The Tunbridge folks resolv’d that truth should dwell
No longer secret in a Tunbridge Well,
But to warn Baker of his dangerous errors;
Accordingly to bring the point to pass,
They call’d a meeting of the broken glass,
The shatter’d chimney pots, and scatter’d tiles,
The damage of each part,
And packed it in a cart,
Drawn by the horse that ran from Mr. Miles;
While Doctor Babblethorpe, the worthy Rector,
And Mr. Gammage, cutler to George Rex,
And some few more, whose names would only vex,
Went as a deputation to the Ex-
Powder-proprietor and Mill-director.
Now Mr. Baker’s dwelling-house had pleased
Along with mill-materials to roam,
And for a time the deputies were teased,
To find the noisy gentleman at home;
At last they found him with undamaged skin,
Safe at the Tunbridge Arms--not out--but Inn.
The worthy Rector, with uncommon zeal,
Soon put his spoke in for the common weal--
A grave old gentlemanly kind of Urban,--
The piteous tale of Jeremiah moulded,
And then unfolded,
By way of climax, Mrs. Davy’s turban;
He told how auctioneering Mr. Pidding
Knock’d down a lot without a bidding,--
How Mr. Miles, in fright, had giv’n his mare
The whip she wouldn’t bear,--
At Prospect House, how Doctor Oates, not Titus,
Danc’d like Saint Vitus,--
And Mr. Beak, thro’ Powder’s misbehaving,
Cut off his nose whilst shaving;--
When suddenly, with words that seem’d like swearing,
Beyond a Licenser’s belief or bearing--
Broke in the stuttering, sputtering Mr. Gammage--
“Who is to pay us, Sir,”--he argued thus,
“For loss of cus-cus-cus-cus-cus-cus-cus--
Cus-custom, and the dam-dam-dam-damage?
Now many a person had been fairly puzzled
By such assailants, and completely muzzled;
Baker, however, was not dash’d with ease--
But proved he practised after their own system,
And with small ceremony soon dismiss’d ’em,
Putting these words into their ears like fleas;
“If I do have a blow, well, where’s the oddity?
I merely do as other tradesmen do,
You, Sir,--and you--and you!
I’m only puffing off my own commodity!”
THE SCHOOLMASTER’S MOTTO.
“The Admiral compelled them all to strike.”--LIFE OF NELSON.
Hush! silence in School--not a noise!
You shall soon see there’s nothing to jeer at,
Master Marsh, most audacious of boys!
Come!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
So this morn in the midst of the Psalm,
The Miss Siffkin’s school you must leer at,
You’re complained of--Sir! hold out your palm,--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You wilful young rebel, and dunce!
This offence all your sins shall appear at,
You shall have a good caning at once--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You are backward, you know, in each verb,
And your pronouns you are not more clear at,
But you’re forward enough to disturb,--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You said Master Twigg stole the plums,
When the orchard he never was near at,
I’ll not punish wrong fingers or thumbs,--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You make Master Taylor your butt,
And this morning his face you threw beer at,
And you struck him--do you like a cut?
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
Little Biddle you likewise distress,
You are always his hair, or his ear at,--
He’s my _Opt_, Sir, and you are my _Pess_:
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
Then you had a pitcht fight with young Rous,
An offence I am always severe at!
You discredit to Cicero-House!
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You have made too a plot in the night,
To run off from the school that you rear at!
Come, your other hand, now, Sir,--the right,
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
I’ll teach you to draw, you young dog!
Such pictures as I’m looking here at!
“Old Mounseer making soup of a frog,”
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
You have run up a bill at a shop,
That in paying you’ll be a whole year at,--
You’ve but twopence a week, Sir, to stop!
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
Then at dinner you’re quite cock-a-hoop,
And the soup you are certain to sneer at--
I have sipped it--it’s very good soup,--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
T’other day when I fell o’er the form,
Was my tumble a thing, Sir, to cheer at?
Well for you that my temper’s not warm,--
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
Why, you rascal! you insolent brat!
All my talking you don’t shed a tear at,
There--take that, Sir! and that! that! and that!
There!--“Palmam qui meruit ferat!”
THE KANGAROOS.
A FABLE.
A pair of married kangaroos
(The case is oft a human one too)
Were greatly puzzled once to choose
A trade to put their eldest son to:
A little brisk and busy chap,
As all the little K.’s just then are--
About some two months off the lap,--
They’re not so long in arms as men are.
A twist in each parental muzzle
Betray’d the hardship of the puzzle--
So much the flavour of life’s cup
Is framed by early wrong or right,
And Kangaroos we know are quite
Dependent on their “rearing up.”
The question, with its ins and outs,
Was intricate and full of doubts;
And yet they had no squeamish carings
For trades unfit or fit for gentry,
Such notion never had an entry,
For they had no armorial bearings.
Howbeit they’re not the last on earth
That might indulge in pride of birth;
Whoe’er has seen their infant young
Bob in and out their mother’s pokes,
Would own, with very ready tongue,
They are not born like common folks.
Well, thus the serious subject stood,
It kept the old pair watchful nightly,
Debating for young hopeful’s good,
That he might earn his livelihood,
And go through life (like them) uprightly.
Arms would not do at all; no, marry,
In that line all his race miscarry;
And agriculture was not proper,
Unless they meant the lad to tarry
For ever as a mere clod-hopper.
He was not well cut out for preaching
At least in any striking style;
And as for being mercantile--
He was not form’d for over-reaching.
The law--why there still fate ill-starr’d him,
And plainly from the bar debarr’d him:
A doctor--who would ever fee him?
In music he could scarce engage,
And as for going on the stage
In tragic socks I think I see him.
He would not make a rigging-mounter;
A haberdasher had some merit,
But there the counter still ran counter,
For just suppose
A lady chose
To ask him for a yard of ferret!
A gardener digging up his beds,
The puzzled parents shook their heads.
“A tailor would not do because--”
They paused and glanced upon his paws.
Some parish post, though fate should place it
Before him, how could he embrace it?
In short each anxious Kangaroo
Discuss’d the matter through and through
By day they seem’d to get no nearer,
’Twas posing quite--
And in the night
Of course they saw their way no clearer!
At last thus musing on their knees--
Or hinder elbows if you please--
It came--no thought was ever brighter!
In weighing every why and whether,
They jump’d upon it both together--
“Let’s make the imp a _short-hand writer_!”
MORAL.
I wish all human parents so
Would argue what their sons are fit for;
Some would-be critics that I know
Would be in trades they have more wit for.
I CANNOT BEAR A GUN.
“Timidity is generally reckoned an essential attribute of the fair
sex, and this absurd notion gives rise to more false starts than a
race for the Leger. Hence screams at mice, fits at spiders, faces
at toads, jumps at lizards, flights from daddy longlegs, panics at
wasps, _sauve qui peut_ at sight of a gun. Surely, when the
military exercise is made a branch of education at so many ladies’
academies, the use of the musket would only be a judicious step
further in the march of mind. I should not despair, in a month’s
practice, of making the most timid British female fond of
small-arms.”--HINTS BY A CORPORAL.
It can’t be minced, I’m quite convinced
All girls are full of flam,
Their feelings fine and feminine
Are nothing else but sham.
On all their tricks I need not fix,
I’ll only mention one,
How many a Miss will tell you this,
“I cannot bear a gun!”
There’s cousin Bell can’t ‘bide the smell
Of powder--horrid stuff!
A single pop will make her drop,
She shudders at a puff.
My Manton near, with aspen fear
Will make her scream and run:
“It’s always so, you brute, you know
I cannot bear a gun!”
About my flask I must not ask,
I must not wear a belt,
I must not take a punch to make
My pellets, card or felt;
And if I just allude to dust,
Or speak of number one,
“I beg you’ll not--don’t talk of shot,
I cannot bear a gun!”
Percussion cap I dare not snap,
I may not mention Hall,
[Illustration: A MINOR CANNON.]
[Illustration: “JAMES’S POWDER.”]
Or raise my voice for Mr. Joyce,
His wadding to recall;
At Hawker’s book I must not look,
All shooting I must shun,
Or else--“It’s hard, you’ve no regard,
I cannot bear a gun!”
The very dress I wear no less
Must suit her timid mind,
A blue or black must clothe my back,
With swallow-tails behind;
By fustian, jean, or velveteen,
Her nerves are overdone:
“Oh do not, John, put gaiters on,
I cannot bear a gun!”
E’en little James she snubs, and blames
His Liliputian train,
Two inches each from mouth to breach,
And charged with half a grain--
His crackers stopp’d, his squibbing dropp’d,
He has no fiery fun,
And all thro’ her “How dare you, Sir?
I cannot bear a gun!”
Yet Major Flint,--the Devil’s in’t!
May talk from morn to night,
Of springing mines, and twelves and nines,
And volleys left and right,
Of voltigeurs and tirailleurs,
And bullets by the ton:
She never dies of fright, or cries
“I cannot bear a gun!”
It stirs my bile to see her smile
At all his bang and whiz,
But if I talk of morning walk,
And shots as good as his,
I must not name the fallen game:
As soon as I’ve begun,
She’s in her pout, and crying out,
“I cannot bear a gun!”
Yet, underneath the rose, her teeth
Are false, to match her tongue:
Grouse, partridge, hares, she never spares,
Or pheasants, old or young--
On widgeon, teal, she makes a meal,
And yet objects to none:
“What have I got, it’s full of shot!
I cannot bear a gun!”
At pigeon-pie she is not shy,
Her taste it never shocks,
Though they should be from Battersea,
So famous for blue rocks;
Yet when I bring the very thing
My marksmanship has won,
She cries “Lock up that horrid cup,
I cannot bear a gun!”
Like fool and dunce I got her once
A box at Drury Lane,
And by her side I felt a pride
I ne’er shall feel again:
To read the bill it made her ill,
And this excuse she spun,
“Der Freyschütz, oh, seven shots; you know,
I cannot bear a gun!”
Yet at a hint from Major Flint,
Her very hands she rubs,
And quickly drest in all her best,
Is off to Wormwood Scrubbs.
The whole review she sits it through,
With noise enough to stun,
And never winks, or even thinks,
“I cannot bear a gun!”
She thus may blind the Major’s mind
In mock-heroic strife,
But let a bout at war break out,
And where’s the soldier’s wife,
To take his kit and march a bit
Beneath a broiling sun?
Or will she cry, “My dear, good-bye,
I cannot bear a gun?”
If thus she doats on army coats,
And regimental cuffs,
The yeomanry might surely be
Secure from her rebuffs;
But when I don my trappings on,
To follow Captain Dunn,
My carbine’s gleam provokes a scream,
“I cannot bear a gun!”
It can’t be minced, I’m quite convinced,
All girls are full of flam,
Their feelings fine, and feminine,
Are nothing else but sham;
On all their tricks I need not fix,
I’ll only mention one,
How many a Miss will tell you this,
“I cannot bear a gun!”
TRIMMER’S EXERCISE,
FOR THE USE OF CHILDREN.
Here, come, Master Timothy Todd,
Before we have done you’ll look grimmer,
You’ve been spelling some time for the rod,
And your jacket shall know I’m a Trimmer.
You don’t know your A from your B,
So backward you are in your Primer;
Don’t kneel--you shall go on _my_ knee,
For I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
This morning you hinder’d the cook,
By melting your dumps in the skimmer;
Instead of attending your book,--
But I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
To-day, too, you went to the pond,
And bathed, though you are not a swimmer:
And with parents so doting and fond--
But I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
After dinner you went to the wine,
And help’d yourself--yes, to a brimmer;
You couldn’t walk straight in a line,
But I’ll make you to know I’m a Trimmer.
You kick little Tomkins about,
Because he is slighter and slimmer;
Are the weak to be thump’d by the stout?
But I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
Then you have a sly pilfering trick,
Your school-fellows call you the nimmer,--
I will cut to the bone if you kick!
For I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
To-day you made game at my back:
You think that my eyes are grown dimmer,
But I watch’d you, I’ve got a sly nack!
And I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
Don’t think that my temper is hot,
It’s never beyond a slow simmer;
I’ll teach you to call me Dame Trot
But I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
Miss Edgeworth, or Mrs. Chapone,
Might melt to behold your tears glimmer;
Mrs. Barbauld would let you alone,
But I’ll have you to know I’m a Trimmer.
AN ADDRESS TO THE STEAM WASHING COMPANY.
“ARCHER. How many are there, _Scrub_?
SCRUB. Five-and-forty, sir.”--_Beaux Stratagem._
“For shame--let the linen alone!”--_Merry Wives of Windsor._
Mr. Scrub--Mr. Slop--or whoever you be!
The Cock of Steam Laundries,--the head Patentee
Of Associate Cleansers,--Chief founder and prime
[Illustration: FANCY PORTRAIT--MRS. TRIMMER.]
[Illustration: PALMAM QUI MERUIT FERAT.]
Of the firm for the wholesale distilling of grime--
Co-partners and dealers, in linen’s propriety--
That make washing public--and wash in society--
O lend me your ear! if that ear can forego
For a moment the music that bubbles below,--
From your new Surrey Geysers[11] all foaming and hot,--
That soft “_simmer’s_ sang” so endear’d to the Scot--
If your hands may stand still, or your steam without danger--
If your suds will not cool, and a mere simple stranger,
Both to you and to washing, may put in a rub,--
O wipe out your Amazon arms from the tub,--
And lend me your ear,--Let me modestly plead
For a race that your labours may soon supersede--
For a race that, now washing no living affords--
Like Grimaldi must leave their aquatic old boards,
Not with pence in their pockets to keep them at ease,
Not with bread in the funds--or investments of cheese,
But to droop like sad willows that lived by a stream,
Which the sun has suck’d up into vapour and steam.
All, look at the laundress, before you begrudge
Her hard daily bread to that laudable drudge--
When chanticleer singeth his earliest matins,
She slips her amphibious feet in her pattens,
And beginneth her toil while the morn is still grey,
As if she was washing the night into day--
Not with sleeker or rosier fingers Aurora
Beginneth to scatter the dewdrops before her;
Not Venus that rose from the billow so early,
Look’d down on the foam with a forehead more _pearly_[12]--
Her head is involved in an aërial mist,
And a bright-beaded bracelet encircles her wrist;
Her visage glows warm with the ardour of duty;
She’s Industry’s moral--she’s all moral beauty!
Growing brighter and brighter at every rub--
Would any man ruin her?--No, Mr. Scrub!
No man that is manly would work her mishap--
No man that is manly would covet her cap--
Nor her apron--her hose--nor her gown made of stuff--
Nor her gin--nor her tea--nor her wet pinch of snuff!
Alas! so _she_ thought--but that slippery hope
Has betray’d her--as though she had trod on her soap!
And she,--whose support,--like the fishes that fly,
Was to have her fins wet, must now drop from her sky--
She whose living it was, and a part of her fare,
To be damp’d once a day, like the great white sea bear,
With her hands like a sponge, and her head like a mop--
Quite a living absorbent that revell’d in slop--
She that paddled in water, must walk upon sand,
And sigh for her deeps like a turtle on land!
Lo, then, the poor laundress, all wretched she stands,
Instead of a counterpane, wringing her hands!
All haggard and pinch’d, going down in life’s vale,
With no faggot for burning, like Allan-a-Dale!
No smoke from her flue--and no steam from her pane,
Where once she watch’d heaven, fearing God and the rain--
Or gazed o’er her bleach-field so fairly engross’d,
Till the lines wander’d idle from pillar to post!
Ah, where are the playful young pinners--ah, where
The harlequin quilts that cut capers in air--
The brisk waltzing stockings--the white and the black,
That danced on the tight-rope, or swung on the slack--
The light sylph-like garments, so tenderly pinn’d,
That blew into shape, and embodied the wind!
There was white on the grass--there was white on the spray--
Her garden--it look’d like a garden of May!
But now all is dark--not a shirt’s on a shrub--
You’ve ruined her prospects in life, Mr. Scrub!
You’ve ruin’d her custom--now families drop her--
From her silver reduced--nay, reduced from her _copper_!
The last of her washing is done at her eye,
One poor little kerchief that never gets dry!
From mere lack of linen she can’t lay a cloth,
And boils neither barley nor alkaline broth,--
But her children come round her as victuals grow scant,
And recal, with foul faces, the source of their want--
When she thinks of their poor little mouths to be fed,
And then thinks of her trade that is utterly dead,
And even its pearlashes laid in the grave--
Whilst her tub is a-dry-rotting, stave after stave,
And the greatest of Coopers, ev’n he that they dub
Sir Astley, can’t bind up her heart or her tub,--
Need you wonder she curses your bones, Mr. Scrub!
Need you wonder, when steam has deprived her of bread,
If she prays that the evil may visit _your_ head--
Nay, scald all the heads of your Washing Committee,
If she wishes you all the soot blacks of the City--
In short, not to mention all plagues without number,
If she wishes you all in the _Wash_ at the Humber!
Ah, perhaps, in some moment of drowth and despair,
When her linen got scarce, and her washing grew rare--
When the sum of her suds might be summ’d in a bowl,
And the rusty cold iron quite enter’d her soul--
When, perhaps, the last glance of her wandering eye
Had caught “the Cock Laundresses’ Coach” going by,
Or her lines that hung idle, to waste the fine weather,
And she thought of her wrongs and her rights both together,
In a lather of passion that froth’d as it rose,
Too angry for grammar, too lofty for prose,
On her sheet--if a sheet were still left her--to write,
Some remonstrance like this then, perchance, saw the light--
LETTER OF REMONSTRANCE
FROM BRIDGET JONES TO THE NOBLEMEN AND GENTLEMEN FORMING THE WASHING
COMMITTEE.
It’s a shame, so it is--men can’t Let alone
Jobs as is Woman’s right to do--and go about there Own--
Theirs Reforms enuff Alreddy without your new schools
For washing to sit Up,--and push the Old Tubs from their stools!
But your just like the Raddicals,--for upsetting of the Sudds
When the world wagg’d well enuff--and Wommen wash’d your old dirty duds,
I’m Certain sure Enuff your Ann Sisters had no steam Indins, that’s Flat,--
But I Warrant your Four Fathers went as Tidy and gentlemanny for all that--
I suppose your the Family as lived in the Great Kittle
I see on Clapham Commun, some times a very considerable period back when I were little,
And they Said it went with Steem,--But that was a joke!
For I never see none come of it,--that’s out of it--but only sum Smoak--
And for All your Power of Horses about your Indians you never had but Two
In my time to draw you About to Fairs--and hang you, you know that’s true!
And for All your fine Perspectuses,--howsomever you bewhich ’em,
Theirs as Pretty ones off Primerows Hill, as ever a one at Mitchum,
Thof I cant sea What Prospectives and washing has with one another to Do--
It ant as if a Bird’seye Hankicher can take a Birds-high view!
But Thats your look-out--I’ve not much to do with that--But pleas God to hold up fine,
Id show you caps and pinners and small things as lillywhit as Ever crosst the Line
Without going any Father off than Little Parodies Place,
And Thats more than you Can--and Ill say it behind your face--
But when Folks talks of washing, it ant for you too Speak,--
As kept Dockter Pattyson out of his Shirt for a Weak!
Thinks I, when I heard it--Well thear’s a Pretty go!
That comes o’ not marking of things or washing out the marks, and Huddling ’em up so!
Till Their frends comes and owns them, like drownded corpeses in a Vault,
But may Hap you havint Larn’d to spel--and That ant your Fault,
Only you ought to leafe the Linnins to them as has Larn’d,--
For if it warnt for Washing,--and whare Bills is concarnd,
What’s the Yuse, of all the world, for a Wommans Headication,
And Their Being maid Schollards of Sundays--fit for any Cityation?
Well, what I says is this--when every Kittle has its spout,
Theirs no nead for Companys to puff steam about!
To be sure its very Well, when Their ant enuff Wind
For blowing up Boats with,--but not to hurt human kind,
Like that Pearkins with his Blunderbush, that’s loaded with hot water,
Thof a xSherrif might know Better, than make things for slaughtter,
As if War warnt Cruel enuff--wherever it befalls,
Without shooting poor sogers, with sich scalding hot washing[13] balls,--
But thats not so Bad as a Sett of Bear Faced Scrubbs
As joins their Sopes together, and sits up Steam rubbing Clubs,
For washing Dirt Cheap,--and eating other Peple’s grubs!
Which is all verry Fine for you and your Patent Tea,
But I wonders How Poor Wommen is to get Their Beau-He!
They must drink Hunt wash (the only wash God nose there will be!)
And their Little drop of Somethings as they takes for their Goods,
When you and your Steam has ruined (G--d forgive mee) their lively Hoods,
Poor Women as was born to Washing in their youth!
And now must go and Larn other Buisnesses Four Sooth!
But if so be They leave their Lines what are they to go at--
They won’t do for Angell’s--nor any Trade like That,
Nor we cant Sow Babby Work,--for that’s all Bespoke,--
For the Queakers in Bridle! and a vast of the confind Folk
Do their own of Themselves--even the bettermost of em--aye, and evn them of middling
degrees--
Why--Lauk help you--Babby Linen and Bread ant Cheese!
Nor we can’t go a hammering the roads into Dust,
But we must all go and be Bankers, Like Mr. Marshes and Mr. Chamber, and that’s
what we must!
God nose you oght to have more Concern for our Sects,
When you nose you have suck’d us and hanged round our Mutherly necks,
And remembers what you Owes to Wommen Besides washing--
You ant, blame you, like Men to go a slushing and sloshing
In mob caps, and pattins, adoing of Females Labers
And prettily jear’d At, you great Horse God-meril things, ant you now by your next
door nayhbours--
Lawk, I thinks I see you with your Sleaves tuckt up
No more like Washing than is drownding of a Pupp--
And for all Your Fine Water Works going round and round
They’ll scruntch your Bones some day--I’ll be bound
And no more nor be a gudgement,--for it cant come to good
To sit up agin Providence, which your a doing,--nor not fit It should,
For man warnt maid for Wommens starvation,
Nor to do away Laundrisses as is Links of Creation--
And cant be dun without in any Country But a naked Hottinpot Nation.
Ah, I wish our Minister would take one of your Tubbs
And preach a Sermon in it, and give you some good rubs--
But I warrants you reads (for you cant spel we nose) nyther Bybills or Good Tracks,
Or youd no better than Taking the Close off one’s Backs--
And let your neighbours Oxin an Asses alone,--
And every Thing thats hern,--and give every one their Hone!
Well, its God for us All, and every Washer Wommen for herself,
And so you might, without shoving any on us off the shelf,
But if you warnt Noddis youd Let wommen a-be
And pull off your Pattins,--and leave the washing to we
That nose what’s what--Or mark what I say,
Youl make a fine Kittle of fish of Your Close some Day--
When the Aulder men wants Their Bibs and their ant nun at all,
And Crismass cum--and never a Cloth to lay in Gild Hall,
Or send a damp shirt to his Woship the Mare
Till hes rumatiz Poor Man, and cant set uprite to do good in his Harm Chare--
Besides Miss-Matching Larned Ladys Hose, as is sent for you not to wash
(for you dont wash) but to stew
And make Peples Stockins yeller as oght to be Blew,
With a vast more like That,--and all along of Steem
Which warnt meand by Nater for any sich skeam--
But thats your Losses and youl have to make It Good,
And I cant say I’m sorry, afore God, if you shoud,
For men mought Get their Bread a great many ways
Without taking ourn,--aye, and Moor to your Prays,
You might go and skim the creme off Mr. Mack-Adam’s milky ways--that’s what you
might,
Or bete Carpets--or get into Parleamint,--or drive crabrolays from morning to night,
Or, if you must be of our sects, be Watchemen, and slepe upon a poste!
(Which is an od way of sleping I must say,--and a very hard pillow at most,)
Or you might be any trade, as we are not on that I’m awares,
Or be Watermen now, (not Water wommen) and roe people up and down
Hungerford stares.
If You Was even to Turn Dust Men a dry sifting Dirt,
But you oughtint to Hurt Them as never Did You no Hurt!
Yourn with Anymocity,
BRIDGET JONES.
THE BLUE BOAR.