XII.

Don’t go to weep upon my grave, And think that there I be; They haven’t left an atom there Of my anatomie.

ODE TO MR. BRUNEL.

“Well said, old Mole! canst work i’ the dark so fast? a worthy pioneer!”

HAMLET.

Well!----Monsieur Brunel, How prospers now thy mighty undertaking, To join by a hollow way the Bankside friends Of Rotherhithe, and Wapping,-- Never be stopping, But poking, groping, in the dark keep making An archway, underneath the Dabs and Gudgeons, For Collier men and pitchy old Curmudgeons, To cross the water in inverse proportion, Walk under steam-boats under the keel’s ridge, To keep down all extortion, And without sculls to diddle London Bridge! In a fresh hunt, a new Great Bore to worry, Thou didst to earth thy human terriers follow, Hopeful at last from Middlesex to Surrey, To give us the “View hollow.” In short it was thy aim, right north and south, To put a pipe into old Thames’s mouth; Alas! half-way thou hadst proceeded, when Old Thames, through roof, not water-proof, Came, like “a tide in the affairs of men;” And with a mighty stormy kind of roar, Reproachful of thy wrong, Burst out in that old song Of Incledon’s, beginning “Cease, rude Bore”-- Sad is it, worthy of one’s tears, Just when one seems the most successful, To find one’s self o’er head and ears In difficulties most distressful! Other great speculations have been nursed, Till want of proceeds laid them on a shelf; But thy concern was at the worst, When it began to _liquidate_ itself! But now Dame Fortune has her false face hidden, And languishes thy Tunnel,--so to paint, Under a slow incurable complaint, Bed-ridden!

Why, when thus Thames--bed-bother’d--why repine! Do try a spare bed at the Serpentine! Yet let none think thee daz’d, or craz’d, or stupid; And sunk beneath thy own and Thames’s craft; Let them not style thee some Mechanic Cupid Pining and pouting o’er a broken shaft! I’ll tell thee with thy tunnel what to do; Light up thy boxes, build a bin or two, The wine does better than such water trades: Stick up a sign--the sign of the Bore’s Head; I’ve drawn it ready for thee in black lead, And make thy cellar subterrane,--Thy Shades?

ANACREONTIC.

FOR THE NEW YEAR.

Come, fill up the Bowl, for if ever the glass Found a proper excuse or fit season, For toasts to be honour’d, or pledges to pass, Sure, this hour brings an exquisite reason: For hark! the last chime of the dial has ceased, And Old Time, who his leisure to cozen, Had finish’d the Months, like the flasks at a feast, Is preparing to tap a fresh dozen! Hip! Hip! and Hurrah!

Then fill, all ye Happy and Free, unto whom The past Year has been pleasant and sunny; Its months each as sweet as if made of the bloom Of the _thyme_ whence the bee gathers honey-- Days usher’d by dew-drops, instead of the tears, May be wrung from some wretcheder cousin-- Then fill, and with gratitude join in the cheers That triumphantly hail a fresh dozen! Hip! Hip! and Hurrah!

And ye, who have met with Adversity’s blast, And been bow’d to the earth by its fury;

[Illustration: THE BOTTLE IMP.]

[Illustration: “THE IDES OF MARCH ARE COME!”]

To whom the Twelve Months, that have recently pass’d, Were as harsh as a prejudiced jury,-- Still, fill to the Future! and join in our chime, The regrets of remembrance to cozen, And having obtained a New Trial of Time, Shout in hopes of a kindlier dozen! Hip! Hip! and Hurrah!

A WATERLOO BALLAD.

To Waterloo, with sad ado, And many a sigh and groan, Amongst the dead, came Patty Head, To look for Peter Stone.

“O prithee tell, good sentinel, If I shall find him here? I’m come to weep upon his corse, My Ninety-Second dear!

“Into our town a sergeant came With ribands all so fine, A-flaunting in his cap--alas, His bow enlisted mine!

“They taught him how to turn his toes, And stand as stiff as starch; I thought that it was love and May, But it was love and March!

“A sorry March indeed to leave The friends he might have kep’,-- No March of Intellect it was, But quite a foolish step.

“O prithee tell, good sentinel, If hereabout he lies? I want a corpse with reddish hair, And very sweet blue eyes.”

Her sorrow on the sentinel Appear’d to deeply strike:-- “Walk in,” he said, “among the dead, And pick out which you like.”

And soon she pick’d out Peter Stone, Half turn’d into a corse; A cannon was his bolster, and His mattrass was a horse.

“O Peter Stone, O Peter Stone, Lord, here has been a skrimmage! What have they done to your poor breast, That used to hold my image?”

“O Patty Head, O Patty Head, You’re come to my last kissing, Before I’m set in the Gazette As wounded, dead, and missing!

“Alas! a splinter of a shell Right in my stomach sticks; French mortars don’t agree so well With stomachs as French bricks.

“This very night a merry dance At Brussels was to be;-- Instead of opening a ball, A ball has opened me.

“Its billet every bullet has, And well it does fulfil it;-- I wish mine hadn’t come so straight, But been a ‘crooked billet.’

“And then there came a cuirassier And cut me on the chest;-- He had no pity in his heart, For he had _steel’d his breast_.

“Next thing a lancer, with his lance, Began to thrust away; I call’d for quarter, but, alas! It was not Quarter-day.

“He ran his spear right through my arm, Just here above the joint:-- O Patty dear, it was no joke, Although it had a point.

“With loss of blood I fainted off, As dead as women do-- But soon by charging over me, The _Coldstream_ brought me to.

With kicks and cuts, and batts and blows, I throb and ache all over; I’m quite convinc’d the field of Mars Is not a field of clover!

“O why did I a soldier turn For any royal Guelph? I might have been a butcher, and In business for myself!

“O why did I the bounty take (And here he gasp’d for breath) My shillingsworth of ‘list is nail’d Upon the door of death!

“Without a coffin I shall lie And sleep my sleep eternal: Not ev’n a _shell_--my only chance Of being made a _Kernel_!

“O Patty dear, our wedding bells Will never ring at Chester! Here I must lie in Honour’s bed, That isn’t worth a _tester_!

“Farewell, my regimental mates, With whom I used to dress! My corps is changed, and I am now In quite another mess.

“Farewell, my Patty dear, I have No dying consolations, Except, when I am dead, you’ll go And see th’ Illuminations.”

COCKLE _v._ CACKLE.

Those who much read advertisements and bills Must have seen puffs of Cockle’s Pills, Call’d Anti-bilious-- Which some Physicians sneer at, supercilious, But which we are assured, if timely taken, May save your liver and bacon; Whether or not they really give one ease, I, who have never tried, Will not decide; But no two things in union go like these-- Viz.--Quacks and Pills--save Ducks and Pease. Now Mrs. W. was getting sallow, Her lilies not of the white kind, but yellow, And friends portended was preparing for A human Pâté Périgord; She was, indeed, so very far from well, Her Son, in filial fear, procured a box Of those said pellets to resist Bile’s shocks, And--tho’ upon the ear it strangely knocks-- To save her by a Cockle from a shell! But Mrs. W., just like Macbeth, Who very vehemently bids us “throw Bark to the Bow-wows,” hated physic so, It seem’d to share “the bitterness of Death:” Rhubarb--Magnesia--Jalap, and the kind-- Senna--Steel--Assa-fœtida, and Squills-- Powder or Draught--but least her throat inclined To give a course to Boluses or Pills; No--not to save her life, in lung or lobe, For all her lights’ or all her liver’s sake, Would her convulsive thorax undertake, Only one little uncelestial globe! ’Tis not to wonder at, in such a case, If she put by the pill-box in a place For linen rather than for drugs intended-- Yet for the credit of the pills let’s say After they thus were stow’d away, Some of the linen mended; But Mrs. W. by disease’s dint. Kept getting still more yellow in her tint, When lo! her second son, like elder brother, Marking the hue on the parental gills, Brought a new charge of Anti-tumeric Pills, To bleach the jaundiced visage of his Mother-- Who took them--in her cupboard--like the other.

“Deeper and deeper, still,” of course, The fatal colour daily grew in force; Till daughter W. newly come from Rome,

## Acting the self-same filial, pillial, part,

To cure Mamma, another dose brought home Of Cockle’s;--not the Cockles of her heart! These going where the others went before, Of course she had a very pretty store; And then--some hue of health her cheek adorning, The Medicine so good must be, They brought her dose on dose, when she Gave to the up-stairs cupboard, “night and morning.” Till wanting room at last, for other stocks, Out of the window one fine day she pitch’d The pillage of each box, and quite enrich’d The feed of Mister Burrell’s hens and cocks,-- A little Barber of a by-gone day, Over the way, Whose stock in trade, to keep the least of shops, Was one great head of Kemble,--that is, John, Staring in plaster, with a _Brutus_ on, And twenty little Bantam fowls--with _crops_. Little Dame W. thought when through the sash She gave the physic wings, To find the very things So good for bile, so bad for chicken rash, For thoughtless cock, and unreflecting pullet! But while they gather’d up the nauseous nubbles, Each peck’d itself into a peck of troubles, And brought the hand of Death upon its gullet. They might as well have addled been, or ratted, For long before the night--ah woe betide The Pills! each suicidal Bantam died Unfatted!

Think of poor Burrell’s shock, Of Nature’s debt to see his hens all payers, And laid in death as Everlasting Layers, With Bantam’s small Ex-Emperor, the Cock, In ruffled plumage and funereal hackle, Giving, undone by Cockle, a last Cackle! To see as stiff as stone, his un’live stock, It really was enough to move his block. Down on the floor he dash’d, with horror big, Mr. Beh’s third wife’s mother’s coachman’s wig; And with a tragic stare like his own Kemble, Burst out with natural emphasis enough, And voice that grief made tremble, Into that very speech of sad Macduff-- “What!--all my pretty chickens and their dam, At one fell swoop!-- Just when I’d bought a coop To see the poor lamented creatures cram!

After a little of this mood, And brooding over the departed brood, With razor he began to ope each craw, Already turning black, as black as coals; When lo! the undigested cause he saw-- “Pison’d by goles!”

To Mrs. W.’s luck a contradiction, Her window still stood open to conviction; And by short course of circumstantial labour, He fixed the guilt upon his adverse neighbour;-- Lord! how he rail’d at her: declaring now, He’d bring an action ere next Term of Hilary, Then, in another moment, swore a vow, He’d make her do pill-penance in the pillory! She, meanwhile distant from the dimmest dream Of combating with guilt, yard-arm or arm-yard, Lapp’d in a paradise of tea and cream; When up ran Betty with a dismal scream-- “Here’s Mr. Burrell, ma’am, with all his farm-yard!” Straight in he came, unbowing and unbending, With all the warmth that iron and a barber Can harbour; To dress the head and front of her offending, The fuming phial of his wrath uncorking; In short, he made her pay him altogether, In hard cash, very _hard_, for ev’ry feather, Charging of course, each Bantam as a Dorking; Nothing could move him, nothing made him supple, So the sad dame unpocketing her loss, Had nothing left but to sit hands across, And see her poultry “going down ten couple.”

Now birds by poison slain, As venom’d dart from Indian’s hollow cane, Are edible; and Mrs. W.’s thrift,-- She had a thrifty vein-- Destined one pair for supper to make shift,-- Supper as usual at the hour of ten: But ten o’clock arrived and quickly pass’d, Eleven--twelve--and one o’clock at last, Without a sign of supper even then! At length the speed of cookery to quicken, Betty was call’d, and with reluctant feet, Came up at a white heat-- “Well, never I see chicken like them chickens! My saucepans, they have been a pretty while in ’em! Enough to stew them, if it comes to that, To flesh and bones, and perfect rags; but drat Those Anti-biling Pills! there is no bile in ’em!”

PLAYING AT SOLDIERS.

“WHO’LL SERVE THE KING?”

AN ILLUSTRATION.

What little urchin is there never Hath had that early scarlet fever, Of martial trappings caught? Trappings well call’d--because they trap And catch full many a country chap To go where fields are fought!

What little urchin with a rag Hath never made a little flag, (Our plate will show the manner,) And wooed each tiny neighbour still, Tommy or Harry, Dick or Will, To come beneath the banner!

Just like that ancient shape of mist, In Hamlet, crying, “‘List, O ‘list!” Come, who will serve the king, And strike frog-eating Frenchmen dead, And cut off Boneyparty’s head?-- And all that sort of thing.

So used I, when I was a boy, To march with military toy, And ape the soldier’s life;-- And with a whistle or a hum, I thought myself a Duke of Drum At least, or Earl of Fife.

With gun of tin and sword of lath, Lord! how I walk’d in glory’s path With regimental mates, By sound of trump and rub-a-dubs-- To ‘siege the washhouse--charge the tubs-- Or storm the garden gates.

Ah me! my retrospective soul! As over memory’s muster-roll I cast my eyes anew, My former comrades all the while Rise up before me, rank and file, And form in dim review.

Ay, there they stand, and dress in line, Lubbock, and Fenn, and David Vine, And dark “Jamaeky Forde!” And limping Wood, and “Cockey Hawes,” Our captain always made, because He had a _real_ sword!

Long Lawrence, Natty Smart, and Soame, Who said he had a gun at home, But that was all a brag; Ned Ryder, too, that used to sham A prancing horse, and big Sam Lamb That _would_ hold up the flag!

Tom Anderson, and “Dunny White,” Who never right-abouted right, For he was deaf and dumb; Jack Pike, Jem Crack, and Sandy Gray, And Dickey Bird, that wouldn’t play Unless he had the drum.

And Peter Holt, and Charley Jepp, A chap that never kept the step-- No more did “Surly Hugh;” Bob Harrington, and “Fighting Jim”-- We often had to halt for him, To let him tie his shoe.

“Quarrelsome Scott,” and Martin Dick, That kill’d the bantam cock, to stick The plumes within his hat; Bill Hook, and little Tommy Grout That got so thump’d for calling out “Eyes right!” to “Squinting Matt.”

Dan Simpson, that, with Peter Dodd, Was always in the awkward squad, And those two greedy Blakes, That took our money to the fair To buy the corps a trumpet there, And laid it out in cakes.

Where are they now?--an open war With open mouth declaring for?-- Or fall’n in bloody fray? Compell’d to tell the truth I am, Their fights all ended with the sham,-- Their soldiership in play.

Brave Soame sends cheeses out in trucks, And Martin sells the cock he plucks, And Jepp now deals in wine; Harrington bears a lawyer’s bag, And warlike Lamb retains his flag, But on a tavern sign.

They tell me Cocky Hawes’s sword Is seen upon a broker’s board: And as for “Fighting Jim,” In Bishopgate, last Whitsuntide, His unresisting cheek I spied Beneath a quaker brim!

Quarrelsome Scott is in the church, For Ryder now your eye must search The marts of silk and lace-- Bird’s drums are filled with figs, and mute, And I--I’ve got a substitute To Soldier in my place!

“NAPOLEON’S MIDNIGHT REVIEW.”

A NEW VERSION.

In his bed, bolt upright, In the dead of the night, The French Emperor starts like a ghost!

[Illustration: FANCY PORTRAIT: THE DUKE OF WELL---- AND PRINCE OF WATER--.]

[Illustration: WETHER WISE.]

By a dream held in charm, He uplifts his right arm, For he dreams of reviewing his host.

To the stable he glides, For the charger he rides; And he mounts him, still under the spell; Then, with echoing tramp, They proceed through the camp, All intent on a task he loves well.

Such a sight soon alarms, And the guards present arms, As he glides to the posts that they keep; Then he gives the brief word, And the bugle is heard, Like a hound giving tongue in its sleep.

Next the drums they arouse, But with dull row-de-dows, And they give but a somnolent sound; Whilst the foot and horse, both, Very slowly and loth, Begin drowsily mustering round.

To the right and left hand, They fall in, by command, In a line that might better be dress’d; Whilst the steeds blink and nod, And the lancers think odd To be rous’d like the spears from their rest.

With their mouths of wide shape, Mortars seem all agape, Heavy guns look more heavy with sleep; And, whatever their bore, Seem to think it one more In the night such a field day to keep.

Then the arms, christened small Fire no volley at all, But go off, like the rest, in a doze; And the eagles, poor things, Tuck their heads ‘neath their wings, And the band ends in tunes through the nose.

Till each pupil of Mars Takes a wink like the stars-- Open order no eye can obey! If the plumes in their heads Were the feathers of beds, Never top could be sounder than they!

So, just wishing good night, Bows Napoleon, polite; But instead of a loyal endeavour To reply with a cheer; Not a sound met his ear, Though each face seem’d to say, “_Nap_ for ever!”

ODE TO DR. KITCHENER.

Ye Muses nine inspire And stir up my poetic fire; Teach my burning soul to speak With a bubble and a squeak! Of Dr. Kitchener I fain would sing, Till pots, and pans, and mighty kettles ring.

O culinary sage! (I do not mean the herb in use, That always goes along with goose) How have I feasted on thy page: “When like a lobster boil’d the morn From black to red began to turn,” Till midnight, when I went to bed, And clapt my tewah-diddle on my head.

Who is there cannot tell, Thou leadest a life of living well? “What baron, or squire, or knight of the shire Lives half so well as a holy Fry--er?” In doing well thou must be reckon’d The first,--and Mrs. Fry the second; And twice a Job,--for, in thy fev’rish toils, Thou wast all over roasts--as well as boils.

Thou wast indeed no dunce, To treat thy subjects and thyself at once: Many a hungry poet eats His brains like thee, But few there be Could live so long on their receipts. What living soul or sinner Would slight thy invitation to a dinner, Ought with the Danaides to dwell, Draw gravy in a cullender, and hear For ever in his ear The pleasant tinkling of thy dinner bell.

Immortal Kitchener! thy fame Shall keep itself when Time makes game Of other men’s--yea, it shall keep, all weathers, And thou shalt be upheld by thy pen feathers. Yea, by the sauce of Michael Kelly! Thy name shall perish never, But be magnified for ever-- --By all whose eyes are bigger than their belly. Yea, till the world is done-- --To a turn--and Time puts out the sun, Shall live the endless echo of thy name. But, as for thy more fleshy frame, Ah! Death’s carnivorous teeth will tittle Thee out of breath, and eat it for cold victual; But still thy fame shall be among the nations Preserved to the last course of generations.

Ah me, my soul is touch’d with sorrow! To think how flesh must pass away-- So mutton, that is warm to-day, Is cold, and turn’d to hashes, on the morrow! Farewell! I would say more, but I Have other fish to fry.

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. R.; The jilt! but I can live, So I have my cigar.

AN ANCIENT CONCERT.

BY A VENERABLE DIRECTOR.

“Give me _old_ music--let me hear The songs of _days_ gone by!”--H. F. CHORLEY.

Oh! come, all ye who love to hear An ancient song in ancient taste, To whom all by-gone Music’s dear As verdant spots in Memory’s waste! Its name “The Ancient Concert” wrongs, And has not hit the proper clef, To wit, Old Folks, to sing Old Songs, To Old Subscribers rather deaf.

Away, then, Hawes! with all your band; Ye beardless boys, this room desert! One youthful voice, or youthful hand, Our concert-pitch would disconcert! No bird must join our “vocal throng,” The present age beheld at font: Away, then, all ye “Sons of Song,” Your Fathers are the men we want!

Away, Miss Birch, you’re in your prime! Miss Romer, seek some other door! Go, Mrs. Shaw! till, counting time, You count you’re nearly fifty-four! Go, Miss Novello, sadly young! Go, thou composing Chevalier, And roam the county towns among, No Newcome will be welcome here!

Our Concert aims to give at _night_ The music that has had its _day_! So, Rooke, for us you cannot write Till time has made you Raven gray. Your score may charm a modern ear, Nay, ours, when three or fourscore old, But in this Ancient atmosphere, Fresh airs like yours would give us cold!

Go, Hawes, and Cawse, and Woodyat, go! Hence, Shirreff, with those native curls; And Master Coward ought to know This is no place for boys and girls! No Massons here we wish to see; Nor is it Mrs. Seguin’s sphere, And Mrs. B----! Oh! Mrs. B----, Such Bishops are not reverend here!

What! Grisi, bright and beaming thus! To sing the songs gone gray with age! No, Grisi, no,--but come to us And welcome, when you leave the stage! Off, Ivanhoff!--till weak and harsh!-- Rubini, hence! with all the clan! But come, Lablache, years hence, Lablache, A little shrivell’d thin old man.

Go, Mr. Phillips, where you please! Away, Tom Cooke, and all your batch; You’d run us out of breath with Glees, And Catches that we could not catch. Away, ye Leaders all, who lead With violins, quite modern things; To guide our Ancient band we need Old fiddles out of leading strings!

But come, ye Songsters, over ripe, That into “childish trebles break!” And bring, Miss Winter, bring the pipe That cannot sing without a shake! Nay, come, ye Spinsters all, that spin A slender thread of ancient voice, Old notes that almost seem call’d in; At such as you we _shall_ rejoice!

No thund’ring Thalbergs here shall balk, Or ride your pet _D-cadence_ o’er, But fingers with a little chalk Shall, moderato, keep the score! No Broadwoods here, so full of tone, But Harpsichords assist the strain: No Lincoln’s pipes, we have our own Bird-Organ, built by Tubal-Cain.

And welcome! St. Cecilians, now Ye willy-nilly, ex-good fellows, Who will strike up, no matter how, With organs that survive their bellows! And bring, oh bring, your ancient styles In which our elders lov’d to roam, Those flourishes that strayed for miles, Till some good fiddle led them home! Oh come, ye ancient London Cries, When Christmas Carols erst were sung! Come, Nurse, who dron’d the lullabies, “When Music, heavenly Maid, was young!” No matter how the critics treat, What modern sins and faults detect, The Copy-Book shall still repeat, These Concerts must “Command respect!”

A REPORT FROM BELOW.

“Blow high, blow low.”--SEA SONG.

As Mister B. and Mistress B. One night were sitting down to tea, With toast and muffins hot-- They heard a loud and sudden bounce, That made the very china flounce, They could not for a time pronounce If they were safe or shot-- For Memory brought a deed to match, At Deptford done by night-- Before one eye appeared a Patch, In t’other eye a Blight!

To be belabour’d out of life, Without some small attempt at strife, Our nature will not grovel; One impulse mov’d both man and dame, He seized the tongs--she did the same, Leaving the ruffian, if he came, The poker and the shovel. Suppose the couple standing so, When rushing footsteps from below Made pulses fast and fervent; And first burst in the frantic cat, All steaming like a brewer’s vat, And then--as white as my cravat-- Poor Mary May, the servant!

Lord, how the couple’s teeth did chatter; Master and Mistress both flew at her,

“Speak! Fire? or Murder? What’s the matter?” Till Mary, getting breath, Upon her tale began to touch With rapid tongue, full trotting, such As if she thought she had too much To tell before her death:--

“We was both, Ma’am, in the wash-house, Ma’am, a-standing at our tubs, And Mrs. Round was seconding what little things I rubs; ‘Mary,’ says she to me, ‘I say’--and there she stops for coughin’, ‘That dratted copper flue has took to smokin’ very often, But please the pigs,’--for that’s her way of swearing in a passion, ‘I’ll blow it up, and not be set a-coughin’ in this fashion!’ Well, down she takes my master’s horn--I mean his horn for loading, And empties every grain alive for to set the flue exploding. Lawk, Mrs. Round! says I, and stares, that quantum is unproper. I’m sartin sure it can’t not take a pound to sky a copper; You’ll powder both our heads off, so I tells you, with its puff, But she only dried her fingers, and she takes a pinch of snuff. Well, when the pinch is over--‘Teach your grandmother to suck A powder horn,’ says she--Well, says I, I wish you luck. Them words sets up her back, so with her hands upon her hips, ‘Come,’ says she, quite in a huff, ‘come, keep your tongue inside your lips; Afore ever you was born, I was well used to things like these I shall put it in the grate, and let it burn up by degrees. So in it goes, and Bounce--O Lord! it gives us such a rattle, I thought we both were canonised, like Sogers in a battle! Up goes the copper like a squib, and us on both our backs, And bless the tubs, they bundled off, and split all into cracks. Well, there I fainted dead away, and might have been cut shorter, But Providence was kind, and brought me to with scalding water. I first looks round for Mrs. Round, and sees her at a distance, As stiff as starch, and looked as dead as any thing in existence; All scorched and grimed, and more than that, I sees the copper slap Right on her head, for all the world like a percussion copper cap. Well, I crooks her little fingers, and crumps them well up together, As humanity pints out, and burnt her nostrums with a feather; But for all as I can do, to restore her to her mortality, She never gives a sign of a return to sensuality, Thinks I, well there she lies, as dead as my own late departed mother. Well, she’ll wash no more in this world, whatever she does in t’other. So I gives myself to scramble up the linens for a minute, Lawk, sich a shirt! thinks I, it’s well my master wasn’t in it; Oh! I never, never, never, never, never see a sight so shockin’; Here lays a leg, and there a leg--I mean, you know, a stocking-- Bodies all slit and torn to rags, and many a tattered skirt, And arms burnt off, and sides and backs all scotched and black with dirt; But as nobody was in ’em--none but--nobody was hurt! Well, there I am, a-scrambling up the things, all in a lump, When, mercy on us! such a groan as makes my heart to jump. And there she is, a-lying with a crazy sort of eye, A-staring at the wash-house roof, laid open to the sky: Then she beckons with her finger, and so down to her I reaches, And puts my ear agin her mouth to hear her dying speeches, For, poor soul! she has a husband and young orphans, as I knew; Well, Ma’am, you won’t believe it, but it’s Gospel fact and true, But these words is all she whispered--‘Why, where _is_ the powder blew!’”

THE LAST WISH.

When I resign this world so briary, To have across the Styx my ferrying, Oh, may I die without a DIARY! And be interr’d without a Bury-ing!

* * * * *

The poor dear dead have been laid out in vain, Turn’d into cash, they are laid out again!

THE DEVIL’S ALBUM.

It will seem an odd whim For a spirit so grim As the Devil to take a delight in; But by common renown He has come up to town, With an Album for people to write in!

On a handsomer book Mortal never did look; Of a flame-colour silk is the binding! With a border superb, Where through flow’ret and herb, The old serpent goes brilliantly winding!

By gilded grotesques, And emboss’d arabesques, The whole cover, in fact, is pervaded; But, alas! in a taste That betrays they were traced At the will of a Spirit degraded!

As for paper--the best, But extremely hot-pressed, Courts the pen to luxuriate upon it, And against ev’ry blank There’s a note on the Bank, As a bribe for a sketch or a sonnet.

Who will care to appear In the Fiend’s Souvenir, Is a question to mortals most vital; But the very first leaf, It’s the public belief, Will be filled by a Lady of Title!

A VALENTINE.

THE WEATHER. TO P. MURPHY, ESQ., M.N.S.

These, properly speaking, being esteemed the three arms of Meteoric

## action.

Dear Murphy, to improve her charms, Your servant humbly begs; She thanks you for her leash of arms, But wants a brace of legs.

Moreover, as you promise folks On certain days a drizzle; She thinks, in case she cannot rain, She should have means to _mizzle_.

Some lightning too may just fall due, When woods begin to moult; And if she cannot “fork it out,” She’ll wish to make a _bolt_!

CONVEYANCING.

Oh, London is the place for all In love with loco-motion! Still to and fro the people go Like billows of the ocean; Machine or man, or caravan, Can all be had for paying, When great estates, or heavy weights, Or bodies want conveying.

There’s always hacks about in packs, Wherein you may be shaken, And Jarvis is not always _drunk_, Tho’ always _overtaken_; In racing tricks he’ll never mix, His nags are in their last days, And _slow_ to go, altho’ they show As if they had their _fast days_!

Then if you like a single horse, This age is quite a _cab-age_, A car not quite so small and light As those of our Queen _Mab_ age; The horses have been _broken well_, All danger is rescinded, For some have _broken both their knees_, And some are _broken winded_.

If you’ve a friend at Chelsea end, The stages are worth knowing-- There is a sort, we call ’em short, Although the longest going-- For some will stop at Hatchett’s shop Till you grow faint and sicky, Perched up behind, at last to find Your dinner is all _dickey_!

Long stages run from every yard; But if you’re wise and frugal, You’ll never go with any Guard That plays upon the bugle, “Ye banks and braes,” and other lays, And ditties everlasting, Like miners going all your way, With _boring_ and with _blasting_.

Instead of _journeys_, people now May go upon a _Gurney_, With steam to do the horses’ work, By _powers of attorney_; Tho’ with a load it may explode, And you may all be _un_-done! And find you’re going _up to Heav’n_ Instead of _up to London_!

To speak of every kind of coach, It is not my intention; But there is still one vehicle Deserves a little mention; The world a sage has call’d a stage, With all its living lumber, And Malthus swears it always bears Above the proper number.

The law will transfer house or land For ever and a day hence, For lighter things, watch, brooches, rings, You’ll never want conveyance: Ho! stop the thief! my handkerchief! It is no sight for laughter-- Away it goes, and leaves my nose To join in running after.

THE ANGLER’S FAREWELL.

“Resign’d, I kissed the rod.”

Well! I think it is time to put up! For it does not accord with my notions, Wrist, elbow, and chine, Stiff from throwing the line, To take nothing at last by my motions!

I ground-bait my way as I go, And dip in at each watery dimple; But however I wish To inveigle the fish, To my _gentle_ they will not play _simple_!

Though my float goes so swimmingly on, My bad luck never seems to diminish; It would seem that the Bream Must be scarce in the stream, And the _Chub_, tho’ it’s chubby, be _thinnish_!

Not a Trout there can be in the place, Not a Grayling or Rud worth the mention, And although at my hook With _attention_ I look, I can ne’er see my hook with _a Tench on_!

At a brandling once Gudgeon would gape, But they seem upon different terms now; Have they taken advice Of the “_Council of Nice_,” And rejected their “_Diet of Worms_,” now?

In vain my live minnow I spin, Not a Pike seems to think it worth snatching; For the gut I have brought, I had better have bought A good _rope_ that was used to _Jack-ketching_!

Not a nibble has ruffled my cork, It is vain in this river to search then; I may wait till it’s night, Without any bite, And at _roost-time_ have never a _Perch_ then.

No Roach can I meet with--no Bleak, Save what in the air is so sharp now; Not a Dace have I got, And I fear it is not “Carpe diem,” a day for the Carp now!

Oh! there is not a one pound prize To be got in this fresh-water lottery! What then can I deem Of so fishless a stream But that ’tis--like St. Mary’s--_Ottery_!

For an Eel I have learned how to try, By a method of Walton’s own showing,-- But a fisherman feels Little prospect of Eels, In a path that’s devoted to towing!

I have tried all the water for miles, Till I’m weary of dipping and casting! And hungry and faint,-- Let the Fancy just paint What it is _without Fish_, to be _Fasting_!

And the rain drizzles down very fast, While my dinner-time sounds from a far bell,-- So, wet to the skin, I’ll e’en back to my Inn, Where at least I am sure of a _Bar-bell_!

A BLOW UP.

“Here we go up, up, up.”--THE LAY OF THE FIRST MINSTREL.

Near Battle, Mr. Peter Baker Was Powder-maker, Not Alderman Flower’s flour,--the white that puffs And primes and loads heads bald, or gray, or chowder, Figgins and Higgins, Fippins, Filby,--Crowder, Not vile apothecary’s pounded stuffs, But something blacker, bloodier, and louder, Gun-powder! This stuff, as people know, is _semper_ _Eadem_; very hasty in its temper-- Like Honour that resents the gentlest taps, Mere semblances of blows, however slight; So powder fires, although you only p’rhaps Strike light. To make it therefore, is a ticklish business, And sometimes gives both head and heart a dizziness, For as all human flash and fancy minders, Frequenting fights and Powder-works well know, There seldom is a mill without a blow Sometimes upon the grinders. But then--the melancholy phrase to soften, Mr. B.’s mill _transpir’d_ so very often! And advertised--than all Price Currents louder, “Fragments look up--there is a rise in Powder,” So frequently, it caused the neighbours’ wonder,-- And certain people had the inhumanity To lay it all to Mr. Baker’s vanity, That he might have to say--“That was _my_ thunder!” One day--so goes the tale, Whether, with iron hoof, Not sparkle-proof Some ninny-hammer struck upon a nail,-- Whether some glow-worm of the Guy Faux stamp, Crept in the building, with Unsafety Lamp-- One day this mill that had by water ground, Became a sort of windmill and blew round. With bounce that went in sound as far as Dover, it Sent half the workmen sprawling to the sky; Besides some visitors who gained thereby, What they had asked--permission “to go over it!” Of course it was a very hard and high blow, And somewhat differed from what’s called a flyblow. At Cowes’ Regatta as I once observed, A pistol-shot made twenty vessels start; If such a sound could terrify oak’s heart, Think how this crash the human nerve unnerved. In fact, it was a very awful thing,-- As people know that have been used to battle, In springing either mine or mill, you spring A precious rattle! The dunniest heard it--poor old Mr. F. Doubted for once if he was ever deaf; Through Tunbridge town it caused most strange alarms; Mr. and Mrs. Fogg, Who lived like cat and dog, Were shocked for once into each other’s arms. Miss M. the milliner--her fright so strong, Made a great gobble-stitch six inches long; The veriest quakers quaked against their wish; The “Best of Sons” was taken unawares, And kick’d the “Best of Parents” down the stairs; The steadiest servant dropped the China dish; A thousand started, though there was but one Fated to win, and that was Mister Dunn, Who struck convulsively, and hooked a fish!

Miss Wigings, with some grass upon her fork, Toss’d it just like a hay-maker at work; Her sister not in any better case, For taking wine, With nervous Mr. Pyne, He jerked his glass of Sherry in her face. Poor Mistress Davy, Bobb’d off her bran-new turban in the gravy; While Mr. Davy at the lower end, Preparing for a Goose a carver’s labour, Darted his two-pronged weapon in his neighbour, As if for once he meant to help a friend.

The nurse-maid telling little “Jack-a-Norey,” “Bo-peep” and “Blue-cap” at the house’s top, Scream’d, and let Master Jeremiah drop From a fourth story! Nor yet did matters any better go With Cook and Housemaid in the realms below; As for the Laundress, timid Martha Gunning, Expressing faintness and her fear by fits And starts,--she came at last but to her wits, By falling in the ale that John left running.

Grave Mr. Miles, the meekest of mankind, Struck all at once deaf, stupid, dumb, and blind, Sat in his chaise some moments like a corse, Then coming to his mind, Was shocked to find, Only a pair of shafts without a horse. Out scrambled all the Misses from Miss Joy’s! From Prospect House, for urchins small and big, Hearing the awful noise, Out rushed a flood of boys, Floating a man in black, without a wig;-- Some carried out one treasure, some another,-- Some caught their tops and taws up in a hurry, Some saved Chambaud, some rescued Lindley Murray, But little Tiddy carried his big brother!

Sick of such terrors, 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.

’Tis known to man, ’tis known to woman, ’Tis known to all the world in common, How politics and party strife Vex public, even private, life; But, till some days ago, at least They never worried brutal beast.

I wish you could have seen the creature, A tame domestic boar by nature, Gone wild as boar that ever grunted, By Baron Hoggerhausen hunted. His back was up, and on its ledge The bristles rose like quickset hedge; His eye was fierce and red as coal, Like furnace, shining through a hole, And restless turn’d for mischief seeking; His very hide with rage was reeking; And oft he gnash’d his crooked tusks, Chewing his tongue instead of husks, Till all his jaw was white and yesty, Showing him savage, fierce, and resty.

And what had caused this mighty vapour? A dirty fragment of a paper, That in his rambles he had found, Lying neglected on the ground; A relic of the Morning Post, Two tattered columns at the most, But which our irritated swine (Derived from Learned Toby’s line) Digested easy as his meals, Like any quidnunc Cit at Peel’s.

He read, and mused, and pored and read, His shoulders shrugg’d, and shook his head; Now at a line he gave a grunt, Now at a phrase took sudden stunt, And snorting turn’d his back upon it, But always came again to con it; In short he petted up his passion, After a very human fashion, When Temper’s worried with a bone She’ll neither like nor let alone. At last his fury reach’d the pitch Of that most irritating itch, When mind and will, in fever’d faction, Prompt blood and body into action; No matter what, so bone and muscle May vent the frenzy in a bustle; But whether by a fight or dance Is left to impulse and to chance. So stood the Boar, in furious mood Made up for any thing but good; He gave his tail a tighter twist, As men in anger clench the fist, And threw fresh sparkles in his eye From the volcano in his fry-- Ready to raze the parish pound, To pull the pigsty to the ground, To lay Squire Giles, his master, level, Ready, indeed, to play the devil.

So, stirr’d by raving demagogues, I’ve seen men rush, like rabid dogs, Stark staring from the Pig and Whistle, And like his Boarship, in a bristle, Resolved unanimous on rumpus From any quarter of the compass; But whether to duck Aldgate Pump, (For wits in madness never jump) To liberate the beasts from Cross’s; Or hiss at all the Wigs in Ross’s; On Waithman’s column hang a weeper; Or tar and feather the old sweeper; Or break the panes of landlord scurvy, And turn the King’s Head topsy-turvy; Rebuild, or pull down, London Wall; Or take his cross from old Saint Paul; Or burn those wooden Highland fellows, The snuff-men’s idols, ‘neath the gallows! None fix’d or cared--but all were loyal To one design--a battle royal.

Thus stood the Boar, athirst for blood, Trampling the Morning Post to mud, With tusks prepared to run a muck;-- And sorrow for the mortal’s luck That came across him Whig or Tory, It would have been a tragic story-- But fortune interposing now, Brought Bessy into play--a Sow;-- A fat, sleek, philosophic beast That never fretted in the least, Whether her grains were sour or sweet, For grains are grains, and she could eat. Absorb’d in two great schemes capacious, The farrow and the farinaceous, If cares she had, they could not stay, She drank, and _wash’d_ them all away. In fact this philosophic sow Was very like a German frow; In brief--as wit should be and fun,-- If sows turn Quakers, she was one; Clad from the duckpond, thick and slab, In bran-new muddy suit of drab. To still the storm of such a lubber, She came like oil--at least like blubber-- Her pigtail of as passive shape As ever droop’d o’er powder’d nape; Her snout, scarce turning up--her deep Small eyes half settled into sleep; Her ample ears, dependent, meek, Like fig-leaves shading either cheek; Whilst, from the corner of her jaw, A sprout of cabbage, green and raw, Protruded,--as the Dove, so stanch For Peace, supports an olive branch,-- Her very grunt, so low and mild, Like the soft snoring of a child, Inquiring into his disquiets, Served like the Riot Act, at riots,-- He laid his restive bristles flatter, And took to arguefy the matter.

“O Bess, O Bess, here’s heavy news! They mean to ‘mancipate the Jews! Just as they turn’d the blacks to whites, They want to give them equal rights, And, in the twinkling of a steeple, Make Hebrews quite like other people. Here, read--but I forget your fetters, You’ve studied litters more than letters.”

“Well,” quoth the Sow, “and no great miss, I’m sure my ignorance is bliss; Contentedly I bite and sup, And never let my flare flare-up; Whilst you get wild and fuming hot-- What matters Jews be Jews or not? Whether they go with beards like Moses, Or barbers take them by the noses, Whether they live, permitted dwellers, In Cheapside shops, or Rag Fair cellars, Or climb their way to civic perches, Or go to synagogues or churches?” “Churches!--ay, there the question grapples, No, Bess, the Jews will go to Chappell’s!”

“To chapel--well--what’s that to you? A Berkshire Boar, and not a Jew? We pigs,--remember the remark Of our old drover Samuel Slark, When trying, but he tried in vain, To coax me into Sermon Lane, Or Paternoster’s pious Row,-- But still I stood and grunted No! Of Lane of Creed an equal scorner, Till bolting off, at Amen Corner, He cried, provoked at my evasion, ‘Pigs, blow ’em! ar’n’t of no persuasion!’”

“The more’s the pity, Bess--the more--” Said, with sardonic grin, the Boar; “If Pigs were Methodists and Bunyans, They’d make a sin of sage and onions; The curse of endless flames endorse On every boat of apple-sauce; Give brine to Satan, and assess Blackpuddings with bloodguiltiness; Yea, call down heavenly fire and smoke To burn all Epping into coke!”

“Ay,” cried the Sow, extremely placid, In utter contrast to his acid, “Ay, that would be a Sect indeed! And every swine would like the creed, The sausage-making curse and all; And should some brother have a call, To thump a cushion to that measure, I would sit under him with pleasure; Nay, put down half my private fortune T’ endow a chapel at Hog’s Norton.-- But what has this to do, my deary, With their new Hebrew whigmaleery?”

“Sow that you are! this Bill, if current, Would be as good as our death-warrant;-- And, with its legislative friskings, Loose twelve new tribes upon our griskins! Unjew the Jews, what follows then? Why, they’ll eat pork like other men, And you shall see a Rabbi dish up A chine as freely as a Bishop! Thousands of years have pass’d, and pork Was never stuck on Hebrew fork; But now, suppose that relish rare Fresh added to their bill of fare, Fry, harslet, pettitoes, and chine, Leg, choppers, bacon, ham, and loin, And then, beyond all goose or duckling”--

“Yes, yes--a little tender suckling! It must be held the aptest savour To make the eager mouth to slaver! Merely to look on such a gruntling, A plump, white, sleek and sappy runtling, It makes one--ah! remembrance bitter! It made me eat my own dear litter!”

“Think, then, with this new waken’d fury, How we should fare if tried by _Jewry_! A pest upon the meddling Whigs! There’ll be a pretty run on pigs! This very morn a Hebrew brother With three hats stuck on one another, And o’er his arm a bag, or poke, A thing pigs never find a joke, Stopp’d--rip the fellow!--though he knew I’ve neither coat to sell nor shoe, And cock’d his nose--right at me, lovey! Just like a pointer at a covey!

To set our only friends agin us! That neither care to fat nor thin us! To boil, to broil, to roast, or fry us, But act like real Christians by us!-- A murrain on all legislators! Thin wash, sour grains, and rotten ’taters! A bulldog at their ears and tails! The curse of empty troughs and pails Famish their flanks as thin as weasels! May all their children have the measles; Or in the straw untimely smother, Or make a dinner for the mother! A cartwhip for all law inventors! And rubbing-posts stuck full of tenters! Yokes, rusty rings, and gates, to hitch in And parish pounds to pine the flitch in, Cold, and high winds, the Devil send ’em-- And then may Sam the Sticker end ’em!”

’Twas strange to hear him how he swore! A Boar will curse, though like a boar, While Bess, like Pity, at his side Her swine-subduing voice supplied! She bade him such a rage discard; That anger is a foe to lard; ’Tis bad for sugar to get wet, And quite as bad for fat to fret; “Besides,”--she argued thus at last-- “The Bill you fume at has not pass’d, For why, the Commons and the Peers Have come together by the ears: Or rather, as we pigs repose, One’s tail beside the other’s nose, And thus, of course, take adverse views Whether of Gentiles or of Jews. Who knows? They say the Lords’ ill-will Has thrown out many a wholesome Bill, And p’rhaps some Peer to Pigs propitious May swamp a measure so _Jew-dish-us_!”

The Boar was conquer’d: at a glance, He saw there really was a chance-- That as the Hebrew nose is hooked, The Bill was equally as crooked; And might outlast, thank party embers, A dozen tribes of Christian members;-- So down he settled in the mud, With smoother back, and cooler blood, As mild, as quiet, a Blue Boar, As any over tavern-door.

MORAL.

The chance is small that any measure Will give all classes equal pleasure; Since Tory Ministers or Whigs, Sometimes can’t even “please the Pigs.”

A FLYING VISIT.

“A Calendar! a Calendar! look in the Almanac, find out moonshine--find out moonshine!”--_Midsummer Night’s Dream._

The by-gone September, As folks may remember, At least if their memory saves but an ember, One fine afternoon, There went up a Balloon, Which did not return to the Earth very soon.

For, nearing the sky, At about a mile high, The Aëronaut bold had resolved on a fly; So cutting his string, In a Parasol thing, Down he came in a field like a lark from the wing.

Meanwhile, thus adrift, The Balloon made a shift To rise very fast, with no burden to lift; It got very small, Then to nothing at all; And then rose the question of where it would fall?

Some thought that, for lack Of the man and his pack, ’Twould rise to the Cherub that watches Poor Jack; Some held, but in vain, With the first heavy rain, ’Twould surely come down to the Gardens again!

But still not a word For a month could be heard Of what had become of the Wonderful Bird: The firm Gye and Hughes, Wore their boots out and shoes, In running about and inquiring for news.

Some thought it must be Tumbled into the Sea; Some thought it had gone off to High Germanie: For Germans, as shown By their writings, ’tis known Are always delighted with what is high-flown.

Some hinted a bilk, And that maidens who milk, In far distant Shires would be walking in silk: Some swore that it must, “As they said at the _fust_, Have gone again’ flashes of lightning and _bust_!”

However, at last, When six weeks had gone past, Intelligence came of a plausible cast; A wondering clown, At a hamlet near town, Had seen “like a moon of green cheese” coming down.

Soon spread the alarm, And from cottage and farm, The natives buzz’d out like the bees when they swarm; And off ran the folk,-- It is such a good joke To see the descent of a bagful of smoke.

And lo! the machine, Dappled yellow and green, Was plainly enough in the clouds to be seen: “Yes, yes,” was the cry, “It’s the old one, sure_ly_, Where _can_ it have been such a time in the sky?

“Lord! where will it fall? It can’t find out Vauxhall, Without any pilot to guide it at all!” Some wager’d that Kent Would behold the event, Debrett had been posed to _predict_ its “descent.”

Some thought it would pitch In the old Tower Ditch, Some swore on the Cross of St. Paul’s it would hitch, And Farmers cried “Zounds! If it drops on our grounds, We’ll try if Balloons can’t be put into pounds!”

But still to and fro It continued to go, As if looking out for soft places below-- No difficult job, It had only to bob Slap-dash down at once on the heads of the mob:

Who, too apt to stare At some castle in air, Forget that the earth is their proper affair; Till, watching the fall Of some soap-bubble ball, They tumble themselves with a terrible sprawl.

Meanwhile, from its height Stooping downward in flight, The Phenomenon came more distinctly in sight: Still bigger and bigger, And strike me a nigger Unfreed, if there was not a live human figure!

Yes, plain to be seen, Underneath the machine, There dangled a mortal--some swore it was Green; Some Mason could spy; Others named Mr. Gye; Or Hollond, compell’d by the Belgians to fly.

’Twas Graham the flighty, Whom the Duke high and mighty, Resign’d to take care of his own lignum-vitæ; ’Twas Hampton, whose whim Was in Cloudland to swim, Till e’en Little Hampton look’d little to him!

But all were at fault; From the heavenly vault The falling balloon came at last to a halt; And bounce! with the jar Of descending so far, An outlandish Creature was thrown from the car!

At first with the jolt All his wits made a bolt, As if he’d been flung by a mettlesome colt; And while in his faint, To avoid all complaint, The Muse shall endeavour his portrait to paint.

The face of this elf, Round as platter of delf, Was pale as if only a cast of itself: His head had a rare Fleece of silvery hair, Just like the Albino at Bartlemy Fair.

His eyes they were odd, Like the eyes of a cod, And gave him the look of a watery God. His nose was a snub; Under which for his grub, Was a round open mouth like to that of a chub.

His person was small, Without figure at all, A plump little body as round as a ball: With two little fins, And a couple of pins, With what has been christen’d a bow in the shins.

His dress it was new, A full suit of sky-blue-- With bright silver buckles in each little shoe-- Thus painted complete, From his head to his feet, Conceive him laid flat in Squire Hopkins’s wheat.

Fine text for the crowd! Who disputed aloud What sort of a creature had dropp’d from the cloud-- “He’s come from o’er seas, He’s a Cochin Chinese-- By jingo! he’s one of the wild Cherookees!”

“Don’t nobody know?” “He’s a young Esquimaux, Turn’d white like the hares by the Arctical snow.” “Some angel, my dear, Sent from some upper _spear_ For Plumtree or Agnew, too good for this-here!”

Meanwhile, with a sigh, Having open’d one eye, The Stranger rose up on his seat by and by; And finding his tongue, Thus he said, or he sung, “_Mi criky bo biggamy kickery bung!_”

“Lord! what does he speak?” “It’s Dog-Latin--it’s Greek!” “It’s some sort of slang for to puzzle a Beak!” “It’s no like the Scotch,” Said a Scot on the watch, “Phoo! it’s nothing at all but a kind of hotch-potch!”

“It’s not parly voo,” Cried a schoolboy or two, “Nor Hebrew at all,” said a wandering Jew. Some held it was sprung From the Irvingite tongue, The same that is used by a child very young.

Some guess’d it high Dutch, Others thought it had much In sound of the true Hoky-poky-ish touch; But none could be poz, What the Dickens (not Boz), No mortal could tell what the Dickens it was!

When who should come pat, In a moment like that, But Bowring, to see what the people were at-- A Doctor well able, Without any fable, To talk and translate all the babble of Babel.

So just drawing near, With a vigilant ear, That took ev’ry syllable in, very clear, Before one could sip Up a tumbler of flip, He knew the whole tongue from the root to the tip!

Then stretching his hand, As you see Daniel stand, In the Feast of Belshazzar, that picture so grand! Without more delay, In the Hamilton way He English’d whatever the Elf had to say.

“_Krak kraziboo ban_, I’m the Lunatic Man, Confined in the Moon since creation began-- _Sit muggy bigog_, Whom, except in a fog, You see with a Lantern, a Bush, and a Dog.

“_Lang sinery lear_, For this many a year, I’ve long’d to drop in at your own little sphere,-- _Och, pad-mad aroon_, Till one fine afternoon, I found that Wind-Coach on the horns of the Moon.

“_Cush quackery go_, But, besides you must know, I’d heard of a profiting Prophet below; _Big botherum blether_, Who pretended to gather The tricks that the Moon meant to play with the weather.

“_So Crismus an crash_, Being shortish of cash, I thought I’d a right to partake of the hash-- _Slik mizzle an smak_, So I’m come with a pack, To sell to the trade, of my own Almanack.

“_Fiz, bobbery pershal_, Besides aims commercial, Much wishing to honour my friend Sir John Herschel, _Cum puddin and tame_, It’s inscribed to his name, Which is now at the full in celestial fame.

“_Wept wepton wish wept_, Pray this Copy accept”-- But here on the Stranger some Kidnappers leapt: For why? a shrewd man Had devis’d a sly plan The Wonder to grab for a show Caravan.

So plotted, so done-- With a fight as in fun, While mock pugilistical rounds were begun, A knave who could box, And give right and left knocks, Caught hold of the Prize by his silvery locks.

And hard he had fared, But the people were scared By what the Interpreter roundly declared: “You ignorant Turks! You will be your own Burkes-- He holds all the keys of the lunary works!

“You’d best let him go-- If you keep him below, The Moon will not change, and the tides will not flow; He left her at full, And with such a long pull, Zounds! ev’ry man Jack will run mad like a bull!”

So awful a threat Took effect on the set; The fright, tho’, was more than their Guest could forget; So taking a jump, In the car he came plump, And threw all the ballast right out in a lump.

Up soar’d the machine, With its yellow and green; But still the pale face of the Creature was seen, Who cried from the car, “_Dam in yooman bi gar!_” That is,--“What a sad set of villains you are!”

Howbeit, at some height, He threw down quite a flight Of Almanacks, wishing to set us all right-- And, thanks to the boon, We shall see very soon If Murphy knows most, or the Man in the Moon!

A ROW AT THE OXFORD ARMS.

“Glorious Apollo, from on high behold us.”--OLD SONG.

As latterly I chanced to pass A Public House, from which, alas! The Arms of Oxford dangle! My ear was startled by a din, That made me tremble in my skin, A dreadful hubbub from within, Of voices in a wrangle--

Voices loud, and voices high, With now and then a party-cry, Such as used in times gone by To scare the British border; When foes from North and South of Tweed-- Neighbours--and of Christian creed-- Met in hate to fight and bleed, Upsetting Social Order.

Surprised, I turn’d me to the crowd, Attracted by that tumult loud, And ask’d a gazer, beetle-brow’d, The cause of such disquiet. When lo! the solemn-looking man, First shook his head on Burleigh’s plan, And then, with fluent tongue, began His version of the riot:

A row!--why yes,--a pretty row, you might hear from this to Garmany, And what is worse, it’s all got up among the Sons of Harmony, The more’s the shame for them as used to be in time and tune, And all unite in chorus like the singing-birds in June! Ah! many a pleasant chant I’ve heard in passing here along, When Swiveller was President a-knocking down a song; But Dick’s resign’d the post, you see, and all them shouts and hollers Is ‘cause two other candidates, some sort of larned scholars, Are squabbling to be Chairman of the Glorious Apollers! Lord knows their names, I’m sure I don’t, no more than any yokel, But I never heard of either as connected with the vocal; Nay, some do say, although of course the public rumour varies, They’ve no more warble in ’em than a pair of hen canaries, Though that might pass if they were dabs at t’other sort of thing, For a man may make a song, you know, although he cannot sing; But lork! it’s many folk’s belief they’re only good at prosing, For Catnach swears he never saw a verse of their composing; And when a piece of poetry has stood its public trials, If pop’lar, it gets printed off at once in Seven Dials, And then about all sorts of streets, by every little monkey, It’s chanted like the “Dog’s Meat Man,” or “If I had a Donkey.” Whereas, as Mr. Catnach says, and not a bad judge neither, No ballad--worth a ha’penny--has ever come from either, And him as writ “Jim Crow,” he says, and got such lots of dollars, Would make a better Chairman for the Glorious Apollers.

Howsomever that’s the meaning of the squabble that arouses, This neighbourhood, and quite disturbs all decent Heads of Houses, Who want to have their dinners and their parties, as is reason In Christian peace and charity according to the season. But from Number Thirty-Nine--since this electioneering job, Ay, as far as Number Ninety, there’s an everlasting mob; Till the thing is quite a nuisance, for no creature passes by, But he gets a card, a pamphlet, or a summut in his eye; And a pretty noise there is!--what with canvassers and spouters, For in course each side is furnish’d with its backers and its touters; And surely among the Clergy to such pitches it is carried, You can hardly find a Parson to get buried or get married; Or supposing any accident that suddenly alarms, If you’re dying for a surgeon, you must fetch him from the “Arms;” While the Schoolmasters and Tooters are neglecting of their scholars, To write about a Chairman for the Glorious Apollers.

Well, that, sir, is the racket; and the more the sin and shame Of them that help to stir it up, and propagate the same; Instead of vocal ditties, and the social flowing cup,-- But they’ll be the House’s ruin, or the shutting of it up, With their riots and their hubbubs, like a garden full of bears, While they’ve damaged many articles and broken lots of squares, And kept their noble Club Room in a perfect dust and smother, By throwing _Morning Heralds_, _Times_, and _Standards_ at each other; Not to name the ugly language Gemmen oughtn’t to repeat, And the names they call each other--for I’ve heard ’em in the street-- Such as Traitors, Guys, and Judases, and Vipers, and what not, For Pasley and his divers ain’t so blowing-up a lot. And then such awful swearing!--for there’s one of them that cusses Enough to shock the cads that hang on opposition ‘busses; For he cusses every member that’s agin him at the poll, As I wouldn’t cuss a donkey, tho’ it hasn’t got a soul; And he cusses all their families, Jack, Harry, Bob or Jim, To the babby in the cradle, if they don’t agree with him. Whereby, altho’ as yet they have not took to use their fives, Or, according as the fashion is, to sticking with their knives, I’m bound there’ll be some milling yet, and shakings by the collars, Afore they choose a Chairman for the Glorious Apollers!

To be sure it is a pity to be blowing such a squall, Instead of clouds, and every man his song, and then his call-- And as if there wasn’t Whigs enough and Tories to fall out, Besides politics in plenty for our splits to be about,-- Why, a Cornfield is sufficient, sir, as anybody knows, For to furnish them in plenty who are fond of picking crows-- Not to name the Maynooth Catholics, and other Irish stews, To agitate society and loosen all its screws; And which all may be agreeable and proper to their spheres,-- But it’s not the thing for musicals to set us by the ears. And as to College larning, my opinion for to broach, And I’ve had it from my cousin, and he driv a college coach, And so knows the University, and all as there belongs, And he says that Oxford’s famouser for sausages than songs, And seldom turns a poet out like Hudson that can chant, As well as make such ditties as the Free and Easies want, Or other Tavern Melodists I can’t just call to mind-- But it’s not the classic system for to propagate the kind, Whereby it so may happen as that neither of them Scholars May be the proper Chairman for the Glorious Apollers!

For my part in the matter, if so be I had a voice, It’s the best among the vocalists I’d honour with the choice; Or a Poet as could furnish a new Ballad to the bunch; Or at any rate the surest hand at mixing of the punch; Cause why, the members meet for that and other tuneful frolics-- And not to say, like Muffincaps, their Catichiz and Collec’s. But you see them there Itinerants that preach so long and loud, And always takes advantage like the prigs of any crowd, Have brought their jangling voices, as far as they can compass, Have turn’d a tavern shindy to a seriouser rumpus, And him as knows most hymns--altho’ I can’t see how it follers-- They want to be the Chairman of the Glorious Apollers!

Well, that’s the row--and who can guess the upshot after all? 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.