Dealing with Poetry, he thus alludes to the present craze for the
_Ballade_:――
This is the age of glorified jingle,
Honour is only to rhyming pranks;
Deftliest who their assonants mingle,
They shall walk first in Poesy’s ranks:
They shall recline upon Helicon’s banks,
Fountain of bards who have conquered Time;
(Others must do with inferior tanks)
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Cold though their verse as the sea-shore shingle,
Common and cheap as the nails in the planks,
Empty as frothiest blather of Fingal,
Pointless as ends of the cats of the Manx,
Still the mere fact that their lines are not “blanks”
Helps them the Mount of Parnassus to climb,
Strengthens their unwinged Pegase’s shanks:
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Who shall reign over us sole and single?
He who his rhyme-web’s intricate hanks
Wears like a collar of bells that tingle,
Not like the links of a chain that clanks:
He who his burden of quips and cranks
Bears with the step of a light-foot mime,
Figure erect and unwavering flanks,――
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
Muse, I presume you object to “spanks,”
Word――I admit it――beneath the sublime.
Pray then excuse me the Envoi. Thanks!
This is the era of run-mad rhyme.
――――
AUSTIN DOBSON.――ANDREW LANG.
Ah me! how many Fate makes mourn
Unhonoured in our midst to dwell,
Tho’ Epics write they, and――in scorn,
Shun Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
Blank verse they scan――at times, as well,
In jolts and jingles harsh rhymes clang,
But fail to reach the pinnacle
Of Austin Dobson――Andrew Lang,
Dear brothers these, whose names adorn
Their roll, who spread Poesy’s spell,
Their sweetest strains heartward are borne
In Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
Yet did no rival e’er excel
Their efforts in the realms o’ sang;――
The Laureate’s self bears not the bell
From Austin Dobson――Andrew Lang.
Their’s not the heaviness men spurn,
Light as the breeze in fairy dell
The flights of fancy that they turn
To Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle;
From them we never flee pell mell,
Ne’er close their volumes with a bang;
O! naught our happiness can quell
With Austin Dobson――Andrew Lang.
_Envoy._
How soothed our souls――what words can tell?
With Rondeau, Ballade, Villanelle,
How robbed of many a bitter pang
By Austin Dobson――Andrew Lang.
From _Ballades of a Country Bookworm_. By Thomas Hutchinson. London,
Stanesby & Co. 1888.
――――
Some years ago Mr. Austin Dobson wrote a few comical _Triolets_, which
appeared in “Hood’s Comic Annual.” These have not been included in
recent English editions of his poems――which is to be regretted.
――――:o:――――
RONDEL.
You bet! you hear _me_. I tell _you_
I, Whistler, Sir, has fetched this town
Onto a copper, _a_ renown,
_He_ scratches in, Sir; yes a few!
Your critics they may hop the flue,
Your painting critturs, Sir, may frown,
I, Whistler, Sir! has fetched the town,
You bet you hear me, I tell you.
His bowie, Sir! is bright _and_ new,
He licks ’em up, he licks ’em down
I guess, he gives ’em _Fits in Brown_,
Yes, Sir! and plays _Old Hell in Blue_!
You bet! you hear me! I tell you!
RONDEL.
We have a most erotic bard,
His style and title Swinburne Charles,
Passion his frame contorts and gnarls,
The gods and women grip him hard.
Observe him bearded like a pard,
Furious and fair as northern jarls;
We have a most erotic bard,
His style and title Swinburne Charles.
He has a dungheap in his yard,
Mixed with the most offensive marls,
No wonder Mrs. Grundy snarls,
Faustine, Dolores, Chastelard,
We have a most erotic bard.
From _London_. 1877.
――――
THAT DEAR OLD TUNE.
(_A Rondeau written in a rage._)
That dear old tune I loved of yore!
Indeed I love it still;
But never save by this one Bore
(Who lives upon my basement floor)
Have heard it played so ill.
Alas, what penance for my sins.
I seek my desk, and soon
Once more the tootling Fiend begins
That dear old tune!
All vainly I expostulate;
He tries it morn and noon,
I vow in sheer distress of hate
To learn the ‘loud bassoon’
‘I rage――I burn’――I execrate;
That dear old tune!
AUSTIN DOBSON.
_Saturday Journal._ 1874.
IN RE RONDEAU.
In corsets laced, in high-heeled shoes,
Too fine a woodland way to choose,
With mincing step and studied strut,
Is this an English Goddess? Tut――
Some masker from the Parley-Voos!
O, Poet! thou of sinewy thews,
Wilt thou free ways and walks refuse,
To mince instead through paths close shut,
In corsets laced?
I cannot――for I’ve old-time views――
Follow the poet who pursues
The Rondeau, with its rabbit scut,
Or Triumphs in a Triolet, but――
There may be those who like the muse,
In corsets laced.
ROUNDEL.
The Cat that sings at dead of night
I pelt with bricks, and boots and things,
Oh, for the luck to kill outright
The Cat that sings!
It is as when at evening rings
Melodeon-music, only slight-
ly worse it tears your bosom-strings.
And if at last you chance to smite
Him over,――as to life he springs,
He simply screeches with delight――
The Cat that sings.
_The University News Sheet._ St. Andrew’s. March 3, 1886.
――――:o:――――
THE VILLANELLE.
(For the original Villanelle, by Jean Passerat, see page 66.)
Jean Passerat, I like thee well――
Thou sang’st a song beyond compare――
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle:
Nor can I write a villanelle――
Thou did’st――and for that Jewel rare,
Jean Passerat, I like thee well.
Now many a twittering hirondelle
The plumes of thy lost dove would wear――
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle.
Could not, indeed, true turtle tell――
If real or mock I could not swear:
Jean Passerat, I like thee well.
True heart that would go “après elle――”
And sure thy sentiment I’d share――
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle.
And am content on earth to dwell――
There are some men they cannot spare:
Jean Passerat, I like thee well,
But I’ve not lost a tourterelle!
CHARLES HENRY WEBB.
――――
VILLANELLE.
“How to compose a Villanelle, which is said to require an elaborate
amount of care in production, which those who read only would hardly
suspect existed.”
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it,
As easy as reciting A. B. C.
You need not be an atom of a poet.
If you’ve a grain of wit and want to show it,
Writing a _Villanelle_――take this from me――
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it.
You start a pair of “rimes” and then you “go it”
With rapid running pen and fancy free,
You need not be an atom of a poet.
Take any thought, write round it or below it,
Above or near it, as it liketh thee;
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it.
Pursue your task, till, like a shrub, you grow it,
Up to the standard size it ought to be;
You need not be an atom of a poet.
Clear it of weeds, and water it, and hoe it,
Then watch it blossom with triumphant glee,
It’s all a trick, quite easy when you know it,
You need not be an atom of a poet.
WALTER W. SKEAT.
_The Academy._ May 19, 1888.
――――:o:――――
THE WAIL OF THE “PERSONALLY CONDUCTED.”
Integral were we, in our old existence;
Separate beings, individually;
Now are our entities blended, fused, and foundered――
We are one Person.
We are not mortals, we are not celestials,
We are not birds, the upper ether clearing,
We are a retrogression toward the Monad:
We are Cook’s Tourists.
All ways we follow him who holds the Guide Book;
All things we look at, with bedazzled optics;
Sad are our hearts, because the vulgar rabble
Call us the Cookies.
Happy the man who, by his cheerful fireside,
Says to the partner of his joys and sorrows:
“Anna Maria, let us go to-morrow
Out for an airing.”
Him to Manhattan, or the beach of Brighton,
Gaily he hieth, or if, fate accurséd,
Lives he in Boston, still he may betake him
Down to Nantasket.
Happy the mortal, free and independent,
Master of the main spring of his own volition,
Look on us with the eye of sweet compassion,
We are Cook’s Tourists.
H. C. BUNNER.
_Scribner’s Monthly._ November, 1879.
――――:o:――――
AN OLD SONG BY NEW SINGERS.
_In the Original._
Mary had a little lamb,
Its fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went
The lamb was sure to go.
――――
_As Austin Dobson Writes It._
Triolet.
A little lamb had Mary, sweet,
With a fleece that shamed the driven snow.
Not alone Mary went when she moved her feet
(For a little lamb had Mary, sweet)
And it tagged her ’round with a pensive bleat,
And wherever she went it wanted to go――
A little lamb had Mary, sweet,
With a fleece that shamed the driven snow.
――――
_As Mr. Browning Has It._
You knew her?――Mary the small,
How of a summer――or, no, was it fall?
The latter, I think――a lamb she received?
You’d never have thought it――never believed,
But the girl owned a lamb last fall.
Its wool was subtly, silky white,
Color of lucent obliteration of night――
Like the shimmering snow or――our Clothild’s arm!――
You’ve seen her arm――her right, I mean――
The other she scalded a-washing, I ween――
How white it is and soft and warm?
Ah, there was soul’s heart-love, deep, true and tender,
Wherever went Mary, the maiden so slender,
There followed, his all-absorbed passion, inciting,
That passionate lambkin――her soul’s heart delighting――
Ay, every place that Mary sought in
That lamb was sure to soon be caught in.
――――
_As Longfellow Might have Done It._
Fair the daughter known as Mary,
Fair and full of fun and laughter,
Owned a lamb, a little he-goat,
Owned him all herself and solely.
White the lamb’s wool as the Gotchi――
The great Gotchi, driving snowstorm.
Hither Mary went and thither,
But went with her to all places,
Sure as brook to run to river,
Her pet lambkin following with her.
――――
_How Andrew Lang Sings It._
Rondeau.
A wonderful lass was Marie, petite.
And she looked full fair and passing sweet――
And, oh! she owned――but cannot you guess
What pet _can_ a maiden so love and caress
As a tiny lamb with a plaintive bleat
And mud upon his dainty feet,
And a gentle veally odour of meat?
And a fleece to finger and kiss and press――
White as snow?
Wherever she wandered――in lane or street
As she sauntered on, there at her feet
She would find that lambkin――bless
The dear!――treading on her dainty dress,
Her dainty dress, fresh and neat――
White as snow.
――――
_Mr. Algernon C. Swinburne’s Idea._
Villanelle.
Dewy-eyed with shimmering hair,
Maiden and lamb were a sight to see,
For her pet was white as she was fair.
And its lovely fleece was beyond compare,
And dearly it loved its Mistress Marie,
Dewy-eyed, with shimmering hair.
Its warped wool was an inwove snare
To tangle her fingers in, where they could be
(For her pet was white as she was fair)
Lost from sight, both so snow-white were,
And the lambkin adored the maiden wee――
Dewy-eyed with shimmering hair.
Th’ impassioned incarnation of rare,
Of limpid-eyed, luscious lipped, loved beauty――
And her pet was white as she was fair.
Wherever she wandered, hither and there,
Wildly that lamblet sought with her to be――
With the dewy-eyed, with shimmering hair,
And a pet as white as its mistress was fair.
A. C. WILKIE.
[Illustration]
Martin Farquhar Tupper.
This gentleman was born in London in 1810, and educated, first at the
Charterhouse school, and afterwards at Christ Church, Oxford, where he
graduated B.A., M.A., and D.C.L. The author of many works, both in
prose and verse, Mr. Tupper has been hardly dealt with by the critics,
and the parodists.
They appear to have ignored such of his writings as have any merit, in
order to hunt most mercilessly to death his _Proverbial Philosophy_,
which, though it has run through many editions, is inferior to much
else that he has written.
The reasons for this perversity on their part cannot here be
considered, only the Parodies as they exist can be dealt with.
――――
The following lines, which were written many years ago by “Cuthbert
Bede” in his _Shilling Book of Beauty_, neatly sum up _Proverbial
Philosophy_:――
Thoughts may abide in the brain, yet how few have the wit to extract
them;
Many may know of Proverbs, yet could not for worlds have devised them.
All are not gifted the same: there are brains that are stupid and
addled;
There are those that are clear as the stream,――the pellucid water
that floweth
Under the bridges, that bind the Surrey shore unto London.
Philosophy cannot be taught, unless you can meet with a teacher:
I am the teacher of this the nineteenth century of being.
Philosophy I can expound in a way hitherto undream’d of;
Witness my book of Proverbial Platitudes, and its Editions;
Book beloved by women――women of intellect feeble;
Book that is lauded by old maids, and Evangelical parsons;
Book that by school-girls is worshipped, and ranked with _The
Pilgrim’s Progress_;
That is read by bachelor curates, to maidens at Dorcas meetings;
Designing curates, who choose the chapters on “Love” and “Marriage,”
And read the soft nothings therein, with smirks and murderous gusto.
I have written of Proverbs, turned everything to a Proverb,
Even my name as an author, proverbial is it with many,
Who, in braying derision, call me “Sweet Singer of Beadledom,”
Let those laugh who win! my Proverbs have eighteen editions!
Eighteen editions bring fame, and――what is better――_money_.
Another old parody may be quoted from the second volume of _Punch_,
(1842).
PUNCH’S PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY.
_Introductory._
Come along, old fellow; follow me as a friend, from the midnight
streets;
Leave awhile the cold and muddy Strand to loiter in the tavern of
the Coal Hole.
Come into this quiet box, with hot water in a batter’d pewter jug,
Over whose beer-stain’d table are strewn many particles of crust;
Here, upon this wooden peg, hang up thy hat and Chesterfield,
Order a pint of stout, or a go of grog, and rest for half-an-hour.
Behold! I would stop a short time in this buzzing crowd of visitors,
Though wrapp’d up in a mackintosh, yet are the seams and pockets
pervious;
But into the foam of this goodly glass I dip my beak,
And receive its contents as nectar, yet the tap is Barclay’s.
Under its cheerful influence I shall, before long, get loquacious,
And mingle the fashion of my speech with froth-built snatches of
philosophy!
_Of Gifts._
I had a seeming friend:――I gave him a licking――he was gone!
I had an open enemy:――I stood a pint――and won him!
Common friends require presents; monkeys more kicks than halfpence;
But the scorn of anyone melteth at a barrel of Quin’s oysters.
A foe may get spiteful, and incline to call thee a humbug,
But send him a turbot, and he saith,――“He’s a good fellow, after all!”
Policemen will not oft refuse a drain, if absent the inspector,
And policemen’s friendship should be courted in the event of rows.
The larker, held by the collar, may be released by half-a-crown,
And thy own bed is better than the stone sofas of a station house,
Or, being James Edwards, compelled to call thyself John Brown.
There is not one crusher who is proof against the waistcoat pocket,
And the same font of happiness hath even power over reporters.
I saw a beggar in St. Giles’s, and another beggar punch’d his head,
For the first had collected more coppers at his crossing than the
other
His broom fell into the mud, and he swore an oath.
Anon a baked potato-man came up, with a high-pressure can,
And gave him of his store; the first beggar was grateful.
He, poor stricken cadger, picked up his broom with a curse,
And, turning to the potato man, asked what he would take to drink.
And so the sprat had been set, and the herring had been caught!
A parody of a somewhat more spiteful character appeared in _Punch_,
August 23, 1856, but the circumstances to which it alluded are now
forgotten, so that the parody lacks interest: a few verses only need
be quoted:――
THE QUEEN OF OUDE.
(NOT)
_By Martin Farquhar Tupper, Esq._
THE QUEEN OF OUDE,
Which is so proud,
She never will get boozy,
Has crossed the seas,
And, if you please,
Will serve out LORD DALHOUSIE.
_The Queen of Oude_,
She cries so loud
For justice, like a Q. C.
And claims her right,
And wants to fight
The MARQUIS OF DALHOUSIE.
* * * * *
The QUEEN OF OUDE
Shall save her gowd,
And this she’d do, _me duce_,
She’d give a lunch,
To me, and _Punch_,
And ask my LORD DALHOUSIE.
The QUEEN OF OUDE,
Which is so proud.
Would find her lot _adouci_,
To hear the wit
That we’d emit.
Me, _Punch_, and LORD DALHOUSIE.
――――
PROVERBIAL PHILOSOPHY.
_By Farthing Tarquhar Mupper, Esq._
Beer, that hath entered my head, and peopled its inner chambers,
The addling outcome of barrels, the dream-inspiring malt and the
hop-juice,
Amber-tinged wine of the Briton, with the headache and biliousness
after,
Heaven-brewed draught of immortals, oh! sweeter than ever was nectar,
Such extend I unto thee, thou docile child of a pot-house:
Commend thy mouth to the tankard, and grudge not to drink of the
liquor,
Nor scorn its yellow flood for the sake of the Bacchus of Cruikshank.
Lo! now, I stand not forth, laying hold on spear and on buckler;
I come, as the cask of pale ale, to comfort thee, and to succour:
With soft and mellowest taste to charm the lips which are eager;
With the balmy breath of fellowship to touch thy heart sympathetic.
Let us drink together as friends, in the happy smoke of tobacco,
Nor judgment take her seat until we are happy as lordlings,
That the fumes of good strong beer may override all argument,
And charity not be a stranger at the board that is spread for
brothers.
ANONYMOUS.
In _Banter_ (a comic paper edited by Mr. G. A. Sala) for November 11,
1867, there was a parody of Tupper, entitled _Proverbial Philosophy of
Sausages_, but it was not very amusing; and in the same paper, for
November 18, there was a burlesque description of a dinner given to
Mr. Tupper, and of an after-dinner speech he delivered in which he
explained the dodges and devices he had practised in order to puff his
works, and increase the sale of _Proverbial Philosophy_.
――――
THE FALL OF TUPPER.
We are too often painfully reminded that the best of us are but very
frail. A very painful case of moral declension has occurred lately.
Martin Farquhar Tupper, the great moral philosopher at whose feet all
England has sat so long and learnt so much, that great and good man
who had discovered a new species of poetry which was neither rhyme nor
reason, but all beautiful pure sentiment, has come down to writing
rhyme! Happily he has not yet reached the next stage――he has not
fallen so low yet as to incur the suspicion of writing reason. But
this abandonment of his principles has been, we fear, the result of
bad company, for――our heart breaks almost while we pen the words,――but
it is too plain, we cannot shut our eyes to the cruel truth――Martin
Farquhar Tupper has fallen into the power of Algernon Charles
Swinburne!! He, the purest of philosophers, the chosen minstrel of the
Evangelical Church, has been studying the words of the erotic Pagan
bard, the laureate of Venus and Faustina!
We are enabled, by a wonderful effort of clairvoyance, to publish a
poem which the modest songster of _The Rock_ has held back, the
charming domestic interest and true Protestant flavour of which must
commend it to all admirers of Martin Farquhar Tupper:――
GOING TO THE WASH.
(_Lines written on Monday morning._)
BY M. F. T.
I really must look to my washing this week,
I must watch how my shirts are got up;
For I feel that in matters like this I’m too meek,
And I don’t keep my pluck enough up;
I ought to be brave, and to speak my mind out,
For of sheep, sure the male is a Tup,
And I am a Tupper, so quite to the rout
I must put Mrs. Sarah Hiccup.
Let me see; five fine shirts as ever was seen,
Five collars (not paper) to match,
With four pairs of socks, some blue and some green,
Will make up a beautiful batch;
Then of handkerchiefs seven seem semblant to see,
And two or three neckties so white!
Every clear starcher’s soul will be strangled with glee,
When on my sacred things they set sight.
Stop, I’ve nearly forgotten two jerseys (quite thin),
And two flannel shirts too I vow!
In this weather its right to wear flannel next skin,
At least I do truly so trow;
One nightshirt, if modesty lets me to add,
In my list I must also include,
I would mention my nightcap, but soberly sad,
Society sneers that it’s rude.
Mrs. Sarah Hiccup now I hope will take care,
And return all the things that I send;
But trumpets of treachery tickle the air
Till I know not where Treason will end!
What if Ritualist robbers should recklessly join
My shirts, to make copes with, to seize;
Or the pattering Papist my parcel purloin
His priests so prehensile to please?
_The Tomahawk._ August 22, 1868.
――――
The following excellent parody has been ascribed to Mr. Andrew Lang:――
MR. TUPPER IN THE CLOUDS.
I, the proverbial philosopher, sing of “electrical storage,”
As discovered by Thompson (Sir William), a philosopher whose name is
also proverbial.
Pride is a horrible sin, and I am no sinner;
So I do not hesitate to extend my hand in greeting to Sir William,
Trusting that he will not overmuch presume on my affability.
Hitherto I have been sorely flouted not only by eagles,
But also by that ridiculous creature the gnat――in Latin ’tis called
_culex pipiens_.
Laughter was good for the gods of Homer; but we are not gods nor
Homeric,
And laughter too audibly laughed betrays the void mind of the laugher.
Therefore, instead of cachinnating, I smile with supernal sarcasm
To think that a gnat should dare to flout the stringer of proverbial
pearls
On silken threads of verse, strengthened and made indestructible
By wax from philosophy’s beehive warmed in the sun of experience;
But oh! Raptorial Bird! oh, vilest of all the _culicides_!
Emblems both of the critics, carnivorous and sharp-stinging reviewers,
I will be even with you now. I’ll fly, but not on waxen wings like
silly Icarus――
Not in a balloon, or in anything on the levitation principle:
That was all very well for Mr. Green and M. de Montgolfier,
But I say that levitation is all my eye and my elbow.
(Proverb that verges on slang, but its uses hath slang, like
adversity).
No levitation for me; but force like that of a cannon-ball.
Not that I mean to be shot out of a twelve-pounder like Zazel at the
Aquarium,
But to be propelled by tame gunpowder. “How shall I tame it?”
Have you never heard of Carter the Lion King, or of Myn Heer Van
Amburg?
Did not they tame furious mammalia? And did they tell you how they
did it?
So shall I not tell you how I intend to tame this “villanous
saltpetre.”
But I’ll do it, or have it done for me by “our mechanicians,”
They shall invent a machine to be loaded with domesticated gunpowder
(I patenting the discovery, of course, as the author of the
suggestion),
That shall enable me to reign in the blue empyrean and complete the
subdual of the planet
Which is and has been for ever so long my heritage.
Wo, then, wo to the gnats! wo to the Jewish-nosed eagle!
I put the least first and the greatest last, partly to snub the King
of the Falconidæ,
And partly because it better suits my rhythm――
I will not say my _metre_ because I condemn all trammels,
Pouring out my soul in lines of unequal lengths occasionally relieved
by hexameters.
Wo, wo, wo! to the eagle! Now you see I reverse things again,
Vice-versa-ing my apostrophe――’tis a common trick of versemen and
orators――
Soon the eagle of song will soar ever so much higher than the eagle
who can’t sing;
And he won’t like that――the other eagle I mean, of course:
So he’ll let himself fall into the sea like a thunderbolt.
(That last idea is not mine, but a Mr. Tennyson’s; have you heard of
him?)
While as for the gnats――they are the critics, as I hinted just now,
you know.
Sting for sting, my hearties, then! buzz for buzz! bite for bite!
And, as of course I am ever so much bigger than you are,
I’ll shrike you as the humming-bird shrikes the honey-bee――that I
will.
_St. James’s Gazette._ June 27, 1881.
[Illustration]
WILLIAM AND MARGARET.
By DAVID MALLET. Born, 1700. Died, 1765.
’Twas at the silent solemn hour,
When night and morning meet;
In glided Margaret’s grimly ghost,
And stood at William’s feet.
Her face was like an April morn
Clad in a wintry cloud;
And clay-cold was her lily hand
That held her sable shroud.
So shall the fairest face appear
When youth and years are flown:
Such is the robe that kings must wear,
When death has reft their crown.
Her bloom was like the springing flower,
That sips the silver dew;
The rose was budded in her cheek,
Just opening to the view.
But love had, like the canker-worm,
Consumed her early prime;
The rose grew pale, and left her cheek――
She died before her time.
Awake! she cried, thy true love calls,
Come from her midnight grave:
Now let thy pity hear the maid
Thy love refused to save.
This is the dark and dreary hour
When injured ghosts complain;
When yawning graves give up their dead,
To haunt the faithless swain.
Bethink thee, William, of thy fault,
Thy pledge and broken oath!
And give me back my maiden-vow,
And give me back my troth.
Why did you promise love to me,
And not that promise keep?
Why did you swear my eyes were bright,
Yet leave those eyes to weep?
How could you say my face was fair,
And yet that face forsake?
How could you win my virgin heart,
Yet leave that heart to break.
Why did you say my lip was sweet,
And made the scarlet pale?
And why did I, young witless maid!
Believe the flattering tale?
That face, alas! no more is fair,
Those lips no longer red:
Dark are my eyes, now closed in death,
And every charm is fled.
The hungry worm my sister is;
This winding-sheet I wear:
And cold and weary lasts our night,
Till that last morn appear.
But hark! the cock has warned me hence;
A long and last adieu!
Come see, false man, how low she lies,
Who died for love of you.
The lark sung loud; the morning smiled
With beams of rosy red;
Pale William quaked in every limb,
And raving left his bed.
He hied him to the fatal place
Where Margaret’s body lay;
And stretched him on the green-grass turf
That wrapped her breathless clay.
And thrice he called on Margaret’s name,
And thrice he wept full sore;
Then laid his cheek to her cold grave,
And word spake never more!
A Latin version of this ballad was written by Mr. Vincent Bourne,
entitled _Thyrsis et Chloe_. It can readily be found in his works, but
the following anonymous French translation is not so well known:――
“L’OMBRE DE MARGUERITE.”
Dans la nuit, à l’heure effrayante
Où l’airain frémit douze fois,
Des spectres la famille errante
Sort des tombeaux à cette voix.
Edmond, que le remords agite,
Cherchait le sommeil, qui le fuit:
L’ombre pâle de Marguerite
Vient s’asseoir au pied de son lit.
Regarde, Edmond, c’est moi, dit-elle,
Moi qui t’aimais, que tu trompas,
Moi dont la tendresse fidèle
Vit encore apprès le trépas.
J’en ai cru ta fausse promesse,
Je t’ai fait maître de mon sort;
Hélas! pour prix de ma tendresse
Fallait-il me donner la mort?
Jadis de la rose naissante
J’avais l’éclat et la fraîcheur:
Pourquoi sur sa tige brillante
Ton souffle a-t-il séché la fleur?
Mes yeux brillaient de tant de charmes,
Ingrat, alors que tu m’aimais;
Pourquoi donc les noyer de larmes,
Pourquoi les fermer à jamais.
Hier dans un palais superbe,
Aujourd’hui dans un noir cercueil;
Mon asile est caché sous l’herbe,
Et ma parure est un linceul.
De quel forfait suis-je victime?
J’aimai, j’ai cru l’être mon tour;
Qui me punit d’un pareil crime?
L’objet même de mon amour.
De ton inconstance cruelle
Le jour fut à tous deux fatal;
Quand ton cœur devint infidèle,
Edmond, il se connaissait mal:
Tu m’abandonnes, je succombe;
Mais enchaîné par le destin,
Le remords vient d’ouvrir ma tombe;
Tu dois y descendre demain.
J’entends le coq; sa voix encore
Pour nous est un signal d’effroi;
Je ne dois plus revoir l’aurore,
Et c’est la dernière pour toi!
Adieu. Celle qui te fut chère
Te plaint, te pardonne, et t’attend...
L’ombre à ces mots perce la terre,
Et disparaît en gémissant.
Edmond immobile, en silence,
A vu ce prodige effrayant:
De son lit soudain il s’élance,
Défiguré, pâle et tremblant.
Il court, il cherche Marguerite;
Sa voix s’échappe en cris aigus;
Sur sa tombe il se précipite;
On le relève: il n’était plus!
――――
DR. JOHNSON’S GHOST.[4]
’Twas at the solemn hour of night,
When men and spirits meet,
That Johnson, huge majestic sprite,
Repaired to Boswell’s feet.
His face was like the full-orb’d moon
Wrapt in a threatening cloud,
That bodes the tempest bursting soon,
And winds that bluster loud.
Terrific was his angry look,
His pendent eyebrows frown’d;
Thrice in his hand he waved a book,
Then dashed it to the ground.
“Behold,” he cry’d “perfidious man!
This object of my rage:
Bethink thee of the sordid plan
That form’d this venal page.
“Was it to make this base record
That you my friendship sought;
Thus to retain each vagrant word,
Each undigested thought?
“Dar’st thou pretend that, meaning praise,
Thou seek’st to raise my name;
When all thy babbling pen betrays
But gives me churlish fame?
“Do readers in these annals trace
The man that’s wise and good?
No!――rather one of savage race,
Illib’ral, fierce, and rude:
“A traveller, whose discontent
No kindness can appease;
Who finds for spleen perpetual vent
In all he hears and sees:
“One whose ingratitude displays
The most ungracious guest;
Who hospitality repays
With bitter, biting jest.
“Ah! would, as o’er the hills we sped,
And climb’d the sterile rocks,
Some vengeful stone had struck thee dead,
Or steeple, spar’d by Knox!
“Thy adulation now I see,
And all its schemes unfold:
Thy av’rice, Boswell, cherish’d me,
To turn me into gold.
“So keepers guard the beasts they show,
And for their wants provide;
Attend their steps where’er they go,
And travel by their side.
“O! were it not that, deep and low,
Beyond thy reach I’m laid,
Rapacious Boswell had e’er now
Johnson a mummy made.”
He ceased, and stalk’d from Boswell’s sight
With fierce indignant mien,
Scornful as Ajax, sullen sprite,
By Sage Ulysses seen.
Dead paleness Boswell’s cheek o’erspread,
His limbs with horror shook;
With trembling haste he left his bed,
And burnt his fatal book.
And thrice he called on Johnson’s name,
Forgiveness to implore!
Then thrice repeated――“Injured fame!”
And word――wrote never more.
――――
The following ballad, which was once very popular among the lower
orders, is said to be founded on “William and Margaret”:――
GILES SCROGGIN’S GHOST.
Giles Scroggin courted Molly Brown,
The fairest wench in all our town,
Fol de riddle lol, de riddle lido.
He bought her a ring with a posy true,
If you loves me, as I loves you,
No knife can cut our loves in two.
Fol de riddle, etc.
But scissors cuts, as well as knives,
And quite unsartain’s all our lives,
Fol de riddle, etc.
The day they were to have been wed,
Fate’s scissors cut poor Giles’s thread,
So they could not be mar――ri――ed.
Fol de riddle, etc.
Poor Molly laid her down to weep,
And cried herself quite fast asleep,
Fol de riddle, etc.
When standing fast by her bed-post,
A figure tall her sight engrossed,
It cried, “I be Giles Scroggin’s ghost,”
Fol de riddle, etc.
The ghost it said all solemnly,
“Oh! Molly, you must go with I,
Fol de riddle, etc.
All to the grave your love to cool.”
Says she, “Why, I’m not dead, you fool,”
Says the ghost, says he, “Vy, that’s no rule.”
Fol de riddle, etc.
The ghost then seized her all so grim,
All for to go along with him,
Fol de riddle, etc.
“Come, come,” said he, “e’er morning beam.”
“I von’t,” says she, and screamed a scream,
Then she awoke, and found she’d dream’d a dream.
Fol de riddle, de riddle lido.
A POLISHED VERSION.
Young Giles the fair Maria wooed;
Flower of the village maidenhood;
Heigho, alack, and well-a-day!
His pledge this legend bore inlaid,――
Love, that two hearts hath mutual made,
Defies the knife of keenest blade;
Heigho! &c.
But keen, alas! as knives are shears
And dubious all our fleeting years,
Heigho! &c.
The morn that should have made them one,
Fate’s shears the bridegroom’s thread outspun,
Sever’d; and bridal there was none,
Heigho! &c.
Maria sought her couch to weep;
Till grief, exhausted, sank in sleep:
Heigho! &c.
When stood, her lonely pillow nigh,
A figure more than mortal high;
And cried――“Behold, my love, ’tis I”
Heigho! &c.
All solemnly the spirit said,
“Away with me unto the dead,”
Heigho! &c.
“To cool thy passion in the tomb!”
――“What, ere my days of earthly doom?”
“No matter!” cried the shape of gloom,
Heigho! &c.
Grimly the phantom clutch’d the fair,
To death’s dark realm his prize to bear,
Heigho! &c.
“Hence! hence!” he cried, “ere morning’s light;”
“Begone!” she shriek’d, and with the fright
Woke. ’Twas a vision of the night.
Heigho! &c.
_Punch._ April 13, 1844.
[Illustration]
The Rev. George Crabbe.
Born December 24, 1754. Died Feb. 3, 1832.
Although the works of this author are now but little read, they were
widely popular at the time when the brothers Smith produced _The
Rejected Addresses_ in 1812, and naturally Mr. Crabbe’s poetry came in
for imitation. Indeed this particular imitation was singled out by
Lord Jeffrey as being the best piece in the collection. “It is,” said
he, “an exquisite and most masterly imitation, not only of the
peculiar style, but of the taste, temper, and manner of description of
that most original author (Crabbe), and can hardly be said to be in
any respect a caricature of that style or manner, except in the
excessive profusion of puns and verbal jingles, which are never so
thick sown in the original works as in this admirable imitation.”
Even Mr. Crabbe, himself, was amused, he wrote “There is a little
ill-nature in their prefatory address; but in their versification they
have done me admirably, yet it is easier to imitate style than to
furnish matter.”
From this it will be gathered that the prose introduction is as much a
parody as the poem, both of which were written by James Smith, who
gives the following lines as a fair sample of Mr. Crabbe’s
versification:――
“Six years had pass’d and forty ere the six,
When time began to play his usual tricks;
My locks, once comely in a virgin’s sight,
Locks of pure brown, now felt th’ encroaching white;
Gradual each day I liked my horses less,
My dinner more――I learn’t to play at chess.”
and as to his jingling style he mentions that Crabbe thus describes a
thrifty house-wife:――
“Heaven in her eye, and in her hand her keys.”
THE THEATRE.
_A Preface of Apologies._
If the following poem should be fortunate enough to be selected for
the opening address, a few words of explanation may be deemed
necessary, on my part, to avert invidious misrepresentation. The
animadversion I have thought it right to make on the noise created by
tuning the orchestra, will, I hope, give no lasting remorse to any of
the gentlemen employed in the band. It is to be desired that they
would keep their instruments ready tuned, and strike off at once. This
would be an accommodation to many well-meaning persons who frequent
the theatre, who, not being blest with the ear of St. Cecilia, mistake
the tuning for the overture, and think the latter concluded before it
is begun.
“――――――――one fiddle will
Give, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still,”
was originally written “one hautboy will;” but, having providentially
been informed, when this poem was on the point of being sent off, that
there is but one hautboy in the band, I averted the storm of popular
and managerial indignation from the head of its blower: as it now
stands, “one fiddle” among many, the faulty individual will, I hope,
escape detection. The story of the flying play-bill is calculated to
expose a practice much too common, of pinning play-bills to the
cushions insecurely, and frequently, I fear, not pinning them at all.
If these lines save one play-bill only from the fate I have recorded,
I shall not deem my labour ill-employed. The concluding episode of
Patrick Jennings glances at the boorish fashion of wearing the hat in
the one-shilling gallery. Had Jennings thrust his between his feet at
the commencement of the play, he might have leaned forward with
impunity, and the catastrophe I relate would not have occurred. The
line of handkerchiefs formed to enable him to recover his loss is
purposely so crossed in texture and materials as to mislead the reader
in respect to the real owner of any one of them. For in the
statistical view of life and manners which I occasionally present, my
clerical profession has taught me how extremely improper it would be,
by any allusion, however slight, to give any uneasiness, however
trivial, to any individual, however foolish or wicked.
G. C.
THE THEATRE.
Interior of a Theatre described.――Pit gradually fills.――The
Check-taker.――Pit full.――The Orchestra tuned.――One fiddle rather
dilatory.――Is reproved――and repents.――Evolutions of a
Play-bill.――Its final settlement on the Spikes.――The Gods taken to
task――and why.――Motley Group of Play-goers.――Holywell Street, St.
Pancras.――Emanuel Jennings binds his Son apprentice――not in
London――and why.――Episode of the Hat.
’Tis sweet to view, from half-past five to six,
Our long wax-candles, with short cotton wicks,
Touch’d by the lamplighter’s Promethian art,
Start into light, and make the lighter start;
To see red Phœbus through the gallery-pane
Tinge with his beam the beams of Drury Lane;
While gradual parties fill our widen’d pit,
And gape, and gaze, and wonder, ere they sit.
At first, while vacant seats give choice and ease,
Distant or near, they settle where they please;
But when the multitude contracts the span,
And seats are rare, they settle where they can.
Now the full benches to late-comers doom
No room for standing, miscall’d _standing room_.
Hark! the check-taker moody silence breaks,
And bawling “Pit full!” gives the check he takes;
Yet onward still the gathering numbers cram,
Contending crowders shout the frequent damn,
And all is bustle, squeeze, row, jabbering, and jam.
See to their desks Apollo’s sons repair――
Swift rides the rosin o’er the horse’s hair!
In unison their various tones to tune,
Murmers the hautboy, growls the hoarse bassoon;
In soft vibration sighs the whispering lute,
Tang goes the harpsicord, too-too the flute,
Brays the loud trumpet, squeaks the fiddle sharp,
Winds the French-horn, and twangs the tinkling harp;
Till, like great Jove, the leader, figuring in,
Attunes to order the chaotic din.
Now all seems hush’d――but no, one fiddle will
Give, half-ashamed, a tiny flourish still.
Foil’d in his crash, the leader of the clan
Reproves with frowns the dilatory man:
Then on his candlestick thrice taps his bow,
Nods a new signal, and away they go.
Perchance, while pit and gallery cry, “Hats off!”
And awed Consumption checks his chided cough,
Some giggling daughter of the Queen of Love
Drops, reft of pin, her play-bill from above:
Like Icarus, while laughing galleries clap,
Soars, ducks, and dives in air the printed scrap;
But, wiser far than he, combustion fears,
And, as it flies, eludes the chandeliers;
Till, sinking gradual, with repeated twirl,
It settles, curling, on a fiddler’s curl;
Who from his powder’d pate the intruder strikes,
And, for mere malice, sticks it on the spikes.
Say, why these Babel strains from Babel tongues?
Who’s that calls “Silence!” with such leathern lungs?
He who, in quest of quiet, “Silence!” hoots,
Is apt to make the hubbub he imputes.
What various swains our motley walls contain!――
Fashion from Moorfields, honour from Chick Lane;
Bankers from Paper Buildings here resort,
Bankrupts from Golden Square and Riches Court;
From the Haymarket canting rogues in grain,
Gulls from the Poultry, sots from Water Lane;
The lottery-cormorant, the auction-shark,
The full-price master, and the half-price clerk;
Boys who long linger at the gallery-door,
With pence twice five――they want but twopence more;
Till some Samaritan the twopence spares,
And sends them jumping up the gallery-stairs.
_Hard is the task who edits――thankless job._[5]
A Sunday journal for the fractious mob:
With bitter paragraph and caustic jest,
He gives to turbulence the day of rest;
Condemn’d, this week, rash rancour to instil,
Or thrown aside, the next, for one who will:
Alike undone or if he praise or rail
(For this affects his safety, that his sale)
He sinks at last, in luckless limbo set,
If loud for libel, and if dumb for debt._
Critics we boast who ne’er their malice baulk,
But talk their minds――we wish they’d mind their talk;
Big-worded bullies, who by quarrels live――
Who give the lie, and tell the lie they give;
Jews from St. Mary Axe, for jobs so wary,
That for old clothes they’d even axe St. Mary;
And bucks with pockets empty as their pate,
Lax in their gaiters, laxer in their gait;
Who oft, when we our house lock up, carouse
With tippling tipstaves in a lock-up house.
Yet here, as elsewhere, Chance can joy bestow,
Where scowling Fortune seem’d to threaten woe.
John Richard William Alexander Dwyer
Was footman to Justinian Stubbs, Esquire;
But when John Dwyer listed in the blues,
Emanuel Jennings polished Stubbs’s shoes.
Emanuel Jennings brought his youngest boy
Up as a corn-cutter――a safe employ;
In Holywell Street, St. Pancras, he was bred
(At number twenty-seven, it is said),
Facing the pump, and near the Granby’s Head:
He would have bound him to some shop in town,
But with a premium he could not come down.
Pat was the urchin’s name――a red-hair’d youth,
Fonder of purl and skittle-grounds than truth.
Silence, ye gods! to keep your tongues in awe,
The Muse shall tell an accident she saw.
Pat Jennings in the upper gallery sat,
But, leaning forward, Jennings lost his hat:
Down from the gallery the beaver flew,
And spurn’d the one to settle in the two,
How shall he act? Pay at the gallery door,
Two shillings for what cost, when new, but four?
Or till half-price, to save his shilling, wait,
And gain his hat again at half-past eight?
Now, while his fears anticipate a thief,
John Mullins whispers, “Take my handkerchief.”
“Thank you,” cries Pat, “but one won’t make a line.”
“Take mine,” cried Wilson, and cried Stokes, “Take mine.”
A motley cable soon Pat Jennings ties,
Where Spitalfields with real India vies.
Like Iris’ bow, down darts the painted clue,
Starr’d, striped, and spotted, yellow, red, and blue,
Old calico, torn silk, and muslin new.
George Green below, with palpitating hand,
Loops the last ’kerchief to the beaver’s band――
Upsoars the prize! The youth with joy unfeign’d,
Regain’d the felt, and felt what he regain’d;
While to the applauding galleries grateful Pat
Made a low bow, and touch’d the ransom’d hat.
――――:o:――――
The First Parody in “Rejected Addresses.”
The very first author selected for imitation by the Smiths was one
whose writings have long since been forgotten, and whose name alone is
preserved from oblivion by Byron’s lines:――
“Let hoarse Fitzgerald bawl
His creaking couplets in a tavern-hall.”
Mr. W. T. Fitzgerald actually sent in a serious address to the Drury
Lane Committee on August 31, 1812. It was published, among the other
_Genuine Rejected Addresses_, in that year. It contained the following
lines:――
“The troubled shade of Garrick, hovering near,
Dropt on the burning pile a pitying tear.”
On which Smith remarks, “What a pity, that like Sterne’s Recording
Angel, it did not succeed in blotting the fire out for ever! That
failing, why not adopt Gulliver’s remedy?” Fitzgerald’s writings do
not appear to have attained the dignity of a collected edition, but in
the Library of the British Museum a number of his poems and prologues
are preserved, from which the following is selected as a fair example
of his style. It will also illustrate the humour of the parody.
BRITONS TO ARMS.
_Written by W. T. Fitzgerald, Esq., and recited by him at the meeting
of the Literary Fund, July 14._
BRITONS, to arms! of apathy beware,
And let your COUNTRY be your dearest care,
Protect your Altars! guard your MONARCH’S Throne.
The cause of George and Freedom is your own!
What! shall that ENGLAND want her SONS support,
Whose HEROES fought at CRESSY … AGINCOURT?
And when Great MARLBOROUGH led the English Van,
In FRANCE, o’er FRENCHMEN, triumphed to a man!
By ALFRED’S great and ever honored name!
By EDWARD’S Prowess, and by HENRY’S Fame!
By all the gen’rous Blood for Freedom shed!
And by the ashes of the Patriot Dead!
By the Bright Glory Britons lately won,
On Egypt’s plains beneath the burning sun.
BRITONS, to arms! defend your Country’s cause;
Fight for your King, your Liberties and Laws!
Be France defied, her slavish YOKE abhorr’d,
And place your safety only on your Sword.
The Gallic DESPOT, sworn your mortal FOE,
Now aims his last, but his most deadly blow;
With England’s plunder tempts his hungry slaves,
And dares to brave you on your native waves,
If _Briton’s_ rights be worth a _Briton’s_ care,
To shield them from the sons of _Rapine_, swear!
Then to _Invasion_ be defiance given,
Your cause is just, approved by earth and heaven,
Should adverse winds our gallant fleet restrain,
To sweep his bawbling[6] vessels from the main,
And fate permit him on our shores t’advance.
The _Tyrant_ never shall return to _France_:
Fortune herself shall be no more his friend,
And here the history of his crimes shall end,
His slaughtered legions shall manure our shore,
And _England_ never know Invasion more.
Printed for James Askern, 32, Cornhill, for 1d. each, or 6s. per 100.
Noblemen, magistrates, and gentlemen would do well by ordering a few
dozen of the above tracts of their different booksellers, and causing
them to be stuck up in the respective villages where they reside, that
the inhabitants may be convinced of the cruelty of the Corsican
usurper.
――――
LOYAL EFFUSION.
BY W. T. F.
“Quicquid dicunt, laudo: id rursum si negant,
Laudo id quoque,” TERENCE.
Hail, glorious edifice, stupendous work!
God bless the Regent and the Duke of York!
Ye Muses! by whose aid I cried down Fox,
Grant me in Drury Lane a private box,
Where I may loll, cry Bravo! and profess
The boundless powers of England’s glorious press;
While Afric’s sons exclaim from shore to shore,
“Quashee ma boo!”――the slave-trade is no more!
In fair Arabia (happy once, now stony,
Since ruined by that arch-apostate Bony),
A Phœnix late was caught: the Arab host
Long ponder’d――part would boil it, part would roast;
But while they ponder, up the pot-lid flies,
Fledged, beak’d, and claw’d, alive they see him rise
To heaven, and caw defiance in the skies.
So Drury, first in roasting flames consumed,
Then by old renters to hot water doom’d
By Wyatt’s trowel patted, plump and sleek,
Soars without wings, and caws without a beak.
Gallia’s stern despot shall in vain advance
From Paris, the metropolis of France;
By this day month the monster shall not gain
A foot of land in Portugal or Spain.
See Wellington in Salamanca’s field
Forces his favourite general to yield,
Breaks through his lines, and leaves his boasted Marmont
Expiring on the plain without his arm on;
Madrid he enters at the cannon’s mouth,
And then the villages still further south,
Base Bonapartè, filled with deadly ire,
Sets one by one our playhouses on fire.
Some years ago he pounced with deadly glee on
The Opera House, then burnt down the Pantheon;
Nay, still unsated, in a coat of flames,
Next at Millbank he cross’d the river Thames;
Thy hatch, O Halfpenny![7] pass’d in a trice,
Boil’d some black pitch, and burnt down Astley’s twice;
Then buzzing on through ether with a vile hum,
Turn’d to the left hand, fronting the Asylum,
And burnt the Royal Circus in a hurry――
(’Twas call’d the Circus then, but now the Surrey).
Who burnt (confound his soul!) the houses twain
Of Covent Garden and of Drury Lane?
Who, while the British squadron lay off Cork
(God bless the Regent and the Duke of York!)
With a foul earthquake ravaged the Caraccas,
And raised the price of dry goods and tobaccos?
Who makes the quartern loaf and Luddites rise?
Who fills the butchers’ shops with large blue flies?
Who thought in flames St James’s court to pinch?
Who burnt the wardrobe of poor Lady Finch?――
Why he, who, forging for this isle a yoke,
Reminds me of a line I lately spoke,
“The tree of freedom is the British oak.”
Bless every man possess’d of aught to give;
Long may Long Tylney Wellesley Long Pole live;
God bless the Army, bless their coats of scarlet,
God bless the Navy, bless the Princess Charlotte;
God bless the guards, though worsted Gallia scoff,
God bless their pig-tails, though they’re now cut off;
And, oh! in Downing Street should Old Nick revel,
England’s prime minister, then bless the devil!
――――:o:――――
GEORGE BARNWELL
In Bishop Percy’s _Reliques of Ancient English Poetry_ is the Ballad
having this title, which the Bishop states had been printed at least
as early as the middle of the 17th century. Upon this Ballad, George
Lillo, the dramatist, founded a tragedy, entitled “_The London
Merchant_, or the History of George Barnwell,” which was first
performed at Drury Lane Theatre, in 1731. Lillo departed from the
ballad by making Barnwell die repentant, thereby spoiling his dramatic
character, and the piece was faulty in other respects, yet it held the
stage for many years, and Mrs. Siddons frequently performed the part
of the fair but naughty _Millwood_, and Charles Kemble was considered
the best _Barnwell_ ever seen on the boards.
At the time, therefore, that _Rejected Addresses_ were written, and
for many years afterwards, _George Barnwell_ was a piece thoroughly
familiar to London playgoers, consequently it was quite natural that
the topic should be selected for a burlesque, and the following was
written by James Smith:――
GEORGE BARNWELL.
George Barnwell stood at the shop-door,
A customer hoping to find, sir;
His apron was hanging before,
But the tail of his coat was behind, sir.
A lady, so painted and smart,
Cried, Sir, I’ve exhausted my stock o’ late;
I’ve got nothing left but a groat――
Could you give me four penn’orth of chocolate?
Rum ti, &c.
Her face was rouged up to the eyes,
Which made her look prouder and prouder;
His hair stood on end with surprise,
And hers with pomatum and powder.
The business was soon understood;
The lady, who wish’d to be more rich,
Cries, Sweet sir, my name is Milwood,
And I lodge at the Gunner’s in Shoreditch.
Rum ti, &c.
Now nightly he stole out, good lack!
And into her lodging would pop, sir!
And often forgot to come back,
Leaving Master to shut up the shop, sir.
Her beauty his wits did bereave――
Determined to be quite the crack O,
He lounged at the Adam and Eve,
And call’d for his gin and tobacco.
Rum ti, &c.
And now――for the truth must be told,
Though none of a ’prentice should speak ill――
He stole from the till all the gold,
And ate the lump sugar and treacle.
In vain did his master exclaim,
Dear George, don’t engage with that dragon;
She’ll lead you to sorrow and shame,
And leave you the devil a rag on,
Your rum ti, &c.
In vain he entreats and implores,
The weak and incurable ninny,
So kicks him at last out of doors,
And Georgy soon spends his last guinea.
His uncle, whose generous purse
Had often relieved him, as I know,
Now finding him grow worse and worse,
Refused to come down with the rhino.
Rum ti, &c.
Cried Milwood, whose cruel heart’s core
Was so flinty that nothing could shock it,
If ye mean to come here any more,
Pray come with more cash in your pocket:
Make Nunky surrender his dibs,
Rub his pate with a pair of lead towels,
Or stick a knife into his ribs――
I’ll warrant he’ll then show some bowels.
Rum ti, &c.
A pistol he got from his love――
’Twas loaded with powder and bullet;
He trudged off to Camberwell Grove,
But wanted the courage to pull it.
There’s Nunky as fat as a hog,
While I am as lean as a lizard;
Here’s at you, you stingy old dog!
And he whips a long knife in his gizzard.
Rum ti, &c.
All you who attend to my song,
A terrible end of the farce shall see,
If you join the inquisitive throng
That follow’d poor George to the Marshalsea.
If Milwood were here, dash my wigs,
Quoth he, I would pummel and lam her well;
Had I stuck to my prunes and figs,
I ne’er had stuck Nunky at Camberwell.
Rum ti, &c.
Their bodies were never cut down;
For granny relates with amazement,
A witch bore ’em over the town,
And hung them on Thorowgood’s casement.
The neighbours, I’ve heard the folks say,
The miracle noisily brag on;
And the shop is, to this very day,
The sign of the George and the Dragon.
Rum ti, &c.
In 1858 the late Mr. Shirley Brooks chose this burlesque as the basis
of a parody he composed on the ecclesiastical procedure adopted by
Samuel Wilberforce, then Bishop of Oxford. It contains nothing more
offensive to religion than the somewhat familiar address to the Bishop
as _Soapy Sam_, the origin of which _sobriquet_ is lost in doubt. It
is said, that when asked its meaning by a lady, Bishop Wilberforce
replied, “I believe they call me ‘Soapy Sam’ because I am so often in
hot water, and always come out with clean hands.”
SAM.
_A Melancholy but Instructive Narrative, Founded on Facts,
and on James Smith’s “George Barnewell”_
Sam Soapey stood at his Palace door,
Promotion hoping to find, Sir;
His Apron it hung down before,
And the tail of his wig behind, Sir.
A Lady, so painted and smart,
Cried “Pardon my little transgression,
But I know what is next to your heart,
Now, what do you think of Confession?”
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
Her face was rouged up to the eyes,
And red was her ladyship’s toggery,
And folks who are thought to be wise,
Recognised a professor of roguery.
A bundle of Keys at her waist――
Says she, “I can help you, Sir, that I can,
In the South I am very much graced,
And I live at a place called the Vatican.”
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
Her language his wits did bereave,
She proceeded to carney and gabble on,
And at last (which you’d hardly believe)
He smirked at the Lady of Babylon.
Says he, “I should get in a scrape,
Could my late and respectable Sire hark;
He’d frown should a Wilberforce ape
A sleek Ultramontanist hierarch.”
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
Says she, “Don’t be frightened at names,
You’ve always to Rome had a tendency!
Stand up for Confession; your game’s
To struggle for priestly ascendency.
Cut the priest a back-way to the house,
And you’ve cut through the Isthmus of Darien:
Fathers, husbands, are not worth a souse
After that, my fine stout-legged Tractarian.”
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
* * * * *
This counsel he took from his love,
And in Parliament’s very next Session
He pleaded, with voice of a dove,
For “the excellent rite called Confession.”
But Premiers are wary, and _they_ can see
Whom ’tis expedient to fish up;
Lo! an archiepiscopal vacancy,
And Sam is _not_ made an Archbishop.
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
“If that Woman were here, dash my wigs.”
Cried he, “I’d come Luther and Knox at her,
I’d slate the old mother of prigs,
And raise my episcopal _vox_ at her.
I fancied I’d made such a rare book,
And now I’m in just the wrong box for ’t;
Had I struck to my Anglican Prayer-book,
I should not have stuck Bishop of Oxford.”
Rum-ti-iddi-ti-ti.
MORAL.
(_Too obvious to need telling._)
――――
The burlesque of _George Barnwell_ is the last of the poetical
extracts that need be quoted from _The Rejected Addresses_. Those
already given in this collection consist of the imitations of W. T.
Fitzgerald, William Wordsworth, Lord Byron, Thomas Moore, Robert
Southey, Walter Scott, M. G. Lewis, S. T. Coleridge and George Crabbe.
Those not given consist of a few prose imitations (William Cobbett and
Dr. Johnson), and two or three parodies of second-rate and almost
forgotten authors.
[Illustration]
MISSIONARY HYMN.
(By Dr. REGINALD HEBER, 1783-1826,)
From Greenland’s icy mountains,
From India’s coral strand,
Where Afric’s sunny fountains
Roll down their golden sand;
From many an ancient river,
From many a balmy plain,
They call us to deliver
Their land from error’s chain.
What though the spicy breezes
Blow soft on Ceylon’s isle,
Though every prospect pleases,
And only man is vile;
In vain, with lavish kindness,
The gifts of God are strewn,
The Heathen in his blindness,
Bows down to wood and stone.
* * * * *
SONG BY PRINCE GORTSCHAKOFF.
From Cashmere’s icy mountains,
From Bombay’s coral strand,
Where Cawnpore’s sunny fountains
Roll down their golden sand;
From many a Punjab river,
From groves where fire-flies flame,
To make us Russians shiver,
The Indian regiments came.
In ships across the ocean,
The dusky warrior steam’d.
’Twas Beaconsfield’s own notion,
And this is what he dream’d:
That at the apparition
Of cut-throats such as these,
My master would petition
For mercy on his knees.
Yes, he was so benighted
This Earl, who governs you,
To think we should be frighted,
At his assorted crew.
Sensation, too, sensation!
That also was his game;
And o’er the British nation
The Jingo spirit came.
Tell, his’try, tell the story,
Whilst future ages jeer,
Of how to gain fresh glory
He brought these Indians here.
And how, when once at Malta,
They back again were sped;
Whilst England paid for carriage
A hundred pounds per head!
_Truth Christmas Number._ December 1879.
――――
TO ENGLISH WOMEN MISSIONARIES.
From Greenland’s icy mountains,
From India’s coral strand,
Comes no distinct appealing
For England’s helping hand;
The poor benighted savage
Compelled unclothed to dwell,
Without our cost-price Bibles
Enjoys life very well.
What though the spicy breezes
Are very nice and dry,
And every prospects pleases
A missionary eye?
In vain with lavish kindness
The Gospel tracts are strewn,
The heathen in his blindness
Does better left alone.
A happy, soulless creature,
He lives his little day;
Directly on conversion,
It seems, ensues decay.
Why seek the cheerful heathen
To tell him he is vile?
Ah, leave him gay and godless
Upon his palmy isle.
* * * * *
From England’s greatest city,
Through all her pomp and pride,
One bitter cry rings ever,
Unsilenced, undenied:
From Stepney’s crowded alleys,
From Bethnal Green’s close lanes,
Men call us to deliver
Souls from the Devil’s chains.
O women! sister women――
Do _you_ not hear the cry
Of these who sin and suffer――
Are damned in life, and die:
Of these whose lives are withered,
Whose youth is trampled down,
The victims and the scourges
Of every Christian town?
By life that is――and is not――
By life that is to be,
By baby lips yet speechless,
By all life’s misery――
They call: their lives adjure you
By all your lives hold dear――
What _foreign_ mission calls you?
Your mission work is _here_!
E. NESBIT.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ July 10, 1887.
――――
A NEW WAR SONG.
From Chatham’s pleasant mountains,
From Aldershot’s bare plain,
Where the British flag floats proudly,
And the lion shakes his mane.
From barracks and from messroom
Resounds the bugle’s notes,
Calling to arms, to cross the seas
And cut some heathen throats.
What tho’ from every pulpit
We daily Christ proclaim
And bend before the Prince of Peace,
And worship in His name,
In vain in adoration
We bow before the throne,
_These heathens are possessed of lands_
That we must make our own.
Blow, gently blow, ye breezes,
Let the war smoke upward curl
While bathed in blood and glory
Stands forth our Premier Earl;
But weep, oh! weep for England,
And bow the head in shame,
For sullied is her honour,
And tarnished is her name.
J. C. A.
_The Bath Herald._ May, 1879.
[Illustration]
The Imperial Institute Ode.
After tremendous efforts to “puff” the so-called “Imperial Institute”
scheme into public favour, and when the subscriptions were coming in
but slowly, the ceremony of laying the foundation stone was gone
through, with all the solemn mummery customary on such occasions. An
Ode was necessary, and one was accordingly written by Mr. _Lewis_
Morris, and set to music by Sir Arthur Sullivan. The Ode contained the
usual commonplaces, expressed in language more than usually dull and
meaningless, as the following extracts will suffice to show:――
I.
With soaring voice and solemn music sing,
High to Heaven’s gate let pealing trumpets ring!
To-day our hands consolidate
The Empire of a thousand years.
Delusive hopes, distracting fears,
Have passed, and left her great,
For Britain, Britain, we our jubilant anthems raise,
Uplift your voices all, worthy is she of praise!
III.
No more we seek our Realm’s increase
By War’s red rapine, but by white-winged Peace;
To-day we seek to bind in one,
Till all our Britain’s work be done――
Through wider knowledge closer grown,
As each fair sister by the rest is known,
And mutual Commerce, mighty to efface
The envious bars of Time and Place,
Deep-pulsing from a common heart
And through a common speech expressed――
From North to South, from East to West,
Our great World Empire’s every part;
A universal Britain strong
To raise up Right and beat down Wrong――
Let this thing be! who shall our Realm divide?
Ever we stand together, Kinsmen, side by side!
V.
First Lady of our British Race!
’Tis well that with thy peaceful Jubilee
This glorious dream begins to be,
This thy lost Consort would, this would thy Son,
Who has seen all thy Empire face to face
And fain would leave it One,
Oh, may the Hand which rules our Fate
Keep this our Britain great!
We cannot tell, we can but pray
Heaven’s blessing on our work to-day.
Uprise, oh, Palace fair, where every eye may see
This proud embodied Unity!
For Britain and our Queen one voice we raise,
Laud them, rejoice, peal forth, worthy are they of praise!
THE INAUGURAL ODE AS IT OUGHT TO HAVE BEEN.
(_With Apologies to Mr. Lewis Morris._)
With partial pomp and sounding bands of brass,
And Royalties――both first and second class――,
To-day the Queen, in semi-state,
Consents a project to befriend
Which for so long seemed doomed to end
In a fiasco great!
But at last, at last, the Prince his labour finds repaid――
The Imperial Institute’s foundation stone is laid!
When first the grasping “Gang” its birth decreed,
And greedily made Kensington its site,
The project’s progress was but small, indeed,
And the subscriptions strangely light.
And though the Prince to the occasion rose,
And summoned all the Mayors to town;
Though hints of knighthood, too, were given to those
Who’d put their names for large donations down;
Though soldiers, too, and sailors, side by side,
Were fiercely dunned throughout the Empire wide;
Though everywhere subscription-lists were sent,
O’er stormy sea, through distant continent;
And though, worked artfully from Kensington,
The “screw” was universally put on,
The Empire set itself against the craze,
And the new Institute was loath to raise.
But was the “Gang” disheartened? Nay;
It persevered, and gathered here to-day,
Where “jobs” have in the past been done,
It sees, we fear, one more begun,
For, spite of all that has been said,
Upon this latest subject light to shed;
Spite of the promises which have been made
That the new Institute shall foster trade;
Spite, too, official zest and skill,
And of the fervent hopes express’d,
From North to South, from East to West,
That it will some good end fulfil,
And make the Empire yet more strong,
We fear such hopes will all prove wrong,
And that this building, with its tower so tall,
Will only be the biggest “job” of all!
Yet do we dare to-day,
As in this solemn rite we here engage,
To hope the future will our fears gainsay,
And make this place a glorious heritage
For all our people, and a source of strength
Throughout the teeming Empire’s breadth and length.
But, if we this would see,
Then, by a stern decree,
This Institute must be forthwith set free
From greed and jobbery!
Those who would batten on it must be told
At once to loose their hold,
So that it may uprise a Palace free and fair,
In whose great benefits an Empire wide may share.
First Lady of our British Race,
We’ll Hope that with thy peaceful Jubilee
We of this dream may a fulfilment see,
For this, were thy lost Consort with us still,
Yon scene of pomp and pageantry to grace,
Would surely be _his_ will;
And this we fain would trust thy son,
Undoing what he’s done,
Will also help fulfil.
Time this must show, but we can pray
That higher motives from to-day
May strengthen those who execute
The business of the Institute;
That from to-day its end and aim
May be the country’s wealth and fame.
That flunkeys, toadies, snobs may find
It is not for _their_ sake designed;
Whilst Kensington, forced to admit
It has no lot nor part in it,
No more will claim to such extent
What is for all the Empire meant.
Then will the Palace fair, by patriotism planned,
Be hailed a glory of the land,
And, as the Empire joins its walls to raise,
Its people, one and all, will loudly sound its praise.
_Truth._ July 7, 1887.
Mr. Lewis Morris was rewarded for his ode by a silver Jubilee medal,
with permission to wear it on public occasions. Some time afterwards
he wrote to a Manchester newspaper complaining that people confounded
him with Mr. _William_ Morris, the poet and socialist, on which _The
Star_ published the following
POET AND POETASTER.
If this kind of thing goes on, Sir, I shall have to change my name;
’Tis an odious position to be in;
Though the other Mr. Morris may be better known to fame,
I am Mr. Lewis Morris, of Penbryn.
He was christened after Shakespeare, but his other name is mine;
Yet, though critics are so quick at me to quiz,
I can honestly asseverate I never wrote a line
That could fairly be compared with one of his.
When I wrote an ode to praise the life our precious Prince has led,
Though I must confess it fell a little flat,
There were certain silly editors who ignorantly said
Mr. William had been capable of that.
Now I happen to be certain it would take him all his time
To indite an ode on Royalty’s affairs,
For disloyalty to Princes isn’t reckoned any crime,
’Mong the people whose society he shares.
In a word he is a poet, and a Socialist to boot,
One whose company ’tis wiser to eschew;
For although I am a person of importance and repute,
It is certain I am neither of the two.
J. L. J.
[Illustration]
THE TWINS.
In form of feature, face and limb,
I grew so like my brother
That folks got taking me for him
And each for one another,
It puzzled all our kith and kin,
It reach’d an awful pitch:
For one of us was born a twin
And not a soul knew which.
* * * * *
The whole of this amusing poem will be found in _Carols of Cockayne_
by Mr. Henry S. Leigh.
Mr. Leigh died early in June, 1883, and the following graceful parody
of his poem appeared in _Judy_, June 27, 1883.
IN THE STRAND.
In form and feature, face, and limb,
He tried to build a double,
And folks got taking it for him,
For want of taking trouble.
“A bitter-minded cynic this!”
Said those who argued blindly.
He took their finding not amiss,
Nor thought it meant unkindly.
He dreamed long dreams, and meant to do
A heap of great grand work;
’T is p’r’aps the same with me and you,
And still the race we shirk.
Another face gone from the Strand,
A voice we hear no more;
We miss the pressure of a hand,
Oft pressed on this LEIGH shore.
――――:o:――――
NURSERY RHYMES.
A learned dissertation might be written――entitled “The Wisdom of our
Nursery Rhymes”――which should go to prove that every important Rhyme
was either founded on some historical basis, or illustrated an old
custom of our forefathers long since fallen into oblivion.
Such an essay would be out of place here, but a few notes will be
inserted to show the undoubted antiquity of such of the principal
Nursery Rhymes as have given rise to the Parodies to be quoted.
Parodies of Nursery Rhymes exist in such numbers that only a small
percentage can be inserted, especially as some of the best are of a
political and personal nature, and rapidly become obsolete.
The selection has been made as carefully and impartially as possible,
with indications as to where such other Parodies may be found as have
had to be omitted.
――――
Some of our Nursery Rhymes owe their origin to names distinguished in
our literature; as Oliver Goldsmith, for instance, is believed in his
earlier days to have written such compositions. Dr. E. F. Rimbault
gives the following particulars as to some well-known favourites;
“Sing a Song of Sixpence,” he states, is as old as the 16th century.
“The Frog and the Mouse” was licensed in 1580. “London Bridge is
broken Down” is of unfathomed antiquity. “Girls and Boys come out to
Play” is certainly as old as the reign of Charles II.; as is also
“Lucy Locket lost her Pocket,” to the tune of which the American song
of “Yankee Doodle” was written. “Pussy Cat, Pussy Cat, where have you
been?” is of the age of Queen Bess. “Little Jack Horner” is older than
the seventeenth century. “The Old Woman Tossed in a Blanket” is of the
reign of James II., to which monarch it is supposed to allude.
J. O. Halliwell, in his “Nursery Rhymes of England,” gives the
following:――
Three blind mice, see how they run!
They all ran after the farmer’s wife,
Who cut off their tails with the carving knife,
Did you ever see such fools in your life?
Three blind mice.
and states that the original is to be found in “Deuteromelia; or, the
Second Part of Músicks Melodie,” 4to., London, 1609, where the music
is also given.
Many other instances of the antiquity of these rhymes will be found
under their respective headings.
Amongst the works on Nursery Rhymes which have been consulted, the
following may be recommended to those who take an interest in their
origin and history.
_The Nursery Rhymes of England_, collected by James Orchard
Halliwell. London. J. R. Smith. 1844.
_Arundines Cami_, edited by Henry Drury, A.M. Cambridge, 1841. This
contains Latin translations of many Nursery Rhymes, of which a
few are given in the following pages.
_Nursery Rhymes Revised._ By J. W. Palmer, 281, Strand, London,
1885.
_A Paper on Nursery Rhymes_, by Alfonzo Gardiner, see parts VIII. &
IX. _Yorkshire Notes and Queries_, 1887.
_The Gladstone Umbrella_, or Political Dainties. An illustrated
pamphlet, curious as having been published (in 1885) by Mr.
Bernard Quaritch, whose name seldom appears in connection with
anything so ephemeral as a political skit.
_The People’s William._ London. W. H. Allen & Co.
Parody Competitions on Nursery Rhymes――
_Truth_――October 15, 1885; September 30, 1886; June 14, 1888; June
28, 1888.
_The Weekly Dispatch_――April 13, 1884; July 5, 1885; October 2,
1887.
_One and All_――Various dates, from 1879 to 1881. These were all
political, and are now of no interest.
――――:o:――――
THIS IS THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT.
This is the house that Jack built.
This is the malt
That lay in the house that Jack built.
This is the rat,
That ate the malt
That lay in the house that Jack built.
* * * * *
This is the farmer sowing his corn,
That kept the cock that crow’d in the morn
That waked the priest all shaven and shorn,
That married the man all tatter’d and torn,
That kissed the maiden all forlorn,
That milked the cow with the crumpled horn,
That tossed the dog,
That worried the cat,
That killed the rat,
That ate the malt
That lay in the house that Jack built.
Very few would suspect that “The House that Jack built” is a
comparatively modern version of an ancient Jewish hymn, sung at the
feast of the Passover. Yet such is the case, according to the late Dr.
Halliwell Phillips, who gives the following translation of the
allegorical Talmudic Hymn, taken from _Sepher Haggadah_, folio 23.
This, he says, was first translated by Professor P. N. Leberecht, of
Leipsic, in 1731. The original, from which the Hebrew version was
translated, is in the Chaldaic language.
1. A _kid_, a kid my father bought,
For two pieces of money:
A kid, a kid.
2. Then came the _cat_ and ate the kid,
That my father bought
For two pieces of money:
A kid, a kid.
3. Then came the _dog_, and bit the cat,
That ate the kid,
That my father bought
For two pieces of money:
A kid, a kid.
4. Then came the _staff_, and beat the dog
That bit the cat,
That ate the kid,
That my father bought,
For two pieces of money:
A kid, a kid.
5. Then came the _fire_, and burned the staff
That beat the dog, _&c._,――as before.
6. Then came the _water_ and quenched the fire.
That burned the staff,
That beat the dog, _&c._
7. Then came the _ox_, and drank the water,
That quenched the fire, _&c._
8. Then came the _butcher_ and slew the ox
That drank the water, _&c._
9. Then came the _Angel of death_
And killed the butcher
That slew the ox, _&c._
10. Then came the _Holy One_, blessed be He,
And killed the Angel of death
That killed the butcher
That slew the ox
That drank the water
That quenched the fire
That burned the staff
That beat the dog
That bit the cat
That ate the kid
That my father bought
For two pieces of money:
A kid, a kid.
_The following is an interpretation of the allegory_:――
1. The Kid which is one of the pure animals denotes the Hebrews. The
father, by whom it is purchased, is Jehovah, who represents himself as
sustaining this relation to the Hebrew nation. The pieces of money
signify Moses and Aaron, through whose medium the Hebrews were brought
out of Egypt.
2. The Cat denotes the Assyrians by whom the ten tribes were carried
into captivity.
3. The dog is symbolical of the Babylonians.
4. The staff signified the Persians.
5. The fire indicates the Grecian Empire under Alexander the Great.
6. The water betokens the Romans, or the fourth of the great
monarchies to whom the Jews were subjected.
7. The ox is a symbol of the Saracens who subdued Palestine, and
brought it under the Caliphate.
8. The butcher that killed the ox denotes the Crusaders by whom the
Holy Land was wrested out of the hands of the Saracens.
9. The Angel of death signifies the Turkish powers by which the land
of Palestine was taken from the Franks, to whom it is still subject.
10. The commencement of the tenth stanza is designed to show that God
will take signal vengeance on the Turks, immediately after whose
overthrow the Jews are to be restored to their own land, and live
under the Government of their long expected Messiah.
A somewhat similar accumulative poem to the “House that Jack built” is
mentioned in Chodzko’s _Popular Poetry of Persia_; it runs thus:――
“I went upon the mountain top to tend my flock. Seeing there
a girl, I said, ‘Lass, give me a kiss.’ She said, ‘Lad, give
me some money.’ I said, ‘The money is in the purse, the
purse in the wallet, the wallet on the camel, and the camel
in Kerman.’ She said, ‘You wish for a kiss, but the kiss
lies behind my teeth, my teeth are locked up, the key is
with my mother, and my mother, like your camel, is in
Kerman.’”
Sir Richard Burton also gives a translation of an old Arab story
called
THE DROP OF HONEY.
Many years ago a hunter found a hollow tree full of bees’ honey, some
of which he took home in a water-skin. In the city he sold the honey
to an oilman, but in emptying out the honey from the skin, a drop fell
to the ground, whereupon the flies flocked to it, and a bird swooped
down from the sky upon the flies. Then the oilman’s cat springs upon
the bird, and the hunter’s dog flies at the cat, and the oilman kills
the dog, and the hunter kills the oilman. Then the men of the
respective tribes took up the quarrel, and fight, till there died of
them much people, none knoweth their number save almighty Allah!
――――
This favourite nursery rhyme has been more frequently imitated than
any other, and has been especially selected as the model on which to
form political squibs and satires.
Some of the principal of these were published by W. Hone (illustrated
by George Cruikshank), early in the present century, and referred to
the matrimonial squabbles of the Prince of Wales (afterwards George
IV.), a topic which possesses so little interest at present that it is
not necessary to reprint the parodies. A few of the titles may here be
enumerated:――
Loyalists’ House that Jack built.
Real, or Constitutional House that Jack built.
The Queen that Jack found.
The Queen and Magna Charta, or the thing that Jack signed.
The Dorchester Guide, or the House that Jack built.
The Political Queen that Jack loves.
The Political House that Jack built. 1821.[8]
The Theatrical House that Jack built.
“Juvenile reduplications, or the New House that Jack built,” a
Parody, by J. Bisalt, with cuts in the manner of T. Bewick.
Birmingham, 1800.
One of the rarest imitations is a little octavo religious pamphlet,
intended as an answer to atheists and freethinkers, entitled “The
Christian House that Jack built by Truth on a Rock,” with portraits of
celebrities. 1820.
――――
In 1809, during the O. P. Riots in the new Covent Garden theatre, many
parodies were produced, and amongst them one on this nursery rhyme.
The riots arose partly from some structural alterations made in the
house, but still more from the great increase made in the prices of
admission. John Kemble, the manager, and Madame Catalani were the
principal objects of public indignation, and the war cries of the
rioters were “Old Prices! No Private Boxes! No Catalani! The English
Drama!” In the end Kemble had to compromise matters, and Catalani’s
name was withdrawn from the bills.
This is the house that JACK[9] built.
These are the _boxes_ let to the _great_, that visit the house that
Jack built.
These are the _pigeon-holes_ over the _boxes_, let to the _great_,
that visit the house that Jack built.
This is the _Cat_[10] engaged to squall to the _poor_ in the
_pigeon-holes_ over the _boxes_, let to the _great_, that visit
the house that Jack built.
This is _John Bull_ with a _bugle-horn_, who hissed the _Cat_
engaged to squall to the _poor_ in the _pigeon-holes_ over the
_boxes_, let to the _great_, that visit the house that Jack
built.
This is the _thief-taker_ shaven and shorn, that took up _John Bull_
with his _bugle-horn_, who hissed the _Cat_, engaged to squall to
the _poor_ in the _pigeon-holes_ over the _boxes_, let to the
_great_, that visit the house that Jack built.
This is the _Manager_ full of scorn, who raised the price to the
people forlorn, and directed the _thief-taker_, shaven and shorn,
to take up _John Bull_ with his _bugle-horn_, who hissed the
_Cat_ engaged to squall to the _poor_ in the _pigeon-holes_ over
the _boxes_, let to the _great_, that visit the house that Jack
built.
From THE REBELLION; _or, All in the Wrong_. A serio-comic Hurly-Burly,
as it was performed for two months at the New Theatre Royal, Covent
Garden, by His Majesty’s servants, _the Players_, and his liege
subjects, _the Public_. London, Vernor, Hood, & Sharp. 1809.
――――
In _The Ingoldsby Lyrics_, by R. H. Barham, collected and edited by
his son, and published by Richard Bentley and Son, London, in 1881,
there are several parodies, which were doubtless very amusing when
they first appeared, but they are now all out of date, especially
those relating to politics.
Page 21. “I am partial to table and tray.”――_Cowper._
” 43. On the London University.
“The University we’ve got in town.”
” 181. “Pity the sorrows of a poor old Church.”
” 108. The House that Jack built.
” 117. Various Nursery Rhymes.
” 174. The House that Jack built.
The last parody, which originally appeared in _The Spectator_, refers
to the Parliamentary enquiry into the causes of the fire that
destroyed the Houses of Parliament in 1834. It commences:――
This is the House that Josh burnt,
These are the sticks that heated the bricks,
That set fire to the house that Josh burnt.
The other parody of _The House that Jack built_ refers to an action
that was brought in 1825, against Mr. Peto, a builder, for a breach of
contract, in consequence of some failure in the foundations of the new
Custom House at London Bridge.
This is the House that Jack built.
This is a sleeper that propped up the House that Jack built.
This is the pile that was short all the while, and wouldn’t go
deeper under the sleeper, that propped up the House that Jack
built.
This is the Peto appointed to see to, the driving the pile that
was short, etc.
* * * * *
This is John Bull with his pockets so full, who “forked out” three
hundred thousand pounds for a tumble down house that fell to the
ground, and paid all the fees, with a great deal of ease, to all
the grave counsellors bouncing and big, every one in a
three-tailed wig, who examined George Rennie that wouldn’t give a
penny, for all the work, etc., etc.
These parodies are both very long, and the above extracts sufficiently
indicate their topics.
――――
“_The Palace that N――h built._ A parody on an old English Poem,” by I.
Hume. A small oblong octavo, with plates. Not dated, but about
1830, as it is a skit on Nash, the architect who built
Regent-street, and Buckingham Palace.
A Latin version of “The House that Jack built” appeared in _The
Hornet_ in 1872, it was also reprinted in _Fun, Ancient and
Modern_, by Dr. Maurice Davies. London, Tinsley Brothers, 1878.
It is too long to be inserted here.
“_The Crystal Palace that Fox built_” a Pyramid of Rhyme, with
illustrations, by John Gilbert. London, David Bogue, 1851.
“These are the workmen, a busy array,
Two thousand and more, as I have heard say,
Who readily, steadily, toiled away,
And finished before the first of May
_The Crystal Palace
that Fox built_.”
The editor offered an apology for not including the name of Mr.
Henderson, as it “_would not_ come into the rhyme.” Messrs. Fox and
Henderson were the builders of the 1851 exhibition, in Hyde Park.
――――
THE HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT.
This is the house that Barry (ought to have) built.
This is the money laid out on the house that Barry (ought to have)
built.
This is the Reid that wasted the money laid out on the house that
Barry (ought to have) built.
This is the architect that snubbed the Reid that wasted the money
laid out on the house that Barry (ought to have) built.
This is the Brougham that worried the architect that snubbed the
Reid that wasted the money laid out on the house that Barry
(ought to have) built.
This is the press with its newsman’s horn, that took up the Brougham
that worried the architect that snubbed the Reid that wasted the
money laid out on the house that Barry (ought to have) built.
This is the Peerage, all forlorn, that appealed to the press with
its newsman’s horn that took up the Brougham that worried the
architect that snubbed the Reid that wasted the money laid out on
the house that Barry (ought to have) built.
* * * * *
_Punch._ 1846.
Notwithstanding all the faults found with Barry’s designs, there are
really only four good reasons of complaint. The Houses of Parliament
are built on too low a site; they are built in a style of architecture
totally unsuited for their purposes, and our climate; they are built
of a very perishable stone, which is already crumbling to decay; and
the chamber in which the Commons meet is only just large enough to
accommodate one-half of the members.
――――
THE WATER THAT JOHN DRINKS.
This is the water that John drinks.
This is the Thames with its cento of stink,
That supplies the water that John drinks.
* * * * *
(_Millions of Money._)
This is the price that we pay to wink
At the vested int’rests that fill to the brink,
The network of sewers from cesspool and sink,
That feed the fish that float in the ink-
y stream of the Thames with its cento of stink,
That supplies the water that John does drink.
_Punch._ 1849.
――――
THE SHOW THAT SHAM BUILT.
This is the Show that Sham built.
This is the fault that lay in the show, &c.
This is the fat that came of the fault, &c.
This is the hog that eat the fat, &c.
This is the press that worried the hog, &c.
This is the swell, commercially born, who cursed the press, &c.
This is the grammar, all tattered and torn, that belonged to the
swell, &c.
This is the feast of much decency shorn, that aired the grammar,
&c.
And this is the home, better known as _Cremorne_,
Fit place for the feast of all decency shorn,
That aired the grammar, all tattered and torn,
That belonged to the swell (commercially born)
That cursed the press,
That worried the hog,
That eat the fat,
That came of the fault,
That lay in the Show,
That Sham built.
_The Tomahawk._ Nov. 9, 1867. (Lord Mayor’s Day.)
――――
In 1872 a skit on the promoters of the _Emma_ mines was published, as
“_A New Nursery Ballad_, embellished with portraits of some of the
most _Emma_-nent men of the Day.” Salt Lake City, Utah. Published by
and for Emma A. Sell. The frontispiece represented Knaves and Asses,
and the other illustrations quaintly represented the various events
alluded to in the Rhyme:
This is the mine that Lyon struck
* * * * *
These are the Dupes who insanely tore
To subscribe the Sum the Directors swore,
Was worth a Million of Pounds and more,
On the return of the Swell who was sent to explore,
The mine by a general of the army corps,
Who was backed by the Britishers, one, two, three, four,
Who shared with the Yanks from the Eastern shore,
Who joined with the men who had cleared out the ore,
That lay in the mine that Lyon struck.
――――
This is the land of Austra-_lia_,
These are the mines of silver and gold,
That lay in the land of Austra-_lia_.
This is the mining captain so bold,
Who prospected the mines of silver and gold, etc.
This is the gallant Companie, founded eighteen and fifty-three,
That sent on the mining captain so bold, etc.
These are the lighthearted gentlemen,
The worthy Board of Directors ten, to the gallant, etc.
This is the gent with his ready pen,
Who was “sec” to the light-hearted gentlemen, etc.
These are the lawyers with their “little bill,”
Messrs. Grab and Snatcher of Diddlegate Hill,
Who got up and “rigged” that Companie, etc.
These are the venturers rushing up stairs
So eager to get an allotment of shares, etc.
This is the Court of Chancerie,
That swallowed that ill-fated Companie, etc.
This is the total dividend, _nil_,
Left after paying the lawyers bill,
Messrs. Grab and Snatchem of Diddlegate Hill, etc.
These are the shareholders, County and Town,
Looking all of them “done” most uncommonly brown,
As they gaze on the total dividend――_nil_,
Left after paying the lawyers bill, etc.
EDWARD WALFORD, M.A.
_Will-o-the-Wisp_, a satirical paper, had two amusing parodies, both
illustrated, the first, which appeared April 17, 1869, entitled _The
Protestant House that Jack Built_, the second, May 8, 1869, _The Comic
History of a Comical Ship built by John Bull_:――
“This is the Ship that Jack Built.”
――――
THE HOUSE THAT JOHN BUILT.
(_Indian Version._)
This the House that JOHN[11] built,
These are the Taxes that lay on the House that JOHN built,
This is the War that eat up the Taxes that lay on the House that
JOHN built.
This is the Viceroy that made the War that eat up the Taxes that lay
on the House that JOHN built.
These are the Strings that pulled the Viceroy that made the War that
eat up the Taxes that lay on the House that JOHN built.
This is Big BEN, with his newspaper horn, who pulled the Strings
that pulled the Viceroy that made the War that eat up the Taxes
that lay on the House that JOHN built.
This is BRITANNIA, Jingo-borne, who was witched by Big BEN with his
newspaper horn, who pulled the Strings that pulled the Viceroy
that made the War that eat up the Taxes that lay on the House
that JOHN built.
This is the AMEER, all sulks and scorn, who said “No” to BRITANNIA
Jingo-borne, who was witched by BIG BEN with his newspaper horn,
who pulled the Strings that pulled the Viceroy that made the War
that eat up the Taxes that lay on the House that JOHN built.
_Punch_, 1878.
――――
THIS IS THE RADICAL BRADLAUGH.
This is the Radical Bradlaugh,
These are electors sturdy and strong,
Who greet him with hearty and welcoming song,
Hurrah for the Radical Bradlaugh!
This is the struggle of Right against Wrong,
Thrice won by electors sturdy and strong,
Who lustily echoed the welcoming song,
Hurrah for the Radical Bradlaugh!
* * * * *
These are the people in whom we must trust
To raise us our liberty out of the dust,
To strive and diminish the deep-lying shame
That now is affixed to the Englishman’s fame,
To kick out the bigots so sorely dismayed
And stop all the cowardly tricks of their trade,
To fight in the battle of Right against Wrong,
And aid the electors sturdy and strong,
Who lustily echoed the welcoming song
To get justice for Radical Bradlaugh.
D. EVANS.
_The Weekly Dispatch_. March 12, 1882.
――――
THE FACE THAT ART MADE.
This is the Face that Art made!
This is the rouge for the modest blush,
That is stippled on with a hare’s-foot brush,
On the Maiden’s Face that Art made!
This is the _Blanc de Perle_ in paste
That imparts a background purely chaste,
For the _Rouge_ that makes the modest blush,
That is stippled on with the hare’s-foot brush!
On the Maiden’s Face that Art made!
This is the _Grenadine_ that tips
With a cherry red the pouting lips,
To suit the _Blanc de Perle_ in paste,
That imparts a background wholly chaste,
For the _Rouge_ that makes the modest blush,
That is stippled on with a hare’s-foot brush!
On the Maiden’s Face that Art made!
This is the _Eau de Violette_
(Price 6s. 6d.), the mouth to wet,
When the _Grenadine_ so sweetly tips
With cherry red the pouting lips,
To suit the _Blanc de Perle_ in paste, &c.
On the Maiden’s Face that Art made!
And here’s the _Etui Mystérieux_,
With its _Henna_ to use _pour les beaux yeux_,
And its velvet _Mouches_, which so black will be,
If stuck on the _Crème de Fleur de Lis_;
And its _House-leek Juice_ to warts remove,
And its _Walnut-water_ to hair improve,
And its wonderful _Incarnate de Chine_,
To hide where the wrinkle once has been,
And its _Powders_ to frost the locks of hair
Which _Sahara Wash_ has made more fair,
And its bright _Eau d’Or_ to turn to gold
The locks that are bound in a massive fold
Above the forehead, deprived of crease
By the far-famed _Crème de l’Impératrice_,
And covered as though with a beauteous calm,
By the secret power of the _Bagdad Balm_;
Above the pupils which _Kohhl_ makes bright,
And _Belladonna_ augments at night,
And to which the _Crayon Noir_ supplies
A finely-arched brow to match the eyes,
And increase the effect of the _Bleu pour Veines_,
Which imparts such a clear and delicate stain
To the skin enamelled with _Blanc de Cygne_,
And powdered over with _Véloutine_,
That enhances the _Grenadine_, which tips
With a cherry red the pouting lips
To suit the _Blanc de Perle_ (in paste)
That forms a background whitely chaste
For the _Rouge’s_ sympathetic blush
Stippled neatly on with a hare’s-foot brush
On the cheeks, to which _Styrian Lotion_ lends
A plumpness that Nature far transcends,
Of the Maiden’s Face that Art made!
_Truth._ December 25, 1883.
――――
ANOTHER VIEW OF A ROOKERY.
This is the House that any one built!
This is the Cadger who’d ruin the House that any one built.
* * * * *
And this is the Writer whose vigilant care shows poverty’s evils
exceptional are, nor visit the men who lead with their wives clean,
sober, hard-working, respectable lives, and exposes the Rads, who, by
stooping to set poor against rich popularity get, and lay their ills
at the rich man’s door, as profits to him at the cost of the poor, and
support the Paper that (so it may sell) will foster sensation and
shamefully tell the Falsehood that stupidly dares to aver it lies with
the rich (who, it says, prefer foul tenants to cleanly, and “bullion”
can squeeze from starving wretches and dirt and disease), and not with
Drink and improvident ways, that they lost the earnings of happier
days, and got those Habits of laziness that led to the Tokens of filth
and distress, that mark the Cadger who’d ruin the House that any one
built.
_A Pen’orth of Poetry for the Poor._ London. 1884.
――――
THE BICYCLE THAT JACK MADE.
This is the bicycle that Jack made.
This is the lathe, all polished and true,
That finished the work, kept under-weighed,
For the bicycle that Jack made.
* * * * *
This the gas oxygen――that you cannot see
Which proportions with iron in atoms three,
To make the chemical of formulæ O₃ Fe₂.
That combines in atoms of twenty-eight times two,
To form the ore, gathered out of the pit,
Which was melted in a furnace, blazingly lit,
That made the iron “carbonised” and clean,
Which was “blown” in the “converter” and “puddled” to steel,
That made the metal properly “tempered” through,
Which was put in the lathe, all polished and true,
That finished the work, kept under-weighed,
To complete the bicycle that Jack made.
P. HOWELL.
_Wheeling Annual._ 1885.
――――
This is the house that Tithe built;
This is the landlord, healthy and lithe,
That made the tenants under him writhe,
That sent their servants to pay the tithe,
That abused the parsons, all so blithe,
That ruined the men that worked the scythe,
That earned no cash,
That obtained the meat
That they had to eat,
That parsons were sent,
That lay in the house that Tithe built.
LEXICON.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
A very long parody, entitled “_This is the House Sir John left!_”
appeared in _Truth_, August 20, 1885. It had reference to the cruel
custom of people leaving their town houses with their dogs, cats, and
other domestic pets improperly cared for during their absence.
――――
These are the Michelstown Murders.
These are the constables brutal and base
That committed the Michelstown Murders.
This is the party that, clinging to place,
Will back up the constables brutal and base
That committed the Michelstown Murders.
This is the bloody undying disgrace
Attached to the party that, clinging to place,
Will back up the constables brutal and base
That committed the Michelstown Murders.
This is the callous, insensible brute
That ordered his men to be “ready to shoot,”
Who shares in the bloody, undying disgrace
Attached to the party that, clinging to place,
Will back up the constables brutal and base
That committed the Michelstown Murders.
* * * * *
These are the Radicals sturdy, with votes,
Who very soon down the Conservative throats
Will cram all the lies that the cowardly crew
Unblushingly utter to carry them through――
Will kick out the callous, insensible brute
That ordered his men to “be ready to shoot,”
Who shares in the bloody undying disgrace
Attached to the party that, clinging to place,
Will back up the constables brutal and base
That committed the Michelstown Murders.
D. EVANS.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ October 2, 1887.
――――
This is the Toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent
This is the Boy
That played with the toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent.
This is the Pain
That worried the Boy
’Till he played with the Toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent.
This is the Doctor who tried in vain
To take away the distressing Pain
That worried the Boy
Till he played with the Toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent.
This is the Nurse who worked amain
To help the Doctor, who tried in vain,
With treatment repeated again and again
To take away the distressing pain
That worried the Boy
Till he played with the Toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent.
And this is the Fund Truth’s friends maintain,
To try to ease dire poverty’s strain,
And to aid the Nurse who works amain
To help the doctor who tries in vain
With treatment repeated again and again,
To take away the distressing pain
That worried the Boy
Till he played with the toy
That was packed in the hamper Truth sent.
_Truth._ December 2. 1886.
――――
THE BOAT THAT JACK BUILT.
This is the boat that Jack built.
This is the girl that sat in the boat that Jack built.
This is the youth that loved the girl that sat in the boat that Jack
built.
This is the man that hated the youth that loved the girl that sat in
the boat that Jack built.
* * * * *
This rhyme, with very humorous illustrations, appeared in _The Lock to
Lock Times_, September 15, 1888. _The Lock to Lock Times_ is a clever
little paper devoted to angling and aquatics, it often contains
amusing parodies.
――――
Several different versions exist of the following imitation, this one
has been selected as the best and most complete. It originally
appeared in one of the University Magazines about twenty years ago,
but the exact reference is wanting.
THE DOMICILE ERECTED BY JOHN.
By A. Pope.
Behold the mansion reared by Dædal Jack!
See the malt stored in many a plethoric sack,
In the proud cirque of Ivan’s Bivouac!
Mark how the rat’s felonious fangs invade
The golden stores in John’s pavilion laid!
Anon, with velvet foot and Tarquin strides,
Subtle Grimalkin to his quarry glides;
Grimalkin grim, that slew the fierce rodent,
Whose tooth insidious Johann’s sackcloth rent!
Lo! Now the deep-mouthed canine foe’s assault!
That vexed the avenger of the stolen malt,
Stored in the hallowed precincts of that hall,
That rose complete at Jack’s creative call.
Here stalks the impetuous cow with the crumpled horn,
Whereon the exacerbating hound was torn
Who bayed the feline slaughter-beast that slew
The rat predaceous, whose keen fangs ran through
The textile fibres that involved the grain
That lay in Hans’ inviolate domain.
Here walks forlorn the damsel crowned with rue,
Lactiferous spoils from vaccine dugs who drew
Of that corniculate beast whose tortuous horn
Tossed to the clouds, in fierce vindictive scorn,
The baying hound whose braggart bark and stir
Arched the lithe spine and reared the indignant fur
Of puss, that, with verminicidal claw,
Struck the weird rat, in whose insatiate maw
Lay reeking malt, that erst in Juan’s courts we saw.
Robed in senescent garb, that seems, in sooth,
To long a prey to Chonos’ iron tooth,
Behold the man whose amorous lips incline
Full with young Eros’ osculative sign,
To the lorn maiden whose lactalbic hands
Drew albulactic wealth from lacteal glands
Of that immortal bovine, by whose horn
Distort, to realms ethereal was borne
The beast catulean, vexer of that sly
Ulysses quadrupedal, who made die
The old mordaceous rat that dared devour
Antecedaneous ale in John’s domestic bower.
Lo! Here, with hirsute honors doffed, succinct
Of saponaceous locks, the priest who linked
In Hymen’s golden bands the man unthrift
Whose means exiguous stared from many a rift,
E’en as he kissed the virgin all forlorn
Who milked the cow with implicated horn,
Who in fierce wrath the canine torturer skied,
That dared to vex the insidious muricide,
Who let auroral effluence through the pelt
Of that sly rat that robbed the palace that Jack built.
The loud cantankerous Shanghai[12] comes at last,
Whose shouts aroused the shorn ecclesiast,
Who sealed the vows of Hymen’s sacrament
To him who, robed in garments indigent,
Exosculates the damsel lachrymose,
The emulgator of the horned brute morose.
That on gyrated horn, to heaven’s high vault
Hurled up, with many a tortuous somersault,
The low bone-cruncher, whose hot wrath pursued
The scratching sneak, that waged eternal feud
With long-tailed burglar, who his lips would smack
On farinaceous wealth, that filled the halls of Jack.
Vast limbed and broad the farmer comes at length,
Whose cereal care supplied the vital strength
Of chanticleer, whose matutinal cry
Roused the quiescent form and ope’d the eye
Of razor-loving cleric, who in bands
Connubial linked the intermixed hands
Of him, whose rent apparel gaped apart,
And the lorn maiden with lugubrious heart,
Her who extraught the exuberant lactic flow
Of nutriment from that cornigerent cow,
Eumenidal executor of fate,
That to sidereal altitudes elate
Cerberus, who erst with fang letiferous
Left lacerate Grimalkin latebrose――
That killed the cat
That ate the malt,
That lay in the house that Jack built.
――――
_The Pall Mall Gazette_ for April 22, 1887, contained a Political
Parody, entitled “Jubilee Coercion Bill, No. 87.” It was profusely
illustrated by F. C. G., and without these illustrations the
letterpress would read flat and dull, especially as the fun of calling
Goschen, Chamberlain and Caine, “_Rats_,” however true it may have
been in 1887, is pretty well exhausted by this time.
The parody concludes with a portrait of _John Bull_ waving a Home Rule
flag, under him are the following lines:――
This is the Farmer who’ll blow his horn――(_John Bull._)
When he hears the Cock that’ll crow one morn,――(_Justice to Ireland._)
And rouse John Morley shaven and shorn,
That stands by the Peasant tattered and torn,
That loves poor Erin all forlorn,
That cheers the Bull with a lofty scorn,――(_Sir W. V. Harcourt._)
That tosses the Pup,――(_Lord R. Churchill._)
That snaps at the Cat,――(_W. E. Gladstone._)
That’ll kill the Rats,――(_Goschen and Chamberlain._)
That swallow the Stuff,
That lay in the Bill
The Tories built.
――――
During the trial in America of the action for Crim. Con. brought by
Mr. Tilton against the Rev. Henry Ward Beecher, a well known
journalist, Mr. W. A. Croffat, published a parody in the _New York
Daily Graphic_ called “The House that Bowen Built,” but it would be of
no interest to English readers.
――――
SCHOOL BOARD VERSION OF THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT.
This is the domiciliary edifice erected by John.
This is the fermented grain which was deposited in the domiciliary
edifice erected by John.
This is the obnoxious vermin that masticated the fermented grain
which was deposited in the domiciliary edifice erected by John.
This is the domesticated creature of the feline tribe that
completely annihilated the obnoxious vermin that masticated the
fermented grain which was deposited in the domiciliary edifice
erected by John.
This is the sagacious scion of the canine genus who disturbed the
equanimity of the domesticated creature of the feline tribe which
completely annihilated the obnoxious vermin that masticated the
fermented grain which was deposited in the domiciliary edifice
erected by John.
This is the graminivorous female of the bovine race who with her
curvilinear and corrugated protuberances considerably elevated
into atmospheric space the sagacious scion of the canine genus
who disturbed the equanimity of the domesticated creature of the
feline tribe that completely annihilated the obnoxious vermin
that masticated the fermented grain which was deposited in the
domiciliary edifice erected by John.
* * * * *
This is the agriculturist who placed in the alluvial deposit that
grain which germinated, flourished, multiplied, and subsequently
became the sustenance of the bold chanticleer who by his shrill
vociferations, at early dawn, awoke from his slumbers that
ecclesiastical gentleman whose cranium was devoid of its hirsute
covering who united in the bonds of h-o-l-y matrimony that humble
individual whose garments presented a disintegrated and unseemly
appearance who sipped the sweet honey from the lips of the young
damsel of dejected mien whose occupation consisted in extracting
the nutritious lacteal beverage from the graminivorous female of
the bovine race who with her curvilinear and corrugated
protuberances considerably elevated into atmospheric space the
sagacious scion of the canine genus who disturbed the equanimity
of the domesticated creature of the feline tribe that completely
annihilated the obnoxious vermin that masticated the fermented
grain which was deposited in the domiciliary edifice erected by
John.
This imitation forms one of a parcel of 14 “Modern Sermons,” as they
are styled, published by F. Passmore, 124, Cheapside, E.C., the whole
of which may be had, post free, for 13 pence. The following is the
introduction to another Sermon founded on the same plot:――
MODERN SERMONS.
“This is the house that Jack built.”
That is the first portion of my text, dear friends, so you see that
for a start we have something definite: we are not simply told that
this is the house; but that it is “the house that Jack built.” Now, if
Jack was anything, he was a far-seeing man; for do we not read that
“This is the malt that lay in the house that Jack built.”
Anticipating a rise in the price of barley, and wishing to profit by
that rise, Jack bought up all the malt that he could get. But, like
many other men, he had an enemy. This was a rat, and of him it is said
that
“This is the rat that ate the malt.”
Now I do not wish to impute any greedy or selfish motives to this rat.
Probably he was well aware that it was through malt that many men make
beasts of themselves. “Beasts,” said the rat to himself, “are already
too numerous. If their number is increased, the struggle for existence
will become fiercer: so it amounts to this, if I do not, by eating
this malt, save men from becoming beasts, we shall have to eat our
‘brothers and our sisters, our cousins and our aunts.’ I will either
prevent such a catastrophe, or perish in the attempt.” He perished in
the attempt, for we are introduced to his destroyer in the following
words:
“This is the cat that killed the rat.”
As I dealt generously with the rat, even so will I deal with the cat.
There is every reason for supposing that he was a friend of publicans
and sinners. Hear him speak for himself: “If this rat eats all the
malt, the publicans must either raise the price of beer, or they must
supply their customers with an inferior article. This shall not be.”
Having spoken these words, he pounced on the robber, and, intoxicated
with success, imprudently shook the fruits of his victory in the face
of one of whom it is written:
“This is the dog that worried the cat.”
* * * * *
――――:o:――――
SING A SONG OF SIXPENCE.
Sing a song of Sixpence,
A pocket full of rye;
Four-and-twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened,
The birds began to sing;
Was not that a dainty dish
To set before the King!
The King was in the parlour
Counting out his money;
The Queen was in the kitchen
Eating bread and honey;
The Maid was in the garden
Hanging out the clothes,
Down came a blackbird
And perched upon her nose.[13]
――――
CARMEN DENARIUM.
Incipe cui titulo ‘Denarius,’ incipe cantum!
Huic tumido loculo massa secalis inest;
Sex quater in patina merularum corpora, crustum
Queis super impositum pista farina fuit,
Procubuere simul; sed quando adaperta farina est,
Concordes merulis insonuere modi:
Mirum opus harmoniæ! nonne inter fercula posset
Haec vel regificae laux placuisse gulæ?
Rex erat in camera, numerans sibi pondera nimmi,
Pondera plebeio non numerando viro;
Mel maudit panemque morans Regina culina;
Dulcia plebeia non comedenda nuru.
Ad solem vestes siccans Ancilla per hortum
Ibat; et expansas aere funis habet;
Quum merula, affini descendens arbore, nasum
Ancillæ insilluit seque ibi constituit.
From _Arundines Cami_. Cambridge, 1841.
――――
When _Bentley’s Miscellany_ was started in 1837 it was supported by
the most brilliant writers of the day, George Cruikshank designed a
cover for it, and Dr. Maginn wrote the following poem which pretty
accurately describes Cruikshank’s design:――
THE SONG OF THE COVER.
“Sing a song of half-a-crown――
Lay it out this minute;
Buy the book, for half the town
Want to know what’s in it.
Had you all the cares of Job,
You’d then forget your troubles,”
Cried Cupid, seated on the Globe
Busy blowing bubbles.
Rosy summer, pretty spring,
See them scattering flowers――
“Catch who can!” the song they sing;
Heart’s-ease fall in showers.
Autumn, tipsy with the grape,
Plays a pipe and tabor;
Winter imitates the ape,
Mocking at his neighbour.
Bentley, Boz, and Cruikshank, stand,
Like expectant reelers――
“Music!” “Play up!” pipe in hand,
Beside the _fluted_ pillars!
Boz and Cruikshank want to dance,
None for frolic riper,
But Bentley makes the first advance,
Because he “pays the piper.”
“Then sing a song of half-a-crown,
And make a merry race on’t.
To buy the book, all London town;
There’s wit upon the face on’t.
Had you all the cares of Job,
You’d then forget your troubles,”
Cried Cupid, seated on the globe,
Busy blowing bubbles.
DR. MAGINN.
――――
CANTUS SEX DENARIORUM.
Sex denariorum
Cane cantilenam,
Viginti quatuor merulis
Artocream plenam.
Artocreâ apertâ,
Aves canebant grege;
Nonne erat bonum hoc
Locare coram rege?
Rex erat in conclavi
Nummos putans bellè,
Regina in coenaculo
Edens panem melle.
In horto vestes regias
Ancilla suspendebat;
Quum pica fortè veniens
Nasonem rapiebat.
_The Hornet._ 1872.
――――
Chansonnette de six sous,
La poche pleine de blé,
Vingt-quatre merles, tous
Cuits dans un pâté.
Quand on y mit le couteau,
Les merles chantérent, ma foi!
N’était-ce pas un spectacle beau
Mettre devant le roi?
EDWARD A. MORTON.
_Mirth._
――――
CHILDREN’S CORNER.
Sing a song of Christmas,
A pocket full of pie,
Four-and-twenty puddings
Oh how ni’――how ni’!――
When the feast is over,
Then the doctor comes,
Twirling golden eye-glass,
Twiddling both his thumbs.
Little Jack Horner,
Glum in a corner
After his Christmas Pie,
He wants more to stuff,
But Ma says “Enough!
Little pig, or you’ll certainly die!”
Mary had a little doll
With curls as white as snow,
And whersoever Mary went
That little doll must go.
But brother Billy, back from school,
To Mary he cried “Bo!”
Then smashed that little doll to bits
And in the fire did throw!
――――
NURSERY SONG IN PIDGIN ENGLISH.
Singee songee sick a pence,
Pockee muchee lye; (rye)
Dozen two time blackee bird
Cookee in e pie.
When him cutee topside
Birdee bobbery sing;
Himee tinkee nicey dish
Setee foree King!
Kingee in a talkee loom (room)
Countee muchee money;
Queeny in e kitchee,
Chew-chee breadee honey.
Servant galo shakee,
Hangee washee clothes;
Chop-chop comee blackie bird,
Nipee off her nose!
ANONYMOUS.
_Pidgin English_ is the dialect in use between the Chinese and the
English. The Chinese pronounce our letter _r_ at the commencement of a
word as _l_.
――――
THE TANNER’S CHANT.
Carol forth a canticle of demi-solidus
With grain in a commensurate degree,
Two-dozen darkly-feathered victims of a blunderbuss,
All coarctate ’neath pastry made with ghee,
By patient terebration, the aperture of the pie
Was effected with a lever-handled spoon;
When, judge the consternation of the monarch sitting by,
All the birds set up a sympanising tune.
They were only slightly wounded――chiefly suffering from surprise
(It was fortunate the oven had been slow)
And the warmth, though it alarmed them, which it’s useless to
disguise,
Made them quickly convalescent from the blow.
Now, shortly after this the mighty monarch of the land
Was ensconced with heaps of bullion untold,
Engaged in what he evidently didn’t understand――
Rhabdologic computation of his gold.
Her Majesty, his spouse, was in her boudoir far away,
Employed in manducation of her lunch;
On a dessicated loaf she gave her appetite full play,
Which, with honey, was as much as she could munch.
The feminine domestic was just then in the parterre,
Suspending some habiliments to dry,
When a darkly-feathered victim saw her standing on a chair,
And amputated her olfactory.
――――
Sing a song of Season,
Pockets full of naught,
Four-and-twenty Prince-lings
Don’t make up a Court.
When the Season’s opened,
They’ll represent the Crown;――
Isn’t that a shabby dish
To set before the town?
The Queen is absent――somewhere,
Saving up her money,
The Prince is in a Nile boat――
The Prince he is so funny.
So there’s left but Christian
To play the King at shows,
And if he does, a blackbird,
We trust, will have his nose!
_The Tomahawk._ March, 1869.
AMERICAN VERSION.
Sing a song of dollars,
A pocket full of brass,
Four-and-twenty blackbirds
Baked in apple sass.
When the pie was opened,
The birds began a hovering,
Wasn’t that a dainty dish
To set before a Sovereign?
――――
At a concert given in the Albert Hall on February 26, 1876, when the
Queen was present, the hall was scarcely half filled, and Sir Henry
Cole’s arrangements were loudly condemned.
Sing a song of native art!
A programme weak and dry;
4 P.M. to Albert Hall
Her Majesty draws nigh.
When the doors were opened,
The dead heads all came in,
And took up their positions
Where they could see the Queen.
The Queen was in the Royal box,
And thought it quite too funny,
That fools to come and look at her
Parted with their money.
Those who could not see her box
Took a quiet doze,
And half the people left the Hall
Long before the close.
The people and Her Majesty
Said ’twas a frightful hash;
If this was all Sir Cole’s big show,
It wasn’t worth the cash.
_The Figaro._ March 4, 1876.
――――
Sing a song of gladness――
“Dissolution” nigh――
All the Tory party
Eating humble pie.
When the pie was opened
What a mess beneath!――
“Peace with honour” stewed with
Turnerelli’s wreath.
Dizzy, down at Hughenden,
Scowling at his fate――
“Imperium et Libertas”
Just a little late;
Staffy at the ’Chequer
Looking very blue――
Budget day’s approaching――
Don’t know what to do!
Hatfield’s lord, and Stanley,
Cranbrook, too, and Cross,
“Bag and Baggage,” clear out――
What a dreadful loss!
Ducal Richmond, also,
Country’s cup’s _too_ full.
With Ireland and Afghan,
Zulu and Cabul.
Ere another Christmas
Brings its frost and snows,
In comes “People’s William!”
Heals the nation’s woes!
L. PROBERT.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ December 21, 1879.
――――
Sing a Song of Sixpence――
Cabmen warm and dry――
Four-and-twenty Cabmen, drinking on the sly;
When they left the “Shelter”
For fares they couldn’t shirk,
The rain had come a pelter
On beasts half dead with work:
Sing a Song of Sixpence――
Philanthropy’s awry,
Which leaves these wretched cattle
To shiver till they die.
_Punch._ November 26, 1881.
――――
THE SONG OF SCIENCE.
Trilobite, Graptobite
Nautilus pie,
Seas were calcareous,
Oceans were dry,
Eocene, miocene,
Pilocene, tuff,
Lias and trias,
And that is enough.
O, sing a song of phosphates,
Fibrine in a line,
Four-and-twenty follicles
In the van of time.
When the phosphorescence
Evoluted brain,
Superstition ended,
Men began to reign.
REV. JOSEPH COOK
_Free Press Flashes._ 1881.
――――
THE ENGLISH ILLUSTRATED MAGAZINE.
Sing a song of sixpence!
A pocket full of gain!
Edited by Comyns Carr!
Wrapper drawn by Crane!
When the pie was opened
Swinburne ’gan to sing.
Allen on a Dormouse,
What a pretty thing:
Maitland’s down in Westminster
Dreaming ’mid the cloisters,
Huxley’s in his oyster bed,
Counting out his oysters!
Miss Yonge among the “Armourers”
No ’prentice talent shows;
Let’s hope the little Black-bird
Won’t peck off her nose!
_The St. James’s Gazette._ October 4, 1883.
The first part of _The English Illustrated Magazine_ was published by
Messrs. Macmillan & Co. in October, 1883. It contained “Les
Casquettes,” a poem by Swinburne, “The Dormouse at Home,” by Grant
Allen, an article on the Law Courts, by F. W. Maitland, and one on
Oysters, by Professor Huxley.
――――
THE HEALTHERIES.
Fifty thousand nimble shillings,
Plus a hundred and thirteen,
That’s the latest of the takings,
Checked by Maskelyne’s Machine.
So Sing a Song of Turnstiles,
As they twist away;
Fifty thousand shillings
Taken in a day!
When the Show was opened,
The crowds at once were thick;
Wasn’t it a pretty sound
To hear the turnstiles click?
The people in the gardens still
Are sampling cream and honey;
But we to the Pavilion
Bear the bags of money!
_Truth._ December, 1884.
――――
Sing a song of Jingo
(Chorus, fife and drum),
Twenty thousand Arabs
Sent to kingdom come.
When the trouble’s over,
And glory’s cup is full,
There’ll be a pretty butcher’s bill
To lay before John Bull.
Bondholders in the City
Are passing sleepless nights,
The Arabs in the Soudan
Are fighting for their rights.
The whole affair’s a muddle
That daily thicker grows,
Why we e’er went into it
Is what nobody knows.
H. B.
――――
Sing a song of dynamite――
What a mighty scare!
A London railway-station
In pieces in the air.
Bags and pistols, clockwork,
Nasty cakes of brown――
Weren’t they dainty dishes
To find about our town?
Government and railway folks
Didn’t think it funny;
They to find the plotters
Offered lots of money.
Perhaps across the sea they’ve gone,
In other suits of clothes;
Perhaps they’re living quietly
Right under London’s nose.
JANE JONES.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ April 13, 1884.
――――
Sing a song of eightpence,
Income tax is high;
Four and twenty blunders
In a Gladstone pie;
When the pie is opened
Won’t there be a shout,
When two dozen blunders
All come flying out.
Gladstone’s in the Treasury,
Counting coin in lumps;
The Queen is in her castle――
Her people in the dumps.
_Judy._ May 13, 1885.
――――
THE JUBILEE COINAGE.
Sing a song of sixpence, they struck it all awry,
“Four” and “twenty” pieces, too, were faked in the die;
When the dies were opened the folks began to sing,
“Why, there ain’t a money value set on this ’ere thing.”
The bankers in their parlours were laughing at the money;
The Queen looked at her portrait and thought it very funny;
The G.O.M. at Hawarden said, sniffling through his nose,
“When I was Master of the Mint we made no coins like those.”
DARJEW.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ October 2, 1887.
――――
Sing a song of sixpence, a packetful of news,
Just a dozen wordlets all that you must use.
When the packet’s open’d, the news begins to ring,
A birth, a death, a dainty dish of gossip doth it bring.
The husband’s in his counting-house losing all his money,
The wife is in the pantry eating bread and honey;
The daughter’s in the garden, undreaming of the news,
When “rat-tat” comes a telegram――they’re shaking in their shoes.
REPEALER.
――――
Sing a song of saving,
A pocketful of tin,
Telegrams for sixpence
A surplus will bring in.
When the cover’s opened,
We feel inclined to sing:
“It’s all abbreviations,
We can’t make out a thing.”
HECLA.
――――
Sing a song of Gladstone, and make the Tories sigh,
Who, in the coming contest, will have another try,
When the House assembles shan’t we do a grin,
If Tories take a back seat, and Gladdy should get in.
Salisbury in the Upper House, pulling faces funny,
Cocky little Randy looking anything but sunny;
Will, as Premier, back again, sitting on his foes,
Staffy up aloft, and indulging in a doze.
WILLIAM TYRRELL.
_Truth._ October 15, 1885.
――――
Sing a song of scaffolds! a pocket full of twine!
Sixty applications to “enlist men in the line!”
When old M. departed, the names came pouring in,――
Isn’t that a pretty way to earn a lot of tin?――
Marwood’s in the churchyard, as dead as any mummy;
The Queen she wants a hangman, which sounds a little rummy!
The tender-hearted maiden says “hanging’s out of date!”
When down comes a black cap upon the Judge’s pate!
F. B. DOVETON. 1886.
――――
Sing a song of gunnery, a science full of slips,
Three-and-forty tonners packed into our ships;
When the guns were fired, the tubes began to burst――
Wasn’t this a clever thing not to know at first?
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
――――
Sing a song of sixpence,
Many of them shy.
Four-and-twenty trippers
To Newcastle hie.
The Exhibition opened,
The trippers crowded in;
Wasn’t there a scramble
To hear the band begin.
They went into the coal mine,
And thought it very funny;
Also tried the switchback,
Well worth the money.
They strolled about the garden,
In their Sunday clothes;
Had a glass or two of Burton,
And off home they goes.
PERSEVERANTIA.
_Newcastle Chronicle._ November, 1887.
――――
GOSCHEN TO THE RESCUE.
Sing a song of French pence,
Tempers all awry;
None will take the foreign “browns”――
All are asking “Why?”
Small shopkeeper, tramway-man,
Pray keep up your pecker,
You’ll have Goschen’s sympathy,
Help from the Exchequer.
To relieve you from your mess,
Goschen says he’s willing;
They shall go, like penny buns,
Thirteen for a shilling.
That shall wipe the ’busman’s eye,
Pacify the nation,
And, what’s better, purify
John Bull’s “circulation.”
_Punch._ April 23, 1887.
――――
NURSERY RHYME FOR YOUNG ITALY.
The King in the Quirinal,
Feeling very funny;
The Kaiser in a parlour,
Tired after journey.
The Pope was in the Vatican,
Looking at his shoe;
Up comes the Emperor,
And says, “How d’ye do?”
October, 1888.
――――
Sing a song of sixpence, in pockets made to lie,
One of forty art-birds, asked to shape the die;
When the dye was token’d, all who saw the mien
Sang――“This is not a dainty ‘tiz’[14] to set before the Queen.”
The Queen was in her country house, counting up her money;
Prince B.[15] was in the pantry, spreading his bread with honey;
The Chancellor was in the garden, hanging out old clothes,
When soon there came back word this “tizzy” to depose.
_Truth._ June 14, 1888.
――――
Sing a song of Chamberlain, three acres and a cow,
Sent across the herring-pond cannot end the row;
Breaking up his party in a fit of spleen,
Wasn’t that the meanest dodge that any one has seen!
Harty’s turned a Tory, fêted in the City,
Jess and Bright are martyrs――isn’t it a pity?
Goschen’s in the Cabinet, happy with the cash,
Up will come the Radicals, and settle all his hash.
RADIX.
Sing a song of armaments, an empire all awry,
Four-and-twenty critics raise a doleful cry;
A capital defenceless, ships without guns or shot.
When the threatened war breaks out, won’t Johnny get it hot!
Johnny is busy in his shop, making and saving money,
His women kind are humming round, like bees in search of honey;
His crafty foes are scheming to bring matters to a close,
By smashing up his ironclads, and pulling Johnny’s nose.
W. H. T.
_Truth._ June 28, 1888.
――――
THE PARNELL COMMISSION.
Sing a song of tricksters,
Commission all my eye!
Walter’s dirty finger
Traced in the pie;
When the bill was promised
It had an honest ring,
But when it was printed
’Twas quite another thing.
The First Lord in his parlour,
As the bees suck honey,
Was listening to Walter
Giving testimony;
The pay for smashing Parnell
’S a peerage, I suppose;
A few more bogus letters
And “up the donkey goes.”
H. M. BLANE.
THE ALLEGATIONS BILL.
Sing a song of libels,
A session full of crimes,
All the Tory Cabinet
Stewing with the _Times_;
When the case is ended
Another tune they’ll sing――
Won’t it be a pretty mess
If they together cling?
Goschen paying for the job
With the people’s money;
Smith and Walter swearing that
The forgeries were “funny”;
Chamberlain and Hartington
Looking down their nose,
And Parnell triumphant,
Grinning at his foes.
JESSE H. WHEELER.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ August 12, 1888.
――――
THE CONSPIRATORS’ CHORUS.
Sing a song of Dynamite, pack it up in bags,
Rattle it in railway trains, drop it on the flags;
Let it go in luggage vans ’mid all harmless loads;
Never mind the consequence if the stuff explodes.
Here’s to Nitro-glycerine! store it in a cask.
Making it, says Chemistry, is an easy task;
Though it’s reckoned dangerous, let it flood the floors,
Startling the detective coves prying at the doors.
Fulminating Mercury goes off with a noise,
Fit for little Fenians like a baby’s toys;
Chlorate of Potassium’s not exactly placid,
When it’s mixed with sugar, Sir, and sulphuric acid.
This a merry business is, but your cruel laws
Say we shan’t use Dynamite to advance the Cause;
Yet we’ll mix our fulminates underneath your eyes,
While the gay Conspirator blows you to the skies.
――――:o:――――
THE BELLS OF LONDON TOWN
Gay go up and gay go down,
To ring the bells of London town.
Bull’s eyes and targets,
Say the bells of St. Marg’ret’s.
Brickbats and tiles,
Say the bells of St. Giles!
Halfpence and farthings,
Say the bells of St. Martin’s.
Oranges and lemons,
Say the bells of St. Clement’s.
Pancakes and fritters,
Say the bells of St. Peter’s.
Two sticks and an apple,
Say the bells at Whitechapel.
Old Father Baldpate,
Say the slow bells at Aldgate.
You owe me ten shillings.
Say the bells at St. Helen’s.
Pokers and tongs,
Say the bells at St. John’s.
Kettles and pans
Say the bells at St. Ann’s.
When will you pay me?
Say the bells at Old Bailey.
When I grow rich,
Say the bells at Shoreditch.
When will that be?
Say the bells of Stepney.
I’m sure I don’t know,
Says the great bell at Bow.
Here comes a candle to light you to bed,
And here comes a chopper to chop off your head.
WHAT THE NEW CITY PEAL SAYS.
You must pay up your “calls”――
Say the bells of St. Paul’s!
Stock rises and falls――
Say the bells of St. Paul’s!
City Companies’ hauls――
Say the bells of St. Paul’s!
Snug prebends and stalls――
Say the bells of St. Paul’s!
Blessings on these old walls!
Say the bells of St. Paul’s!
ORANGES AND LEMONS IN THE CITY.
“Reformers are unpleasant,”
Say the bells of St. Clement.
“Yes, that is quite sartin,”
Say the bells of St. Martin.
“Do they want a sermon daily?”
Say the bells of Old Bailey.
“I’m sure I don’t know,”
Says the great bell of Bow.
“The Lords are in a fury,”
Say the bells of Old Jewry.
“Will they leave us in the lurch?”
Say the bells of Abchurch.
“I’ve a beadle and a clerk,”
Say the bells of St. Mark.
“Those two a church fill,”
Say the bells of Cornhill.
_Punch._ July 23, 1881.
――――
“Poor Ireland’s enslavèd!” say the bells of St. David;
“God help the poor creaturs!” say the bells of St. Peter’s;
“Turned out of their dwellin’s,” say the bells of St. Helen’s;
“And speed Home Rule on!” say the bells of St. John;
“O, Tories, you rile us!” say the bells of St. Silas;
“Confound your vagaries,” say the bells of St. Mary’s;
“You’re always ridiculous,” say the bells of St. Nicholas;
“And traitors besides!” say the bells of St. Bride’s;
“You’ve earned our abhorrence,” say the bells of St. Lawrence;
“You’re fit for the gallows,” say the bells of All Hallows;
“So get away from us,” say the bells of St. Thomas;
“We want better men!” roars out old Big Ben;
“You’ve had all your flukes,” say the bells of St. Luke’s;
“Suspensions and brawls,” say the bells of St. Paul’s;
“The session concludes,” say the bells of St. Jude’s;
“Out you must go!” says the great bell at Bow.
ROBERT PUTTICK.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ October 2, 1887.
THE CHIMES. 1886.
(_For Bad Times._)
“The Turks haven’t a shilling!”
Said the gate bell of Billing.
“And then Russia wants all!”
Said a bell near Millwall.
“And poor France has no power!”
Said the bell of the Tower.
“And that Egypt’s a sweep!”
Cried the bell of Eastcheap.
“And there’s Spain――a great sell!”
Said St. Lawrence’s bell.
“Oh, we’ve had a nice ride!”
Said the bell of St. Bride.
“And are ground in a mill!”
Moaned a bell near Cornhill.
“We must wait for high tide!”
Mourned the bell of Cheapside.
“It’s a regular hitch!”
Clanged the bell of Shoreditch.
“Shall we really lose all?”
Asked the bell of St. Paul.
“We should much like to know!”
Tolled the big bell of Bow.
――――:o:――――
WHO SHOULD EDUCATE THE PRINCE OF WALES?
“This is a serious question; and though we have looked through the
advertisements of Morning Governesses every day for the last week, we
are compelled to admit we have seen nothing that seems likely to
suit――at least, at present. It is no doubt a very serious
consideration, how the young ideas of the Prince of Wales should be
taught to shoot so as to hit the mark; and it is, unfortunately, not
so easy to train up a royal child, though the railroad pace at which
education travels renders it necessary that he should be put into a
first-class train as soon as possible. Awfully impressed with the deep
importance of the question, we have made an humble endeavour to answer
it, and if the hints are of any service to the nation, our object will
be fulfilled, and our ambition will be gratified.”
Who’ll teach the Prince?
I, answered Punch,
With my cap and hunch;
And I’ll teach the Prince.
Who’ll write his books?
I, answered Brougham,
With my goose-quill plume;
And I’ll write his books.
Who’ll make him dance?
I, answered Peel,
For I can turn and wheel;
I’ll make him dance.
Who’ll teach him logic?
Says Hume, I’ve the right,
I can vote black is white;
So I’ll teach him logic.
Who’ll teach him dancing?
I, lisp’d Baron Nathan,
’Mongtht tea-cupth, jughth, and bathin:
I’ll teach him dancing.
Who’ll teach him writing?
I, said Lord William,
Because a copyist with a quill, I am;
And I’ll teach him writing.
Who’ll teach him politics?
Said Graham, that will I,
That he every side may try;
So I’ll teach him politics.
Who’ll pay the piper?
I, said John Bull,
On me will come the pull:
I _must_ pay the piper.
_Punch._ September, 1843.
This old parody of “Who killed Cock Robin?” was illustrated with a
number of funny little portraits.
――――
Who killed these Arabs?
“I did,” said Graham;
I’d orders to slay em――
I killed these Arabs.
Who saw them die?
Allah on high,
With all-seeing eye――
He saw them die.
Who’ll be their mourners?
“We,” said the Tribes,
“Although we’ve had bribes――
We’ll be their mourners,”
Who’ll pay the cost?
“I,” said John Bull,
“Because I’m a fool――
I’ll pay the cost.”
And who’ll wind it up?
“The Rads!” cried the Nation;
“If but firm in their station,
They’ll wind it up!”
GEORGE MALLINSON.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ April 13, 1884.
――――
WHO KILLED HOME RULE.
Who killed Home Rule?
I, said Joe Chamberlain;
Simply by speaking plain,
I killed Home Rule.
Who saw it die?
I, answered Goschen――
I gave it a potion,
Then saw it die.
Who made its shroud?
I, said Lord Harty;
Regardless of party,
I made its shroud.
Who dug its grave?
I, Lord Randy cried,
Making it deep and wide,
I dug its grave.
Who was chief mourner?
I, said Parnell;
When my hopes fell,
I was chief mourner.
Who was the parson?
I, said Trevelyan;
My text was “rebellion,”
I was the parson.
Who was the clerk?
I, said John Morley,
And I wept sorely,
I was the clerk.
Who tolled the bell?
I, said John Bull;
With a good hearty pull,
I tolled the bell.
_The People._ July 3, 1886.
――――
THE GRAND OLD COCK ROBIN.
Who killed Gladstone?
I, said Chamberlain,
And I feel like Cain(e)
_I_ killed Gladstone.
Who saw him die?
I, said Goschen,
Without any emotion
_I_ saw him die.
Who caught his blood?
I, said Caine,
And it’s left a big stain;
_I_ caught his blood.
Who’ll make his shroud?
I, said Argyll,
In superior style;
_I’ll_ make his shroud.
Who’ll carry him to the grave?
I, said County Guy,
With a tear in his eye;
_I’ll_ carry him to the grave.
Who’ll dig his grave?
I, said Lord Randy,
For I’ve got the tools handy;
_I’ll_ dig his grave.
Who’ll carry the link?
I, said John Bright,
With my sweetness and light;
_I’ll_ carry the link.
Who’ll be chief mourner?
I, said John Morley,
For I miss him sorely;
_I’ll_ be chief mourner.
Who’ll sing a psalm?
I, said Fowler,
A regular howler:
_I’ll_ sing a psalm.
Who’ll be the parson?
I, said Hicks-Beach,
For I can preach;
_I’ll_ be the parson.
Who’ll be the clerk?
I, said John Walter,
For the _Times_ may alter;
_I’ll_ be the clerk.
Who’ll toll the bell?
I, said Parnell:
’Twas for Ireland he fell;
_I’ll_ toll the bell.
_The Pall Mall Gazette._ June 17, 1886.
――――
Who won Miss Jenny?
“I,” said young Bogle,
“With my bow and Ogle.
I won Miss Jenny!”
Who heard him pop?
“I,” said Miss Squeers,
“With my two itching ears,
I heard him pop!”
Who made him do it?
“I,” said Miss Jenny,
“The bashful young ninny.
I made him do it!”
Who’ll tie the knot?
“I,” said Dean B――――.
“For the sake of the fee,――
I’ll tie the knot!”
Who’ll be best man?
“I,” said Jack Bate,
“For I’ll kiss saucy Kate.
I’ll be best man!”
Who’ll tell his Dad?
“I,” said Tom Hare,
“And oh! won’t he swear!
I’ll tell his Dad!”
From _Sketches in Prose and Verse_, by F. B. Doveton, London, Sampson
Low & Co., 1886.
――――
Who killed Will Gladstone?
“I,” said Joe C――――;
“The blow came from me;
I killed Will Gladstone.”
Who saw him die?
“I,” said Lord Harty,
“With my little party;
We saw him die.”
Who’ll dig his grave?
“I,” said Lord Randy;
“I’ve got the place handy;
I’ll dig his grave.”
EAST ANGLIA.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
――――
Who’ll kill Coercion?
“I,” cries Democracy;
“Despite the Aristocracy,
“I’ll kill Coercion.”
Who’ll see him die?
“I,” sighs each Tory;
“Though in him I glory,
“I’ll see him die.”
Who’ll catch his blood?
“I,” says Castle rule;
“He is my favourite tool,
“I’ll catch his blood.”
Who’ll make his shroud?
“I,” cries Trevelyan;
“Would wager a million,
“I’ll make his shroud.”
Who’ll dig his grave?
“I,” cries old Gladstone;
“In _Mitcheltown’s_ sandstone,
“I’ll dig his grave.”
Who’ll carry him to the grave?
“I,” says Salisbury;
(“But I am in no hurry),
“I’ll carry him to the grave.”
Who’ll bear the pall?
Says Chamberlain and Goschen,
“We are both of one notion,
“We’ll bear the pall.”
Who’ll carry the link?
“I,” says John Bright,
“To give you all light,
“I’ll carry the link.”
Who’ll be chief mourner?
“I,” says Rack-renter;
“My hopes in him centre,
“I’ll be chief mourner.”
“Who’ll be the parson?
“I,” says gagging Smith;
“Have the books to do it with,
“I’ll be the parson.”
Who’ll be the clerk?
“I,” says O’Brien;
“His grace to be eyein’,
“I’ll be the clerk.”
Who’ll toll the bell?
“I,” shouts bold Parnell;
“His end aloud to tell,
“I’ll toll the bell.”
DEMOCRAT.
_Newcastle Weekly Chronicle._
――――
WHO STOLE O’BRIEN’S BREECHES?
Who stole O’Brien’s breeches?
I, said Balfour, with the aid of a warder,
_I_ stole his breeches.
Who stole his shirt?
I, said Londonderry, and it’s made London merry,
I stole his shirt.
Who stole his coat?
I, said Plunkett: I went and slunk it,
I stole his coat.
Who stole his socks?
I, said King-Harman, for I wanted to darn ’em,
I stole his socks.
Who stole his boots?
I, said Saxe-Weimar, and the joke is a screamer,
I stole his boots.
Who’ll wear the gaol clothes?
Not I, said O’Brien, spite of all their tryin’!
I’ll _not_ wear the gaol clothes.
_Pall Mall Gazette._ November, 1887.
――――:o:――――
Jack and Jill went up the hill,
To fetch a pail of water;
Jack fell down, and broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after.
JOHANNES ET GILLIA.
Johannes atque Gillia
Scandebant super clivo,
Ut urnam aquæ gelidæ
Haurirent ibi rivo.
Johanni decidenti, heu,
Tunc caput frangebatur;
Et Gillia cadens etiam
Johannem sequebatur.
_The Hornet._ 1872.
――――:o:――――
A SONG FOR FIVE FINGERS.
This pig went to market;
This pig stayed at home,
This pig had a bit of meat;
And this pig had none;
This pig said “wee, wee, wee!”
I can’t find my way home.
IN QUINQUE DIGITOS.
Hic porculus forum pergebat,
Hic, contrà, in domo manebat,
Hic porculus carnem edebat
Hic victu, heu, planè carebat.
Hic porculus mœstè lugebat,
Quod illum nox domo claudebat.
_The Hornet._ 1872.
――――:o:――――
Hey! diddle diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over the moon;
The little dog laughed
To see such sport,
And the dish ran away with the spoon.
NURSERY RHYMES A LA MODE.
(Our nurseries will soon be too cultured to admit the old rhymes in
their Philistine and unæsthetic garb. They may be redressed somewhat
on this model!)
O but she was dark and shrill,
(Hey-de-diddle and hey-de-dee!)
The cat that (on the First Aprill)
Played the fiddle upon the lea.
O and the moon was wan and bright,
(Hey-de-diddle and hey-de-dee!)
The Cow she looked nor left nor right,
But took it straight at a jump, pardie!
The hound did laugh to see this thing,
(Hey-de-diddle and hey-de-dee!)
As it were parlous wantoning,
(Ah, good my gentles, laugh not ye!)
And underneath a dreesome moon
Two lovers fled right piteouslie;
A spooney plate with a plated spoon,
(Hey-de-diddle and hey-de-dee!)
_Postscript._
Then blame me not, altho’ my verse
Sounds like an echo of C. S. C.
Since still they make ballads that worse and worse
Savour of diddle and hey-de-dee.
From _Rhymes and Renderings_. Cambridge. Macmillan and Bowes. 1887.
“HEY DIDDLE DIDDLE! THE CAT AND THE FIDDLE.”
Ah! joy with me, my neighbours, joy with me,
And let the air resound with glad acclaims,
For she indeed, our furry feline friend,
Hath shown herself disposed to music’s charms,
And with the viol held in nimble paw,
Scrapeth the tunes of mirthful melody.
Meanwhile, aroused from out her careless mood,
The Cow forgets her grazing on the grass,
Forgets the blades most choice and succulent,
Forgets the pail defrauded of its milk,
Forgets the aim and tenor of her life,
And rapt in rumination at the sound,
Listens, until the sweet mysterious strains
Fire her most inmost soul: then wildly forth
In frantic frenzy speeds her wind-whirled way,
Stirred by the notes of feline minstrelsy.
But, louder comes the soul-inspiring sound,
Till, boiling o’er with ecstacy, she leaps
Far from the earth, and further still, away.
I may not tell the distance of her leap,
’Twas all too far for mortal eye to trace;
Yet afterwards her corse came hurtling down,――
For in the mighty magnitude of space
Through which she sprang with impulse unrestrained,
Her very swiftness had abstracted breath――
And on her hoof a substance green was found
Which soon, ’twas marked, was nothing else than cheese;
That so ’twould seem she had all but o’ertopped
In that one bound the far far distant moon,
A portion of whose substance there appeared
Hoof-stricken, and adhering to its foe,
To warn all others from such lofty leaps.
Then was there mourning for the direful death;
The horse, the hen, the labourer, and the lamb
Flowed down in floods of saline tears sincere:
While eke the cat hath stayed her viol’s notes,
And wipes with trembling paw each streaming eye:
But he, that very fiend in canine form,
Brawls in a bluff brutality of mirth,
Cries that “I’sooth it was a merry sport;”
Aye laughs, as if each lateral wall of ribs
Would burst asunder; for methinks that she
While yet in life, our much-lamented cow,
The while the dog was barking at her heel,
With well-aimed kick erst stretched him on the plain;
Wherefore at her mishap in spiteful spleen
He now with cachinnations fills the air.
Ah! would that I could end my tale aright,
And give to something some good attribute.
But no:――for in this wicked worthless world
Seldom we see a soul untouched by taint:――
Let me then hurry o’er the final scene,
The shameful shift to make emolument
Amid the wild confusion that prevailed.
’Tis said the earthenware receptacle,
Surnamed the Dish, who, highly held in honour,
Maintained the meats, and lived a lordly life,
Struck by a sudden guilty greed of gain,
And noting furthermore that none espied,
Clutched in his grasp the partner of his trade,
The Spoon yclept, and, hurrying hastily,
Bore him away right down into the street,
And reached by stealth the pawnbroker’s at length,
Whence,――for the spoon was one of Mappin’s make,――
He went back richer by a good round sum,
Nor told to anyone his shameless sin.
(Attributed to Mr. T. H. S. Escott, afterwards Editor of the
_Fortnightly Review_.)
From _College Rhymes_. Oxford, 1873.
――――
AT THE INVENTIONS.
Hey diddle diddle,
Piano and fiddle,
The fountains sprang up towards the moon,
The people all flocked to see the fine sight,
And sipp’d Indian tea with a spoon.
CHICKWEED.
_Truth._ October 15, 1885.
――――:o:――――
MISTRESS MARY.
Mistress Mary,
Quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells
And cockle shells
And hyacinths all of a row.
DOMINA MARIA.
O mea Maria,
Tota contraria,
Quid tibi crescit in horto?
Testae et crotali
Sunt mihi flosculi,
Cum hyacinthino serto.
HENRY DRURY.
From _Arundines Cami_. Cambridge. 1841.
A REVISED EDITION.
Mary, Mary quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
Do red rose and sweet mignonette
Make quite a summer show?
Twice seven days since we have met,
But it seems years ago――
Mary, Mary, so contrary,
Why do I love you so!
Mary, Mary, in your airy
Summer gown of snow,
Folding fragrant linen fair,
Through your house to go;
Full of self and full of care
Will you heed my woe――
Mary, Mary, so contrary,
Why do I love you so?
Mary, Mary, in the dairy,
Setting pans in row,
Jingling keys and silver bells,
Marching to and fro,
Learned in all your household spells――
(Wise you are we trow),
Tell me Mary, still contrary,
Why do I love you so!
Ah! my Mary comes a fairy,
Whispers soft and low,
All the sweet and sudden truth
Heart to heart must owe;
Be it joy or be it ruth,
Only this I know――
’Tis because you are contrary
That I love you so!
S. FRANCES HARRISON.
――――
FROM W. E. G.
Joseph, Joseph, quite contrary,
How do your acres grow?
Some with weeds and some with seeds,
But ne’er a one with a cow.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
――――
Harty, Harty, what of your party,
How does your Union grow;
Primrose belles, and Radical swells,
Coercionists all in a row.
_Newcastle Chronicle._ November, 1887.
――――
“Master Joey,
Quite too showy,
How does your party grow?”
“There’s Collings, and Dick,
And Mister Kenrick,
And myself, the boss of the show.”
P. Q. X.
_Truth._ June 28, 1888.
――――:o:――――
MOTHER HUBBARD.
Brethren, the words of my text are:――
“Old Mother Hubbard, she went to the cupboard,
To get her poor dog a bone;
But when she got there the cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none.”
These beautiful words, dear friends, carry with them a solemn lesson.
I propose this morning to analyze their meaning, and to attempt to
apply it, lofty as it may be, to our every-day life.
“Old Mother Hubbard, she went to the cupboard,
To get her poor dog a bone.”
Mother Hubbard, you see, was old; there being no mention of others, we
may presume she was alone; a widow――a friendless, old, solitary widow.
Yet, did she despair? Did she sit down and weep, or read a novel, or
wring her hands? No! _she went to the cupboard_. And here observe that
she _went_ to the cupboard. She did not hop, or skip, or run, or jump,
or use any other peripatetic artifice; she solely and merely _went_ to
the cupboard. We have seen that she was old and lonely, and we now
further see that she was poor. For, mark, the words are “_the_
cupboard.” Not “one of the cupboards,” or “the right-hand cupboard,”
or “the left-hand cupboard,” or “the one above,” or “the one below,”
or “the one under the floor,” but just “_the_ cupboard,” the one
humble little cupboard the poor widow possessed. And why did she go to
the cupboard? Was it to bring forth goblets, or glittering precious
stones, or costly apparel, or feasts, or any other attributes of
wealth? _It was to get her poor dog a bone!_ Not only was the widow
poor, but her dog, the sole prop of her old age, was poor too. We can
imagine the scene. The poor dog, crouching in the corner, looking
wistfully at the solitary cupboard, and the widow going to that
cupboard――in hope, in expectation may be――to open it, although we are
not distinctly told that it was not half open, or ajar, to open it for
that poor dog.
“But when she got there the cupboard was bare,
And so the poor dog had none.”
When she got there! You see, dear brethren, what perseverance is! _She
got there!_ There were no turnings and twistings, no slippings and
slidings, no leanings to the right, or falterings to the left. With
glorious simplicity we are told “she got there.”
And how was she rewarded?
“The cupboard was bare!” It was bare! There were to be found neither
apples, nor oranges, nor cheesecakes, nor penny buns, nor gingerbread,
nor crackers, nor nuts, nor lucifer matches. The cupboard was bare!
There was but one, only one solitary cupboard in the whole of the
cottage, and that one, the sole hope of the widow, and the glorious
loadstar of the poor dog, was bare! Had there been a leg of mutton, a
loin of lamb, a fillet of veal, even an ice from Gunter’s, the case
would have been very different, the incident would have been
otherwise. But it was bare, my brethren, bare as a bald head. Many of
you will probably say, with all the pride of worldly sophistry――“The
widow, no doubt, went out and bought a dog biscuit.” Ah, no! Far
removed from these earthly ideas and mundane desires, poor Mother
Hubbard, the widow, whom many thoughtless worldlings would despise, in
that she only owned one cupboard, perceived――or I might even say
saw――at once the relentless logic of the situation, and yielded to it
with all the heroism of that nature which had enabled her, without
deviation, to reach the barren cupboard. She did not attempt, like the
stiff-necked scoffers of this generation, to war against the
inevitable; she did not try, like the so-called man of science, to
explain what she did not understand. She did nothing. “The poor dog
had none.” And then at this point our information ceases. But do we
not know sufficient? Are we not cognisant of enough? Who would dare to
pierce the veil that shrouds the ulterior fate of Old Mother
Hubbard――her poor dog――the cupboard――or the bone that was not there?
Must we imagine her still standing at the open cupboard door, depict
to ourselves the dog still drooping his disappointed tail upon the
floor, the sought-for bone remaining somewhere else? Ah, no, my
brethren, we are not so permitted to attempt to read the future.
Suffice it for us to glean from this beautiful story its many lessons;
suffice it for us to apply them, to study them as far as in us lies,
and, bearing in mind the natural frailty of our nature, to avoid being
widows; to shun the patronymic of Hubbard; to have, if our means
afford it, more than one cupboard in the house; and to keep stores in
them all.
And oh! dear friends, keep in recollection what we have learned this
day. Let us avoid keeping dogs that are fond of bones. But, brethren,
if we do, if fate has ordained that we should do any of these things,
let us then go, as Mother Hubbard did, straight, without curvetting
and prancing, to our cupboard, empty though it be,――let us, like her,
accept the inevitable with calm steadfastness; and should we, like
her, ever be left with a hungry dog and an empty cupboard, may future
chroniclers be able to write also in the beautiful words of our text――
“And so the poor dog had none.”
_Notes and Queries_, April 21, 1888, contained the following
interesting account of the origin of this singular jeu d’esprit:
This is not a “burlesque” of the story of ‘Mother Hubbard,’ but a
good-humoured parody of the popular (?) “regulation” sermon. It
appeared originally in 1877, in a novel by Lord Desart, who claimed it
in a letter to the _Pall Mall Gazette_ in December, 1886, in which he
says that “one of his characters delivered it as a mock sermon,” and
adds that it has been copied into “most of the provincial English and
Scotch, and into many American and Canadian newspapers.” He adds:――
“I myself heard it preached by a negro minstrel at
Haverley’s, New York; it has been neatly printed, with an
introduction, by a clergyman, and sent round to his brother
preachers as an example of how not to do it; it was bought
for a penny in a broadsheet form in the City a year or two
ago by a friend of mine; it has been heard at countless
penny readings and entertainments of the kind; it has
appeared among the facetiæ of a guide-book to Plymouth and
the South Coast; and in a volume published by the owners of
St. Jacob’s Oil, as well as in another jest-book; and the
other day I was shown it in a collection of _ana_, just
published by Messrs. Routledge & Co., for a firm in
Melbourne; and all this without any acknowledgment of its
authorship whatsoever. Perhaps you will allow me, through
your columns, to claim my wandering child――‘a poor thing,
but mine own.’”
――――:o:――――
Little Jack Horner sat in a corner,
Eating a Christmas pie;
He put in his thumb, and he took out a plum,
And said, “What a good boy am I!”
These lines form part of “The pleasant History of Jack Horner,
containing his witty Tricks and pleasant Pranks,” a copy of which
is in the Bodleian Library, the story must have been in existence
earlier than 1617, at which date a similar tale was printed in
London founded upon it.
VERSIO ALTERA.
Horner Jacculo sedit in angulo
Vorans, ceu serias ageret ferias,
Crustum dulce et amabile;
Inquit et unum extrahens prunum――
“Horner, quam fueris nobile pueris
Exemplar imitabile.”
HENRY DRURY.
From _Arundines Cami_. Cambridge, 1841.
JOHANNIS HORNERII JACTATIO.
Hornerius Johannes
In angulo sedebat,
Et ibi in silentio
Artocream edebat.
Extraxit prunum digito
Et statim se jactabat――
“Ecce quam bonus puer sum!”
Hornerius clamabat.
_The Hornet._ May 29, 1872.
――――
Studious Jack Horner, of Latin no scorner,
In the second declension did spy
How nouns there were some,
Which, ending in um, do not make their plural in i.
CHESSMEN.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
――――
THE MODERN JACK HORNER.
Little Jack Horner, on the street corner,
Smoked up his last cigarette;
Saying, “When this is done, I’ll to the saloon
And wet up my whistle, ‘you bet.’”
Little Jack Horner is now the chief mourner
To head a policeman’s procession.
The infantile dude became far too rude
In trying to follow the fashion.
_Detroit Free Press._ December, 1886.
――――
Little Lord Randy
Turned up quite handy,
Speaking his mind so spry;
He slashed right and left,
Both weavers and weft,
And he said, “What a statesman am I.”
M. B. B.
_Truth._ June 28, 1888.
――――:o:――――
Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy was a thief;
Taffy came to my house, and stole a shin of beef:
I went to Taffy’s house, Taffy was not at home;
Taffy came to my house and stole a marrow bone.
I went to Taffy’s house, Taffy was not in,
Taffy came to my house and stole a silver pin;
I went to Taffy’s house, Taffy was in bed,
I took up a poker and flung it at his head.
For an explanation of this curious old rhyme, and Shirley
Brooks’s adaptation of it in English and Welsh see p. 255, Vol.
iv. _Parodies_.
Staffy was a poor man,
Staffy was a chief;
Staffy in the Lower House
Often came to grief;
So Staffy to the Upper House
Hurriedly has flown,
And left ’em the Lower House
To stay and pick the bone!
JESSE H. WHEELER.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ July 5, 1885.
NEGLECTED WAILS.
Taffy was a Welshman, Taffy had a farm,
Taffy wouldn’t pay his tithes, but kept ’em in his palm;
His Vicar lowered Taffy’s tithes, for the sake of quiet,
Taffy had rejoicings, ending in a riot.
The Landlord sent his Agent, and doubled Taffy’s rent,
Taffy’s now for Welsh Home Rule, and Disestablishment!
_Punch._ December 4, 1886.
――――:o:――――
What are little boys made of, made of?
Snaps and snails, and puppy dog’s tails;
And that’s what little boys are made of.
What are little girls made of, made of?
Sugar and spice, and all that’s nice;
And that’s what little girls are made of, made of.
What is an Englishman made of?
Roast beef and jam tart,
And a pint of good Clar’t,
And that’s what an Englishman’s made of.
What is a Frenchman, pray, made of?
Horse steak and frog fritter,
And absinthe so bitter,
And that’s what a Frenchman is made of.
[_Therefore, my dears, you must be kind to a Frenchman, and give
him some of your nice dinner, whenever you can, and teach
him better._]
SHIRLEY BROOKS. 1864.
What are some young Misses made of?
Poker and Bang,
Second-hand slang;
Plenty of face,
Air without grace;
Bustle and flounce,
Brains half an ounce;
Dreams but of pelf,
Thoughts but of self;
Life all a lie,
Hang by-and-bye!
That’s what some Misses are made of.
What are most young Johnnies made of?
Needless toothpicking,
Stage door heel-kicking;
Long lemon squashing,
Prodigal washing;
Stock-seller’s model,
Hairdresser’s noddle;
Old schoolboy vices,
Love-lingering for “nicies”;
_Blasé_ pretended,
Unbegun――ended!
That’s what most Johnnies are made of!
_Judy._ January 3, 1883.
“DICKORY,” _à la française_.
Diggoré, doggoré, doge,
Le rat monte à l’horloge,
Une heure se frappe
Le rat s’échappe
Diggoré, doggoré, doge.
_Boys Own Paper._ March, 1884.
MUS IN HOROLOGIO.
Quatit terrore domus,
Est horologio mus.
Tunc hora prima sonuit,
Et murem sic attonuit;
Caret terrore domus――
Non horologio mus.
_The Hornet._ June 19, 1872.
A SONG OF A SELL.
Hickery, dickery, dare!
The Socialists met in the Square;
Warren nabs one,
Away the rest run,
Hickery, dickery, dare!
――――:o:――――
Multiplication is vexation,
Division is as bad;
The Rule of Three, it puzzles me,
And Practice drives me mad!
POEM BY THE ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY.
(_Composed on the day His Grace “deprived” Mr. Denison._)
Transubstantiation is vexation,
Consubstantiation is as bad;
Archdeacon D. doth trouble me,
And I rather think he’s mad.
J. B. CANTUAR. 1856.
THE KHEDIVE’S SUMMING UP.
Abdication is vexation,
Deposition’s twice as bad;
The Rule of Three it bothers me,
And Bismarck drives me mad.
_Punch._ June 28, 1879.
(Written shortly before the deposition of the Khedive, by Turkey,
France and England.)
A SUM OF SORROWS.
The Iligant Nation
Is a vexation,
But Gordon’s twice as bad:
From Redistribution
Comes bitter confusion,
And Egypt’s driven me mad.
BY A PUBLICAN.
“Application” is vexashun,
“Compensation” ’ll prove bad;
Terms o’ years three is a muzzle for me,
Them practices drives me mad.
DANEHILL.
Lord S. _loqr._
Compensation’s tribulation,
The wheel-tax is as bad,
By Jokin G――
And Licensed V,
I’m fairly driven mad.
BARITONE.
_Truth_, June 14, 1888.
――――
Mobilisation’s desperation,
Inaction is as bad;
The Admiraltee it puzzles “we,”
The Horse Guards drives us mad.
_Truth._ June 28, 1888.
――――
Shakespeare and Bacon are vexation
Donelly is as bad,
His Cryptogram it puzzles me,
His Cypher drives me mad.
_Scott Surtees._ 1888.
――――:o:――――
Please to remember
The Fifth of November,
Gunpowder, treason and plot;
I know no reason
Why gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot.
(About 1651.)
MITCHELSTOWN.
Please to remember
The ninth of September,
Mitchelstown’s murderous shot.
I see no reason
Why Government treason
Should ever be forgot.
Balfour blacksheep,
Have you any gruel?
Yes sir, yes sir,
Three plates full.
One for the Parson,
One for the Dame,
And one for the man who joins
The Plan of Campaign.
Ding, dong, dell,
Dillon’s in a cell,
Who put him in?
Servants of the Queen.
Who’ll pull him out?
G. O. M. no doubt.
NEWGATE.
_Truth._ June 14, 1888.
――――
Remember, remember, the recreant member
Who with Tories has cast in his lot,
I see no reason why Chamberlain’s treason
Should ever be forgot.
Clever, smart, and spry,
With his eye-glass in his eye,
Send him to the House of Lords
And there let him lie!
A Tory place the traitor to pay;
True Radicals scorn to lash him;
Old Ireland’s curse on his soul to lay,
And the next election to smash him.
JOHN BULL.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ November, 1888.
――――
A LAY FOR THE FIFTH OF NOVEMBER.
Remember, remember, the fifth of November,
And gunpowder treason plot;
I know no reason why winking at treason
Should ever be forgot.
So, holloa, boys, holloa, and bring out the guys
That every true Englishman needs must despise.
Instead of Old Guy, who in years long gone by
Used gunpowder kegs for a tool,
We’ve a certain old man who does all he can
To break up the House with Home Rule.
Bring the effigy out, and take it about;
On to the Bonfire with laughter and shout,
And all the good people who see it will cry,
“Holloa! boys, holloa! for Gladstone the Guy.”
Remember, remember, the fifth of November,
As years have rolled on we have got
Fresh guys for the season of gunpowder treason
So now let us bring out the lot.
Here’s Charley Parnell, and Dillon as well,
With Labby so fond of abuse,
And Harcourt may find a place close behind
With a jar of the Parnellite juice.
And give to each one a moonlighter’s gun,
A mask, and some powder and shot,
With Fenian dynamite somewhere concealed
To finally blow up the lot.
Holloa, boys, holloa, and pile the chips well,
For Gladstone of Hawarden has plenty to sell.
Bring the effigies out and take them about,
On to the bonfire with laughter and shout,
With cheers for the empire, with hooting and cries
Of “Holloa! boys, holloa! boys, down with the guys!”
J. E. CLARKE.
_Judy._ November 7, 1888.
――――:o:――――
THE HUSBAND’S REVENGE.
_A Warning to wives who will keep bad Cooks._
Provisions raw
Long time he bore,
Remonstrance was in vain;
To escape the scrub
He join’d a club;
Nor dined at home again.
_Punch._ March 1, 1856.
――――
EPITAPH ON A LOCOMOTIVE.
Collisions four
Or five she bore,
The signals wor in vain;
Grown old and rusted,
Her biler busted,
And smash’d the Excursion Train――
“Her end was pieces”
MONODY ON PROTECTION.
Protection sore long time we bore,
Seditions were in vain;
But now his friends have given him o’er,
He’ll never wake again.
――――:o:――――
NURSERY RHYMES FOR CYCLISTS.
Here is a touching little thing to “teach the young idea how to
shoot”――down nasty hills:――
“Sing a song of wheeling,
Mind that no one squeals――
Four-and-twenty black boys
Riding on their wheels,
When down hill they ventured,
They ‘braked’ it rather rash,
And four-and-twenty cripples
Resulted from the smash!”
The pathetic address of the bicyclist to his lamp:――
“Twinkle, twinkle, little light
Struggle through the murky night,
Round about the corners trot
Many a blue _for-get-me-not_ (_i.e._, the _Bobby_),
Who would drag me to the Beak
For a fine or for a ‘week,’
And they’d always serve me so
If you did not twinkle so!”
“Little Jack Jumber
Sat on his Humber,
Waiting till cows go by,
When one in a flurry
Sent him in a hurry
_Sow_-so into the old pig-stye!”
Ladies are invited to――
“Ride a machine to What’s-the-name Green,
To see whatever there is to be seen,
Rings on her fingers and bells on her toes,
She shall have music wherever she goes!”
“Jack and Jill
Rode down the hill,
With joke and jeer and laughter,
Jack fell down,
And broke his crown,
And Jill came tumbling after!”
Jack and Gill came down the hill
Upon a Humber tandem,
Jack turned round to Gill and frowned,
“Eugh!” you don’t understand ’em
Put up your feet, stick to your seat,
I’m going to do a ‘flyer,’
For goodness sake don’t touch the brake.
We’re spilt! oh Jeremyur!
_Wheeling Annual._ 1885.
――――:o:――――
QUESTIONS FOR SIR CHARLES.
O where, O where, are your little wee dogs,
O where are they gone, Sir C.?
Says Chawles “Down in Surrey,
They fled in a hurry,
And never came back to me,”
And where, O where, were your merry men gone
That people should murdered be?
“O, my men were ‘all there,’
In Trafalgar Square,
Looking most militaree.”
But Chawlie, O Chawlie, where were you?
Why didn’t you travel down E.?
“I was up to my eyes
In a Christmas Prize
Composition for Newnes’s _T. B._”
COCK WARREN.
Who killed Cock Warren?
“I,” said the gin distiller;
“I’m the tyrant killer,
I killed Cock Warren.”
Who killed Cock Warren?
“I,” said the _Pall Mall_;
“I set him up as well,
Then I killed Cock Warren.”
Who killed Cock Warren?
“I,” said Mr. Graham,
“I’m the hound to bay ’em;
I killed Cock Warren.”
Who killed Cock Warren?
“We,” said the people;
“Clash the bells in the steeple;
We killed Cock Warren.”
H. W. M.
AN EPITAPH.
Here lies
Sir CHARLES WARREN,
Formerly
Chief Commissioner of Metropolitan Police.
During his Tenure of Office
He Lectured on the Holy Land,
And Trampled Under his Feet
Our Free and ancient laws,
Daily insulting the law-abiding people of London.
Contrary to the Regulations of the Service
He wrote an article in _Murray’s Magazine_,
The grammar of which was shaky,
And the spelling of which is said to have been corrected
By the Printer’s Devil.
He resigned rather than submit to
Merited censure.
Forbear, pious reader,
To spit upon his tomb,
For though his actions were despotic,
His resignation brought joy and gladness
To the homes of thousands.
“_When the wicked perish there is shouting._”
From _The Star_. November, 1888. Just after the resignation of Sir C.
Warren as Chief Commissioner of the London Police, much to the delight
of the London people.
――――:o:――――
In _Carols of Cockayne_ (London, Chatto & Windus, 1874) the late Mr.
Henry S. Leigh gave some poetical versions of Nursery Rhymes, which he
termed “Chivalry for the Cradle.” The stories selected were
“Humpty-Dumpty,” “Ride a Cock-horse to Banbury Cross,” and “Babie
Bunting.”
THE ROMAUNT OF HUMPTY-DUMPTY.
’Tis midnight, and the moonbeam sleeps
Upon the garden sward:
My lady in yon turret keeps
Her tearful watch and ward.
“Beshrew me!” mutters, turning pale,
The stalwart seneschal;
“What’s he that sitteth, clad in mail,
Upon our castle wall?”
“Arouse thee, friar of orders gray;
What, ho! bring book and bell!
Ban yonder ghastly thing, I say;
And, look ye, ban it well.
By cock and pye, the Humpty’s face!”――
The form turn’d quickly round;
Then totter’d from its resting-place――
* * * * *
That night the corse was found.
The king, with hosts of fighting men,
Rode forth at break of day;
Ah! never gleam’d the sun till then
On such a proud array.
But all that army, horse and foot,
Attempted, quite in vain,
Upon the castle wall to put
The Humpty up again.
THE BALLAD OF BABYE BUNTING.
The Knight is away in the merry green wood,
Where he hunts the wild rabbit and roe:
He is fleet in the chase as the late Robin Hood――
He is fleeter in quest of the foe.
The nurse is at home in the castle, and sings
To the babe that she rocks at her breast:
She is crooning of love and of manifold things,
And is bidding the little one rest.
“Oh, slumber, my darling! oh, slumber apace!
For thy father will shortly be here;
And the skin of some rabbit that falls in the chase
Shall be thine for a tippet, my dear.”
――――
H. DUMPTEII TRISTIS HISTORIA.
Humptius Dumpteius
Sedebat stulte muro:
Humptius, heu, decidit
Nec fatum in obscuro.
Non omnes equi regii,
Non viri potuere
Pristinam rectitudinem
Dumpteio præbere.
AD INFANTEM BUNTINII.
Buntincule beate!
Pater venatur catè.
Pellem feret cuniculi,
Ut vestis sit Buntinculi.
_The Hornet._
――――:o:――――
THE MONTHS.
Thirty days hath September,
April, June, and November;
February has twenty-eight alone,
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting leap-year, that’s the time,
When February’s days are twenty-nine.
These lines occur in an old play, “The Return from Parnassus,” printed
in London in 1606, they may have been derived from the following old
poem _De Computo_, written in the thirteenth century:――
“En avril, en juing, en septembre
A .xxx. jours et en novembre:
Tout li autre ont .xxxj jour,
Fors fevriers qi est li plus cour,
En soi que .xxviij. jors n’a,
Ne plus ne meins n’i avra ja
Fors en l’an qe bissextres vient,
Adont en a, einsi avient,
.xxix., de tant est creüs,
L’an que bixestres est cheüs.”
Dirty days hath September,
April, June, and November;
From December up to May,
The rain it raineth every day.
All the rest have thirty-one,
Without a blessed gleam of sun;
And if any had two-and-thirty,
They’d be just as wet, and twice as dirty.
_Figaro._ 1873.
A SUMMERY SUMMARY.
Thirty-one days hath the month of May,
Most of them chilly, and none of them gay,
June――less obnoxious by one day――has thirty,
Every one, more or less, dirty and squirty.
Thirty plus one are the “whack” of July,
None of them sunny, and few of them dry,
Three months of gloom that each year groweth glummer!
That sums the sell that is called English Summer!
USEFUL MEMS. FOR 1885.
JANUARY is first month
(It commences with the oneth).
FEBRUARY’S days are twenty-eight
(Wanting more, four years you wait).
In MARCH you find mad hares and Lent
(25th’s the day for rent).
APRIL’S days are only thirty
(And even most of those are dirty!)
Thirty-one there are in MAY
(24th’s Victoria’s day).
Thirty days are there in JUNE
(Rent-day the 24th――too soon!)
Thirty-one days in JULY
(A month for eating greengage pie).
In AUGUST thirty-one you’ll find
(If you don’t care, well, I don’t mind).
Thirty days, please, hath SEPTEMBER
(And 29th’s the rent, remember!)
Thirty-one days hath OCTOBER
(Quite enough, if you keep sober!)
NOVEMBER it has thirty (why?――
You’d best ask some one else than I).
DECEMBER――thirty-one (contrive
To scrape up rent by 25).
――――:o:――――
THE THREE JOLLY RATSMEN.
(_With Apologies to the Memory of Randolph Caldecott_).
It’s of three politicians, and a rattin’ they did go;
An’ they ratted, an’ they ranted, an’ they blew their horns also.
Look ye there!
An’ one said, “Mind yo’r een, an’ keep yo’r noses reet i’ th’ wind,
An’ then, by scent or seet we’ll leet o’summat to our mind.”
Look ye there!
(_Portraits of Chamberlain, Goschen and Hartington._)
They ratted, an’ they ranted, an’ the first thing they did find
Was a Grand Old Statesman in a field, an’ him they left behind.
Look ye there!
One said it was a Statesman, an’ another he said, “Nay;
It’s just a Liberal Party, that has been and gone astray.”
Look ye there!
They ratted an’ they ranted, an’ the next thing they did find,
Was a gruntin’, grindin’ grindlestone, an’ that they left behind.
Look ye there.
One said it was a grindlestone, another he said, “Nay,
It’s nought but a fossil Quaker that’s gone an’ roll’t away.”
Look ye there!
(_Portrait of John Bright._)
They ratted an’ they ranted, an’ the next thing they did find
Was a bull calf in a Tory fold, an’ that they left behind.
Look ye there!
One said it was a bull calf, an’ another he said, “Nay,
It’s just a little jackass that has never learnt to bray.”
Look ye there!
(_Lord R. Churchill_).
They ratted an’ they ranted, an’ the next thing they did find
Was a two-three children leaving school, an’ these they left behind.
Look ye there!
One said they were children, but another he said, “Nay,
They’re no’ but little Radicals, so we’ll leave ’em to their play.”
Look ye there!
They ratted an’ they ranted, an’ the next thing they did find,
Was a poet singing in a ditch, an’ him they left behind.
Look ye there!
One said it was a poet, an’ another he said, “Nay;
It’s only just a poor young man whose wits are stole away.”
Look ye there!
(_A. C. Swinburne._)
They ratted an’ they ranted, an’ the next thing they did find,
Was two young lovers in a lane, an’ these they left behind.
Look ye there!
One said that they were lovers, but another he said “Nay;
They’re two poor wandering lunatics: come, let us go away.”
Look ye there!
(_Erin and John Morley._)
So they ratted an’ they ranted till, the setting of the sun,
And they’d naught to bring away at last when election time was done.
Look ye there!
Then one unto the other said, “This rattin’ doesn’t pay;
But we’n powler’t up an’ down a bit, an’ had a rattlin’ day.”
Look ye there!
_Pall Mall Gazette._ July 7, 1886.
Mr. Randolph Caldecott must have founded his well known children’s
ballad upon the following very old nursery rhyme:――
There were three jovial Welshmen,
As I have heard them say,
And they would go a hunting
Upon St. David’s day.
All the day they hunted,
And nothing could they find,
But a ship a-sailing,
A-sailing with the wind.
One said it was a ship,
The other he said, nay;
The third said it was a house,
With the chimney blown away.
And all the night they hunted,
And nothing could they find
But the moon a-gliding,
A-gliding with the wind.
One said it was the moon,
The other he said, nay;
The third said it was a cheese,
And half o’t cut away.
――――:o:――――
The following old rhyme was sung to the tune of Chevy Chace. It was
taken from a poetical tale in the “Choyce Poems” printed in London in
1662. John Poole introduced the song in his _Hamlet Travestie_ in
1810, without any acknowledgment, perhaps thinking it was too well
known to require mention.
Three children sliding on the ice
Upon a summer’s day,
It so fell out they all fell in,
The rest they ran away.
Now had these children been at home,
Or sliding on dry ground,
Ten thousand pounds to one penny
They had not all been drown’d.
You parents all that children have,
And you that eke have none,
If you would have them safe abroad,
Pray keep them safe at home.
CARMEN CANINUM.
Labentes super glaciem,
In medio æstatis,
Tres pueri sunt mersi, et
Succubuêre fatis.
Ah, si in terrâ lapsi sint,
Vel domi si mansissent
Sestertium ad denarium
Non aquâ periisent.
Parentes quibus nati sunt,
Et vos qui non habetis
Si salvos vultis foris hos,
Clausos domi servetis.
_The Hornet._ 1872.
――――:o:――――
THE COW.
Thank you, pretty cow, that made
Pleasant milk to soak my bread,
Ev’ry day and ev’ry night,
Warm, and fresh, and sweet, and white.
Do not chew the hemlock rank,
Growing on the weedy bank;
But the yellow cowslips eat,
They perhaps will make it sweet.
Where the purple violet grows,
Where the bubbling water flows,
Where the grass is fresh and fine,
Pretty cow, go there and dine.
TO A PET REPTILE.
Thank you, pretty spotted snake,
Thus to as your mistress try me.
What a charming pet you make,
Cold and creepy, damp and slimy!
How you wriggle up my sleeve.
How you coil around my shoulder
Causing visitors to leave,
Terrifying each beholder.
Come, then, where your breakfast waits,
Reptile of eccentric habits;
Come, and seal the several fates
Of these frogs and two plump rabbits.
――――:o:――――
THE CAT.
I love little Pussy, her coat is so warm,
And if I don’t hurt her, she’ll do me no harm;
So I’ll ne’er pull her tail, nor drive her away.
But pussy and I together will play;
She shall sit by my side, and I’ll give her some food,
And she’ll love me because I am gentle and good.
TO MY NEW PET.
I love my ichneumon,
Its tongue is so queer,
Its ways are so human,
It has such a leer.
’Tis fond of the emmet
For dinner and tea;
But ere you condemn it,
Pray listen to me.
And know that though _ants_ it
Delights in so much;
Its fiercest foe grants it
An _uncle_ won’t touch.
“Be lenient with lobsters, and ever kind to crabs,
And be not disrespectful to cuttle-fish or dabs;
Chase not the Cochin-China, chaff not the ox obese,
And babble not of feather-beds in company with geese.
Be tender with the tadpole, and let the limpet thrive,
Be merciful to mussels, don’t skin your eels alive;
When talking to a turtle don’t mention calipee――
Be always kind to animals wherever you may be.”
――――:o:――――
Speak roughly to your little boy,
And beat him when he sneezes;
He only does it to annoy,
Because he knows it teases.
_Alice in Wonderland._
Speak when _not_ spoken to,
Sulk when you’re chid,
Bang the door after you
Good little kid!
――――:o:――――
Be kind to the panther! for when thou wert young,
In thy country far over the sea,
’Twas a panther ate up thy papa and mama,
And had several mouthfuls of thee!
Be kind to the badger! for who shall decide
The depth of his badgerly soul?
And think of the tapir, when flashes the lamp
O’er the fast and the free flowing bowl.
Be kind to the camel! nor let word of thine
Ever put up his bactrian back;
And cherish the she-kangaroo with her bag,
Nor venture to give her the sack.
Be kind to the ostrich! for how canst thou hope
To have such a stomach as it?
And when the proud day of your “bridal” shall come,
Do give the poor birdie a “bit.”
Be kind to the walrus! nor ever forget
To have it on Tuesday to tea;
But butter the crumpets on only one side,
Save such as are eaten by thee.
Be kind to the bison! and let the jackal
In the light of thy love have a share;
And coax the ichneumon to grow a new tail,
And have lots of larks in its lair!
Be kind to the bustard! that genial bird,
And humor its wishes and ways;
And when the poor elephant suffers from bile,
Then tenderly lace up his stays!
_Figaro’s Natural History._ (O. P. Q. Smiff.)
――――:o:――――
MARY’S LAMB.
Mary had a little lamb,
Its fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went,
The lamb was sure to go.
He followed her to school one day,――
That was against the rule;
It made the children laugh and play,
To see a lamb at school.
(_Two verses omitted._)
――――
DOT LAMBS VOT MARY HAF GOT.
Mary haf got a leetle lambs already:
Dose vool vas vite like shnow;
Und every times dot Mary did vend oud,
Dot lambs vent also oud vid Mary.
Dot lambs did follow Mary von day to der school-house,
Vich was obbosition to der rules of der schoolmaster,
Alzo, vich it dit caused dose schillen to schmile out loud
Ven dey did saw dose lambs on der insides of der school-house.
Und so dot schoolmaster did kick dot lambs quick oud,
Likevise, dot lambs dit loaf around on der outsides,
Und did shoo der flies mit his tail off patiently aboud
Undil Mary did come also from dot school-house oud.
Und den dot lambs did run right away quick to Mary,
Und dit make his het on Mary’s arms,
Like he would said, “I dond vos schkared
Mary would keep from droubles ena how.”
“Vot vos de reason aboud it, of dot lambs and Mary?”
Dose schillen did ask it, dot schoolmaster;
Vell, doand you know it, dot Mary lov dose lambs already,
Dot schoolmaster did zaid.
MORAL.
Und zo, alzo, dot moral vas,
Boued Mary’s lambs’ relations:
Of you lofe dose like she lofe dose,
Dot lambs vas obligations.
――――
MARY HAD A LITTLE LAMB.
A TALE.
Mary was the proprietress of a diminutive incipient sheep, whose outer
covering was as devoid of colour as congealed atmospheric vapour, and
to all localities to which Mary perambulated, her young South-down was
morally sure to follow. It tagged her to the dispensary of learning
one diurnal section of time, which was contrary to all precedent, and
excited cachinnation to the seminary attendants when they perceived
the presence of a young mutton at the establishment of instruction.
Consequently the preceptor expelled him from the interior, but he
continued to remain in the immediate vicinity, without fretfulness,
until Mary once more became visible.
“What caused this specimen of the _genus ovis_ to bestow so much
affection on Mary?” the impetuous progeny vociferated.
“Because Mary reciprocated the wool-producer’s esteem, you understand,”
the teacher answered.
――――:o:――――
MARY’S LITTLE LAMB.
_Verses culled from different Authors._
Oh, who has not heard of Sweet Mary’s pet sheep,
With fleece like the lilies by Alaway’s stream,
When the day on the breast of the night falls asleep
With the fragrance of lilies to perfume its dream?
The love of that mutton for Mary was more
Like the nightingale’s song by the swift Bendemeer
Which born in the grove, seeks a grave on the shore
As laughter or music is drowned in a tear.
THOMAS MOORE.
I saw that lamb rise from the hallowed ground
That emperors have kissed as they resigned their rule;
I saw him rise like Venice rise and straddle round,
There where the wraith of Time prowls like a ghoul
And centuries have sate, each on its stool,
Then, with a spring of ages, saw him bound
To Mary’s side, and down the sombre cool
Dark corridors of rotting years he followed her to school
LORD BYRON.
Bounce, bounce, bounce,
For Mary’s poor pet wool!
But the tenderness of three days’ grace
Can’t get him back to school;
Oh, well for the sailor lad
That he bit his sister’s thumb,
For the contribution box goes round
And the lamb is deaf and dumb!
TENNYSON.
Prithee, good pedagogue, we lend our ears
To feed on explanation. It appears
That this pet lamb has passed the world’s estate
Of treachery, and love that loves to prate
Of love, while loving but the sound
The gnashing lips that bear it breathe around,
Beseemeth he would with her spangle nights
And wear her as the stars wear satellites,
To him she is the lightning to the cloud,
The rain to summer, to death the shroud,
Dreams to eyes, sleep to the weary, rest
To the yearning or ambitious breast.
We prithee, pedagogue, if so be you know,
Why does this sheep love little Mary so?
SHAKESPEARE.
――――:o:――――
William had a big gingham,
Its folds were strong and broad;
And everywhere that William came
That gingham too abode.
Lord Rosey put it up one day,
And many sheltered there;
It made the Tories laugh and play
To see the huge affair.
To shut it up their leaders tried,
But still its folds are spread,
And ’neath them Libs and Rads abide
Around their Grand Old Head.
“Why do they all love William so?”
The jealous Tories cry.
“Because he trusteth us you know,”
The people loud reply.
SCRAWLER.
_Truth._ October 15, 1885.
――――
Mary had a little corn
Upon her little toe,
And everywhere that Mary went
The corn was sure to go.
But Mary bought an Alcock’s shield,
And stuck it on her toe;
And then she ran about alone,
For the corn soon had to go.
And Mary, grown up, tells the tale,
Of that time, long ago,
When she was little Mary with
That corn upon her toe.
――――
Mary had a little lamb,
With coat as black as soot,
And into Mary’s cup of milk
It put its dirty foot.
Now Mary, a straightforward girl,
Who hated any sham,
Rapped out a naughty little word
That rhymed with Mary’s lamb.
HUSSAR.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
――――
Mary had a pot of jam
Presented by the cook,
And everywhere that Mary went,
The luscious jar she took.
She carried it to school one day,
Which was against the rule;
And when the teacher looked away,
She ate the jam in school.
At last the teacher found her out,
And, oh! was most severe:
But what the imposition was
It doth not well appear.
Now Mary soon began to roll
Her head upon her arm,
And felt dismayed, and much afraid
The jam had done her harm.
“Oh! why does Mary’s head ache so”
The curious children cry,
“Quaejam est, ea _sic_ erit,”
The teacher did reply.
C. W. G.
_Newcastle Weekly Chronicle._ 1887.
――――
JOSEPH AND HIS JESSE.
_An Adaptation of “Mary had a Little Lamb,” said to have been Sung
during the Ayr Contest, in which Mr. Collings took an active part._
Joseph had a little lamb――a little lamb――
Joseph had a little lamb,
Which loved its master so,
That everywhere that Joseph went――that Joseph went――
That everywhere that Joseph went,
The lamb was sure to go.
It followed him so close about――so close about――
It followed him so close about,
To every place you know,
It made the people laugh and shout――laugh and shout――
It made the people laugh and shout,
To see the lamb and Joe.
And when the laborers turned it out――turned it out――
And when the laborers turned it out,
Yet still it lingered near,
And wandered helplessly about――helplessly about――
And wandered helplessly about,
Till Joseph did appear.
“What makes the lamb love Joseph so――love Joseph so――
What makes the lamb love Joseph so?”
The “Rural Laborers” cry,
“Why Joseph loves the lamb, you know――the lamb, you know”――
Why Joseph loves the lamb――you know,
And Jesse makes reply, Baa! Baa!
_The Star._ June 18, 1888.
――――
Mary had a cactus plant
So modestly it grew,
Shooting its little fibers out
It lived upon the dew.
Her little brother often heard
Her say it lived on air,
And so he pulled it up one day
And placed it in a chair.
Placed it in a chair he did,
Then laughed with ghoulish glee――
Placed it in the old arm chair
Under the trysting tree.
Nor thought of Mary’s lover,
Who called each night to woo,
Or even dreamed they’d take a stroll,
As lovers often do.
The eve drew on. The lover came.
They sought the _trysting tree_,
Where has the little cactus gone?
The lover――where is he!
――――:o:――――
SONG.
AIR.――“_If I had a donkey vot vouldn’t go,
Do you think I’d wallop, &c._”
Had I an ass averse to speed,
Deem’st thou I’d strike him? No, indeed
Mark me, I’d try persuasion’s art,
For cruelty offends my heart:
Had all resembled me, I ween,
Martin, thy law had needless been
Of speechless brutes from blows to screen
The poor head;
For had I an ass averse to speed
I ne’er would strike him; no indeed!
I’d give him hay, and cry, “Proceed,”
And “Go on, Edward!”
Why speak I thus? This very morn,
I saw that cruel William Burn,
Whilst crying “Greens!” upon his course,
Assail his ass with all his force;
He smote him o’er the head and thighs,
Till tears bedimm’d the creature’s eyes!
Oh! ’twas too much. My blood ’gan rise,
And I exclaim’d,
“Had I an” &c.
Burn turn’d and cried, with scornful eye,
“Perchance thou’rt one of Martin’s fry,
And seek’st occasion base to take,
The vile informer’s gain to make.”
Word of denial though I spoke,
Full on my brow his fury broke,
And thus, while I return’d the stroke,
I exclaim’d,
“Had I an” &c.
To us, infringing thus the peace,
Approach’d its guardians――the police;
And, like inevitable Fate,
Bore us to where stern Justice sate:
Her minister the tale I told,
And to support my word, made bold
To crave he would the ass behold:
“For,” I declared,
“Had I an” &c.
They call’d the creature into court,
Where, sooth to say, he made some sport,
With ears erect, and parted jaws,
As though he strove to plead his cause:
I gain’d the palm of feelings kind;
The ass was righted; William fined.
For Justice, one with me in mind,
Exclaim’d, by her Minister,
“Had I an” &c.
Cried William to his Judge, “’Tis hard
(Think not the fine that I regard),
But things have reach’d a goodly pass――
One may not beat a stubborn ass!”
Nought spoke the Judge, but closed his book;
So William thence the creature took,
Eyeing me――ah! with what a look,
As gently whispering in his ear, I said,
“William, had I an,” &c.
_Punch._ February 17, 1844.
――――
THE CRY OF THE CHILDREN.
(_A propos of Jumbo._)
If _I_ owned Jumbó,
(Who declines to go)
Would I sell him to a show?
No, no, not I!
When the Titan I saw
Firmly plant his paw,
I would shout “Hooraw!”
For his bra-ve-ry.
_Chorus._
If an army of Yankees should proffer their pay,
I’d button my pockets, and send them away.
* * * * *
_Punch._ March 4, 1884.
――――
ON LORD GUMBOIL.
What are you doing, my pretty maid?
I’m mashing a lord, kind sir, she said.
Then pray be careful, my pretty maid;
I’m more than seven, sir, she said.
What is his father, my pretty maid?
His father’s a lawyer, sir, she said.
Say, has he married you, my pretty maid?
No, an it please you, kind sir, she said.
What will you do then, my pretty maid?
I’ll sue on his promise, sir, she said.
Then has he a fortune, my pretty maid!
He’s got one――at present――sir, she said.
PENZANCE.
_The Weekly Dispatch._ April 13, 1884.
――――
There was an old statesman,
And what do you think?
He used mountains of paper,
And oceans of ink,
And even on postcards would issue his fiat,
And yet this great statesman
Could never rest quiet.
AUGUST FIFTEENTH.
_Truth._ June 14, 1888.
――――:o:――――
THE LEGISLATIVE ORGAN.
[“The capacity of our Legislative Organ is limited. Its strength is
overtaxed. In its perspective, the first place is held by the great
and urgent Irish question. Still more limited are the means,
especially as to the future, possessed by a man on the margin of his
eightieth year.”――_Mr. Gladstone’s letter._]
Seated long since at the organ,
I strummed in my weary way;
And my fancies wandered widely
For a popular air to play.
I know not what I was doing,
(And I cannot explain it still),
But I struck one chord of faction;
Like the sound of a Home Rule Bill.
It startled the House and the Empire,
With a fantasy wild and new;
And it shattered a mighty party
Like a thunderbolt from the blue.
And I struggled and “reconstructed,”
But passions I could not cool;
So I gave up my seat at the organ,
Where I might not play “Home Rule.”
Yet still on that worn-out Organ
I shall strike those chords once more;
And sing in life’s sunless gloaming,
The song that I learnt of yore;
And the Law of the Land shall quaver
In tune to a plundering Plan,
When the grand Old English Organ
Shall throb to the Grand Old Man.
_The St. James’s Gazette._ 1889.
――――:o:――――
AN UTTER PASSION UTTERED UTTERLY.
This poem, inserted on page 81, was disfigured by a misprint, the
third line should have read:――
“And drapen in tear-colour’d minivers.”
The author (Dr. Todhunter) wishes it to be understood that the poem
was intended as a skit on the imitators of Mr. Swinburne’s style in
general, and not on any particular individual. It was therefore a
little out of place amongst the Parodies of Mr. Oscar Wilde, as it was
not intended to refer in any way to the writings of that
gentleman.――ED. _Parodies._
――――:o:――――
PARODIES & POEMS
IN
PRAISE OF TOBACCO.
[Illustration: T]he following poems, devoted entirely to the laudation
of Tobacco, either as smoked in the pipe, cigar, or cigarette, or as
taken in the form of snuff, have been collected from many different
works. One of the principal sources of information has been that
entertaining journal _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_, which has now
unfortunately ceased to exist. Another useful authority was a little
book published at the office of _Tobacco_ in Gracechurch Street,
London, entitled _Tobacco Jokes for Smoking Folks_, which contained
many amusing anecdotes, and humorous illustrations. A few of the
latter are here inserted by the kind permission of the proprietors.
Following the Parodies some of the most noted _Poems_ on Tobacco are
given, so as to make the collection on this interesting topic more
complete.
[Illustration]
One of the earliest burlesque poems in praise of Tobacco was that
written by Mr. Isaac Hawkins Browne about one hundred and fifty years
ago, entitled “_A Pipe of Tobacco_, in imitation of Six Several
Authors.”
This poem has been repeatedly reprinted, although there is little in
it that strikes a modern reader as either remarkably humorous or
clever. The authors imitated are Colley Cibber (the Poet Laureate),
Ambrose Phillips, James Thomson, Edward Young, Alexander Pope, and
Jonathan Swift, Dean of St. Patrick’s. It is stated that the imitation
of Ambrose Phillips was not written by Mr. I. H. Browne, but was sent
to him by a friend, whose name has not been transmitted to us. This is
to be regretted, as this particular imitation (the second) is
generally considered the best in the collection. According to Ritson
this was written for the collection by Dr. John Hoadley.
A PIPE OF TOBACCO:
_In Imitation of Six Several Authors._
IMITATION I.
_Laudes egregii Cæsaris――――
Culpâ deterere ingenî._
HOR.
A NEW-YEAR’S ODE.
_Recitative._
Old battle-array, big with horror is fled,
And olive-robed peace again lifts up her head.
Sing, ye Muses, Tobacco, the blessing of peace;
Was ever a nation so blessed as this?
_Air._
When summer suns grow red with heat,
Tobacco tempers Phœbus’ ire,
When wintry storms around us beat,
Tobacco cheers with gentle fire.
Yellow autumn, youthful spring,
In thy praises jointly sing.
_Recitativo._
Like Neptune, Cæsar guards Virginian fleets,
Fraught with Tobacco’s balmy sweets;
Old Ocean trembles at Britannia’s pow’r,
And Boreas is afraid to roar.
_Air._
Happy mortal! he who knows
Pleasure which a Pipe bestows;
Curling eddies climb the room,
Wafting round a mild perfume.
_Recitativo._
Let foreign climes the vine and orange boast,
While wastes of war deform the teeming coast;
Britannia, distant from each hostile sound,
Enjoys a Pipe, with ease and freedom crown’d;
E’en restless Faction finds itself most free,
Or if a slave, a slave to Liberty.
_Air._
Smiling years that gayly run,
Round the Zodiack with the sun,
Tell, if ever you have seen
Realms so quiet and serene.
Britain’s sons no longer now
Hurl the bar, or twang the bow,
Nor of crimson combat think,
But securely smoke and drink.
_Chorus._
Smiling years that gayly run
Round the Zodiack with the sun,
Tell, if ever you have seen
Realms so quiet and serene.
――――
IMITATION II.
_Tenues fugit ceu fumus in auras._
VIRG.
Little tube of mighty pow’r,
Charmer of an idle hour,
Object of my warm desire,
Lip of wax, and eye of fire:
And thy snowy taper waist,
With my finger gently brac’d;
And thy pretty swelling crest,
With my little stopper prest,
And the sweetest bliss of blisses,
Breathing from thy balmy kisses.
Happy thrice, and thrice agen,
Happiest he of happy men;
Who when agen the night returns,
When agen the taper burns;
When agen the cricket’s gay,
(Little cricket, full of play)
Can afford his tube to feed
With the fragrant Indian weed:
Pleasure for a nose divine,
Incense of the god of wine.
Happy thrice, and thrice agen,
Happiest he of happy men.
――――
IMITATION III.
_――――Prorumpit ad æthera nubem
Turbine fumantem piceo._
VIRG.
O thou, matur’d by glad Hesperian suns,
Tobacco, fountain pure of _limpid[16] truth_,
_That looks the very soul_; whence pouring thought
_Swarms all the mind_; absorpt is yellow care,
_And[17] at each puff imagination burns_.
Flash on thy bard, and with exalting fires
Touch the mysterious lip, that chaunts thy praise
In strains to mortal sons of earth unknown.
Behold an engine, wrought from tawny mines
Of ductile clay, with _plastic[18] virtue_ form’d,
And glaz’d magnifick o’er, I grasp, I fill.
From _Pætotheke_[19] with pungent pow’rs perfum’d,
_Itself[20] one tortoise all, where shines imbib’d
Each parent ray_; then rudely ram’d illume,
With the red touch of zeal-enkindling sheet,
_Mark’d[21] with Gibsonian lore_; forth issue clouds,
Thought-thrilling, thirst-inciting clouds around,
And many-mining fires: I all the while,
Lolling at ease, _inhale_[22] the breezy balm.
But chief, when _Bacchus wont with thee to join
In genial strife_ and orthodoxal ale,
_Stream[23] life and joy into the Muses’ bowl_.
Oh be thou still _my great inspirer_, thou
_My Muse_; oh fan me with thy zephyrs boon,
While I, in clouded tabernacle shrin’d,
Burst forth all oracle and mystick song.
――――
IMITATION IV.
_――――Bullatis mihi nugis,
Pagina turgescat, dare pondus idonea fumo._
PERS.
Criticks avaunt; Tobacco is my theme;
Tremble like hornets at the blasting steam.
And you, court-insects, flutter not too near
Its light, nor buzz within the scorching sphere.
Pollio, with flame like thine, my verse inspire,
So shall the Muse from smoke elicit fire.
Coxcombs prefer the tickling sting of snuff;
Yet all their claim to wisdom is――a puff:
Lord Fopling smokes not――for his teeth afraid:
Sir Tawdry smokes not――for he wears brocade.
Ladies, when pipes are brought, affect to swoon;
They love no smoke, except the smoke of town;
But courtiers hate the puffing tribe,――no matter,
Strange if they love the breath that cannot flatter!
Its foes but shew their ignorance; can he
Who scorns the leaf of knowledge, love the tree?
The tainted templar (more prodigious yet)
Rails at Tobacco, tho’ it makes him――spit.
Citronia vows it has an odious stink;
She will not smoke (ye gods!) but she will drink:
And chaste Prudella (blame her if you can)
Says, pipes are us’d by that vile creature Man:
Yet crowds remain, who still its worth proclaim,
While some for pleasure smoke, and some for fame:
Fame, of our actions universal spring,
For which we drink, eat, sleep, smoke,――ev’rything.
――――
IMITATION V.
_――――Solis ad ortus
Vanescit fumus._
LUCAN.
Blest leaf! whose aromatick gales dispense
To templars modesty, to parsons sense:
So raptur’d priests, at fam’d Dodona’s shrine
Drank inspiration from the steam divine.
Poison that cures, a vapour that affords
Content, more solid than the smile of lords:
Rest to the weary, to the hungry food,
The last kind refuge of the wise and good.
Inspir’d by thee, dull cits adjust the scale
Of Europe’s peace, when other statesmen fail.
By thee protected, and thy sister, beer,
Poets rejoice, nor think the bailiff near.
Nor less the critick owns thy genial aid,
While supperless he plies the piddling trade.
What tho’ to love and soft delights a foe,
By ladies hated, hated by the beau,
Yet social freedom, long to courts unknown,
Fair health, fair truth, and virtue are thy own.
Come to thy poet, come with healing wings,
And let me taste thee unexcis’d by kings.
――――
IMITATION VI.
_Ex fumo dare lucem._
HOR.
Boy! bring an ounce of Freeman’s best,
And bid the vicar be my guest:
Let all be placed in manner due,
A pot wherein to spit or spue,
And _London Journal_ and _Free Briton_,
Of use to light a pipe――――
* * * * *
This village, unmolested yet
By troopers, shall be my retreat:
Who cannot flatter, bribe, betray;
Who cannot write or vote for pay.
Far from the vermin of the town,
Here let me rather live, my own,
Doze o’er a pipe, whose vapour bland
In sweet oblivion lulls the land;
Of all which at Vienna passes,
As ignorant as ―――― Brass is:
And scorning rascals to caress,
Extoll the days of good Queen Bess,
When first TOBACCO blest our isle,
Then think of other Queens――and smile.
Come jovial pipe, and bring along
Midnight revelry and song;
The merry catch, the madrigal,
That echoes sweet in City Hall;
The parson’s pun, the smutty tale
Of country justice o’er his ale.
I ask not what the French are doing,
Or Spain to compass Britain’s ruin:
Britons, if undone, can go,
Where TOBACCO loves to grow.
[Illustration]
――――:o:――――
HORACE.
_In imitation of Epode III._
AN ODE AGAINST TOBACCO.
For parricide, that worst of crimes,
Hemlock’s cold draught, in ancient times,
Scarce taught the rogue repentance:
But had tobacco then been known,
Its burning juices swallow’d down,
Had prov’d a fitter sentence.
How callous are the lab’rers jaws,
Who this dire weed both smokes and chaws,
And feasts upon the venom!
While I by chance a taste once got,
That so inflam’d my mouth and throat,
I thought all hell was in ’em.
Sure, this vile drug, that serv’d me thus,
The deadly viper’s poisonous juice
Infus’d must have great share in;
Or else some hag, with midnight wish,
Procur’d it as a special dish
Of Satan’s own preparing.
This was the charm Medea taught
Her dear advent’rous Argonaut,
To steal the Golden Fleece with;
Down bulls and dragons gaping throat
A quid he threw, which, quick as thought,
The brutes were laid at peace with.
Ting’d in tobacco’s baleful oil,
Her presents made her rival broil
Past Jason’s art of quenching:
And when he swore revenge, the witch
Mounted aloft astride her switch,
Pleas’d she had spoil’d his wenching.
Under the blue I’d rather live,
And the sun’s fiercest rays receive,
How apt soe’er to burn us:
Nay, Hercules’s shirt I’d wear,
Or any flame much sooner bear,
Than a pipe’s fiery furnace.
My merry lord, if quid or whiff
You ever taste of this damn’d leaf,
May you meet with what you dread most,
May Chloe, when with her you lie,
And press to kiss her, put you by,
And rather hug the bed post!
From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. May, 1744.
――――:o:――――
Elegy.
WRITTEN OVER AN OLD PIPE-BOX.
The postman hits his last rat-tat to day,
And hies him to his lowly home with glee;
My wife reposes in her white array;
The night is left to “’Bacca” and to me.
Now starts a glimmering bottle on the sight,
And all the air a spirit perfume holds;
At sight of me the cockroach takes to flight,
And leaves awhile my common dips and moulds.
All raving now, at yonder area gate,
The moping “bobbies” to the cooks complain
That soldiers, with their padded breasts elate,
Molest their ancient privilege and reign.
Beneath this hingeless lid, bound round with braid,
Wherein no anti-vermin dare to creep
(Each one done brown, aside for ever laid),
The ancient tutors of my smoking sleep.
The bull-like voice of nicotinian Bob,
The sylph-like tones of sweet, poetic, Ned,
The fierce denouncings of the anti-mob,
No more shall call them from their narrow bed.
For them no more the fierce fusee shall burn,
Or plugs be purchased and put in with care;
In memory only, I to them return;
Their smoke, too strong, would all my nerves impair.
Oft have they lain with me in some green field;
Their solace oft some stiff-neck’d care has broke.
How strangely sorrow to the pipe doth yield,
And joy descends e’en through ascending smoke.
Let not philosophy at smoking mock――
Philosophy is but its prototype;
Nor e’en religion hear with spurning shock,
The short and simple annals of the pipe.
* * * * *
Ah me! In this neglected box is laid
Old pipes, once glowing with the scented fire;
Pipes for which shillings, ay, and pounds were paid.
Start not――’tis true, or I’m a living liar!
But pipes on pipes of “Bacca,” day by day,
With poison laden, did their fates control;
Strong-smelling oil stopp’d up the narrow way,
And now they may no more console my soul.
Full many a pipe, of purest briar root,
The stern schoolmaster confiscates and breaks;
Full many a clay, too, seized is by the brute,
And flung with tops and marbles, buttons, cakes.
One colour’d meerschaum that, in hidden poke
Conceal’d, full many a day in school did lie,
Escaped the notice of the stern-eyed bloke,
To linger in this box and never die.
To take excursion by the iron way,
In smoking-carriage, where thick clouds arise;
To fumigate――(tho’ anti-smokers bray),
And blow their ashes into people’s eyes――
Their state forbids. Now, circumscribed they lie,
For pleasure useless, and for work as well;
Weak, helpless, all, I bid them now good-by;
For, tho’ so weak, dear me, how strong they smell!
For thee, who, brooding thus with bended head,
Deploring much their sad and helpless state,
If chance, by nicotinian feelings led,
Some brother smoker shall inquire thy fate:
Haply some wooden-headed clown may say:
“I’ve often seed him, when the ale-house closed,
Wandering along the all-too narrow way,
His eyes a quiver, like to one who dozed;
“There, at the foot of yonder painted sign,
That looks more like a pig than like a cow,
He’d drink his beer――it would’nt run to wine――
And smoke his pipe, all reckless――anyhow.
“Or down the street, to put his watch in pawn,
Feeling for vanish’d coppers, he would rove,
His old hat on, his bristly chin unshorn.
He liked his beer, but warn’t a drunken cove.
“One night I miss’d him at the accustom’d pub;
Unoccupied remain’d his favourite seat.
Another came. Where was he?――sore the rub;
In losing him, we lost a look’d-for treat.
“The next, with solemn march, in blue array
(A crowd behind with strong tumultuous din,)
Two bobbies came. They’d found him on the way,
With beer o’ercome, and so they ran him in!”
THE EPITAPH.
Here rests, with his old head upon a stone,
A man who smoked till he did reason drown.
To-morrow morn the mayor, all fully blown,
Will frown on him, and fine him half-a-crown.
H. L.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. September, 1874.
――――
HAMLET’S SOLILOQUY ON TOBACCO.
To smoke or not to smoke, that is the question:
Whether a mild cigar assists digestion;
Or, whether it begets a kind of quaintness,
Which some would say was nothing but a faintness;
To smoke――to drink and then to go to bed;
To find a pillow for an aching head;
To snore――perchance to dream! and half your senses scare
With visionary demons or nightmare;
To wake, in perspiration nicely dished,
’Tis a consummation hardly to be wished;
For who would bear the kicks, cuffs, and abuse
Of this base world, when he might cook his goose
Upon his toasting fork? Or who would care
For half the motley groups which at him stare,
Some morning early, stuck before the bench,
When soda-water would his fever quench,
But that a little thing within doth call?
Thus porter doth make rumuns of us all!
And thus our resolution to keep sober
Is drown’d and soon forgot in good October.
But hush! my Phelia comes, the pretty dear!
Oh! think of me love――when you fetch your beer.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
TO SMOKE, OR NOT TO SMOKE.
To smoke, or not to smoke――that is the question!
Whether ’tis better to abjure the habit,
And trust the warnings of a scribbling doctor,
Or buy at once a box of best Havanas,
And ten a day consume them? To smoke, to puff,
Nay more, to waste the tender fabric of the lungs
And risk consumption and its thousand ills
The practice leads to――’tis a consummation
Discreetly to be shunned. To smoke, to puff――
To puff, perhaps to doze――ay, there’s the rub;
For in that dozing state we thirsty grow,
And, having burned the tube up to a stump,
We must have drink, and that’s one cause
We modern youth are destined to short life;
For who can bear to feel his mouth parched up,
His throat like whalebone and his chest exhausted,
His head turned giddy, and his nerves unstrung,
When he himself might drench these ills away
With wine or brandy? Who could live in smoke,
And pine and sicken with a secret poison;
But that the dread of breaking o’er a rule
Prescribed by Fashion, whose controlling will
None disobey, puzzles ambitious youth,
And makes us rather bear the ills we feel
Than others that the doctor warns us of.
Thus custom does make spectres of us all,
And thus the native hue of our complexion
If sicklied o’er with a consumptive cast;
The appetite, a loss of greater moment,
Palled by the weed, and the digestive powers
Lose all their action.
JOHN W. FARRELL.
_Rare Bits._ November 18, 1882.
――――:o:――――
A SONG, AFTER SHERIDAN.
Here’s to the hookah with snake of five feet,
Or the “portable” fix’d to one’s “topper”;
Here’s to the meerschaum more naughty than neat,
And here’s to all pipes that are proper.
Fill them up tight,
Give ’em a light;
I’ll wager a smoke will set everything right.
Here’s to the Warden’s twelve inches of stalk,
Here’s to Jack Tar’s clay, with one, sir;
To the pipes now with mountings so rich that they “walk,”
And here’s to most pipes which have none, sir.
Fill them up tight, &c.
Here’s to the Milo just out of the shop,
With mouthpiece as dry as pale sherry;
Here’s to your veteran, wet as a mop,
Black as a sloe or a cherry.
Fill them up tight, &c.
Let them be clumsy or let them be slim,
Light or heavy, I care not a feather;
So, fill them with ’Baccy right up to the rim,
And let us all smoke them together.
Fill them up tight,
Give ’em a light;
I’ll wager a smoke will set everything right.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. February, 1875.
――――:o:――――
HAIL TO THE PLANT.
(_A Parody of Sir Walter Scott._)
Hail! to the Plant which we owe to brave Raleigh,
Long may it flourish on Cuba’s lone shore,
Bloom on the mountain, and spread in the valley,
Fertile, and fragrant, and fresh evermore!
Bright sunshine, nourish it,
Gentle deeds, cherish it,
Life giving breezes, around it still flow;
Moisture and warmth, give aid,
That it may never fade;
Tabak, St. Nicotine, ho, ieroe!
* * * * *
Smoke, brother, smoke of the pride of Virginia;
Snuff, brother, snuff, if you’d clear up your brain;
Chew, brother, chew, and I’ll bet you a guinea,
Once fairly started, you’ll do it again.
Oh, would our northern air
Nurture this plant so rare!
Never aught else in my garden I’d grow:
All my flowers pluck’d should be,
Fruit-trees give place to thee,
Tabak, St. Nicotine, ho, ieroe!
――――
THE LAY OF THE LAST SMOKER.
The weed was rank, the pipe was old,
Along the road the smoker rolled;
His scared and hesitating way
Showed that he owed and couldn’t pay.
The pipe, his one remaining joy,
Was scoff of every man and boy;
For last of all the smokers, he,
This old man was well known to be
For ’Bacca’s day was lately fled,
And all his brother smokers dead;
And he but stayed to smoke and swear,
And wonder where the others were.
No more amid the jest and song,
He puffed at his churchwarden long;
No longer in a smoking car
He blew a cloud from his cigar,
And stood his ground both stern and stout,
To smoke the anti-puffers out.
Old days were drowned in Time’s dark stream,
And “antis” reigned now all supreme;
The quivering noses of the time
Now called each harmless puff a crime.
A wandering smoker, scorned and sad,
He nearly drove the city mad;
And had to smoke――oh! wretched elf!
Some ’Bacca that he grew himself.
* * * * *
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. April, 1876.
――――:o:――――
THE LAST CIGAR.
(_After Thomas Moore._)
’Tis a last choice Havana
I hold here alone;
All its fragrant companions
In perfume have flown.
No more of its kindred
To gladden the eye,
So my empty cigar case
I close with a sigh.
I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one,
To pine; but the stem
I’ll bite off and light thee
To waft thee to them
And gently I’ll scatter
The ashes you shed,
As your soul joins its mates in
A cloud overhead.
All pleasure is fleeting,
It blooms to decay
From the weeds glowing circle,
The ash drops away.
A last whiff is taken,
The butt-end is thrown,
And with empty cigar case
I sit all alone.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
’Tis the last weed of Hudson’s
Left lying alone;
All his dark brown Regalias
Are vanished and gone.
No cigar of its colour,
No “Lopez” is mine,
To delight with its perfume
And fragrance divine.
I’ll not leave thee, thou lone one!
I’ll ring for a light;
Thy companions are ashes,
I’ll smoke thee to-night.
Thy halo and incense
Shall rise o’er my head,
As I sigh for the beauties
All scentless and dead.
And soon may I follow
Those lov’d ones’ decay;
Since from each tempting bundle
They’ve faded away.
When Regalias are smok’d out,
And “Lopez” are blown,
Oh! who would still linger,
Cigarless, alone?
From _Hints to Freshmen, in the University of Oxford_.
――――
A LAST CIGAR.
’Tis my last mild Havana
Pervading the room;
Her companions have taken
Their _leaves_ in a fume.
No kindred _to back her_,
Nor plug, twist, nor snuff,
To return her aroma
Or give puff for puff.
Oh, fain would I follow
When the last whiff is sped,
And in life’s brightest garden
The _weeds_ are all dead.
When troubles oppress us,
Or better-halves jar,
Oh, what were existence
Without a cigar?
――――:o:――――
THE BUTCHER BOY.
The butcher boy down the road has gone,
With beefsteak he has lined him;
A pipe of clay he has put on,
And his basket’s slung behind him.
“Lend me that,” cried the baker’s boy,
“The pipe you now are biting,”
“Not I,” cried he, “my pipe I’ll guard!”
And so they fell to fighting.
The butcher fell, but the baker’s boy,
Could not bring his proud soul under;
The pipe he loved ne’er smoked again,
For he broke its stem asunder;
And cried, “No dough shall sully thee,
I’ll be thy undertaker;
Thy joys were made for the butcher boy――
Thou shalt ne’er be smoked by a baker!”
H. L.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. July. 1873.
――――
MY OLD DHUDEEN.
(Air: _Love’s Young Dream_.)
Oh! the days are gone when lollipops
My heart could move;
When sugar-sticks and almond rock
Were my first love;
Inventions sweet
And succulent,
Made childhood all serene;
Now there’s nothing half so sweet in life
As my old Dhudeen;
Yes, there’s nothing half so sweet in life
As my old Dhudeen.
For the youth will tire at last of sweets
When “down” appears,
And he wears a collar in the streets
That hides his ears:
The vile “Pickwick”
May make him sick,
And turn his face quite green,
Yet there’s nothing half so sweet in life
As his old Dhudeen;
Oh! there’s nothing half so sweet in life
As his old Dhudeen.
Oh! the first sly smoke I’ll ne’er forget――
It made me queer;
And when I my stern parent met,
He pulled my ear;
But now I’m old,
And weak and cold,
And on my stick do lean,
There’s nothing half so sweet in life
As my old Dhudeen;
Oh! there’s nothing half so sweet in life
As my old Dhudeen.
H. L.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. December, 1872.
――――:o:――――
I REMEMBER.
(_After Hood._)
I remember, I remember,
The pipe that first I drew;
With red waxed end and snowy bowl,
It perfect was and new.
It measured just four inches long,
’Twas made of porous clay;
I found when I began to smoke,
It took my breath away,
I remember, I remember,
In fear I struck a light;
And when I smoked a little time,
I felt my cheeks grow white.
My nervous system mutinied,
My diaphragm uprose,
And I was very――very ill
In a way you may suppose.
I remember, I remember,
The very rod he got,
When father who discovered me,
Made me exceeding hot.
He scattered all my feathers then,
While, face down I reclined;
I sat upon a cold hearthstone,
I was so warm behind.
I remember, I remember,
I viewed the rod with dread,
And silent, sad, and supperless,
I bundled off to bed.
It was a childish punishment,
And now ’tis little joy
To know that, for the self-same crime,
I wallop my own boy!
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. March, 1875.
――――:o:――――
THE OLD BLACK CLAY.
I love it! I love it! though some may say
It’s wrong to be fond of an old black clay;
I haven’t exactly inlaid it with sighs――
The turn of my mind has been otherwise――
For I always feel excessively gay
When I’m gazing upon that old black clay.
When rude and frivolous folk are by,
I never produce it――I’ll tell you why――
They call it harsh, injurious names,
And vex my soul with mischievous games;
But when to a lonely place I repair,
I make quite sure there’s nobody there,
And adore in the most abandoned way
That stumpy loveable coal-black clay.
I’ll never forget the dreadful day
When they “played it low” on that harmless clay――
The ruthless hand of a mother dear
Hid it away in a dust-hole drear;
But, ah! no words can properly tell
My joy when I found it again by the smell;
And I took to my heart (as one may say),
Once more that redolent, long lost clay.
I love it! I love it! as I have said,
I smoke it abroad, and I smoke it abed;
And if the prophecy turn out right
That I’m burned to a cinder some fine night,
I’ll simply deem it a glorious way
Of ending my life with my faithful clay.
_The Manchester City Jackdaw._ April 21, 1876.
――――:o:――――
SMOKE NOT!
Smoke not, smoke not your weeds nor pipes of clay!
Cigars that are made from leaves of cauliflowers;――
Things that are doomed no duty e’er to pay;――
Grown, made, and smokèd in a few short hours.
Smoke not, smoke not.
Smoke not, smoke not! the weed you smoke may change
The healthfulness of your stomachic tone;
Things to the eye grow queer and passing strange;
All thought seems undefined――save one, to be alone.
Smoke not, smoke not.
Smoke not! the tradesman whose weed you smoke may die!
May perish from the cabbage-bearing earth;――
The sordid _dun_ into your chamber hie――
Sent by the trustees in their tinless dearth.
Smoke not, smoke not.
Smoke not, smoke not! O, warning vainly said!
Cane and cap-paper since we first did try,
Smoke flings a halo round the smoker’s head;
And all in vain do anxious mothers cry,
Smoke not, smoke not!
From _Hints to Freshmen in the University of Oxford_, published by J.
Vincent, Oxford, and attributed to the Rev. Canon Hole.
――――:o:――――
THE PIPES OF ENGLAND.
The stately pipes of England,
How beautiful they be,
With amber tips and meerschaum bowls――
Such pipes are not for me!
With scented Latakie they burn,
And golden crowns they wear;
And the smoke steals from the scented urn――
Like summer’s perfumed air.
The merry pipes of England,
Amid the joke and jest,
With gladsome glasses of hot grog,
Are found then at their best,
The smoker’s eye is seen to wink,
As many a tale is told;
Or lips ope cheerfully to drink
The glorious ale of old.
The cottage pipes of England――
By thousands made of clay――
All snowy in their wooden box,
How beautiful are they!
From ruddy lips they outward poke,
As white as wool or lard;
And the lowly do a cheerful smoke,
When the times are not too hard.
The free, fair pipes of England
Live long in hall and hut;
And sweet for ever be their lips,
And scented be their bowls;
And may no humbug e’er eclipse
The solace of our souls.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. April 1873.
――――:o:――――
THE GENIUS OF SMOKING.
[_We have been favored with the following defence of smoking, by an
intimate literary friend of Lord Byron, who assures us it is selected
from several unpublished juvenile trifles written at various times in
his album by the noble bard._]
I had a dream――it was not all a dream;
Methought I sat beneath the silver beam
Of the sweet moon, and you were with me there,
And everything around was free and fair;
And from our mouths upcurled the fragrant smoke,
Whose light blue wreaths can all our pleasures yoke,
In sweetest union to young Fancy’s car,
And waft the soul out thro’ a good cigar.
There as we sat and puffed the hours away,
And talked and laughed about life’s little day,
And built our golden castles in the air,
And sighed to think what transient things they were,
As the light smoke around our heads was thrown,
Amidst its folds a little figure shone,
An elfin sprite, who held within her hand
A small cigar her sceptre of command.
Her hair above her brow was twisted tight off,
Like a cigar’s end, which you must bite off;
Her eyes were red and twinkling like the light
Of Eastern Hookah, or Meerschaum, by night;
A green tobacco leaf her shoulders graced,
And dried tobacco hung about her waist;
Her voice breathed softly, like the easy puffing
Of an old smoker, after he’s been stuffing.
Thus as she rolled aside the wanton smoke,
To us, her awe-struck votaries she spoke,――
“Hail faithful slaves! my choicest joys descend
On him who joins the smoker to the friend,
Yours is a pleasure that shall never vanish
Provided that you smoke the best of Spanish;
Puff forth your clouds”――(with that we puff’d amain)
“Sweet is their fragrance”――(then we puff’d again)
“How have I hung, with most intense delight,
Over your heads when you have smoked at night,
And gratefully imparted all my powers
To bless and consecrate those happy hours;
Smoke on,” she said. I started and awoke,
And with my dream she vanished into smoke.
ANONYMOUS.
――――:o:――――
AN AMERICAN PARODY OF WORDSWORTH’S “SONNET ON THE SONNET.”
Scorn not the meerschaum. Housewives, you have croaked
In ignorance of its charms. Through this small reed
Did Milton, now and then, consume the weed;
The poet Tennyson hath oft evoked
The Muse with glowing pipe, and Thackeray joked
And wrote and sang in nicotinian mood;
Hawthorne with this hath cheered his solitude;
A thousand times this pipe hath Lowell smoked;
Full oft hath Aldrich, Stoddard, Taylor, Cranch,
And many more whose verses float about,
Puffed the Virginian or Havanna leaf;
And when the poet’s or the artist’s branch,
Drops no sustaining fruit, how sweet to pout
Consolatory whiffs――alas, too brief!
――――:o:――――
MY HOOKAH.
What is it, that affords such joys
On Indian shores, and never cloys,
But makes that _pretty, bubbling_ noise?
My Hookah.
What is it, that a party if in
At breakfast, dinner, or at Tiffin,
Surprises and delights the Griffin?
My Hookah.
What is it to Cadets gives pleasure?
What is it occupies their leisure?
What do they deem the greatest treasure?
My Hookah.
Say――what makes Decency wear sable?
What makes each would-be nabob able
To cock his legs upon the table?
My Hookah.
What is it (trust me, I’m not joking,
Tis truth――altho’, I own, provoking)
That sets e’en Indian _belles_ a smoking?
My Hookah.
What is it――whensoe’er we search
In ev’ry place;――_except the Church_,
That leaves sweet converse in the lurch?
My Hookah.
But hold my Muse――for shame for shame――
One question ere you smoking blame――
_What is it gives your book a name?_
My Hookah.
My fault I own――my censure ends;
Nay more――I’ll try to make amends,
Who is the _safest_ of all friends?
My Hookah.
Say who? or what retains the power,
When fickle Fortune ’gins to lour,
To solace many a lonely hour?
My Hookah.
When death-like dews and fogs prevailing
In Pinnace or in Budg’-row sailing,
What is it that prevents our ailing?
My Hookah.
When we’re our skins with claret soaking,
And heedless wits their friends are joking,
_Which_ friend will stand the _greatest smoking_?
My Hookah.
By what――(nay, answer at your ease,
While pocketing our six rupees)――
By what d’ye mean the town to please?
My Hookah.
From MY HOOKAH; or, _The Stranger in Calcutta_. Being a collection of
Poems by an Officer. Calcutta: Greenway and Co., 1812.
――――
A PINCH OF SNUFF.
With mind or body sore distrest,
Or with repeated cares opprest,
What sets the aching heart at rest?
A pinch of snuff!
Or should some sharp and gnawing pain
Creep round the noddle of the brain,
What puts all things to rights again?
A pinch of snuff!
When speech and tongue together fail,
What helps old ladies in their tale,
And adds fresh canvass to their sail?
A pinch of snuff!
Or when some drowsy parson prays,
Or still more drowsy people gaze,
What opes their eyelids with amaze?
A pinch of snuff!
A comfort which they can’t forsake,
What is it some would rather take,
Than good roast beef, or rich plum cake?
A pinch of snuff!
What warms without a conflagration,
Excites without intoxication,
And rouses without irritation?
A pinch of snuff!
Then let us sing in praise of snuff!
And call it not such “horrid stuff,”
At which some frown, and others puff,
And seem to flinch
But when a friend presents a box,
Avoid the scruples and the shocks
Of him who laughs and her who mocks,
And take a pinch!
From _The Sportsman_. August, 1835.
――――
STANZAS TO A LADY
_In defence of Smoking._
What taught me first sweet peace to blend
With hopes and fears that knew no end,
My dearest, truest, fondest friend?
My pipe, love!
What cheer’d me in my boyhood’s hour,
When first I felt Love’s witching power,
To bear deceit,――false woman’s dow’r
My pipe, love!
What still upheld me since the guile,
Attendant on false friendship’s smile,
And I in hope, deceiv’d the while?
My pipe, love!
What cheer’d me when misfortunes came,
And all had flown me? Still the same
My only true and constant flame,
My pipe, love!
What sooth’d me in a foreign land,
And charm’d me with its influence bland,
Still whisp’ring comfort, hand in hand?
My pipe, love!
What charm’d me in the thoughts of past
When mem’ry’s gleam my eyes o’ercast,
And burns to serve me to the last?
My pipe, love!
_Nicotiana_, by H. J. Meller. London. E. Wilson, 1832.
――――
TO MY CIGAR.
When cares oppress the drooping mind,
And fickle friends are most unkind,
Who constant still remains behind?
My true cigar!
Oh! where’s the friend who’d cheerfully,
To soothe one pensive hour for me,
Resign his latest breath like thee――
My kind cigar?
Thy spirit’s gone, poor fragile thing!
But still thine ashes, mouldering,
To me a valued lesson bring,――
My pale cigar!
Like man’s, how soon thy vital spark,
Expiring, leaves no other mark,
But mouldering ashes, drear and dark,
My dead cigar.
T. G. J.
Bristol. 1844.
――――
TOBACCO.
Whene’r I’m out of sorts or sad,
Oppress’d with care, and well-nigh mad,
What comforts me, and makes me glad?
Tobacco!
What builds such castles in the air,
And paints my prospects bright and fair,
And makes me negligent of care?
Tobacco!
How is it that I’m so resign’d,
When’er my wife _must_ speak her mind,
And ne’er retaliate in kind?
Tobacco!
What makes my holidays so sweet,
And ev’ry “outing” such a treat
That I would fain their joys repeat?
Tobacco!
Whene’er my brain is dull and dark,
And utterly beside the mark,
What wakes the latent, slumb’ring spark?
Tobacco!
What changes all my scowls to smiles,
And many a tedious hour beguiles,
And ne’er by any chance me riles,
Tobacco.
Enlarger of our mortal ken,
_Familiar_ of the artist’s den,
Beloved by literary men――
Tobacco!
Far kinder than the kindest friend,
O, teach us how your powers blend!
And from your heavenly throne descend,
Tobacco!
E. H. S.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. April, 1873.
――――
THE WEED.
When roses droop beside the wall,
When lily petals fade and fall,
What swiftly rises, covering all?
The Weed.
When starts the widow on the chase,
To fill “the late lamented’s” place,
What decorates her pretty face?
The Weed.
When coffee’s served and wine runs low,
When conversation waxes slow,
What brings the after-dinner glow?
The Weed.
――――
A SMOKE.
What comforts me when I am sad,
Or when I’ve got the toothache _bad_,
Or when the money market’s mad?
A smoke.
What soothes me if I dine not well,
When lies about me people tell,
Or friendship proves a hollow sell?
A smoke.
What quiets indigestion’s pangs,
And takes the edge off hatred’s fangs,
And salves misfortune’s cruel bangs?
A smoke.
――――:o:――――
HYMN TO SAINT NICOTINE.
(_Imitation of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes._)
Strange! that this gently breathèd cloud
So far, far sweeter unto me,
Than all that this green earth enshroud,
Or float above the sea.
My meerschaum, when thy mouth I greet,
No lady’s lips seem half so sweet.
I look upon the fair blue skies,
And naught but empty air I see;
But when thy circling cloudlets rise,
It seemeth unto me
Ten thousand angels spread their wings,
Within those little azure rings.
Tobacco hath the choicest leaf
That ever western breeze hath fanned;
Its healing odour gives relief
To men of ev’ry land.
This precious herb to me doth yield
More joy than all the broider’d field.
O, comrade! there be many things
That seem right fair in truth or joke;
But sure from none among them springs
A richer charm than smoke.
Let us not puff our pipes alone,
But join two altars both in one.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. December, 1871.
――――:o:――――
PARODY OF DR. WATTS, BY AN ANTI-SMOKER.
How doth the nasty, dirty man,
Go smoking every hour;
And spend his money wastefully
On Old Nick’s favourite flower.
How wistfully he seeks his pipe,
How glad he doth it light;
And smokes the foul thing all the day,
And feels quite ill at night.
In shag, bird’s eye, or honey-dew,
His mind is ever fast;
And Satan knows to him he’s due,
For he’ll get him at last.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
THE LAST PIPE.
T’was the voice of the doctor, I heard him declare,
“You’ve been smoking too much, of tobacco beware!
To be candid and plain you’ll find it no joke,
For you’ll become _ashes_ yourself if you smoke.”
So I’ve filled my last pipe as I sit by the fire,
And gaze at the cloud rising higher and higher,
And languidly watching each up-curling ring,
A mournful adieu to tobacco I sing.
Farewell, good cigars, I will e’en call you dear,
Yet your price were no object so you were still here.
Good bye! Latakia, Mild Turkey, good by!
Virginia, Cavendish, Bristol Bird’s-eye,
And my pipe! My sweet pipe, with thy cool amber tip!
No more shall that amber caress my fond lip.
Oh! friend of my youth! must thou really go――
My partner in joy, and my solace in woe?
’Tis too true; nought avail me these heart-broken sighs!
And, alas! thou art out. There are tears in my eyes,
As I lay thee down gently. I will not complain,
But I feel I shall never be happy again.
_Fun_, 1870.
――――:o:――――
THE PIPE.
A Parody of Barry Cornwall’s “_The Sea, the Sea!_”
The pipe, the pipe, the German pipe!
The short, the long, the meerschaum ripe!
Its odorous puffs without a sound,
They float my head’s wide regions round;
They rise in clouds and mock the skies,
While _Baccy_ snugly eradled lies.
My hookah wide! my hookah deep!
I’ve that which I would ever keep;
With the smoke above, and smoke below,
And smoke wheresoe’er I go.
If a storm (like a Chinese gong) should ring
What matters that? I’ll smoke and sing.
What matters, &c.
I love――oh! how I love to smoke,
And drink full bumpers of th’ foaming soak!
And when its waves have drowned my soul,
I’ll whistle aloud such a “Tol-de-rol!”
Don’t ask me where the world is going,
Nor why the sou’-west _blast_ is blowing.
I never breathed the dull tame air,
But I relish my great pipe mair and mair,
And back again flew for a soothing puff,
Like a bird――I’m sure that’s quick enough.
My _mother_ it is, and I’ll prove it to ye,
(Much more of a mother than the open sea!)
For _smoking_, I’m at it ever and ever!
I hope your comment on this line is “clever!”
For fear of growing at all lackadaisical
I hasten to lay down my pen _parody_-sical;
In truth these stanzas concluding with somewhat
’Bout “birth” and “death,” which things I can’t come
I’ve only one word, and that’s to crave pardon,
These sweet pretty verses that I’ve been so hard on.
From _The Individual_. Cambridge, January 31, 1837.
――――:o:――――
A DREAM (ANTI-CIPATED).
(_After Kingsley._)
Three Antis[24] went groaning out into the east――
Out into the east, as the sun arose;
Each thought on the newspaper he loved the least;
The _Tobacco Plant_ followed, and chaff’d at their woes.
But antis will croak, and smokers will smoke,
Tho’ chaff it be sudden, and endless the joke
That the antis afford with their moaning.
The _Plant_ having stopped in a garden bower,
Lit up his sweet pipe, as the sun arose;
And he heard those three antis bawl out by the hour
The weakest of humbug, in seedy old clothes.
But antis will croak, and the _Plant_ have his joke,
And chaff, if ignited, must all end in smoke,
And the antis must soon end their moaning.
Three antis lay drunk on the shining sands,
In the morning gleam, as the sun arose;
And smokers are laughing and rubbing their hands,
To know they’re already relieved of their foes.
For _Observers_ will talk, and the _Plant_ doesn’t sleep;
Though tough be the job, ’tis amusing to keep
All the anti-Tobaccoites moaning.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. January, 1875.
ODE TO TOBACCO.
Thou who, when fears attack,
Bidst them avaunt, and Black
Care, at the horseman’s back
Perching, unseatest;
Sweet when the morn is grey;
Sweet, when they’ve clear’d away
Lunch; and at close of day
Possibly sweetest:
I have a liking old
For thee, though manifold
Stories, I know, are told.
Not to thy credit
How one (or two at most)
Drops make a cat a ghost――
Useless, except to roast――
Doctors have said it:
How they who use fusees
All grow by slow degrees
Brainless as chimpanzees,
Meagre as lizards;
Go mad, and beat their wives;
Plunge (after shocking lives)
Razors and carving knives
Into their gizzards.
Confound such knavish tricks!
Yet know I five or six
Smokers who freely mix
Still with their neighbours;
Jones――(who, I’m glad to say,
Asked leave of Mrs. J――)
Daily absorbs a clay
After his labours.
Cats may have had their goose
Cooked by tobacco-juice;
Still why deny its use
Thoughtfully taken?
We’re not as tabbies are:
Smith, take a fresh cigar!
Jones, the tobacco-jar!
Here’s to thee, Bacon!
C. S. CALVERLEY.
――――
DETAINED.
Hand me another spill――
Phœbe, my glass refill,
As I’ve some time to kill.
What do you mention?
Boat, gun, and tackle nigh,
Horse and trap ready?――I
Think I can manage my
Task of detention.
Rowing? I’ve had a bout!
Raining? Then can’t go out!
Capital stream for trout?
Not very handy!
No, I’ll just pen a lay;
Clear all these things away;
Landlord! another clay
Soda and brandy
Anti-Tobaccoite!
I have no wish to fight;
But if you douse my light,
Mind, we shall wrangle.
Why should you interfere,
With your new-fangled gear,
And try _my_ course to steer
At such an angle?
No! I must have my light;
Whether I read or write,
Smoking, by day or night,
Aids the reflection.
Some may prefer Bohea;
Excellent though it be,
_I_ think Tobacco the
Pink of Perfection!
Shag’s my divinity,
Pure as virginity;
In its vicinity
Come not, you croakers!
What, though the _Antis_ choke?
Still I must have my smoke;
Pshaw! let the beggars _croak_!
Here’s to the smokers!
E. H. S.
――――:o:――――
BEWARE!
I know a meerschaum fair to see,
Take care!
It whispers “Smoke and colour me,”
Beware! beware!
Smoke it not,
’Tis fooling thee!
It cost two guineas, golden brown,
Take care!
You’d better smash it; drop it down;
Beware! beware!
Smoke it not;
’Tis fooling thee.
A mouthpiece of a golden hue,
Take care!
’Twill very likely make you――vomit,
Beware! beware!
Smoke it not!
’Tis fooling thee.
It hath a bowl as white as snow,
Take care!
Smoke it black, to Old Nick you’ll go;
Beware! beware!
Smoke it not;
’Tis fooling thee.
P. C.
――――
TOBACCO SMOKE!
The clouds of smoke were rising fast,
As through a college room there passed
A youth, who bore, ’spite sage advice,
A “baccy”-pouch, with strange device,
“Tobacco smoke!”
His brow was sad; his eye beneath
Glared on a pipe, laid in its sheath,
And in his ears there ever rung
The accents of the donor’s tongue,
Tobacco smoke!
In ground-floor rooms he saw the light,
Of pipes and weeds glow strong and bright;
And, heedless of the passing don,
From out his lips escaped a groan,
Tobacco smoke!
“Try not the shag,” the old man said,
“It is o’er strong for thy young head,
Dire its effects to those untried;”
Heedless he was, and but replied,
Tobacco smoke!
“Oh, stay,” the maiden said, “and test
Our Latakia――’tis the best!”
He grasped his packet of birds’-eye,
And only muttered with a sigh,
Tobacco smoke!
“Beware; don’t set your room alight――
The college might object――good night!”
Such were the words the scholar spoke,
And scarcely heard through closing oak,
Tobacco smoke!
At midnight hour, as bedroom-ward
Two “undergrads” from drinking hard,
Steered up the gas-less break-neck stair,
A voice cried from the “right two-pair,”
Tobacco smoke!
The Freshman by his scout was found,
Lying all prone upon the ground,
And still his hand grasped like a vice
The “baccy”-pouch with strange device,
Tobacco smoke!
There, in the morning cold and gray,
Moaning, and all unkempt, he lay,
And then the scout, unmoved, serene――
Said――“Oh! ’tis easy to be seen,
Tobacco smoke!”
R. C.
From _College Rhymes_. Part XVI., 1864.
――――
_The Song of Firewater_, a parody of Longfellow’s “Song of Hiawatha,”
appeared in _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_ for November, 1871. The poem
relates to snuff, but as it extends to over 200 lines it cannot be
inserted here. It commences thus:――
Should you ask me whence this story?
Whence this legend and tradition?
I should answer, I should tell you,
From the lips of Blow-me-tite-o;
Blow-me-tite-o, sweetest singer,
Singer of the mournful ditties.
* * * * *
――――
THE SONG OF NICOTINE.
Should you ask me why this meerschaum,
Why these clay-pipes and churchwardens,
With the odours of tobacco,
With the oil and fume of “mixture,”
With the curling smoke of “bird’s eye,”
With the gurgling of rank juices,
With renewed expectorations
As of sickness on the fore-deck?
I should answer, I should tell you,
From the cabbage, and the dust-heaps,
From the old leeks of the Welshland,
From the soil of kitchen gardens,
From the mud of London sewers,
From the garden-plots and churchyards,
Where the linnet and cock-sparrow
Feed upon the weeds and groundsel,
I receive them as I buy them
From the boxes of Havana,
The concoctor, the weird wizard.
Should you ask how this Havana
Made cigars so strong and soothing,
Made the “bird’s eye,” and “York-river,”
I should answer, I should tell you,
In the purlieus of the cities,
In the cellars of the warehouse,
In the dampness of the dungeon,
Lie the rotten weeds that serve him;
In the gutters and the sewers,
In the melancholy alleys,
Half-clad Arab boys collect them,
Crossing-sweepers bring them to him,
Costermongers keep them for him,
And he turns them by his magic
Into “cavendish” and “bird’s-eye,”
For those clay-pipes and churchwardens,
For this meerschaum, or he folds them,
And “cigars” he duly labels
On the box in which he sells them.
From _Figaro_. October 7, 1874.
――――
LINES TO THE “ANTI-TOBACCO JOURNAL.”
Tell me not in penny numbers
Smoking’s but a loathsome dream;
Worse than onions and cucumbers,
Though they be chawed up like steam!
Smoke is sweetness, done in earnest,
Power possessing to console,
If ’tis healthy weed thou burnest
In the clay or meerschaum bowl.
Not to aid expectoration
Doth the smoker burn the weed,
But to woo sweet meditation,
And also digest his “feed.”
“Shag” is strong, “Returns” is milder,
“Cavendish” but suits the brave;
Though our pulses beat the wilder,
Still for ’bacca do we crave.
In this world so full of brawling,
If in years your manhood’s ripe,
Heed ye not the antis’ calling――
Be a man and smoke a pipe.
Pipes of great men all remind us
(Tho’ of clay the bowl and stem),
Wheresoever fate may find us,
We can colour pipes like them.
Dhudeens, that perhaps another
On the wheel of fortune broke,
Some forlorn and bankrupt brother,
Seeing, may take heart, and smoke.
Let us, then, take weeds and matches,
And a pipe――that is enough;
Tho’ it only be by snatches,
Spared from toil, we still will puff!
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. March, 1876.
――――
MEERSCHAUM.
Come to me, O! my meerschaum,
For the vile street organs play;
And the torture they’re inflicting
Will vanish quite away.
I open my study window
And into the twilight peer,
And my anxious eyes are watching
For the man with my evening beer.
In one hand is the shining pewter,
All amber the ale doth glow;
In t’other are long “churchwardens,”
As spotless and pure as snow.
Ah! what would the world be to us
Tobaccoless?――Fearful bore!
We should dread the day after to-morrow
Worse than the day before.
As the elephant’s trunk to the creature,
Is the pipe to the man, I trow;
Useful and meditative
As the cud to the peaceful cow.
So to the world is smoking;
Through that we feel, with bliss,
That, whatever worlds come after,
A jolly old world is this.
Come to me, O! my meerschaum,
And whisper to me here,
If you like me better with coffee
Than grog, or the bitter beer.
Oh! what are our biggest winnings
If peaceful content we miss?
Though fortune may give us an innings,
She seldoms conveys us bliss.
You’re better than all the fortunes
That ever were made or broke;
For a penny will always fill you,
And buy me content with a smoke.
WRONGFELLOW.
――――
THE PIPE AND THE QUID.
_An imitation of Longfellow’s “The Arrow and the Song.”_
I flung a pipe into the air,
And it fell down, I knew not where;
For many folks were near to me,
And so I did not stay to see.
I spun a quid up in the air,
And that fell down, I knew not where;
For ’twould require the strongest sight
To follow a quid in its erring flight.
Shortly I found my pipe again,
On the head of my uncle broke in twain;
And the quid I had not seen descend,
I found in the eye of my dearest friend.
WRONGFELLOW.
_Cope’s Tobacco Plant._ June, 1876.
――――:o:――――
ANOTHER MATCH.
(After _A. C. Swinburne_.)
If love were dhudeen olden,
And I were like the weed,
Oh! we would live together,
And love the jolly weather,
And bask in sunshine golden,
Rare pals of choicest breed;
If love were dhudeen olden,
And I were like the weed.
If I were what cigars are,
And love were like the case,
In double rows or single,
Our varied scents we’d mingle,
Both brown as Persian shahs are――
(You recollect _his_ face);
If I were what cigars are,
And love were like the case.
If you were snuff, my darling,
And I, your love, the box,
We’d live and sneeze together,
Shut out from all the weather,
And anti-snuffers snarling,
In neckties orthodox;
If you were snuff, my darling,
And I, your love, the box.
If you were oil essential,
And I were nicotine,
We’d hatch up wicked treason,
And spoil each smoker’s reason,
Till he grew penitential,
And turned a bilious green;
If you were oil essential,
And I were nicotine.
If you were shag of dark hue,
And I were mild bird’s eye,
We’d scent the passing hours,
And fumigate the flowers;
And in the midnight, hark you,
The Norfold Howards should die
If you were Shag of dark hue,
And I were mild Bird’s-eye.
If you were the aroma,
And I were simply smoke,
We’d skyward fly together,
As light as any feather;
And flying high as Homer,
His grey old ghost we’d choke;
If you were the aroma,
And I were simply smoke.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. August, 1876.
――――
ANOTHER BALLAD OF MORE BURDENS.
(_After Swinburne._)
The burden of false meerschaums: Fair to sight
Built up by scamps in a most fraudful way,
With glass for amber, can’t be seen at night,
But looketh what it is in truthful day.
And bowls that turn (with dirt) to dirty grey,
And narrow bores that all our jaws do tire,
And fill our souls with horrible dismay.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of bad ’Bacca: This is worse.
A burden with full fruit of mild swearing:
We drop the pipe to drop a gentle curse,
Six score between the morn and evening.
The quivering of the glands, the shuddering,
The wheezy grunts with which we do respire,
Makes “weed” seem horrid and a treacherous thing.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of burnt breeches: Nay, sit down;
Cover thyself and sleep; for verily
The market women all about the town
Behind thy back shall laugh and hoot at thee.
Like the red beet-root all thy face shall be;
That box of lights set thy coat tails on fire,
And burnt thee bare. Tarry till daylight flee.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of the missus: oh! her tongue
Shall let thee rest not, e’en upon thy bed;
For that her curtains at the window hung,
Of stale smoke smelling, fill her soul with dread.
With mutton cold thou shalt be often fed,
And drink cold grog, against thy warm desire,
And wear a broomstick round thy shrinking head.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of mean cadgers; thou shalt flee
All ways at once, but still they will be seen;
And at the thing thou seest thy face shalt be
Transmogrified, and not at all serene.
And thou shalt say of ’Bacca, “It hath been
Consumed by me;” and they shall whisper “Liar;”
And go their ways with chagrin turning green.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of sad Antis: Every day
They will prognosticate thy doom, and tell
Where thou art going to at last, and say
The place is warm and undesirable.
And swear that for a mile thy clothes do smell;
And preach to thee till thy whole soul doth tire;
Then, going, groan――just for a parting knell.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of the taxes: Spoiled is Spring,
With fragrant ’Bacca ’neath the growing trees,
To think of what we pay for this one thing,
The dearest physic for our miseries.
For, at each puff, the weeping smoker sees
His wreath fly up, away, and higher, higher,
Till thoughts of bankruptcy do make him freeze.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of the fusees: Some won’t light,
And some will spit out fire upon the hands;
The wretch who sells them slinketh in the night,
And counts his fortune in far, foreign lands
Where police are not, and where are no cab-stands,
While we still on his head heap curses dire
And blame the makers of the various brands.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
The burden of fierce headaches: When we must
Forsake the weed, altho’ ’tis our delight,
When all our eyes seem red with blinding dust,
And on our head a weight hangs day and night,
And our red faces, lo! are bloodless white;
When nothing in the world we do admire,
And folks do ask us when we last were tight.
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
L’ENVOY.
Smokers, and ye whom ’Bacca tickleth,
Heed what is here before the weed you fire;
You cannot smoke for ever. Where’s your breath?
_This is a cause of every smoker’s ire._
SINBURN.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. September 1876.
――――:o:――――
THE CIGAR-SMOKERS.
“‘Courage!’ he said, and pointed towards the land;
‘This mounting wave will roll us shoreward soon.’
In the afternoon they came unto a land
In which it seemed always afternoon.”
THE LOTOS EATERS――_Alfred Tennyson_.
I.
“Land ho!” he cried “I see it now,” says he,
“This jolly breeze will fetch us soon to land.”
Towards night they got there, time for early tea,
A land where tea seemed ever smoking hot to stand.
Thick clouds of smoke, by sleepy breezes fanned,
Twined, serpent like, o’er all, in curves and twists;
The setting sun glared red and angry, close at hand,
And from his steaming brow fell off the mists,
As falls the sweat from boxers, boxing with their fists.
II.
A land of smokers! smoking fast were some,
Quick, restless puffers wand’ring to and fro;
And some, with drowsy eyes and senses dumb,
Rolled heavy smoke-clouds very long and slow.
The strangers saw the smokers come and go
Along the shore, in groups of eight and sometimes ten,
From somewhere up above to somewhere down below;
Strange, dingy faces, strongly-perfumed men,
Smelling as husbands when their wives ask, where they’ve been.
III.
The sun went out, the moon began to rise,
But could not shine; smoke rests on everything
And closes o’er the sea; the hum of flies
Is heard afar, and vast musquitoes sing,
Who buzz and nearer buzz, then ’light and sting;
A place where all things always sleepy feel!
And round about and in and out, on odorous wing,
With faces like an owl, and tail unlike an eel,
The red-eyed ghosts of old Tobacco-smokers steal.
IV.
Great leaves of that disgusting weed they brought,
And some chopped fine to chew, and also snuff,
Whereof they gave to each, but who once caught
The taste, from him the strangely-smelling stuff
Took all good sense, nor said he ever, “hold! enough;”
The ocean’s voice he heard as tho’ it spake
To some one else; his own grew thick and gruff,
And half asleep and scarcely half awake,
An everlasting puffing, puffing he did make.
V.
They sat them down upon the dingy shore,
Betwixt the moonlight and the moonlight’s ray,
And closed their eyes with heavy eyelids o’er,
And saw the “old folks’” faces far “at home” away;
But dark and dismal seemed the tossing bay,
Dismal the hammock’s swing, the boatswain’s cry.
Then one man said, “We won’t go home, to-day!”
And all at once chimed in, “Agreed say I;
Let’s all together not go home till by-and-by!”
CHORIC SONG.
I.
There’s sweet tobacco here, of every kind,
Sweeter than honey in the hollow tree,
Or sugar in the sugar-cane, you’ll find,
Or dew-drop in the hollyhock can be;
Cigars whose smoke floats lightly round the eye,
As round the buttercup the butterfly;
Cigars that one would die to smoke, then smoke to die!
Here lie long-nines beside,
And plugs no teeth have ever tried,
And all the earth is snuff too, far and wide,
And in the craggy rocks the cigarettos hide!
II.
Why leave dry land to sail on boiling water?
Why make our short lives, any longer, shorter
By still debating, while the minutes flee?
All folks smoke here; why only smoke not we?――
We who have smoked vile smoke as e’er was known,
And chewed vile chews on land and sea,
Still from a bad one to a worse one thrown!
Nor ever end our woes,
By snuffing up the nose,
Nor yield our senses to the potent spell;
Nor hearken to the song that o’er us goes;
“No joy that tongue can tell
Is like what enters thro’ the avenue of smell!”
III.
Hateful is the pea-green sky,
Hanging o’er the pea-green sea――
Life ends in smoke, oh! why
Should life all labor be?
Let us alone. We do not want to go!
Since life’s a vapor, smoke it all away!
Let us alone. We have no strength to row,
We won’t attempt it, anyhow, to-day.
Let us alone. What fun can sailors find
In climbing up a wave, and down behind?
All folks have rest excepting only tars,
Their work is always of the endless kind;――
Give us a smoke or sleep, sound sleep or good cigars!
IV.
How sweet it were, seeing the rising fog,
With half-cigar and half a smile,
Dozing in a half-and-half the while,
To dream and dream like yonder aged frog,
Which only leaves his hole, the smoky log,
To muse amid abandoned stumps near by;
Chewing Tobacco, here to lie
And see the waves rush up, our joy to share,
Clutching with eager arms the vacant air,
To grasp the sweets the scented breezes bear;
To give our minds up to it wholly,
To chase away blue-thoughted melancholy,
To put rich flavorous, antique fine-cut tobacco,
Into these pipes by steady use grown blacker;
Pressed down with thumb to make it stay;
Two pinches of black dust shut in a bowl of clay.
V.
Our wives and children are at home, ’tis true;
But we can do without them, I and you;
All things have undergone a change back there;
Our babes climb other knees; our shirts new husbands wear!
They would not know us now, so dirty grown:
So strong we smell they’d slam the angry door,
Thinking our souls upon the wings of smoke had flown,
Been puffed away upon this dingy shore,
Leaving behind the wasted stumps alone,
Fit on the ash-pile only to be thrown.
Let what is, be as ’tis, of course;
A wife is hard to reconcile;
We might be driven out by force;
’Tis hard to fix things, when they’ve run awhile;
’Twould be at best our labor for our pains;
He gains but little who a woman gains:
Sad work, for hearts worn out with household noise,
And arms grown lame long since with nursing baby-boys!
VI.
Tobacco-posies blossom high and low;
Tobacco-posies bloom where’er you go;
All day the breezes from the ocean dipping,
O’er hill and vale, on tireless tiptoe tripping,
Up and down the sandy beach the dust of the Tobacco blow.
We have done enough of rolling and of pitching, O!
Up the foremast, up the hindmast, in the musty hold below,
While the bellowing boatswain shouted his eternal “Yo heave ho!”
Let us take an oath and keep it, with an open eye,
In the land of the Tobacco still to live and lie,
On the bank, like pigs together, you and also I;
For they lie beside each other, and the slops are hurled
All around them in the gutter, while their tails are tightly curled
All around them――glad and happy, in a glad and happy world;
There they smile in comfort, dreaming over future joys,
Dreading neither thirst nor hunger, sun nor storm, nor roaring noise,
Swearing men, nor scolding women, barking dogs, nor tyrant boys.
But they smile, they smell a prospect of a dinner by-and-bye,
Steaming up, a preparation making in the kitchens nigh,
And their tail is full of meaning when it’s curled so high!
But the luckless race of human labor for their life,
Plant and dig and raise potatoes, mostly keep a wife;
Wife who scolds them late and early, more than one would think,
’Till they lose their senses nearly――some, ’tis whispered, take
to drink――
Swigging endless potions――others in Tobacco islands dwell,
Resting weary legs, at last, on beds of assfoodel.
Surely, surely, smoking is more nice than not-the chew,
Than life upon the great big ocean, with so much work to do;
Oh! bless you, brothers, yes of course, we’ll stay here, I and you!
This is taken from a small volume of American parodies,
entitled “_The Song of Milkan Watha_, and other poems,”
by Marc Antony Henderson, D.C.L. Cincinnati: _Tickell_
and _Grinne_. 1856.
――――
NICOTINA.
_After Tennyson’s “Oriana.”_
At a bal masqué in San Francisco a young lady appeared attired to
represent _Nicotine_. Her dress was made of Tobacco leaves, her
necklace was formed of cigars, and she carried a fan and a parasol
constructed of the weed.
My liver’s out of order, oh!
Nicotina!
A cloudy gloom doth o’er me flow,
Nicotina!
When blossoms fall as white as snow,
I think of her of “Francisco,”
Nicotina!
I wriggle in my bitter woe,
Nicotina!
When the dark to light was growing,
Nicotina!
And the cock left off a crowing,
Nicotina!
Thin ones “oh”-ing, fat ones blowing,
All unto the ball were going,
Nicotina!
I, too, went, to my o’erthrowing!
Nicotina!
In the ball-room fill’d with light,
Nicotina!
(Some were downstairs getting tight,
Nicotina!)
While thine eyes entranced my sight,
Underneath the gay gaslight,
Nicotina!
I engaged you; you said “Right!”
Nicotina!
We danced in the whirling ball
Nicotina!
She loved my mask ’mong them all,
Nicotina!
She saw me slip, she heard me fall,
When out stepp’d a rival tall,
Nicotina!
He kicked me hard, and made me bawl,
Nicotina!
The villain dragg’d thee on one side,
Nicotina!
The bitter beast, he went aside,
Nicotina!
The darn’d brute, he glanced aside,
And took thee oft, my love, my bride,
Nicotina!
Thy dress, thy fan, and thee beside,
Nicotina!
Oh! narrow, narrow was the place,
Nicotina!
I call’d out as a donkey brays,
Nicotina!
Oh! dreadful looks were dealt apace,
There was no room for dancing ways,
Nicotina!
And flat I went upon my face!
Nicotina!
They tried to smash me where I lay,
Nicotina!
I couldn’t rise and get away,
Nicotina!
No more I thought to see the day,
They tried to smash me where I lay,
Nicotina!
They nearly turn’d my dust to clay,
Nicotina!
Oh! breaking ribs, that would not break,
Nicotina!
Oh! damaged nose, so snub and meek,
Nicotina!
She winketh, but she does not speak;
I rub the chalk dust from my cheek,
Nicotina!
And feel inclined away to sneak,
Nicotina!
I cry, “my corns!” none hear my cries,
Nicotina!
And, rueful, rub my blacken’d eyes,
Nicotina!
My face is like to boneless size,
Up from my chin unto my eyes,
Nicotina!
On thy programme my name it lies,
Nicotina!
Oh! cursed boot! oh! cursed blow,
Nicotina!
I was not happy lying low,
Nicotina!
All night my nose with blood did flow;
A quart it bled, and more, I know,
Nicotina!
A damaged man, away I go,
Nicotina!
When my old pipe is lit by me
Nicotina!
I crawl about and think of thee,
Nicotina!
I do not dare to look at thee,
I fear _him_, tall as forest tree,
Nicotina!
I “cuss” him, and his pedigree.
Nicotina!
H. L.
――――
O DARLING WEED!
O darling weed! my heart’s delight,
Dear plant, the apple of my sight,
Thou hast a ray so warm and bright
I know no charm so exquisite
As puffing out thy smoke so white.
It puts all troublous thoughts to flight,
Sending dull spirits left and right,
While yielding joy by day and night.
This is a parody of a little poem by Alfred Tennyson, published in
1833, but afterwards omitted from his works, probably because of the
ridicule it received from Lord Lytton in “The New Timon”:――
O darling room, my heart’s delight
Dear room, the apple of my sight,
With thy two couches soft and white,
There is no room so exquisite,
No little room so warm and bright,
Wherein to read, wherein to write.
* * * * *
――――
THE WEED.
I come from vaunted root, and burn
To many a merry sally;
I sparkle, and to ashes turn,
Men’s spirits worn to rally.
Thrice thirty ills that press folks down,
I fumigate like midges;
In country, city, little town,
My charm some care abridges.
Yon chattering Stiggins with a craze,
In little sharps and trebles,
A hubbub makes in my dispraise――
Demosthenes, _sans_ pebbles.
Ay! chatter, with thy face of woe;
With bile and anger quiver;
Thus Antis come and Antis go,
But I’m smoked on for ever.
They go about, and fume and spout,
Against Tobacco railing,
With here and there a lusty shout,
And here and there a wailing.
I’m smoked on lawns and grassy plots,
By sportsmen in the covers;
My cloud’s blue as forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.
There is not under moon and stars,
In this world’s wildernesses,
A plant that care more stoutly bars,
Or labour better blesses.
Behold my vapour curve and flow
Tow’rds where the pure clouds quiver;
Let antis come and antis go――
My smoke goes up for ever.
R. C.
_Cope’s Tobacco Plant._ March, 1874.
――――:o:――――
SONG FROM THE MIKADO.
The travellers who try in the spring,
Tra la!
To sell their cigars by the case,
Must find it a difficult thing,
Tra la!
When the shopkeeper won’t buy a thing,
Tra la!
And kicks them right out of the place,
And he kicks them all out of his place.
And that’s what they mean when they say or they sing:
“Oh, bother the trade we are having this spring,”
Tra la la la la la, tra la la la la,
Tra la la la la la lah!
――――:o:――――
The following can scarcely be termed _parodies_, they are poems in
praise of Tobacco written in the newly-revived but old-fashioned
Ballade metre.
BALLADE OF THE BEST PIPE.
I hear you fervently extol
The virtues of your ancient clay,
As black as any piece of coal.
To me it smells of rank decay
And bones of people passed away,――
A smell I never could admire.
With all respect to you I say,
Give me a finely seasoned briar.
Poor Jones, whose judgment as a whole
Is faultless, has been led astray
To nurse a costly meerschaum bowl.
Well, let him nurse it as he may,
I hardly think he’ll find it pay.
Before the colour gets much higher,
He’ll drop it on the grate some day.
Give me a finely seasoned brier.
The heathen Turk of Istamboul,
In Oriental turban gay,
Delights his unregenerate soul
With hookahs, bubbling in a way
To fill a Christian with dismay,
And wake the old Crusading fire.
May no such pipe be mine I pray!
Give me a finely seasoned brier
ENVOY.
Clay, meerschaum, hookah, what are they
That I should view them with desire?
I’ll sing, till all my hair is grey,
Give me a finely seasoned brier.
_The University News Sheet._ St. Andrews, N.B. March 3, 1886.
――――
THE BALLADE OF TOBACCO.
When verdant youth sees life afar,
And first sets out wild oats to sow,
He puffs a stiff and stark cigar,
And quaffs champagne of Mumm & Co.
He likes not smoking yet; but though
Tobacco makes him sick indeed,
Cigars and wine he can’t forego:――
A slave is each man to the weed.
In time his tastes more dainty are,
And delicate. Become a beau,
From out the country of the Czar
He brings his cigarettes, and lo!
He sips the vintage of Bordeaux.
Thus keener relish shall succeed
The baser liking we outgrow:――
A slave is each man to the weed.
When age and his own lucky star
To him perfected wisdom show,
The schooner glides across the bar,
And beer for him shall freely flow,
A pipe with genial warmth shall glow;
To which he turns in direst need,
To seek in smoke surcease of woe:――
A slave is each man to the weed.
ENVOI.
Smokers! who doubt or con or pro,
And ye who dare to drink, take heed!
And see in smoke a friendly foe:――
A slave is each man to the weed.
BRANDER MATTHEWS.
From Mr. Gleeson White’s collection of _Ballades and Rondeaus_.
London, Walter Scott, 1887.
――――
IN A CLOUD OF SMOKE.
_A Rondel._
In a cloud of smoke when the lights are low
I half forget that I’m nearly “broke,”
And my cares and my sorrows they seem to go
In a cloud of smoke.
Ah, yes! ’tis a mystical “Basingstoke,”[25]
That guides my thoughts to a saner flow
So a fig to the Anti-Tobacco folk!
_Her_ tongue has no “measured beat and slow;”
She says that in fumes narcotic I soak;
But her withering scorn seems to softer grow
In a cloud of smoke.
From _Judy_. April 18, 1888.
――――
WITH PIPE AND BOOK.
With Pipe and Book at close of day,
O! what is sweeter, mortal, say?
It matters not what book on knee,
Old Izaak or the Odyssey,
It matters not meerschaum or clay.
And though our eyes will dream astray,
And lips forget to sue or sway,
It is “enough to merely _Be_,”
With Pipe and Book.
What though our modern skies be grey,
As bards aver, I will not pray
For “soothing death” to “succour” me,
But ask thus much, O! Fate, of thee,
A little longer yet to stay
With Pipe and Book.
From _Volumes in Folio_. By Richard Le Gallienne, author of “My
Ladies’ Sonnets,” etc. London, Elkin Matthews, Vigo Street, W. 1889.
A dainty little Volume of Bookish Verses.
――――
LINES ON AN EMPTY TOBACCO-POUCH.
I, who was brisk and R T once,
Am C D now; become a dunce.
If U the reason would descry,
I’ll very quickly tell U Y.
I ne’er indulged in sad I――OOO!
When smoke was curling round my N――OOO;
But I am falling 2 D K,
Who could X L, no distant day.
I lack not T, or O D V,
But B 4 long my want U’ll C:
My pouch is M T; so, indeed,
I N V men with lots of weed.
I C U feel an interest
In what your poet would request;
There 4 I ask U 2 X QQQ
The plaint of my dejected M UUU.
I C U R the smoker’s friend;
Send me some weed, B 4 my end!
This craving I would fain ap PPP,
And smoke my pipe “O K” at EEE.
Declare I lived and died in peace,
If U should hear of my D CCC.
Erect an F-I-G of me,
And write this in my L-E-G.
Here lies a man of Letters, C,
Who shunned X S; and yet was E
Merry and YYY; a busy B,
Who never made an N M E.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. November 1871.
――――:o:――――
THE SMOKER’S ALPHABET.
A was an Anti-Tobacconist moke,
B was the ’Bacca his neighbours _would_ smoke,
C was the Counsel he forced on the world,
D was Derision, that at him was hurled.
E more Enlightened, would chuckle and say,
F “Fill your pipes, and puff nonsense away.”
G was a Guardsman, who lit a cigar;
H was the health that it never could mar.
I was an Irishman witty and gay,
J was the Joy that his pipe gave each day.
K was the Keel of the vessel that bore
L Lots of the “Weed” from Columbia’s shore.
M was the Mariner, chewing a quid,
N was a Noodle, who vowed “If he did,
O “Only ’Orrible qualms would arise.”
P was the Punch that he got ’twixt his eyes,
Q with the Quid; he turned sickly and wan,
R was the “Robert” who made him “move on.”
S was the Snuff, pungent, fragrant, and light,
T the Torment of Headache cured by it quite.
U the plant Universal, that is still
V the Victor over full many an ill.
W the Wealth, that its growers may hoard,
X is a Xebeck, with tobacco on board.
Y was a Yankee, who offered cheroots,
Z was a Zealot, who said “Fit for brutes!”
& the Yankee replied, “Brutes don’t talk, or wear boots.”
ANONYMOUS.
[Illustration]
POEMS IN PRAISE OF TOBACCO.
In the following pages the poems are thus arranged――on Tobacco
generally, on the Pipe, Cigar and Cigarette, and on Snuff. No poets
have been found, however, to sing the praise of chewing Tobacco, a
very old form of enjoying the weed. This habit is now principally
confined to sailors, soldiers, policemen and others, whose duties
compel them to remain in solitude for many hours at a stretch without
the solace of a pipe. The following amusing letter shows the
importance a sailor attaches to his Quid:――
GRAVESEND, March 24, 1813.
Dear Brother Tom;
This comes hopein to find you in good health as it leaves me
safe anckor’d here yesterday at 4 P.M. arter a pleasant
voyage tolerable short and a few squalls.――Dear Tom――hopes
to find poor old father stout, and am quite out of
pig-tail.――Sights of pig-tail at Gravesend, but unfortinly
not fit for a dog to chor.
Dear Tom, Captain’s boy will bring you this, and put
pig-tail in his pocket when bort. Best in London at the
Black Boy in 7 diles, where go acks for best pig-tail――pound
a pig-tail will do, and am short of shirts. Dear Tom, as for
shirts ony took 2 whereof one is quite wored out and tuther
most, but don’t forget the pig-tail, as I aint had a quid to
chor never since Thursday. Dear Tom, as for shirts, your
size will do, only longer. I liks um long――get one at
present, best at Tower-hill, and cheap, but be particler to
go to 7 diles for the pig-tail at the Black Boy, and Dear
Tom, acks for pound best pig-tail, and let it be good.
Captain’s boy will put the pig-tail in his pocket he likes
pigtail, so ty it up. Dear Tom, shall be up about Monday
there or thereabouts. Not so perticuler for the shirt, as
the present can be washed, but dont forgit the pig-tail
without fail, so am your loving brother,
_Timothy Parsons._
P. S.――Dont forget the pig-tail.
――――:o:――――
THE INDIAN WEED.
Many versions exist of the following very old song, and the history of
it is somewhat contradictory and confusing. It has been ascribed to
George Wither (1588-1667), and was originally published in 1631, in a
volume entitled _The Soules Solace_, by Thomas Jenner. Another version
was printed in 1672 in “Two Broadsides against Tobacco.”
One version commenced with the following stanza:
Why should we so much despise
So good and sweet an exercise
As, early and late, to meditate?
Thus think, and drink tobacco.[26]
The most usually accepted version runs as follows:――
The Indian weed withered quite,
Green at noon, cut down at night,
Shows thy decay,――
All flesh is hay:
Thus think, then drink tobacco.
The pipe that is so lily-white,
Shows thee to be a mortal wight,
And even such,
Gone with a touch:
Thus think, then drink tobacco.
And when the smoke ascends on high,
Think thou behold’st the vanity
Of worldly stuff,
Gone with a puff:
Thus think, then drink tobacco.
And when the pipe grows foul within,
Think on thy soul defiled with sin;
And then the fire
It doth require:
Thus think, then drink tobacco.
The ashes that are left behind,
May serve to put thee still in mind,
That unto dust,
Return thou must,
Thus think, then drink tobacco.
The next is a more modern version:――
TOBACCO IS AN INDIAN WEED.
This Indian weed now withered quite
Though green at noon, cut down at night,
Shows thy decay;
All flesh is hay;
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
The pipe, so lily-like and weak,
Does thus thy mortal state bespeak;
Thou art e’en such,
Gone with a touch:
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
And when the smoke ascends on high,
Then thou behold’st the vanity
Of worldly stuff,
Gone with a puff!
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
And when the pipe grows foul within,
Think on thy soul defiled with sin;
For then the fire
It does require:
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
Thou seest the ashes cast away,
Then to thyself thou mayest say,
That to the dust
Return thou must:
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
Some additional, but very inferior stanzas, were written by the Rev.
Ralph Erskine, a minister of the Scotch Church, and printed in his
_Gospel Sonnets_, about the end of the last century. This continuation
has been called
SMOKING SPIRITUALIZED.
“Was this small plant for thee cut down?
So was the plant of great renown,
Which mercy sends
For nobler ends.
Thus think and smoke tobacco.
“Doth juice medicinal proceed
From such a naughty foreign weed?
Then what’s the power
Of Jesse’s flower?
Thus think and smoke tobacco.
“The promise, like the pipe, inlays
And, by the mouth of faith, conveys
What virtue flows
From Sharon’s rose.
Thus think and smoke tobacco.
“In vain th’ unlighted pipe you blow,
Your pains in outward means are so,
Till heavenly fire
Your heart inspire.
Thus think and smoke tobacco.
“The smoke, like burning incense, towers;
So should a praying heart of yours
With ardent cries
Surmount the skies.
Thus think and smoke tobacco.”
――――
A CATCH ON TOBACCO.
(_Sung by four men smoking their Pipes._)
Good, good indeed;
The herb’s good weed;
Fill thy pipe, Will.
And I prithee, Sam, fill,
And yet sing still,
And yet sing still,
What say the learn’d?
What say the learn’d?
_Vita fumus, vita fumus!_
’Tis what you and I,
And he and I,
You, and he, and I,
And all of us _sumus_.
But then to the learned say we again,
If life’s a smoke as they maintain;
If life’s a vapour without doubt,
When a man does die,
He should not cry,
That his glass is run but his pipe is out.
But whether we smoke or whether we sing,
Let us be loyal and remember the King,
Let him live, and let his foes vanish thus, thus, thus,
Like, like a pipe, like a pipe of Spanish, thus, thus, thus,
A pipe of Spanish!
From “_Bacchus and Venus_.” 1737.
――――
INVOCATION TO TOBACCO.
Weed of the strange power, weed of the earth,
Killer of dulness――parent of mirth;
Come in the sad hour, come in the gay,
Appear in the night, or in the day:
Still thou art welcome as June’s blooming rose,
Joy of the palate, delight of the nose.
Weed of the green field, weed of the wild,
Foster’d in freedom, America’s child;
Come in Virginia, come in Havannah,
Friend of the universe, sweeter than manna:
Still thou art welcome, rich, fragrant and ripe.
Pride of the tube-case, Delight of the pipe.
Weed of the savage, weed of each pole,
Comforting,――soothing,――Philosophy’s soul;
Come in the snuff-box, Come in cigar,
In Strasburgh and King’s, come from afar;
Still thou art welcome, the purest, the best,
Joy of earth’s millions, for ever carest.
From _Nicotiana_, by Henry James Meller. London Effingham Wilson.
1832.
――――
VIRGINIA TOBACCO.
Two maiden dames of sixty-two
Together long had dwelt:
Neither, alas! of love so true,
The bitter pangs had felt.
But age comes on, they say, apace,
To warn us of our death,
And wrinkles mar the fairest face,
At last it stops our breath.
One of these dames, tormented sore
With that curst pang, tooth-ache,
Was at a loss for such a bore
What remedy to take:
“I’ve heard,” thought she, “this ill to cure,
A pipe is good, they say,
Well then, tobacco I’ll endure,
And smoke the pain away.”
The pipe was lit, the tooth soon well,
And she retir’d to rest――
When thus the other ancient belle
Her spinster mate addressed:――
“Let me request a favour, pray”――
“I’ll do it if I can”――
“Oh! well then, love, smoke everyday,
_You smell so like a man_!”
From _Gimcrackiana_, or Fugitive pieces on Manchester Men and Manners.
Manchester, 1833. (Attributed to John Stanley Gregson.)
――――
AN IMITATION OF MR. ABRAHAM COWLEY.
“The lazy Earth doth steam amain,
And fumes and smokes beneath the rain:
The Rivers, Brooks, and Rivulets are
No less in smoke particular
At nightfall: and the storm blast loud
Is often wont to _blow a cloud_
Around the mountain-tops, and they
Do take delight in this same way;
And send a fiery fume from out
Their angry heights, and such a rout
Of burnt-up _ashes_, that do strow
Great cities in the plains below.
The _setting Sun_ is oft made dim
With smoky mists that circle him.
So all the world’s on _smoking_ bent,
And puffs and fumes to its content:
Fill up the bowl then, fill it high,
Fill all the gaping pipes, for why
Should every creature smoke but I:
Why, man of morals, tell me why?”
From “_The Anatomy of Tobacco_: or Smoking Methodised, Divided, and
Considered after a new fashion.” By Leolinus Siluriensis. London.
George Redway, 1884.
AN ADDRESS TO THE CRITICS.
Critics avaunt――tobacco is my theme,
Tremble like hornets at the blasting steam;
And you Court insects――flutter not too near
Its light, nor buzz within its scorching sphere.
Pollio, with flame like thine, my verse inspire,
So shall the Muse, with smoke, elicit fire;
Coxcombs prefer the tickling sting of snuff,
Yet all their claim to wisdom is――a puff.
Lord Fopling smokes not――for his teeth afraid;
Sir Tawdry smokes not――for he wears brocade.
Ladies, when pipes are brought, affect to swoon;
They love no smoke, except the smoke of town.
But courtiers hate the puffing tribe――no matter,
Strange if they love the breath that cannot flatter.
Its foes but show their ignorance, can he
Who scorns the leaf of knowledge, love the tree?
Citronia vows it has an odious stink,
She will not smoke, ye gods, but she will drink;
And chaste Prudella――blame her if you can――
Says――pipes are used by that vile creature man.
Yet crowds remain, who still its worth proclaim,
For some for pleasure smoke, and some for fame――
Fame, of our actions, universal spring,
For which we drink, eat, sleep, smoke――everything.
_Smoking and Smokers._ By W. A. Delamotte. 1845.
――――
A MANILLA SONNET.
Luscious leaf of fragrant savour,
Mild cheroot of choicest flavour,
Wafting incense to the sky,
Like the gales of Araby,
Let us press thee to our lips,
As the bee the honey sips;
Culling as our well-earned meed,
Joys from thee――thou heavenly weed!
Ere thy burnished lip we kiss,
Let us thus enjoy the bliss,
Lit by the promethean spark,
Kindled from the congreve dark;
In summer-house or country villa,
There’s nothing like a good Manilla!
From _A Pipe of Tobacco_, by E. L. Blanchard. London. H. Beal. (No
date.)
――――
L’HEUREUX FUMEUR.
Certain fumeur courtisait une veuve,
Grâce à l’hymen, lorsqu’il fut dans ses lacs,
Pour te donner, lui dit-il, une preuve
De mon amour, je vais mettre en éclats
Si tu le veux, ma pipe toute neuve;
――Non, non; la pipe a pour toi trop d’appas;
Je ne la crains que lorsque je suis grosse:
L’odeur m’en plait quand je ne la suis pas;
Tu peux fumer. Notre époux, dans la Beauce
Comme héritier d’un oncle, avait des droits;
Il part. Suivant des conseils maladroits,
Dans un procès chicaneau vous l’enfourne;
Ce n’est qu’après absence de vingt mois,
Qu’à son logis un matin il retourne,
_Pipe_ à la bouche. Oh! qu’est ce que je vois?
S’écria-t-il en rentrant; quoi! commode,
Console içi! pendule, glace la?
D’ou viennent done ces meubles à la mode?
――D’un troc. Je vais te conter tout cela;
Mais――mon mari――ta pipe m’incommode.
PONS DE VERDUN.
――――
AN ENCOMIUM ON TOBACCO.
Thrice happy Isles that stole the world’s delight
And thus produce so rich a Margarite!
It is the fountain whence all pleasure springs,
A potion for imperial and mighty kings.
He that is master of so rich a store
May laugh at Crœsus and esteem him poor;
And with his smoky sceptre in his fist,
Securely flout the toiling Alchymist,
Who daily labours with a vain expense
In distillations of the Quintessence,
Not knowing that this golden Herb alone
Is the Philosopher’s admired Stone.
It s a favour which the Gods doth please,
If they do feed on smoke, as Lucian says.
Therefore the cause that the bright sun doth rest
At the low point of the declining West――
When his oft wearied horses breathless pant――
Is to refresh himself with this sweet Plant,
Which wanton Thetis from the West doth bring,
To joy her love after his toilsome ring:
For ’tis a cordial for an inward smart,
As is Dictamnum[27] to the wounded hart.
It is the sponge that wipes out all our woe;
’Tis like the thorn that doth on Pelion grow,
With which whoe’er his frost limbs anoints,
Shall feel no cold in fat, or flesh, or joints.
’Tis like the river, which whoe’er doth taste,
Forgets his present griefs and sorrows past,
Music, which makes grim thoughts retire,
And for a while cease their tormenting fire
Music, which forces beasts to stand at gaze,
And fills their senseless spirits with amaze――
Compared to this is like delicious strings,
Which sound but harshly while Apollo sings.
The train with this infumed, all quarrel ends
And fiercest foemen turn to faithful friends;
The man that shall this smoky magic prove,
Will need no philtres to obtain his love.
Yet this sweet simple, by misordered use,
Death or some dangerous sickness may produce.
Should we not for our sustentation eat
Because a surfeit comes from too much meat?
Should we not thirst with mod’rate drink repress,
Because a dropsy springs from such excess?
So our fair Plant――that doth as needful stand
As heaven, or fire, or air, or sea, or land;
As moon, or stars that rule the gloomy night,
Or sacred friendship or the sunny light――
Her treasured virtue in herself enrolls,
And leaves the evil to vainglorious souls.
And yet, who dies with this celestial breath,
Shall live immortal in a joyful death.
All goods, all pleasures, it in one can link――
’Tis physic, clothing, music, meat, and drink.
Gods would have revell’d at their feasts of Mirth
With this pure distillation of the earth;
The marrow of the world, star of the West,
The Pearl whereby this lower Orb is blest;
The joy of Mortals, Umpire of all strife,
Delight of Nature, Mithridate of Life;
The daintiest dish of a delicious feast,
By taking which Man differs from a beast.
ANONYMOUS. TEMP., JAMES I.
From _The Smoker’s Guide, Philosopher and Friend_, by a veteran of
Smokedom. London. Hardwicke and Bogue.
――――
THE PATRIOTIC SMOKER’S LAMENT.
Tell me, shade of Walter Raleigh,
Briton of the truest type,
When that too-devoted valet
Quenched your first-recorded pipe,
Were you pondering the opinion,
As you watched the airy coil,
That the virtue of Virginian
Might be bred in British soil?
You transplanted the potato:
’Twas a more enduring gift
Than the wisdom of a Plato
To our poverty and thrift.
That respected root has flourished
Nobly for a nation’s need;
But our brightest dreams are nourished
Ever on a foreign weed.
For the deepest meditation
Of the philosophic scribe,
For the poet’s inspiration,
For the cynic’s polished gibe,
We invoke narcotic nurses
In their jargon from afar:
I indite these modest verses,
On a polyglot cigar.
Leaf that lulls a Turkish Aga
May a scholar’s soul renew,
Fancy spring from Larranaga,
History from honeydew.
When the teacher and the tyro
Spirit-manna fondly seek,
’Tis the cigarette from Cairo
Or a compound from the Greek.
But no British-born aroma
Is fit incense to the Queen;
Nature gives her best diploma
To the alien nicotine.
We are doomed to her ill-favour;
For the plant that’s native grown
Has a patriotic flavour
Too exclusively our own.
O my country, could your smoker
Boast your “shag,” or even “twist,”
Every man were mediocre
Save the blest tobacconist!
He will point immortal morals,
Make all common praises mute,
Who shall win our grateful laurels
With a national cheeroot!
_The St. James’s Gazette._
――――
ODE TO THE WEED.
When happy quite and cosy grown,
I feel for meditation ripe,
I need companionship, and so
I take a pipe.
When from the irksome cares of life
I pine to be removed far,
They vex no longer if I light,
A good cigar.
I realize what Eden was,
(Or some faint semblance of it get)
When “she” is with me, and I light
A cigarette.
Ah me! how much the spirits bless
Mankind. I fail when I begin
To count thy many gifts to me
Sweet “Nicotin.”
I wonder oft as I enjoy
Thy calm delights (and calm indeed),
How they can call thy resting place
By name “a weed.”
O, may the world in all its ills,
Ne’er have this greatest to confess,
That is, that it should e’er become
Tobaccoless.
R. W. ESSEX.
――――
AMOURETTES OF A SMOKER.
I flirted first with cigarettes
One windy, wild March day;
But found their fire, like fair coquettes,
Too soon consume away.
And then I wooed the mild cheroot,
As balmy as the south;
Inserting, after much dispute,
The big end in my mouth.
Awhile I dallied with cigars,
Havanna’s ripe brunettes;
And wafted incense to the stars,
In blue and spiral jets.
Shag, bird’s-eye, twist, and negro-head
This infant doth eschew;
And cavendish he hath “cut” dead:
But “_Chacun â son goût_.”
One Christmas on an ottoman
I sat, and some turkey
A fair girl brought me in a can――
Ister, a duck was she!
I bought a pipe, with amber tip,
Of Moses Abrahams;
Alas! one day I let it slip――
I’ll love no more mere-shams!
Now, all my youthful amour o’er,
I’m wed, and every day
With smoking holocausts adore
An idol made of clay.
GEORGE HILL.
――――
A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO.
May the Babylonish curse
Straight confound my stammering verse,
If I can a passage see
In this word-perplexity,
Or a fit expression find,
Or a language to my mind
(Still the phrase is wide or scant),
To take leave of thee, Great Plant!
Or in any terms relate
Half my love or half my hate:
For I hate yet love thee so,
That, whichever thing I show,
The plain truth will seem to be
A constrain’d hyperbole,
And the passion to proceed
More from a mistress than a weed.
Sooty retainer to the vine,
Bacchus’ black servant, negro fine;
Sorcerer, that makest us dote upon
Thy begrimed complexion,
And for thy pernicious sake,
More and greater oaths to break
Than reclaimed lovers take
’Gainst women: thou thy siege dost lay
Much too in the female way,
While thou suck’st the labouring breath
Faster than kisses or than death.
Thou in such a cloud dost bind us,
That our worst foes cannot find us,
And ill fortune, that would thwart us,
Shoots at rovers, shooting at us;
While each man, through thy heightening steam,
Does like a smoking Etna seem,
And all about us does express
(Fancy and wit in richest dress)
A Sicilian fruitfulness.
Thou through such a mist dost show us,
That our best friends do not know us,
And, for those allowed features,
Due to reasonable creatures,
Liken’st us to fell chimeras――
Monsters that, who see us, fear us;
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon,
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion.
Bacchus we know, and we allow
His tipsy rites. But what art thou,
That but by reflex canst show
What his deity can do,
As the false Egyptian spell
Aped the true Hebrew miracle?
Some few vapours thou may’st raise,
The weak brain may serve to amaze,
But to the reins and nobler heart
Canst nor life nor heat impart.
Brother of Bacchus, later born,
The old world was sure forlorn
Wanting thee, that aidest more
The god’s victories than before
All his panthers, and the brawls
Of his piping Bacchanals.
These, as stale, we disallow,
Or judge of _thee_ meant: only thou
His true Indian conquest art;
And, for ivy round his dart
The reformed god now weaves
A finer thyrsus of thy leaves.
Scent to match thy rich perfume
Chemic art did ne’er presume
Through her quaint alembic strain,
None so sovereign to the brain.
Nature that did in thee excel,
Framed again no second smell.
Roses, violets, but toys,
For the smaller sort of boys,
Or for greener damsels meant;
Thou art the only manly scent.
Stinking’st of the stinking kind,
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,
Africa, that brags her foison,
Breeds no such prodigious poison,
Henbane, nightshade, both together,
Hemlock, aconite――
Nay, rather,
Plant divine, of rarest virtue;
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you.
’Twas but in a sort I blamed thee,
None e’er prosper’d who defamed thee:
Irony all and feign’d abuse,
Such as perplex’d lovers use
At a need, when, in despair
To paint forth their fairest fair,
Or in part but to express
That exceeding comeliness
Which their fancies doth so strike,
They borrow language of dislike;
And, instead of Dearest Miss,
Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
And those forms of old admiring,
Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
Basilisk, and all that’s evil,
Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor.
Monkey, Ape, and twenty more:
Friendly Traitress, Loving Foe,――
Not that she is truly so,
But no other way they know
A contentment to express,
Borders so upon excess,
That they do not rightly wot
Whether it be pain or not.
Or as men, constrain’d to part,
With what’s nearest to their heart,
While their sorrow’s at the height,
Lose discrimination quite,
And their hasty wrath let fall,
To appease their frantic gall,
On the darling thing whatever
Whence they feel it death to sever,
Though it be, as they, perforce,
Guiltless of the sad divorce.
For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee.
For thy sake, Tobacco, I,
Would do anything but die,
And but seek to extend my days
Long enough to sing thy praise.
But, as she who once hath been
A king’s consort, is a queen
Ever after, nor will bate
Any tittle of her state
Though a widow, or divorced,
So I, from thy converse forced,
The old name and style retain,
A right Katherine of Spain:
And a seat, too, ’mongst the joys
Of the blest Tobacco Boys;
Where, though I, by sour physician,
Am debarr’d the full fruition
Of thy favours, I may catch
Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Sidelong odours, that give life
Like glances from a neighbour’s wife;
And still live in the by-places
And the suburbs of thy graces;
And in thy borders take delight
An unconquer’d Canaanite.
CHARLES LAMB.
――――
LORD BYRON ON TOBACCO.
Borne from a short frail pipe which yet had blown
Its gentle odours over either zone,
And, puff’d where’er winds rise or waters roll,
Had wafted smoke from Portsmouth to the Pole,
Opposed its vapour as the lightning flash’d,
And reek’d, midst mountain-billows unabash’d,
To Æolus a constant sacrifice,
Thro’ every change of all the varying skies.
And what was he who bore it? I may err,
But deem him sailor or philosopher.
SUBLIME TOBACCO! which from East to West
Cheers the tar’s labour or the Turkman’s rest;
Which on the Moslem’s ottoman divides
His hours, and rivals opium and his brides;
Magnificent in Stamboul, but less grand,
Though not less loved, in Wapping or the Strand;
Divine in hookahs, glorious in a pipe,
When tipp’d with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe;
Like other charmers, wooing the caress,
More dazzlingly when daring in full dress;
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far
Thy naked beauties――give me a cigar!
_The Island._
――――
A SHIELD OF ADAMANT.
For lack o’
Tobacco,
I’d die;
For cigars
O! my stars,
How I cry!
For a smoke is the shield
Before which troubles yield――
Enabling us cares to defy!
E. H. S.
――――:o:――――
EPITAPH
_On a young lady who desired that Tobacco might be planted over her
grave._
Let no cold marble o’er my body rise――
But only earth above, and sunny skies.
Thus would I lowly lie in peaceful rest,
Nursing the Herb Divine from out my breast.
Green let it grow above this clay of mine,
Deriving strength from strength that I resign.
So in the days to come, when I’m beyond
This fickle life, will come my lovers fond,
And gazing on the plant, their grief restrain
In whispering, “Lo! dear Anna blooms again!”
[Illustration]
POEMS ON THE PIPE.
Hail! social pipe――thou foe to care,
Companion of my elbow chair;
As forth thy curling fumes arise,
They seem an evening sacrifice――
An offering to my Maker’s praise,
For all His benefits and grace.
DR. GARTH.
SONNET TO A PIPE. (1690.)
“Doux charme de ma solitude,
Brulante pipe, ardent fourneau!
Qui purges d’humeur mon cerveau,
Et mon esprit d’inquiétude.
Tabac! dont mon ame est ravie,
Lorsque je te vois te perdre en l’air,
Aussi promptement q’un éclair,
Je vois l’image de ma vie;
Tu remets dans mon souvenir,
Ce qu’un jour je dois devenir,
N’étant qu’une cendre animée;
Et tout d’un coup je m’aperçoi,
Que courant après ta fumée,
Je passe de même que toi.”
Attributed to _Esprit de Raymond, Comte de Modène_.
_Translation of the above._
“Sweet smoking pipe, bright glowing stove,
Companion still of my retreat,
Thou dost my gloomy thoughts remove,
And purge my brain with gentle heat.
“Tobacco, charmer of my mind,
When, like the meteor’s transient gleam
Thy substance gone to air I find,
I think, alas! my life the same.
“What else but lighted dust am I?
Thou show’st me what my fate will be;
And when thy sinking ashes die,
I learn that I must end like thee.”
――――
TO A PIPE OF TOBACCO.
Come, lovely tube by friendship blest,
Belov’d and honour’d by the wise,
Come, fill’d with honest _Weekly’s best_,
And kindled from the lofty skies.
While round me clouds of incense roll,
With guiltless joys you charm the sense,
And nobler pleasures to the soul,
In hints of moral truth, dispense.
Soon as you feel th’ inlivening ray,
To dust you hasten to return;
And teach me that my earliest day,
Began to give me to the urn.
But tho’ thy grosser substance sink
To dust, thy purer part aspires;
This when I see, I joy to think
That earth but half of me requires.
Like thee myself am born to die,
Made half to rise and half to fall.
O! could I while my moments fly,
The bliss you give me, give to all.
From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. July, 1746.
――――
CHOOSING A WIFE BY A PIPE OF TOBACCO.
Tube, I love thee as my life;
By thee I mean to chuse a wife,
Tube, thy _colour_ let me find,
In her _skin_ and in her _mind_
Let her have a _shape_ as fine;
Let her breath be sweet as thine:
Let her, when her lips I kiss,
_Burn_ like thee, to give me bliss:
Let her in some _smoke_ or other,
All my failings kindly smother.
Often when my thoughts are _low_,
Send them where they _ought to go_.
When to study I incline
Let her aid be such as thine:
Such as thine her charming pow’r,
In the vacant social hour
Let her live to give delight,
Ever _warm_ and ever _bright_:
Let her deeds, whene’er she dies,
Mount as _incense to the skies_.
From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. 1757.
――――
TRANSLATION OF A GERMAN SONG.
When my pipe burns bright and clear,
The gods I need not envy here;
And as the smoke fades in the wind,
Our fleeting life it brings to mind.
Noble weed! that comforts life,
And art with calmest pleasures rife;
Heaven grant thee sunshine and warm rain,
And to thy planter health and gain.
Through thee, friend of my solitude,
With hope and patience I’m endued,
Deep sinks thy power within my heart,
And cares and sorrows all depart
Then let non-smokers rail for ever;
Shall their hard words true friends dissever?
Pleasure’s too rare to cast away
My pipe, for what the railers say!
When love grows cool, thy fire still warms me.
When friends are fled, thy presence charms me;
If thou art full, though purse be bare,
I smoke, and cast away all care!
――――
THE PIPE OF TOBACCO.
Why should life in sorrow be spent,
When pleasure points to the road
Wherein each traveller with content
May throw off the ponderous load?
And instead, in ample measure,
Gather fruits too long left ripe;
What’s this world without its pleasure?
What is pleasure but a pipe?
Is it not tobacco dear,
That from the brow fell grief can wipe?
Yes! like them with jolly cheer,
I find pleasure in a pipe.
Some delight in envy ever,
Others avaricious gripe;
Would you know our greatest pleasure?
’Tis a glowing social pipe.
_Two verses omitted._
(Printed by W. J. Shelmerdine, about 1794.)
From Logan’s _Pedlar’s Pack of Ballads_.
――――
LA PIPE DE TABAC.
Contre les chagrins de la vie,
On crie, “Et ab hoc et ab hac;”
Moi, je me crois digne d’envie,
Quand j’ai ma pipe et mon tabac.
Aujourd’hui, changeant de folie,
Et de boussole et d’almanach,
Je préfère fille jolie,
Même à la pipe de tabac.
Le soldat bâille sous la tente,
Le matelot sur le tillac;
Bientot ils out l’âme contente,
Avec la pipe de tabac.
Si pourtant survient une belle
A l’instant le cœur fait tictac,
Et l’amant oublie auprès d’elle
Jusqu’à la pipe de tabac.
Je tiens cette maxime utile
De ce fameux monsieur de Crac:
En campagne, comme à la ville,
Fêtons l’amour et le tabac.
Quand ce grand homme allait en guerre,
Il portait dans son petit sac,
Le doux portrait de sa bergère,
Avec la pipe de tabac.
PIGAULT LEBRUN. (1755-1835.)
――――
CONTENT AND A PIPE.
Contented I sit with my pint and my pipe,
Puffing sorrow and care far away,
And surely the brow of grief nothing can wipe
Like smoking and moist’ning our clay;
For, though liquor can banish man’s reason afar,
’Tis only a fool or a sot,
Who with reason or sense would be ever at war,
And don’t know when enough he has got.
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe――and his life but smoke.
Yes, a man and a pipe are much nearer akin
Than has as yet been understood,
For, until with breath they are both fill’d within,
Pray tell me for what are they good?
They, one and the other, composed are of clay,
And, if rightly I tell nature’s plan,
Take but the breath from them both quite away,
The pipe dies and so does the man:
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe――and his life but smoke.
Thus I’m told by my pipe that to die is man’s lot,
And, sooner or later, die he must;
For when to the end of life’s journey he’s got,
Like a pipe that’s smoked out――he is dust:
So you, who would wish in your hearts to be gay.
Encourage not strife, care, or sorrow,
Make much of your pipe of tobacco to-day,
For you may be smoked out to-morrow:
For, though at my simile many may joke,
Man is but a pipe――and his life but smoke.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
LA FEMME ET LA PIPE.
Plains-moi, Philippe, mon ami;
Le sort me traite en ennemi.
Un instant mon âme charmée
Sut se caresser de fumée;
Un instant m’enivra l’amour:
Hélas! tout a fui sans rétour.
Suis-je donc né pour le malheur, Philippe?
J’ai perdu ma femme et j’ai cassé ma pipe.
Ah! combien je regrette ma pipe!
Ma femme était blanche de peau,
Ma pipe était comme un corbeau;
Elle était simple et pas bégueule;
Je m’en servais en brûle-gueule:
Avec elles deux je chauffais
Mon lit, mes doigts et mon palais!
Suis-je donc né pour le malheur, etc.
* * * * *
Quand, par un caprice à blâmer,
Ma femme me faisait fumer,
Moi, j’avais alors un principe;
Je prenais ma blague et ma pipe,
Et, las de fumer au moral,
Je savourais mon caporal.
Suis-je donc né, etc.
Ma femme avait bien des appas,
Et ma pipe n’en manquait pas.
Que sa jupe était bien portée!
Dieu! qu’elle etait bien culottée!
J’embrassais l’une en musulman,
Je fumais l’autre en Allemand.
Suis-je donc né, etc.
_Conclusion Consolante._
――Mon cher Fumard, pour ton chagrin
Il est un baume; c’est du vin!
La femme pour qui tu sanglotes,
Souvent te tirait des carottes,
Et grâce à la pipe, au tabac,
Se desséchait ton estomac.
――Tu crois! allons, verse-moi donc, Philippe,
Verse-moi l’oubli de ma femme et ma pipe!
Ah! pourtant je regrette ma pipe!
――――
A POT AND A PIPE OF TOBACCO.
Some praise taking snuff,
And ’tis pleasant enough,
To those who have got the right knack, oh!
But give me, my boys,
Those exquisite joys,
A pot and a pipe of tobacco.
When fume follows fume
To the top of the room,
In circles pursuing their track, O!
How sweet to inhale
The health-giving gale,
Of a pipe of Virginia tobacco.
Let soldiers, so bold,
For fame, or for gold,
Their enemies cut, slash, and hack, O!
We have fire and smoke
Though all but in joke,
In a peaceable pipe of tobacco.
Should a mistress unkind,
Be inconstant in mind,
And on your affections look black, O!
Let her werritt and tiff
’Twill blow off in a whiff,
If you take but a pipe of tobacco.
The miserly elf
Who, in hoarding his pelf,
Keeps body and soul on the rack, O!
Would he bless and be blest
He might open his chest,
By taking a pipe of tobacco.
Life’s short, ’tis agreed
So we’ll try from the weed,
Of man a brief emblem to tack, O!
When his spirit ascends,
Die he must――and he ends
In dust like a pipe of tobacco!
――――
TO AN OLD PIPE.
Once your smoothly-polished face
Nestled lightly in a case;
’Twas a jolly, cosy place,
I surmise;
And a zealous subject blew
On your cheeks, until they grew
To the fascinating hue
Of her eyes.
Near a rusty-hilted sword,
Now upon my mantle-board,
Where my curios are stored,
You recline.
You were pleasant company when
By the scribbling of her pen
I was sent the ways of men
To repine.
Tell me truly (you were there
When she ceased that debonair
Correspondence and affair)――
I suppose
That she laughed and smiled all day;
Or did gentle teardrops stray
Down her charming, _retrousée_,
Little nose?
Where the sunbeams, coyly chill,
Fall upon the mantel-sill
You perpetually will
Silence woo;
And I fear that she herself,
By the little chubby elf,
Will be laid upon the shelf,
Just as you.
DE WITT STERRY.
――――
THE CUTTY.
When nobs come oot to walk aboot,
And show their shapes to leddies;
They’re ne’er without their grand cheroot,
For that they think well bred is.
And when they meet――no in the street,
But aiblins ower a meal like――
Then oot they draw a meerschaum braw,
An’ that looks real genteel like.
Weel! there’s nae ban on ony man,
Let him be braw or sootie;
I’ll no debar their grand cigar,
But I’ll haud to my cutty.
* * * * *
The winter’s blast, aft gey an fast,
Blaws your genteel cigar oot;
My cutty’s fire, with tap o’ wire,
Burns no a grain the waur o’t.
* * * * *
So now I’ll ripe my cutty pipe,
And bauldly face rude Boreas;
And, as I fill, ower ilka ill,
I’ll still haud on victorious.
These extracts are taken from _A Pedlar’s Pack of Ballads and Songs_.
Edinburgh, W. Paterson. 1869.
――――
MY CLAY PIPE.
“Thou cheering friend of many a weary hour,
I’ll sing thy virtues in my humble lay;
Oft have I felt thy gentle, soothing power;
I do not scorn thee, though thou art but _clay_.
Far dearer thou to me than choicest work
From the skill’d products of Italia’s land,
Or rich chibouque of the enamour’d Turk,
With endless tubes, and amber mouthpiece grand.
Companion thou hast been for many a year;
’Tis I have colour’d thy once fair face black;
I could not leave thee now without a tear,
Thou, the last keepsake of my old friend Jack.
He prized thee for thy shape――and then to hear
How oft upon thy merits he hath spoken!
Long may I smoke thee with my evening beer,
My own loved pipe!――Confound it! it is broken!”
――――
ON THE PLEASURE OF A PIPE.
Charm of the solitude I love;
My pleasing, my glowing stove!
My head of rheum is purged by thee;
My heart of vain anxiety.
Tobacco! favourite of my soul!
When round my head thy vapours roll;
When lost in air they vanish too,
An emblem of my life I view.
I view, and, hence instructed, learn
To what myself shall shortly turn:
Myself, a kindled coal to-day,
That wastes in smoke, and flees away.
Swiftly as these――confusing thought――
Alas! I vanish into naught.
From _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_. December, 1871.
――――
LA PIPE.
Je suis la pipe d’un auteur;
On voit, à contempler ma mine
D’Abyssinienne ou de Cafrine,
Que mon maitre est un grand fumeur.
Quand il est comblé de douleur,
Je fume comme la chaumine
Où se prépare la cuisine
Pour le retour du laboureur.
J’enlace et je berce son âme
Dans le réseau mobile et bleu
Qui monte de ma bouche en feu,
Et je roule un puissant dictame
Qui charme son cœur et guérit
De ses fatiques son esprit.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE.
_Translation of the above._
A Poet’s pipe am I;
And my Abyssinian tint
Is an unmistakable hint
That he lays me not often by,
When his soul is with grief o’erworn,
I smoke like the cottage where
They are cooking the evening fare
For the labourer’s return.
I enfold and cradle his soul
In the vapour moving and blue
That mounts from my fiery mouth;
And there is power in my bowl
To charm his spirit and soothe,
And heal his weariness too.
RICHARD HERNE SHEPHERD.
――――
MY DARLING PIPE.
Pipe, my darling,
Fate is snarling――
Let her snarl.
Thou art my love
Thee do I love
Best of all.
In thy kisses,
Truest blisses
Ever dwell.
Faithful ever,
Pouting never――
Ah! ’tis well,
Pipe, my darling,
Fate is snarling――
Let her snarl
――――:o:――――
MY AFTER-DINNER CLOUD.
Some sombre evening, when I sit
And feed in solitude at home,
Perchance an ultra-bilious fit
Paints all the world an orange chrome.
When Fear, and Care, and grim Despair,
Flock round me in a ghostly crowd,
One charm dispels them all in air;――
I blow my after-dinner cloud.
’Tis melancholy to devour
The gentle chop in loneliness.
I look on six――my prandial hour――
With dread not easy to express.
And yet, for every penance done,
Due compensation seems allow’d,
My penance o’er, its price is won;――
I blow my after-dinner cloud.
My clay is _not_ a Henry Clay――
I like it better, on the whole;
And when I fill it, I can say
I drown my sorrows in the bowl.
For most I love my lowly pipe
When weary, sad, and leaden-brow’d:
At such a time behold me ripe
To blow my after-dinner cloud.
As gracefully the smoke ascends
In columns from the weed beneath,
My friendly wizard, Fancy lends
A vivid shape to every wreath.
Strange memories of life or death,
Up from the cradle to the shroud,
Come forth as, with enchanter’s breath,
I blow my after-dinner cloud.
What wonder if it stills my care
To quit the present for the past;
And summon back the things that were,
Which only thus in vapour last?
What wonder if I envy not
The rich, the giddy, and the proud,
Contented in this quiet spot
To blow my after-dinner cloud?
From _Gillott and Goosequill_. By Henry S. Leigh. London, British
Publishing Company. 1871.
MY THREE LOVES.
When Life was all a summer day,
And I was under twenty,
Three loves were scattered in my way――
And three at once are plenty.
Three hearts, if offered with a grace,
One thinks not of refusing.
The task in this especial case
Was only that of choosing.
I knew not which to make my pet――
My pipe, cigar, or cigarette.
To cheer my night or glad my day
My pipe was ever willing;
The meerschaum or the lowly clay
Alike repaid the filling.
Grown men delight in blowing clouds,
As boys in blowing bubbles,
Our cares to puff away in crowds,
And banish all our troubles.
My pipe I nearly made my pet,
Above cigar or cigarette.
A tiny paper, tightly rolled
About some Latakia,
Contains within its magic fold
A mighty _panacea_.
Some thought of sorrow or of strife
At ev’ry whiff will vanish;
And all the scenery of life
Turn picturesquely Spanish.
But still I could not quite forget
Cigar and pipe for cigarette.
To yield an after-dinner puff
O’er _demi-tasse_ and brandy,
No cigarettes are strong enough
No pipes are ever handy.
However fine may be the feed,
It only moves my laughter
Unless a dry delicious weed
Appears a little after.
A prime cigar I firmly set
Above a pipe or cigarette.
But, after all, I try in vain
To fetter my opinion;
Since each upon my giddy brain
Has boasted a dominion.
Comparisons I’ll not provoke,
Lest _all_ should be offended.
Let this discussion end in smoke,
As many more have ended.
And each I’ll make a special pet;
My pipe, cigar, and cigarette.
HENRY S. LEIGH.
_The London Magazine._ November, 1875.
――――
ODE TO MY PIPE.
My pipe to me, thro’ gloom and glee,
Has been my faithful friend;
I sit and _smoke_――not sit and soak,
For that I can’t commend.
Bird’s eye, returns, or shag that burns
Most freely and most bright;
This Indian weed, it is, indeed,
My solace and delight.
Some people say it steals away
The brain, till all is bare,
But they are foes, or _chiefly_ those
Who’ve got no brains to spare.
Great Doctor Parr, bright learning’s star,
A scholar rare and ripe,
Would sit and puff, through smooth and rough,
Enraptured with his pipe.
My pipe I’ll fill, and smoke I will,
Though all the world condemn;
And if I die burnt black and dry,
Pray, what is that to them?
_The Echo._ February 16, 1889.
――――
WHO SCORNS THE PIPE.
Who scorns the pipe? Show me the man,
I do not mention “glasses,”
He’s writhing under social ban
The jink his soul compasses――
Old friend Tobacco!
Ye carping souls, who, envious, doom
The weed to dire perdition,
Just take a whiff――dispel the gloom
That clouds your mental vision――
Of rare Tobacco!
――――:o:――――
MOTTO FOR A TOBACCO JAR.
Come! don’t refuse sweet Nicotina’s aid,
But woo the goddess through a yard of clay;
And soon you’ll own she is the fairest maid
To stifle pain and drive old Care away.
Nor deem it waste, what though to ash she burns,
If for your outlay you get good Returns!
Some time since, in _Cope’s Tobacco Plant_, there was a competition
for the best inscription for a Tobacco Jar. The first and second
prizes were awarded to the following, and many others were printed:――
_First._
INSCRIPTION FOR A TOBACCO JAR.
Three hundred year ago or soe,
Ane worthye knight and gentleman
Did bring mee here, to charm and cheer
Ye physical and mental man.
God rest his soul, who filled ye bowl,
And may our blessings find him;
That hee not miss some share of bliss,
Who left soe much behind him!
YE SMOKE JACK (BERNARD BARKER).
_Second._
Keep me at hand, and as my fumes arise
You’ll find a _jar_ the gates of Paradise.
[Illustration]
THE CIGAR.
Some sigh for this and that;
My wishes don’t go far;
The world may wag at will,
So I have my cigar.
Some fret themselves to death
With Whig and Tory jar,
I don’t care which is in,
So I have my cigar.
Sir John requests my vote
And so does Mr. Marr;
I don’t care how it goes,
So I have my cigar.
Some want a German row,
Some wish a Russian war,
I care not――I’m at peace,
So I have my cigar.
I never see the _Post_,
I seldom read the _Star_;
_The Globe_ I scarcely heed,
So I have my cigar.
They tell me that Bank stock
Is sunk much under par;
It’s all the same to me,
So I have my cigar.
Honours have come to men
My juniors at the Bar;
No matter I can wait,
So I have my cigar.
Ambition frets me not,
A cab or glory’s car
Are just the same to me,
So I have my cigar.
I worship no vain gods,
But serve the household Lar,
I’m sure to be at home,
So I have my cigar.
I do not seek for fame,
A General with a scar;
A private let me be,
So I have my cigar.
To have my choice among
The toys of life’s bazaar,
The deuce may take them all,
So I have my cigar.
Some minds are often tost
By tempests like a tar;
I always seem in port
So I have my cigar.
The ardent flame of love
My bosom cannot char,
I smoke, but do not burn,
So I have my cigar.
They tell me Nancy Low
Has married Mr. Parr;
The Jilt! but I can live,
So I have my cigar.
THOMAS HOOD.
――――
THE CIGAR SONG.
The sky it was dark, and the way it was long,
When I mounted his Majesty’s Mail;
And I tried to chirrup a cheery song
In the teeth of the wind and the hail;――
But it wouldn’t do――so on night’s dark face
I said there should glitter _one_ star;
And I took from snug sleep in its own cozy case,
And lit up into life a cigar.
And then, as its sweet breath came forth with good-will,
The sky didn’t look half so gruff;
’Till I felt like a player or poet, who still
Gets more happy at every puff.
And said I to myself, since mere vapour thus soothes,
Why should men their bliss ever mar?
Life’s cold spots it warms, and its rough places smoothes,
And each pleasure is but a cigar!
But――like Hope, self-consuming before its own fire――
It silently wasted away;
And I was too happy to stop to inquire
If there was such a thing as decay.
It was gone! and I could not another one light!
But the lesson in love’s stronger far;
Ere the embers of one flame have ceased to be bright,
Light another――just like a cigar!
From _The Chameleon_, published anonymously by Longmans, Rees & Co.,
London, 1833 Ascribed to T. Atkinson.
――――
THE SMOKERS.
Smoke, do you? Well, then, sir, you know
How fast and firm these habits grow;
You’ve often doubtless sworn to quit,
And then forgot it till you’d lit
A fresh cigar, and caught the smell
Of that which pleases you so well.
You’ve doubtless looked into your purse
And counted cost with many a curse,
And read of dread diseases caught
By smoking oftener than you ought;
And vowed at least that you’d curtail
The cost and danger, but to fail.
You buy two where ’twas six before――
But go more often to the store;
You storm and reason with yourself,
And put your box back on the shelf,
But, in whatever place you are,
Your thoughts are with your shelved cigar.
How weak this proves strong men to be!
Free, yet in hopeless slavery!
The thought is madness to the mind;
We’ll burst these galling chains that bind!
But, ere, my friend, we go too far,
I’ll thank you for a fresh cigar.
COLUMBUS DISPATCH.
――――
TO MY CIGAR.
(_Translated from the German of Friedrich Marc._)
The warmth of thy glow,
Well lighted cigar
Makes happy thoughts flow,
And drives sorrow afar.
The stronger the wind blows
The brighter thou burnest,
The dreariest of life’s woes
Less gloomy thou turnest.
As I feel on my lip
Thy unselfish kiss,
Like thy flame colour’d tip,
All is rosy-hued bliss.
No longer does sorrow,
Lay weight on my heart,
And all fears of the morrow
In joy dreams depart.
Sweet cheerer of sadness
Life’s own happy star!
I greet thee with gladness
My precious cigar!
――――
HIS FIRST CIGAR.
A small boy puffed at a big cigar
His eyes bulged out and his cheeks sank in:
He gulped rank fumes with his lips ajar,
While muscles shook in his youthful chin.
His gills were green, but he smole a smile;
He sat high up on the farmyard stile,
And cocked his hat o’er his glassy eye,
Then wunk a wink at a cow near by.
The earth swam round, but the stile stood still,
The trees rose up and the kid crawled down
He groaned aloud for he felt so ill,
And knew that cigar had “done him brown.”
His head was light, and his feet like lead,
His cheeks grew white as a linen spread,
While he weakly gasped, as he gazed afar,
“If I live, this here’s my last cigar.”
――――
MY LAST CIGAR.
The mighty Thebes, and Babylon the great,
Imperial Rome, in turn, have bowed to fate;
So this great world, and each particular star,
Must all burn out, like you, my last cigar:
A puff――a transient fire, that ends in smoke,
And all that’s given to man――that bitter joke――
Youth, Hope, and Love, three whiffs of passing zest
Then come the ashes, and the long, long rest.
From _Nicotiana_, by Henry James Meller. London. Effingham Wilson.
1832.
――――
ODE TO MY CIGAR.
Yes, social friend, I love thee well.
In learned doctors’ spite;
Thy clouds all other clouds dispel,
And lap me in delight.
What though they tell, with phizzes long,
My years are sooner passed?
I would reply, with reason strong.
“They’re sweeter while they last.”
And oft, mild friend, to me, thou art
A monitor, though still;
Thou speak’st a lesson to my heart,
Beyond the preacher’s skill.
Thou’rt like the man of worth who gives
To goodness every day,
The odour of whose virtues lives
When he has passed away.
When in the lonely evening hour,
Attended but by thee,
O’er history’s varied page I pore,
Man’s fate in thine I see.
Oft, as thy snowy column grows,
Then breaks and falls away,
I trace how mighty realms thus rose,
Thus trembled to decay.
Awhile, like thee, earth’s masters burn,
And smoke and fume around,
And then like thee to ashes turn
And mingle with the ground.
Life’s but a leaf adroitly rolled,
And time’s the wasting breath,
That late or early we behold
Gives all to dusky death.
From beggar’s frieze to monarch’s robe
One common doom is passed;
Sweet nature’s work, the swelling globe,
Must all burn out at last.
And what is he who smokes thee now?
A little moving heap,
That soon like thee to fate must bow,
With thee in dust must sleep.
But though thy ashes downward go,
Thy essence rolls on high;
Thus, when my body must lie low,
My soul shall cleave the sky.
CHARLES SPRAGUE.
From _The New York Tobacco Plant_.
――――
MY FIRST CIGAR.
As the years vanish, darling,
Time, with the sponge of Fate,
Wipes the events we cherish
Cleanly from Memory’s slate;
E’en the first pair of * *
That I put on, I vow,
I have forgot their colour,
Their cut and their pattern now;
When did the dawning whisker
Sprout on my boyish face?
When did my soaring treble
Change to a manly bass?
I have forgotten, darling,
I have forgotten――but, ah!
One memory ever will haunt me――
The taste of my First Cigar!
Not in fair Cuba, darling,
Under a sun of gold;
Or down in old Virginny
Were those brown leaves enrolled,
But from the English cabbage
Sprang the enchanting weed
In a Whitechapel cellar,
Moulded and made, indeed;
I cannot tell you, darling,
How my heart thrill’d with glee,
As down on the shiny counter
Planked I my last two _d._,
And the fair girl who served me,
Lounging behind the bar,
Handed across the beer-pulls
A light for my First Cigar.
Moments of dire upheaval,
Darling, your boy has known,
When salmon for supper unsettled
Sadly his system’s tone,
When at two a.m. on the doorstep
He has stood, with a vacant smile,
Two bob and a toothpick in pocket,
And wearing a stranger’s tile,――
And oft on the billowy ocean,
His anguish has naught assuaged,
When there was a run on the brandy,
And the basins were all engaged,――
But even these pangs, my darling,
Are not to be held on a par
With the writhe, and the rack, and the riot,
That followed my First Cigar.
CLO. GRAVES.
From _Hood’s Comic Annual_, 1889.
――――
CONFESSION OF A CIGAR-SMOKER.
I owe to smoking, more or less,
Through life the whole of my success;
With my cigar I’m sage and wise――
Without, I’m dull as cloudy skies.
When smoking all my ideas soar,
When not, they sink upon the floor.
The greatest men have all been smokers,
And so were all the greatest jokers.
Then ye who’d bid adieu to care,
Come here and smoke it into air!
――――:o:――――
THE CIGARETTE.
I sing the song of the cigarette,
The nineteenth century dudelet’s pet;
With its dainty white overcoat,
Prithee, now, make a note,
How your affections entangled get.
The Machiavelian power I sing,
Of the stealthy, insidious, treacherous thing.
What odours unpleasant our nostrils fret!
That subtle aroma we ne’er forget.
But wherefore complain of it?
Spite of the pain of it,
We, too, indulge in our cigarette.
The skeletonizing power I sing,
Of the mind-paralyzing, perfidious thing.
Shades of the past, that linger yet!
Is there no land where laws beset
Those who lay sense aside,
Puffing slow suicide,
Into themselves from a cigarette?
Thither I’d fly, and for ever sing
The praise of the land that is free from the thing.
From the various gamins the slums beget
To the gilded youth with the coronet,
All of them play with it,
Seemingly gay with it,
Taking slow death through a cigarette.
The invasive, intrusive, odoriferous thing
Its power autocratic I sadly sing.
What sinner without and beyond the pale
Of civilization, began to inhale,
Sealing his own sad fate,
Telling us, oh, too late!
Gibbering lunacy ends the tale.
Husky my voice, I must cease to sing,
I’m puffing, myself, at the poisonous thing.
_The Judge._
[Illustration]
SNUFF: AN INSPIRATION.
The pungent, nose-refreshing weed,
Which, whether pulverised it gain
A speedy passage to the brain,
Or, whether touched with fire, it rise
In circling eddies to the skies,
Does thought more quicken and refine
Than all the breath of all the Nine.
WILLIAM COWPER.
――――
SGANARELLE, _tenant une tabatière_:――
“Quoi que puissent dire Aristote et toute la philosophie, il
n’est rien d’égal au tabac; c’est la passion des honnêtes
gens, et qui vit sans tabac n’est pas digne de vivre. Non
seulement il réjouit et purge les cerveaux humains, mais
encore il instruit les âmes à la vertu, et l’on apprend avec
lui à devenir honnête homme. Ne voyez-vous pas bien, dès
qu’on en prend, de quelle manière obligeante on en use avec
tout le monde, et comme on est ravi d’en donner à droite et
à gauche, par-tout où l’on se trouve? On n’attend pas même
que l’on en demande, et l’on court au-devant du souhait des
gens: tant il est vrai que le tabac inspire des sentiments
d’honneur et de vertu à tous ceux qui en prennent.”
MOLIERE. _Don Juan._ (1665.)
――――
SIX REASONS FOR TAKING SNUFF.
When strong perfumes and noisome scents,
The suffering nose invade
Snuff, best of Indian weeds, presents
Its salutary aid.
When vapours swim before the eyes,
And cloud the dizzy brain,
Snuff, to dispel the mist, applies
Its quick enlivening grain.
When pensively we sit or walk,
Each social friend away,
Snuff best supplies the want of talk,
And cheers the lonely day.
The hand, like alabaster fair,
The diamond’s sparkling pride,
Can ne’er so gracefully appear,
If snuff should be denied.
E’en Commerce, name of sweetest sound
To every British ear,
Must suffering droop, should snuff be found
Unworthy of our care.
For ev’ry pinch of snuff we take
Helps trade in some degree;
As smallest drops of water make
The vast unbounded sea.
Read’s _Weekly Journal_. February 21, 1761.
――――
J’AI DU BON TABAC.
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
J’en ai du fin et du rapé,
Ce n’est pour ton fichu nez.
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Ce refrain connu que chantait mon père,
A ce seul couplet il était borné.
Moi, je me suis déterminé
A le grossir comme mon nez.
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Un noble heritier de gentilhommière,
Recueille tout seul un fief blasonné,
Il dit à son frère puîné
Sois abbé, je suis ton aîné.
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Un vieil usurier, expert en affaire,
Auquel par besoin on est amené,
A l’emprunteur infortuné,
Dit, après l’avoir ruiné:
J’ai du bon tabac, dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Juges, avocats, entr’ouvrant leurs serres,
Au pauvre plaideur par eux rançonné,
Après avoir pateliné,
Disent, le procès terminé:
J’ai du bon tabac, dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
D’un gros financier, la coquette flaire
Le beau bijou d’or de diamants orné.
Ce grigou, d’un air renfrogné,
Lui dit: Malgré ton joli nez――
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière,
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Tel qui veut nier l’esprit de Voltaire,
Est pour le sentir trop enchifrené.
Cet esprit est trop raffiné,
Et lui passe devant le nez.
Voltaire a l’esprit dans sa tabatière,
Et du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
Voilà huit couplets, cela ne fait guère,
Pour un tel sujet bien assaisonné;
Mais j’ai peur qu’un priseur mal né,
Me chante, en me riant au nez:
J’ai du bon tabac dans ma tabatière
J’ai du bon tabac, tu n’en auras pas.
GABRIEL CHARLES DE LATTEIGNANT (1697-1779.)
[Illustration]
TO MY NOSE.
Knows he that never took a pinch,
Nosey, the pleasure thence which flows?
Knows he the titillating joys
Which my nose knows?
O nose! I am as proud of thee
As any mountain of its snows;
I gaze on thee, and feel that pride
A Roman knows?
ALFRED CROWQUILL.
_The Comic Offering._ 1834.
PADDY DUNBAR.
At the request of numerous subscribers the following very humorous
parody of Sir Walter Scott’s “Young Lochinvar” is here given, although
somewhat out of its proper order. The parody, which is a favourite
piece with reciters, has been kindly sent by Mr. C. H. Stephenson, of
Southport.
PADDY DUNBAR.
Och, Paddy Dunbar is come out of the West,
In all broad St. Giles his brogue was the best,
And, save his shillelah, he weapon had none,
He walked by himself, when he walked all alone;
So daring in love, and so plucky in war,
Och, a broth of a boy now, was Paddy Dunbar.
He carried up bricks, and he carried up stone,
And he carried up mortar, when bricks there was none;
But ere he had rattled at Mulrooney’s gate,
The bride had consinted, poor Paddy came late,
And a fresh-water sailor, as niver smelt tar,
Was to wed the swate Norah of Paddy Dunbar.
So bowldly he marched into Mulrooney’s stall,
’Mongst mothers, and brothers, and cousins, and all;
Then spake ould Mulrooney, his fist in his hand
While the spalpeen of a bridegroom quite spacheless did stand,
“Och, come ye in pace here; or come ye in war,
Or to jig at our wedding, ye blaygard Dunbar?”
“When I first coorted Norah, ye thought me too bould,
Love warms us like toddy, but sooner grows cold;
And now I am come, without malice or spleen,
To jig at your wedding, and smoke my dhudeen;
There are girls in St. Giles more pretty by far,
Would gladly be married to Paddy Dunbar.”
The bride filled a noggin, young Pat took it up,
He tipped off the whisky, then threw down the cup;
She looked down to sneeze, then looked up so sly,
Wid a pipe in her mouth, and a patch on her eye;
He took her red hand, ere her mother could bar,
“Here goes for a jig now,” says Paddy Dunbar.
So big was his form, and so red was her face,
That nivir a stall such a couple did grace;
While the mother did fret, and the father did fume,
And the bridegroom lay drunk at the end of the room:
And the bride-gossips whispered, “’twere better by far,
To have matched our fair cousin with Paddy Dunbar.”
One wink o’ the eye, and one word in the ear,
When they reached the street door, and found the coast clear;
So light to his shoulder swate Norah he flung,
So swift o’er the gutter before him he sprung,
“We are gone, she is mine, over post, rail, and bar,
They’ll have long legs that catch us,” said Paddy Dunbar.
There was rousing and growling in Mulrooney’s clan,
The Murphys and Donovans up and they ran;
There was racing and chasing, a deuce of a spree,
But the illigant Norah no more did they see:
So daring in love, and so plucky in war,
Och, a broth of a boy now was Paddy Dunbar.
――――
THE STAR.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
How I wonder what you are!
Up above the world so high,
Like a diamond in the sky.
When the blazing Sun is gone,
When he nothing shines upon,
Then you show your little light,
Twinkle, twinkle, all the night.
Then the traveller in the dark
Thanks you for your tiny spark:
He could not see which way to go,
If you did not twinkle so.
In the dark blue sky you keep,
And often through my curtains peep,
For you never shut your eye,
Till the Sun is in the sky.
As your bright and tiny spark
Lights the traveller in the dark,
Though I know not what you are,
Twinkle, twinkle, little star.
_Ascribed to Miss Taylor._
――――
MICA, MICA.
Mica, mica, parva Stella;
Miror, quænam sis tam bella!
Splendens eminus in illo,
Alba velut gemma, coelo.
Quando fervens Sol discessit,
Nec calore prata pascit,
Mox ostendis lumen purum,
Micans, micans, per obscurum.
Tibi, noctu qui vagatur,
Ob scintillulam gratatur;
Ni micares tu, non sciret
Quas per vias errans iret.
Meum sæpe thalamum luce
Specularis curiosa;
Neque carpseris soporem,
Donec venit Sol per auram.
HENRY DRURY.
From _Arundines Cami_. 1851.
――――
TO A LONDON CHURCH BELL.
Tinkle, tinkle, horrid bell!
How I hate your dismal knell!
From your church’s tower so high
Plaguing all the dwellers nigh.
Ere the shades of night are gone,
Ere the sun earth shines upon,
You begin with morning light
Tinkle, tinkle, till the night.
And the toiling City clerk
Hears you in his office dark;
Less of headache he might know
If you did not tinkle so.
With your ceaseless clang you keep
Many a sufferer from sleep,
For you never silent lie
While the sun is in the sky.
As your din from dawn to dark
Worries both sick man and clerk,
Proving oftentimes their knell,
Cease to tinkle, horrid bell!
(Prize parody.) M. BEACH.
_One and All._ November 6, 1880.
――――
TO THE TEMPLE BAR MEMORIAL.
Monument to Temple Bar,
How I wonder why you are
Stuck in Fleet by magnates high,
Like a huge November guy!
Though the ugly Bar is gone,
You the site must rest upon,
Just to show how little light
Flickers in this Council bright.(?)
Then the travellers in the dark,
Curse you as their shins you bark,
For they could tell which way to go
If you did not hinder so.
In the narrow street you keep,
At solemn pace my cab doth creep
’Neath thy “all-fired” griffin’s eye,
Leering there ’twixt earth and sky.
As of light no tiny spark,
Brightens all thy hist’ry dark,
Oh! I know not _why_ you are,
Monument to Temple Bar.
_One and All._ November 6, 1880.
There are five other parodies of the same original in the competition,
but the two above are the most interesting.
――――
THE REVISED VERSION.
“Twinkle, twinkle, little star,” the nursery rhyme so familiar to
everybody, has been revised by a Committee of Eminent Scholars, with
the following result:
Shine with irregular, intermitted light,[28] sparkle at intervals,
diminutive, luminous, heavenly body.[29]
How I conjecture, with surprise, not unmixed with uncertainty,[30]
what you are,
Located, apparently, at such a remote distance[31] from and at a
height so vastly superior to this earth, the planet we inhabit.
Similar in general appearance and refractory powers to the precious
primitive octahedron crystal of pure carbon,[32] set in the aërial
region surrounding the earth.
_Merry Folks Library._
――――
Scintillate, scintillate, globule vivific,
Fain would I fathom thy nature specific.
Loftily poised in æther capacious,
Strongly resembling a gem carbonaceous.
When Torrid Phœbus refuses his presence,
And ceases to lamp us with fierce incandescence,
Then you illumine the regions supernal
Scintillate, scintillate, semper nocturnal.
Then the victim of hospiceless peregrination
Gratefully hails your minute coruscation;
He could not determine his journey’s direction
But for your bright scintillating protection.
――――
THE SPRINKLER.
Sprinkle, sprinkle, water cart,
How I wonder what thou art;
Never can I find you nigh
When the dust is deep and dry.
When the clouded sun is set,
And the streets with rain are wet,
Then you wing your little flight,
Sprinkle, sprinkle, left and right.
When the crossings, Sunday clean,
Full of well-dressed folks are seen,
Men, amid their shrieks and oaths
How you sprinkle all their clothes.
And when bright my boots are “shined,”
And my hands in kids confined,
Rattling down the thirsty street
How you soak my hands and feet.
Some day, when this deed is done,
I will draw my trusty gun,
Then we’ll wonder where thou art
Buckshot sprinkled water-cart.
――――
TO A FALLEN “STAR.”
Twinkle! twinkle! _Morning Star!_[33]
How I wonder where you are!
Not that you were ever high
In the journalistic sky.
But I wonder has John Bright
Ceased to feed you with his light?
Have you had your little day?
Have you shone your last weak ray?
If you have――why then I’m glad,
For the light you gave was bad!
If you’re snuffed out, _Morning Star_,
Why I’m very pleased you are!
_Punch and Judy_ (London.) October 23, 1869.
――――
TO THE NEW STAR IN ANDREW MEDIA.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star,
Up among the nebular;
How I wonder all the same,
Where you were before you came?
You are shining, are you not,
When the blazing sun is sot?
Tell me truly, is it right,
To be on the blaze all night?
I do not know who you are,
Though your face seems famil-yar;
Nameless little globe of fire――
Twinkle, twinkle, little stire.
――――
THE TINKLING TRAM.
Tinkle, tinkle, Tramway Car!
Well I’m conscious where you are.
Down below my study high,
Like a demon ever nigh.
When the morning opens wet,
When in fog the sun hath set,
Then you sound to left, to right,
Tinkle, tinkle, day and night!
When to sleep my eyes incline,
Then your bells kicks up its shine;
Up the street and down the street,
’Mid the horse-hoofs’ maddening beat.
No――detested demon car.
I _don’t_ “wonder what you are”;
But _too_ well aware am I,
Tinkling horror, ever nigh!
_Punch’s Almanack_ for 1884.
――――
THE PUBLIC PROSECUTOR.
_The Public asks_:――
Twinkle, twinkle, Prosecu_tar_,
How we wonder what you are,
Up above our heads so high,
Conundrum in the legal sky.
When a blazing wrong is done.
To prosecute you are the one;
Out should come your little light,
In the clouds of legal night.
Then the public, in the dark,
Would thank you for your welcome, spark;
Justice could not onward go,
If you did not twinkle so.
But behind a cloud you keep,
Only popping out to peep.
Legal star, you shut your eye,
We, and Hawkins, wonder why.
_The P. P. answers_:――
My blessings, friend, are over-estimated;
You ask me plainly, why I was created;
I’ll tell you straight, and stop your flippant raillery:
I was appointed――――
_The Public_:――Well?
_The P. P._:――To draw my salary.
_The Referee._ December 2, 1882.
――――
Twinkle, twinkle little star
I can tell you what you are;
And your atmosphere, I hope,
Analyse with spectroscope.
Tin, I fancy; lead, I fear,
Lurk within your atmosphere.
Gold, by Jingo, better far!
Twinkle, twinkle little star.
SALVE.
_Truth._ October 15, 1885.
Wrinkles, wrinkles, solar star,
I obtain of what you are,
When unto the noonday sky,
I the spectroscope apply;
For the spectrum renders clear
Gaps within your photosphere,
Also sodium in the bar,
Which your rays yield, solar star.
CHESSMAN.
_Truth._ September 30, 1886.
(This latter had previously appeared in _Harper’s Magazine_.)
――――:o:――――
VERB SAP.
(_To a Wandering Star._)
“I am willing to throw in my lot with that of my friend Huxley, and
‘to fight to the death’ against this wicked and cowardly surrender. A
desperate gamester, miscalled a Statesman, has chosen to invoke
ignorant foreign opinion against the instructed opinion of his own
countrymen.”――_Professor Tyndall’s last Letter to the Times._
Tyndall, Tyndall, learned star,
How we wonder where you are!
Fizzing up like penny pop,
Coming down on Gladstone flop!
“Desperate gamester!” Tyndall mine,
Such invective is _not_ fine.
Have _you_ not a card to trump,
Rattling Randolph on the stump?
* * * * *
Difference exists no doubt;
Let us calmly fight it out;
But to call each other names
Is the vulgarest of games.
Honestly one view you hold;
If to differ one makes bold,
Is it fair, Sir, to infer,
That he’s rascal, traitor, cur?
Pooh! That’s Party’s puerile plan,
Wisdom, Sir, should play the man.
Drop these tart polemic pennings,
Leave that sort of stuff to Jennings.
_Punch._ July 23, 1887.
――――
LINES TO THE ELECTRIC LIGHT IN THE READING
ROOM OF THE BRITISH MUSEUM.
Twinkle, twinkle, little arc,
Sickly, green, uncertain spark!
Up above my head you swing,
Ugly, strange, expensive thing.
When across the foggy air
Streams the lightning’s blinding glare
Does the Reader in the dark
Bless your radiance, little arc?
When you fade with modest blush,
Scarce more bright than farthing rush,
Would he see which way to go,
If you always twinkled so?
Cold, unlovely, shivering star,
I’ve no notion what you are――
How your wondrous “system” works,
Who controls your jumps and jerks.
Yours a splendour like the day――
Bilious green and purple ray!
No: where’er they worship you
All the world is black or blue.
Though your light _at times_ surpass
Homely oil or vulgar gas,
Still――I close with this remark――
I detest you, little arc!
Slightly altered from _Judy_. June 6, 1888.
――――
BOULANGER.
Twinkle, twinkle, little Star,
How I wonder what you are!
Still more what you mean to be,
When you get back to Par_ee_!
Are you a Republican,
Wedded to the Rights of man?
Or an embryotic King?
Emperor? Despot? Anything?
When you’re President-elect,
What new move may we expect?
Will you show us what you are
By a bloody Coup d’Etat?
Here meanwhile in London town
You will certainly _go down_;
Social crowds will stare and cheer;
Of expulsion there’s no fear!
Twinkle, twinkle, Gallic Star!
We’ve no notion what you are;
Living low and flying high.
Like a comet in the sky.
_Puck._ May 1, 1889.
The political adventurer Boulanger, having done all he could to
embarrass the French Government, and to create disturbances on the eve
of the opening of the great Paris Exhibition, ignominiously fled to
Belgium, when he found that his selfish and unpatriotic conduct was
likely to bring upon him the punishment he deserved. Whilst in
Brussels he issued a ridiculously theatrical manifesto, whereupon the
Belgian Government hinted that his presence was undesirable in that
country, and in April last he sought refuge in London. His reception
was cool, and in a few days he was completely forgotten. Boulanger,
who is fifty-two years of age, has none of the qualities necessary in
a man who aspires to be a great political leader, and had he not been
supported by the wealth and influence of the re-actionary parties in
France, he would long since have sunk back into his native obscurity.
THE SPIDER AND THE FLY.
“Will you walk into my parlour?” said a spider to a fly,
“’Tis the prettiest little parlour, sure, that ever you did spy;
You’ve only got to pop your head within side of the door,
You’ll see so many curious things you never saw before,
Will you walk in pretty fly?”
“My house is always open,” says the spider to the fly,
“I’m glad to have the company of all I see go by;”
“They go in, but don’t come out again――I’ve heard of you before;”
“Oh yes, they do, I always let them out at my back door.
Will you walk in, pretty fly?”
“Will you grant me one sweet kiss, then!” says the spider to the fly;
“To taste your charming lips, I’ve a cu-ri-os-i-ty!”
Said the fly, “If once our lips did meet, a wager I would lay,
Of ten to one, you would not after let them come away.”
“Will you walk in, pretty fly?”
“If you won’t kiss, will you shake hands?” says the spider to the fly,
“Before you leave me to myself, with sorrow sad to sigh.”
Says the fly――“there’s nothing handsome unto you belongs;
I declare you should not touch me even with a pair of tongs.”
“Will you walk in, pretty fly?”
“What handsome wings you’ve got,” says the spider to the fly,
“If I had got such a pair, I in the air would fly
’Tis useless all my wishing, and only idle talk,
You can fly up in the air, while I’m obliged to walk.
Will you walk in, pretty fly?”
“For the last time, now, I ask you, will you walk in, Mr. Fly?”
“No! if I do, may I be shot! I’m off! so now good by.”
Then up he springs, but both his wings were in the web caught fast!
The spider laughed, “ha, ha, my boy, I have you safe at last.”
“Will you walk _out_, pretty fly?”
“And pray how are you now?” says the spider to the fly!
“You fools will never wisdom get, unless you dearly buy!
’Tis vanity that ever makes repentance come too late,
And you who into cobwebs run, surely deserve your fate.
Listen to me, listen to me, foolish fly.”
MORAL.
Now, all young men take warning by this foolish little fly:
Pleasure is the spider, that to catch you fast will try;
For, although you may think that my advice is quite a bore,
You’re lost if you stand parleying outside of Pleasure’s door.
Remember, oh, remember, the foolish little fly.
MARY HOWITT.
――――
“WILL YOU MIGRATE TO NEW ZEALAND?”
I.
“Will you migrate to New Zealand?” its Colonists do cry,
“’Tis the richest, healthiest country, that ever you did spy;
The way to our Arcadia is o’er the pleasant sea,
And endless the enchanting scenes we’ll show when there you be!”
“Oh! no, no,” say the Englishmen, “to ask us in vain,
For who goes o’er your longsome seas, can ne’er come back again.”
II.
“We’re sure you must be weary, lads, with toiling all the day,
Luxuriate in our balmy clime,” the Colonists still say;
“The fertile earth here laughs around, the skies are warm and fine,
Oh! do but come, live here awhile, and share our oil and wine.”
“Ah! no, no,” say the Englishmen, “we’ve often heard before,
How many gammon’d simple folk, wreck on your earthquake-shore.”
III.
The cunning Colonists repeat――“Dear friends, what can we do
To prove the immense solicitude we’ve always felt for you?
We have within our ample bounds good store of all that’s nice,
You’re very welcome all to come, and each to take his slice.”
“Oh! no, no,” say the Englishmen, “kind sirs, that cannot be,
We’ve heard what’s in your country, and we have no care to see.”
IV.
“Fine fellows,” say the Colonists, “you’re industrious and you’re
steady,
How powerful are your toil-task’d limbs, your minds so strong and
ready!
We have full many a splendid spot in our new-promis’d land,
Such soil,――so water’d,――timber’d too, soliciting your hand.”
“We thank you, liberal Colonists, for what you’re pleased to proffer,
We’re busy now,――another day we’ll listen to your offer.”
V.
The Colonists are waiting still, they prowl about their beach,
For well they guess some English dupes will come within their reach;
So they conjure up some Siren song, and have it put in print,
And rub their hands, and slap their thighs, at folks believing in’t:
They fabricate long letters home――from settlers well-to-do,
All season’d high with luring lies, so couched to seem quite true;
“Here capital must multiply, wealth waits each working clan,
Here is――Eutopia itself, aye,――Paradise for man.”
VI.
Alas! alas! how very soon some too-confiding men,
Hearken to the seductive words said o’er and o’er again:
With home――they discontented grow, fancy――a fairer land,
Air-castles build in promis’d scenes, with wealth that courts the
hand;
Seas cross’d――the colony must now for ever hold them fast.
Fresh Colonists are old one’s game, who pluck them great and small,
Gloat o’er their brethren――victimized, sore struggling, one and all.
VIII.
And now, ye English, old and young, who may this story read,
To tales from coves――of distant shores, I pray you ne’er give heed;
Unto the crafty Colonist, close heart, and ear, and eye,
And heed this version of the tale of “The Spider and the Fly.”
From _Emigration Realised_, a poem, &c., by S. C. C. (_i.e._ Chase),
London. Saunders & Otley, 1855.
――――
THE SONG OF THE BANK DIRECTOR.
“Will you walk into my parlour?” said the spider to the fly!
“Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy.
“You’ve only got to pop your head just inside of the door,
“You’ll see so many curious things you never saw before”
“Will you let me see your pocket?” said the spider to the fly!
“To handle your bright gold I’ve a great curiosity.”
Said the fly, “If once you’d hold of it, a wager I would lay
“Of ten to one you very soon would take it all away.”
“What handsome purse, what lots of cash!” quoth spider to the fly.
“If I had so much money, some nice Bank shares I would buy.
“Look here!” And here he ope’d a safe, and said, “Dear fly, just see
“These lovely shares, big divs., and unlim’d liability.”
“What lovely wings they’d make you! How much higher you could fly!
“For the last time, now, I ask you, pretty creature, will you buy?”
And the silly fly, intoxicated with his flattery,
Bought lots of shares with unlimited liability.
But when the time came for the dividends to be received,
The poor fly found that he had been most woefully deceived.
When he went into the parlour, quick the spider shut the door,
And tightly round him spun his web, and hurled him on the floor――
And laughed, “Ha! ha!” and said, “I’ll show you now, my pretty fly,
“What comes of buying shares with unlim’d liability.”
And first he plundered all his gold, and all he had beside,
And then he crushed him utterly, and sucked him till he died.
From _Dizzi-Ben-Dizzi_, 1878.
――――
THE IRISH SPIDER AND THE ENGLISH FLY.
“Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly.
“We can talk without disturbance, and no Tories can espy.
It is just across the Channel, you can very soon get there.
And I’ve curious things to show you which I’m sure will make you
stare.”
“Excuse me,” said the Grand Old Fly, “your manner has a charm,
But are you really sure, dear sir, you do not mean me harm?”
Said the cunning Spider to the Fly, “Dear friend, what can I do
To prove the warm affection I have always felt for you?
I’ve eighty-six companions too so pleasant, kind, and nice,
Who’ll welcome any friend of mine and help him in a trice.”
“Forgive me,” said the Grand Old Fly, “because I make so bold,
But about that Irish party there are awful stories told,”
“Sweet creature,” said the Spider, “you’re witty and you’re wise,
On you the universal world now turns its wondering eyes,
I have an Irish looking-glass upon my parlour shelf――
You’ll be surprised if in that glass you but behold yourself,”
“I thank you, gentle sir, indeed for what you’ve pleased to say,
And bidding you good morning now I’ll call another day.”
The Spider waited for a time inside his Irish den,
For well he knew the Grand Old Fly would soon come back again.
He wove his subtle Home Rule web in a little corner sly
And set his eighty-six _confrères_ to watch the Grand Old Fly.
Then wandered to his door again and merrily did say,
“Come hither, hither, dearest Fly――a moment step this way.”
There was no limit to the pride of that poor silly Fly.
He listened to the Spider’s voice, which flattered him sky high;
He buzzed about, he tossed his head, and near and nearer drew――
Deceived by his own vanity he thought the Spider true.
“No English Fly has soared so high,” said he, but now at last,
Caught in the cunning Home Rule web, the Spider held him fast.
_Moonshine._ June 5, 1886.
――――
A CHARITABLE INSTITUTION.
(_A Hint to some Hospitals nearer Home._)
“Will you walk into our death-trap?”
Say the surgeons so serene,
“’Tis the neatest little death-trap
That there ever yet has been;
The beds are most inviting,
The sheets are nice and white――
And when you get between ’em
You can bid the world good-night.”
“We have wards to suit all parties,”
Say the surgeons so serene,
“But the one we’re recommending
Is that special ward――eighteen.
Kindly cut your little finger,
And select your little bed――
Then, before a week is over,
You will certainly be dead.”
“If you fracture say your elbow,
And come here to get it dress’t――
Well, your arm is amputated
And you find eternal rest;
For your blood is surely poisoned,
And so deadly is the taint
That you’re here, perchance, one morning,
And, to-morrow, here you ain’t.
“When some nasty broken chilblains
Give you trouble with your toes,
Oh! we take your leg, and presto!
In a moment off it goes.
It is getting on quite nicely,
Is that amputated pin,
When, as certain as the sunrise,
Erysipelas sets in.
“Then walk into our death-trap――
Harry, Tommy Johnny, Bob――
We have instruments in plenty
And are always on the job;
’Tis the very surest death-trap
That the world has ever seen,
Make your wills and have a shake-down
In our special ward――eighteen.”
_The Sydney Bulletin._ August 7, 1886.
――――
HARCOURT AND CHAMBERLAIN.
“Will you walk into our parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly;
“’Tis the cosiest little parlour, friend, that ever you did spy――
The way into this parlour is quite wide, as you’re aware,
And, oh! we’ll do such wondrous things when once we get _you_ there!
Then, won’t you, won’t you, won’t you, won’t you,
Pretty little fly?”
Now, as I’ve heard, this little fly was young, but wary, too,
And so he thought, I’ll mind my eye――the thing may be a do!
So “No, no!” said that little fly; “kind Sir, that cannot be,
I’ve heard what’s in your parlour, and I do not wish to see.”
That Spider he was portly, and that Spider he was bland,
And he played the part of siren for an even Older Hand.
Says he, “Oh, Fly, you must be tired of being on the shelf,
Why don’t you just step in awhile, if but to rest yourself?”
“Our parlour’s snugly furnished, for expense we never spare,
We’ve such a nice Round Table; you shall have an easy chair.
It seems incomplete without you as a sort of settled guest;
Turn up solitary buzzing now; step in and take a rest.”
That little Fly looked longingly. Thinks he, “I _do_ feel tired,
I’m fond of cosy parties, and I like to be admired.
Yet I have a slight suspicion that the thing may be a trap――
I twig something in the corner――I distrust that fat old chap.”
So “I’ll wait a little longer,” to the Spider said the Fly,
As he spread his wings (with friend Col-lings), and fluttered
towards the Skye.
But whether he’ll come back again, and try that parlour yet,
Is a thing on which a cautious man would hardly like to bet.
_Punch._ March 19, 1887.
_The Spider_, by Sir W. Y. Harcourt.
_The Fly_, by Mr. Joseph Chamberlain.
――――
“Will you walk a little faster?” said a whiting to a snail,
“There’s a porpoise close behind us, and he’s treading on my tail.
See how eagerly the lobsters and the turtles all advance!
They are waiting on the shingle――will you come and join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, will you join the dance?
Will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you, won’t you join the dance.”
* * * * *
From _Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland_.
There was a parody in _Will-o’-the-Wisp_, March 20, 1869, entitled
“The Abbess and the Maid” concerning a law suit which attracted much
attention at the time, but is now forgotten. It commenced:――
“Will you walk into my convent?” said the abbess to the maid.
“’Tis the prettiest little cloister ever nestled in the shade.”
Another long political parody in _The London Figaro_, August 7, 1886,
commenced:――
“Will you come into our Chamber?” said the Marquis to “Grand Cross”
“’Tis a finely gilded chamber” (so went on the Tory Boss.)
Another appeared in _Punch_, June 30, 1888, soon after Mr. W. E.
Gladstone had given his vote in favour of Watkin’s scheme for the
Channel Tunnel. Two verses may be quoted:――
THE WATKIN SPIDER AND THE GLADSTONE FLY.
“Will you walk into my Tunnel?” said the Spider to the Fly,
“’Tis the handiest little Tunnel that ever you did spy.
You’ve only got to pop your head inside and peep, no more,
And you’ll see a many curious things you never saw before.
Will you, will you, will you, will you, walk in,
Grand Old Fly?”
Said the Spider to the Fly, “It’s most absurd, upon my soul,
To see so big a nation scared about so small a hole.
To share the scare that’s in the air is worthy, don’t you know,
Not of a Grand Old Fly like you, but of a midge like Joe!
Then won’t you, won’t you, won’t you, won’t you,
plucky Grand Old Fly?”
* * * * *
_Punch._ June 30, 1888.
――――
Pray come along to Hawarden, says the Grand Old Man so fly,
(Or p’rhaps I should say spider), to convince you let me try.
Home Rule’s the grandest principle since first the earth began,
And to vote for C. S. Parnell and his friend, the Grand Old Man.
Pop in the train at Euston and to Chester then run down,
And don’t make speeches on the way (such conduct makes me frown,)
If but a Post-card you will send to say when you’ll arrive,
The Home Rule van shall meet you, and the Grand Old whip will drive.
* * * * *
This not very brilliant political parody will be found in an anonymous
pamphlet entitled “_Glad-Par-Stonell-Iana_.” Waterlow & Sons, 1889.
――――
NURSERY RHYMES.
Parodies on Nursery Rhymes and Children’s Songs, which were
interrupted in order to introduce those relating to Smoking, can now
be resumed, as a few good ones still remain to be quoted. When the
late Mr. J. O. Halliwell (Halliwell-Phillipps) first brought out his
collection of Nursery Rhymes, his friend James Robinson Planché, the
dramatist, wrote some little humourous skits on them. These were
merely meant for playful badinage, but a few lines may be quoted from
them:――
Ride-a-cockhorse
To Kennington-Cross;
Come and see Planché,
Who works like a horse
Sucking his fingers,
And roasting his toes;
He would have you come
Wherever he goes.
Halliwell-Halliwell,
My pretty man,
Make me a book
As fast as you can;
Write it and print it,
And mark it with P.,
And send it by
Parcels Delive_rye_.
Ding dong bell,
Planché’s at Stockwell.
What took him there?
His wife, you may swear.
When will he come back?
As soon as he can――good lack.
――――
The Prince of Wales was christened on January 25, 1842, for which
occasion a very handsome cake was prepared, but it was remarked that
it remained uncut, the Queen appearing unwilling to spoil this
remarkable specimen of confectionary.
A Nursery Ballad, entitled “The Christening Cake,” was published on
the occasion, (by Mr. John Lee, of 440, West Strand,) from which a few
extracts may be quoted:――
When great Victoria ruled the land,
She ruled it like a Queen;
She had a Princess and a Prince
Not very far between.
The Princess was a girl, you’ll guess,
A pretty little thing;
Yet parties all agreed in this――
She never could be King.
But ere the year its course had run,
What universal joy!
On Lord Mayor’s Day there came to light
A glorious princely Boy!
The Queen gazetted him next week,
The caudle ran in pails;
She girded on his little sword,
And called him “Prince of Wales.”
“The christening shall be superb,
And worthy of our state.”
So spoke the Queen to Albert, her
Most true and royal mate.
* * * * *
The Banquet served, the brilliant throng
Proceed their seats to take;
The plate was grand, yet every eye
Was fixed upon the Cake!
The thistle, rose, and shamrock twined
The Prince’s arms and crest;
The Prussian Eagle, raised on high,
To please the Royal Guest.
In matchless beauty stood the cake,
The glory of the day;
And now each lady hoped to take
A little bit away.
Prince Albert raised a knife and fork,
Victoria looked a frown!
So, with a disappointed air,
He laid the weapons down.
She rose――and the distinguished guests
Their last obeisance make!
All murmuring, as they left the room,
“She never cut the Cake!”
The Queen and Prince, like other folks,
Their party gone away,
Sat for five minutes, chatting o’er
The pleasures of the day.
“When I’ve enjoyed a _fete_ so much
I really cannot tell;
From early morn till now midnight,
All things went off so well!”
“Nay, dear Victoria, pardon me,
You make a slight mistake;
For every thing _did not go off_.”
(He glanced towards the cake.)
“Consider our expenses, love;
Outgoings are so great,
Receiving foreign Potentates
With all this form and state.
Our family increases fast,
And cakes are _very_ dear;
The Prussian Eagle laid aside,
We’ll keep it for next year!”
This ballad shows that the Queen had a reputation for parsimony as
long ago as 1842, the moral it enforces is similar to that contained
in the old Nursery Rhyme the ballad parodies, concerning the famous
plum Pudding of King Arthur:――
“The King and Queen ate of the same,
And all the Court beside;
And what they could not eat that night,
The Queen next morning _fried_.”
It is somewhat curious that Poets should so often select incidents in
the lives of Royal personages as topics for their poems, considering
how ephemeral is the interest they excite.
The above ballad was, of course, only a burlesque, and had no claim to
longevity, but of all the _serious_ adulatory poems written about the
Queen, and her family, during the last fifty years how many have
survived? With the exception of some few lines in Tennyson’s
Dedications and Odes, the present generation knows nothing of them.
Where is Leigh Hunt’s poem on the birth of the Princess Royal? Where
is Professor Aytoun’s Ode on the Marriage of the Prince of Wales?
Where, oh, where is Mr. _Lewis_ Morris’s Ode for the Opening of the
Imperial Institute? Forgotten, all forgotten, and nearly as obsolete
as the Birthday Odes of the Poets-Laureate Eusden, Warton, and Pye.
Who reads or remembers Martin F. Tupper’s Welcome to the Princess
Alexandra?
“And thus they warbled, in the style of Tupper,
Whose ode to our Princess is thought a fine
Sample of metre _Alexandra_-ine――
A poet arithmetical in fame,
Who lisp’d in numbers, for the numbers came:”
THE JOY BIRDS’ ODE.
100,000 welcomes![34]
100,000 welcomes!!
And 100,000 more!!!
Oh! happy birds of Eden,
Sing like the Star of Sweden,
Yes, yes, like Nilsson sing, birds,
And make the island ring, birds,
As no land rang before;
And let the welkin roar,
To wel_kin_ her to shore;
Let miles of echo shout it,
And sparkling fountains spout it,
Let leagues of lightning flash it,
And tons of thunder crash it;
Let pouring rainfalls hail her name,
And fiery earthquakes sound her fame,
Till sky, and sea, and shore
Join in a vast _encore_,
100,000 welcomes,
And 100,000 more!
* * * * *
In justice to Mr. Tupper it must be admitted that these are not
_exactly_ his lines, but only a very fair parody of them taken from
_The Lays of the Saintly_, by Mr. Walter Parke. (London, Vizetelly,
1882.)
――――:o:――――
DR. FELL.
I do not like thee, Dr. Fell,
The reason why I cannot tell;
But this alone, I know full well,
I do _not_ like thee, Dr. Fell.
This little nursery rhyme claims ancient lineage. In Thomas Forde’s
“Virtus Rediviva,” 1661, in a collection of familiar letters, is the
following passage:――
“There are some natures so Hetrogenious, that the
streightest, and most gordion knot of Wedlock is not able
to twist, of which the Epigrammatist (Martial) speaks my
mind better than I can myself:――
Non amo te Sabide, nec possum dicere quare,
Hoc tantum possum dicere, non amo te.
Take the English in the words of a gentleman to his wife:――
I love thee not, Nel,
But why, I can’t tell;
But this I can tell,
I love thee not, Nel.”
The following is Clément Marot’s version as given in Chapsal’s
‘Modèles de Littérature Française,’ ii. p. 26:――
Jan, je ne t’aime point, beau sire:
Ne sais quelle mouche me point,
Ni pourquoi c’est je ne puis dire
Sinon que je ne t’aime point.
Another version, by Roger de Bussy, Comte de Rabutin (_ob._
1693), ran as follows:――
Je ne vous aime pas, Hylas,
Je n’en saurois dire la cause;
Je sais seulement une chose;
C’est que je ne vous aime pas.
[Illustration]
JOHN DRYDEN.
BORN August 9, 1631. | DIED May 1, 1700.
(_Was Poet Laureate from 1670 till the accession of William III. in
1688, when he was superceded by a Protestant poet, Thomas Shadwell._)
In the year 1683, a musical society was formed in London for the
celebration of St. Cecilia’s Day, and from that time a festival was
held annually on November the 22nd in Stationers’ Hall, and an Ode,
composed for the occasion, was sung. These festivals continued, with a
few interruptions, down to the year 1744, and some were held at even a
later date; but these celebrations must not be confounded with the
performances given by the “Cecilian” Society, which was established in
1785.
A collection of the Odes, written for the Festival of St. Cecilia’s
Day, was first formed by Mr. William Henry Husk, Librarian of the
Sacred Harmonic Society, and published by Bell and Daldy in 1857, in
“_An Account of the Musical Celebrations on St. Cecilia’s Day_. To
which is appended a Collection of Odes on St. Cecilia’s Day.” It is
unnecessary to enumerate them all here, but as Odes written by Nahum
Tate, John Dryden, Thomas Shadwell, Samuel Wesley, Joseph Addison,
William Congreve, Alexander Pope, and the burlesque Ode by Bonnell
Thornton are included, the volume has considerable literary interest.
John Dryden wrote a song for the Festival of November, 1687, but his
great Ode, “Alexander’s Feast; or, the Power of Music,” was written
and performed in 1697. For this poem it is said Dryden received forty
pounds, its success was so great that it was frequently performed at
later festivals, and in 1736 “Alexander’s Feast” was set to music by
Handel. The poem has been frequently parodied, it will therefore be
convenient to give the original Ode, followed by the parodies, or such
parts of them as are fit for re-publication, for it must be confessed
that some of the earlier imitations are excessively coarse.
ALEXANDER’S FEAST.
’Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won,
By Philip’s warlike son,
Aloft in awful state,
The god-like hero sate
On his imperial throne.
His valiant peers were placed around,
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound:
(So should desert in arms be crown’d.)
The lovely Thais, by his side,
Sate like a blooming eastern bride,
In flower of youth, and beauty’s pride.
_Chorus._
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
Timotheus placed on high,
Amid the tuneful choir,
With flying fingers touched the lyre;
With trembling notes ascend the sky,
And heavenly joys inspire.
The Song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seat above
Such is the power of mighty love:
A dragon’s fiery form belied the god;
Sublime on radiant spheres he rode,
When he to fair Olympia press’d,
And while he sought her snowy Breast,
Then round her slender waist he curl’d,
And stamp’d an image of himself, a sovereign of the world.
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound;
“A present deity!” they shout around;
“A present deity!” the vaulted roofs rebound.
_Chorus._
With ravish’d ears
The monarch hears,
Assumes the God,
Affects to nod,
And seems to shake the spheres.
The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musican sung,
Of Bacchus, ever fair and ever young!――
The jolly god in triumph comes!
Sound the trumpets! beat the drums!
Flush’d with a purple grace,
He shows his honest face,
Now give the hautboys breath! he comes! he comes!
Bacchus ever fair and young,
Drinking joys did first ordain:
_Chorus._
Bacchus’ blessings are a treasure;
Drinking is the soldier’s pleasure:
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet is pleasure, after pain!
Sooth’d with the sound, the king grew vain;
Fought all his battles o’er again;
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he slew the slain!
The master saw the madness rise;
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes;
And while he heaven and earth defied――
Changed his hand, and check’d his pride.
He chose a mournful Muse,
Soft Pity to infuse:
He sang Darius great and good!
By too severe a fate,
Fallen! fallen! fallen! fallen!
Fallen from his high estate
And weltering in his blood!
Deserted at his utmost need
By those his former bounty fed,
On the bare earth exposed he lies,
With not a friend to close his eyes!
With downcast look the joyless victor sate.
_Chorus._
Revolving, in his alter’d soul,
The various turns of fate below;
And now, and then, a sigh he stole,
And tears began to flow!
The mighty master smil’d to see
That love was in the next degree:
’Twas but a kindred sound to move:
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures.
Soon he sooth’d his soul to pleasures
War, he sung, is toil and trouble:
Honor but an empty bubble;
Never ending, still beginning,
Fighting still, and still destroying,
If the world be worth thy winning,
Think, oh think it worth enjoying!
Lovely Thais sits beside thee,
Take the good the gods provide thee!
The many rend the skies with loud applause,
So Love was crown’d; but Music won the cause.
_Chorus._
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care,
And sigh’d and look’d, sigh’d and look’d,
Sigh’d and look’d, and sigh’d again:
At length, with love and wine at once oppress’d,
The vanquish’d victor sank upon her breast!
Now strike the golden lyre again!
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain!
Break his bands of sleep asunder,
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark! hark! the horrid sound
Has raised up his head,
As awaked from the dead;
And, amazed, he stares around!
“Revenge! revenge!” Timotheus cries――
See the Furies arise!
See the snakes that they rear,
How they hiss in the air,
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes!
Behold a ghastly band,
Each a torch in his hand!
Those are Grecian ghosts that in battle were slain,
And unburied remain
Inglorious on the plain!
Give the vengeance due,
To the valient crew!
Behold; how they toss their torches on high,
How they point to the Persian abodes,
And glittering temples of their hostile gods;――
The princes applaud, with a furious joy!
_Chorus._
And the king seized a flambeau, with zeal to destroy;
Thais led the way,
To light him to his prey!
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy.
Thus, long ago,
Ere heaving bellows learned to blow,
While organs yet were mute,
Timotheus, to his breathing flute
And sounding lyre,
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame:
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds,
And added length to solemn sounds,
With Nature’s mother-wit, and arts unknown before.
_Chorus._
Let old Timotheus yield the prize,
Or both divide the crown:
He raised a mortal to the skies!
She drew an angel down!
JOHN DRYDEN.
――――
SHAKESPEARE’S FEAST.
_An Ode on the recent rehearsal in the Town Hall
of Stratford._
I.
’Twas at the solemn feast, for laurels won
By William, old John Shakespeare’s son,
Aloft in awful state
The Mayor of Stratford sate,
Rais’d on a wool-pack throne:
His aldermen were plac’d around,
Their brows with spreading antlers crown’d,
(So city spouses should be found)
The lovely May’ress by his side
Sat like a plump High-German bride,
Not less for fat renown’d, than pride.
Happy, happy, happy May’r!
None but the fat,
None but the fat,
None but the fat deserve the bouncing fair.
II.
The bard of Ferney, plac’d on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
With flying fingers touch’d the wooden lyre:
The notes, tho’ lame, ascend as high
As civic joys require.
The song began from G――K’s toil,
Who left his Litchfield’s native soil,
(Such were his hopes of golden spoil)
King Richard’s crooked form bely’d the man:
Sublime on high-heel’d shoes he trod,
When first he courted Lady Anne
In Goodman’s Fields, till then an unfrequented road.
As Hastings next round Pritchard’s waist he curl’d,
Or shew’d, in Drugger’s rags, an idiot to the world.
The list’ning crowd admire the lofty sound,
A present Shakespeare, loud they shout around:
A present Shakespeare, loud the rafter’d halls rebound.
With prick’d up ears
His May’rship hears;
Assumed the play’r,
Affects to stare,
And shakes the room about his ears.
III.
The praise of ven’son, then, the rapt enthusiast sung;
Of ven’son, whether old or young:
The jolly haunch in triumph comes;
Sound the trumpets, beat the drums;
Flush’d with a purple grace,
It shews its currant-jelly face:
Now give each feeder breath: it comes, it comes;
Ven’son, ever fair and young,
Drinking joys can best reveal;
Fat of ven’son is a treasure,
Eating is the glutton’s pleasure:
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet as stuffing is with veal.
* * * * *
From _The Court Miscellany_. 1769.
――――
The following Parody will be found in a scarce little volume entitled
“_Pranceriana Poetica_, or Prancer’s Garland. Being a Collection of
Fugitive Poems written since the publication of Pranceriana and the
Appendix. Dublin: Printed in the year M.DCC.LXXIX.” This volume opens
with a very satirical dedication to the Right Honourable Sir J――n
B――q――re, Knight of the Bath, Alnager of all IRELAND, and Bailiff of
Phœnix Park; in this he is taken to task for “placing the most
improper man in the Kingdom at the head of our College.” The College
alluded to was Trinity College, Dublin, and the individual who had
been appointed at its head was nicknamed the “Prancer,” as “more fit
to be a dancing master than a Provost.”
PRANCER’S FEAST,
_or, the Power of_ ORATORIAL FLATTERY.
I.
’Twas at Election Feast for College, won
By Bregah’s wond’rous son,
Aloft in awful state
The prancing Hero sate,
On academic throne;
His supple Voters plac’d around,
Who on Election Day were faithful found
(Minions only by self Interest bound,)
The grim Ben Saddi by his side
(Not like a blooming Eastern Bride)
With awkward stiffness, awkward pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair!
None but Ben Sad,
None but Ben Sad,
None but Ben Sad deserves a Prancer’s care.
II.
The great Pomposo rose
To utter his Harangues,
Writhing with oratorial pangs,
Puffing as when a Bellows blows,
Or when a bagpipe twangs.
His speech from Bregah he begun
To flatter Prancer――Bregah’s son,
(Though one would think it all was Fun)
He shew’d what a fine nimble Lad
Was Bregah――this our Prancer’s Dad,
How long ago he was stark wild
To get his Sheelah great with child;
And when he had with Raptures entranc’d her
He stamp’d an image of himself, a mighty Prancer.
The list’ning crowd admire the lofty sound,
Great Prancer’s fame they shout around,
Great Prancer’s name the vaulted roofs rebound.
With ravish’d ears
McBregah hears,
Adjusts his wig,
Looks bluff and big;
Anon he smiles and leers.
Pomposo then held forth in Praise of Prancer,
Both as a Fencer and a Dancer,
In minuet step how he advances!
Strike up the Fiddles, see, see how he dances!
With his well-turn’d Pumps
How he skips and he jumps!
Clear tables and chairs, for he prances, he prances.
He dancing lectures did ordain
And drove out all the Muses’ Train;
Dancing is a Prancer’s Pleasure.
Rich the Treasure!
Sweet the Pleasure!
Sweet the Pleasure that requires no Brain!
* * * * *
――――
“To commemorate the Naval Review at Portsmouth, the Oratorio of
Alexander’s Feast is to be performed at one of the Theatres Royal, by
command of his Majesty, with the following alterations, by William
Whitehead, Esq; Poet Laureate.”
ALEXANDER’S FEAST, PARODIED;
OR, THE GRAND PORTSMOUTH PUPPET-SHEW.
’Twas at the royal show, and grand display
Of all the navy which at Portsmouth lay;
Aloft in laughing state,
Britain’s monarch sat,
And look’d serenely gay.
Goldstick, and other peers were plac’d around,
Their hair in bags of silken ribbons bound;
So should, ye fair, our men of arms be crown’d!
Charlotte smil’d sweetly at his side,
Yet inwardly, alas! she sigh’d
At George’s folly, and at Twitcher’s pride.
_Air._
Happy, happy, happy pair,
How they rejoice!
How they rejoice!
To see the weather grown so fair!
Then Sandwich plac’d on high,
Amid the tuneful band,
Struck the loud kettle-drums with mighty hand;
The deaf’ning notes ascend the sky,
And sound along the strand.
From Fred’rick began the strain,
Who left Germania’s bleak domain
For England――such the pow’r of Stuart’s reign!
Augusta then his Highness woo’d,
Got children, as all Princes should,
When he to Saxe-Gotha press’d,
And while he sought her snowy breast:
Then round her waist his arms he spread,
And stamp’d an image of himself――a Prince without a head.
The list’ning tars admire the lofty sound;
A Prince without a head――they shout around;
A Prince without a head――the vaulted skies rebound.
_Air._
Not us’d to hear
Such truths sincere,
At first he shrinks
Before he thinks,
That tars must have their jeer.
* * * * *
From _The New Foundling Hospital for Wit._ 1786.
――――
THE COVENT GARDEN ROW.
’Twas at a _glorious row_, for Clifford won,
By german Wienholt’s son,
After the play was done,
Aloft in drunken state
Was placed the stupid candidate,
For O.P. fame and fun.
* * * * *
This parody, relating to the famous O. P. riots, will be found in _The
Covent Garden Journal_, 1810, which contains a full account of that
curious theatrical episode.
A long political parody of Dryden’s Ode, relating to Irish affairs,
and entitled _Ode to St. Patrick’s Day_, appeared in Vol. ix. of _The
Spirit of the Public Journals_, 1806, and in Vol. xvi. of the same
series, (1813) was a parody describing a law case. It commenced:――
“’Twas where the fam’d Home Circuit is begun.”
Neither of these parodies possesses any interest for modern readers.
Another parody, of which only the title can be given, was “W――――S’s
Feast, or Dryden Travesti; a mock Pindarick: addressed to his most
Incorruptible Highness, Prince Patriotism.”
――――
SIR FRANCIS’S[35] FEAST.
_An Ode for the anniversary of a Westminster Election._
’Twas at a feast, giv’n to their Baronet
By his own factious set,
Placed by the chairman’s side,
Sate Piccadilly’s pride,
With airs of coy regret.
His noisy friends were ranged about,
With dirty shirts, and pots of heady stout:
Meet dress, meet drink for such a rout!
The valiant Cochrane, by his side,
Sate, snappish, yet self satisfied,
In naval garb and northern pride.
Happy, happy, happy day!
None but the mob,
None but the mob,
None but the mob are fit to sway!
Cobbett, exalted high,
Amid that unwash’d train,
Roar’d lies and libels out amain;
Yet still he ’scapes the pillory,
And sells the sland’rous strain.
The King he first assail’d:
Gold, in this reign, he said, had fail’d
(For gold such patriots ever rail’d!)
Your flimsy notes, he cried, bely a King:
Old England was another thing,
When her great Monarch had a mint,
And stamp’d an image of himself, the money of the World!
The gaping mob admire the lofty sounds.
“Burdett and Bullion!” all the street rebounds:
With ravish’d ears
The Bar’net hears,
Affects to rouse
The Commons House,
And wake the torpid Peers.
The muse of Cobbett then extoll’d the drabs and rogues,
Whom Cold-bath prison disembogues:
From them the Bar’nets honours flow
Salt-box play, and whistle blow!
Deck’d with St. Giles’s graces,
They shew their greasy faces.
They come! stop, salt-box! whistle, cease to blow!
Cold-bath prison disembogues
Glorious food for discontent:
Any grievance is a treasure,
A patriot’s instrument and pleasure;
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
Sweet a charge in Parliament.
Swell’d with the puff, Sir Frank grew vain,
Spoke all his speeches o’er again,
And thrice he damned the Ministers, and thrice the war in Spain.
Cobbett[36] saw the madness rise,
His open mouth, his rolling eyes,
And, while he heaven and earth defied,
Chang’d the tune, and check’d his pride.
He chose an awkward story,
To damp his blazing glory:
He sang this chief, so fond of pow’r,
With notable disgrace,
Taken, taken, taken, taken,
Taken by the Speaker’s mace,
And caged within the Tower:
Afraid at his return to meet
Th’ expectant rabble in the street,
He skulks incog to Piccadilly――
Did ever patriot look so silly?
Long, long, and longer grows the hero’s face:
He meditates, in sullen mood,
On fickle popularity:
He’d blush, if blush reformer could,
And lets the toast go by!
* * * * *
The remainder of this parody refers to political events of little
interest to modern readers.
It is taken from _Posthumous Parodies_, an anonymous collection of
poems having a strong Tory bias, published in London by John Miller,
1814.
――――
COMMEMORATION DAY.
Commemoration day: a day devoted to prayers and _good living_, _i.e._,
feasting.
“_Who leads a good life is sure to live well._”――_Old Song._
The following Ode on a College Feast Day, will hardly be read with dry
_lips_, or _mouths_ that do not _water_. Whoever was the author of it,
he certainly appears to have been a man of taste.
I.
Hark! heard ye not yon footsteps dread,
That shook the hall with thund’ring tread?
With eager haste
The Fellows pass’d,[37]
Each intent on direful work,
High lifts his mighty blade, and points his deadly fork.
II.
But hark! the portals sound, and pacing forth,
With steps, alas, too slow,
The College GYPS, of high illustrious worth,
With all the dishes in long order, go.
In the midst a form divine,
Appears the fam’d sir-loin;
And soon, with plums and glory crown’d,
Almighty pudding sheds its sweets around.
Heard ye the din of dinner bray?
Knife to fork, and fork to knife;
Unnumber’d heroes, in the glorious strife,
Thro’ fish, flesh, pies, and puddings cut their destin’d way.
III.
See, beneath the mighty blade
Gor’d with many a ghastly wound,
Low the fam’d sir-loin is laid
And sinks in many a gulf profound.
Arise, arise, ye sons of glory,
Pies and puddings stand before ye;
See the ghosts of hungry bellies
Point at yonder stand of jellies;
While such dainties are beside ye,
Snatch the goods the gods provide ye;
Mighty rulers of this state,
Snatch before it is too late;
For, swift as thought, the puddings, jellies, pies,
Contract their giant bulks, and shrink to pigmy size.
IV.
From the table now retreating
All around the fire they meet,
And with wine, the sons of eating,
Crown at length their mighty treat;
Triumphant Plenty’s rosy graces
Sparkle in their jolly faces;
And mirth and cheerfulness are seen
In each countenance serene.
Fill high the sparkling glass,
And drink th’ accustom’d toast;[38]
Drink deep ye mighty host
And let the bottle pass.
Begin, begin the jovial strain,
Fill, fill the mystic bowl,
And drink, and drink, and drink again;
For drinking fires the soul.
But soon, too soon, with one accord, they reel
Each on his seat begins to nod;
All conquering Bacchus’ pow’r they feel,
And pour libations to the jolly god.
At length, with dinner, and with wine, oppress’d,
Down in the chairs they sink, and give themselves to rest.
From _The Gradus ad Cantabrigiam_. By a Brace of Cantabs. London.
Printed for John Hearne, 1824. It had previously appeared in _The
Spirit of the Public Journals for 1799_. London, 1800.
――――
ODE TO A WRANGLER’S SPREAD.
’Twas at the roaring feast for _Wrangler_ won,
By Wiggin’s tipsy son,
As high in lofty state,
That classic Hero sate
A music stool upon.
The large eyed Lucy by his side
Blush’d like a codling, Autumn’s pride;――
And spirits; fit to stem the tide
Of Fortune’s current rough,
Alike her frailties to deride,
Or for her many dangers tried,
Still ne’er to cry “Enough!”
Throng’d round the Hero as he gave
The toast in liquor brave,
And by his ruling nod
Rous’d the huzzas of gladness
O’er the blue devils sadness,
Waking the drowsy God,
That slumber’d in the soul of each,
To Wine, to Jollity, and Speech.
* * * * *
From _The Cambridge Odes_, by Peter Persius. Cambridge W. H. Smith. No
date.
――――
THE KENNINGTON COMMON REVOLUTION.
’Twas on the Common of famed Kennington,
Reynolds (old Reynolds’ son),
Aloft in mimic state,
Upon a waggon sate――
The driving box his throne.
The idle riff-raff stood around,
Some of their brows――for recent fractures――bound
(So theft and mischief should be crowned).
The Chartist, Williams, by his side,
With envy his position eyed,
As if for chairmanship he sighed.
Precious, precious pair!
None but the brave,
None but the brave
Deserve the chair!
Young Reynolds, placed on high,
Produces half a quire
Of correspondence, which, without desire,
He reads, in notes that reach the sky,
And shouts of “Hear!” inspire.
Note one――bid Sir George Grey,
Before a certain day,
Leave Ministerial sway,
And send the reins of power, straight from his hand,
To Mister Reynolds, somewhere in the Strand;
When he, of the said reins possessed,
Would guide the State himself, in style the very best.
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound;
“A plucky chap this here,!” they shout around,
And dabs of mud against the van rebound.
With lengthened ears
Young Reynolds hears,
And thinks, with joy,
“Yes I’m the boy
That means to shake the spheres.!”
Praise of the French he next in glowing accents sung――
French Freedom――very fair, but very young.
But a poor baker’s cart there comes:
With their fingers and their thumbs,
The mob to their disgrace,
(Blush every honest face!)
Would fain have stole the bread――the crusts, the crumbs!
Freedom, very, very, young,
Surely never did ordain
Making baker’s carts a treasure,
Robbing their contents at pleasure――
Pleasure to the owners’ pain.
To their disgust, the very rain,
Resolved such conduct to restrain,
Came down as if to say――“You shan’t do that again.”
Young Reynolds saw the vast supplies
Of rain pour down before his eyes.
While he the Government defied,
Away he saw the meeting glide
He chose a wilder strain
To bring them back again.
He spoke of France, so great and good;
Of Louis-Philippe’s fate,
Fall’n, fall’n, fall’n, fall’n;
From his high estate,
And flying with his brood.
Deserted at his utmost need
By those who on corruption feed,
From his own realm in fear he flies,
To England turns his anxious eyes,
Still, in the rain, young Reynolds boldly sate,
Until there lingered scarce a soul;
The wet had cleared the ground below,
And down the van he gently stole
Thinking――he’d better go.
_Punch_, 1848.
This refers to a meeting held at Kennington in connection with the
Chartist agitation, when certain reforms were demanded, which were
then ridiculed as revolutionary, but which have since either been
granted, or else have come within the scope of practical political
discussion.
――――
JOSH HUDSON’S FEAST.
’Twas at the dinner given, the prime tuck-out,
By Josh, the boxer stout:
Aloft the worthy sat,
His corpus lin’d with fat,
And, pleas’d, he gaz’d about:
His jovial pals were plac’d around,
For fancy feats and milling deeds renown’d,
And for their fistic worth with glory crown’d.
His blooming missus by his side,
Smok’d like a hock of bacon fried,
In glow of health and beauty’s pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair,
None but the fat,
None but the fat,
None but the fat deserves the fair.
Jack Fogo, placed on high
Amid the tuneful quire,
Touch’d with his fives the laureate lyre;
The sounds discordant reach’d the sky,
And set their souls on fire.
Of law he curs’d the rod
That sent fat Josh to quod.
And swore it was too bad, by G――――!
But now at length from durance vile releas’d,
With spirit buoyant and in flesh increas’d,
He took his seat that happy day the father of the feast.
The list’ning coves admir’d the lofty sound,
Jolly Josh Hudson’s health they shout around,
“The John Bull fighter” all the roofs rebound:
With ravish’d ears
The fat one hears,
Swore it was odd
He went to quod.
And drank their health with cheers.
The praise of prime old Tom then Fogo sung,
A liquor always dear to old and young.
Let a dram our dinner crown,
To keep the beef and pudding down.
Waiter, ’tis Josh’s pleasure,
You bring in a gallon measure,
The very best and strongest in the town.
Spirit ever bright and clear!
Who from drinking can refrain?
Who can censure without blushing
The joy, the extacy of lushing?
Rich the treasure,
Sweet the pleasure,
To imbibe a cordial drain.
Pleas’d with its praise fat Josh grew vain,
Fought all his battles o’er again,
And swore his max was very prime, and better than champagne.
Jack Fogo saw his madness rise,
His rosy snout, his staring eyes;
And to subdue his furious fit,
Swore he would bring him down a bit.
He sung a mournful ditty
To rouse fat Josh’s pity:
He sung of Gyblett’s, boxer prime!
By law’s relentless rule
Sent to stonejug, and doom’d from thence
To cross the herring pool.
Deserted, in his utmost need,
By all the traps his bounty fed
Deprived of max, depriv’d of shag,
Without a friend, without a mag.
With downcast look the John Bull fighter sate,
And gaz’d upon the tuneful bard:
“Alack! for Charles, my friend,” cried he;
“What! must he go across the sea?
’Tis gallows, gallows hard!”
But Frosty Fogo’s powers began to fail;
The sounds he tried to vent
Within his throat were pent,
Subdu’d by max, and heavy wet, and ale.
He, who on eagle’s wing
Was wont sublime to soar
In fruitless effort still to sing,
Pitch’d headlong on the floor!
――――
In November 1884 Mr. Alexander Henderson produced a new comic opera at
the Comedy Theatre, London, entitled _The Great Mogul_. In this piece
Miss Florence St. John had to appear with live snakes writhing about
her, an innovation which was not appreciated by the audience, whilst
the songs written by H. B. Farnie, were received with derision.
Although the house was packed with the friends of the Lessee, on the
opening night (for no money was taken at the doors) the opera met with
a very cool reception, and the following parody appeared in _The
Referee_ on November 23, 1884:
ALEXANDER’S FIRST.
(_With apologies to the late Ingenious Mr. Dryden._)
’Twas at the Royal Comedy (where none
But friends of Hender_son_
Were let to pass the gate
On first night held in state)
This week A. H. got “done.”
The folks therein on Monday found
Had had free passes to that spot renowned
(There was no money’s jingling sound).
The gentle Farnie stood aside,
And all the preparations eyed
With all a mighty author’s pride.
And then they cried――that peerless pair
“None but our friends,
None but our friends,
Shall see _our_ first nights, we declare.”
Van Biene, placed on high,
Amid his tuneful quire
(All wearing swallow-tail attire)
’Gan wave his bâton by-and-by
His comrades to inspire.
Anon commenced to play
(A comic opera, let me say,
Penned some time back in Paris gay),
And first the “house” did to applause give vent,
As up the curtain went.
Stalls, boxes, pit, and gallery soon expressed
Their joy when Florence entered sweetly dressed.
She charmed them by her voice’s flute-like sound;
But later, on the crawling snakes they frowned,――
_That_ exhibition they disgusting found.
Their whispered sneer
Did Alec hear.
But like a god,
Assumed to nod
As though he felt no fear.
The praises of pale ale anon the chords sung.
But, strange to say, no sounds of “Encore!” rung.
When Leslie through his teeth ’gan hum
His pretty air――it worried some.
The Song too of the “Steak”
Did not applause awake.
That lyric, like the rest, in rhythm was so rum.
For Farnie to the wings had flung
All rules for writing verse ’twas plain,
Mostly halting was his measure;
(Let him mend it, at his leisure).
When a measure
Gives no pleasure
It is apt to give you pain!
The company worked hard, in vain,
But dull and duller grew the strain,
And no finale was a “go”――no, weaker did it wane.
Then Alec heard the hiss arise
Among the “friends” he used to prize.
Even the Jingo gags they guyed
And H. B. Farnie did deride.
A most unequal muse
Had Audran stooped to choose.
Then Alexander, great and good,
Began his teeth to grate――
Galling, galling, galling, galling,
Galling was his sorry state,
Dismayed, abashed, he stood,
Deserted all at once was he
By those whom he admitted free,
“What! hissed by deadheads!” Alec cried;
“What, by my own packed house defied!”
Then D’Albertson, the smart and the sedate
(With rich moustache with curlèd ends),
Said Farnie could not take a call――
“Yah! we don’t want him!” cried the “friends”――
“Ugh! good job too!” did others bawl.
* * * * *
“Revenge!” great Alexander cries;
Hear the hisses that arise!
E’en the snakes, they ne’er cheered;
At most “numbers” they jeered.
This ingratitude gives me surprise;
Such cheek from _my_ band
I cannot understand――
I have used them on first nights again and again
But the ads shall remain
In their first-arranged vein.
I will show all this crew
That I know what to do,
Though they serve me like this, and thus dare to express
_An opinion_, I’ll show I can fight against odds――
I’ll defy all these treacherous pittites and “gods”――
Go, announce it at once: “An Enormous Success!”
* * * * *
Not long ago
(Ere Henderson received this blow)
I ventured to dispute
That A. in this respect was ’cute.
I struck my lyre
And told him that this dodge few people could admire
At last, you see, to spoil his game,
His dead-head “friends” rise up to blame;
Henceforth, perhaps, he’ll try this trick no more,
But warned by Monday’s gruesome sounds,
Will run his premières upon proper grounds,
And do as others do――take money at the door.
So henceforth, Alec, wisdom try――
Don’t on the Public frown;
A failure, e’en when “friends” _don’t_ guy,
Will never draw the town
CARADOS.
――――
LINES PRINTED UNDER THE ENGRAVED PORTRAIT OF JOHN MILTON.
(_In Tonson’s Folio Edition of “Paradise Lost,” 1688._)
Three poets, in three distant ages born,
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn.
The first in loftiness of thought surpassed,
The next in majesty, in both the last.
The force of Nature could no further go;
To make a third she joined the former two.
Mr. Malone suggested that the idea of these lines was borrowed by
Dryden from Salvaggi’s Latin distich:――
“_Græcia, Mæonidem, jactet sibi Roma Maronem,
Anglia Miltonum jactat utrique parem._”
But in a little work, printed in 1676, entitled “Anima Astrologia,” a
verse occurs which bears a much nearer resemblance to Dryden’s
epigram:――
“Let envy burst; Urania’s glad to see
Her sons thus joined in a triplicity;
To Cardan and to Guido much is due,
And in one Lilly we behold the two.”
These lines allude to Jerome Cardan, the Astrologer (1501-1576), to
William Lilly, also an Astrologer (1602-1681), and to Ubaldo Guido, an
Italian Mathematician (1540-1601). Dryden was a firm believer in
astrology, and as he must, in all probability, have been well
acquainted with this book, it is probable these lines were in his mind
when he composed his own more polished epigram.
On page 233, Vol. 2, of this Collection, a number of parodies of the
Epigram will be found, but the following imitations were accidentally
omitted.
ON HYPATIA. MADAME AGNESI, AND MRS. SOMERVILLE.
“Three women, in three different ages born,
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn;
Rare as poetic minds of master flights,
Three only rose to science’ loftiest heights.
The first a brutal crowd in pieces tore,
Envious of fame, bewildered at her lore;
The next through tints of darkening shadow passed,
Lost in the azure sisterhood at last;
Equal to these the third, and happier far,
Cheerful though wise, though learned, popular,
Liked by the many, valued by the few,
Instructs the world, yet dubbed by none a Blue.”
There is a little confusion in these lines, both Madame Agnesi and
Mrs. Somerville were born in the same “age” if by that _century_ is
meant, and although Hypatia talked Greek she was an Egyptian, whilst
Mrs. Somerville was not English at all, having been born in Scotland.
Hypatia, a female philosopher in Alexandria, was brutally murdered by
an ignorant mob; Madame Agnesi, an Italian lady of great scientific
attainments, died a _Blue_ Nun in a convent at Milan in 1799. Mrs.
Mary Somerville wrote several scientific books, of which perhaps the
best known was “The Connection of the Physical Sciences.”
Three Richards lived in Brunswick’s glorious reign,
In Westminster the first[39], the next in Warwick Lane[40],
In Dumbleton the third[41], each doughty knight,
In spite of nature, was resolved to write.
The first in penury of thought surpassed,
The next in rambling cant; in both the last.
The force of dulness could no further go,
To make the third she joined the former two.
By Dr. James Drake, then an Undergrad of St. John’s College,
Cambridge, printed in _Anonymiana_, 1809.
――――
Biographies of John Dryden are so numerous and accessible that it is
unnecessary here to discuss the weak points of his character. To use
the mildest language possible, he was a time-server, a turncoat, and a
court sycophant. He had written in praise of Oliver Cromwell, he wrote
equally laudatory verses on Charles II., he had strongly defended the
Protestant religion, yet within a twelvemonth of the accession of the
Catholic James II. the following entry appeared in Evelyn’s Diary,
January 19, 1686: “Dryden, the famous play writer, and his two sons,
and Mrs. Nelly (Miss to the late King) were said to go to mass; such
proselytes were no great loss to the Church.” His conversion brought
him Court patronage, and in April 1687 he published a defence of his
new religion in verse, entitled “_The Hind and the Panther_.” This was
a long allegorical poem in which the Hind represented the Catholic
Church, and the Panther the Protestant Church of England. It gave rise
to much controversy, and many burlesques were written upon it,
ridiculing the work, and the character of its author. The most famous
of these parodies was one of exquisite humour, the joint production of
Charles Montague (the future Earl of Halifax) and Matthew Prior. This
was called “The Hind and the Panther Transversed to the story of the
Country Mouse and the City Mouse.” The principal characters in the
famous farce _The Rehearsal_, Bayes, Smith, and Johnson, were revived
in this witty production, which is unfortunately much too long to
reprint. Dryden’s poem commences:――
A milk white Hind, immortal and unchanged,
Fed on the lawns, and in the forest ranged;
Without, unspotted, innocent within,
She feared no danger, for she knew no sin.
Yet had she oft been chased with horns and hounds,
And Scythian shafts, and many winged wounds
Aimed at her heart; was often forced to fly,
And doomed to death, though fated not to die.
The first lines of the parody are:――
A milk-white Mouse immortal and unchanged,
Fed on soft cheese, and o’er the Dairy ranged
Without, unspotted; innocent within,
She feared no Danger, for she knew no gin.
Yet had she oft been scor’d by bloody claws
Of winged owls, and stern Grimalkin’s Paws
Aim’d at her destin’d Head, which made her fly,
Tho’ she was doomed to death, and fated not to die.
* * * * *
[Illustration]
ALEXANDER POPE.
BORN May 21, 1688. | DIED May 30, 1744.
Dryden’s Odes for St. Cecilia’s Day have already been mentioned, and
in 1708 Pope was also induced, by Richard Steele, to write an ode for
the annual festival. This is acknowledged to be the finest poem of its
kind that had appeared since Dryden’s odes were produced. In fact, as
Pope himself said, “Many people would like my ode on music better if
Dryden had never written on that subject. It was at the request of Mr.
Steele that I wrote mine; and not with any thought of rivalling that
great man, whose memory I do, and have always reverenced.”
Pope chose the mythological story of Orpheus and Eurydice as the theme
for his ode; it is too long to quote in full, but the first verse, and
last quatrain, will serve as key notes for the parodies which follow.
ODE FOR ST. CECILIA’S DAY.
Descend ye Nine! descend and sing;
The breathing instruments inspire,
Wake into voice each silent string,
And sweep the sounding lyre!
In a sadly pleasing strain
Let the warbling lute complain:
Let the loud trumpet sound,
Till the roofs all around
The shrill echoes rebound;
While, in more lengthen’d notes and slow,
The deep, majestic, solemn organs blow.
Hark! the numbers soft and clear
Gently steal upon the ear;
Now louder, and yet louder rise,
And fill with spreading sounds the skies;
Exulting in triumph now swell the bold notes,
In broken air, trembling, the wild music floats;
Till, by degrees, remote and small,
The strains decay,
And melt away,
In a dying, dying fall.
* * * * *
Of Orpheus now no more let poets tell,
To bright Cecilia greater power is given,
His numbers raised a shade from hell,
Hers lift the soul to heaven.
ALEXANDER POPE.
――――
AN ODE TO TOAST-MASTER TOOLE.[42]
“Descend, ye Nine!”
No common theme is mine――
I sing of thee, O Toole!
Bacchus baptised thee in a font of wine,
And from the roseate pool
Thy face received the sunny tint it wears,
And thus illumed (blest face!) a thousand “chairs.”
Who, that hath heard poor Charity’s appeal
And nobly paid a guinea for a meal
(Where soup and fish
And every new-made dish,
Just verged upon the cold;
Or else the _very_ tough, or _very_ old――
Except the tepid salad, which appear’d
Fresh gather’d from the hot-bed where ’twas rear’d),
Can e’er forget, O Toole! thy coat of blue
With dazzling metal buttons spangled o’er――
The yard of broad black ribbon, whereunto
Appends the eye-glass thro’ which thou dost pore
Over the list of toasts, ere thou dost bawl
With such stentorian lungs,
That we opine the walls of old Guildhall
Are each endowèd with a thousand tongues――
“Silence!” To hear that Patagonian shout
Is to obey.
The hand that’s in the act of pouring out
Is forced to stay――
“Non Nobis!!!” The greediest crammer
Deserts his plate, roused by thy voice and hammer.
* * * * *
The buzz of bottle-drawing’s at its height;
Brown takes wine with Smith, and Briggs with Bright,
Hark! To that thunder, eloquent o’er all――
Toole! ’tis thy call.
Of “Silence if you please――order for the chair!”
As with an exquisite and finished air,
(Worthy of――Widdicomb, when he essays
To fix some shilling-gallery beauty’s gaze),
You wave your paper _bâton_ o’er the head
Of him who, like Olympian Jove, is seated there,
And guides _your_ voice the thunder of the “Chair!”
Who ne’er,――when public dinner port began
To, Circe-wise, transmogrify the man,
Hath found the rising hiccup downward driven,
When, Toole! thy lungs this glorious toast have given――
“The Queen, with three times three!
“Hip, hip, hurrah!――Silence for a glee!”
* * * * *
Farewell, thou King of Sentiment and Toast!
Long may’st thou rule the roast
At philanthropic and at civic dinner!
Long may Lachesis (that old maiden spinner)
Keep thy thread going, and long may we
Hear you declare
“Silence in the Chair!
Messrs. Hobbs, Dobbs, Snobbs, will ’blige you with a glee.”
_Punch_, November, 1843.
――――
ODE ON ST. CECILIA’S DAY.
(_A long way after Pope._)
Descend, great Bunn!――descend and bring
A furnace of poetic fire;
Nib fifty pens, and take your fling,
Boldly of foolscap fill a quire.
In a namby-pamby strain,
Let the tenor first complain;
Let the falsetto sound,
With nasal twang around,
’Till in applause ’tis drown’d.
Then in more ponderous notes and slow,
Let the deep bass go down, extremely low.
Hark the shrill soprano near
Bursts upon the startled ear!
Higher and higher does she rise,
And fills with awful screams the flies,
By straining and shrieking she reaches the notes,
Out of tune, out of time too, the wild music floats;
Till by degrees the vigorous bawl,
Seems to decay,
And melts away
In a feeble, feeble squall.
In music there’s a medium, you know;
Don’t sing too high, nor sink too low.
If in a house tumultuous rows arise,
Music to drown the noise the means supplies;
Or when the housemaid, pressed with cares,
To yonder public-house repairs,
Some gallant soldier, fired by music’s sound
Will order pints of half-and-half all round.
John the footman nods his head,
Swears he’ll not go home to bed;
In his arms a partner takes,
As some courteous speech he makes;
And suddenly the joyous pair engage
In giddy Waltz or Polka, now the rage.
But when the violin puts forth its charms,
How the sweet music every bosom warms:
So when the dilettante dared the squeeze,
To hear of Jenny Lind the opening strain,
And in the rush serenely sees
His best coat torn in twain,
Transported simpletons stood round,
And men grew spooneys at the sound,
Roaring with all their wind;
Each one his power of lung displayed
In bawling to the Swedish Maid
While cheers from box to pit resound
For Lind, for Lind, for Lind!
But when through those mysterious bounds
Where the policeman goes his rounds,
The poet had by chance been led
Mid the coal-hole, festive shed,
What sounds were heard,
What scenes appeared,
How horrible the din!
Toasted cheese
If you please.
Waiter――stop!
Mutton-chop.
Hollo! Jones,
Devilled bones;
And cries for rum or gin!
But hark! the chairman near the fire
Strikes on the table, to require
Strict silence for a song.
Thy tongue, O waiter, now keep still;
Bring neither glass, nor go, nor gill;
The pause will not be long.
The guests are mute as if upon their beds;
Their hair uncurl’d hangs from their listening heads.
By the verses as they flow,
By their meaning nothing though,
Full of tropes and flowers;
By those lofty rhymes that dwell
In the mind of Bunn[43] so well,
Like love in Paphian bowers.
By the lines that he has made,
Working at the poet’s trade――
By the “marble halls” so smart,
By “other lips” and “Woman’s heart,”
True poetry at once restore, restore,
Or don’t let Bunn, at least, write any more!
But soon, too soon, poor music shuts her eyes;
Again she falls――again she dies, she dies.
How will she now once more attempt to thrive?
Ah! Jullien[44] comes to keep her still alive.
Now with his British Army
Quadrille, so bright and balmy,
Or with four bands meeting,
Two men a large drum beating,
He gives the tone
Of dying groan,
Or soldier’s moan,
When at his post
His life is in the battle lost.
With five bands surrounded,
Is Jullien confounded?
No! onwards he goes,
And his arms about he throws.
See: wild as a wild duck the bâton he plies;
Ah! down in the chair he drops, closing his eyes.
My eyes! He dies!
He comes to life――for Jullien all have sung;
The name of Jullien is on every tongue.
The boxes and the pit,
Both they who stand and sit;
With Jullien’s name the entire house has rung.
Music the greatest brute can charm,
And savage natures will disarm.
Music can find luxurious ease,
Making what bargain it may please.
A salary it can improve
To any sum that it may love.
This the delightful Lind has found,
And to the tune of fifteen thousand pound.
When the full house enjoys the Swedish bird,
E’en Fashion deigns to lend its ear,
So eager ’t is to catch each little word,
That were a pin to drop it must be heard;
And people come from far as well as near!
Of Orpheus now no more let poets tell,
For Jenny Lind may boast with greater reason:
His numbers he for gold could never sell――
She makes her fortune in a season!
From _George Cruikshank’s Comic Almanack for 1848_.
――――:o:――――
In 1749 Bonnell Thornton published a humorous burlesque upon the
Cecilian odes, under the title of “An Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day,
adapted to the Ancient British Musick,” which is said to have been set
to music with characteristic accompaniments by Dr. Arne, and performed
on the Saint’s day, November 22, 1749. This appears somewhat doubtful,
it was however set to music in 1759 by Dr. Burney, who has left the
following account of his work and its performance: “In 1759 I set for
Smart and Newbery, Thornton’s Burlesque Ode on St. Cecilia’s Day. It
was performed at Ranelagh in masks, to a very crowded audience, as I
was told, for I then resided in Norfolk. Beard sang the Salt-box song,
which was admirably accompanied on that instrument by Brent, the
fencing master, and father of Miss Brent, the celebrated singer;
Skeggs on the broomstick as bassoon, and a remarkable performer on the
Jew’s Harp, ‘Buzzing twangs the iron lyre.’ Cleavers were cast in bell
metal for this entertainment. All the performers of the Old Woman’s
oratory, employed by Foote, were, I believe, employed at Ranelagh on
this occasion.”
Boswell mentions that Dr. Johnson was much diverted with the humour of
this ode.
AN ODE ON SAINT CECILIA’S DAY.
Adapted to the Antient British Musick: viz. The _Salt-Box_, the _Jew’s
Harp_, the _Marrow-Bones_ and _Cleavers_, the _Hum-Strum_ or _Hurdy
Gurdy_, etc.
With an introduction, giving some account of these truly British
Instruments.
By BONNELL THORNTON, Esquire.
The Preface, which is too long to quote in full, concludes with the
following remarks. “If this Ode contributes in the least to lessen our
false taste in admiring that foreign Musick now so much in vogue, and
to recall the ancient British spirit, together with the ancient
British harmony, I shall not think the pains I employed on the
composition entirely flung away on my countrymen. This Ode, I am
sensible, is not without faults; though I cannot help thinking it far
superior to the odes of Johnny Dryden, Joe Addison, Sawney Pope, Nick
Rowe, little Kit Smart, etc, etc, etc, or of any that have written, or
shall write on St. Cecilia’s day.”
“I have strictly adhered to the rule of making _the sound echo to the
sense_.”
AN ODE ON SAINT CECILIA’S DAY.
OVERTURE.
_Recitative._
Be dumb, be dumb, ye inharmonious Sounds,
And Musick, that th’ astonish’d Ear with Discord wounds:
No more let common Rhymes profane the Day.
_Grand Chorus._
Grac’d with divine Cecilia’s Name;
Let solemn Hymns this awful Feast proclaim,
And heav’nly Notes conspire to raise the heavn’ly Lay.
_Recitative._
The meaner melody we scorn,
Which vulgar instruments afford;
Shrill flute, sharp fiddle, bellowing horn,
Rumbling Bassoon, or tinkling Harpischord.
_Air._
In strains more exalted the Salt-box shall join,
And Clattering, and Battering, and Clapping combine;
With a Rap and a Tap while the hollow Side sounds,
Up and down leaps the Flap, and with Rattling rebounds.
_Recitative._
Strike, strike the soft Judaic Harp,
Soft and sharp,
By Teeth coercive in firm Durance kept,
And lightly by the volant Finger swept.
_Air._
Buzzing twangs the Iron Lyre,
Shrilly Thrilling,
Trembling, trilling,
Whizzing with the wavering wire.
A GRAND SYMPHONY.
_Accompanied with Marrow Bones and Cleavers._
_Air._
Hark, how the Banging Marrow-Bones
Make Clanging Cleavers ring,
With a Ding Dong, Ding Dong,
Ding Dong, Ding Dong,
Ding Dong, Ding Dong, Ding Dong, Ding.
Raise your uplifted arms on high;
In long-prolonged tones
Let Cleavers sound
A merry merry round
By Banging Marrow-Bones.
_Full Chorus_
(Repeat the above verse.)
_Recitative_
Cease lighter Numbers: Hither bring
The undulating String
Stretch’d out, and to the tumid Bladder
In amity harmonious bound;
Then deeper swell the notes and sadder,
And let the hoarse Base slowly solemn sound.
_Air._
With dead, dull, doleful Hums,
With mournful moans,
And grievous groans,
The sober Hurdy-Gurdy thrums.
PART II.
_Recitative._
With majick sounds, like these, did Orpheus’ lyre,
Motion, Sense, and Life inspire;
When, as he play’d, the list’ning flood
Still’d its loquacious waves, and silent stood;
The Trees swift-bounding danc’d with loosen’d stumps,
And sluggish stones caper’d in active jumps.
_Air._
Each ruddy-breasted Robin
The concert bore a Bob in,
And ev’ry hooting Owl around;
The croaking Frogs,
The grunting Hogs,
All, all conspir’d to raise th’ enliv’ning Sound.
_Recitative._
Now to Cecilia, heav’nly maid,
Your loud united voices raise:
With solemn hymns to celebrate her Praise,
Each instrument shall lend it’s aid.
The Salt Box with clattering and clapping shall sound,
The Iron lyre
Buzzing twang with wav’ring wire,
With heavy hum
The Sober Hurdy-Gurdy thrum,
And the Merry Merry Marrow-Bones ring round.
_Last Grand Chorus._
Such matchless strains Cecilia knew,
When audience from their heavenly sphere,
By Harmony’s Strong Power, she drew,
Whilst list’ning angels gladly stoop’d to hear.
BONNELL THORNTON, 1749.
――――:o:――――
MOCK HEROIC POEMS.
Numerous imitations exist of Pope’s _Dunciad_, and the poets of the
last century, and the early years of this, exercised considerable
ingenuity in ringing the changes on the title, as will be seen from
the following list. It must not, however, be concluded that the works
mentioned are all _parodies_, except in the cases where the opening
lines are quoted. One of the most scholarly of these productions was
“_The Scribleriad_,” written by Richard Owen Cambridge, and published
in 1751. In his preface he mentions Boileau’s _Lutrin_, Garth’s
_Dispensary_, and Pope’s _Rape of the Lock_ and _Dunciad_, each of
which, he considers, have a thousand beauties, but neither of which
comes up to the true idea of a Mock-Heroic Poem. In fact he does not
believe it was the _primary idea_ of either of the authors to write a
Mock-Heroic, whereas that was the task he set himself in composing The
_Scribleriad_. He gives the following apposite remarks on _Parody_:――
“The Athenians were so fond of Parody, that they eagerly
applauded it, without examining with what propriety or
connection it was introduced. _Aristophanes_ showed no sort
of regard to either, in his ridicule of Euripides; but
brings in the characters as well as verses of his tragedies,
in many of his plays, though they have no connection with
the plot of the play, nor any relation to the scene in which
they are introduced. This love of Parody is accounted for by
an excellent French critic, from a certain malignity in
mankind, which prompts them to laugh at what they most
esteem, thinking they, in some measure, repay themselves for
that involuntary tribute which is exacted from them by
merit.”
_The Baviad_, a paraphrastic imitation of the First satire of Persius,
by William Gifford. London, 1794. This was written to ridicule a
certain _clique_ of self-admirationists known as the “Della-Cruscan
school,” and was very effectual in its object. It was followed by _The
Maeviad_, by the same author, which completed the work _The Baviad_
had commenced, and the spurious poetry of the Della-Cruscan school was
laughed out of existence. The footnotes to these satires are delicious
reading, as Gifford has selected the most amusing examples of bathos,
and inflated nonsense, from the poems of Anna Matilda, Merry, Parsons,
Jerningham, Bell, Mrs. Robinson, and Della-Crusca, to illustrate his
points.
_The Beeriad_, or Progress of Drink. An Heroic Poem, in Two Cantos,
the first being an imitation of _The Dunciad_, the second a
description of a _Ram Feast_, held annually in a particular small
district of Hampshire. By a Gentleman in the Navy. Gosport. J.
Philpot. 1736.
The first canto of this poem is printed side by side with a reprint of
the first book of Pope’s Dunciad.
_The Beeriad_ commences thus:――
Beer and the men (a mighty theme!) I sing,
Who to their mouths the brimming Pitcher bring.
Say Sons of midnight! (since yourselves inspire,
This drunken Work; so Jove and Drink require!)
Say from what cause, in vain unquench’d the Thirst,
Still reigns to-day as potent as at first.
In eldest time ere mortals were so dry,
E’er Bacchus issued from the Thund’rer’s Thigh,
Strong Drink o’er some possess’d its native right,――
Lord of delusion, Sov’raign of the Night.
* * * * *
_The Billiad_, or how to criticise, a satire, with the Dirge of the
Repeal (of the Irish Union) and other Jeux d’Esprit. By T. M. Hughes.
Illustrated. 1846.
_The Blueviad_, a Satirical Poem, by E. Goulburn, Royal Horse Guards.
London, 1805.
The author remarks, “The following ridiculous lines contain the
description of some characters that once formed a Regiment of
Volunteers.”
_The Burniad_; an Epistle to a Lady, in the manner of Burns, with
Poetic Miscellanies, by J. H. Kenny. 1808.
_The Consuliad. A Mock Heroic Poem_, by Thomas Chatterton. This short
poem is to be found amongst the works of the poor Bristol boy, he sold
it to a Mr. Fell for ten shillings and sixpence at the time when he
was slowly starving to death in London. It commenced thus:――
Of roaring constables and battles dire,
Of geese uneaten, muse, awake the lyre!
Where Campbell’s chimneys overlook the square,
And Newton’s future prospects hang in air;
Where counsellors dispute, and cockers match,
And Caledonian earls in concert scratch,――
A group of heroes occupied the round,
Long in the rolls of infamy renown’d.
Circling the table, all in silence sat,
Now tearing bloody lean, now champing fat;
Now picking ortolans and chickens, slain
To form the whimsies of an _à la reine_:
Now storming castles of the newest taste,
And granting articles to forts of paste;
Now swallowing bitter draughts of Prussian beer;
Now sucking tallow of salubrious deer.
The god of Cabinets and senates saw
His sons, like asses, to one centre draw.
* * * * *
There are passages in this satire of surprising power and originality
for the work of a boy of seventeen years of age.
_The Censoriad_, a Poem, written originally by Martin Gulliver,
illustrated with curious annotations. 1730.
_The Chessiad_, by C. Dibden the Younger. With other poems, by the
same author, 1825.
_The Christiad_, a sacred heroic poem, translated by Cranwell from
Vida. No date.
_The Dapiad_, a mock-heroic poem, by J. Randall. Barnstaple: printed
by J. Avery, 1806.
_The Diaboliad_, a Poem dedicated to the Worst Man in His Majesty’s
Dominions. London. G. Kearsley, 1677. The date given is evidently a
misprint for 1777, as David Garrick, who is named in the Preface, was
not born until 1716. This work has been ascribed to Combe.
_Anti-Diabo-Lady._ Respectfully dedicated to all the Women in Her
Majesty’s Dominions in general; and to the Best of Them in Particular,
calculated to expose the Malevolence of the Author of Diabo-Lady.
London, 1777. Quarto 18 pp. (A satire in verse.)
_The Dispensary._ A poem in six Cantos, by Sir Samuel Garth. London,
1696.
_The Druriad_, or Strictures on the principal performers of Drury Lane
Theatre. A Satirical Poem. Quarto. 1798.
_The Electriad_: A Tale of the Trojan War. “Homer down to Date,” by a
G. O. M. London. The Pall Mall Electric Association. About 1885. Price
sixpence. This anonymous advertising pamphlet was illustrated with
portraits of the most eminent men of the day, represented as suffering
from various ailments, and
Within his tent Achilles sat and swore;
With pain the hero’s face was sicklied o’er,
Gout in his feet, neuralgia in his jaws,
Too weak, alas, to fight for Grecian cause;
Bronchitis, rheumatism, lungs and liver,
Hurried him fast towards the Stygian river.
* * * * *
_The Fijiad_, or English Nights Entertainments, by an author of _The
Siliad_. Beeton’s Fifteenth Christmas Annual. Illustrated. London:
Ward, Lock, and Tyler.
_The Fribbleriad._ This was first printed in 1761, and was afterwards
included in _The Repository_, vol. 2. It was addressed to a certain
individual “X. Y. Z.,” who had been guilty of publishing an Essay
containing an unfavourable criticism of David Garrick.
Who is the scribbler X. Y. Z.?
Who still writes on, though little read?
Whose falsehood, malice, envy, spite,
So often grin, yet seldom bite?
Say, Garrick, does he write for bread,
This _friend_ of yours, this X. Y. Z.?
For pleasure sure, not bread――’twere vain
To write for that he ne’er could gain.
* * * * *
_The Female Dunciad_, containing:――I. A Faithful account of the
Intrigues, Gallantries, and Amours of Alexander Pope, of Twickenham,
Esq., written by Himself. II. A Satire upon the Court Lords and
Ladies. Written also by him in the year 1717. III. A Single Instance
of his Repentance. IV. The New Surprising Metamorphosis; or, Mr. Pope
turn’d into a Stinging Nettle; being a Familiar Epistle from a
Gentleman in Town to a Lady in the Country. Occasioned by reading the
Dunciad. V. Irish Artifice; or, the History of Clarina. A Novel, by
Mrs. Eliza Haywood. VI. Female Worthies, by the Bishop of
Peterborough. The whole being a Continuation of the Twickenham
Hotch-Potch. London. T. Read, White-Fryers. 1728.
_The Hilliad_: an Epic Poem by Christopher Smart, A.M., Fellow of
Pembroke Hall, Cambridge. 1753. This was a satire on a certain Dr.
Hill, it commenced as follows:――
Thou God of Jest, who o’er th’ ambrosial bowl,
Giv’st joy to Jove, while laughter shakes the pole;
And thou, fair Justice, of immortal line,
Hear, and assist the poet’s grand design,
Who aims at triumphs by no common ways,
But on the stem of dulness grafts the bays.
O thou, whatever name delight thine ear.
Pimp! Poet! Puffer! ’Pothecary! Play’r!
Whose baseless fame by vanity is buoy’d,
Like the huge earth self-center’d in the void,
Accept one partner thy own worth t’explore,
And in thy praise be singular no more.
* * * * *
_The Lentiad_; or, _Peter the Pope_ and his Pioneers the Pusey men.
Together with Anti-Pentateuchal Prelates, Broad-church and
Balaam-ass-men, Pommelled and Pounded with a Hudibrastic cudgel.
_A Tale in Rhymes
Fit for the Times_,
By a Beefeater, domestic chaplain to Fill-pots. Edited by Rev. John
Allen. London: William Freeman, Fleet Street. 1863.
“John Chinaman, when fighting foes,
At times holds stink-pots to their nose,
For he believes――and he is right,
That when in this way he can fight,
And find thereby the battle won
His stink-pots are as good’s a gun.”
More than 400 closely-printed pages of similar fustian to this are
devoted to abuse of the Pope and his Church; coarse denunciations of
the High Church party, and the Puseyites, Bishop Colenso and his
works.
_The Lousiad_, an Heroi-Comic Poem, in five cantos. By Peter Pindar,
Esq. (Dr. John Wolcott.) The introduction to this satire runs as
follows: “It is necessary to inform thee, _Gentle Reader_, that His
Majesty (George III.) actually discovered, some time ago, as he sat at
table, a _louse_ on his plate. An edict was, in consequence, passed
for shaving the cooks, scullions, etc., and the unfortunate louse was
condemned to die.”
Such is the foundation of _The Lousiad_, of which the ingenious
author, who ought to be allowed to know somewhat of the matter, hath
been heard privately to declare, that, in his opinion, the
_Batrachomyomachia_ of Homer, the _Secchia Rapita_ of Tassoni, the
_Lutrin_ of Boileau, the _Dispensary_ of Garth, and the _Rape of the
Lock_ of Pope, are not to be compared to it.
The Louse I sing, who, from some head unknown,
Yet born and educated near a throne,
Dropped down――(so willed the dread decree of fate!)
With legs wide sprawling on the monarch’s plate:
Far from the raptures of a wife’s embrace,
Far from the gambols of a tender race,
Whose little feet he taught with care to tread
Amidst the wide dominions of the head;
Led them to daily food with fond delight,
And taught the tiny wanderers where to bite;
To hide, to run, advance, or turn their tails,
When hostile combs attacked, or vengeful nails:
Far from those pleasing scenes ordained to roam,
Like wise Ulysses, from his native home;
Yet like that sage, though forced to roam and mourn,
Like him, alas, not fated to return!
Who, full of rags and glory, saw his boy
And wife again, and dog that died for joy.
Down dropped the luckless _louse_ with fear appalled,
And wept his wife and children as he sprawled.
* * * * *
_The Mobiad_, or battle of the Voices: an Heroi-Comic Poem, sportively
satirical, being a briefly historical, natural and lively, free and
humorous description of an _Exeter Election_, by Democritus Juvenal
(A. Brice) with notes &c., Exeter, 1770.
_The Modern Dunciad_, a Satire; with notes, biographical and critical.
London. Effingham Wilson, 1814. With a frontispiece by George
Cruikshank. This anonymous work, written in imitation of the first
satire of Persius, was devoted to the ridicule of the minor poets of
the day, most of whom are now entirely forgotten:――
What can provoke thy muse? scarce thrice a year
_Matilda’s_ woeful Madrigals appear;
_Lewis_ no more the tender maid affrights
With incantations, ravishments, and sprites;
_Crusca_ (to _Gifford_ thanks!) is fairly fled,
And _Cottle’s_ epics sleep among the dead;
E’en _Wolcot’s_ impious blasphemies are o’er,
And _Andrews’_ Prologues are the vogue no more.
* * * * *
Alluding to Rosa Matilda’s effusions; M. G. Lewis, author of “The
Monk;” Gifford’s attack on the Della Cruscans; Amos Cottle’s poems,
and the satirical works of Dr. John Wolcot, known as “Peter Pindar.”)
_The Mæviad_, by William Gifford, 1795. In imitation of a satire of
Horace, and directed against the Della-Cruscan school of Poetry. See
_The Baviad_.
_The Moneiad_: or The Power of Money. By the Rev. W. P. Macdonald,
late Chaplain of the Regiment of Roll. London. James Harper, 46 Fleet
Street. 1818.
It contains an early poem, entitled “Sir Penny, or the Power of
Money.” The work was dedicated to the Duke of Kent.
_The New Dunciad_. Facts and anecdotes illustrative of the iniquitous
practises of Anonymous Critics, 1806.
This is a _prose_ commentary on the critics, published by Tegg,
London, and has no relation to Pope’s _Dunciad_.
_The New Dunciad_, as it was found in the year 1741, with the
Illustrations of Scriblerus, and Notes Variorum. London. J. H. Hubbard
1742.
_Yet_, yet a moment, one dim ray of Light
Indulge, dread Chaos and eternal Night!
Of Darkness visible so much be lent,
As half to show, half veil the deep intent.
Ye Pow’rs! whose mysteries restor’d I sing,
To whom Time bears me on his rapid wing,
Suspend awhile your force inertly strong,
Then take at once the Poet and the Song.
_The New Dunciad._ This appeared in parts in a London penny paper
called _The Jester_, the first number of which was published February
23, 1889. It was a weak attempt to satirise some of the celebrities of
the day, and was destitute of interest, or poetical merit.
_The Obliviad_: A Satire, with notes, together with additional Notes,
Preface, and Supplement, by the American Editor. And the Perpetual
Commentary of the _Athenæum_. New York. James Millar, Broadway.
London, B. Quaritch, 15, Piccadilly. 1879.
This is a very remarkable book, it consists of about 350 pages in all,
of which at least two thirds are occupied by Notes, critical,
satirical, and biographical, dealing with the principal writers of the
day, in a most unmerciful manner. Even _The Saturday Review_, which
itself has a reputation for sharp speaking, remarked (June 28,
1879):――“_The Obliviad_ is a laborious imitation of the Dunciad,
somewhat more universally insolent in its treatment of contemporary
authors than any other satire in prose or verse that we remember.”
Naturally a book which could speak with fearless truth of the writings
of such men as Tennyson, Robert Browning, Swinburne, Dickens, Hepworth
Dixon, and Robert Buchanan created a sensation, but unfortunately the
author was almost too indiscriminate in his censures, for whilst
everyone admits that the above named authors have occasionally written
absurd and nonsensical works, it is equally certain that they did not,
in the first place, make their names and fames in that manner.
_The Obliviad_ has been attributed to Dr. William Leech of New York.
_The Olympiad._ A Satirical Poem.
_The Puffiad_, a Satire, with a dedication to “Those who don’t like
it,” a Critique for their use, and copious Introductory Epistle to an
Eminent Puffer. 1828.
_The Rodiad_, by George Coleman, 1813. This relates to Flagellation:
Delightful Sport! whose never failing charm Makes young blood
tingle, and keeps old blood warm.
_The Rosciad._ By Charles Churchill. 1761.
_The Rolliad_, or more correctly, _Criticisms_ on the Rolliad, for the
poem itself (except in some disjointed extracts introduced as
examples) existed only in the fertile brains of the authors of this
satire on Mr. Rolle (afterwards Lord Rolle), who was elected M.P. for
Devon in 1784, in the Tory interest. When _The Rolliad_ first appeared
it had a great success, and rapidly ran through many editions, but
time has cast into oblivion most of its allusions, and the characters
introduced are well nigh forgotten. _The Rolliad_ was written by
several authors, and parts have been ascribed to George Ellis, General
Fitzpatrick, and Joseph Richardson M.P. Lord Rolle died in 1842.
_The Rational Rosciad_, in two parts, 1767.
_The Rape of the Bucket_, an Heroi-Comical Poem by Tassoni, translated
with Notes, by J. Atkinson. 1825.
_The Scribleriad_: an Heroic Poem. In six books. London: R. Dodsley in
Pall Mall 1751, quarto, with curious illustrations. This satire was
written to ridicule the errors of false taste and false learning, and
was pronounced, by a contemporary critic, to be a work of great fancy
and poetical elegance. The author, Mr. Richard Owen Cambridge, is
highly spoken of by Boswell, in his life of Dr. Johnson.
The much enduring Man, whose curious Soul
Bore him, with ceaseless toil, from pole to pole,
Insatiate, endless knowledge to obtain,
Thro’ woes by land, thro’ dangers on the main,
New woes, new dangers destin’d to engage
By wrathful _Saturn’s_ unrelenting rage,
I sing. * * * * *
_The Siliad_, or the Siege of the Seats. Beeton’s Christmas Annual,
fourteenth season. London. Ward, Lock and Tyler. An Illustrated
Political Satire, by the authors of “The Coming K――.” 1873.
Bobilloe’s spleen, to whigs the direful spring
Of votes ungiven, printed pages, sing!
That spleen which made the ballot-boxes tell
Of liberal candidates the funeral knell;
Whose names, dishonoured in the morning sheet,
Devouring scribes and hungry penmen greet:――
Since his bad-tempered way Bobilloe’s showed,
And made ill use of place on him bestowed;
Began to wane men’s confidence and trust
Which, to succeed in warfare, hold chiefs must.
_The Spiritual Dunciad_; or, Oxford “_Tracks_” to Popery. A Satire
with Notes and Appendix by Robert Dick, M.D., C.M. London, C.
Westerton, 1859. This was a bitter attack on the Roman Catholic
religion;
If by antiquity, we judge what’s true,
Why halt a Roman? Why not turn a Jew?
Our noble Luther――he did nothing more
Than pristine pureness to Christ’s truth restore,
By ignorance and lies long crusted o’er.
_The Tauroboliad_; or, the Sacrifice of the Constitution. A Satire.
1831.
_The Thespiad_; a Poem. 1809.
_The Tommiad_; a Biographical Fancy, written about the year 1842.
London. Anonymous.
_The Toriad_; a Poem. By Eupolis. London. Wightman & Co., 1837. 18 pp.
octavo, Price one shilling.
“War and the Debt I sing-the giant crimes
Of Tories in the good old Tory Times.”
_The Triad._ By W. Wiekenden, 1855.
_The Victoriad_; or, New World, an Epic Poem. By E. Carrington. A
curious work which the author modestly considered was written in the
simple classic style of Dante.
――――:o:――――
There are many passages in Pope’s writings which might well be spared
on account of their indelicacy, yet they are innocent and pure as
compared with some of the satires launched at him by his enemies and
rivals. The greater number of these are too gross to be republished in
a work intended for general readers, as are also the three principal
and most amusing parodies of his works.
Pope’s _Essay on Man_ was the subject of a parody, entitled _The Essay
on Woman_; his _Eloisa to Abelard_ was burlesqued in _Eloisa en
Déshabille_; and _The Rape of the Lock_ was parodied in a poem
entitled _The Rape of the Smock_.
In an article on John Wilkes published in _The Athenæum_ in 1874, it
was stated that the charge against him of having written the infamous
_Essay upon Woman_ must now be given up. “It is as clear as is any
fact in history, that whoever wrote the _Essay_, Wilkes, at all
events, did not. Wilkes was prosecuted for it, and was convicted, not
however for being the author of the poem, but for having published it.
All the statements on the trial go to show that the original Essay was
printed in red letter, and with a frontispiece, and an engraved
title.”
Much has been written about this parody, but its authorship is still
shrouded in mystery. In 1763 The Rev. John Kidgell published “A
Narrative of a scandalous, obscene, and exceedingly profane libel,
entitled _An Essay on Woman_” to which an answer was printed in the
same year. Both of these tracts are in the British Museum. _The Essay
on Woman_ has been recently re-published by private subscription, but
is still what is called a scarce book.
_Eloisa en Déshabille_: Being a Parody of Mr. Pope’s celebrated
Epistle of that young lady to Abelard. By a late celebrated Greek
Professor, dedicated to the _Loungers_ of Great Britain and Ireland.
1810.
This witty but indelicate poem has been generally ascribed to
Professor Porson, the famous Greek scholar, who frequently quoted
passages from it. But it seems more probable that it was written by
Colonel J. Matthews, the brother of the author of “The Diary of an
Invalid.”
Immur’d in this prison, so dull and so moping,
Where vows and high walls bar all hopes of eloping;
Where close-grated windows scarce show us the sun,
What means this strange itch in the flesh of a nun?
Why wander my thoughts in the midst of devotion
Why feels my fond heart its long smother’d emotion?
Still, still, love prevails! this unquenchable flame
Blazes fresh at the sight of my Abelard’s name.
* * * * *
_The Rape of the Smock._ An Heroi-comical Poem. In Two Books. London.
R. Burleigh, in Amen Corner. 1717. _Price one shilling._ With a quaint
illustration.
I sing a Virgin’s Smock, the direful cause
Of horrid Bloodshed, and of Breach of Laws;
That Linnen Veil, which pendant Ruffles grace,
Of _Indian_ Muslin, or of Flanders Lace;
Wide stretch’d, and falling down in many a Plait,
From the fair Bosom, to the snowy Feet;
White as the Lilly, or the Skin it hides,
Where charming Nature shines, and Love resides.
Let Ozell sing the _Bucket_,[45] Pope the _Lock_,
My daring Muse prefers the _Rape of Smock_.
* * * * *
This poem, which is by no means difficult to obtain, is generally
ascribed to Lady Mary Wortley Montague, the friend and correspondent
of Pope. The most remarkable feature about it is that it could have
been written and published by a lady of rank and fashion.
_An Elegy written in an Empty Assembly Room_ Published (anonymously)
by R. & J. Dodsley, London, 1766, was a parody on some of the most
remarkable passages in Pope’s _Epistle of Eloisa to Abelard_, but the
subject does not inspire interest, and the parody has little humour.
In scenes where _Hallet’s_ genius has combin’d
With Bromwich to amuse and chear the mind;
Amid this Pomp of Cost, this Pride of Art,
What mean these sorrows in a Female Heart?
Ye crowded Walls, whose well enlighten’d Round
With Lover’s Sighs and Protestations sound,
Ye pictures flatter’d by the learn’d and wise,
Ye glasses, ogled by the brightest eyes,
Ye cards, whom Beauties by their touch have blest,
Ye chairs, which Peers and Ministers have prest,
How are ye chang’d! like you my fate I moan,
Like you, alas! neglected and alone――
For ah! to me alone no card is come,
I must not go abroad――and cannot _Be at Home_.
* * * * *
A French parody of this famous poem by Pope also exists, entitled
“_Histoire des amours et des infortunes d’Abelard et d’Eloise_ mise en
vers satiré-comi-burlesques,” par M. Armand. Cologne, Pierre Marteau,
1724.
[Illustration]
From AN ESSAY ON MAN. Epistle I.
Lo, the poor Indian! whose untutor’d mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind;
His soul, proud science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk, or milky way;
Yet simple nature to his hope has given,
Behind the cloud-topp’d hill, an humbler heaven;
Some safer world, in depth of woods embraced,
Some happier island in the watery waste,
Where slaves once more their native land behold,
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold:
To be, contents his natural desire,
He asks no angel’s wing, no seraph’s fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.
A. POPE.
Lo! the poor toper whose untutor’d sense
Sees bliss in ale, and can with wine dispense,
――But sees, admitted to an equal share,
Each faithful swain the heady portion bear.
From Crabbe’s _Inebriety_.
A NEW READING OF POPE.
Lo, the lean Indian, whose bewildered mind
Sees naught of God, either in cloud or wind;
His soul, proud science never taught to stray,
It strayed itself, and now has lost its way.
Simple nature to his hope has given,
Beyond some cloud-capped hill, a sensual heaven,
Some place where science cannot grope its way,
Nor learning cast one single feeble ray;
No whites disturb. No Christian ’stablish laws.
But he can rest while work is done by squaws.
To loaf contents his natural desire;
He asks no angel’s wings to get up higher,
And if he did, no angel from the sky
Would think of taking Lo up very high.
But grant the burden of his Indian song――
Do as he likes, and take his dorg along.
ANONYMOUS.
Another parody of the same passage is given “after a bad dinner” in
“_Anecdotes_, Historical and Literary,” published in London by Vernor
and Hood in 1796.
An imitation of Pope’s _Universal Prayer_ will be found on page 115 of
_The Pleasures of Nature_ by D. Carey. 1803.
――――
A PARODY OF ACHILLES’ SPEECH,
Pope’s _Homer_, Book I, line 309.
(Occasioned by the author hearing of a Clergyman who, in a violent fit
of anger, threw his wig into the fire, and turned his son out of
doors.)
“Now by this sacred perriwig I swear,
Which never more shall locks or ringlets bear,
Which never more shall form the smart toupee,
Forced from its parent head,――(as thou from me);
Once ’twas live hair; now form’d by th’ artist’s hand,
It aids the labours of the sacred band;
Adds to the vicar’s brow a decent grace,
And pours a glory round his rev’rend face.
By this I swear, when thou shalt ask again
My doors to enter, thou shalt ask in vain.”
He spoke, and furious with indignant ire
Hurl’d the vast hairy texture on the fire;
Then sternly silent sate――the active flame
Remorseless wastes the soft and tender frame:
Writhed to and fro consumes the tortured hair,
And lost in smoke attenuates to air.
From _The Works of Richard Owen Cambridge_. London. Cadell and Davies,
1803.
――――
It is sometimes objected to parodies, that they tend to bring into
ridicule the finest productions of genius; but this is an imaginary,
rather than a real ground of complaint. Who does not admire the
Mantuan Poet though Cotton has burlesqued his Æneid? And though the
Iliad has been more than once travestied, do we not still dwell with
enthusiastic pleasure on every line attributed to Homer? We see
therefore no need of apology in submitting to our readers a parody of
the following beautiful lines of Pope:――
As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night,
O’er heaven’s pure azure sheds her sacred light;
When not a breath disturbs the deep serene,
And not a cloud o’ercasts the solemn scene;
Around her throne the vivid planets roll;
And stars unnumber’d gild the glowing pole.
O’er the dark trees a yellower verdure shed,
And tip with silver every mountain’s head;
Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise,
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies;
The conscious swains rejoicing in the sight,
Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light.
PARODY
As when an alderman just dubb’d a knight,
Doth his fat comrades to a feast invite;
His eager hand uplifts the deep tureen,
Beneath whose lid the smoking turtle’s seen;
Around the chair the ready waiters roll,
To fill the plate of every hungry soul.
O’er all the room the grateful odours spread,
And nods with pleasure every civic head;
Then shine their cheeks ne’er ting’d with deeper dyes,
The well made punch stands sparkling ’fore their eyes.
The aldermen rejoicing in the sight
Eye the rich treat, and bless the bounteous knight.
From _The British Minerva_, printed in _Hamburgh_, 1818.
In _Posthumous Parodies_ (1814) there is a paraphrase of a passage in
Pope’s “Temple of Fame,” it commences thus:
But lo! amidst the oratoric choir,
Six gorgeous columns o’er the rest aspire:
Around the chair itself of fame they stand,
Hold her chief honours, and her house command.
High on the first the son of Chatham shone,
(The British lion couching by his throne,)
Master of speech! His potent eloquence
Seems still to echo on the wond’ring sense:
Anxious, but firm, his lofty look appears,
And young he seems, with all the skill of years.
* * * * *
George Canning, C. J. Fox, R. B. Sheridan, Warren Hastings, Burke and
Windham are the other politicians alluded to in this poem.
――――:o:――――
AN ESSAY ON PLAY.
_By_
_A_――――_r_ _P_――――_e_.
I.
“Who shall decide,” I asked some time ago,
“When doctors disagree?” None seemed to know,
But change one word, and let the question be,
“Who shall decide, when critics disagree?”
We all are critics, not alone the men
Who fail to make a living by their pen.
And though there’s nought,――at least so poets deem,――
“That’s half so sweet in life as love’s young dream,”
There’s nought, I think, for which one so much cares
As talking over other folks’ affairs.
And so we meet with those who sometimes say,
That men have too much work, too little play:
Others assert that men their duties shirk,
Have too much play, and do too little work.
What is the truth? Some men find life full sore,
Work fifteen hours of the twenty-four;
They say that work does nothing else but vex,
And vow the collar’s never off their necks.
Others declare the ancient precept stuff,
And say one day in seven’s not enough;
So half another day is, so to speak,
Transferred from work to pleasure every week,
While now we have, our hard-worked lives to cheer,
Four extra holidays in every year.
Truth is, to neither party should we lean,
But ’twixt them both essay to hit the mean;
Some of hard work get far too large a share,
And ere they’ve learned to live, they die of care.
Some _do_ themselves as well as others too,
And still declare they’ve not enough to do,
Saunter through Life, and vow it is a gem,
And say they’re killing Time, while Time kills them.
II.
Pleasure just now indeed is quite the rage,
No matter sex or station, rank or age.
The child, we know, is tickled with a straw,
The boy is happy with his hoop or taw;
The girl at first with dolls enjoys a span,
But, older grown, the doll becomes a man;
And, in her quest for what can life enhance,
She gives her time to flirting and the dance.
Youth growing up assume a manly tone,
And seem to think the world is all their own,
And while at school imagine they are men,
And take to smoking and to billiards then;
At college, too, of classics seldom speak,
Think more of Cricket than they do of Greek;
Rowing and Football take up half their time,
Lawn-tennis too is voted “quite sublime.”
Thus time is spent in learning, it is true,
But not in learning what they ought to do.
Life is a game, so many people say,
And they win easiest who have learned to play.
III.
I’ve said before, and won’t my words forsake,
That “every woman is at heart a rake”;
Perhaps, I may with greater justice say,
Both man and woman dearly love to play.
A curious problem to the world they give:
Some live to play while others play to live;
And this phenomenon is seen to-day,
A whole profession given up to play.
Men its attractions cannot well refuse,
Their P’s neglect, but cultivate their cues;
While ladies, who in Fortune’s favours bask,
Make the pursuit of pleasure quite a task.
For what with concerts, and “four o’clock tea,”
With pictures that they “really ought to see,”
With conversaziones, routs, and balls,
And what so dear to women’s hearts, their “calls,”
With flower shows, and riding in the “Row.”
With dinners, drives, and all that’s “comme il faut,”
Worn out, half dead, when Saturday arrives
They meekly vow they’re tired of their lives,
But wake on Monday morning free from pain,
And vow they’re ready to begin again.
IV.
Then Sunday comes and, it must be confessed,
They wonder how to pass the “Day of Rest.”
Many, with wearied limbs and aching head,
Resolve to spend it cosily in bed;
Some drive to Richmond, if the weather’s fine,
And at the Star and Garter go to dine;
Some, as I’ve said before, to church repair,
“Not for the doctrine but the music there;”
While others, and indeed they’re not a few,
Resolve to spend some hours at the Zoo.
These seem to think Religion is displayed
In noting how their fellow Creature’s made:
They throng the walks, but oft so queerly dressed,
Although ’tis true they wear their “Sunday best,”
That e’en the animals opine, no doubt,
Their relatives have got a “Sunday out.”
The monkeys at each other grin and wink,
And whisper in Ape-language, “missing link!”
The grissly bear himself, with outstretched claw
Politely asks a passer for “his paw;”
The loving seal oft thinks he sees his kin,
But quite as often finds he’s taken in,
For now-a-days folks do not seem to feel
That seal-skin jackets are not always seal.
They see the lions feed, which call to mind
The fact that they themselves have not yet dined;
So home to dine, and pass with mis-timed jest
The rest of Sunday, not the Sunday’s rest,
Well-satisfied, howe’er, to feel and know
They’ve shown themselves, as well as seen the show.
A. W. MACKENZIE. (Author of “_The Idylls of the Rink_.”)
From _Pastime_ September 28, 1883.
――――
Pope’s prologue to Addison’s tragedy of _Cato_ is justly considered
one of the finest prologues in the language. The following parody of
it is taken from a little tract entitled “_A Succinct Description of
that Elaborate Pile of Art_, _called the Microcosm_. With a short
account of the Solar System.” Coventry. Printed for the Proprietor Mr.
Edward Davis, 1763. The _Microcosm_ was constructed by Mr. Henry
Bridges of Waltham Abbey, architect, it was in the form of a Roman
Temple, ten feet high by six feet broad in the basis, and was designed
to give the spectator instruction in architecture, sculpture and
astronomy.
“The following parody (on Pope’s prologue to Cato) was addressed to
Mr. Henry Bridges, constructor of that elaborate piece of mechanism.
_The Microcosm_, by Dr. Burton, of Yarmouth.”
To sooth the Soul by tender Strokes of art,
To raise the Genius and to rouse the Heart,
To make Mankind by Harmony elate,
Soften the Breast and banish direful Hate,
The ruffled Passions potent to asswage,
To conquer Fear and to enervate Rage,
Was _music’s_ Power, by _Orpheus_ first ordain’d;
Fierce Beasts were tam’d, and fiercer Tyrants Chain’d.
Th’ enchanting Sounds through their whole Fabrick crept,
And _Savage_ Mortals wonder’d why they wept.
Our _Artist_ shuns by vulgar Springs to move
His mimic Race below, or Orbs above,
Here Pleasure flows from _Scientific_ Cause,
Whilst Ingenuity extorts applause:
He bids your breast with Emulation rise,
And tho’ you’re e’er so learn’d, e’er so wise,
By Arts _Mechanick_ you will here be taught
More than _Rome_ knew, or _Grecian_ Sages thought.
Those Objects to your Senses he displays,
Which the Spectator of our Globe surveys;
The various Movements and the changing State.
Of Beings active and inanimate.
Whilst _Bridges_ gives his _Microcosm_ Laws,
What Bosom beats not in Invention’s Cause?
Who sees him work, but envies every Deed?
Who hears him lecture hears e’en _Newton_ read.
_Britons_ attend, be Worth like his approv’d,
And shew you have the Virtue to be mov’d.
With honest Scorn our wond’rous Artist view’d
Meer Machinations on the World obtrude:
_French_ and _Italian_ Puppets pleas’d too long,
And _British_ sense was barter’d for a Song.
Dare to invent yourselves, to _Fame_ aspire,
Be justly warm’d with your own native Fire.
_Bridges!_ those Sounds must ravish every Ear,
Which _Handel’s_ Self did not disdain to hear.
――――
THE RAPE OF THE CAKE.
A COVENT-GARDEN ECLOQUE.
Inscribed to the Musical Band of Covent-garden theatre, on account of
the recent theft of their twelfth-cake.
“_Quid Rapuisti?_”
The night was dark! fast clos’d the plunderer’s hand!
And idle Jehu’s slept upon the stand!
The lone Piazza, erst the gay resort
Of flash and fun, and meritricious sport,
Then only echo’d to th’ unvarying sound
Of drowsy watchmen, pacing their dull round,
Kiddies no more at _Glue_ or _Brilliant_ sup,
And e’en the far-fam’d _Finish_ was _done up_.
All rest in sleep! save――_those who were awake_――
The wicked wags who stole the _fiddlers’ cake_.
Not in more silence did Ulysses tread,
When he relentless struck king Rhesus dead;
Not with more caution did the invading Gaul
Attempt to storm the Capitolian wall;
Not with more care did valorous Smith advance
To burn the navy of insulting France;
Not with more ease did Belcher beat poor Burke,
Then those vile plunderers did the dreadful work!!!
But say, my muse, what prodigies appear’d?
The rain fast pour’d, and horrid screams were heard!
Loud thunder shook the gay theatric pile,
And Kemble first relax’d into a smile!
The theft announc’d, the _band_ were in dismay,
And nought were heard, but ‘Oh!’ and ‘Well-a-day!’
The leader _Ware_, with anger in his soul,
_While his limbs tremble_, _and his eyeballs roll_,
“D――n!” cried, “this insults too imposing,
Shall we bear this, ye _scraping sons of Rosin_?”
The puffy _Parke_, who never was a starter,
Said, “In this cause I wish to die a _Martyr_!”
_Hawtin_, with face inflated like a crumpet,
“Lord bless us,” said, and dropp’d his brazen _trumpet_.
And smirking _Davy_, with his _powder’d_ pate,
Plump’d snug upon his seat and _grinn’d_ in state.
While feeble _Woodcock_ let his anger loose,
And fix’d the theft on harmless _Mother Goose_!!!
But say, my muse, and then I’ll cry farewell!
Who stole the _cake_?――“Indeed I cannot tell!
And this I swear, in accents strong and slow,
_I cannot tell!_――because _I do not know!_”
――――
A volume of poems by T. Flatman, published in 1674, contains a poem
entitled _A Thought on Death_ from which Pope must have borrowed his
ode “_The Dying Christian to his Soul_:”――
“Vital spark of heavenly flame!
Quit, oh quit this mortal frame!
Trembling, hoping, lingering, flying
Oh the pain, the bliss of dying!”
* * * * *
“Hark! they whisper; angels say,
Sister spirit, come away!”
So far Pope, compare Flatman:――
“When on my sick bed I languish,
Full of sorrow, full of anguish――
Fainting, grasping, trembling, crying,
Panting, groaning, speechless, dying.”
* * * * *
“Methinks I hear some gentle spirit say,
Be not fearful――come away!”
Pope was the author of numerous imitations of other Poets, such as
Chaucer, Spenser, Waller, Abraham Cowley, the Earl of Rochester, the
Earl of Dorset, and Dean Swift. The poem in imitation of Chaucer is
somewhat coarse, that after Dr. Swift will be quoted later on, under
that author’s name.
[Illustration]
COLIN’S COMPLAINT.
NICHOLAS ROWE, Born 1673, Died 1718.
_Poet Laureate_ 1715 to 1718.
Despairing beside a clear stream,
A shepherd forsaken was laid;
And while a false nymph was his theme.
A willow supported his head:
The wind that blew over the plain,
To his sighs with a sigh did reply,
And the brook, in return to his pain,
Ran mournfully murmuring by.
Alas! silly swain that I was,
Thus sadly complaining, he cried;
When first I beheld that fair face,
’Twere better by far I had died:
She talk’d, and I bless’d her dear tongue;
When she smil’d, ’twas a pleasure too great;
I listen’d and cry’d when she sung,
Was nightingale ever so sweet!
How foolish was I to believe
She could doat on so lowly a clown,
Or that her fond heart would not grieve,
To forsake the fine folk of the town:
To think that a beauty so gay,
So kind and so constant would prove,
Or go clad like our maidens in grey,
Or live in a cottage on love?
What though I have skill to complain,
Tho’ the muses my temples have crown’d;
What tho’ when they hear my soft strain,
The virgins sit weeping around?
Ah, Colin! thy hopes are in vain,
Thy pipe and thy laurel resign,
Thy false one inclines to a swain,
Whose music is sweeter than thine.
All you, my companions so dear,
Who sorrow to see me betray’d,
Whatever I suffer, forbear,
Forbear to accuse the false maid.
Tho’ thro’ the wide world I should range,
’Tis in vain for my fortune to fly,
’Twas her’s to be false and to change,――
’Tis mine to be constant and die.
If while my hard fate I sustain,
In her breast any pity is found,
Let her come with the nymphs of the plain,
And see me laid low in the ground:
The last humble boon that I crave,
Is to shade me with cypress and yew
And when she looks down on my grave
Let her own that her shepherd was true.
Then to her new love let her go,
And deck her in golden array;
Be finest at every fine show,
And frolic it all the long day:
While Colin, forgotten and gone,
No more shall be talked of or seen,
Unless when beneath the pale moon,
His ghost shall glide over the green.
Nicholas Rowe wrote several tragedies and some poems, but the above is
almost the only specimen which has any life in it. A Latin version,
entitled “Corydon Querens” will be found in Vincent Bourne’s works.
A PARODY.
(Ascribed to George Canning.)
By the side of a murmuring stream
An elderly gentleman sat;
On the top of his head was his wig,
On the top of his wig was his hat.
The wind it blew high and blew strong
Where this elderly gentleman sat,
And took from his head in a trice,
And plunged in the river his hat.
The gentleman then took his cane,
Which lay by his side as he sat,
But he dropp’d in the river his wig
In attempting to get out his hat.
And now in the depth of despair,
Though still from the place where he sat,
He flung in the river his cane,
To swim with his wig and his hat.
But cooler reflection at length,
As this elderly gentleman sat,
Said “Jump up and follow the stream,
And look for your wig and your hat.”
But, alas for the thought! for so soon
As he rose from the place where he sat,
He slipp’d and fell plump over head,
To swim with his wig and his hat.
――――
BOW BELLS.
At the brink of a murmuring brook
A contemplative Cockney reclined;
And his face wore a sad sort of look,
As if care were at work on his mind.
He sigh’d now and then as we sigh
When the heart with soft sentiments wells;
And a tear came and moisten’d each eye
As he mournfully thought of Bow Bells.
I am monarch of all I survey!
(Thus he vented his feelings in words)――
But my kingdom, it grieves me to say,
Is inhabited chiefly by birds.
In this brook that flows lazily by
I believe that _one_ tittlebat dwells,
For I saw something jump at a fly
As I lay here and long’d for Bow Bells.
I am partial to trees, as a rule;
And the rose is a beautiful flower.
(Yes, I once read a ballad at school
Of a rose that was wash’d in a shower.)
But, although I may doat on the rose,
I can scarcely believe that it smells
Quite so sweet in the bed where it grows
As when sold within sound of Bow Bells.
No; I’ve tried it in vain once or twice,
And I’ve thoroughly made up my mind
That the country is all very nice――
But I’d much rather mix with my kind.
Yes; to-day――if I meet with a train――
I will fly from these hills and these dells;
And to-night I will sleep once again
(Happy thought!) within sound of Bow Bells.
From _Carols of Cockayne_, by Henry S. Leigh. London, Chatto and
Windus, 1874.
[Illustration]
LORD LYTTLETON.
A BURLESQUE ODE BY TOBIAS SMOLLETT.
Lord Lyttleton was not only the patron of poets, but was also a minor
poet himself. He married, in 1741, Miss Lucy Fortescue, whose death
five years afterwards gave him a theme for a monody which contained
the following lines:――
In vain I look around
O’er all the well-known ground,
My Lucy’s wonted footsteps to descry;
Where oft we used to walk,
Where oft in tender talk
We saw the summer sun go down the sky;
Nor by yon fountain’s side,
Nor where its waters glide
Along the valley, can she now be found:
In all the wide-stretched prospect’s ample bound,
No more my mournful eye
Can aught of her espy,
But the sad sacred earth where her dear relics lie.
Sweet babes, who, like the little playful fawns,
Were wont to trip along these verdant lawns,
By your delighted mother’s side:
Who now your infant steps shall guide?
* * * * *
Smollett, who considered that his merits had been neglected by Lord
Lyttleton, wrote the following parody on this monody:――
Where wast thou, wittol Ward, when hapless fate,
From these weak arms mine aged grannam tore:
These pious arms essay’d too late,
To drive the dismal phantom from the door.
Could not thy healing drop, illustrious Quack,
Could not thy salutary pill prolong her days;
For whom, so oft, to Marybone, alack!
Thy sorrels dragg’d thee, thro’ the worst of ways!
Oil-dropping Twick’nham did not then detain
Thy steps, tho’ tended by the Cambrian maids;
Nor the sweet environs of Drury Lane;
Nor dusty Pimlico’s embow’ring shades;
Nor Whitehall, by the river’s bank,
Beset with rowers dank
Nor where th’ Exchange pours forth its tawny sons;
Nor where to mix with offal, soil and blood,
Steep Snow Hill rolls the sable flood;
Nor where the Mint’s contaminated kennel runs;
Ill doth it now beseem,
That thou should’st doze and dream,
When death in mortal armour came,
And struck with ruthless dart the gentle dame.
Her lib’ral hand and sympathising breast,
The brute creation kindly bless’d:
Where’er she trod grimalkin purr’d around,
The squeaking pigs her bounty own’d;
Nor to the waddling duck or gabbling goose,
Did she glad sustenance refuse;
The strutting cock she daily fed,
And turkey with his snout so red;
Of chickens careful as the pious hen,
Nor did she overlook the tomtit or the wren;
While redbreast hopp’d before her in the hall,
As if the common mother of them all.
For my distracted mind;
What comfort can I find;
O best of grannams! thou art dead and gone,
And I am left behind to weep and moan,
To sing thy dirge in sad funereal lay,
Oh! woe is me! alack! and well-a-day!
――――:o:――――
IT IS NOT THAT MY LOT IS LOW.
(After _Henry Kirke White_.)
It is not that my “place” was low,
That bids my foolish tear to flow;
It is not that that makes me moan,
But ’tis, that all my money’s gone.
Thro’ slummy back-streets now I roam,
Whene’er I venture out from home;
To luckier souls I leave the rest,
The streets that once I knew the best.
Yet when the plates, of varied size,
With hunger-stirring symphonies
Resound, I think――“A nice grilled bone!”
And sigh that all my money’s gone.
My friends now pass me, cut me dead;
I’m only happy when in bed;
I cannot get more “whisker-dye”
Without committing felony.
My creditors, with angry wail,
Tell all the same relentless tale.
I’ve none to smile with, or make free
Or, when I want it, lend to me
Yet in my dreams a cheque I view,
That’s meant for me――a large one too.
I start, and when the vision’s flown,
I weep that all my money’s gone.
From _The Lays of the Mocking Sprite_. Cambridge. W. Metcalfe & Sons.
――――:o:――――
ODE,
(_In the Manner of Dr. Samuel Johnson._)
Addressed to a Girl in the Temple, 1777.
While the calescent, sanguine flood,
By vile Vulgarity call’d Blood,
Pervades this mortal frame;
Amaz’d at your translucid charms,
You I solicit to these arms,
Tho’ of procacious name!
When in your dim nocturnal rounds,
Erratic from the Temple’s bounds
Thro’ devious lanes you stray;
With friendly auscultation deign
To audit amatorial pain
Subvected in this lay.
Satellite of the Paphian dame,
Whose rays, tho’ darken’d by thy fame,
Illuminate my mind:
Desert the street, resume the plain,
Rejoin your derelicted swain――
Be prudent, as you’re kind.
My brows, obumbrated with age,
Hang scowling o’er life’s latter-page――
But you, like Lunar beam,
Thro’ my nimbosity arise;
Dispensing, from your lucid eyes,
Refocillating gleam.
From _The Wiccamical Chaplet_. Edited by George Huddesford. London,
Leigh, Sotheby & Son, 1804.
――――
Dr. Johnson wrote the following lines as a skit on the style of Dr.
Warton, then Poet-Laureate:――
Hermit hoar, in solemn cell
Wearing out life’s evening grey;
Strike thy bosom sage, and tell
What is bliss, and which the way.
Thus I spoke, and speaking sighed,
Scarce repress’d the starting tear,
When the hoary sage replied,
“Come, my lad, and drink some beer.”
_Imitation of the Above._
“Crested warrior, on whose helm
Nodding plumes encircling bind,
Tell me in what happy realm
Valour such as thine to find?”
Thus I said, and envious sighed.
He, who ne’er from battle run,
The mighty warrior, eager cried,――
“_Show me how to hold my gun!_”
――――
Dr. Johnson wrote the Prologue for the opening of Drury Lane Theatre,
in 1747, which was spoken by David Garrick, it commenced with the well
known lines:――
“When Learning’s triumph o’er her barbarous foes
First rear’d the stage, immortal _Shakespeare_ rose;
Each change of many colour’d life he drew,
Exhausted Worlds, and then imagined new:
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign,
And panting time toil’d after him in vain,”
* * * * *
This was the subject of a political parody in _Posthumous Parodies_
(London, 1814) of which it is only necessary to quote a few lines:――
When Europe’s peril from her Gallic foes
First roused the age, immortal Pitt arose,
Each plot of many colour’d France o’erthrew,
Saved the old world, and overawed the new.
Commerce beheld him stretch her golden reign,
And jealous Whigs toil’d after him in vain:
His lofty thoughts his lofty phrase impress’d,
And admiration throbb’d in ev’ry breast.
* * * * *
[Illustration]
EDMUND SPENSER.
BORN 1553. | DIED January 16, 1599.
Appointed Poet-Laureate 1590.
Although there are not many parodies extant of Spenser’s poetry, yet
the beautiful metre which he invented, and used with such success in
_The Faerie Queene_, has been since imitated, or adopted by many of
our leading poets. This will be seen by the following list of works,
written in the Spenserian stanza, which has been compiled with great
care, by Mr. Jonathan Bouchier, of Ropley.
Allan’s ‘Bridal of Caolchaiarn’ and ‘Last Deer of Brenn Doran’ (or
Dran).
Beattie’s ‘Minstrel.’
Bedingfield ‘The Education of Achilles.’
William Lisle Bowles ‘Childe Harold’s Last Pilgrimage,’ six stanzas.
Burns’s ‘Cotter’s Saturday Night.’
W. C. Bryant ‘The Ages.’
Byron’s ‘Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.’
Campbell’s ‘Gertrude of Wyoming.’
Campbell’s ‘Chaucer and Windsor.’
Cooper’s ‘Purgatory of Suicides.’
Edward’s ‘Tour of the Dove.’
Hood’s ‘Irish Schoolmaster.’
Howitt’s ‘Desolation of Eyam.’
Keats’s ‘Imitation of Spenser’ (his first, or nearly his first
verses).
Keats’s ‘Eve of St. Agnes.’
Keats’s ‘The Cap and Bells.’
Keble’s ‘Mourners following the Cross.’
William Julius Mickle ‘The Concubine’ (title afterwards altered to
‘Sir Martyne’), a poem in two cantos.
Neale’s ‘Edom.’
Read’s (American) ‘New Village.’
Miss Frances Rolleston, ‘The Pilgrimage of Harmonia,’ 1874.
Sir W. Scott, Fitztraver’s Song in ‘The Lay of the Last Minstrel,’
canto vi.
‘Vision of Don Roderick,’ and introductory stanzas to each canto of
the ‘Lady of the Lake,’ and the ‘Lord of the Isles.’
Shelley’s ‘Revolt of Islam’ (sometimes called ‘Laon and Cythna’),
and ‘Adonais.’
Shenstone’s ‘Schoolmistress.’
Smith, Alexander ‘Lady Barbara.’
Edmund Neale Smith, _obiit_ 1710: ‘Thales: a Monody, sacred to the
memory of Dr. Pococke. In imitation of Spenser.’――First published in
1751, forty years after Smith’s death.
‘Psyche, or the Great Metamorphosis’ (query author), in Dodsley’s
‘Collection of Poems by Several Hands,’ ed. 1775, vol. iii.
Southey ‘A Tale of Paraguay.’
Tennyson’s ‘Lotos-Eaters’ (introduction).
Thomson’s ‘Castle of Indolence.’
Mrs. Tighe’s ‘Psyche.’
Walker, William Sidney: ‘Wandering Thoughts.’
West, Gilbert ‘Education’ and ‘On the Abuse of Travelling.’
White, Kirke ‘Christiad.’
Wiffen’s Translation of Tasso’s ‘Jerusalem Delivered.’
Isaac William’s, ‘Rule of Faith’ (‘Lyra Apostolica’).
Wilson’s ‘Children’s Dance’ and ‘Scholar’s Funeral.’
Wordsworth’s ‘Guilt and Sorrow,’ an imitation of Thomson, written in
1802.
Worsley’s Homer’s ‘Iliad.’
Worsley’s Homer’s ‘Odyssey.’
――――
THE ALLEY.
(_A Burlesque imitation of Spenser._)
In every town, where Thamis rolls his tyde,
A narrow pass there is, with houses low;
Where, ever and anon, the stream is eyed,
And many a boat soft sliding to and fro.
There oft are heard the notes of infant woe,
The short thick sob, loud scream, and shriller squall:
How can ye, mothers, vex your children so?
Some play, some eat, some lean against the wall,
And as they crouchen low, for bread and butter call.
And on the broken pavement, here and there,
Doth many a stinking sprat and herring lie:
A brandy and tobacco shop is near,
And hens, and hogs, and dogs are feeding by;
And here a sailor’s jacket hangs to dry.
At every door are sun-burnt matrons seen,
Mending old nets to catch the scaly fry;
Now singing shrill, and scolding oft between;
Scolds answer foul-mouth’d scolds; bad neighbourhood I ween.
The snappish cur (the passengers’ annoy)
Close at my heel with yelping treble flies;
The whimpering girl, and hoarser-screaming boy,
Join to the yelping treble, shrilling cries;
The scolding quean to louder notes doth rise,
And her full pipes those shrilling cries confound;
To her full pipes the grunting hog replies;
The grunting hogs alarm the neighbours round,
And curs, girls, boys, and scolds, in the deep bass are drown’d.
Hard by a sty, beneath a roof of thatch,
Dwelt Obloquy, who in her early days
Baskets of fish at Billingsgate did watch,
Cod, Whiting, oyster, mackarel, sprat or plaice;
There learn’d the speech from tongues that never cease.
Slander beside her, like a magpie, chatters,
With Envy, (spitting cat) dread foe to peace;
Like a cursed cur, Malice before her clatters,
And vexing every wight, tears clothes and all to tatters.
(_One very coarse verse omitted._)
Such place hath Deptford, navy-building town,
Woolwich and Wapping, smelling strong of pitch;
Such Lambeth, envy of each band and gown,
And Twickenham such, which fairer scenes enrich,
Grots, statues, urns, and John’s dog and bitch,
Ne village is without, on either side,
All up the silver Thames, or all adown;
Ne Richmond’s self, from whose tall front are eyed
Vales, spires, meandering streams, and Windsor’s towery pride.
ALEXANDER POPE.
――――
THE HOLIDAYER.
The sportive swain in Sunday clothes is dressed,
And struts he proudly, head high held in air;
His sweetheart, who’s with charms like his impressed,
Thinketh, perdie, ‘Are we not both all there’?
Nor lacketh she adornment’s artful aid,
But with enticements rare is she yclout;
My pen, I ween, would fail describe the maid,
But she with practised skill is trickéd out,
And that she pleaseth Lubin fair Chloe doth not doubt.
From train and chaise they run to where the sands
Invite the lovers――many joys be there.
They foot it to the strains of German bands,
And at time-honoured Punch and Judy stare.
The wheedling portrait-taker catcheth them,
Their likeness taketh, and their cash also;
The wily boatman useth stratagem,
And out upon the billows they do go――
Not soon will they forget what followeth, I trow.
Then viands meet for holiday they buy――
Pork pies, fresh “natives,” sausages, cold beef――
And as, forsooth, such cakes make folk’s mouth dry,
The flowing cans do furnish much relief.
At length the railway bell doth loudly ring,
To tell them they no longer mote there stay;
They crowd in train, they songs again do sing,
As from the festive scene they go away.
When morrow cometh――ah, that dreadful holiday!
_Funny Folks_, June 12, 1886.
The following is the title of a small book written in imitation of
Spenser’s style:――
“An original Canto of _Spencer_ (sic): Designed as part of
his Fairy Queen, but never Printed.”――Now made Publick by
NESTOR IRONSIDE Esq.――The Second Edition. LONDON. Printed
for James Roberts, near the Oxford Arms in Warwick Lane,
MDCCXIV.
[Illustration]
JONATHAN SWIFT.
BORN, 1667. | DIED, October 29, 1745.
THE STATE-COACH.
(_In Imitation of the Manner of Dr. Swift._)
Once on a time a grand lord-may’r
(No matter when, no matter where)
Kept a huge pompous coach of state,
Of most enormous bulk and weight;
And on the times of public joy,
To wheel about the pond’rous toy,
He kept besides a noble string
Of horses, fit to draw a king;
All of high blood, all beasts of breeding,
But vicious from excess of feeding;
Of course, intractable and heady,
Yet in one point perversely steady,
Viz., each good steed was true and hearty
To his own interest and his party;
Nay, this curs’d spirit hast possest
To such degree each sturdy beast,
That not a single chuff would move
From threats or soothing, fear or love,
Unless in partnership he drew
With those of his confed’rate crew,
Though thus the clumsy and the clever,
Ill-pair’d oft hobbled on together.
Hence when the coach was order’d out,
Buck would refuse to match with Stout,
At least one inch would not proceed
Unless impetuous Di’mond led,
Who when of late our grand premier,
And then uncheck’d in his career,
While he tugg’d on the vast machine
O’er rough and smooth, through thick and thin,
Would often with their rapid turn
Make the wheels creak and axle burn;
Yet give the haughty devil his due,
Though bold his quarterings, they were true:
Yes, let us not his skill disparage,
He never once o’erset the carriage,
Though oft he whirl’d it, one would think,
Just o’er the pitfall’s headlong brink;
While at each hair-breadth ’scape, his foes
Would cry, there, there, by G――d, it goes!
And as stiff Buck would ne’er submit
But on these terms to champ the bit,
Stout in return was full as sullen,
Nor the same harness would he pull in,
Unless by cautious Duke preceded,
Or by pacific Sawney headed:
The body-coachman, hence unable
To rule the refractory stable,
Was forc’d to leave the saucy brutes
To terminate their own disputes;
And when they deign’d to wear the traces,
Chuse their own partners and their places;
But, tir’d themselves with these distractions,
Resolv’d at last the several factions
(For in their anger all had wit)
Some terms of union to admit,
Which, that more firmly they might bind,
Drawn in this form by all were sign’d:
We the contracting steeds, (exprest
Here was the name of each prime beast,
As Di’mond, Sawney, Duke) however
Determined not to work together,
Yet by these presents are agreed
Together peaceably to feed:
On this account then (work or play)
Let each receive his ’custom’d pay;
Confirm we by concurring votes
To each his daily peck of oats:
Besides, omit we by no means
Proportion’d quantities of beans;
Nor yet warm mashes when we chuse ’em,
Nor Bracken’s balls when pleas’d to use ’em;
For as ’tis likely from full feeding,
At times, diseases may be breeding,
’Tis right for ev’ry horse that is sick,
Who finds the food should find the physic.
These previous articles now clos’d,
Here prudent Di’mond interpos’d,
Long fam’d for his contempt of pelf,
And views which center’d not in self,
“How chang’d at present!” (or no more
Wears he that mask which once he wore.)
Quoth he (wrapp’d round with many a clout
His greasy heels, the horses gout)
“Snug now ourselves and our dependants,
Shall we neglect our dear descendants?
Nay e’en from Scripture we should learn
For our own households due concern;
Lest we incur then, to our shame,
Of infidels th’ accursed name.
Provide we next (if such your will is)
For all your present colts and fillies;
No matter, tho’ for this supply
We drain our master’s coffers dry:
Stretch we the grant too, if ye please,
E’en to the future colts of these;
Then to their coltlings in entail,
’Till issue of such issue fail:
Well, bullies, are you all content?”
Each steed here snorted his assent;
And now adjusted their pretensions,
And thus secur’d their long-breath’d pensions,
Like porkers fattening in the sty,
On their fat sides at ease they lie;
Uplitter’d to their ears in straw,
Yet not a single beast will draw.
Dogs! to reduce you all to reason,
I wish, at least, for some short season,
That in your present master’s stead,
Too meek to tame so rough a breed,
Too mild to curb your factious spirit,
Too good to treat ye as ye merit,
Stern boisterous Cromwell from the dead,
Or bluff old Hal would lift his head,
That I might see you bound and skip
Beneath their disciplining whip;
That I might see your pamper’d hides
Flogg’d, ’till from out your furrow’d sides
Spun, in each part, the sizy blood,
Too rich from sloth and copious food;
That thus let out at all these sluices,
It may purge off its vicious juices;
While I should hear you, at each jerk,
Cry, “Lash no more, we’ll work, we’ll work.”
From _The Foundling Hospital for Wit_, Vol. IV. 1786.
――――
THE HAPPY LIFE OF A COUNTRY PARSON.
(_In Imitation of Dean Swift._)
Parson, these things in thy possessing
Are better than the bishop’s blessing.
A wife that makes conserves; a steed
That carries double when there’s need;
October store, and best Virginia,
Tithe-pig, and mortuary guinea;
Gazettes sent gratis down, and frank’d;
For which thy patron’s weekly thank’d;
A large Concordance, bound long since;
Sermons to Charles the First, when Prince;
A chronicle of ancient standing;
A Chrysostom to smooth thy band in;
The Polyglott――three parts,――my text:
Howbeit,――likewise――now to my next:
Lo here the Septuagint,――and Paul,
To sum the whole,――the close of all.
He that has these, may pass his life,
Drink with the Squire, and kiss his wife;
On Sundays preach, and eat his fill;
And fast on Fridays――if he will;
Toast Church and Queen, explain the news,
Talk with churchwardens about pews,
Pray heartily for some new gift,
And shake his head at Doctor Swift.
ALEXANDER POPE.
In the works of Oliver Goldsmith two poetical imitations of Dean Swift
appear, one is entitled “A new Simile in the Manner of Swift,” the
other, and the more amusing, is given below.
THE LOGICIANS REFUTED.
Logicians have but ill defin’d,
As rational the human mind;
Reason, they say, belongs to man,
But let them prove it if they can.
Wise Aristotle and Smiglesius,
By ratiocinations specious,
Have strove to prove with great precision,
With definition and division,
_Homo est ratione preditum_;
But for my soul I cannot credit ’em.
And must in spite of them maintain,
That man and all his ways are vain;
And that this boasted lord of nature
Is both a weak and erring creature.
That instinct is a surer guide,
Than reason, boasting mortal’s pride;
And that brute beasts are far before ’em,
_Deus est anima brutorum_.
Who ever knew an honest brute
At law his neighbour prosecute,
Bring action for assault and battery,
Or friend beguile with lies and flattery?
O’er plains they ramble unconfin’d,
No politics disturb the mind;
They eat their meals, and take their sport,
Nor know who’s in or out at court;
They never to the levee go
To treat as dearest friend, a foe;
They never importune his Grace,
Nor ever cringe to men in place;
Nor undertake a dirty job,
Nor draw the quill to write for Bob;
Fraught with invective they ne’er go
To folks at Pater-Noster Row:
No judges, fiddlers, dancing masters,
No pickpockets, or poetasters,
Are known to honest quadrupeds,
No single brute his fellows leads.
Brutes never meet in bloody fray,
Nor cut each other’s throats for pay.
Of beasts, it is confess’d, the ape
Comes nearest us in human shape.
Like man he imitates each fashion,
And malice is his ruling passion;
But both in malice and grimaces,
A courtier any ape surpasses.
Behold him humbly cringing wait
Upon the minister of state;
View him soon after to inferiors
Aping the conduct of superiors:
He promises with equal air,
And to perform takes equal care.
He in his turn finds imitators,
At court, the porters, lacqueys, waiters,
Their master’s manners still contract,
And footmen, lords, and dukes can act,
Thus at the court both great and small,
Behave alike, for all ape all.
OLIVER GOLDSMITH.
[Illustration]
JAMES BROWN.
(_“Baron” Brown, the Durham Poet._)
Hone’s _Every Day Book_, (Vol. II, p. 1218) contains a record of the
career, and a portrait of this eccentric individual, who lived in
Newcastle-on-Tyne during the first quarter of the present century,
when he published a series of extraordinary writings which he
considered Poems, and assumed the title of Poet-Laureate. Brown was
known to be inordinately vain, and many letters were sent him
purporting to come from the leading poets and authors of the day. All
of these he believed to be genuine, and would show them to his
friends, (who were frequently the real authors) with much pride. These
letters, which were chiefly in verse, were produced by the law and
medical students of Durham and Newcastle, and of the Catholic College
of Ushaw. In 1821, Brown received a large parchment signed G.R.
attested by Messrs. Canning and Peel, to which was suspended a large
unmeaning seal, which he believed to be the great seal of Great
Britain, conferring upon him the title of Baron Brown of Durham, in
the County Palatine of Durham, in consequence of a translation of his
works having been the means of converting the Mogul empire. From that
moment he assumed the name and style of “Baron Brown,” and had a
wooden box made for the preservation of his patent. Of the poems that
were sent to him only the following fragments have been preserved:――
The first is an imitation of Wilson’s _Isle of Palms_.
Poetic dreams float round me now,
My spirit where art thou?
Oh! art thou watching the moonbeams smile
In the groves of palm in an Indian isle;
Or dost thou hang over the lovely main
And list to the boatswain’s boisterous strain;
Or dost thou sail on sylphid wings
Through liquid fields of air,
Or, riding on the clouds afar,
Dost thou gaze on the beams of the evening star
So beautiful and so fair.
Oh no! oh no! sweet spirit of mine
Thou art entering a holy strain divine
A strain which is so sweet,
Oh! one might think ’twas a fairy thing,
A thing of love and blessedness,
Singing in holy tenderness,
A lay of peaceful quietness,
Within a fairy street!
But _ah_! ’tis Brown. &c., &c.
The next was supposed to be written by Sir Walter Scott. (_Lady of the
Lake._)
The heath-cock shrill his clarion blew
Among the heights of Benvenue,
And fast the sportive echo flew,
Adown Glenavin’s vale.
But louder, louder was the knell,
Of Brown’s Northumbrian penance-bell,[46]
The noise was heard on Norham fell,
And rung through Teviotdale.
There was also a respectable burlesque of _The Ancient Mariner_,
commencing:――
“It is a lion’s trumpeter,
And he stoppeth one of three.”
It is a pity that only these few extracts were preserved by Mr. John
Sykes in his “Local Records, or Historical Register of Remarkable
Events,” 1824.
THE BISHOP’S WISH.
(_After Robert Bloomfield._)
Be mine a modest pension clear
Of just six thousand pounds a-year;
And to complete my humble lot,
Give Fulham Palace for my cot.
Let me enjoy a quiet life,
Away from controversial strife;
My daily meal should ne’er disturb
My tranquil mind! for meat or herb,
Or fish or fowl, I ne’er would look,
But leave it to my foreign cook.
My drink――I ask no better sort,
A bin of six-and-twenty port;
With now and then, to warm my veins,
Some Burgundy or brisk Champagnes.
Of cash I need no large amount,
But at the Bank a good account,
On which――(my tradesmen not to vex)――
To draw from time to time my cheques.
My simple wishes thus supplied,
I into privacy will glide;
My Bishop’s mitre I’ll resign,
And calm contentment shall be mine,
If they will only give me clear
For life――six thousand pounds a-year.
_Punch._ August 9, 1856.
――――
THE POT-BOY.
Let poets sing the high-flown praise
Of shepherds and of rural joys,
Whilst I direct my humbler lays
To town, its bustle and its noise.
The Pot-boy’s joys shall be my theme,
Nor shall a barren subject be,
When rising from some lightsome dream,
Whitechapel streets he treads with glee.
Bliss is not always join’d to wealth,
Nor dwells beneath the gilded roof;
For poverty is bliss with health,
Of that my Pot-boy stands a proof.
See him with steady footsteps here,
How straight he bears the brimful jug,
And sips with thirsty lips the beer,
Which high o’ertops the pewter mug.
When night resumes her gloomy sway,
The object of his fond desire;
How happy then he’ll sport and play,
Around the blazing kitchen fire.
Then to beguile away the time,
He tells the kitchen nymphs his tale;
His left hand bears some doggrel rhyme,
And in his right――a pot of ale.
And hard must be that kitchen fair,
Who could his am’rous tale neglect;
And often Moll or Jenny dare,
For him some stouter swain reject.
Then weary to his garret hies,
Or if perchance the beds be spare,
Upon the straw he’ll close his eyes,
And sleep with Dapple or the mare.
These lines were written in August, 1808, by Connop Thirlwall, a
precocious youth of eleven years of age, on the occasion of
receiving the present of a copy of Bloomfield’s poem, “The Plough
Boy.” The little work from which “The Pot-boy” is extracted, is
entitled “_Primitiæ; or Essays and Poems_,” by Connop Thirlwall,
with a preface by his father, the Rev, Thomas Thirlwall, M.A., who
asserts that these Essays and Poems were entirely composed by his
son before he was eleven years of age, a statement which requires
considerable credulity from the reader.
[Illustration]
JOHN KEATS.
BORN Oct. 29, 1796. | DIED Dec. 27, 1820.
Who kill’d John Keats?
“I” says the Quarterly,
So savage and Tartarly;
“’Twas one of my feats.”
Who shot the arrow?
“The poet-priest Milman
(So ready to kill man),
Or Southey, or Barrow.”
LORD BYRON. July, 1821.
The following imitation of two Odes by John Keats is taken from _The
Diversions of the Echo Club_, by Bayard Taylor:――
ODE ON A JAR OF PICKLES.
I.
A sweet, acidulous, down-reaching thrill
Pervades my sense: I seem to see or hear
The lushy garden-grounds of Greenwich Hill
In autumn, when the crispy leaves are sere:
And odours haunt me of remotest spice
From the Levant or musky-aired Cathay,
Or from the saffron-fields of Jericho,
Where everything is nice:
The more I sniff, the more I swoon away,
And what else mortal palate craves, forego.
II.
Odours unsmelled are keen, but those I smell
Are keener; wherefore let me sniff again!
Enticing walnuts, I have known ye well
In youth, when pickles were a passing pain;
Unwitting youth, that craves the candy stem,
And sugar-plums to olives doth prefer,
And even licks the pots of marmalade
When sweetness clings to them:
But now I dream of ambergris and myrrh,
Tasting these walnuts in the poplar shade.
III.
Lo! hoarded coolness in the heart of noon,
Plucked with its dew, the cucumber is here,
As to the Dryad’s parching lips a boon,
And crescent bean-pods, unto Bacchus dear;
And, last of all, the pepper’s pungent globe,
The scarlet dwelling of the sylph of fire,
Provoking purple draughts; and, surfeited,
I cast my trailing robe
O’er my pale feet, touch up my tuneless lyre,
And twist the Delphic wreath to suit my head.
IV.
Here shall my tongue in other wise be soured
Than fretful men’s in parched and palsied days;
And, by the mid-May’s dusky leaves embowered,
Forget the fruitful blame, the scanty praise.
No sweets to them who sweet themselves were born,
Whose natures ooze with lucent saccharine;
Who, with sad repetition soothly cloyed,
The lemon-tinted morn
Enjoy, and find acetic twilight fine:
Wake I, or sleep? The pickle-jar is void.
――――
LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI.
Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
Alone, and idly loitering?
The season’s o’er――at operas
No “stars” now sing.
Oh, what can ail thee, seedy swell,
So moody! in the dumps so down?
Why linger here when all the world
Is “out of town?”
I see black care upon thy brow,
Tell me, are I.O.U.’s now due?
And in thy pouch, I fear thy purse
Is empty, too.
“I met a lady at a ball,
Full beautiful――a fairy bright;
Her hair was golden (dyed, I find!)
Struck by the sight――
“I gazed, and long’d to know her then:
So I entreated the M.C.
To introduce me――and he did!
Sad hour for me.
“We paced the mazy dance, and too,
We talked thro’ that sweet evening long,
And to her――it came to pass,
I breathed Love’s song.
“She promised me her lily hand,
She seemed particularly cool:
No warning voice then whispered low,
‘Thou art a fool!’
“Next day I found I lov’d her not,
And then she wept and sigh’d full sore,
Went to her lawyer, on the spot,
And talked it o’er.
“She brought an action, too, for breach
Of promise――’tis the fashion――zounds!
The jury brought in damages
Five thousand pounds!
“And this is why I sojourn here
Alone, and idly loitering,
Tho’ all the season’s through and tho’
No ‘stars’ now sing!”
_The Figaro._ September 15, 1875.
BEAUTY.
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and oer’darkened ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils,
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
’Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms;
And such too is the grandeur of the domes
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read.
JOHN KEATS.
――――
KEATS IMPROVED.
“In his opinion, a railway was in itself a beautiful object.”――_Mr.
Labouchere in the Debate on the Ambleside Railway Bill._
A Locomotive is a joy for ever:
It’s loveliness enchants us; it shall never
Be blamed for noisiness, but still will keep
The country quiet for us, and our sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and easy breathing.
Therefore in every Railway Bill we’re wreathing,
An iron band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of the sentimental, who to mirth,
More manly natures, spite of foggy days,
Of all the unhealthy and smoke-darkened ways,
Made for our travelling: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty makes the whistle’s squall,
Sweet to our spirits. Such the bellman’s tune,
Roofs, old and rotten, leaking, a shady boon
For passengers; and such Excursion bills,
With the waste walls they cling to; and loud shrills,
With which the drivers nightly shindy make,
Sharp shunting shocks, the grinding of the brake,
The rich soot-sprinkling that befouls our homes;
And such too is the grandeur of the domes,
Art hath imagined for the Engine shed.
All lovely tales that ever we have read,
Of Attic temples on the river’s brink,
Before that roof at Cannon Street must shrink!
[Illustration]
COVENTRY PATMORE.
The best known work of this poet “The Angel in the House,” published
in 1855, was the subject of the following parody written by Shirley
Brooks in 1860:
THE BABY IN THE HOUSE.
_By Poventry Catmore, author of the “Angel in the House,” etc._
_The Doctor._
“A finer than your newborn child,”
The Doctor said, “I never saw,”
And I, but half believing, smiled
To think he thought me jolly raw.
And then I viewed the crimson thing,
And listened to its doleful squeal,
And rather wished the nurse would bring
The pap-boat with its earliest meal.
My wife remarked, “I fear, a snub,”
The Doctor, “Madam, never fear,”
“’Tis hard, Ma’am, in so young a cub
To say.” Then Nurse, “A cub! a Dear!”
_The Glove._
“’Twere meet you tied the knocker up,”
The Doctor laughed, and said, “Good-bye.
And till you drown that yelping pup
Your lady will not close an eye.”
Then round I sauntered to the mews,
And Ponto heard his fate was near,――
Here few of coachmen will refuse
A crown to spend in beastly beer!
And then I bought a white kid glove,
Lucina’s last and favourite sign,
Wound it the knocker’s brass above,
And tied it with a piece of twine.
_The Advertisement._
“But, Love,” she said, in gentle voice,
(’Twas ever delicate and low,)
“The fact which makes our hearts rejoice
So many folks would like to know.
My Scottish cousins on the Clyde,
Your uncle at Northavering Gap,
The Adams’s at Morningside,
And Jane, who sent me up the cap.
So do.” The new commencing life
The _Times_ announced, “May 31,
At 16, Blackstone Place, the wife
Of Samuel Bobchick, of a son.”
_The Godfathers._
“Of course your father must be one,”
Jemima said, in thoughtful tones;
“But what’s the use of needy Gunn,
And I detest that miser Jones.”
I hinted Brown. “Well, Brown would do,
But then his wife’s a horrid Guy.”
De Blobbins? “Herds with such a crew.”
Well love, whom have you in your eye?
“Dear Mr. Burbot.” Yes, he’d stand,
And as you say, he’s seventy-three,
Rich, childless, hates that red-nosed band
Of nephews――Burbot let it be.
_The Godmother._
“We ought to ask your sister Kate,”
“Indeed, I shan’t,” Jemima cried,
“She’s given herself such airs of late,
I’m out of patience with her pride.
Proud that her squinting husband (Sam,
You know I hate that little sneak)
Has got a post at Amsterdam,
Where luckily he goes next week.
No, never ask of kin and kith.
We’ll have that wife of George Bethune’s,
Her husband is a silver-smith,
And she’ll be sure to give some spoons.”
_The Christening._
“I sign him,” said the Curate, Howe,
O’er Samuel Burbot George Bethune,
Then baby kicked up such a row,
As terrified that Reverend coon.
The breakfast was a stunning spread,
As e’er confectioner sent in,
And playfully my darling said,
“Sam costs papa no end of tin.”
We laughed, made speeches, drank for joy:
Champagne hath stereoscopic charms;
For when Nurse brought our little boy,
I saw two Babies in her arms.
――――
THE SPOONS.
By _Coventry Flatmore_.
’Tis six o’clock: at Jones’s house,
That stands in Russell Square,
And in his dining room there sit
The guests, while on a chair
That’s placed at top sits Jones himself;
Near him a loving pair.
His daughter Bertha and her swain
Young Chintip, who’s a clerk
In the War-Office, and who’s got
Good interest: Reader, mark
How snowy-white his shirt front is;
Not like his hair――that’s dark.
How happy looks the festive board!
The dishes too invite
Those present to begin; these do
As bid, with all their might;
Meanwhile the wine smiles and the cloth
Looks comfortably bright.
* * * * *
And so the Tailor goes to Jones
And says “I know that he
In six weeks’ time your loving childs’
Liege lord forsooth will be
And therefore p’rhaps you’ll pay the bill
Its all the same to me.”
“Such may have been the case,” says Jones.
“But now since he has spent
So much, he ne’er shall have my child;
I only willed consent
When all who did not dance stood still,
And Gent knew less of Gent.
“And as for your request, I pray
You list, sir: no one cares
To pay another person’s debts
Who gives himself such airs,
And so depart _instanter_, if
You’d not be kicked downstairs.”
* * * * *
When Chintip learned that Bertha was
Another’s bride, he swore
He should do some rash action in
His grief, that he no more
Could call her his――nor else her wealth,
Which last perplexed him sore.
For creditors now dunned alway
Each day without respite;
And he could ne’er meet their demands,
For he was cleared out-quite;
And they refused to be put off
Which on their part was right.
And so unto a Coffee-house
He went to take some tea;
And looking in the next box p’rhaps,
Saw spoons in number three
Therein his pocket with hands red
With guilt perhaps put he.
And when the white tied waiter came,
He talked about the skies
In low and silent tones perhaps,
That drown’d all the cries
Bawled in the street; the waiter though
Said “Sir I keep my eyes
Full-orbed about me and I saw
You take them spoons and so
You’ll perhaps be kind enough unto
The station house to go.”
* * * * *
And on the day on which his fate
In Newgate-list appears,
The lovely Bertha takes the _Times_
And reads “for seven years――”
Her rosy shoulders weep with grief,
Her tongue speaks only tears――
It was a very violent cold
That made her sight grow dim,
And o’er her shady eyes p’rhaps cast
A disagreeable film――
For Chintip figured as “Smith”
And so ’twas not for him.
From _The Puppet Showman’s Album_. Illustrated by Gavarni. No date.
[Illustration]
MISS JEAN INGELOW.
THE APPLE-WOMAN’S SONG.
The marten flew to the finch’s nest,
Feathers, and moss, and a wisp of hay:
The arrow it sped to thy brown mate’s breast;
Low in the broom is thy mate to-day!
“Liest thou low, love! low in the broom?
Feathers, and moss, and a wisp of hay,
Warm the white eggs till I learn his doom.”
She beateth her wings, and away, away.
“Ah, my sweet singer, thy days are told,
(Feathers, and moss, and a wisp of hay,)
O mournful morrow! O dark to-day!”
The finch flew back to her cold, cold nest,
Feathers, and moss, and a wisp of hay.
Mine is the trouble that rent her breast,
And home is silent, and love is clay.
This little ballad, which is taken from _Mopsa the Fairy_, by Jean
Ingelow (London: Longmans, Green & Co., 1869) is supposed to have been
the original which C. S. Calverley had in his mind when he composed
the amusing parody commencing:――
The auld wife sat at her ivied door,
(Butter and eggs and a pound of cheese)
A thing she had frequently done before;
And her spectacles lay on her apron’d knees.
This ballad has already been alluded to, and some imitations of it
given on p. 71 of this volume.
It will be found in _Fly Leaves_, by C. S. Calverley (London: George
Bell & Sons, 1878), in which there is another burlesque imitation of
Miss Jean Ingelow’s poetry, entitled――
LOVERS, AND A REFLECTION.
In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter
(And heaven it knoweth what that may mean;
Meaning, however, is no great matter),
Where woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween;
Thro’ God’s own heather we wonn’d together,
I and my Willie (O love my love):
I need hardly remark it was glorious weather,
And flitterbats wavered alow, above:
Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing
(Boats in that climate are so polite),
And sands were a ribbon of green endowing,
And O the sundazzle on bark and bight!
Thro’ the rare red heather we danced together,
(O love my Willie!) and smelt for flowers:
I must mention again it was glorious weather,
Rhymes are so scarce in this world of ours;――
By rises that flushed with their purple favours,
Thro’ becks that brattled o’er grasses sheen,
We walked and waded, we two young shavers;
Thanking our stars we were both so green.
We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie,
In fortunate parallels! Butterflies,
Hid in weltering shadows of daffodilly
Or marjoram, kept making peacock eyes:――
Songbirds darted about, some inky
As coal, some snowy (I ween) as curds;
Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky――
They reck of no eerie To-come, those birds!
But they skim over bents which the millstream washes,
Or hang in the lift ’neath a white cloud’s hem;
They need no parasols, no goloshes;
And good Mrs. Trimmer she feedeth them.
Then we thrid God’s cowslips (as erst His heather)
That endowed the wan grass with their golden blooms;
And snapt――(it was perfectly charming weather)――
Our fingers at fate and her goddess-glooms.
And Willie ’gan sing (oh, his notes were fluty;
Wafts fluttered them out to the white-wing’d sea)――
Something made up of rhymes that have done much duty,
Rhymes (better to put it) of “ancientry.”
Bowers of flowers encounter’d showers
In William’s carol――(O love my Willie!)
When he bade sorrow borrow from blithe to-morrow
I quite forgot what――say a daffodilly:
A nest in a hollow, “with buds to follow,”
I think occurred next in his nimble strain;
And clay that was “kneaden” of course in Eden――
A rhyme most novel, I do maintain:
* * * * *
O if billows and pillows and hours and flowers,
And all the brave rhymes of an elder day,
Could be furled together, this genial weather,
And carted, or carried on “wafts” away,
Nor ever again trotted out――ah me!
How much fewer volumes of verse there’d be.
Admirers of Miss Ingelow’s fiction may be interested in knowing the
history of those funny little bits of verse with which she enlivened
the later chapters of “Fated to be Free.” There can be no doubt that
they were intended as a delicate kind of retaliation to Mr. Calverley.
As he, who was a cunning master of every kind of metre, had thought
fit to directly parody Miss Ingelow’s most popular pieces, by exposing
and exaggerating all her worst faults, it was only natural that she
should seek to be revenged in kind. But it is clear that the lady
cannot cope with Calverley in parody. Her verses read more like
deliberate nonsense, and lack the faculty of imitation of style in
which he excelled. The following satirical lines, from “Fated to be
Free” illustrate this point, “Crayshaw” having been substituted for
“Calverley,” doubtless for the sake of the rhyme:――
That maiden’s nose, that puppy’s eyes,
Which I this happy day saw,
They’ve touched the manliest chords that rise
I’ the breast of Clifford Crayshaw.
* * * * *
All day she worked, no lover lent
His aid; and yet with glee
At dusk she sought her home, content,
That beauteous Bumble Bee.
A cell it was, nor more nor less,
But oh! all’s one to me,
Whether you write it with an S,
Dear girl, or with a C.
* * * * *
Then doth Tuck-man smile, “Them there
(Ho and Hi and futile Hum)
Jellies three-and-sixpence air,
Use of spoons an equal sum.”
Trees are rich. Sweet task, ’tis o’er,
“Tuck-man, you’re a brick,” they cry.
Wildly then, shake hands, all four
(Hum and Ho, the end is Hi).
――――
THE SHRIMP-GATHERERS.
Scarlet spaces of sand and ocean.
Gulls that circle and winds that blow;
Baskets and boats and men in motion,
Sailing and scattering to and fro.
Girls are waiting, their wimples adorning
With crimson sprinkles the broad gray flood;
And down the beach the blush of the morning,
Shines reflected from moisture and mud.
Broad from the yard the sails hang limpy,
Lightly the steersman whistles a lay;
Pull with a will, for the nets are shrimpy,
Pull with a whistle, our hearts are gay!
Tuppence a quart; there are more than fifty,
Coffee is certain, and beer galore:
Coats are corduroy, and minds are thrifty,
Won’t we go it on sea and shore?
See, behind, how the hills are freckled
With low white huts, where the lasses bide!
See, before, how the sea is speckled
With sloops and schooners that wait the tide!
Yarmouth fishers may rail and roister,
Tyne-side boys may shout “Give way!”
Let them dredge for the lobster and oyster,
Pink and sweet are our shrimps to-day!
Shrimps and the delicate periwinkle,
Such are the sea-fruits lasses love:
Ho! to your nets till the blue stars twinkle,
And the shutterless cottages gleam above!
From _Diversions of the Echo Club_, by Bayard Taylor.
――――
In a volume of poems by Miss Jean Ingelow, published in 1880, there
was a long one entitled _The Letter L_, which gave rise to the
following parody, printed in “The Daily News” of December 4, 1885.
THE LETTER L.
_By a Despairing Tory._
Oh, letter L, Miss Ingelow
Once wrote a poem all about you,
And what she meant I do not know,
I know I never thought to doubt you!
But now I fairly tell you this――
I wish I’d never learnt to spell,
You come between me and my bliss,
Oh, hated, hated letter L!
As daily to the Club I go,
My heart with honest ardour burns,
I hope for Gladstone’s overthrow,
Expect Conservative returns;
But where I long to see a C,
Of Tory victory to tell,
I only meet the face of _thee_,
Oh hated, hateful letter L!
The Labour and the Crofter vote,
I do not greatly dread them now,
Rather the influence I note
Of that once sacred beast, the Cow.
I mark a lot of N’s and P’s
That brand the people of Parnell;
I’m quite prepared to swallow _these_,
But not, oh _not_ the letter L!
This was at the time of the general election, when the returns were
daily being scanned with great interest, and the C’s and L’s and P’s
were eagerly counted up by all politicians.
[Illustration]
HORACE.
Messrs. George Bell & Sons have recently published an interesting
collection entitled, “_Horace’s Odes_, Englished and Imitated”
selected and arranged by Charles W. G. Cooper. This contains several
burlesque imitations of Horace’s Odes, but not the following, which
are certainly also worthy of preservation.
_“Persicos odi, puer, apparatus.”_
Buttons, you booby, I wish you would learn;
I don’t want the big lamp, nor yet the épergne
When I sit down to dine by myself.
I’ll have no made-dishes in future; tell cook
She may keep her receipts shut up close in her book,
Her stock in tureen, and her game on her hook,
And her Bang-Mary bright on her shelf.
And you lay the table-cloth neatly and straight
(You’re a stupid young owl, and you won’t learn to wait,
You’re always too slow, or too fast);
I’ll just have two chops, underdone, if you please,
Some stout in the pewter, a tin of stewed cheese,
Then some port, wherein flutter the wings of the bees,
Will make up my modest repast.
SHIRLEY BROOKS, 1859.
Mr. Shirley Brooks wrote many other humorous translations of Horace,
which will be found in his _Wit and Humour_. London, Bradbury & Co.
1883.
――――
ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF TERM.
(_See Horace. Book 1. Ode IV._)
Vacation’s o’er,――in every street
We soon shall many a Cantab meet;
For hither numbers daily hie,
Or by the Tele,[47] or the Fly.[47]
Once more the halls, so desert late,
With smoking cheer, our senses greet;
Freshmen and Sophs with one intent
Haste to the scene of merriment.
O’er _Alma Mater’s_ sacred head,
Who widely late her banner spread,
Fell solitude,――to jocund song,
Now yields her reign usurp’d too long:
While Bacchus, rosy god of wine! }
And Venus, with her joys divine, }
Dispute the Empire with the Nine.}
But would you reach the heights of fame,
And glory from Apollo’s claim;
Now, now, the Chaplet ’gin to weave,
Now, vows to favouring heaven give.
For Death, whose unrelenting hand,
No mortal prowess can withstand,
Strikes surely, with impartial dart,
Masters’ and under-graduates’ heart
And the short space that here we tarry,
At least “_in statu pupillari_,”
Forbids our growing hopes to germ
Alas! beyond the appointed term.
Nay, even now our time is o’er,
And January threatening lower,[48]
And warn us quickly to resign
The jovial monarchy of wine;
To freshmen yield the boasted claim,
As from the boards we take our name.
From _Gradus ad Cantabrigiam_ by a Brace of Cantabs. London, 1824.
――――
NOVEMBER 1858.
_Derby._ While Peel’s old ministry could twine
Thy lot political with mine;
Ere yet on corn were disagreed,
As colleagues we were blest indeed.
_Gladdy._ Whilst thou didst feel no rival flame,
Nor Gladdy next to Dizzy came,
O then thy Gladdy’s echoing name
Excelled its since Homeric fame.
_Derby._ My heart from Peelite loves outworn
By Dizzy’s corkscrew curls is drawn;
My forfeit life I’ll freely give.
So Diz――my better life――may live.
_Gladdy._ My bosom burns to yield possession,
Of all my charms to Bright next session;
I’ll face two several deaths with joy,
So fate but spare my broad-brimm’d boy.
_Derby._ What if our ancient love awoke
And bound us with its golden yoke;
If Diz were sent some Indian venture,
And Gladdy his old place re-enter?
_Gladdy._ Bright as the Morning Star is B.,
Thou rougher than the Adrian Sea,
And fickle as light bark; yet I
With thee would live――with thee would die.
ANONYMOUS.
Thackeray also wrote some humourous versions of Horace, which are
familiar to everyone. In 1862 a small volume entitled _Railway
Horace_, by G. Chichester Oxenden, was published by Upham and Beet,
London; the translations were not destitute of merit, but are now
rather out of date.
――――:o:――――
JOHN GAY.
THE BEGGAR’S OPERA.
_Macheath’s Song._
How happy could I be with either,
Were t’other dear charmer away!
But while ye thus teaze me together,
To neither a word will I say
But _toll de roll_, etc.
――――
How happy could I be with ether,
Were mesmeric charmers away;
But whilst they perplex me together,
I’ll cut, and no longer will stay.
Sing Robinson, Thomson, and Cooper,
Tol lol de rol, lol de rol lay,
There’s nothing like ether and stupor
For making an hospital gay.
From _The Man in the Moon_, Vol. I.
In the same volume there was another parody, dealing with a similar
topic, entitled――
A LAY OF GUTHRIE.
AIR――“_Maiden, I will ne’er deceive thee._”
Patient, I will ne’er deceive thee,
Never pain thee, never grieve thee:
Take this tube, inhale it so,
Out carbonic acid blow.
From your lips the mouthpiece move,
Only when you senseless prove.
Patient I’ll before we part,
Amputate without a smart.
Patient, I will ne’er deceive thee, &c.
“The Beggar’s Opera,” written by Mr. John Gay, was first produced at
the theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, in 1728, and was so successful
that it made “Gay rich and Rich (the lessee) gay.” This encouraged Gay
to write a sequel to it, entitled “Polly,” which was produced in 1729,
but met with far less approbation.
An anonymous play was produced in 1773, called “The Bow Street Opera,”
on the plan of “The Beggar’s Opera,” in which the most celebrated
songs were parodied.
John Gay was the author of the well-known song _Black-eyed Susan_,
“All in the Downs the fleet was moor’d,” of which an excellent Latin
translation will be found in the Poetical Works of Vincent Bourne.
[Illustration]
Dr. ERASMUS DARWIN.
1731-1802.
The fame of this once popular poet has been so utterly eclipsed by the
philosophical and scientific writings of his grandson, that there is
some danger that the author of “The Loves of the Plants” and “The
Botanic Garden” may soon be quite forgotten. Fifty years ago the Death
of Eliza at the Battle of Minden, taken from “The Loves of the Plants”
was a favourite recitation, and was included in every book of Elegant
Extracts.
This detached passage is quoted below, together with a modern parody
upon it:――
Now stood Eliza on the wood-crown’d height,
O’er Minden’s plains spectatress of the fight;
Sought with bold eye amid the bloody strife
Her dearer self, the partner of her life;
From hill to hill the rushing host pursued,
And view’d his banner, or believed she view’d.
Pleased with the distant roar, with quicker tread,
Fast by his hand one lisping boy she led;
And one fair girl amid the loud alarm
Slept on her kerchief, cradled on her arm:
While round her brows bright beams of honour dart,
And love’s warm eddies circle round her heart.
――Near and more near the intrepid beauty press’d,
Saw through the driving smoke his dancing crest,
Heard the exulting shout――“They run!――they run!”
“He’s safe!” she cried, “he’s safe! the battle’s won!”
――A ball now hisses through the airy tides,
(Some Fury wings it, and some Demon guides,)
Parts the fine locks her graceful head that deck,
Wounds her fair ear, and sinks into her neck;
The red stream issuing from her azure veins,
Dyes her white veil, her ivory bosom stains.
――“Ah me!” she cried, and sinking on the ground,
Kiss’d her dear babes, regardless of the wound:
“Oh, cease not yet to beat, thou vital urn,
Wait, gushing life, oh! wait my love’s return!”――
Hoarse barks the wolf, the vulture screams from far,
The angel, Pity, shuns the walks of war;――
“Oh spare, ye war-hounds, spare their tender age!
On me, on me,” she cried, “exhaust your rage!”
Then with weak arms, her weeping babes caress’d,
And sighing, hid them in her blood-stain’d vest.
From tent to tent, the impatient warrior flies,
Fear in his heart, and frenzy in his eyes:
Eliza’s name along the camp he calls,
Eliza echoes through the canvas walls;
Quick through the murmuring gloom his footsteps tread,
O’er groaning heaps, the dying and the dead,
Vault o’er the plain,――and in the tangled wood,――
Lo! dead Eliza――weltering in her blood!
Soon hears his listening son the welcome sounds,
With open arms and sparkling eyes he bounds,
“Speak low,” he cries, and gives his little hand,
“Mamma’s asleep upon the dew-cold sand;
Alas! we both with cold and hunger quake――
Why do you weep! Mamma will soon awake.”
――“She’ll wake no more!” the hopeless mourner cried,
Upturn’d his eyes, and clasp’d his hands, and sigh’d;
Stretch’d on the ground, awhile entranced he lay,
And press’d warm kisses on the lifeless clay;
And then upsprung with wild convulsive start,
And all the father kindled in his heart;
“Oh, Heaven!” he cried, “my first rash vow forgive!
These bind to earth, for these I pray to live.”
Round his chill babes he wrapp’d his crimson vest,
And clasp’d them sobbing, to his aching breast.
From _The Loves of the Plants_, by Dr. Erasmus Darwin.
ELIZA.
Now stood Eliza on the wood-crown’d height
O’er Chobham’s plain, spectatress of the fight;
Sought with proud eye, amid the noisy strife,
Her own John Jenkins, private in the Life
Guards Blue. This day a holyday she’d got,
Telling her Missus (whether true or not,
Who knows?) her grandmother in danger lay
Of death, and might she go out for the day?
From hill to hill the Guards the foe pursued;
She viewed her Jenkins, or believed she viewed;
And in full uniform what female heart
Could look on Jenkins, and not feel Love’s dart?
Near and more near th’ exulting Housemaid press’d.
’Twas Jenkins! What emotions fill’d her breast!
She caught his eye,――then heard a shout, “They run!”
“Now, then,” she cried, “he’ll come――the fight is done!”
One Sergeant Jones approaches now her side,
(Some demon pow’r it is his steps doth guide.)
He smoothes the locks her graceful head that deck,――
Kisses her,――puts his arm about her neck,
And whispers softly in her ear a vow,
Swearing that he will love her then as now.
“Heigho!” she sighs,――then in half-smother’d tones
Consents, and so,――goes off with Sergeant Jones.
* * * * *
From tent to tent the impatient Jenkins flies;――
“Where is Eliza?” he despairing cries.
Eliza’s name through all the camp he calls,――
“Eliza!” echoes through the canvas walls.
Swift gains he the canteen. What horror’s here,
Eliza with the Sergeant drinking beer!
“Eliza false!” the hopeless Jenkins cried,
Upturn’d his eyes, and clasp’d his hands, and sigh’d.
“Have you, then, for a Sergeant, false one, scorn’d
The ‘private’ station I so well adorn’d?
I’ll be revenged.” The false Eliza smiles,――
“There’s not an area to be seen for miles.”
Hopeless, despairing, Jenkins dropp’d one tear;
And then upsprung, and wildly call’d for beer.
* * * * *
That night a whisper through the encampment went,
Jenkins was carried, drunk, unto his tent.
_Diogenes_, 1853.
――――
But one of the most humorous parodies in the language, which was also
founded upon Darwin’s poem, appeared in _The Anti-Jacobin_, it was
entitled
THE LOVES OF THE TRIANGLES.
_A Mathematical and Philosophical Poem,
Inscribed to Dr. Darwin._
Stay your rude steps, or e’er your feet invade
The Muses’ haunts, ye sons of War and Trade!
Nor you, ye legion fiends of Church and Law,
Pollute these pages with unhallow’d paw!
Debas’d, corrupted, grovelling, and confined,
No _Definitions_ touch your senseless mind;
To you no _Postulates_ prefer their claim,
No ardent _Axioms_ your dull souls inflame;
For you, no _Tangents_ touch, no _Angles_ meet,
No _Circles_ join in osculation sweet!
For me, ye _Cissoids_, round my temples bend
Your wandering curves; ye _Conchoids_ extend;
Let playful _Pendules_ quick vibration feel,
While silent _Cyclois_ rests upon her wheel;
Let _Hydrostatics_, simpering as they go,
Lead the light Naiads on fantastic toe;
Let shrill _Acoustics_ tune the tiny lyre;
With _Euclid_ sage fair _Algebra_ conspire;
The obedient pulley strong _Mechanics_ ply,
And wanton _Optics_ roll the melting eye!
But chief, thou Nurse of the Didactic Muse,
Divine _Nonsensia_, all thy soul infuse;
The charms of _Secants_ and of _Tangents_ tell,
How Loves and Graces in an _Angle_ dwell;
How slow progressive _Points_ protract the Line,
As pendant spiders spin the filmy twine;
How lengthened _Lines_, impetuous sweeping round,
Spread the wide _Plane_, and mark its circling bound;
How _Planes_, their substance, with their motion grown,
Form the huge _Cube_, the _Cylinder_, the _Cone_.
* * * * *
This parody has two drawbacks, in the first place it is much too long
to be inserted here in full, in the second place, much of its humour
depends on an acquaintance with the original poem, which comparatively
few modern readers have. It will be found complete in _The Poetry of
the Anti-Jacobin_.
There were several other parodies of Darwin’s _Loves of the Plants_,
such as _The Loves of the Colours_, and _The Loves of the Lowlier
Plants_, both of which were published about 1824.
――――:o:――――
NATURAL SELECTION.
_A Skit on the Darwinian Theory._
I have found out a gift for my fair,
I have found where the cave men are
Laid, Skull femur and pelvis are there,
And spears that of silex they made.
But he ne’er could be true, she averred,
Who would dig up an ancestor’s grave;
And I loved her the more when I heard
Such filial regard for the Cave.
My shelves they are furnished with stones,
All sorted and labelled with care,
And a splendid collection of bones,
Each one of them ancient and rare.
One would think she might like to retire
To my study――she calls it a “hole,”
Not a fossil I heard her admire,
But I begged it, or borrowed,――or stole.
But there comes an idea-less lad,
With a strut, and a stare, and a smirk;
And I watch, scientific though sad,
The Law of Selection at work.
Of Science he hasn’t a trace,
_He_ seeks not the How or the Why.
But he sings with an amateur’s grace,
And dances much better than I.
And we know the more modified males
By dance and by song win their wives,
’Tis a law that in “Aves” prevails
And that even in “Homo” survives.
Shall I rage as they twirl in the valse?
Shall I sneer as they carol and coo?
Oh, no! for since Chloe is false
I’m certain that Darwin is true.
From _The Modern Apostle_, by C. C. W. Naden.
――――
TO MY BELOVED.
Miss, I’m a Pensive Protoplasm,
Born in some pre-historic chasm.
I, and my humble fellow-men
Are hydrogen, and oxygen,
And nitrogen and carbon too,
And so is Jane, and so are you.
In stagnant water swarm our brothers
And sisters, but we’ve many others,
Among them animalculæ,
And lizard’s eggs――and so, you see,
My darling Vesta, show no pride,
Nor turn coquettish head aside,
Our pedigrees, as thus made out,
Are no great things to boast about.
The only comfort seems to be
In this――philosophers agree
That how a Protoplasm’s made
Is mystery outside their trade.
And we are parts, so say the sages,
Of life come down from Long Past Ages.
So let us haste in Hymen’s bands
To join our protoplastic hands,
And spend our gay organic life
As happy man and happy wife.
SHIRLEY BROOKS. 1869.
――――
PARODY EPITAPH ON DARWIN.
What needs my Darwin for his honoured bones,
The labour of an age in pilèd stones?
He, to our wonder and astonishment,
Was hid beneath a grander monument,
And in such pomp doth here sepulchrèd lie,
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die!
From _Travels_, by “Umbra.” 1865.
[Illustration]
MATTHEW ARNOLD.
In the second volume of this collection (p. 236) will be found several
parodies of Matthew Arnold’s _Sonnet to George Cruikshank_, and _The
Forsaken Merman_, which had been printed some years before. Yet a
writer in the _Saturday Review_, in a notice of Arnold’s poems, made
the following confession of his ignorance:――
“Tennyson, Browning, Swinburne, and most of our lesser poets
besides, have been parodied again and again; we do not
remember to have seen a single parody of Mr. Arnold.… There
is a subtlety about the structure of his verse and the
harmony of his lines which defies imitation.”
_The Superfine Review_ makes such claims to omniscience that it is
refreshing to find a writer on its staff not only stating his belief
that Arnold had not been parodied, but that his poetry _defied
parody_, and this soon after the reading world had been delighted with
the following successful burlesque, in Mr. W. H. Mallock’s _The New
Republic_, published in London by Messrs. Chatto & Windus:――
“Softly the evening descends,
Violet and soft. The sea
Adds to the silence, below
Pleasant and cool on the beach
Breaking; yes, and a breeze
Calm as the twilight itself
Furtively sighs through the dusk,
Listlessly lifting my hair,
Fanning my thought-wearied brow,
Thus I stand in the gloom
Watching the moon-track begin
Quivering to die like a dream
Over the far sea-line
To the unknown region beyond.
“So for ages hath man
Gazed on the ocean of time
From the shores of his birth, and, turning
His eyes from the quays, the thronged
Marts, the noise and the din
To the far horizon, hath dreamed
Of a timeless country beyond.
Vainly: for how should he pass,
Being on foot, o’er the wet
Ways of the unplumbed waves?
How, without ship, should he pass
Over the shipless sea
To the timeless country beyond?
“Ah, but once――once long ago,
There came a ship white-sailed
From the country beyond, with bright
Oarsmen, and men that sang;
Came to Humanity’s coasts,
Called to the men on the shore,
Joyously touched at the port.
Then did time-weary man
Climb the bulwarks, the deck
Eagerly crowding. Anon
With jubilant voices raised,
And singing, “When Israel came
Out of Egypt,” and whatso else
In the psalm is written, they passed
Out of the ken of the land,
Over the far sea-line,
To the unknown region beyond.
“Where are they now, then――they
That were borne out of sight by the ship――
Our brothers, of times gone by?
Why have they left us here,
Solemn, dejected, alone,
Gathered in groups on the shore?
Why? For we, too, have gazed
O’er the waste of waters, and watched
For a sail as keenly as they.
Ah, wretched men that we are!
On our haggard faces and brows
Aching, a wild breeze fawns
Full of the scents of the sea,
Redolent of regions beyond.
Why, then, tarries the ship?
When will her white sail rise
Like a star on the sea-line? When?
“When?――And the answer comes
From the sailless face of the sea,
“Ah, vain watchers, what boots
The calm of the evening?
Have ye not watched through the day
Turbulent waves, the expanse
Endless, shaken with storm,
And ask ye where is the ship?
Deeper than plummet can dive
She is bedded deep in the ooze,
And over her tall mast floats
The purple plain of the calm.”
“Yes――and never a ship
Since this is sunken, will come
Ever again o’er the waves――
Nay, not even the craft with the fierce
Steersman, him of the marsh
Livid, with wheels of flame
Circling his eyes, to smite
The lingering soul with his oar.
――Not that even. But we
Drop where we stand one by one
On the shingles and sands of time,
And cover in taciturn gloom,
With only perhaps some tear,
Each for his brother the hushed
Heart and the limitless dreams
With a little gift of sand.”
――――
CHRISTMAS THOUGHTS.
_By a Modern Thinker._
’Tis Christmas-eve; a low wind breathes:
The windows of the church are bright,
And girls with happy eyes to-night
Are hanging up the Christmas wreaths;
And village voices by and by
Will reach my windows through the trees
With wild sweet music: “Praise on high
To God, on earth good will and peace!”
O happy girls that hang the wreaths
O village fiddlers, happy ye!
Christmas to you still truly breathes
Good-will and peace, but not to me!
Yes, gladness is your simple rôle
Ye foolish girls, ye labouring poor;
But ill would joy beseem my soul,
To sigh, my past is, and endure.
For as once Rousseau stood, I stand
Apart, made picturesque by grief
One of a small world-weary band,
The orphans of a dead belief
Through graveyards lone we love to stray,
And sadly the sad tombs explore,
And contradict the texts which say
That we shall rise again once more.
Our faith is dead, of course, and grief
Fills up its room; and Christmas pie
And turkey cannot bring relief
To such as Obermann and I.
Ah, Obermann! and might I pass
This English Christmastide with thee
Far by those inland waves whose glass
Brightens and breaks by Meillerie!
Or else amidst the loveliest dells
Alp-crags with pine we’d mix our sighs;
Mourn at the sound of Christmas bells
Sniff at the smells of Christmas pies;
But thou art dead, and long dank grass
And wet mould cools thy tired hot brain;
Thou art lain down and now, alas,
Of course you won’t get up again
Yet Obermann, ’tis better so;
For if, sad slumberer, after all
We were to re-arise you know
’Twould make us feel so very small.
Best bear our grief this manlier way,
And make our grief be balm to grief
For if in faith sweet comfort lay
There lurks sweet pride in unbelief.
Wherefore remembering this once more,
Unto my childhood’s church I’ll go
And bow my head to that low door
I passed through standing long ago.
I’ll sit in the accustomed place
And make, whilst all the unlearned stare
A mournful atheistic face
At their vain noise of unheard prayer.
Then whilst they hymn the heavenly birth
And angel-voices from the skies,
My thoughts shall go where Weimar’s earth
For ever darkens Goethe’s eyes;
Till sweet girls’ glances from their books
Shall steal towards me as they sigh,
“How intellectual he looks
And yet how wistful! and his eye
Has that vain look of baffled prayer.”
And then when church is o’er, I’ll run
Comb misery into my hair,
And go and get my portrait done!
W. H. M.
This parody of Matthew Arnold appeared in _The World_ some years ago,
so that the _Saturday Reviewer_ before alluded to must either have
been Rip Van Winkle, or very fresh from school.
――――
GUIDO AND LITA.
For the son of a Duke, and the husband of a Princess, to write and to
publish a poem was a pretty piece of condescension, which was not
properly appreciated. But, alas! we live in a busy age, and two
thousand lines of verse have a deterring effect on the average modern
mind. To overcome the difficulty, _Funny Folks_ condensed the Marquis
of Lorne’s dismal poem _Guido and Lita_ into half a dozen stanzas,
faithfully preserving the pith of the original.
Guido on the Riviera
Talketh verse unto his dad,
Brusquely says the father, “Bother!
Where is shelter to be had?”
For a storm is fiercely rising,
And the old man hath the blues――
Here a fisherman’s small cottage
Sentimental Guido views.
Guido there beheld his Lita
Frying fish――she turned to grin;
Guido, fired with sudden passion,
“Chucked” her underneath the chin,
Saying, “Sweetest maid, I love thee!”
Said the maiden unto him,
“Get out with your stuff and nonsense!
See, your parent’s looking grim.”
Soon the Paynim host came fiercely,
Slaughtering with fire and sword;
Aid was sought from Guido’s father,
But that crusty knight was bored.
Off they carried beauteous Lita――
Guido could not bring relief;
Sirad, Saracenic leader,
Made her of his Harem chief.
There a victim of that Paynim
A goblet of “cold pizen” brings.
“When the Saracenic chieftain
At the banquet drinks and sings,”
Says this personage vindictive,
“Give this gruel, dear, to _he_――
It will cure him of his tantrums,
Straightway then arise and flee.”
Escaping thus, the dauntless Lita,
Emulating Joan of Arc,
Dons bright armour, sword, and buckler,
And in battle makes her mark.
This the “Elder Knight” perceiving
(Guido’s father), though a churl,
Said, “I never more will hinder
Guido’s _penchant_ for the girl.”
Meanwhile, screwing up his courage,
Guido, maundering no more,
Has again put on his armour,
Plunged into the battle’s roar,
Deeds of daring without number,
Paynims driven from the walls,
Dying father, “Bless ye children!”
_Tableau!_――and the curtain falls.
_Funny Folks_, November 27, 1875.
――――:o:――――
NUTSHELL NOVELS.
VOL. I.
A winning wile,
A sunny smile,
A feather;
A tiny walk,
A pleasant talk,
Together!
VOL. II.
A little doubt,
A playful pout.
Capricious;
A merry miss,
A stolen kiss,
Delicious!
VOL. III.
You ask mamma,
Consult papa,
With pleasure!
And both repent
This rash event
At leisure!
MARRIAGE A LA MODE.
A hat, a cane,
A nobby beau!
A narrow lane,
A whisper low.
A smile, a bow,
A little flirt!
An ardent vow――
That’s cheap as dirt!
A hand to squeeze,
A girl to kiss
Quite at one’s ease
Must needs be bliss.
A ring, a date,
A honeymoon,
To find too late
It was too soon!
――――
ONE SLEIGH RIDE.
A sleigh――
A day
Of glorious weather;
A girl――
A whirl
Of man and maid together.
A freeze――
A squeeze――
A touching of cold noses;
A crash――
A blush――
And cheeks as red as roses.
A yearn――
A turn,
And homeward they go flying;
A sigh――
Good-bye,
And then some more good by’ing.
* * * * *
A span――
A man
The livery stable trusted;
A youth,
In truth,
Demented, quite, and busted.
――――
NO DOUBT OF IT.
Carpets rise,
Dust flies,
Confusion reigns supreme;
Mouth dries,
Aching eyes,
Almost makes me scream.
Floors wet,
House upset,
I think you catch my meaning.
If not yet,
Soon I bet
You’ll see it is house-cleaning.
G. L. HARRISON.
――――
The four following examples originally appeared in _Truth_, February,
3, 1887, together with many others of a less amusing character:――
“Hansom quick!
Waterloo.
First-class tick-
ets for two.”
Wretched train;
Bray as last!
Will it rain?
Sky o’ercast.
Sudden shock!
Boat upset!
Brand new frock
Soaking wet.
Back to town
Feeling small,
Parents frown,
That is all!
CHARON.
THE OLD MAID.
Seventeen
Fairy Queen!
Rich and rare,
Golden hair!
Wilful maid
Youths upbraid:
Twenty-one,
Will have none!
Twenty-eight,
Getting late:
Rather vexed,
Unannexed!
Years advance,
Lost her chance;
Thirty-six,
Cross as sticks!
SCHLEMIL.
Celandine,
Violet;
Shower and shine,
Baby Pet.
Sunny days,
Roses rare;
Woodland ways,
Maiden fair.
Changing leaves,
Busy feet;
Golden sheaves,
Mother sweet.
Snowflakes white,
Angel cheer;
Hope grows bright,
Granny dear!
DELIA.
DRINKS.
Some like tea
Or cocoa;
Not for me――
Thank you, no!
B. and S.
After sup.?
Thank you, yes!
Finish up.
Sparkling “boy,”
If the best,
Bringeth joy,
Wit and jest.
But of the
Drinks that cheer
Give to me
Bitter beer!
H.M.D.
A COUNTRY QUARTER SESSION.
Three or four parsons, three or four squires,
Three or four lawyers, three or four liars;
Three or four parishes bringing appeals,
Three or four hands, and three or four seals;
Three or four bastards, three or four w――――s,
Tag rag and bobtail three or four scores;
Three or four bulls, and three or four cows,
Three or four orders, three or four bows.
Three or four statutes not understood,
Three or four paupers paying for food;
Three or four roads that never were mended,
Three or four scolds, and the session is ended.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
RECIPE FOR LORD CASTLEREAGH’S SPEECHES.
Two or three facts without any foundation;
Two or three charges of party vexation;
Two or three metaphors warring on sense;
Two or three sentences ditto on tense;
Two or three knocks the table to hammer;
Two or three rants in defiance of grammar;
Two or three vows on economy’s plan;
Two or three hours ending but where you began;
Two or three novels in eulogium of tax;
Two or three hints about turning your backs;
Two or three boasts of venal majorities;
Two or three groans on dismal minorities;
Two or three cheers from two or three creatures;
Two or three fundaments, two or three features;
Two or three meanings which nobody reaches,
Will be certain to make _one_ of Castlereagh’s speeches.
From _The New Tory Guide_. London, 1819.
――――
A RECEIPT FOR COURTSHIP.
Two or three dears, and two or three sweets;
Two or three balls, and two or three treats;
Two or three serenades, given as a lure;
Two or three oaths, how much they endure!
Two or three messages sent in one day;
Two or three times led out to the play;
Two or three soft speeches made by the way;
Two or three tickets for two or three times;
Two or three love-letters writ all in rhymes;
Two or three months keeping strict to these rules
Can never fail making a couple of fools.
[Illustration]
A STOCK EXCHANGE BALLAD.
_The Grand Promotion Army._
I am Colonel North of the Horse Marines,
I began promoting when in my teens,
And I rather think I’m behind the scenes
In the Grand Promotion Army.
’Tis said to the early bird is due
The worm, and I’ve collared of worms a few;
For I came from Leeds, and “I’m Yorkshire too,”
In the Grand Promotion Army.
With Chili for long I cast my lot,
And made some money in that far spot;
And Chilies are strong and I make it hot
For the Grand Promotion Army.
The City imagination fails
To realise how the Nitrate Rails
Were boomed so high; but we tell no tales
In the Grand Promotion Army.
Two hundred and eighty from fourteen!
Why, what could a rise so tremendous mean?
’Twas simply that I was upon the scene
With the Grand Promotion Army.
What great financial soul confines
Itself to a pitiful few designs?
There’s a smaller crop of Nitrate lines
For the Grand Promotion Army.
So we run them up, and the rig succeeds,
And if some day there’s somebody bleeds,
You bet it isn’t the tyke from Leeds,
Of the Grand Promotion Army.
Of Tarapaca I might be dumb;
For the waterworks have only come
To a trumpery thirty premium
For the Grand Promotion Army.
In promoting schemes I still persist:
There are lines that pay, yet don’t exist.
Egad! I’m quite the philanthropist
Of the Grand Promotion Army.
As all my friends and admirers know,
I’ve mixed myself up with Whitley’s show,
That the organ-grinder’s tin might flow
To the Grand Promotion Army.
Although I am bald, with whiskers red,
There’s Ouless, R.A., who paints one, said
He thought I had a wonderful head
For the Grand Promotion Army.
Then _vive le jeu!_ and the game for me
Is starting a merry companèe
And waltzing away with the £ s. d.
For the Grand Promotion Army.
For “some has brains and some has tin,”
As Orton remarked; and if you’d win,
Why, stick to the Colonel, and all stand in
With the Grand Promotion Army.
OWLET.
_The Financial News_, May 26, 1888.
For reasons which can be easily understood by those interested in
public companies it has suited the Editor of _The Financial News_ to
cry down the ventures in which Mr. John Thomas North is interested. It
is easy enough to sneer at him as the “Nitrate King,” and to laugh at
his Volunteer Colonelcy, but we do not hear that the Editor of _The
Financial News_ is either so successful in business, or so hospitable
in private life, as “Colonel North of the Horse Marines.”
[Illustration]
LINES ON A DEAD DOG,
_Seen floating in the Canal_.
(NOT by A. C. Swinburne.)
In the stir and the tumult of nations,
’Mid the wrestlings of right and of power,
It is good to lay hold upon Patience
And sit by her side for an hour;
Apart from the world and her wonders,
In a garden of poppies to wait,
And list to the tremulous thunders
Of the chariot of Fate.
O carcase not fragrant but fetid!
O wave whither all things are shot!
O dogs not in honour, but treated
As of brutes the most rotten that rot!
O moment not gladsome but gloomy,
When the threads of our Fates intertwined;
O sepulchre, spacious and roomy
For thee and thy kind!
Thou wert fair ere the doleful disaster,
Firm thy muscles, thy bones featly set,
And they moved at the voice of thy master
Though obedience were tinged with regret.
What moved him, old dog, to thy slaughter,
To cast to the pike and the eel?
When o’er thy bright form closed the water
No remorse did he feel?
Dost thou dream in the night of existence
’Mong the things that have been and but seem,
Of thy passionate pulseful resistance
To the cad that consigned to the stream?
Dost thou dream, when of terriers the gamest
Thou didst leap from the leash to be freed,
And the blood of the rats thou o’ercamest
Besprinkled the mead?
By the maidens who love us and flatter,
By the maidens who flout us and jeer,
By the friends who but bore with their chatter,
By the others whose chatting can cheer,
By the tutors who woefully work us,
By the tutors who don’t in the least,
We adjure thee, respond out of Orcus,
Unfortunate beast.
The desire of an aimless flirtation
Is more than the wisdom of years,
Though we’ve tasted its utter nugation,
Light laughter and fugitive fears.
For the lords of terrestrial treasures
Afflict us and rack us with pains,
And we fly to the palace of pleasures
Forgetting their chains.
And we smile pressing hands in the dances,
And we feign what we give not nor take,
And indulge in the gleaming of glances
Though the heart is as cold as a snake.
As lovers, though loving not truly,
We are filled with the fire of the eyes
And with langours and laughs that unduly
Depress and surprise.
We are tender and warm in the twilight,
But the day finds us tuneless and old;
Till equally low light and high light
Have faded from field and from fold.
For the world hath in humbug abounded
Since the fiends bade the game to begin,
And the motto hath ever resounded,――
‘Let those laugh that win.’
Like Lady Macbeth or like Pontius,
We wash us, of these to be rid;
For sadly the soul is subconscious
That the fitness of things doth forbid.
But the water of Lethè were powerless
To cleanse from the rust of the years,
And the heavens are sultry and showerless
And the eye hath no tears.
Shall we e’er know what Atè intended,
Libitina and Clotho to boot,
When on Sunday three ’varsity men did
Encounter the corse, of the brute?
Oh why, as they walked in their wisdom,
And cramped with conventional togs,
Were they brought into contact with his doom,
Defunctest of dogs?
From the sides of the dogs of the Dorians
Fur has fallen, but fur is on thine?
Ah, where shall we find the historians,
In their pages to give thee a line?
Where are they――Macaulay or Lingard――
Thy tale and thy troubles to write?
Would they touch and cry “faugh!” as they fingered?
Would they turn from the sight?
Thou shalt change, and the rot and the canker
Make mock of thy beauty and bloom;
Thou shalt swell with thy gases, and ranker
And ranker shall grow thy perfume.
_We_ shall fade, and diminish, and perish,
As the Hours and the Fates shall decree,
But till then in our bosoms we cherish
Remembrance of thee!
EREMUS.
From _College Rhymes_. Volume XI. 1870.
――――
The following are extracts from an imitation of A. C. Swinburne which
appeared in _The Century Magazine_, February, 1883. As to any meaning
to be attached to the lines each reader is perfectly at liberty to
make what sense out of them he can.
THE SONG OF SIR PALAMEDE.
_“Came Palamede, upon a secret quest,
To high Tintagel, and abode as guest
In likeness of a minstrel with the king.
Nor was there man could sound so sweet a string._
* * * * *
_To that strange minstrel strongly swore King Mark,
By all that makes a knight’s faith firm and strong,
That he, as guerdon of his harp and song,
Might crave and have his liking.
* * * ‘O King, I crave
No gift of man that king may give to slave,
But this thy crowned queen only, this thy wife.’”_
SWINBURNE. _Tristram of Lyonesse._
With flow exhaustless of alliterate words,
And rhymes that mate in music glad as birds
That feel the spring’s sweet life among light leaves
That ardent breath of amorous May upheaves
And kindles fluctuant to an emerald fire
Bright as the imperious seas that all men’s souls desire:
With long strong swell of alexandrine lines,
And with passion of anapæsts, like winds in pines
That moan and mutter in great gusts suddenly,
With whirl of wild wet wings of storms set free:
In mirth of might and very joy to sing,
Uplifting voice untired, I sound one sole sweet string.
* * * * *
And many a theme I choose in wayfaring,
As one who passing plucks the sunflower
And ponders on her looks for love of her.
Yea, her flower-named whose fate was like a flower,
Being bright and brief and broken in an hour
And whirled of winds: and her whose awless hand
Held flickering flame to fawn against the brand,
Till Meleager splendid as the sun
Shrank to a star and set, and all her day was done:
And her who lent her slight white virgin light
For death to dim, that Athens’ mastering might
Above all seas should shine, supernal sphere of night:
And her who kept the high knight amorous
Pent in her hollow hill-house marvellous,
And flame of flowers brake beauteous where she trod,
Her who hath wine and honey and a rod,
And crowneth man a king and maketh man a slave,
Her who rose rose-red from the rose-white wave:
And her who ruled with sword-blue blade-bright eyes
The helpless hearts of men in queenly wise,
And all were bowed and broken as on a wheel,
Yet no soft love-cloud long could sheath that stainless steel,
Her tiger-hearted and false and glorious,
With flower-sweet throat and float of warm hair odorous:
These sing I, and whatso else that burns and glows,
And is as fire and foam-flowers and the rose
And sun and stars and wan warm moon and snows.
Who hath said that I have not made my song to shine
With such bright words as seal a song to be divine?
Who hath said that I have not sweetness thereon spread
As gold of peerless honey is poured on bread?
Who hath said that I make not all men’s brains to ring,
And swim with imminent madness while I sing,
And fall as feeble dykes before strong tides of spring?
And now as guerdon of my great song I claim
The swan-white pearl of singers, yea Queen Fame,
Who shall be wed no more to languid lips and tame,
But clasp me and kiss and call me by my name,
And be all my days about me as a flame,
Though sane vain lame tame cranes sans shame make game and blame!
HELEN GRAY CONE.
――――
MR. SWINBURNE’S PROSE.
As a critic and a scholar Mr. Swinburne ranks among the first of the
day, yet his style has its defects, as was clearly pointed out by a
correspondent of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ in November 1886.
If one of Mr. Swinburne’s long and involved sentences is printed side
by side with one selected from Mrs. Gamp’s _repertoire_, the
comparison is not altogether to the advantage of the poet:
MR. SWINBURNE.
We may even, and not unreasonably, suspect and fear that it
must be through some defect or default in ourselves if we
cannot feel, as they do, the force or charm of that which
touches others, and these our betters as often as our
equals, so nearly; if we cannot, for example――as I may
regretfully confess that I never could――feel adequately, or
in full, the bitter sweetness that so many thousands, and
most notably among them all a better man by far and a far
worthier judge than I, have tasted in these pages of Dickens
which hold the story of Little Nell, a story in which all
the elaborate accumulation of pathetic incident and
interest, so tenderly and studiously built up, has never, to
speak truth, given me one passing thrill――in the exquisitely
fit and faithful phrase of a great living poet, “one sweet,
possessive pang” of the tender delight and pity requickened
well nigh to tears at every fresh perusal or chance
recollection of that one simple passage in “Bleak House”
which describes the baby household tended by the little
sister, who leaves her lesser charges locked up while she
goes charing; a page which I can imagine that many a man
unused to the melting mood would not undertake to read out
aloud without a break.――_Note on Charlotte Brontë_, pp.
64-65.
NOW for MRS. GAMP.
To think as I should see beneath this blessed ouse which
well I know it Miss Pecksniff my sweet young lady to be a
ouse as there is not a many like――and worse luck, and
wishin’ it were not so, which then this tearful walley would
be changed into a flowerin’ guardian Mrs. Chuffy; to think
as I should see identically comin’ Mrs. Pinch――I take the
liberty though almost unbeknown――and so assure you of it
Sir, the smilinest and sweetest face as ever Mrs.
Chuzzlewit, I see exceptin’ your own, my dear good lady, and
your good lady’s too Sir Mrs. Moddle, if I may make so bold
as speak so plain of what is plain enough to them as need’nt
look through millstones Mrs. Todgers to find out what is
wrote upon the wall behind: which no offence is meant ladies
and gentlemen none being took I hope: to think as I should
see that smilinest and sweetest face which me and another
friend of mine took notice of among the packages down London
Bridge in this promiscuous place is a surprise indeed!
[Illustration]
SIX OF ONE AND HALF-A-DOZEN OF THE OTHER.
(_Some little way after the late Mortimer Collins._)
Oh, Summer said to Winter,
“Earth lovers love me best;
For I flush the mead, and I fill the rill,
And the violet and the daffodil,
And the red, red rose o’er the world I spill;
And my dawns are cool, and my eves are chill;
And don’t I run up the doctor’s bill
For bronchitis and all the rest!”
But Winter said to Summer:
“Earth-lovers best love _me_:
For I now bring slop instead of snow,
(Which comes in June, or mostly so;)
And roses and noses at Christmas blow,
And the birds their nesting-time don’t know,
But lay in December――a pretty go!
And _your_ azure skies, and your sunny glow
Are silly legends of long ago;
Whilst as to the Doctor’s Bills, oho!
We are equally good at _them_ I trow.
Fact is, the difference ’twixt us two
Is the purest fiddle-de-dee!”
_Punch._ December 15, 1888.
Several humorous parodies written by the late Mr. Mortimer Collins
have already appeared in this collection, but his lines to Chloe, with
her supposed burlesque reply to them, deserve to be quoted:――
AD CHLOEN M.A.
(_Fresh from her Cambridge Examination._)
Lady, very fair are you,
And your eyes are very blue,
And your hose;
And your brow is like the snow,
And the various things you know,
Goodness knows.
And the rose-flush on your cheek,
And your Algebra and Greek
Perfect are:
And that loving lustrous eye
Recognises in the sky
Every Star.
You have pouting piquant lips,
You can doubtless an eclipse
Calculate;
But for your cerulean hue,
I had certainly from you
Met my fate.
If by some arrangement dual
I were Adams minced with Whewell,
Then some day
I, as wooer, perhaps might come,
To so sweet an Artium
Magistra.
CHLOE. M.A.
_Ad Amantem Suam._
Careless rhymer, it is true,
That my favourite colour’s blue:
But am I
To be made a victim, Sir;
If to puddings I prefer
Cambridge pie?
If with giddier girls I play
Croquet through the summer day
On the turf,
Then at night (’tis no great boon)
Let me study how the moon
Sways the turf.
Tennyson’s idyllic verse
Surely suits me none the worse
If I seek
Old Sicilian birds and bees――
Music of sweet Sophocles――
Golden Greek.
You have said my eyes are blue:
There may be a fairer hue,
Perhaps――and yet
It is surely not a sin
If I keep my Secrets in
Violet.
MORTIMER COLLINS.
――――:o:――――
THE COMIC HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
The following song was written by Mr. Collins in the days when George
the Third was King. It was published, with music, by T. Broome, 15
Holborn Bars, London.
The Romans in England they once did sway,
And the Saxons they after them led the way,
And they tugg’d with the Danes ’till an Overthrow,
They both of them got by the Norman Bow,
Yet barring all Pother, the one and the other,
Were all of them Kings in their turn.
Little Willy the Conqueror long did reign,
But Billy his Son by an Arrow was slain:
And Harry the first was a scholar bright,
But Stephy was forc’d for his Crown to fight.
Yet barring &c.
Second Harry, Plantagenet’s name did bear,
And Cœur de Lion was his Son and Heir;
But Magna Charta we gain’d from John,
Which Harry the Third put his Seal upon.
Yet barring &c.
There was Teddy the first like a Tyger bold,
But the Second by Rebels was bought and sold
And Teddy the third was his Subject’s pride,
Tho his Grandson Dicky was popp’d aside.
Yet barring &c.
There was Harry the fourth a warlike wight,
And Harry the Fifth like a cock would fight
Tho Henry his son like a chick did pout,
When Teddy his Cousin had kick’d him out.
Yet barring &c.
Poor Teddy the fifth he was kill’d in bed,
By butchering Dick who was knock’d in head;
Then Harry the Seventh in fame grew big;
And Harry the Eighth was as fat as a Pig.
Yet barring &c.
With Teddy the Sixth we had tranquil days,
Tho’ Mary made Fire and Faggot blaze;
But good Queen Bess was a glorious Dame,
And bonnie King Jamie from Scotland came.
Yet barring &c.
Poor Charley the First was a Martyr made,
But Charley his Son was a comicle blade;
And Jemmy the Second when hotly spurr’d,
Run away, do ye see me, from Willy the Third.
Yet barring &c.
Queen Ann was victorious by Land and Sea,
And Georgey the First did with glory sway,
And as Georgey the Second has long been dead,
Long life to the Georgey we have in his stead,
And may his son’s sons to the end of the Chapter
All come to be Kings in their turn.
[Illustration]
Prose Parodies.
In the following pages a selection, as nearly representative as it can
be made, will be given from the parodies of the works of our greatest
prose writers. Although the axiom _le style c’est l’homme_ does not
apply to prose with quite the same force as to poetry, yet there are
many amusing prose burlesques, the originals of which will at once be
recognised.
Unfortunately most prose parodies are very long, in dealing with these
merely brief extracts can be given, and in some cases it will only be
necessary to indicate the names of the works in which they occur.
A PREFATORY PAPER.
_By the shade of Mr. Joseph Addison._
Lest my readers, and more especially the fair part of them, be
startled to find themselves thus accosted from another world, I take
the freedom in the first place, to assure them that I am a peaceable
and altogether inoffensive ghost. In the many private transactions
whereat I have been present unseen, I have ever observed a strict
discretion.
The secrets of the rouge pot are as safe with me as with my lady’s own
woman: and when I have found a lover in the closet of a dame of
quality, I have taken no more notice, than her husband himself would
have done of a like accident. Our Queen, Proserpine, being, as
everybody knows, obliged entirely to the poets for her throne and
title, and taking likewise, in her capacity of moon, no little share
in their inspiration, hath ever distinguished the whole brotherhood of
us with her singular grace: and from time to time, by her intercession
with her grim spouse, one or other of us hath the liberty of paying a
visit to the upper sphere.
All the condition set upon us is only this; that on our return, we
shall make such corrections in our most popular works, as modern men
and things may appear to need.
For the sake of mutual help in these our reforms, a few of us have
united of late into a Society, of which I have been appointed
(together with Dr. Samuel Johnson) to be the joint secretary, or
Recorder. And it may be convenient, if, by way of introduction to the
pieces now revised and put forth, I prefix a short catalogue of their
authors, persons who, though born in different ages, do nevertheless
marvellously harmonise and agree, insomuch, that a sincerer friendship
is hardly to be met with at Court, or even among beauties themselves.
(_Here follow descriptions of the principal authors whose works are
imitated in “Posthumous Parodies.”_)
However, it were almost too much to expect in either of us the
perfection of later judges, who have carried the art of criticism to
such a pitch of excellence, as that no mixture whatsoever of
commendation is any longer let in, to weaken its spirit and effect.
For my own part, I am wonderfully pleased with this improvement; for
it helps the main end of criticism, to wit, to make the public laugh.
And what author can be so blind to his own real interests, as not to
discern, how much more truly those are his friends who point out his
errors, than who puff up his vanity?
I know not how it hath happened, that in an assembly so notable for
ingenious persons as ours is, there is yet no mixture of the fairer
sort. Their absence is always a subject of regret with me, the most
unworthy of their admirers: and it is so now in a more especial
manner, forasmuch as I foresee that many small wags will take occasion
to draw therefrom a conclusion not a little disparaging to the sex’s
wit, and so make themselves mighty merry, as little people are ever
willing, at their better’s expence. C.
From _Posthumous Parodies_. London. J. Miller. 1814.
――――:o:――――
DR. JOHNSON’S GHOST.
_On the re-opening of Drury Lane Theatre._
That which was organised by the moral ability of one has been executed
by the physical efforts of many, and DRURY LANE THEATRE is now
complete. Of that part behind the curtain, which has not yet been
destined to glow beneath the brush of the varnisher, or vibrate to the
hammer of the carpenter, little is thought by the public, and little
need be said by the committee. Truth, however, is not lo be sacrificed
for the accommodation of either; and he who should pronounce that our
edifice has received its final embellishment would be disseminating
falsehood without incurring favour, and risking the disgrace of
detection without participating the advantage of success.
Professions lavishly effused and parsimoniously verified are alike
inconsistent with the precepts of innate rectitude and the practice of
external policy: let it not then be conjectured, that because we are
unassuming, we are imbecile; that forbearance is any indication of
despondency, or humility of demerit. He that is the most assured of
success will make the fewest appeals to favour, and where nothing is
claimed that is undue, nothing that is due will be withheld. A
swelling opening is too often succeeded by an insignificant
conclusion. Parturient mountains have ere now produced muscipular
abortions; and the auditor who compares incipient grandeur with final
vulgarity is reminded of the pious hawkers of Constantinople, who
solemnly perambulate her streets, exclaiming, “In the name of the
Prophet――figs!”
Of many who think themselves wise, and of some who are thought wise by
others, the exertions are directed to the revival of mouldering and
obscure dramas; to endeavours to exalt that which is now rare only
because it was always worthless, and whose deterioration, while it
condemned it to living obscurity, by a strange obliquity of moral
perception, constitutes its title to posthumous renown. To embody the
flying colours of folly, to arrest evanescence, to give to bubbles the
globular consistency as well as form, to exhibit on the stage the
piebald denizen of the stable, and the half-reasoning parent of combs,
to display the brisk locomotion of Columbine, or the tortuous
attitudinising of Punch;――these are the occupations of others, whose
ambition, limited to the applause of unintellectual fatuity, is too
innocuous for the application of satire, and too humble for the
incitement of jealousy.
Our refectory will be found to contain every species of fruit, from
the cooling nectarine and luscious peach to the puny pippin and the
noxious nut. There Indolence may repose, and Inebriety revel; and the
spruce apprentice, rushing in at second account, may there chatter
with impunity; debarred, by a barrier of brick and mortar, from
marring that scenic interest in others, which nature and education
have disqualified him from comprehending himself.
Permanent stage-doors we have none. That which is permanent cannot be
removed, for, if removed, it soon ceases to be permanent. What
stationary absurdity can vie with that ligneous barricado, which,
decorated with frappant and tintinnabulant appendages, now serves as
the entrance of the lowly cottage, and now as the exit of a lady’s
bed-chamber; at one time, insinuating plastic Harlequin into a
butcher’s shop, and, at another, yawning, as a floodgate, to
precipitate the Cyprians of St. Giles’s into the embraces of Macheath.
To elude this glaring absurdity, to give to each respective mansion
the door which the carpenter would doubtless have given, we vary our
portal with the varying scene, passing from deal to mahogany, and from
mahogany to oak, as the opposite claims of cottage, palace, or castle,
may appear to require.
Amid the general hum of gratulation which flatters us in front, it is
fit that some regard should be paid to the murmurs of despondence that
assail us in the rear. They, as I have elsewhere expressed it, “who
live to please,” should not have their own pleasures entirely
overlooked. The children of Thespis are general in their censures of
the architect, in having placed the locality of exit at such a
distance from the oily irradiators which now dazzle the eyes of him
who addresses you, I am, cries the Queen of Terrors, robbed of my fair
proportions. When the king-killing Thane hints to the breathless
auditory the murders he means to perpetrate in the castle of Macduff,
“ere his purpose cool,” so vast is the interval he has to travel
before he can escape from the stage, that his purpose has even time to
freeze. Your condition, cries the Muse of Smiles, is hard, but it is
cygnet’s down in comparison with mine. The peerless peer of capers and
congees[49] has laid it down as a rule, that the best good thing
uttered by the morning visitor should conduct him rapidly to the
doorway, last impressions vying in durability with first. But when, on
this boarded elongation, it falls to my lot to say a good thing, to
ejaculate “keep moving,” or to chant “_hic hoc horum genitivo_,” many
are the moments that must elapse ere I can hide myself from public
vision in the recesses of O. P. or P. S.
To objections like these, captiously urged and querulously maintained,
it is time that equity should conclusively reply. Deviation from
scenic propriety has only to vituperate itself for the consequences it
generates. Let the actor consider the line of exit as that line beyond
which he should not soar in quest of spurious applause: let him
reflect, that in proportion as he advances to the lamps, he recedes
from nature; that the truncheon of Hotspur acquires no additional
charm from encountering the cheek of beauty in the stage-box, and that
the bravura of Madame may produce effect, although the throat of her
who warbles it should not overhang the orchestra. The Jove of the
modern critical Olympus, Lord Mayor of the theatric sky[50] has, _ex
cathedrâ_, asserted, that a natural actor looks upon the audience part
of the theatre as the third side of the chamber he inhabits. Surely,
of the third wall thus fancifully erected, our actors should, by
ridicule or reason, be withheld from knocking their heads against the
stucco.
Time forcibly reminds me, that all things which have a limit must be
brought to a conclusion. Let me, ere that conclusion arrives, recall
to your recollection that the pillars which rise on either side of me,
blooming in virid antiquity, like two massy evergreens, had yet
slumbered in their native quarry, but for the ardent exertions of the
individual who called them into life: to his never-slumbering talents
you are indebted for whatever pleasure this haunt of the Muses is
calculated to afford. If, in defiance of chaotic malevolence, the
destroyer of the temple of Diana yet survives in the name of
Erostratus, surely we may confidently predict that the rebuilder of
the temple of Apollo will stand recorded to distant posterity in that
of――SAMUEL WHITBREAD.
From _The Rejected Addresses_, by James and Horace Smith. London,
1812.
There is a _Prefatory Paper_, in the style of Dr. Johnson, in
“Posthumous Parodies,” published by John Miller, London, 1814, but it
is greatly inferior to that contained in “Rejected Addresses.”
――――
ON BOOKBINDERS.
(_After Rasselas._)
Ye who listen with credulity to the whispers of noodles, and pursue
with eagerness the phantom “collection,” who believe that binder’s
promises are――binding, and that an inch of margin to-day matters not
on the morrow, attend to the wisdom of Bonnardot, Prince of
Book-Restorers. “The greatest merit of a rare book is indisputably a
margin uncut, or at least, little and regularly cut in every way.” No
hesitating words these; no room for doubt here. An uncut margin is the
greatest merit a rare book can possess, and it is a merit which has a
well ascertained commercial value. An eighth of an inch more or less
of margin often makes a difference in value of hundreds of dollars.
Now let the botcher-binder cut and slash as you will.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
ANONYMOUS JOURNALISM.
(_From an unpublished Essay by Dr. Johnson._)
He that asserts the annexation of a correct cognomen to each
production to be imperative upon every author, either strays from
veracity for the sake of disseminating falsehood, or circulates error
through the possession of congenital imbecility. Let it not be
surmised that this declaration is expressed through sensitive timidity
or supported by vacuous generalizations, for a further perusal will
speedily discover a clinching dialectic. The individual that appends
his hereditary appellation to a composition of transcendant ability,
does but seek to enervate his intellect by encomiastic excess, and
whilst he panders to his ambition, exaggerates his energies. Such a
course indeed, is too ephemeral for the attainment by an author of
immortality, because too invidious for the approbation of his
colleagues. Of the many who consider their cerebral progeny worthy of
attentive investigation, but few have the right to predicate
correctness of their hopeful conviction; and he that inscribes his
signature on a piece of somniferous fatuity, involves his relatives in
unmerited obloquy, whilst he exposes himself to dedecorating derision.
Amid the multitude of periodical productions it is but reasonable that
some should be devoted to the analysis of individual idiosyncracies,
and the maxims previously unfolded may to these be pertinently
applied.
An anonymous panegyric by an unknown friend is more acceptable than
the cringing adulation of a patent parasite, whilst unsigned reproofs
are more meritorious than personal vituperations.
He that panders to an inflamed irascibility by affording it an
opportunity of illicit flagellation, does but incite an infuriated man
to rebel against the legal institutions of his country.
To the contemptible criticisms of those whose opinions are in
contrariety with the superscribed, we merely reply, that, whilst the
procrastination of judgment is essential to the perfectibility of
Truth, their future ratiocinations will still be treated with
dignified derision by their magnanimous admonishers.
From _The Shotover Papers_, Oxford, 1874.
――――
“_Lexiphanes_, a Dialogue, imitated from Lucian, and suited to the
present times,” (1767), was a malicious piece of drollery directed
against Dr. Johnson; this has been attributed to Sir John Hawkins, the
real author, however, was Archibald Campbell, the Purser of a
Man-of-War.
A continuation of Rasselas, entitled _Dinarbas_, was published in
1793, it had little merit.
[Illustration]
Rev. LAURENCE STERNE.
BORN 1713. DIED March, 18, 1768.
A SENTIMENTAL JOURNEY.
_By a Sterne Shade._
CHAPTER I.
“I’ll be hanged if I do!”
I was standing at the verge of the pavement at the bottom of
Ludgate-hill, with one foot on the kerb and the other in the kennel.
’Tis an attitude of irresolution and uncertainty, and throws a man off
his level. And when a man is thrown off his level there’s no telling
what may be the end of it. I took my foot out of the kennel, and as I
set it down beside its companion on the granite I repeated my
exclamation――
“I’ll be hanged if I do!”
Now, ’tis an undertaking no man in the possession of his senses would
make if he was not quite sure of avoiding the penalty. There are many
inconveniences connected with being hanged, which would incline us to
hesitate. A man of sentiment and refinement would shrink from it. The
idea of engrossing the attention of so many people, from the Sheriff
and the Ordinary down to the most ragged beggar in the crowd, is a
shock to delicacy.
Besides, hanging entails early rising, and early rising is bad. Oh!
great Sun! for what dost thou quit thy roseate couch at so unearthly
an hour, but to air the world for us poor mortals?
Whip me the man who would rise before eleven, if he could help it. If
he couldn’t――well, ’tis different, and there’s an end on’t.
But early rising is a thing I never cared for or practised; and indeed
I can think of no worse way of beginning a day than getting up at
eight to be hanged.
And this brings me back to my first proposition. “I’ll be hanged if I
do!” said I.
As I uttered the words I brought down my cane with a smart rap on the
stones――for if the intention and the deed be the same thing, as
learned legists tell us, it was on the stones that I brought it down.
But between the deed and the intention a plaguy fellow must needs
thrust the foot on which he wore his largest and tenderest corn.
Mine is a sensitive heart, and of a truth tenderness is a failing that
is always leading me into difficulties.
I could not support the sight of his anguish; and as soon as he found
the use of his voice――which was pretty soon――I thought it best to move
away.
CHAPTER II.
I had not gone many steps ere I fell in with a donkey. Now an ass is
an animal I can never pass without giving him the time of day. There
is a gentle patience with which he listens to my discourses that wins
my heart in spite of myself.
He was harnessed to a sort of barrow, laden with mackerel, and he was
standing in Farringdon-street to allow the stream of traffic to pass
up Ludgate-hill.
“’Tis ever so, Honesty!” said I; “thou and I must e’en wait to let our
betters go by. See how yon ‘Bow and Stratford’ rolls by――mark that
_Pickford’s_ van――and thou’rt obliged to wait with thy fish, though
they be perishable goods at best.”
As I said this I had taken up one of the mackerel, and was moralizing
over it.
“Come, I say, jest drop that ’ere?” said a voice. I looked up. It was
Jack’s master. “And this is thy tyrant, then!” I thought to myself.
“Thine must be a hard lot, with one so suspicious of his kind――so
devoid of sentiment.” But I said nothing, and replaced the fish.
Just at this moment the tide of traffic was broken for an instant, and
the ass’s master hastened to take advantage of it. “Kim up!” said he
to Jack; and before the poor animal could obey him, he seized him by
the head and dragged him along, dealing him at the same time a score
of heavy blows with a thick stick that he carried in his right hand.
I could have found it in my heart to have given the rascal a sound
drubbing for his pains. But I refrained. I protest I am too
soft-hearted. I feared I might by chance hurt him, or he me.
“Farewell, Honesty!” said I, as Jack shambled off with his load. And
then I knew not what tender emotion stirred me, but I felt a tear
trickling down my cheek. “Farewell, Honesty!” said I again, as I put
my hand into my pocket for my kerchief.
It was gone!――――
CHAPTER III.
I have come to the conclusion that ’tis not the best way to get
through a story to begin at the end.
’Tis an unprofitable way at best, and tends to lead one into
digressions.
Now, digressions will be the ruin of me in this world and the next. I
shall be so beset with digressions I shall never reach my destination.
’Tis a very butterfly-like temptation. Here was I set down to write
you out my journey, and I’ve not got three steps from the bottom of
Ludgate-hill.
And this because of my fatal failing for digression. I had proposed to
write a chapter on _Pickford’s_ vans, and another on Public
Executions; but here’s the end of my letter, and I am still standing
with one foot on the kerbstone and the other in the kennel.
* * * * *
As I was writing that last sentence, I felt I could bear it no longer.
It had rung in my ears all day. I had looked out of windows, and out
of doors, and upstairs, and downstairs, but I could not discover
whence it came.
“I can’t get on! I can’t get on!”
’Twas a little plaintive voice like a child’s.
“I can’t get on!” This time I traced it to its source. ’Twas nothing
but a little squirrel in a revolving cage. As he ran, so his prison
turned, and he still kept crying, “I can’t get on!”
Oh! great principle of Liberty! was I wrong to make the instant
determination to set that poor little captive free? My heart assures
me I was not. I fumbled at the wire-fastening. It resisted my efforts;
but the squirrel bit my fingers all the same.
* * * * *
Another digression. But it shall be the last. I have sworn it, and so
there’s an end of the matter. And ’tis no much matter either, for
after all ’tis no more than this:――
As I stood on the pavement at the bottom of Ludgate-hill, with one
foot on the kerb and the other in the kennel, I suddenly remembered
that it was _Lord Mayors Day_.
“Shall I go and see the show?” said I to myself. And myself answered――
“I’ll be hanged if I do!” And I didn’t.
ANONYMOUS.
――――
AFFECTING APPEAL.
Linton, a musician belonging to the orchestra of Covent Garden
Theatre, was murdered by street robbers, who were afterwards
discovered and executed. A play was given for the benefit of his widow
and children; and the day preceding the performance the following
appeared in one of the public prints.
“THEATRE ROYAL, COVENT GARDEN.
_“For the Benefit of Mrs. Linton, &c.”_
“The Widow,” said Charity, whispering me in the ear. “must have your
mite; wait upon her with a guinea, and purchase a box-ticket.”
“You may have one for five shillings,” observed Avarice, pulling me by
the elbow.
My hand was in my pocket, and the guinea, which was between my finger
and thumb, slipped out.
“Yes,” said I, “she shall have my five shillings,”
“Good heaven!” exclaimed Justice, “what are you about! Five shillings?
If you pay but five shillings for going into the Theatre, then you get
value received for your money.”
“And I shall owe him no thanks,” added Charity, laying her hand upon
my heart, and leading me on the way to the Widow’s house.
Taking the knocker in my left hand, my whole frame trembled. Looking
round, I saw Avarice turn the corner of the street, and I found all
the money in my pocket grasped in my hand.
“Is your mother at home, my dear?” said I, to a child who conducted me
into a parlour.
“Yes,” answered the infant; “but my father has not been at home for a
great while; that is his harpsichord, and that is his violin.――He used
to play on them for me.”
“Shall I play you a tune, my boy?” said I.
“No, sir,” answered the boy, “My mother will not let them be touched;
for since my father went abroad, music makes her cry, and then we all
cry.”
I looked on the violin――it was unstrung. I touched the harpsichord――it
was out of tune. Had the lyre of Orpheus sounded in my ear, it could
not have insinuated to my heart thrills of sensibility equal to what I
felt. It was the spirit in unison with the flesh.
“I hear my mother on the stairs,” said the boy.
I shook him by the hand――“Give her this, my lad,” said I, and left the
house.――It rained――I called a coach――drove to a coffee-house, but not
having a farthing in my pocket, borrowed a shilling at the bar.
――――
THE CITIZEN.
I took a fat citizen, and having first shut him up in his little
sitting-room, I proceeded to take his picture. I beheld his body
gorged with long gratification and confinement to the house, and I
felt what kind of sickness of the stomach it is that arises from
having eaten too much. On looking nearer, I beheld him bloated and
feverish. In sixty years the country breeze had not once fanned his
blood, and he had seen the sun and moon but indistinctly in all that
time. He was seated, or rather buried in a large arm-chair, which
stood in front of the fire-place, and which might have served either
for a chair or a bed. A bundle of promissory notes lay on the table,
scrawled all over, the fruits of the dark and dismal days and nights
he had spent there. He had one of these small slips of paper in his
hand, and with a pen he was etching his own signature and the day of
the month, to add it to the heap. As I darkened the little light he
had, he lifted up an eye, swimming in fat, towards the door, bent his
head forward earnestly to listen, and then went on with his work of
delight.
I heard the rubbing of his hands when he had with difficulty turned
his body round to place the note on the bundle――he gave a sigh of joy.
I saw the ecstasy that entered into his soul――I burst into a laugh――I
could not contain myself at the picture which my fancy had drawn.
TOGATUS.
From _The Gownsman_, Cambridge, 1830.
_Fragments in the Manner of Sterne_, by Isaac Brandon. Published in
1797, with fine plates, by Kirk, contained the following
chapters:――Address to the Shade of Yorick――War――Prosperity――and
Humanity――A Shandean Minister――Justice――Necessity――Anna and an
“Apostrophe to the Genius of Yorick Redivivus.”
A second edition was published in 1798, with some additional matter.
_The Rambles of Mr. Frankly, published by his Sister_, 1772, was
written in imitation of Sterne’s _Sentimental Journey_.
_A Sentimental Journey_ (intended as a sequel to Mr. Sterne’s) through
Italy, Switzerland, and France. By Mr. Shandy. 2 vols. 1793.
_Yorick’s Sentimental Journey, continued._
_The Sentimental Journey_, a continuation by Eugenius.
_Maria_, or a Shandean journey of a young Lady through Flanders and
France, in 1822, by my Uncle Oddy. 1823.
These are the titles of a few only of the principal imitations of
Sterne, in which his maudlin sentiment is easily burlesqued, but in
which little of his wit can be found.
[Illustration]
THOMAS CARLYLE.
BORN Dec. 4, 1795. DIED Feb. 5, 1881.
A LATTER-DAY FRAGMENT, 1851.
(_Carlyle on Bloomerism._)
“A mad world this, my friends, a World in its lunes, petty and other;
in lunes other than petty now for sometime; in petty lunes,
pettilettes or pantalettes, about these six weeks, ever since when
this rampant androgynous Bloomerism first came over from Yankee land.
A sort of shemale dress you call Bloomerism; a fashion of SISTER
JONATHAN’S.
Trowsers tight at ankles, and for most part frilled; tunic descending
with some degree of brevity, perhaps to knees, ascending to throat and
open at chemisette front, or buttoned there; collar down-turned over
neckerchief; and crowning all, broad brimmed hat; said garments
generally feathered, trimmed, ribboned, variegated, according to the
fancies and the vanities: these, chiefly, are the outward differences
between Bloomer dress and customary feminine Old Clothes. Not much
unlike nursery-uniforms, you think this description of costume, but
rather considerably like it, I compute. Invisible are the merits of
the Bloomer dress, such as it has. A praiseworthy point in Bloomerism
the emancipation of the ribs; an exceeding good riddance, the
deliverance from corset, trammelling genteel thorax with springs of
steel and whalebone, screwing in waist to Death’s hour glass
contraction, and squeezing lungs, liver, and midriff into unutterable
cram. Commendable, too, the renouncement of sous-jupe bouffante, or
ineffable wadding, invented, I suppose, by some Hottentot to improve
female contour after the type of _Venus_, his fatherland’s, and not
Cythera’s. Wholesome, moreover, and convenient, the abbreviation of
trains, serving in customary female old clothes the purpose of besom,
and no other: real improvements, doubtless, these abandonments
of ruinous shams, ridiculous unveracities, and idolatries of
indescribable mud-Pythons.… Disputes about surplices in pulpit, and
also elsewhere, give place to controversies in theatres and
lecture-halls concerning petty lunes and frilled trowsers;
paraphernalia, however, not less important than canonicals, as I judge
for one.… But here are we, my friends in this mad world, amid the
hallooings and bawlings, and guffaws, and imbecile simperings, and
titterings, blinded by the November smoke fog of coxcombries and
vanities, stunted by the perpetual hallelujahs of flunkeys, beset by
maniacs and simpletons in the great lunes and the petty lunes; here, I
say, do we, with Bloomerism beneath us bubbling uppermost, stand,
hopelessly upturning our eyes for the daylight of heaven, upon the
brink of a vexed unfathomable gulf of apehood and asshood simmering
for ever.”
ANONYMOUS.
――――
THE TICHBORNE TRIAL.
_By Thomas Carr Lisle._
The Tichborne Trial is ended! Yea, my brother and _other_ things are
ended of which that is but a type, Looming Portentous; verily, a sort
of Fire-balloon of paper, or of _papers_ rather, _Standard_,
_Telegraph_, and what not.
Men say “The truth is out at last.” The Truth out! my poor
brothers-nay, was the Truth ever _in_. Surely there was _no_ Truth,
rather other than that.
And yet doth it not _mean_ something, think you, this Tichborne Trial,
its Solicitor-Generals, Tichborne bonds, and legal Inanities? Says it
not “Is there Truth in the land, O Israel?” “What is Truth?” said
jesting Pilate, or rather _where_ is it? Cry the question into the
bottomless Inane of this our world, and what answer? Nothing but an
inarticulate response of Tichborne bonds, Solicitor-Generals, and
such.
Yea, they mean something, these Solicitor-Generals and Tichborne
bonds:――a Partridge-shooting, Salmon-preserving, Dilettante
Aristocracy have said so much, have said so with lifting of hands and
Reverence――we fear somewhat of the Rotatory Calabash kind. They mean
this much, which is perhaps somewhat other than Double-barrelled
Dilettantisms would have them mean. They mean _this_ much. This
England of ours believes no longer in Truth, believes rather in a kind
of _Sham_ Truth, a stucco business, much to be lamented; at least, by
all such as hold their soul for a purpose other than to save salt, to
keep them from Rottenness, Stinking, and utter Unsavouryness. “They
say unto us ‘make brick,’ and no straw is given unto thy servants.” So
might cry our men of law, lacking Truth to work upon; but for straw
they cry _not_, thinking to make brick _without_ straw; and they make
_no_ brick, rather Falsity, Puffery, and Unnature.
O, great Roger! these matters of thine call with a tolerably audible
voice of Proclamation, and a universal “_oyez_,” and we English
Microcosms may know that it was verily meant in earnest that same
Phenomenon, and had its reasons for appearing there――Just and Unjust
cause――_Dikaios_ and _Adikos Logos_――trying to settle or _get_
themselves settled, incessantly protesting against each being the
other, and with it may be another kind of _Logos_ from the great
Universe with silent continual Beckonings trying to revenge itself,
_revancher_ itself, make itself good again.
For does not the Universe hold an inarticulate Sympathy with Justice,
yearning that _meum_ be mine _tuum_ thine. That _meum_ be mine! There
is surely something Respectable in that.
And what is the outcome, ask Practical men, of all this? What is the
import of the matter to us who are _not_ Rogers? Verily, my friends,
this――that England is in a state of Chronic Atropos, hath made her a
covering of Asses-ears, Midas-leavings, Sermons, parchment and what
not, hoping to sleep through it in such caloric apparel in this Glass
house of hers, knowing that glass is no _conductor_――to Heaven’s
lightning at least.
The Outcome of ninety-one days’ sittings, Red-tape Philosophies,
Club-room jaw-clackings, and Infernal Babel of _Telegraphs_ and
_Morning Stars_ is little other than――for Rogers _Newgate_ and the
Blackness of Darkness, for those who are not Rogers, discovery of
Chronic Atropos in a Rampant state, wholly Insuppressible,
Irrepressible, and Mad.
After all, is not _Insanity_ just what is the matter with this English
Bull just now? Is there Sanity at all among us butchers, bakers and
candlestick-makers, red tape dummies, black crape ludicrousnesses,
Puseyisms, Benthamee Radicalisms, Church and Statisms, Dilettantisms,
Mammonisms, double-barelled Aristocracies, and inane Chimæras
generally? Literature is, perhaps, the Sanest thing we have just at
present, at least tolerabler, impressibler, beneficenter than mere
Chaos, articulate or inarticulate. Writers, at least, have a
_Meaning_, must have a Meaning; state some Fact or Facts, or what they
take for Fact or Facts, intelligibly, so that men may say “Thus thinks
a Man, whether he think wrong or right.”
And the Tichborne Trial was mad, utterly mad, with no Truth, hardly
even _Un_truth in it, but Confusion and Roaring as of the Pit and
Abyss of stupidity.
Did the Insanity thereof dawn upon many, think you? One might have
hoped so, have hoped that such had been the _Outcome_ which Practical
Men require. One might have hoped that the sense of the World,
Judicial, Social, and Otherwise, would have got itself resuscitated
from Asphyxia, or proved for ever irresuscitable. But, instead
thereof, we have _Times_ Subscription-list actually now present, and
Impending Ominous Perjury-trials, fresh Chaotic Incongruities,
diabolic Floppings and Caterwaulings hitherto thought moribund,
scattering incalculable Contagion.
Thus clearly doth this Roger matter preach its lesson to mankind,
teaching and preaching clearly as these Words writ down here the
Unveracity of Demiurgurships, of Solicitor-Generals, and such
Parchment Kings.
But, my friends, such things will not _last_, at least not longer than
Doomsday in the afternoon. It is very notable, Demiurgurship of
Judges, that loud Inane Actuality with justice in its pocket, which
rolls along there with trumpeters blaring round it, and all the world
escorting it as mute or vocal Flunkey――go thy way. Escort it not thou,
my brother. Say unto it rather, “Loud blaring Nonentity, no force of
wigs, spectacles, and trumpets can make thee an Entity. Thou art a
_Non_entity and deceptive Simulacrum.” Storm-clothed Caverns Cheese
and Earwigs! French and Phrygians, Zero. Ba! Moo! Hee Haw! Hee Haw.
From _The Light Green_, Cambridge, 1872.
――――
The Editor of _The World_ offered two prizes for compositions (in the
style of Thomas Carlyle) describing Mr. Gladstone’s portrait by
Millais, and on August 6, 1879, it published the two following
parodies:――
FIRST PRIZE.
Turn we, therefore, from this jaunting, jostling, pestering Piccadilly
into the Academy――whether really Royal this year I know not, or
whether it be no more than the grandest _Graphic_ we have had this
many months, the most illustrious _Illustrated_ of the year. Pause not
to catch glamorous glancing glimpses of the besodden (with rain only,
think you?) Season’s Beauties――drawn verily, each of them, by most
Special Correspondents――but step sternly on, and stop face to face
with this William――the People’s William, as the mob hath not dubiously
dubbed him. Is it the Portrait merely or the Man himself that ye have
come out for to see? Be you friend or foe to him, is there not in this
counterfeit presentment of him――this wild, much-suffering,
much-inflicting (not on trees only) man――something which almost
attaches you? Is it not the attitude and face of a man who hath said
to Cant, ‘Begone!’ to Dilettantism, ‘Here canst thou not be!’ and to
Truth, ‘Be thou in place of all――ay, of ‘place’ itself to me!’――a man
who hath manfully defied the ‘Time-Prince’ or Devil to his face, by
all weapons, in all places, at all times? See you not, in the
earnestly, sternly eagle-eyed look of him the ground of the
enthusiasm,――The _Schwärmerei_,――for him? Contrast him not odiously,
but in sober, sensible silence, with the dazzling Dizzy, the bright
Beaconsfield. Which of them, both great, is really great_est_? Which
the grandest Thing and thoughtfullest we have done lately? Which will
we send to the next Exhibition, Paris or otherwise? Which of them will
we show for our Honour, with Peace or without it, amongst foreign
nations, and for our Peace with Honour surely amongst ourselves?
Which? Consider now, if they asked us, “Choose ye not this time, like
ill-starred princess ’twixt axe and crown,’ but twixt the man who
sways the axe, and him who rejects (rightly doubtless) the crown;
’twixt the lopper of laurels, and the creator of crowns, Imperial and
other, that fade.” Consider now, if they asked us, “Will you give up
your William or your Benjamin,――not little truly, and just now your
Ruler――O ye lost Tribes of Israel? Never have had any William, or
never have had any Benjamin?” Consider now both of them, all of you,
as MEN of State, of Letters, ay, of Post-cards also if you will!
Really it were a grave question. Official persons would doubtless
answer in official language; but we, for our part, should not we also
be forced to answer, ‘Benjamin or no Benjamin, we cannot do without
William’? He is verily ours,――not with us here and there only, in
Oriental mystery amongst us; but ours always,――_Fortnightly_, our own
_Contemporary_ (or a large part of it), our best _Nineteenth Century_
Man.
CONSERVATIVE.
SECOND PRIZE.
Here, O belated wayfarer, in thy weary march in search of the
Beautiful, after painful journeying through a Realm of æsthetic
Unrealities, pause! Thou art verily at last in presence of a _Man_. No
mere clothes-bundle of humanity this, presented before thee, smirking,
pomatumed, garnered from the Dustbin of the Ages――marvelling by what
blundering Miracle of the Destinies he finds himself there. Wandering
in this bewildering waste of ruined canvas, that by _wise_ guidance
might have evolved itself into practical _Breeches_ for the Breechless
in this howling naked world――this many-tinted appalling array of
painted, but, alas, soulless Flesh――of bewigged Pomposity, of empty
Dead-Sea faces with no Souls behind them, children of the Inane
begotten in Vanity and brought forth in Vexation of Spirit, acres of
æsthetic Upholstery, Sugar-loaf Confectionary, perpetuated
Blockheadism, respectable _Giggery_, and other like phenomena,――all
jumbled together, gibbeted in veneer and gold;――here, at last, I say,
amid this motley throng, come we on a glimpse of the Ideal, a Giant
among pigmies, a _Man_ surrounded by Tailor-puppets, a human Soul
gazing out from an earnest human face intent upon things other than
mere cultivation of the Digestive faculty. Yea, look upon him! An
earnest, passionate, restless, lean, but withal noble face. An eager
eye, but pathetic in its eagerness, looking out compassionately on
this sad oppressed world. Stern compressed lips, an undaunted brow,
with a Stormy Force hidden under the calm exterior. Straight he looks
into the Shams and Chicanery of our insincere Charlatan age,――the keen
lightnings of his eye, and fierce thunderbolts of his tongue,
cleaving, piercing, exploding the Windbags and inflated Bladders that
in our noodle, jabbering, screech-owl Parliament try to pass
themselves as Verities and Realities. O my brothers, look on this, a
fragment of the Real flung by some miracle amid the Unreal, of the
Invisible made Visible, embodying for us, and for those who come after
us, a picture, a semblance, an apparition, a Verisimilitude of
Greatness that will survive the cacklings and hissings and
venom-squirting propensities of a purblind Age!
TEUFELSDRÖCKH JUNIOR.
――――
On March 5th, 1882, _The Weekly Dispatch_ published the result of a
Prize competition for parodies on Carlyle’s style. Four imitations
were printed, but the prize was awarded to the following:
ON THE PARLIAMENTARY “CLOSURE.”
Business in these latter days the national palaver has mostly ceased
to do; talk in every variety, perorations, objurations clamorously
vehement have inundated the poor palaver, well-nigh swamping what of
sense and work remained to it. Strange have been the sights of late,
honourable members struggling all day, all night, stormful,
impetuously rampant, found still by saffron Phœbus motioning,
dividing, weary, and reckless of everything, wishful only to make an
end. Sacred truly are the rights of minorities, sacred too are other
rights, for one the right to work and to progress; but this right of
the not honourable member, shameless, unreasonable, treasonable to
drone, and adjourn, and divide, senselessly and hopelessly seems not
sacred; not to me, nor to the Eternal Reason. For from of old was it
not given to the strong to rule, and rule _well_, at peril of their
souls; and is not strength with the many and not the few, shriek and
expostulate though they may, passionate, hysterical, futile――now to be
overborne by the “evident sense of the majority” arresting the inane
jabberings with true Puritan earnestness and vigour, rejoiced in by
the Empyreans, enemies of froth and the Pit. The sense of the majority
cannot too often be “evident.”
J. W. HALE.
――――
PEOPLE OF THE PRESENT.
_Omitted from Carlyle’s “Reminiscences.”_
BROWN, THE POET.
Went last night in wet, bad weather to Dash’s to meet Brown. A lean,
long, clothes-prop of a man, with a bilious complexion-spectral,
hideous, discordant, almost infernal. Much common-coloured hair
streaming over narrow shoulders. Asked leave to present me with his
new volume of poems, the result being that I got to talking in the
Annandale accent, and communicated large masses of my views on weak
verse to all within hearing. Tuneful Brown shaken as with a passing
earthquake. A very questionable impression of myself left in _that_
quarter, I imagine.
ROBINSON, THE PAINTER.
In the evening an Oscarian rout. Dauber Robinson was the only novelty,
for I have never noticed him before――a man with huge bush of beard,
spectacled, staring, owlish. For the rest, a podgy man with loose
mouth (spout mouth), cock nose, and shallowest brow. A sandy, barren
character, dissonant speaking, dogmatic, trivial, with a singular
exasperation on a question of perspective. Let him go on spoiling good
canvas with his pictures――save the mark!――in the name of Beelzebub,
the God of Ekron, who seems to be his god: but don’t let him flatter
himself that he will ever get an order from me――_ach Gott_!
_Funny Folks_, November 1884.
――――:o:――――
THE GHOST OF CARLYLE AT THE INVENTORIES.
His observations on the equestrian statue of the Prince of Wales in
the Entrance Hall.
Beyond doubt a horse――breed questionable――a horse nevertheless. A
horse, charging like an unbottled whirlwind, kicking up behind and
before; dash, plash! Symptoms unmistakable. Too much other charging
for the equine-imity of this full-bodied charger from the stables of
Gulliver Swift’s Brobdingnag. Wo, intrepedest! carriest thou not a
prince astride; he that is of Wales, yet no Welshman, no Taffy-stick;
man of Three Feathers simply! He is the great chum-chum of the
sociabilities, knowest thou not? not to be sneezed at like everyday
clay. This clay that thou upbearest on that square back of thine is of
the Pottery-Royal, good steed; hall-marked from Plantagenet to Guelph
with despisable and undespisable Saxon-Norman-Dutch-German
interweavings; yet a sound clay, and transparent withal, not mere
bric-a-brac. All other sons of Adam bow to him; throw him, therefore,
at thy peril. See, the Inanities are coming, with them the
Lack-lustres, the Sham-aristocrats, the Brass-brains, the
Tittle-tattlers, and the Bubble-mongers. What! still kicking! Do not
these High Mightinesses affright thee? What sayest thou to the
feminine new clothes-screens that come lilting in, puffy, protuberant,
patchy? piquancy personified; all that. Burlesques of anatomy
notwithstanding. _Nunquam non paratus_.
Oh, Bucephalus, I am ashamed of thee; all the fineries are here, and
thou shouldst be of the inaudibles. Else, better wert thou with thy
commemorative counterpart, in distant, hot-as-Hades Bombay. Dost thou
not, like the Heine-immortalised palm, have internal yearnings towards
the other self out there in the land of the palanquin――that other
self-made gift of to the Bombayliffs by Sir Albert Sassoon, C.S.I.?
Ridden by an H.R.H., K.G., G.C.S.I., and presented by a C.S.I. Kt.,
thou shouldst, with thy O B C T, abide by the letter of thy compact.
Look around thee; the show is now going on; the asinines are upon us;
“Walk up! walk up!” See how they stream through the turn-stiles; pay
here, pay there, pay everywhere; halt cabs, halt carriages; crush;
press. Whoogh! Hotter work this than shelling peas in the back kitchen
with Gretchen. Why, the very mural panels blush for thee in all their
Doulton red-hotness. Yes, they have panelled all the inventions on
these walls, from Agricola to Bessemer, from Caxton to Walter, from
Jost Amman to Arkwright. These panels empanel thee, kicker. _Ach
Gott!_ an’ thou dost not stop thy cursed racket, thou shalt seek the
Evermore with a walking-stick betwixt thy ribs! A full score peelers
(well I remember Robert o’ that ilk) stand sentry, Right over Wrong,
or _vice versa_, in this Hall of no entrance _sans_ the cash, and yet
thou art not mollified.
See, the crowds come in by the Subway also――Subwayters they, with a
vengeance, and mix and muddle. Mark, too, the seats for the Demi-semi
Flirts and their victims. Followers allowed there, Bucephalus, I
surmise. See, how the crowd streams down the broad steps that lead to
the great South Gallery in the West. A sunny south it is, methinks,
this day of autumn. Wo, wo; gently, gently; thou wilt be _Hors de
combat_ of a verity one of these days; and this entrancing Hall of
Entrance will be disinvented for its entrance upon the chaos of
Do-Nothingness, which will surely come with the Inevitable that lies
round the corner of Time’s next street, waiting for the ding of doom.
Ah, here comes another tribe of the Monetaries, with parboiled
visages, and permeations of fashion――starch all over them, head to
foot. Boy, bring me a mushroom!
_Gaiety_, October 17, 1885.
――――
FROM THE “WORLD-HARMONIC-ÆOLIAN-ATTACHMENT.”
_A burlesque notice of “The Biglow Papers.”_
Speech is silver: silence is golden. No utterance more Orphic than
this. While, therefore, as highest author, we reverence him whose
works continue heroically unwritten, we have also our hopeful word for
those who with pen (from wing of goose loud-cackling, or seraph
God-commissioned) record the thing that is revealed.… Under mask of
quaintest irony, we detect here the deep, storm-tost (nigh
shipwracked) soul, thunder-scarred, semi-articulate but ever climbing
hopefully toward the peaceful summits of an Infinite Sorrow.… Yes,
thou poor, forlorn Hosea, with Hebrew fire-flaming soul in thee, for
thee also this life of ours has not been without its aspects of
heavenliest pity and laughingest mirth. Conceivable enough! Through
coarse Thersites cloak, we have revelation of the heart, wild glowing,
world-clasping, that is in him. Bravely he grapples with the
life-problem as it presents itself to him, uncombed, shaggy, careless
of the “nicer proprieties,” inexpert of “elegant diction,” yet with
voice audible enough to whoso hath ears up there on the gravelly
side-hills, or down on the splashy, Indiarubber-like salt-marshes of
native Jaalam. To this soul also the _Necessity of Creating_ somewhat
has unveiled its awful front. If not Œipuses and Electras and
Alcestises, then in God’s name Birdofredum Sawins. These also shall
get born into the world, and filch (if so need) a Zingali subsistence
therein, these lank, omnivorous Yankees of his. He shall paint the
Seen, since the Unseen will not sit to him. Yet in him also are
Nibelungen-lays and Iliads, and Ulysses-wanderings, and Divine
Comedies――if only once he could come at them! Therein lies much, nay
all; for what truly is this which we name _All_, but that which we do
_not_ possess?... Glimpses also are given us of an old father Ezekiel,
not without paternal pride, as is the wont of such. A brown,
parchment-hided old man of the geoponic or bucolic species, gray-eyed,
we fancy, _queued_ perhaps, with much weather-cunning and plentiful
September-gale memories, bidding fair in good time to become the
Oldest Inhabitant. After such hasty apparition, he vanishes and is
seen no more.… Of “Rev. Homer Wilbur, A.M., Pastor of the First Church
in Jaalam,” we have small care to speak here. Spare touch in him of
his Melesigenes namesake, save, haply, the――blindness! A tolerably
caliginose, nephelegeretous elderly gentleman, with infinite faculty
of sermonizing, muscularized by long practice, and excellent digestive
apparatus, and, for the rest, well-meaning enough, and with small
private illuminations (somewhat tallowy, it is to be feared) of his
own. To him, there, “Pastor of the First Church in Jaalam,” our Hosea
presents himself as a quite inexplicable Sphinx-riddle. A rich poverty
of Latin and Greek,――so far is clear enough, even to eyes peering
myopic through horn-lensed editorial spectacles,――but naught farther?
O purblind, well-meaning, altogether fuscous Melesigenes-Wilbur, there
are things in him incommunicable by stroke of birch! Did it ever enter
that old bewildered head of thine that there was the _Possibility of
the Infinite_ in him? To thee, quite wingless (and even featherless)
biped, has not so much even as a dream of wings ever come? “Talented
young parishioner”? Among the Arts whereof thou art _Magister_, does
that of _seeing_ happen to be one? Unhappy _Artium Magister_! Somehow
a Nemean lion, fulvous, torrid-eyed, dry-nursed in broad-howling
sand-wildernesses of a sufficiently rare spirit――Libya (it may be
supposed) has got whelped among the sheep. Already he stands
wild-glaring, with feet clutching the ground as with oak-roots,
gathering for a Remus-spring over the walls of thy little fold. In
Heaven’s name, go not near him with that fly-bite crook of thine! In
good time, thou painful preacher, thou wilt go to the appointed place
of departed Artillery-Election Sermons, Right-Hands of Fellowship, and
Results of Councils, gathered to thy spiritual fathers with much Latin
of the Epitaphial sort; thou, too, shalt have thy reward; but on him
the Eumenides have looked, not Xantippes of the pit, snake-tressed,
finger-threatening, but radiantly calm as on antique gems; for him
paws impatient the winged courser of the gods, champing unwelcome bit;
him the starry deeps, the empyrean glooms, and far-flashing splendors
await.
――――:o:――――
In _Banter_ (Edited by G. A. Sala) for November 11, 1867, there is a
parody on Carlyle entitled _Shows and Shams_, dealing with the Lord
Mayor’s Show for that year. But the topic is exhausted, and the parody
is exhausting.
In the _Christmas Number_ of the _World_ for 1879 there is an
imitation of Carlyle, descriptive of a picture called _Music in the
Drawing Room_, this parody is of no interest apart from the
illustration.
“_Carlyle Redivivus_, being an occasional discourse on Sauerteig” by
Smellfungus, Edited by P. P. Alexander, M. A., was a pamphlet
published in Glasgow by Mr. James Maclehose. It was first published
during Mr. Carlyle’s lifetime, and ran through several editions. It
not only parodied Carlyle’s style, but criticised his theories.
――――
Here then, by way of conclusion, is a piece of real genuine
Carlyleism, printed in _The Times_ as long ago as 1877, and not now so
generally remembered as it deserves to be.
MR. CARLYLE ON THE CRISIS.
(To the Editor.)
SIR,――A rumour everywhere prevails that our miraculous
Premier, in spite of his Queen’s Proclamation of Neutrality,
intends, under cover of “care for British interests,” to
send the English Fleet to the Baltic, or do some other feat
which shall compel Russia to declare war against England.
Latterly the rumour has shifted from the Baltic and become
still more sinister, on the eastern side of the scene, where
a feat is contemplated that will force not Russia only, but
all Europe, to declare war against us. This latter I have
come to know as an indisputable fact; in our present affairs
and outlooks surely a grave one.
As to “British interests,” there is none visible or
conceivable to me, except taking strict charge of our route
to India by Suez and Egypt; and, for the rest, resolutely
steering altogether clear of any copartnery with the Turk in
regard to this or any other “British interest” whatever. It
should be felt by England as a real ignominy to be connected
with such a Turk at all. Nay, if we still had, as, in fact,
all ought to have, a wish to save him from perdition and
annihilation in God’s world, the one future for him that has
any hope in it is even now that of being conquered by the
Russians and gradually schooled and drilled into peaceable
attempt at learning to be himself governed. The newspaper
outcry against Russia is no more respectable to me than the
howling of Bedlam, proceeding, as it does, from the deepest
ignorant egotism, and paltry national jealousy.
These things I write not on hearsay, but on accurate
knowledge, and to all friends of their country will
recommend immediate attention to them while there is yet
time lest in a few weeks the maddest and most criminal thing
that a British Government could do should be done, and all
Europe kindle into flames of war. I am, &c.,
T. CARLYLE.
5, Cheyne-row, Chelsea, May 4.
[Illustration]
CHARLES DICKENS.
BORN, February 7, 1812. DIED, June 9, 1870.
On the second of August, 1879, there was a severe storm in London, and
the Editor of _The World_ offered prizes for the two best descriptions
of it to be written in imitation of the style of the fifteenth chapter
of _Martin Chuzzlewit_. This, it will be remembered, recounts the
experiences of Martin and Mark Tapley, on their voyage to the States.
The following were the successful compositions, which appeared in _The
World_, August 27, 1879.
FIRST PRIZE.
A bright warm close to a dull dripping week; Labour, just paid his
weekly wages by Capital, taking a friendly cup in the alehouse porch;
Capital giving a last look to his horses and wagons, as he saunters
across the Home-meadow to his evening meal; youth of the village
disporting itself on the village green; fishers’ boats coming in,
booty-laden, from the open-sea; coastguardmen looking anxiously out
for what neither village youth, nor Labour, nor keen-eyed Capital
himself can see――a thin dark cloud-line upon the horizon, with grey
curling fringes that point upwards and move slowly on, just as the
advance guard of a mighty army crests with its bayonets the distant
hill.
An hour passes. The sun sets, the cloud-bank rising over him, and his
struggling beams throwing a wan unearthly glare across the western
heavens. Ever and anon as the wind rises, the tall poplars shake their
heads and whisper to the oaks and shrubs beneath them; then the breeze
as suddenly dies away, and again over all Nature is spread the sable
pall and deathlike silence of an impenetrable night; or a few heavy
drops patter down on the still pool, and then cease――all again is
hushed, all restful, but yet pregnant with the rest and hush that
precedes the hurricane.
Ten, eleven, twelve! Does some relentless demon of the storm, from the
old church-tower, give the signal for the war of the elements? Scarce
has the midnight chime died away when the tempest wakes. First one
vivid flash, then, before the crash reverberates from hill to hill,
another succeeds it, and another――not the ordinary fitful change from
gleam to gloom, from darkness to light, but the mad meeting of storms
from every quarter of the heavens, in all the fulness of rage and
strife, and never ceasing turmoil.
Again, again! The rain seems to crash down rather than to fall,
streaming with a torrent’s force from the hillside, foaming, rushing,
seething in a thousand eddies down to the swollen river, till the
banks no longer endure the awful pressure, and the wild flashes laugh
out, fiend-like, at trees and flocks and newly-stacked hay, all swept
adrift, all whirled oceanwards.
Again, again! What further ruin can the storm-demon work? Gradually,
unwillingly, the tempest departs; only the gray scattered clouds
remain, hanging on the hill slope. Yet, as the daylight dawns, one sad
cry is heard from all, “God’s house!”
The chimes are for ever silent, for God’s house has fallen! Just
before the storm passed away a vivid flash struck the topmost pinnacle
and caught the oaken rafters in the belfry――and now the roof has
fallen in; the pillars crumble beneath the still-consuming flame; the
bells crash down from the steeple one by one, a smoking mass of
blackened walls and arches alone bears witness to the past, alone
tells of anthems raised to heaven by the white-robed choir, and
earnest words of God’s chosen messengers, and the all-pervading
incense of hushed and solemn prayer.
NEW SARUM.
SECOND PRIZE.
Murk midnight. Some in their beds for a moment waking only to hear the
buffeting of the elements. Policemen, wetter than Ramsgate
bathing-men, seeking the shelter of doorways. The bells of St. Paul’s
unwillingly giving utterance to their dissatisfaction with their
position by twelve muttering growls. The town, dry in the early
spring, now ankle-deep in mud; the wind is no longer still, but,
stealthily following the unwary foot-passenger, whirls off his hat,
and, stopping for a moment in glee at his discomfiture, rushes on,
eager for more mischief.
Now crowds, freed from their cramped postures in the playhouse, rush
out upon the wild waste of the dripping Strand.
Here, roaring, fighting, pushing, elbowing each other into the howling
fury of the night. Hither come chattering voices from the stalls, pit,
and recesses of the theatre, where the chairs remain sole occupants of
the place, and seem to say, “Ah, ha, here we are, snug for the night!”
Here in the eagerness of regained liberty, they storm and push each
other, while the tempest falls in sheets of water, and howls above
them. On and on in countless crowds they rush, like human billows. Men
and women, hats, bonnets, and umbrellas, draggled dresses in one
rushing wet mass. Pursuit of cabs, and fruitless return to the shelter
of the passage; savage struggle of humanity enlivening the black
night; little forbearance, but eternal fighting. On and on they surge,
backwards and forwards, and darker grows the night, fiercer falls the
hail, louder roars the thunder, more clamorous and angry the
numberless voices in the street, when a wild cry goes forth, “A cab!”
Onward it comes, fighting its way through the elements, the crazy door
rattling; onward it comes, now free as the surging crowd falls back,
now overwhelmed in a sea of human forms. And every voice in the
multitude, answered by storm-voices in the air, shrieks more loudly,
“A cab!”
Still he comes driving on, and at the boldness and determination of
one man the angry crowd rise up, peering over each other’s heads, and
round about the cab they press upon him, forcing each other down, and
starting up and rushing forward in reckless eagerness.
Round it they surge and roar, and, giving way to others, moodily
depart, still this one fights on bravely.….
At last the eager multitude fall back, and dawn of day discovers the
happy occupant within, with the elements still pouring their fury upon
the devoted driver in an eternity of hail and rain, as on and on he
goes into the far suburbs, with his dim lamps burning, and the fare
inside asleep and snoring, as if there were no tempest trying every
chink and cranny of the shaky vehicle, and no half-drowned cabby
outside with only a moist billycock on his head, and sleepily yawning
so wide that the spirits of the air, if they could exist on such a
night, might look into the unfathomable depths below.
ROBERT LE DIABLE.
――――
THE AGE OF LAWN-TENNIS.
(_After Charles Dickens’s “Pickwick.” A fragment._)
CHAPTER I.
The first record we have of the Hitquick Club, which has since assumed
a position of proud eminence in the ball-playing world, is embodied in
the following resolution, which appears in an old minute book, lately
disinterred from the cloisters of Wymbledoune Priory.
“It is proposed by Mr. Pleycynge, and seconded by Mr. de Vorley,――
“That this Association has heard read, with feelings of unmingled
satisfaction, the paper communicated by Verdant Hardcourt Hitquick,
Esq., A.E.L.T.C.,[51] P.H.C.,[52] etc., etc., entitled, ‘Speculations
on the origin of ball-playing, with some observations on the theory of
the back-hander, and the parabola of the lob;’ and that this
Association returns its warmest thanks for the same.”
It further appears that an amendment was suggested by Will. O’Bye
Wisp, Esq., who had failed as a ball-player, and was better known as
an enthusiastic Pyramidalist,――
“That the study of the triangular must inevitably result in greater
benefits to the human race than the consideration of the sphere;” but,
as this was unsupported by any further argument than that the triangle
had more point than the ball, the original resolution was carried, Mr.
Will. O’Bye Wisp alone dissenting.
It was further agreed, that V. H. Hitquick, Esq., should be President;
that he, with Mr. Cutman, Mr. Shortgrass, and Mr. de Vorley, should be
the Committee; and that Mr. Pleycynge should be the Secretary.
“A casual observer,” adds the Secretary, to whose notes we are
indebted for the following interesting remarks, “A casual observer
might have remarked nothing extraordinary in the appearance of V. H.
Hitquick, Esq., during the reading of these resolutions; but to those
who knew that there sat the man who had traced the origin of the ball
into the early ages, when globular masses had been created by the
introduction of the laws of gravity among shapeless matter; who had
detected how, true to the model of the planetary system, the earliest
balls had been ellipsoidal; how prehistoric men, in their primæval
pastimes, had been driven nigh to frenzy by the false bounds arising
out of this apparently heaven-directed shape; how, in such times, the
advantages of service had been all preponderating; how certain crafty
Chaldean astrologers in their studies had discovered the shape of the
true sphere, and how, having backed themselves with wagers of corn and
oil and wine, they had cheated in their international games by
substituting the true spheres when they were being served to, and by
using the ellipsoids when serving; to those, I say, who knew that
there sat the man who had traced out all this and much else, by the
research of half a lifetime, the sight, indeed, was an interesting
one. Mr. Hitquick’s oration in response was remarkable;” but the damp
of the Wymbledoune cloisters had here much obliterated the Secretary’s
notes. It was gathered, however, that he was comparing the life of man
to that of a tennis-ball, and was congratulating them “that the
philanthropists and the ball-makers were rapidly, in both cases,
eliminating the seamy side, though he was fain to acknowledge that
some hollowness still remained in both.” Here the entry becomes
illegible, and we have had to fall back upon tradition, and other
sources, for what we are about to record further of the doings of the
Hitquick Club.
CHAPTER II.
Mr. Hitquick, who had been delivering over-night, amidst much
applause, an impressive lecture to the members of the Hitquick Club on
various phases of Lawn-tennis dynamics, was with some difficulty
roused from his slumbers on the particular morning of which it now
becomes our duty to write.
“What’s that, Samuel?” he proceeded to say to his servant, as he sat
up in his bed, rubbing his eyes,――“a letter?”
“Yes, sir,” was the reply.
“Then bring me my spectacles,” said Mr. Hitquick.
“If you please, sir, a boy have walked over with this from Little
Mugborough, and he’s a-vaiting below for a hanswer.”
“Very well, Samuel,” said Mr. Hitquick, as he adjusted his spectacles
and opened the letter. “Why! dear me! What’s this?”
‘The Secretary of the Little Mugborough Lawn-Tennis Club presents his
compliments to Mr. Hitquick, and begs to inform him that two members
of his Club will be glad to play any two members of the Hitquick
Association at four o’clock this afternoon.’
“Why! a challenge,” said Mr. Hitquick. “Of course, we will meet them.
Let me see there’s Shortgrass and Cutman, two active men in the prime
of life, who tell me they generally offer half-thirty in mixed country
society; the very thing. Here, take this, Samuel.”
“It strikes me wery forcibly,” said Samuel to himself with a wink,
“that, if those two gents don’t look a bit more spry this afternoon
than I have ever seen them ven I have had the extreme privilege of
vatching their performances, the Hitquick Club will have a very
considerable wopping,”――and, whistling to himself, he went off with
the letter.
Now, it must be confessed that neither Mr. Shortgrass nor Mr. Cutman
were such performers on the Tennis-lawn as they had led their worthy
President, Mr. Hitquick, to believe, nor as they had described
themselves in their after-dinner conversations, as they sipped the
soft claret for which the Hitquick Club was so deservedly famous;
though certain papers which they had read before the members of the
Association had, no doubt, stamped them as theoretical professors of
no mean order.
Notably, a paper by Mr. Cutman on “Atmospheric resistance to the
Cutman service in the latitude of Greenwich” (a lecture suggested by
certain accurate memoranda, prepared by the statist of the Club, to
the effect that only ’17 of these services so far overcame it as to
pass over the net), had placed him in the front ranks of Lawn-tennis
theorists; while a lecture by Mr. Shortgrass, on “Suspected tidal
attraction on the Shortgrass lob” (accounting for the discovery by the
same scientific observer that it almost always completed its parabola
on Mr. Shortgrass’s side of the net), had brought him, too, into a
leading position amongst spheric scientists.
At four o’clock, however, Mr. Shortgrass and Mr. Cutman stepped upon
the lawn, prepared to do battle for the Hitquickians, and were soon
confronted by the team from Little Mugborough.
The game began, A sharp service was sent to Mr. Shortgrass, who shut
his eyes, hit wildly, and returned it accidentally. No one’s
astonishment was greater than his own; he felt he had done enough; he
shouted “yours” to balls which kept striking him on head, stomach, and
legs, and did not appear to recover from his intense surprise till the
umpire called, “Set the first, six games to love, Little Mugborough
wins.”
“Call that placing, Samivel, my boy,” said a stout elderly gentleman,
of horsey dress, to his son, who was no other than Mr. Hitquick’s
servant; “call that placing? Vy! I should like to see one of these ere
ball-placers as could _flick_ a fly off a leader’s ear! That’s wot I
calls placing, Samivel.”
Mr. Hitquick’s face had now begun to lengthen to such an extent as to
cause a bystander to inform him that a curious compound of brandy and
soda-water was to be obtained in the marquee close by, whither Mr.
Hitquick, taking such bystander’s advice now adjourned.
“Capital game――smart sport――rare exercise――very,” were the words that
fell upon Mr. Hitquick’s ear as he entered the marquee.
“What! Jangle?” said he, recognising an old acquaintance, “What brings
you here?”
“ Me here――Wymbledoune Arms――met a party――capital fellows――gin and
water――Lawn-tennis――great match――Little Mugborough――came on here――and
here we are. What name? Know your face.”
“My name, sir, is Hitquick, author of a ‘Treatise on Balls;’ at your
service, sir.”
“Ah! Hitquick――much pleasure――great man――good book――read it myself――
Spheric lore――Sun, Saturn――Earth――Jupiter――pumpkins――balls――inter-
threaded――human race――round games――round robins――general idea――deuced
clever.”
“And do you――er――join, Mr. Jangle, in this――er――healthgiving pastime?”
“Play, Sir,” said Jangle――“I think I did――never heard?――queer
thing――deuced strange――great traveller――round the world――visited
Madagascar――met a stranger――said he could play――offered to play
him――gave fifteen――thermometer 110 degrees in the shade――threw in a
bisque――beat him hollow――no umpire――stranger riled――disputed
scoring――they always do――ex-champion――name Shadow――all love-
sets――play? rather.”
As Jangle and Mr. Hitquick reapproached the game, it had just become
the duty of the umpire to cry: “Three sets to love, Little Mugborough
wins,” thus deciding the match adversely to the Hitquickians. Mr.
Hitquick retired a few paces from the bystanders, and, beckoning
Shortgrass to approach, fixed a keen and searching glance upon him,
and uttered in a low tone these remarkable words:――
“Sir, you’re a humbug.”
Turning to Cutman, who was trying to conceal himself behind his late
partner, he added,――
“And you, too, sir.”
“What?” they both exclaimed, starting.
“Humbugs, sir. I will speak more plainly, if you desire it. Imposters,
sir. Yes; imposters.”
And with these words Mr. Hitquick turned slowly on his heel, and
proceeded to rejoin his friends.
This Parody originally appeared in _Pastime_, July 20, 1883. It was
afterwards reprinted in _Tennis Cuts and Quips_, an amusing volume
ably edited by Mr. Julian Marshall, and published by Field and Tuer,
London.
――――
The late Mr. Charles Stuart Calverley, the author of many clever
parodies, was a diligent student of the works of Dickens, and when he
entered at Christ’s College, Cambridge, in October 1852, it was
generally admitted that he was more familiar with the Pickwick Papers
than any other man in the University. Hence arose the jocular notion
of having a competitive examination on that work, and Calverley drew
up an ingenious syllabus of questions, from which it may be gathered
how accurate and minute was his acquaintance with Pickwick. The
examination was open to all members of Christ’s College, the first
prize was taken by Mr. Walter Besant, and the second by Mr. (now
Professor) Skeat, two gentlemen whose names have since become familiar
in the literary world. The Pickwick Examination Paper will be found in
_Fly Leaves_, by C. S. Calverley, published by G. Bell & Sons, a few
specimen questions will show the humour of the thing:――
1. Mention any occasions on which it is specified that the
Fat Boy was _not_ asleep; and that (1) Mr. Pickwick and (2)
Mr. Weller, senr., ran. Deduce from expressions used on one
occasion Mr. Pickwick’s maximum of speed.
2. Translate into coherent English, adding a note wherever a
word, a construction, or an allusion requires it:
“Go on, Jemmy――like black-eyed Susan――all in the
Downs”――“Smart chap that cabman――handled his fives
well――but if I’d been your friend in the green
jemmy――punch his head――pig’s whisper――pieman, too.”
3. Elucidate the expression, “the Spanish Traveller,” and
the “narcotic bedstead.”
4. What operation was performed on Tom Smart’s chair? Who
little thinks that in which pocket, of what garment, in
where, he has left what, entreating him to return to whom,
with how many what, and all how big?
5. Give, approximately, the height of Mr. Dubbley; and,
accurately, the Christian names of Mr. Grummer, Mrs. Raddle,
and the Fat Boy; also the surname of the Zephyr.
8. Give in full Samuel Weller’s first compliment to Mary,
and his father’s critique upon the same young lady. What
church was on the valentine that first attracted Mr.
Samuel’s eye in the shop?
11. On finding his principal in the pound, Mr. Weller and
the town-beadle varied directly. Show that the latter was
ultimately eliminated, and state the number of rounds in the
square which is not described.
12. “Any think for air and exercise; as the wery old donkey
observed ven they voke him up from his deathbed to carry ten
gen’lmen to Greenwich in a tax-cart.” Illustrate this by
stating any remark recorded in the Pickwick Papers to have
been made by a (previously) dumb animal, with the
circumstances under which he made it.
15. Describe Weller’s Method of “gently indicating his
presence” to the young lady in the garden; and the Form of
Salutation usual among the coachmen of the period.
20. Write down the chorus to each verse of Mr. S. Weller’s
song, and a sketch of the mottle-faced man’s excursus on it.
Is there any ground for conjecturing that he (Sam) had more
brothers than one?
23. “She’s a swelling visibly.” When did the same phenomenon
occur again, and what fluid caused the pressure on the body
in the latter case?
24. How did Mr. Weller, senior, define the Funds, and what
view did he take of Reduced Consols? in what terms is his
elastic force described, when he assaulted Mr. Stiggins at
the meeting? Write down the name of the meeting?
30. Who, besides Mr. Pickwick, is recorded to have worn
gaiters?
In connection with this examination reference may be made to the
“Death of Mr. Pickwick,” by Messrs. W. Besant and J. Rice in “The Case
of Mr. Lucraft, and other Tales.”
――――
THE BATTLE WON BY THE WIND.
_By the author of the “Picnic Papers,” “Barnaby Fudge,” &c._
Night! Night and a thick darkness on the dreaming city. It was o’er
all――that pitchy veil――o’er lone deserted streets and broad suburban
roads, along which wagons with their great clamped wheels jolt forward
to the early market――o’er square and terrace, and stately dome and
carved pinnacle――a deep dense obscurity, into which tower and steeple
rose and were lost to the eyes of the gazer from below!
Night! black, stormy, dreary night. Driving in long dim lines athwart
the starless sky――lashing the sloping roofs of dripping houses――flooding
kennel and gutter and choked-up drain――pattering like a loud chorus
of rolling spectre drums at rattling windows and on streaming
sky-lights――down――in one steady, uninterrupted, continuous pour――drove
the wild storm of lashing hail and rain! A dismal night! A night for
the well-housed to snoozle themselves up beneath the bed-clothes, and
listen all crouchingly to the roaring of the tempest! A night for the
homeless pauper to lie down on the lee side of hedge and stack――and
stretching his stiffening limbs in the icy sludge, wait patiently
until Death came by and touched him with its sceptre!
Night――a dreary, dismal, rainy, windy night! A night of unchained gale
and unbridled hurricane! How the fierce wind roared, to be sure! How
it roared in its wrath, and muttered in its sulkiness, and sung in its
glee, and howled and shrieked and whistled and raved in the full swing
of its fury. It was a jubilee――be certain of it――a time of jubilee
with the Wind!――a night when it had full license and authority, and
power and sanction, to do its best and its worst――by sea and by
land――above and below. And did not the fierce wind avail itself of the
opportunity? Did it not muster its forces, and its energies, and its
powers, far up amongst the dim-driving clouds, preparing for the
onset――preparing for its night of empire and of pillage and of
mischief? And then, when its time of liberty came, did it not burst
out with a roar, and a shout, and a clang, as of victorious
trumpets――did it not career all madly over land and sea, beating down
the weak and broken corn, and roaring over the stark brown moors, and
catching the big leafy limbs of gnarled trees――gnarled old mighty
trees which had stood there for centuries――and wrenching them all torn
and riven and splintered from the groaning trunks, and then grappling
and wrestling with them as strong men fight, until the victorious
wind, with a loud shriek of triumph, would drag the huge branch out,
and toss it contemptuously away!
Who――o――o――op! for the Battle won by the Wind!
But that was not all. No, no. It attacked the city too, as well as the
country. It did. The wind! Coming with a sweep and a pounce and a roar
and a whistle-shrieking up through empty streets――groaning with a
hollow sound in dim big archways――catching as with a muscular grasp,
vanes and weathercocks――coming to the outside of windows――laying hold
of the glazed sashes――shaking and rattling them and shouting hoarse
mad greeting to the people within――lingering, I say, an instant at
such places, and then departing with a burst of uproarious joy to lay
siege to some high old tottering ricketty gable, which it would so
shake, and push, and pull, and cause to waver and quake――that the
whole crazy old tenement to which it belonged would wheeze and creak
and groan in sympathy, until the old men and the old women, who dwelt
there for long years, would be terrified and frightened, and would
cower down upon the hot hearths or in their beds, crying――“Woe is me,
but this is a wild night!”
And it was――it was――a wild night.――Who――o――o――op for the Battle won by
the Wind!
On a bridge which spans a black, swollen, mightily rushing river. Dim
lights twinkle along its great massive, girding, granite parapets. The
wind sweeps over it, and roars in the arches below, and catches up the
bright foam from the water, and rushes along with it, scattering the
spray in white handfuls aloft, so that the passenger who looks into
the gulf from between the balustrades of carven stone which fence the
footpath, shrinks to see the driving masses of blurred whiteness――the
vexed surface of the waters torn up and carried along by the strong
broad hands of the blast!
Where a flickering lamp flashed and paled, and rose and fell within
the streaming and storm-lashed crystal of its dripping prison, stood a
woman――a woman, beautiful and alone. Black clusters of rain-drenched
hair waved and streamed from her pale cheeks. Her garments were mean
and sodden, and saturated with the storm; but her eye was bright and
fierce, and burning with a fire not of this world――with a fire which
once――when the western heaven opened, and the forked lightning leaped
out into the darkness――confronted the fierce blaze――and gave it back
glare for glare!
She stood beneath the flickering lamp. For a moment only. The next she
was erect upon the parapet――her arms extended――her drapery streaming
free――like a bird that preens its plumage for a new flight――a flight
into another world?
Ha!――a voice! Yes――the woman’s――hark!
What says it? The words――the last words――have gone forth; and as the
dark form disappears from its granite resting-place――disappears into
the black, howling, lashing gulf beneath――these words ring up and away
into the air――being carried on the wings of the tempest whithersoever
it will――these awful words――
“Who――o――o――op for the Battle won by the Wind!”
Yes, yes――the wind of Passion――the breath of hopeless, homeless,
heartless, Despair!
From _The Puppet-Showman’s Album_. Illustrated by Gavarni. London, no
date.
――――
Amongst the _Sensation Novels_, so skilfully condensed by Bret Harte,
is a humourous parody of the most popular of Charles Dickens’s
Christmas books. In it the leading characteristics and failings are
admirably hit off, not only of Dickens, but also of Scott, Charles
Lever, Marryat, Fennimore Cooper, Hawthorne, and Thackeray, as will be
seen from the following extracts:――
THE HAUNTED MAN.
_A Christmas Story._
PART I.
THE FIRST PHANTOM.
Don’t tell me that it wasn’t a knocker. I had seen it often enough,
and I ought to know. So ought the three o’clock beer, in dirty
highlows, swinging himself over the railing, or executing a demoniacal
jig upon the doorstep; so ought the butcher, although butchers as a
general thing are scornful of such trifles; so ought the postman, to
whom knockers of the most extravagant description were merely human
weaknesses, that were to be pitied and used. And so ought, for the
matter of that, etc., etc., etc.
But then it was _such_, a knocker. A wild, extravagant, and utterly
incomprehensible knocker. A knocker so mysterious and suspicious that
Policeman X 37, first coming upon it, felt inclined to take it
instantly in custody, but compromised with his professional instincts
by sharply and sternly noting it with an eye that admitted of no
nonsense, but confidently expected to detect its secret yet. An ugly
knocker; a knocker with a hard, human face, that was a type of the
harder human face within. A human face that held between its teeth a
brazen rod. So hereafter in the mysterious future should be held,
etc., etc.
But if the knocker had a fierce human aspect in the glare of day, you
should have seen it at night, when it peered out of the gathering
shadows and suggested an ambushed figure; when the light of the street
lamps fell upon it, and wrought a play of sinister expression in its
hard outlines; when it seemed to wink meaningly at a shrouded figure
who, as the night fell darkly, crept up the steps and passed into the
mysterious house; when the swinging door disclosed a black passage
into which the figure seemed to lose itself and become a part of the
mysterious gloom; when the night grew boisterous and the fierce wind
made furious charges at the knocker, as if to wrench it off and carry
it away in triumph. Such a night as this.
It was a wild and pitiless wind. A wind that had commenced life as a
gentle country zephyr, but wandering through manufacturing towns had
become demoralised, and reaching the city had plunged into extravagant
dissipation and wild excesses. A roystering wind that indulged in
Bacchanalian shouts on the street corners, that knocked off the hats
from the heads of helpless passengers, and then fulfilled its duties
by speeding away, like all young prodigals――to sea.
He sat alone in a gloomy library listening to the wind that roared in
the chimney. Around him novels and storybooks were strewn thickly; in
his lap he held one with its pages freshly cut, and turned the leaves
wearily until his eyes rested upon a portrait in its frontispiece. And
as the wind howled the more fiercely, and the darkness without fell
blacker, a strange and fateful likeness to that portrait appeared
above his chair and leaned upon his shoulder. The Haunted Man gazed at
the portrait and sighed. The figure gazed at the portrait and sighed
too.
“Here again?” said the Haunted Man.
“Here again,” it repeated in a low voice.
“Another novel?”
“Another novel.”
“The old story?”
“The old story.”
“I see a child,” said the Haunted Man, gazing from the pages of the
book into the fire――“a most unnatural child, a model infant. It is
prematurely old and philosophic. It dies in poverty to slow music. It
dies surrounded by luxury to slow music. It dies with an accompaniment
of golden water and rattling carts to slow music. Previous to its
decease it makes a will; it repeats the Lord’s Prayer, it kisses the
‘boofer lady.’ That child――――”
“Is mine,” said the phantom.
“I see a good woman, undersized. I see several charming women, but
they are all undersized. They are more or less imbecile and idiotic,
but always fascinating and undersized. They wear coquettish caps and
aprons. I observe that feminine virtue is invariably below the medium
height, and that it is always babyish and infantine. These women――――”
“Are mine.”
“I see a haughty, proud, and wicked lady. She is tall and queenly. I
remark that all proud and wicked women are tall and queenly. That
woman――――”
“Is mine,” said the phantom, wringing his hands.
“I see several things continually impending. I observe that whenever
an accident, a murder, or death is about to happen, there is something
in the furniture, in the locality, in the atmosphere that foreshadows
and suggests it years in advance. I cannot say that in real life I
have noticed it――the perception of this surprising fact belongs――――”
“To me!” said the phantom. The Haunted Man continued, in a despairing
tone:
“I see the influence of this in the magazines and daily papers: I see
weak imitators rise up and enfeeble the world with senseless formula.
I am getting tired of it. It won’t do, Charles! it won’t do!” and the
Haunted Man buried his head in his hands and groaned. The figure
looked down upon him sternly: the portrait in the frontispiece frowned
as he gazed.
“Wretched man,” said the phantom, “and how have these things affected
you?”
“Once I laughed and cried, but then I was younger. Now, I would forget
them if I could.”
“Have then your wish. And take this with you, man whom I renounce.
From this day henceforth you shall live with those whom I displace.
Without forgetting me, ’twill be your lot to walk through life as if
we had not met. But first you shall survey these scenes that
henceforth must be yours. At one to-night prepare to meet the phantom
I have raised. Farewell!”
The sound of its voice seemed to fade away with the dying wind, and
the Haunted Man was alone. But the firelight flickered gaily, and the
light danced on the walls, making grotesque figures of the furniture.
“Ha, ha!” said the Haunted Man, rubbing his hands gleefully; “now for
a whiskey punch and a cigar.”
BOOK II.
THE SECOND PHANTOM.
One! The stroke of the far-off bell had hardly died before the front
door closed with a reverberating clang. Steps were heard along the
passage; the library door swung open of itself, and the Knocker――yes,
the Knocker――slowly strode into the room. The Haunted Man rubbed his
eyes――no! there could be no mistake about it――it was the Knocker’s
face, mounted on a misty, almost imperceptible body. The brazen rod
was transferred from its mouth to its right hand, where it was held
like a ghostly truncheon.
“It’s a cold evening,” said the Haunted Man.
“It is,” said the Goblin, in a hard, metallic voice.
“It must be pretty cold out there,” said the Haunted Man, with vague
politeness. “Do you ever――will you――take some hot water and brandy?”
“No,” said the Goblin.
“Perhaps you’d like it cold, by way of change?” continued the Haunted
Man, correcting himself, as he remembered the peculiar temperature
with which the Goblin was probably familiar.
“Time flies,” said the Goblin coldly. “We have no leisure for idle
talk. Come!” He moved his ghostly truncheon towards the window, and
laid his hand upon the other’s arm. At his touch the body of the
Haunted Man seemed to become as thin and incorporeal as that of the
Goblin himself, and together they glided out of the window into the
black and blowy night.
In the rapidity of their flight the senses of the Haunted Man seemed
to leave him. At length they stopped suddenly.
“What do you see?” asked the Goblin.
“I see a battlemented medieval castle. Gallant men in mail ride over
the drawbridge, and kiss their gauntletted fingers to fair ladies, who
wave their lily hands in return. I see fight and fray and tournament.
I hear roaring heralds bawling the charms of delicate women, and
shamelessly proclaiming their lovers. Stay. I see a Jewess about to
leap from a battlement. I see knightly deeds, violence, rapine, and a
good deal of blood. I’ve seen pretty much the same at Astley’s.”
“Look again.”
“I see purple moors, glens, masculine women, barelegged men, priggish
bookworms, more violence, physical excellence, and blood. Always
blood――and the superiority of physical attainments.”
“And how do you feel now?” said the Goblin.
The Haunted Man shrugged his shoulders.
“None the better for being carried back and asked to sympathise with a
barbarous age.”
The Goblin smiled and clutched his arm; they again sped rapidly
through the black night and again halted.
“What do you see?” said the Goblin.
“I see a barrack room, with a mess table, and a group of intoxicated
Celtic officers telling funny stories, and giving challenges to duel.
I see a young Irish gentleman capable of performing prodigies of
valour. I learn incidentally that the acme of all heroism is the
cornetcy of a dragoon regiment. I hear a good deal of French! No,
thank you,” said the Haunted Man hurriedly, as he stayed the waving
hand of the Goblin, “I would rather _not_ go to the Peninsular, and
don’t care to have a private interview with Napoleon.”
Again the Goblin flew away with the unfortunate man, and from a
strange roaring below them, he judged they were above the ocean. A
ship hove in sight, and the Goblin stayed its flight, “Look,” he said,
squeezing his companion’s arm.
The Haunted Man yawned. “Don’t you think, Charles, you’re rather
running this thing into the ground? Of course, it’s very moral and
instructive, and all that. But aint there a little too much pantomime
about it! Come now!”
“Look!” repeated the Goblin, pinching his arm malevolently. The
Haunted Man groaned.
“Oh, of course, I see Her Majesty’s ship Arethusa. Of course I am
familiar with her stern First Lieutenant, her eccentric Captain, her
one fascinating, and several mischievous midshipmen. Of course, I know
it’s a splendid thing to see all this, and not to be sea-sick. Oh,
there the young gentlemen are going to play a trick on the purser. For
God’s sake let us go,” and the unhappy man absolutely dragged the
Goblin away with him.
* * * * *
The Haunted Man started, and――woke. The bright sunshine streamed into
the room. The air was sparkling with frost. He ran joyously to the
window and opened it. A small boy saluted him with “Merry Christmas.”
The Haunted Man instantly gave him a Bank of England note. “How much
like Tiny Tim, Tom and Bobby that boy looked――bless my soul, what a
genius this Dickens has!”
A knock at the door, and Boots entered.
“Consider your salary doubled instantly. Have you read _David
Copperfield_?”
“Yezzur.”
“Your salary is quadrupled. What do you think of the _Old Curiosity
Shop_?”
The man instantly burst into a torrent of tears, and then into a roar
of laughter.
“Enough. Here are five thousand pounds. Open a porter-house, and call
it ‘Our Mutual Friend.’ Huzza! I feel so happy!” And the Haunted Man
danced about the room.
And so, bathed in the light of that blessed sun, and yet glowing with
the warmth of a good action, the Haunted Man, haunted no longer, save
by those shapes which make the dreams of children beautiful, reseated
himself in his chair, and finished _Our Mutual Friend_.
“Sensation Novels,” first introduced to the British public by the late
John Camden Hotten in 1871, has been since republished by Ward, Lock &
Co., London.
“DOMBEY AND SON” FINISHED.
_Part the Best and Last._
CHAPTER I.
It was ten o’clock! In the morning! The Easterly sun came down bright
upon busy streets and grimy thoroughfares, and quiet places in the far
off country. It was eleven o’clock! In the morning! The sun lighted up
city churches and the broad river, and shone into death chambers, in
houses at the doors of which stood mutes. It was twelve o’clock! Noon!
Broad, bright, unwinking noon! The sun gleamed on many roofs――and on
market gardens in the suburbs, and on potato cans in the streets, and
into the counting house of Dombey and Son.
The clerks worked noiselessly that day――almost breathlessly. Many pens
scratched on the paper, and yet no word was spoken. For Carker was
there! Carker the smooth, the oily――the velvetty――the sly.
The sun gleamed through the window panes――it fell on Carker――and on
Carker’s teeth. And still it gleamed――still it sparkled after the
glass door had noiselessly opened, and before Carker was seen standing
the form――the stately――cold――wifeless――childless form of Mr. Dombey!
There was a long pause. You could have heard all the pens going in the
outer office. A long pause――long――very――very long. Carker spoke first,
and when he spoke he seemed all teeth――white glistening teeth――like a
shark of smooth tongue and oily address――accustomed to good society.
“Mr. Dombey――I delight to see you――I feel honoured――much
honoured――deeply honoured――by this visit.”
There was another pause――longer than the first――Oh, yes! much longer!
Eight minutes longer!
And Mr. Dombey drew himself up――up! High! higher! like the Genie in
the Arabian Tales, till it appeared (to the eye of Perch which eye
happened to be accidentally applied at the keyhole)――that the top of
Mr. Dombey’s hat had touched――nay lifted off the roof of the counting
house of Dombey and Son.
“Ha!” said Mr. Dombey, and Perch being frightened fell backwards upon
a nail, and the pens in the outer office stopped.
“Ha! ha!” said Mr. Dombey――“here――come here――all of you,――and learn
how to crush a viper.”
The clerks came accordingly――thronging about the door――with white
faces and clenched hands――excepting Robinson, who was of a merry turn
of mind, and who said audibly “here’s a lark.”
“Thus”――said Mr. Dombey, “thus it is I crush a viper.” His wild, big,
grey eyes were fixed, yet flashing,――his long gaunt form worked and
quivered like a galvanized corpse,――his face was as the face of a
roasting demon!
Nobody saw anything of Carker but his teeth: yet from these teeth
issued a hissing sound of “now.”
Could it be? It could! It was! Four policemen sprung from under the
table and held four staffs up to Mr. Dombey’s nose!
“Now,” said the Teeth, “remove that man.”
Dombey stood like a statue carved out of Parian marble, but dressed in
a hat, coat, pantaloons, wellingtons, and other minor articles of
costume. He waved his hand and the constables fell back.
“Remove me――remove Dombey from the counting house of Dombey and Son?”
These were the only words he spoke; then his tongue clave unto the
roof or ceiling of his mouth.
The Teeth spoke not――but they held up a board, a white painted board,
such as may be seen at the doors of merchants’ offices. All started.
For on the board was painted:――
CARKER. LATE DOMBEY AND SON.
“Mine”――hissed the Teeth――“mine――all is mine Dombey! Dombey! you have
fallen! Dombey――you’re a beggar! Dombey――here’s a penny for you!
Dombey――move on!”
A pause. Dombey as motionless as the figure-head of a stranded ship.
“You left me to manage your business――you did.――I managed it――ha! ha!
ha!――till I made it mine! mine! ha! ha! Take the penny, Dombey! take
it, that’s a good man, and go! go! go!”
“No!”
“No”――was it an echo? More actors on the scene? Aye. More! more!
The old woman――the old woman and the handsome daughter!――Edith’s
counterpart――Edith in rags――Edith an outcast――Edith――Edith――
Still――Still, Edith.
Oh! how the Teeth chattered――the Teeth――they did――as the lightening of
that outcast’s eye flashed――and the cataract of that outcast’s hair
streamed, and the trumpet of that outcast’s voice rang and re-echoed
in God’s sunshine!
“Forger――Felon――Murderer! Ha! ha! ha! The hour is come――it is!”
And the old crone screamed in chorus “Felon!――it is!”
And where was Carker?
On the floor in a strong fit. Smitten――smitten――in his pride and his
power. Smitten by the voice of the woman he had ruined――the woman he
had tried to hang.――Now it was her turn! It was!
The policemen were gentle and not rough. They lifted the fallen man
and took him away. Perch saw handcuffs on the manager’s wrists.
Then the counting house was locked up and seals put upon the doors. A
great crowd stood long opposite to it. In the midst, Mr. Perch found
Dombey with Carker’s penny still in his hand, and so led him away
gently and gave him shelter at Ball’s-pond.