Charley was young and in his prime,
A courting went to widow Pincher;
She was shy, and fair, and fine,
He was constant and no flincher.
The time arrived when they got married,
She had houses, and cows, Sirs, four,
But Charley soon them all did swallid,
And left her in an evil hour;
He went and drank just like an ass,
Then came home as you may guess
And found her dead; but was not wise,
So he'd make her do the exercise;
The women did not like such jokes,
So they sent off for T. Pitt Stokes--
Who neck and crop to the Workhouse took him
And in the dungeon they did hook him.
This madman told the gentlemen,
That he would fetch her back again,
So they kept him there till she was buried,
When he got home he was most worried.
Many hundred comical verses by this singular man have perished from
memory since his death, but _Ben_ was a great Tory in his time, and
his latter days were sustained by political association and sympathy.
The old man at last became houseless and very poor, and was eventually
removed to the Workhouse, where he died in 1851, being upwards of
eighty years of age.