_Observations on the Epic Poem of Giles Scroggins and Molly
Brown--resumed._
The fatal operation of the unavoidable, ever-impending, ruthless shears of
the stern controller of human destiny, and curtailer of human life--the
action by which
"Fate's scissors cut Giles Scroggins' thread,"
or rather the thread of Giles Scroggins' life, at once and most completely
establishes the wholesome moral as to the fearful uncertainty of all
sublunary anticipations, and stands forth a beautiful beacon to warn the
over-weaning "worldly wisemen" from their often too-fondly-cherished
dreams of realising, by their own means and appliances, the darling
projects of their ambitious hopes!
The immediate effect of the operation performed by Fate's scissors, or
rather by Fate herself--as she was the great and absolute disposer--to
whom the implement employed was but a matter of fancy; for had Fate so
chosen, a bucket, a bowie-knife, a brick-bat, a black cap, or a box of
patent pills, might, as well as her destructive shears, have made a tenant
for a yawning grave of doomed Giles Scroggins. We say, the immediate
effect arising from this cutting cause was one in which both parties--the
living bride and defunct bridegroom--were equally concerned, their lover's
co-partnership rendering each liable for the acts or accidents of the
other; therefore as may be (and we think is) clearly established, under
these circumstances,
"They could _not_ be _mar-ri_-ed!"
There is something deliciously affecting in the beautiful drawing out of
the last syllable!--it seems like the lingering of the heart's best
feelings upon the blighted prospects of its purest joys!--the ceremony
that would have completed the union of the loving maiden and admiring
swain, blending, as it were, like the twin prongs of a brass-bound
toasting-fork, their interests in one common cause. The ceremony of love's
concentration can never be performed! but the heart-feeling poet extends
each tiny syllable even to its utmost stretch, that the tear-dropping
reader may, while gulping down his sympathies, make at least a handsome
mouthful of the word.
We now approach, with considerable awe, a portion of our task to which we
beg to call the undivided attention of our erudite readers. Upon referring
to the original black-letter quarto, we find, after each particular
sentence, the author introduces, with consummate tact, a line, meant, as
we presume, as a kind of literary resting-place, upon which the delighted
mind might, in the sweet indulgence of repose, reflect with greater
pleasure on the thrilling parts, made doubly thrilling by the poet's fire.
The diversity of these, if we may so express them, "camp stools" of
imagination, is worthy of remark, both as to their application and
amplitude. For instance, after _one_ line, and that if perused with
attention, comparatively less abstruse than its fellows, the gifted poet
satisfies himself with the insertion of three sonorous, but really simple
syllables, they are invariably at follows--
"Too-ral-loo!"
But when _two_ lines of the poem--burning with thought, bursting with
action--entrance by their sublimity the enraptured reader, greater time is
given, and more extended accommodation for a mental sit-down is afforded
in the elaborate and elongated composition of
"Whack! fol-de-riddle lol-de-day!"
These introductions are of a high classic origin. Many professors of
eminence have quarrelled as to whether they were not the original of the
"Greek chorus;" while others, of equal erudition, have as stoutly
maintained, though closely approximating in character and purpose, they
are not the "originals," but imitations, and decidedly admirable ones,
from those celebrated poets.
A Mr. William Waters, a gentleman of immense travel, one who had left the
burning zone of the far East to visit the more chilling gales of a
European climate, a philosopher of the sect known as the "Peripatetic," a
devoted follower of the heathen Nine, whose fostering care has ever been
devoted to the tutelage of the professors of sweet sounds; and therefore
Waters was a high authority, declared in the peculiar _patois_ attendant
upon the pronunciation of a foreign mode of speech--that
"Too-ral-loo"
was to catch him wind! And
"Whack! fol-de-riddle lol-de-day,"
to let "um rosin up him fuddlestick!" These deductions are practical, if
not poetical; but these are but the emanations from the brain of
one--hundreds of other commentators differ from his view.
The most erudite linguists are excessively puzzled as to the nation whose
peculiar language has been resorted to for these singular and unequalled
introductions. The
"Too-ral-loo"
has been given up in despair. The nearest solution was that of an eminent
arithmetician, who conjectured from the word too (Anglice, _two_)--and the
use of the four cyphers--those immediately following the T and L--that
they were intended to convey some notion of the personal property of Giles
Scroggins or Molly Brown (he never made up his mind which of the two); and
merely wanted the following marks to render them plain:--
T--oo (_two_)--either shillings or pence--and L--oo: no pounds!
This may or may not be right, but the research and ingenuity deserve the
immortality we now confer upon it. The other line, the
"Whack! fol-de-riddle lol-de-day!"
has, perhaps, given rise to far more controversy, with certainly less
tangible and satisfactory results.
The scene of the poem not being expressly stated in the original or early
black-letter translation, many persons--whose love of country prompted
their wishes--have endeavoured to attach a nationality to these gordian
knots of erudition. An Hibernian gentleman of immense research--the
celebrated "Darby Kelly"--has openly asserted the whole affair to be
decidedly of Milesian origin: and, amid a vast number of corroborative
circumstances, strenuously insists upon the solidity of his premises and
deductions by triumphantly exclaiming, "What, or who but an _Irish_ poet
and an Irish hero, would commence a matter of so much consequence with the
soul-stirring "whack!" adopted by the great author, and put into the mouth
of his chosen hero?" Others again have supposed--which is also far more
improbable--that much of the obscurity of the above passage has its origin
from simple mis-spelling on the part of the poet's amanuensis--he taking
the literal dictation, forgetting the sublime author was suffering from a
cold in the head, which rendered the words in sound--
"Riddle _lol_ the lay;"
whereas they would otherwise have been pronounced--
"Riddle--_all the day_"--
that being an absolute and positive allusion to the agricultural pursuits
of Giles Scroggins, he being generally employed by his more wealthy
master--a great agrarian of those times--in the manly though somewhat
fatiguing occupation of "riddling all the day:" an occupation which--like
this article--was to be frequently resumed.
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