Never, never, since old Troy fell

(Or fell not, ‘Gibbon versus Gell’)

Was ever battle fought so well.                                               2400

No fiery Arab ever hewed

Down Kafir dogs in ranks bestrewed

On crimson plain with half the will

As gars ye slaughter critics spill

The Readers’* blood, Reviewers kill.

I only hope some Homer may

Embalm your dust in deathless lay.”

Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., pro-

poses a portrait to his volume.

 
“You’re in the regions of Romance;

Kindly return. Ere I commence

The work, indulge me with a hint                                            2410

About the kind of thing to print.

Shall I prefix a face in wood

Or steel cut out, showing my mood,

Romantical Byronic sneer

Round th’ oval region, and a tear

Trembling outside the canthi; or

Would you prefer the style of Yor-

ickindex laid on writhèd nose,

And cunning leer ’neath thickest brows,

And bulging forehead one foot high;                                        2420

Or Rab’lais, with expression sly,

The Stone derides this vanity,

 
And grinning mouth——”

Cried he, “Restrain

Thy jaw. A satirist, and vain

Of hair and grin and brow! Repent

In dust and Bengal blue th’ intent

To foist upon the world your looks.

The Public’s tired of buying books

 

* Namely, the publisher’s Readers, not the readers of this revelation.—F. B.

 

Half-a-crown dearer to be shown

Whether the author’s blond or brown;

Now every volume seems to groan                                         2430

Neath weight of costard, and to moan

‘Caput apri defero,

Laus sit biblipolo’—

Big Bore’s head I offer, O!

Thanks to Messrs. Blank and Co.”

“Punning! a stone!” “Yes, sir, a man

Never omits a pun that can;

But, where he can’t, why, then, to mock it,

His envy dubs punster ‘Pickpocket.’

“Genius, man, never will endure                                       2440

Communism—of that be sure.”

“But I’m no genius.”

“You should try,

Then, t’ ape its singularity—

Originality they call ’t

So shall your readers be at fault;

For few are they, or young or old,

Know well gilt brass from purest gold;

And, when some simple savan tries

and ridicules even a phreno-

logic sketch,

 
To pluck the bandage from their eyes,

Tis ten to one they sneer, and quote                                       2450

Something about a beam and mote.

As for your forehead, this the rule—

A large-brow’d fool is twice a fool.

I happened once to know a huge-

sconc’d individual called F * * *—

So tall his cranium, broad his brain-

pan, Gall and Combe had sworn ’tis plain

As Donovan’s mouth he wore a mind

To influence and rule his kind:

The calvary deserved to bear a                                               2460

Craniological tiara;

But that within was vulgar, dense,

And hardly worth its weight in pence

For cat’s-meat.”

Phrenologic sketch,

Being original, might catch

Some gudgeons,” I put in——

“There, there;

Sketch both your hams for all I care,

Or draw your coccyx os. Conceit

Is authorcraft’s own mental meat,

And serves him from ancestral seat.                                        2470

inveighing against the frantic folly of authors.

 
There’s not a goose-quill of ye all,

From garret to baronial hall,

Young, old, plain, handsome, great or small,

That stands not forth the world before

For men to tremble and adore,

That for himself is slow to claim

To be the crêmest of the crême.”

“Faith, you’re a cynic all ran rabid,

Ultra-Diogenes more crabbed

Than any stale virginity                                                           2480

In robe of spotless dimity.

Perhaps you can still more complain

Of London life?”

With might and main

He groaned aloud, e’en as might do

The Methodist that wants to show

Thereupon the Stone breaks into a philippic against street-

walkers,

 
Bottle and purse are very low,

And thus resumed: “What weighs me down

In this your God-forgotten town—

What nightly makes me wish I were

In muddy Thames or anywhere                                                2490

Else—is the horrid degradation

Of the Hetæra’s incalcation.

O what potato heels and toes!

How dread her stamp as on she goes,

Wolf-like, upon the human tracks,

Hurls horrid oaths and foul jests cracks

In ghastly mirth, as the Death’s head

Grinning before Egyptian ‘spread;’

Wafting of gin th’ infernal stench

Till e’en Cotytto’s ghost would blench;                                  2500

For ne’er, I ween, had met its eyes

Such ultra-Thracian mysteries!

By all the virtues Britons claim,

By all your sense of human shame,

Have you, I ask, no means to stop

The growth of such a poison crop—

To curb a scandal makes your name

Now and hereafter most infame?

I hear it said, were you to cull

From every city every trull                                                      2510

Of abominablest infamy,

And loose them here their chance to try,

No two of them could e’er excel

One of these candidates for hell.

Remain ye idle, careless mute,

While such foul scenes and sights pollute

Innocency’s sanctuaries—

Your children’s opening minds and eyes;

Or fondly deem ye such things are

To them unknown, unheard of? Far                                         2520

Front this, I may with safety say,

Rare is the brat in present day

That learns not with his penny trumpet

The name and nature of a strumpet—

That can’t, all sage, discriminate

Betwixt the verb to fornicate,

And with a just discrimen see

The difference of adultery.

Tis said fruits prove the parent tree

Or sound or else unsound to be.                                              2530

To judge from spec’mens of your fruit,

The tree must be a Upas shoot,

Within whose ring of poison gloom

Rank Sin and Death luxuriant bloom—

Disease that leaves to far off time

The dreadful legacy of crime;

That, on your children’s guiltless heads,

Vials of Heavenly vengeance sheds;

That saps your race’s vigour, and

Spreads like a plague o’er every land.                                    2540

O falsest of false modesty!

Pharisaic hypocrisy!

These crying horrors to ignore,

Nor stretch one hand to salve the

sore!

O silly shame, to you confined,

Unto all vile unkindly kind,

Britannia, wake, turn on the gas,

And, with thy trident, to the ‘Cas;’

Then wend thy melancholic way

Adown the Market named of Hay,                                           2550

Into the thick night-houses stray,

And end them, like a good old soul,

With Cider Cellar and Coal Hole.”

whom Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., defends on the usual grounds.

 
I thought awhile, and thus replied:

“Let your immoral peoples hide

Such scenes with cloak of privacy:

We British English like to see

Them, as in evidence they show

Our mental frame hath power to throw

Out on the surface its foul humours                                         2560

The Stone replies fiercely that “trees are known by their fruits,”

 
As healthy constitution’s tumours.”

“Man,” said he, gruffly, “pray go try

On softer souls your sophistry;

Let pamphleteering priest deceive,

Newspaper-spelling fool believe;

Let all the Commons, all the Lords,

Lend amplest credit to such words:

Me one sage sentence fully suits,

‘Good trees are they that bear good fruits.’

Your Knowledge-apple is a mess                                           2570

Of most infragrant rottenness;

And, for its core, I’ve mainly found

Inside and outside correspond.

When I see nought but simony,

Souls bought and sold for sly money,

and that the Church’s pride alienates it from its origin.

 
A mercantile affair their ‘cure,’

I know such things can’t long endure.

Your Churchmen, puffed with pomp and pride,

Claiming this world, the next beside,

Recall me not the mighty dead,                                                2580

Whose humble state their tenets spread.

Not such th’ old moralists that strove

By wordless works of love to prove

The faiths for which they lived and died,

In death by living glorified.

Whoe’er could boast two coats was told

One should be worn, the other sold.

How many coats, d’ye think, contains

Yon bishop’s lackey’s room?—yet feigns

That bishop he to Paul succeeds.                                             2590

Where tall trees fall spring noxious weeds!

The marrow of the thing may be

Piety or impiety;

But, when I judge of works, my eyes

Th’ outside, not th’ inside, scrutinize.”

Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., declares that the streets are pure by

day.

 
“At any rate, our streets by day

Are pure enough, say what you may.”

“Sir, if your streets are bad by night,

By day they are as vicious quite.

The Stone declares they are not,

 
I speak not of the swell-mob crew                                          2600

In every lane that meet the view—

Pickpockets, flashmen, and garotters

That ruffle up and down your trottoirs.

Another deeper case I meant.

There’s not a snob or Sunday gent

That ‘sports’ not some foul sentiment;

Each shop-boy’s a La Rochefoucault,

Each cabman deals in Attic salt;

E’en the Bœotian drayman swears

Far-fetched oaths with witty airs.                                            2610

The bottle-washing boys that carry

Pills and draughts for apothecary

Instance how well canaille know

To ape their betters and to show

Their reading in Life’s folio.

Your higher classes, as they term

Themselves, are quite as bad. I’m firm

In this my statement. As a sample,

The quoted may be deemed proof ample.

 

SENT. I.*

cites proofs,

 
“‘A promise, like a pie-crust, ’s meant                                   2620

For breaking, when convenient.’

 

* N.B.—Not borrowed from “The Dirty Little Snob,” by Mr. Chas. Mackay, whose latest good news to us is “Rot, poor old pen! die, hapless bard!”—F. B.

 

SENT. II.

“‘Tell her the truth? You precious flat!

To woman lies are tit for tat.’

 

SENT. III.

“‘Society’s essence, I opine,

Is a good feed with better wine.

The feast of reason and the flow

Of soul, you know, ’s all “rococo.”’

 

SENT. IV.

“‘The real value of a friend

Is just what he will give or lend.’

 

SENT. V.

“‘My tailor’s waxing violent,                                                  2630

And, when I venture to indent

On the governor, like Polar bear

The old put growls me deaf, I swear.

Hail Continent and misanthropy!

Demme, good sir, the desert for me!’

 

SENT. VI.

“‘I marry Sal; her brothers are

Ordered out to this Indian war—

One croaks with fever, t’other’s shot;

And so the coin’s my charmer’s lot.’

 

SENT. VII.

“‘Two things are sweet in polished life—                              2640

A friend’s old wine and younger wife;

And two things mort’lly I detest—

An honest woman and a priest.’

 

SENT. VIII.

“‘Lord, man, you’d laugh your larynx hoarse

To see him pick the spavin’d horse.

He asked me if I’d sell the other;

“Gad, sir,” said I, “I’d sell my mother,

But she’s so old there’s none would buy

her.”

“Ah, trot her out,” cried he; “we’ll try her.”’

 

SENT. IX.

“‘I’m not quite ass enough to cry                                             2650

Because my elder brothers die.

Three ’twixt me and the property;

Faith, they’ve no time to lose, say I.’

 

SENT. X.

“‘A precious dolt the chap must be

That dies for, bah! L. O. V. E.;

The which, transposed, upon my soul,

Denote a nobler thing—“La Vole.”’*

 

SENT. XI.

“‘I say, that precious Yahoo, Mister * * *,

Wanted to fight about—his sister!’

 

SENT. XII.

“‘While I’ve a cooter in my purse                                           2660

I’ll take no woman for better or

worse;

Till turned of fifty, then, of course,

Your wife’s a good and unpaid nurse.’

 

*At Ecarté, I presume.—F. B.

 

SENT. XIII.

“‘The old girl’s forty, but she’s money.

I’m two-and-twenty: ‘twill be funny

To see me, as John Little said,

Lickerish in my grandam’s bed!’

 

SENT. XIV.

“‘When the old bird hops off the perch,

Then, Poll, my pet, we’ll go to church.

(Aside) She is uncommon mild—                                         2670

A girl without coin and with child.’

 

and waxes very wrathful.

 
“Can I contain my wrath! why should

I do so even if I could?

You Cains that walk the London streets,

Ye little ‘Devil’s-hypocrites’!

Lucifers of the shop and till!

Machiavels of the oven and mill!

Petroniuses and Talleyrands

Of livery stables and errands!

Gentlemen into ‘gent’ cut down!                                             2680

Small bourgoisie to Borgias grown!

Are Reason, Sense, and Virtue flown

So far away ye dare not own

To an acquaintance with the name

Of Goodness without blush of shame?

Did ye act out each nauseous boast,

I’d think ye all a mission host

Sent by Sathanas’ ’hest to levy

Of volunteers an ardent bevy.

But, no! small things, I know ye

quake                                                                              2690

Privately at the lie ye spake

So bravely to your friends; and why?—

To prove your wit, your manhood? Fie!

“An hour ago I said, Sir, we

Stones look towards futurity——”

“Enjoy the ‘is;’ no one e’er saw

The ‘will be,’ or the ‘was’ re-saw;

And, though some German swears the present

Is not, I say th’ idea’s pleasant.”

“Your ‘sentiment’! your dainty bit                                     2700

Of quibbling, verbal grammar wit!

Your galimatias! would you close

My mouth for ever?”

Fearing to lose

His latest words, rebuked, I sat

Listening,

The Stone looks into futurity;

 
“Futurity, I state,

When we shall come t’ our own again,

Again assert our ancient reign,

And sit upon the throne we once

So proudly held—the human sconce.

In days of yore we stones (and faggots)                                  2710

Were used to purge of Schism’s maggots

And Doubts the brains that dared to breed

Question of catechism or creed.

Still, it is said, in distant lands

We are strong weapons in the hands

Of priests, who, knowing well that edo

Is properest terminal of credo,

Are by their mundane interests led

T’ insinuate into human head

By stones what argument can’t teach.                                      2720

Europe, the recipe’s in thy reach—

Simple, yet sure, Thus it is: Bind

The unconvinced one’s hands behind;

Then bring your mob, with stones and clods,

To vindicate insulted gods.

The light work done, smash in his skull,

And break his backbone with the full

advises intolerance,

 
Force of your argumental State

Machine for righting sceptic pate:

He’ll feel its force, and, lest his fate                                       2730

Some softer soul commiserate,

Tell him that Allah the Raheem*

Made stones to smite lips that blaspheme

His name. If all this reason fail,

Him with the same strong proof assail.

“But your wise folk in Europe now

Think the Creator strong enow

To settle his own quarrels—fear

To crop the Deist’s nose or ear—

Are too enlightened, or too good,                                            2740

To shed the blatant Atheist’s blood

You cut him dead; but, as his throat

Is safe, he careth not a groat.

“And see, th’ adulterer, he thrives

With you like cat with ninety lives:

In Jews’ and Moslems’ dispensation

punishment of adultery,

 
We soon cut short his avocation.

There the amour detected led

Directly to a stone-cracked head;

Your brighter souls prefer to see                                             2750

Him settled by some pert Q. C.—

Some Buz-fuz Bovell, Edwin James,

Or other talking thing that shames

The name of Themis. You would damage

His ‘bons’ and not his bones; you rummage

 

* One of the Moslems’ names for the Supreme Being, meaning “The Merciful.”—F. B.

 

His chest and eke his case to find

Food for enlightened Public’s mind,

Institute Probate and Divorce

Courts to inflame the evil worse,

Each fact least decent joy to trace,                                          2760

And, with delicious detail, grace

Tale of a ‘charming crim. con. case.’

Lotharios who have funds to pay

At that same game here safely play.

Tis only paupers can’t afford

Part in their neighbour’s bed and board.

‘Come, Fan, with me, and be my love,

And we will o’er Ausonia rove,

Where no stiff prude shall sneer and say

Sweet Fan’s a naughty divorcée.’”                                          2770

“Stone, outrag’d Honour——”

“Good sir, oftest

Inflicts the penalty the softest;

And, in such cases, very great is

The chance of getting off clean gratis.

For Honour, in her quiet way,

Stifles the-ugly exposé;

And few now fight, while fewer fall

By pistols only wanting ball,

Save youngest hands, who’re sometimes found

Wounded—in mind—upon the ground.                                   2780

The herd will aye prefer relief

For cornute pain, connubial grief,

(not damages),

 
And broken heart and woe intense

By bank-note plaster, salve of pence.

The man who pockets his disgrace

Never, methinks, should show his face

Without his ticket, duly worn

Suspended to his dexter horn.

Yet so ’tis not: Society

Treats him as well as you or me;                                             2790

And, if he’s rich, pray who’ll refuse

Once more to let him pick and choose?

“Faith, sir, in Britain there’s a price,

A tariff for each sin and vice

Not difficult to calculate;

impartial justice,

 
Although the values fluctuate.

Crime, also, hath its market rate,

Though grown exorbitant of late.

It is a goodly sight to see

Astræa in nineteenth century,                                                   2800

In robes of solemn black berigged,

With a huge horse-hair wig befigged,

Bagging poor Peter’s Pence, and crying

‘Ho! Dispensations! who’s for buying?’

But, when unmoneyed criminals steal,

Or forge, or kill, stern fingers feel

The edge of her avenging steel,

Which, were the culprit rich, would lie

In scabbard cased eternally,

And be to all, save common fellow,                                        2810

Nothing but ‘leather and prunella.’

When ducal hands cut common throat——”

“The duke must hang——”

“Yes, sir, but note

The gap ’twixt fictions of the law

And facts not you or I e’er saw.

Dukes have an easy saving clause;

Lawyer hath pouch—indictment flaws.

The grandee drives away on bail—

The pauper’s carried straight to jail.

Soldier’s habitual drunkenness                                               2820

Is a trimestrial excess;

Among the captains met to try

The private for debauchery,

How many, if the truth they’d speak,

Would own to ‘freshness’ once a week?”

“Station and rank must be upheld,

And wealth should make a man be bailed.”

“The ‘must’ and ‘should’ I cannot see;

It is your shame such things should be.

For, mark me, sir, in this fair land                                           2830

No sin is hated, crime is banned,

Like poverty: here to be poor

Is to be vile. The wide world o’er

Tis a misfortune—here a worse

Than any sublunary curse.

less avarice,

 
Rich Vice trips out in laced chemise,

Poor Virtue shakes her cold-chapped knees;

Chastity hath nor shoon nor hose,

And Honour swabs a snivelling nose.                                     [2840

And why? D’ye ask? Because you’ve sold

Your souls for filthy Mammon’s gold.

Long since from pest’lent Guinea’s plains

Came the ‘vile yellow slave’* that reigns

Supreme o’er England’s coasts and chains

Its thirty million sovereigns,

Of whom few souls would not adore

The golden calf to ‘bone’ its ore.

Tis only when it’s lead you’re strong

In love of right, in hate of wrong.

You’re very dotards in your lust                                             2850

Of lucre, madmen in your trust

To acre-might. Some South Sea scheme,

 

* From poor John Leyden’s pathetic “Ode to an Indian Gold Coin.”—F. B.

 

Some art of turning coin to steam,

Some project wild as drunkard’s dream

Starts up each century, and drives

Britannia raving mad. So strives

The cunning maniac to conceal

His dread complaint. Would you reveal

The horrid malady, and goad

Into a fiend what seemed a load?                                            2860

With wizard wand of words that part

He hideth with his studied art.

But touch, and see his passions rise!

Mark all the demon in his eyes!

With you the latest wand appeared

In Engine shape; you forthwith reared,

Acteon-like, a bestial front,

With crowns of branching antlers on’t.

What Dian, Circe, Moon, had might

To work such marvel? What fierce sprite,                              2870

Tell me, what Hecate-taught hag

Thus metamorphosed man to stag,

Sending him forth in modern days,

Nebuchadnezzar-like, to graze

Where’er a Railway king might lead—

Like Schwein-König of comic Head*—

King Hudson, who could e’en permute,

As royal Lub,† mankind to brute!

Till, after brief but brilliant sway,

He sank t’ a thing as low as they.                                            2880

The fit hath passed, yet still remains

Its traces burnt in many brains—

 

* See “Bubbles from the Brunnens of Nassau,” by Sir Francis Head, Bart.—F. B.

† A celebrated enchantress in the “Arabian Nights.”—F. B.

 

To be expelled when Furies send

Another and more frantic fiend;

And even now ye’re hardly sane,

But sad with unforgotten pain—

Many a loser sick and sore

With ruin’s potent Hellebore;

While, in the few, fixed melancholy

Hath ta’en the place of frantic folly,                                        2890

Let me prescribe a cure which all

Will join in owning radical—

The real Font de la Jouvence,

Which can bring back your better sense,

The only dose for certain health—

and disgorging over wealth.

 
Namely, disgorging th’ over wealth,

Th’ ungodly fill with which your claws

Have crammed and rammed your ravening

maws.

Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., objects, and even threatens.

 
Render, I say.”

“Stone, Chartist ‘chaff’

Calls for the flail of Special’s staff.                                        2900

Like Quaker Bright, wouldst parcel out

Our nobles’ lands to rabble rout?

Wouldst, like the bagman Cobden, see all

Perfections in one beau idéal

The dis-United States—and plan

For John the fate of Jonathan,

Manifest fate of Uncle Sam,

Whom wiser men call Uncle Sham?”

“Man, I’ve an honest petrifaction;

Little I feel for petty faction                                                    2910

Of patriots paid so much a day

To march with flags and run away.

And, what is more, I would not barter

Bond Pennsylvanian for Big Charter,

Whereupon

the Stone actually abuses Magna Charta,

 
Your liberalo-politic creed,

Calf-skin Tables of Runnymede

To Lackland sense and wit baronial

Most creditable testimonial

(The which enables every stark ass

To have and hold his proper carcass,                                      2920

And eke demand a baker’s dozen

Of jurymen the law to cozen,

The benefit of which appears

In Lion Range from negro peers).*

Of all the barons meeting there

How many read or wrote? They were

Dext’rous at pulling nose with grace

Their mutton fists could mar a face

As well as mighty Mahmud’s mace,†

And, with one buffet, breast-plate batter                                 2930

As flat as farmer’s pewter platter;

Their mighty draughts of beer and mead

Could flood the fields of Runnymede:

Strong men-at-arms, they had stiff seats

On steed, were proud of jousting feats—

Not as your ‘silken barons’ play,

With long cracked poles at mock tournay

(Like hodded cocks on soft green sward),

A tableau-vivant tilting-yard,

Passage of arms to scaramouch                                               2940

The dust of Ashby de la Zouche;‡

Not like Smith’s knights, whose arms

adorn

The tournament of Smith’s Cremorne,

 

* Alluding, perhaps, to the quasi-infernal Sierra Leone.—F. B.

The conqueror of Somnauth.—F. B.

‡ For which see “Ivanhoe.”—F. B.

 

Where the object of the fray appears

Only t’ avoid the shock of spears.

Their lances, sir, were strong, were sharp,

More than their wits: on this I harp,

Because your age finds greater charms

In their dull wisdom than their arms.

To copy all they said—not did—                                            2950

Sir, I would bid your people rid

Themselves of all the ills they suffer,

And not a patched-up armistice offer

and lapses into treasonable talk.

 
Upon such terms as cheaper bread

Or votes at £5 5. a head.

Ages to come mankind shall quote

The Great Napoleon’s Code: he wrote

From dictate of superior sense,

Not extracts from the impotence

Which Pepin might have penned, or great                               2960

Carolus scratching scurfy pate.*

Ye Chartist wormkins, pull up roots

Of wrongs, and thus you’ll kill the shoots;

But——”

“Stop!” cried I; “hast lost thy reason?

Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., would restrain him,

 
Ruffian, thy words are rank high treason.

I, too, a’ ‘Special.’”

“Ass!said he;

“Choose other subject; what made ye

Provoke me to it?” I could hear

Him muttering to himself—“A year

Or ten, perhaps—trampled upon—                                         2970

Starved—Lords and Commons, all dupe

on!—

 

* “Charlemagne, being dull at his pen, was in the habit of looking to the ceiling for words and of scratching his head to urge his thoughts.” (Old Chronicle).—F. B.

 

Pikes, bludgeons—William Tell, Jack Cade—

Horseguards and Foot—a barricade—

Sulphuric acid—Specials to pot—

As fou, but not so brisk as Lot——”

The last allusion was too much

For me t’ endure. “Wretch!” cried I, “such

Insinuations loudly call

For treatment in Correction Hall.”

but cannot.

 
“You mean the station?”                                                    [2980

“Yes, of course.”

“Then will I tell you something worse.”

I sat as one spell-bound to see

His grimy grin of vicious glee.

“Stones, as I oft to you have said,

Ere this have broken human head;

And soon it may be ours again

The Stone looks forward to a London barricade match,

 
To test the strength of human brain.

“Behold our proper paradise—Paris.

How gentle, gay, polite—how far is

Our Paris from an insurrection?                                              2990

You’d say, ‘From this to Resurrection!’

You’re wrong. A dinner’s countermanded.

The weather’s sultry; they’ve demanded

Reasons: the only answer given

Is something touching anti-Heaven.

Two fellows hap to meet: one swears

C’est un peu fort; his friend declares

C’est infâme, that evil days

Are on the Français et Françaises.

A third man thinks it won’t ‘draw length’                               3000

Before Parisians show their strength.

A fourth opines—if e’er, ’tis now—

That brave men ought their strength to show,

And counsels all ‘poltrons’ to go

Somewhere. A fifth says present is

The best of opportunities,

And, being an ancient militaire,

Offers to manage the affair;

While some old chef of barricades

His tactics ’fore the crowd parades,                                       3010

Sans further parlez-vous, they rush

Into the next gun-shop, and push

The owner out of house and hall

To show the People’s might—that’s all—

And kiss his daughter or his wife

To give the thing a spice of life.

This first step ta’en, they congregate,

Dozens and scores, in frantic state.

Not one has time to think or doubt,

Or ask or see what he’s about—                                             3020

Boys bad as men, and women first

Of plagues, as usual, and the worst.

A sea of blood, o’er whose fierce tide

Satan himself might gloat with pride,

In one quart d’heure—tables, chairs,

Beds, wardrobes, boxes, strips of stairs;

And we, sir, placed on planks in layers.”

(“Thank God, from Paris streets stone all’s

Gone!——”

“Yes, but they’ve left it in the walls!)

Proclaim Messieurs ‘No thoroughfare.’                                  3030

Now, armed by magic, some prepare

Flanking defences from the windows;

Some dance, drink, sing, curse, try what din does

T’ excite their enemies to fight.

Faith, ’tis a spirit-stirring sight!

Clashes the tocsin, rolls the drum

Loud notes above the savage hum,

Whose key-note is the Sacré nom

Allahu’* of Gallic Christendom;

Blares the loud trump, and woman’s shriek                            3040

Inflames the brave and nerves the weak.

Now all’s still as the tomb: the mound

One mounts, to hear the measured sound

Of ironed hoofs and gaitered feet

Slowly defiling up the street.

No ‘obus’? À merveille! Clear

These warriors know nought of war!

*          *          *          *          *

describing one at Paris.

 
“A pause, a brief, long-seeming pause,

Broken in time—a shot the cause,

Theffect an empty saddle. ‘Vive                                            3050

La Charte!’† Now, patriots, give

‘Pepper’ as well as tongue! prepare

Rifle and knife with anxious care!

Climb the banquette—on t’other side

Pour in a ceaseless fiery tide!

A feu d’enfer that mows them down

Like grass before the practised clown.

Ye flankers, fire! women, vitriol throw

Upon the fated troupe below!                                                 [3060

Splash face and arms with gore; ’twill show—

Well—hero-like: O qu’il est beau!

You die? Eh bien! your friends will mourn,

And give, perhaps, a plaster urn

Where Paris plants her choicest bays—

In pretty, trashy Père la Chaise.

Your brother falls: a rien!—drive

Your blade through slaves that run to live!

 

* “Allah he!” (is Allah!) the Moslem war-cry—F. B.

† Which, if memory serves me, was usually pronounced “La Chatte.”—F. B.

 

They charge; bah! Let them near you; keep

Your fire awhile. Now roll your heap

Of stones from every window-sill!                                         3070

Cold iron hurl, hot water spill!

Fill your barrels, men, fill, re-fill!

Taunt, howl, or else they’ll bolt before

You’ve tasted half enough of gore—

Before your hero-boy or wife

Gash e’en one throat with rusty knife!

            *          *          *          *          *

Ah, what a pity! Shame, O shame!

Those well-trained cocks show scanty game.

They stand—they run! Let showers of

stones,

Parting volleys of shots and groans,                                        3080

Avenge the execrable crime

Of trifling with your dinner-time.

“A pretty sight this seems to be,

Succedaneous to thAgapæ;

You’ve admirably learn’d to smother

Your charity to one another.

‘See how these Christians love’ was true;

‘See how they hate’ is true of you.”

“Ah, they are French——”

“Yes, sir, they are,

These Gallicans, a very mar-                                                  3090

tial member of the creed you can’t

But own to be most militant.

Slavish Islam can boast but one

Revolution, some ages gone

(When slain their caliph hight Usman

For meddling with their Alcoran).

But, this in brackets, d’ye suppose

That only France these passions knows?

No; by my origin! we stones

Ere long shall dance on English bones,                                   3100

Or Citoyen Crapaud despatch

Some million brother-men to teach

Stiff Lord Jean Boule grace to dance

With Miss Liberté, fresh from France.

Then some small hero Joinville

Or Cavaignac the Second will,

Under his huge mustachio, sneer

En avant, tugs; to gloire ye steer!

Go it, mes braves! the landing’s clear—

Thank God! no coast-defences here.                                       3110

March, enfants of vin ordinaire,

Against the bifteck and the bière;

Advance, sour wine, against flat swipes—

Sans culotte versus cotton wipes.’”

The dreadful thought hard froze my tongue;

I sat in reverie deep and long.

Then came another burst of glee,

And, with a jerk, thus he: “Sir, see,

Paris is settled; view a scene

Methinks may more incite your spleen.                                   3120

“Behold yon lovely land outspread

Like emeralds strewn on sapphire bed;

He viciously enables Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., to Cumming-ize the Crimea.

 
Its bound the narrow waving band

Of silvery cliff and golden sand:

That lovely region decked and drest

In bounteous Nature’s brightest, best;

The land where Zephyr loves to roam

Thro’ flowery hort and fruity grove,

Where Phœbus sheds his latest ray

As loth to leave a scene so gay.                                              3130

Is’t not an earthly paradise?”

“Now sit up, fellow; use your eyes,

And look and mark, with wondering stare,

The pretty scene that’s passing there.”*

In truth, his leer had mesmerized me:

My sudden power of sight surprised me.

“Mind ye yon city shining fair

In the translucent morning air;

Whose skirts descend on either side

To th’ edges of the subject tide,                                              3140

Upon whose heaving bosom ride

Three navies, each a nation’s pride.

The sea’s blue depths that seem to lave

The buildings based upon the wave;

The land’s green length, where objects all

Into a picture seem to fall;

Whilst, round about, o’er land and deep

Eternal quiet seems to sleep.

Is’t not too fair for ye to gaze

Upon except on holidays?                                                       3150

“A curious contrast, now you see

Two hosts contend for victory—

This stretching o’er the distant hills,

Whilst that the goodly city fills.

They meet as lines of pismires—fall

By thousands ’fore a battered wall;

Whilst trumpet bray and cannon roar

Are answered by the groaning shore,

And puffs of fetid smoke soar high,

Staining the amethystine sky;                                                   3160

And, swifter than the fiery leven,

Man’s guardian angel speeds to heaven,

While tortured shriek and dying yell

Are borne on demons’ wings to hell.

 

* Verily this beats Mother Shipton and Rob. Nixon and Dr. Cumming—Prophets or Prophetasters.—F. B.

 

The French Malakoff-victory;

 
“The line divides; the right half, which is

Conspicuous for madder breeches,

Presses like flock of hunted sheep

Towards yon town so grim and steep:

O’er ditch and stream and crest and wall

They jump and swarm, they rise and fall,                                3170

With vives and crés and cheers and cries

Like thunderings in autumnal skies;

A few defenders, brave in vain,

Slashed, stifled, stabbed, and shot, are slain,

Till every foot of ground is mud

With tears and brains and bones and blood.

Yet, ’faith, it is a grim delight.

To see the little devils fight.

They turn the guns against the town,

Batter each strongest bulwark down.                                      3180

Charge, grédins, charge! On, crétins, on!

Sevastopol is lost and won.

and the English Redan-defeat.

 
“Now mark the line sinister that’s

In red coatees and Albert hats—

That host of sickly, war-worn men

Despatched against yon iron den

By chief who, seated far—too far!—

Through his specs darkly views the war,

Hidden behind a hilly rise

Where wicked bullet never flies;                                            3190

And round about the ‘brilliant staff’

All have their silly mot and laugh—

The delicate diminutives!—

About men’s perilled limbs and lives.

Without reserves, supports, or aught

(The idler red-coat host hath sought

Each man a place to view the fray)

That slender column works its way.

“Now neared the trench! a thrilling

shout!

All tumble in and scramble out,                                              3200

And, spite of bayonet and ball,

They jumble o’er the earthen wall,

Another charge and all is won—

Already the defenders run.

What means this check? Why halt they here,

Stricken by sudden panic fear?

Why slink these warriors aside

Their ostrich heads from death to hide?

Have Britons learned to hark-away

And live to fight another day?                                                 3210

In vain their captains, stark and brave,

Push, urge, and scold, smite, curse, and rave;

They will not face that fiery flood

That sweeps them back in brother-blood.

Advance, supports, reserves, and save

Your honour front a craven’s grave,

And win and wear the glorious

Bronze Cross yclept Victorious!

Supports, reserves—ah, where are they?

Dispersed like wanton boys at play!                                       3220

Where’s the great Chief-Commander—where?

Lurking in honourable lair?

Arise, Sir James! arise and see

The fate of England’s chivalry!

The Stone ex-plains what

will cause these “Cumming” things,

 
            *          *          *          *          *

“The cause of this I’ll now describe:

Tis meet to move a cynic’s gibe.

Far in the north, where suns are cold,

Where ice is water, snow is mould,

Dwelt in those dreary lands a ‘Ba’ar,’

Horrid of mien, of hunger rare,                                               3230

Wont by his roar to spread a fear

’Mid minor brutelets far and near.

One day he formed the fell design

Upon a neighbouring bird to dine;

But Cock and Bull cried, ‘Bear, forbear;

That bird to all our peace is dear:

Sometime he must be some one’s prey,

But now let Turkey ‘joy his day.’

For all reply they hear a growl

And certain innuendos foul,                                                     3240

Proceeding from a host of Bears

That into Turkey’s messuage tears,

And inopine converts a brood

Of likely poults to lawless food.

The bird, tho’ somewhat stiff with age,

Ruffles his plume with noble rage,

And flies with’s softy beak and claw

At the vile breaker of the law,

Till tetchy Cock-a-doodle and

The Bull, who e’er must have a hand                                      3250

In every pie of rich inside,

Rescue and comfort have supplied.

(They summon even the Sardine,

Done in Cassiteridean tin.)

Ensues a pretty scrimmage, till

The Bear of baiting hath his fill.

With grimly grins and groans of pain,

He wends, head backwards, to his den,

Which nature, art, and toil immense

Had made a marvel of defence.                                               3260

The Turkey, by his luck ’scaped gobbling,

Waddles to glory proudly wobbling;

And Cock, with all his little poules,

And Bull, with all his junior Bulls,

Hasten to waste, in Justice’ name,

Beargarden Lodge with steel and flame.

“But one Spread-Eagle, ‘Death-in-Life,’

Aideth the Bear in’s mortal strife,

And by his wily art lays low

Some twenty thousand of the foe.                                            3270

Comes the beginning of the end

E’en ‘Death-in-Life’ may not defend:

He warns the Bears, who, waxing savage,

Their den beloved spoil, tear, and ravage,

And then depart in surly pride

Unto their stronghold’s other side;

Where, sitting safe, they take a sight

At Cock and Bull’s behungered plight,

Who sit at meat with saddened mien

’Fore potted cat and coffee green.                                           3280

“But soon the Bull and Cockadoodle

Resolved that both had played the noodle,

And daily, as at meat they sat,

’Fore coffee green and potted cat,

They yearned to think on brats and wives,

How hastily they’d sold their lives,

Adorned a tale, pointed a moral

By meddling in another’s quarrel;

For which unauthorized interpose

Both oft had wiped cruorish nose.                                           3290

This done, they both devised manœuvre

To make the evil time run over;

And, having tried once more again

A mastery o’er the Bear to gain,

They packed the Turkey and his brood

Back to his home of painted wood,

And winked while Bruin in his rage

Tore down a corner of the cage.

 

This deed politic duly done,

As all had lost, and none had won,                                          3300

As none could buck or boast that he

Had gained superiority,

They all decreed fierce war to cease

And hail return of smiling peace,

To love once more with heart and soul

And drown their difference in the bowl.

Soon said, quick done; they drank, and then

Each warrior sought his distant den,

While Bruin whispered, ‘Heartkins, mum,

‘We’ll bide our time; ’twill surely come.’                              3310

“A hundred thousand men and more

Stained the Crimean soil with gore;

A hundred thousand souls had died

To gratify two despots’ pride.

Ah, man! it is a treat to see

Thy human inhumanity.”

He ceased, and rang within mine ear

His words significantly drear;

And, while I tried to seek relief

From vision of our national grief,                                           3320

Out broke, in sad and wailing tone

And doleful dumps, the following moan:

 

MOAN.

 

and moans over  modern English de-generacy.

 
“Mourn, Britain, mourn the sad decay

Of honour in thine elder day.

The children of thy younger age,

That race so brave, if not so sage,

Ah, where are they?

Those knights so débonnaire and gay,

So fiery in the fight and fray,

That never knew the word of fear,                                          3330

Brought up from milk on beef and beer,

Ah, where are they?

Like other things, they’ve passed away,

And for their spirits churchmen pray;

Their sword-blades stain the walls with rust,

Their war-steeds, like themselves, are dust:

Ah, gone are they.

A poor and puny race to-day

In vain to take their place essay—

A dwarf’d, degenerate progeny,                                              3340

Reared on dry toast and twice-drunk tea:

Ah, sad decay!

 

He then enters upon the case of Poland,

 
“Ah, sad decay! see Bruin once more

Rageth far fiercer than before.

As Turkeys may not gorge his maw,

On Poles he plants his heavy paw;

He rules their realm by fines and fetters;

He robs their brats, and eke their letters;

He drives their youth to swell his host;

He racks their rents, t’ uphold his boast                                  3350

Of being thincarnate principle

Of rule ye call despotical;

And, when they offer to object,

Their lives and fortunes rack’d and wreck’d,

He fills their towns with venal spies;

T’ hunt down each nobler soul he tries,

Most rigorous martial law proclaims,

Be-knouts their men, be-rates their dames,

Sending them forth, a dreary way,

To Tobolsk, in Siberia;                                                           3360

Fines, harries, bans, and confiscates

The friends of Freedom, whom he hates

With all the wrath of tyrant ire,

and abuses the so-called Liberals,

 
As squire loathes poacher, poacher squire.

“Ye Whigs, ye Liberals, that be

Infleshed Illiberality,

That e’en to use the Liberal name

Should flush your checks with blush of shame,

What did ye when the generous cry

Of Christendom was heard on high?                                        3370

“Of course the Jack of Britain sees

The Euxine and the Baltic seas—

Not led by men from whom the go

Hath gone some score of years ago,

Not boasting knight of Netherby

In place where he should never be,

Nor John de Bedford (name of fear!),

Nor Pecksniff Glad. to Grundy dear,

Nor wanting bomb-ketch, light craft—all,

In fact, that was effectual—                                                     3380

Not with a broadside of popgun,

But cupolas, by Coles begun;

Not manned by tailor, potboy, clown—

Refuse of bog, and eke of town;

But, from the first to last, complete,

As Britain pays to fight her fleet.

“Ah, no! So powerful, so grand

The lecturing of this freeborn land,

What erring ruler dare gainsay

Nor see the folly of his way?                                                  3390

Blate, Britain! blate, till Russia, all

Penitent—constitutional—

From Poland’s limbs shall strike the chain,

Peccavicry with might and main,

And rush to learn the A B C

Of ten-pun vote and liberty.

“Sarah” especially.

 
“Yes, look ye! ‘Sarah’* grips the pen

And Europe ’gins to sneer again—

Sneer with a concentrated spite

To see the Briton Britain blight.                                              3400

No Solon he to talk or think,

But ‘peart’ at goosequill stained with ink.

And what writes he?

Some wretched trash,

Grotius and Bible all in hash,

With stern dictate and feint of threat

And league for armed coercion met—

Three allied powers’ (all the scoff

Of single-handed Gortschakoff)

Vapid outcries and maunder’d pleading

For the poor land whose corpse lies

bleeding,                                                                        3410

All ending with the arrière-goût

‘Go in and win: who'll fight for you?’

“Then th’ all unreasonable Tartar,

Though caught, will not be daunted,

laughter

And equal scribbling art opposing

To all the foeman thinks most posing;

And, daunting all with fell-fanged grin,

He hugs his victim tighter in,

While Dogberry, hast’ning tail to show,

Takes note of him and lets him go†—                                     3420

Like bully Pistol, e’en must seek

A private coigne to eat his leek.

 

* Surely the irreverend wretch of a Stone cannot allude to the motto of the ducal family of——?—F. B.

† I cannot pass over this misquotation. In the original Dogberry says, “Take no note of him, but let him go.”—F. B.

 

He waxes pathetic about the dis-United States war,

 
“Behold a brother-nation stand

Embattled on its mother-land—

This half for empire fights, the other,

That won't call Sambo man and brother,

For Freedom strikes: the twain appeal

To the old parent, who should feel

Bowels of pity yearn to see

The fury of his progeny.                                                          3430

A word in time had stayed the flood

That drenched the land in tears and blood.

Tis money-loving cowardice,

Tis slavish silence to be nice

When men's lives in the balance sway:

Outspeak it, men, come what come may.

But no! we wait what France may say.

France, being troubled with a throe

Abortive, called a Mexico,

For once sits deeply, deadly dumb;                                         3440

So mumbles Bull with toothless gum,

‘Oyez! ye great Confederates,

And Oyez! ye great Federal States:

Great are ye both! Considering this,

Considering that, and all that is

To be considered, I'm content

To call ye both belligerent,

To keep a strict neutrality,

Which means look out. for self, ye see.

Bella debella belle! Belly                                                       3450

Will make ye soon knock off, I tell ye;

Meanwhile, fight on till all is red,

And grind your bones to make my bread.’

“Turn t’other way: see yonder Dane,

His realm invaded, cities ta’en,

His people plundered, soldiers slain

By those twin gaunt and grisly forms

That daunt the steed in Russian storms.

Weary of wrangle in their lairs

O’er the dry bones of State affairs,                                         3460

Fearing a general mutiny

In the whole horde both far and nigh,

Luck-burgh and High-toll (such their

names)

Set forth to see the world in flames—

Bravely pick out the smallest prey

And crack his crown.

And where are they

That should defend?—the ‘Cabinet

Of all the Talents’—Premier Threat,

Secundus Sneer, and Grundy Glad.,

Inevitable Stick?*

Tis sad!                                                    3470

Again they all sit down to write,

When other men would stand and fight.

They fire off—Armstrongs? Whitworths?—

No!

But protocol and plenipo!

Pushed to the last, they dare propose

Of Conference the normal dose;

And now behold how all this ends—

The Lord defend me from my friends!

*          *          *          *          *

and ends with general abuse of John Bull.

 
Certes, the last half-century

Hath sent us queerish things to see.                                         3480

When the great Uncle’s subtle Nephew

Delivered Europe—rose to save you

 

* Can he mean the great No-shire statesman with whom Dr. Polyglott dined?—F. B.

 

From Cossack and Republican—

Who mostly thwarted’s every plan?

Grundy and Stiggins! Thou and Thou!!

That was a glorious pow-wow!*

What tricks ye played in Church and State!

What jinks ye flung infuriate!

Court, pulpit, press, and public, all

Lunatico-maniacal:                                                                  3490

The Stone shows that England made Nap. III.

 
Such mania as say’th th’ old tradition

The gods make courier to perdition.

And thus Napoleon rose. Abuse

First taught fair France her scion’s use:

‘See, l’Anglais hates him!—why? ’tis

clear

No more Napoleons wanted here:

Le petit homme is Heaven sent,

And he shall sit our President!’

“I’ sooth, it was a contrast—You

Versus the man of ’Fifty-two,                                                  3500

And You kow-towing all before

To self-same man of ’Fifty-four.

Tis true that was a candidate,

And this had won imperial state;

Whilst your rank-worship casts you prone

All the world o’er before a throne,

And from all ‘Things of Pagod sway,’

With brazen Front and feet of Clay,

Turning with mien sufficient bold,

You lowly buss the toe of gold.                                               3510

Thus rose Napoleon III.: again

Imperialism took the rein.

 

* A council amongst the savage aborigines of North America.—F. B.

 

Poor Johnny Bull down louted low

’Fore Gallic cockrel’s clarion crow,

And warned his female sharp to put her

Alarm-bells up at every shutter,

Whilst he went forth to guard his store

Of steel-traps and spring-guns galore.

‘Who knows,’ cries he, ‘what treachery?

That “beastly bird” may cunning be.                                       3520

L’Empire c’est la paix: a word

For Peace may substitute the Sword.

While fields are pocked with armed heel,

While ports are stocked with iron keel,

While Cherbourg, bold as Spurgeon, shows

To general Europe upturned nose,*

Who knows what is the fellow’s plan

Against a “Merchant and a Man”?

My constitution’s strong and free

When not assailed by enemy;                                                  3530

But man, when danger groweth near,

Must think of all that man holds dear,

Prize wife and children, friends, renown,

Protestantism, Peerage, Crown.

Bide we our time—he’ll go his way;

I’ll run, to fight another day.’

And so the rude and rampant roar,

Erst wont to echo Europe o’er,

Subsided to the piteous whine

Of second childhood genuine,                                                 3540

 

* It is wrong thus to allude to that reverend gentleman; but the friends of Mr. S—— surely ought not to have left him standing, in the shape of a plaster-of-Paris bust, in the Crystal Palace, looking, with cock-nose and snarling lip, at those high-bred gentlemen Cardinals Richelieu and Mazarin as if he were a potboy offering to fight either of them for a pint o’ porter.—J. B.

 

And all the beasts of field and fell

The Bull-ings are made to

fall foul of Mr. Bull, their sire,

 
Cried ‘Farewell, Johnny Bull! Farewell!’

“But Bull of Bull-lings had a brood

Full fierce of fight and full of blood,

Sturdy young louts who more than once

To odds had dealt a broken sconce.

They ranked themselves in troop and

squad,

And learned to stand and eke to prod,

To turn, to wheel about, and show

A ’fended front to every foe:                                                   3550

Their Bull’s Run o’er was t’other way;

And some had nearly died (they say)

For want of enemy to slay.

“When Bull-lings heard their sire’s decree,

T’ ignobly guard his property,

They made a mighty ‘many’ and

Thus unto hint preferred demand:

‘Thee, great Papa, we praise,’ they said,

‘Yet wherefore hide that dear old head?

If weight of hours and honours press thee,                              3560

If stricture, rheum, gout, stone, oppress thee,

O take thy rest! Speak thou the word,

And we go forth a ready herd,

To sweep from off our pasture’s face

Of hostile animals every trace—

Cocks, Eagles with Two Heads or One,

Dragons and Bears, Lions and Sun.

Right soon the beasts obscure shall see

The British Beef’s supremacy.

We’ll dip the world in English ale,                                         3570

Make Kickshaw and Beaujolais pale,

And send to Vaterland undear

Sausage, Sauer-kraut, and Lagerbier.

Bellow the word!’

But Bull was old,

And Bull was stupid; Bull was cold;

Bull, like a certain widow, ’d seen

Far better times than these, I ween.

“‘My sons,’ he gently ’gan to low,

‘We all must reap the thing we sow.

I planted storms in my hot youth,                                             3580

And now I gather cyclones. ’Sooth

To say, my sin hath found me out.’

“‘Papa! no cant!’

‘Hush, rebel rout,

Time was when to Borussia none

Without my leave could bang a gun,

Civis Romanus sum could save

The veriest miscreant from the grave,

And a roast Protestant set fire,

Like Helen's rape, t’ a whole empire.

Twas then three mighty specs I made,                                    3590

And threw all peoples in the shade:

I shipped old Afric’s West Coast clean

Of negro and of niggerine

Five hundred million guineas there

Were brought me by my negro ware;

Next India came below my heel,

And voided gold ’neath fire and steel,

Till I could hardly stir a foot

For weight of land and blood and

loot;

And, lastly, cotton made me roll                                             3600

In gold and notes, until my soul

Is made of money——

about his fleet,

 
‘But, Pa, your fleet?——’

‘My little dears, is tight and neat;

Wanting, ’tis true, officers, men,

And the right gun: but still, what then?

Each Bull is fit, you know, ye dogs,

To meet and eat a dozen Frogs.

army,

 
Hip! hip! hurrah!’

‘But, Pa, your army?——’

“‘Let not that nauseous theme alarm ye.

Tis, somehow, hard to raise recruits,                                     3610

Who cry for rank and pay (the brutes!),

And yet I beat, on Belgian plain,

The Frenchman, and will do ’t again;

At Alma we were not behind;*

In India all went well, I find.

and colonies.

 
Hip! hip! hurrah!’

‘Your colonies?——’

“‘Oh, let them slide: Ionians go

To Athens or to Jericho;

Thou Caffre-fighting Cape, aroynt;

Maori-slaying Zealand, avaunt;                                               3620

African pest-house, gang your gait;

Take Canada you, Fourth Estate!

And, e’en if India parts, you'll find

I've left her nothing but the rind.’

The Bull-lings blushed, each shook his head—

‘No luck till poor Papa is dead.’

And Europe scoffs at English Moll,

From rising Sun to setting Sol.

The Stone re-

opens his Lament ab initio,

 
*          *          *          *          *

Alas and oh! oh and alas!

How Tempora and Mores pass!                                              3630

Time was—but now once more the doom

Striketh me silent as the tomb;

 

* Kinglake says English won Alma, Todleben says French. Who can hesitate which to believe?—F. B.

 

when Fate dumbs him.

 
A cold clutch grips my heart around,

My ear grows deaf, my tongue is bound——

“Place me on Shakespeare's sandstone Cliff,

His last words are, “I’ll go to Germany.”

 
Where nought save donkey-boys and I

Can hear our mutual groan and sniff;

Thence, swan-like, let me take fly:

A Land of Slaves shall ne'er be mine—

I'll wend me somewhere on the Rhine.”                                  3640

Dr. Polyglott, Ph.D., who can stand it no more,

 
I could no more. “Police! Po-li-ce!”

I shouted. “Ruffian, in a trice

The station-house shall hold your tongue,

And Johnny Bull shall see you hung,

Meagher’d, Bedlam’d, or sent to try an-

other attempt with Rex O'Brien;

Where, in thought, and thought only, you

Are Fingal's rock—he Brian Boru.”*

And off I ran full hard, while he

Giggled a sneering “Hi! hi! hi!”                                              3650

And, looking round, methought a dead-

light played above his pestilent head,

Which made me faster run from th’ evil—

Perhaps Ram Mohun was the Devil.

I gazed around. Day slothful broke

Through hanging veils of coaly smoke;

Rose in her russet cloak the Dawn,

As if her silks were out of pawn;

complains

to the Police,

 
And every sparrow seem’d to say,

“’Drat it! another rainy day!”                                                  3660

Th’ inspector heard my hurried tale,

And threatened me with fine or jail

is laughed at, and

 
For hoaxing the detective force.

Seeing the matter might be worse,

 

* Brian the Brave, king of Munster, killed at Clontarf A.D. 1014.—F. B.

 

Back I returned to mark the place

Where lay that pagan Stone, in case

A future reference were required.

I searched all round about, till tired

goes to bed sober.

 
Of scrutinizing every stone

Except the one my thoughts were on.                                       3670

Yet there, I’m certain, stood the house

Of the old wife and junior spouse;*

Here lived Miss B., and there Miss A.:

Twas vain; I sighed, and went away

To bed—sober.

 

* Omitted in page 75.—F. B.

 

 

 

 

 

THE END.

 

 

 

                                   

LONDON: WILLIAM STEVENS, PRINTER, 37, BELL YARD,

TEMPLE BAR.