Whether Harmony will ever make the “Arms” her House of call,
Or whether this here mobbing--as some longish heads foretel it,
Will grow to such a riot that the Oxford Blues must quell it.
Howsomever, for the present, there’s no sign of any peace,
For the hubbub keeps a growing, and defies the New Police;--
But if _I_ was in the Vestry, and a leading sort of Man,
Or a Member of the Vocals, to get backers for my plan,
Why, I’d settle all the squabble in the twinkle of a needle,
For I’d have another candidate--and that’s the Parish Beadle,
Who makes such lots of Poetry, himself, or else by proxy,
And no one never has no doubts about his orthodoxy;
Whereby--if folks was wise--instead of either of them Scholars,
And straining their own lungs along of contradictious hollers,
They’ll lend their ears to reason, and take my advice as follers,
Namely--Bumble for the Chairman of the Glorious Apollers!
A TABLE OF ERRATA.
(HOSTESS LOQUITUR.)
Well! thanks be to heaven,
The summons is given;
It’s only gone seven
And should have been six;
There’s fine overdoing
In roasting and stewing,
And victuals past chewing
To rags and to sticks!
How dreadfully chilly!
I shake, willy-nilly;
That John is so silly
And never will learn!
This plate is a cold one,
That cloth is an old one,
I wish they had told one
The lamp wouldn’t burn.
Now then for some blunder,
For nerves to sink under;
I never shall wonder
Whatever goes ill.
That fish is a riddle!
It’s broke in the middle,
A Turbot! a fiddle!
It’s only a Brill!
It’s quite over-boil’d too,
The butter is oil’d too,
The soup is all spoil’d too,
It’s nothing but slop.
The smelts looking flabby,
The soles are as dabby,
It all is so shabby
That Cook shall not stop!
As sure as the morning,
She gets a month’s warning,
My orders for scorning--
There’s nothing to eat!
I hear such a rushing,
I feel such a flushing,
I know I am blushing
As red as a beet!
Friends flatter and flatter,
I wish they would chatter;
What _can_ be the matter
That nothing comes next?
How very unpleasant!
Lord! there is the pheasant!
Not wanted at present,
I’m born to be vext!
The pudding brought on too
And aiming at ton too!
And where is that John too,
The plague that he is?
He’s off on some ramble:
And there is Miss Campbell,
Enjoying the scramble,
Detestable Quiz!
The veal they all eye it,
But no one will try it,
An Ogre would shy it
So ruddy as that!
And as for the mutton,
The cold dish it’s put on,
Converts to a button
Each drop of the fat.
The beef without mustard!
My fate’s to be fluster’d,
And there comes the custard
To eat with the hare!
Such flesh, fowl, and fishing,
Such waiting and dishing,
I cannot help wishing
A woman might swear!
Oh dear! did I ever--
But no, I did never--
Well, come, that is clever,
To send up the brawn!
That cook, I could scold her,
Gets worse as she’s older;
I wonder who told her
That woodcocks are drawn!
It’s really audacious!
I cannot look gracious,
Lord help the voracious
That came for a cram!
There’s Alderman Fuller
Gets duller and duller.
Those fowls, by the colour,
Were boil’d with the ham!
Well, where is the curry?
I’m all in a flurry,
No, cook’s in no hurry--
A stoppage again!
And John makes it wider,
A pretty provider!
By bringing up cider
Instead of champagne!
My troubles come faster!
There’s my lord and master
Detects each disaster,
And hardly can sit:
He cannot help seeing,
All things disagreeing;
If _he_ begins d--ing
I’m off in a fit!
This cooking?--it’s messing!
The spinach wants pressing,
And salads in dressing
Are best with good eggs.
And John--yes, already--
Has had something heady,
That makes him unsteady
In keeping his legs.
How _shall_ I get through it!
I never can do it,
I’m quite looking to it,
To sink by and by.
Oh! would I were dead now,
Or up in my bed now,
To cover my head now
And have a good cry!
THE GREEN MAN.
Tom Simpson was as nice a kind of man
As ever lived--at least at number Four,
In Austin Friars, in Mrs. Brown’s first floor,
At fifty pounds,--or thereabouts,--per ann.
The Lady reckon’d him her best of lodgers,
His rent so punctually paid each quarter,--
He did not smoke like nasty foreign codgers--
Nor play French horns like Mr. Rogers--
Or talk his flirting nonsense to her daughter--
Not that the girl was light behaved or courtable--
Still on one failing tenderly to touch,
The Gentleman did like a drop too much,
(Tho’ there are many such)
And took more Port than was exactly portable.
In fact,--to put the cap upon the nipple,
And try the charge,--Tom certainly _did_ tipple.
He thought the motto was but sorry stuff
On Cribb’s Prize Cup--Yes, wrong in ev’ry letter--
That “D----d be he who first cries _Hold Enough_!”
The more cups hold, and if enough, the better.
And so to set example in the eyes
Of Fancy’s lads, and give a broadish hint to them,
All his cups were of such ample size
That he got into them.
Once in the company of merry mates,
In spite of Temperance’s ifs and buts,
So sure as Eating is set off with _plates_,
His Drinking always was bound up with _cuts_!
Howbeit, such Bacchanalian revels
Bring very sad catastrophes about;
Palsy, Dyspepsy, Dropsy, and Blue Devils,
Not to forget the Gout.
Sometimes the liver takes a spleenful whim
To grow to Strasbourg’s regulation size,
As if for those hepatical goose pies--
Or out of depth the head begins to swim--
Poor Simpson! what a thing occurred to him!
’Twas Christmas--he had drunk the night before,--
Like Baxter, who “so went beyond his last”--
_One_ bottle more, and then _one_ bottle more,
Till, oh! the red-wine _Ruby-con_ was pass’d!
And homeward, by the short small chimes of day,
With many a circumbendibus to spare,
For instance, twice round Finsbury Square,
To use a fitting phrase, he _wound_ his way.
Then comes the rising, with repentance bitter,
And all the nerves--(and sparrows)--in a twitter,
Till settled by the sober Chinese cup:
The hands, o’er all, are members that make motions,
A sort of wavering just like the ocean’s,
Which has its swell, too, when it’s getting up--
An awkward circumstance enough for elves
Who shave themselves;
And Simpson just was ready to go thro’ it
When lo! the first short glimpse within the glass--
He jump’d--and who alive would fail to do it?--
To see, however it had come to pass,
One section of his face as green as grass!
In vain each eager wipe,
With soap--without--wet--hot or cold--or dry,
Still, still, and still, to his astonished eye
One cheek was green, the other cherry ripe!
Plump in the nearest chair he sat him down,
Quaking, and quite absorb’d in a deep study,--
But verdant and not brown,
What could have happened to a tint so ruddy?
Indeed it was a very novel case,
By way of penalty for being jolly,
To have that evergreen stuck in his face,
Just like the windows with their Christmas holly.
“All claret marks,”--thought he--Tom knew his forte--
“Are red--this colour CANNOT come from Port!”
One thing was plain; with such a face as his,
’Twas quite impossible to ever greet
Good Mrs. Brown; nay, any party meet,
Altho’ ’twas such a parti-coloured phiz!
As for the public, fancy Sarcy Ned,
The coachman, flying, dog-like, at his head,
With “Ax your pardon, Sir, but if you please--
Unless it comes too high--
Vere ought a fellow, now, to go to buy
The t’other half, Sir, of that ‘ere green cheese?”
His mind recoil’d--so he tied up his head,
As with a raging tooth, and took to bed;
Of course with feelings far from the serene,
For all his future prospects seemed to be,
To match his customary tea,
Black mixt with green.
Meanwhile, good Mrs. Brown
Wondered at Mr. S. not coming down,
And sent the maid up-stairs to learn the why;
To whom poor Simpson, half delirious,
Returned an answer so mysterious
That curiosity began to fry;
The more, as Betty, who had caught a snatch
By peeping in upon the patient’s bed,
Reported a most bloody, tied-up head,
Got over-night of course--“Harm watch, harm catch,”
From Watchmen in a boxing-match.
So, liberty or not,--
Good lodgers are too scarce to let them off in
A suicidal coffin--
The dame ran up as fast as she could trot;
“Appearance,--fiddlesticks!” should not deter
From going to the bed,
And looking at the head:
“La! Mister S----, he need not care for her!
A married woman that had had
Nine boys and gals, and none had turned out bad--
Her own dear late would come home late at night,
And liquor always got him in a fight,
She’d been in Hospitals--she wouldn’t faint
At gores and gashes fingers wide and deep;
She knew what’s good for bruises and what ain’t--
Turlington’s Drops she made a p’int to keep.
Cases she’d seen beneath the surgent’s hand--
Such skulls japann’d--she meant to say trepann’d!
Poor wretches! you would think they’d been in battle,
And hadn’t hours to live,
From tearing horses’ kicks or Smithfield cattle,
Shamefully over-driv!--
Heads forced to have a silver plate atop,
To get the brains to stop.
At imputations of the legs she’d been,
And neither screech’d nor cried--
Hereat she pluck’d the white cravat aside,
And lo! the whole phenomenon was seen--
“Preserve us all! He’s going to gangrene!”
Alas! through Simpson’s brain
Shot the remark, like ball, with mortal pain;
It tallied truly with his own misgiving,
And brought a groan,
To move a heart of stone--
A sort of farewell to the land of living!
And as the case was imminent and urgent,
He did not make a shadow of objection
To Mrs. B.’s proposal for a “surgent,”
But merely gave a sight of deep dejection,
While down the verdant cheek a tear of grief
Stole, like a dew-drop on a cabbage-leaf.
Swift flew the summons,--it was life or death!
And in as short a time as he could race it,
Came Doctor Puddicome as short of breath,
To try his Latin charms against _Hic Jacet_.
He took a seat beside the patient’s bed,
Saw tongue--felt pulse--examined the bad cheek,--
Poked, stroked, pinch’d, kneaded it--hemm’d--shook his head--
Took a long solemn pause the cause to seek,
(Thinking, it seem’d, in Greek,)
Then ask’d--‘twas Christmas--“Had he eaten grass,
Or greens--and if the cook was so improper
To boil them up with copper,
Or farthings made of brass;
Or if he drank his Hock from dark green glass,
Or dined at City Festivals, whereat
There’s turtle, and green fat?”
To all of which, with serious tone of woe,
Poor Simpson answered “No.”
Indeed he might have said in form auricular,
Supposing Puddicome had been a monk--
He had not eaten (he had only drunk)
Of any thing “Particular.”
The Doctor was at fault;
A thing so new quite brought him to a halt.
Cases of other colours came in crowds,
He could have found their remedy, and soon;
But green--it sent him up among the clouds,
As if he had gone up with Green’s balloon!
Black with Black Jaundice he had seen the skin;
From Yellow Jaundice yellow,
From saffron tints to sallow;--
Then retrospective memory lugg’d in
Old Purple Face, the Host at Kentish Town--
East Indians, without number,
He knew familiarly, by heat done Brown,
From tan to a burnt umber,
Ev’n those eruptions he had never seen
Of which the Caledonian Poet spoke,
As “_rashes_ growing green!”
“Pooh! pooh! a rash grow green!
Nothing of course but a broad Scottish joke!”
Then as to flaming visages, for those
The Scarlet Fever answer’d, or the Rose--
But verdant that was quite a novel stroke!
Men turn’d to blue, by Cholera’s last stage,
In common practice he had really seen;
But green--he was too old, and grave, and sage,
To think of the last stage to Turnham Green!
So matters stood in-doors--meanwhile without,
Growing in going like all other rumours,
The modern miracle was buzz’d about,
By People of all humours,
Native or foreign in their dialecticals;
Till all the neighbourhood, as if their noses
Had taken the odd gross from little Moses,
Seem’d looking thro’ green spectacles.
“Green faces!” so they all began to comment--
“Yes--opposite to Druggist’s lighted shops,
But that’s a flying colour--never stops--
A bottle-green that’s vanished in a moment.
Green! nothing of the sort occurs to mind,
Nothing at all to match the present piece;
Jack in the Green has nothing of the kind--
Green-grocers are not green--nor yet green geese!”
The oldest Supercargoes of Old Sailors
Of such a case had never heard,
From Emerald Isle to Cape de Verd;
“Or Greenland!” cried the whalers.
All tongues were full of the Green man, and still
They could not make him out, with all their skill;
No soul could shape the matter, head or tail--
But truth steps in where all conjectures fail.
A long half-hour, in needless puzzle,
Our Galen’s cane had rubbed against his muzzle:
He thought, and thought, and thought, and thought, and thought--
And still it came to nought,
When up rush’d Betty, loudest of Town Criers,
“Lord, Ma’am, the new Police is at the door!
It’s B, ma’am, Twenty-four,--
As brought home Mr. S. to Austin Friars,
And says there’s nothing but a simple case--
He got that ‘ere green face
By sleeping in the kennel near the Dyer’s!”
* * * * *
BEN BLUFF.
A PATHETIC BALLAD.
“Pshaw, you are not on a whaling voyage, where everything that
offers is game.”--THE PILOT.
Ben Bluff was a whaler, and many a day
Had chased the huge fish about Baffin’s old Bay,
But time brought a change his diversion to spoil,
And that was when Gas took the shine out of Oil.
He turn’d up his nose at the fumes of the Coke,
And swore the whole scheme was a bottle of smoke:
As to London he briefly delivered his mind,
“Sparma-city,” said he--but the City declined.
So Ben cut his line in a sort of a huff,
As soon as his whales had brought profits enough,
And hard by the Docks settled down for his life,
But, true to his text, went to Wales for a wife.
A big one she was, without figure or waist,
More bulky than lovely, but that was his taste;
In fat she was lapp’d from her sole to her crown,
And, turn’d into oil, would have lighted a town.
But Ben like a Whaler was charm’d with the match,
And thought, very truly, his spouse a great catch;
A flesh-and-blood emblem of Plenty and Peace,
And would not have changed her for Helen of Greece.
For Greenland was green in his memory still;
He’d quitted his trade, but retain’d the good-will;
And often, when soften’d by bumbo and flip,
Would cry--till he blubber’d--about his old ship.
No craft like the Grampus could work through a floe,
What knots she could run, and what tons she could stow.
And then that rich smell he preferr’d to the rose,
By just nosing the whole without holding his nose!
Now Ben he resolved, one fine Saturday night,
A snug Arctic Circle of friends to invite,
Old Tars in the trade, who related old tales,
And drank, and blew clouds that were “very like whales.”
Of course with their grog there was plenty of chat,
Of canting, and flinching, and cutting up fat;
And how Gun Harpoons into fashion had got,
And if they were meant for the Gun-whale or not?
At last they retired, and left Ben to his rest,
By fancies cetaceous, and drink, well possess’d,
When, lo! as he lay by his partner in bed,
He heard something blow through two holes in its head.
“A start!” mutter’d Ben, in the Grampus afloat,
And made but one jump from the deck to the boat!
“Huzza! pull away for the blubber and bone--
I look on that whale as already my own!”
Then groping about by the light of the moon,
He soon laid his hand on his trusty harpoon;
A moment he poised it, to send it more pat,
And then made a plunge to imbed it in fat!
“Starn all!” he sang out, “as you care for your lives--
Starn all, as you hope to return to your wives--
Stand by for the flurry! she throws up the foam!
Well done, my old iron, I’ve sent you right home!”
And scarce had he spoken, when lo! bolt upright
The Leviathan rose in a great sheet of white,
And swiftly advanced for a fathom or two,
As only a fish out of water could do.
“Starn all!” echoed Ben, with a movement aback,
But too slow to escape from the creature’s attack;
If flippers it had, they were furnish’d with nails,--
“You willin, I’ll teach you that Women an’t Whales!”
“Avast!” shouted Ben, with a sort of a screech,
“I’ve heard a Whale spouting, but _here_ is a speech!”
“A-spouting, indeed!--very pretty,” said she;
“But it’s you I’ll blow up, not the froth of the sea!
“To go to pretend to take _me_ for a fish!
You great Polar Bear--but I know what you wish--
You’re sick of a wife, that your hankering baulks,--
You want to go back to some young Esquimax!”
“O dearest,” cried Ben, frighten’d out of his life,
“Don’t think I would go for to murder a wife
I must long have bewailed”--“But she only cried Stuff!
Don’t name it, you brute, you’ve _be-whaled_ me enough!”
“Lord, Polly!” said Ben, “such a deed could I do?
I’d rather have murder’d all Wapping than you!
Come, forgive what is passed.” “O you monster!” she cried,
“It was none of your fault that it passed of one side!”
However, at last she inclined to forgive;
“But, Ben, take this warning as long as you live--
If the love of harpooning so strong must prevail,
Take a whale for a wife, not a wife for a whale.”
SALLY SIMPKIN’S LAMENT;
OR, JOHN JONES’S KIT-CAT-ASTROPHE.
“He left his body to the sea,
And made a shark his legatee.”
BRYAN AND PERENNE.
“Oh! what is that comes gliding in,
And quite in middling haste?
It is the picture of my Jones,
And painted to the waist.
“It is not painted to the life,
For where’s the trowsers blue?
Oh Jones, my dear!--oh dear! my Jones,
What is become of you?”
“Oh! Sally dear, it is too true,--
The half that you remark
Is come to say my other half
Is bit off by a shark!
“Oh! Sally, sharks do things by halves,
Yet most completely do!
A bite in one place seems enough,
But I’ve been bit in two.
“You know I once was all your own,
But now a shark must share!
But let that pass--for now to you
I’m neither here nor there.
“Alas! death has a strange divorce
Effected in the sea,
It has divided me from you,
And even me from me!
“Don’t fear my ghost will walk o’nights
To haunt, as people say;
My ghost _can’t_ walk, for, oh! my legs
Are many leagues away!
“Lord! think, when I am swimming round,
And looking where the boat is,
A shark just snaps away a _half_,
Without ‘a _quarter’s_ notice.’
“One half is here, the other half
Is near Columbia placed;
Oh! Sally, I have got the whole
Atlantic for my waist.
“But now, adieu--a long adieu!
I’ve solved death’s awful riddle,
And would say more, but I am doomed
To break off in the middle!”
I’M GOING TO BOMBAY.
“Nothing venture, nothing have.”--OLD PROVERB.
“Every Indiaman has at least two mates.”--FALCONER’S
MARINE GUIDE.
I.
My hair is brown, my eyes are blue,
And reckon’d rather bright;
I’m shapely, if they tell me true,
And just the proper height;
My skin has been admired in verse,
And called as fair as day--
If I _am_ fair, so much the worse,
I’m going to Bombay!
II.
At school I passed with some éclât;
I learned my French in France;
De Wint gave lessons how to draw,
And D’Egville how to dance;--
Crevelli taught me how to sing,
And Cramer how to play--
It really is the strangest thing--
I’m going to Bombay!
III.
I’ve been to Bath and Cheltenham Wells,
But not their springs to sip--
To Ramsgate--not to pick up shells,--
To Brighton--not to dip.
I’ve tour’d the Lakes, and scour’d the coast
From Scarboro’ to Torquay--
But tho’ of time I’ve made the most,
I’m going to Bombay!
IV.
By Pa and Ma I’m daily told
To marry now’s my time,
For though I’m very far from old,
I’m rather in my prime.
They say while we have any sun,
We ought to make our hay--
And India has so hot an one,
I’m going to Bombay!
V.
My cousin writes from Hyderapot
My only chance to snatch,
And says the climate is so hot,
It’s sure to light a match.--
She’s married to a son of Mars,
With very handsome pay,
And swears I ought to thank my stars
I’m going to Bombay!
VI.
She says that I shall much delight
To taste their Indian treats,
But what she likes may turn me quite,
Their strange outlandish meats.--
If I can eat rupees, who knows?
Or dine, the Indian way,
On doolies and on bungalows--
I’m going to Bombay!
VII.
She says that I shall much enjoy,--
I don’t know what she means,--
To take the air and buy some toy,
In my own palankeens,--
I like to drive my pony-chair,
Or ride our dapple gray--
But elephants are horses there--
I’m going to Bombay!
VIII.
Farewell, farewell, my parents dear,
My friends, farewell to them!
And oh, what costs a sadder tear,
Good-bye to Mr. M.!--
If I should find an Indian vault,
Or fall a tiger’s prey,
Or steep in salt, it’s all _his_ fault,
I’m going to Bombay!
IX.
That fine new teak-built ship, the Fox
A. 1--Commander Bird,
Now lying in the London Docks,
Will sail on May the Third;
Apply for passage or for freight,
To Nichol, Scott, and Gray--
Pa has applied and seal’d my fate--
I’m going to Bombay!
X.
My heart is full--my trunks as well;
My mind and caps made up,
My corsets shap’d by Mrs. Bell,
Are promised ere I sup;
With boots and shoes, Rivarta’s best,
And dresses by Ducé,
And a special license in my chest--
I’m going to Bombay!
JOHN JONES.
A PATHETIC BALLAD.
“I saw the iron enter into his soul.”--STERNE.
John Jones he was a builder’s clerk,
On ninety pounds a year,
Before his head was engine-turn’d
To be an engineer!
For, finding that the iron roads
Were quite the public tale,
Like Robin Redbreast, all his heart
Was set upon a rail.
But oh! his schemes all ended ill,
As schemes must come to nought,
With men who try to make short cuts,
When cut with something short.
His altitudes he did not take,
Like any other elf;
But first a spirit-level took,
That levelled him, himself.
Then getting up, from left to right
So many tacks he made,
The ground he meant to go upon
Got very well survey’d.
How crows may fly he did not care
A single fig to know;--
He wish’d to make an iron road,
And not an iron crow.
So, going to the Rose and Crown,
To cut his studies short,
The nearest way from _pint_ to _pint_,
He found was through a quart.
According to this rule he plann’d
His railroad o’er a cup;
But when he came to lay it down,
No soul would take it up!
Alas! not his the wily arts
Of men as shrewd as rats,
Who out of one sole _level_ make
A precious lot of _flats_!
In vain from Z to crooked S,
His devious line he show’d;
Directors even seemed to wish
For some directer road.
The writers of the public press
All sneered at his design;
And penny-a-liners wouldn’t give
A penny for his line.
[Illustration: OVERTAKER AND UNDERTAKER.]
[Illustration: THE BATH GUIDE.]
Yet still he urged his darling scheme,
In spite of all the fates;
Until at last his zigzag ways
Quite brought him into _straits_.
His money gone, of course he sank
In debt from day to day,--
His way would not pay _him_--and so
He could not pay his way.
Said he, “All parties run me down--
How bitter is my cup!
My landlord is the only man
That ever runs me up!
“And he begins to talk of scores,
And will not draw a cork;”--
And then he rail’d at Fortune, since
He could not rail at York!
The morrow, in a fatal noose
They found him hanging fast;
This sentence scribbled on the wall,--
“I’ve got my line at last!”
Twelve men upon the body sate,
And thus, on oath, did say,
“We find he got his _gruel_, ‘cause
He couldn’t have his _way_!”
POMPEY’S GHOST.
A PATHETIC BALLAD.
“Skins may differ, but affection
Dwells in white and black the same.”--COWPER.
’Twas twelve o’clock, not twelve at night,
But twelve o’clock at noon,
Because the sun was shining bright,
And not the silver moon:
A proper time for friends to call,
Or Pots, or Penny Post;
When, lo! as Phœbe sat at work,
She saw her Pompey’s Ghost!
Now when a female has a call
From people that are dead,
Like Paris ladies, she receives
Her visitors in bed:
But Pompey’s Spirit could not come
Like spirits that are white,
Because he was a Blackamoor,
And wouldn’t show at night!
But of all unexpected things
That happen to us here,
The most unpleasant is a rise
In what is very dear:
So Phœbe scream’d an awful scream,
To prove the seaman’s text,
That after black appearances,
White squalls will follow next.
“Oh, Phœbe dear! oh, Phœbe dear!
Don’t go to scream or faint;
You think because I’m black I am
The Devil, but I ain’t!
Behind the heels of Lady Lambe
I walk’d whilst I had breath;
But that is past, and I am now
A-walking after Death!
“No murder, though, I come to tell,
By base and bloody crime;
So, Phœbe dear, put off your fits
Till some more fitting time;
No Crowner, like a boatswain’s mate,
My body need attack,
With his round dozen to find out
Why I have died so black.
“One Sunday, shortly after tea,
My skin began to burn,
As if I had in my inside
A heater, like the urn.
Delirious in the night I grew,
And as I lay in bed,
They say I gather’d all the wool
You see upon my head.