Chapter XXI (3)

The hundred clerks that live along the street,
Bondsmen to mercantile and City schemers,
With squashing, sloshing and galoching feet,
Go paddling, paddling, through the wet, like steamers,
Each hurrying to earn the daily stipend--
Umbrellas pass of every shade of green,
And now and then a crimson one is seen,
Like an Umbrella _ripen’d_.

Over the way a waggon
Stands with six smoking horses, shrinking, blinking,
While in the George and Dragon
The man is keeping himself dry--and drinking!
The Butcher’s boy skulks underneath his tray,
Hats shine--shoes don’t--and down droop collars,
And one blue Parasol cries all the way
To school, in company with four small scholars!

Unhappy is the man to-day who rides,
Making his journey sloppier, not shorter;
Aye, there they go, a dozen of outsides,
Performing on “a Stage with real water!”
A dripping Pauper crawls along the way,
The only real willing out-of-doorer
And says, or seems to say,
“Well, I am poor enough--but here’s a _pourer_!”

The scene in water colours thus I paint,
Is your own Festival, you Sloppy Saint!
Mother of all the Family of Rainers!
Saint of the Soakers!
Making all people croakers,
Like frogs in swampy marshes, and complainers!
And why you mizzle forty days together,
Giving the earth your water-soup to sup,
I marvel--Why such wet, mysterious weather?
I wish you’d _clear it up_!
Why cast such cruel dampers
On pretty Pic Nics, and against all wishes
Set the cold ducks a-swimming in the hampers,
And volunteer, unask’d, to wash the dishes?
Why drive the Nymphs from the selected spot,
To cling like lady-birds around a tree--
Why spoil a Gipsy party at their tea,
By throwing your cold water upon hot?

Cannot a rural maiden, or a man,
Seek Hornsey-Wood by invitation, sipping
Their green with Pan,
But souse you come, and show their Pan, all dripping!
Why upon snow-white table-cloths and sheets,
That do not wait, or want a second washing,
Come squashing?
Why task yourself to lay the dust in streets,
As if there were no Water-Cart contractors,
No pot-boys spilling beer, no shop-boys ruddy
Spooning out puddles muddy,
Milkmaids, and other slopping benefactors!

A Queen you are, raining in your own right,
Yet oh! how little flatter’d by report!
Even by those that seek the Court,
Pelted with every term of spleen and spite.
Folks rail and swear at you in every place;
They say you are a creature of no bowel;
They say you’re always washing Nature’s face,
And that you then supply her,
With nothing drier,
Than some old wringing cloud by way of towel!
The whole town wants you duck’d, just as you duck it,
They wish you on your own mud porridge supper’d,
They hope that you may kick your own big bucket,
Or in your water-butt go sous! heels up’ard!
They are, in short, so weary of your drizzle,
They’d spill the water in your veins to stop it--
Be warn’d! You are too partial to a mizzle--
Pray _drop it_!

LINES TO A LADY ON HER DEPARTURE FOR INDIA.

Go where the waves run rather Holborn-hilly,
And tempests make a soda-water sea,
Almost as rough as our rough Piccadilly,
And think of me!

Go where the mild Madeira ripens _her_ juice,--
A wine more praised than it deserves to be!
Go pass the Cape, just capable of ver-juice,
And think of me!

Go where the Tiger in the darkness prowleth,
Making a midnight meal of he and she;
Go where the Lion in his hunger howleth,
And think of me!

Go where the serpent dangerously coileth,
Or lies along at full length like a tree,
Go where the Suttee in her own soot broileth,
And think of me!

Go where with human notes the Parrot dealeth
In mono-_polly_-logue with tongue as free,
And like a woman, all she can revealeth,
And think of me!

Go to the land of muslin and nankeening,
And parasols of straw where hats should be,
Go to the land of slaves and palankeening,
And think of me!

Go to the land of Jungles and of vast hills,
And tall bamboos--may none _bamboozle_ thee!
Go gaze upon their Elephants and Castles,
And think of me!

Go where a cook must always be a currier,
And parch the pepper’d palate like a pea,
Go where the fierce musquito is a worrier,
And think of me!

Go where the maiden on a marriage plan goes,
Consign’d for wedlock to Calcutta’s quay,
Where woman goes for mart, the same as mangoes,
And think of me!

Go where the sun is very hot and fervent,
Go to the land of pagod and rupee,
Where every black will be your slave and servant,
And think of me!

SIR JOHN BOWRING.

To Bowring, man of many tongues,
(All over tongues like rumour)
This tributary verse belongs
To paint his learned humour;
All kinds of gabs he talks, I wis,
From Latin down to Scottish;
As fluent as a parrot is,
But far more _Polly_-glottish!
No grammar too abstruse he meets
However dark and verby,--
He gossips Greek about the streets,
And often _Russ_--in urbe--:
Strange tongues whate’er you do them call,
In short the man is able
To tell you what’s _o’clock_ in all
The _dialects_ of Babel.
Take him on ‘Change; try Portuguese,
The Moorish and the Spanish,
Polish, Hungarian, Tyrolese,
The Swedish and the Danish;
Try him with these and fifty such,
His skill will ne’er diminish,
Although you should begin in Dutch
And end (like me) in _Finnish_.

TO MR. M‘ADAM.

“Let us take to the road!”--_Beggar’s Opera._

Madam, hail!
Hail, Roadian! hail, Collossus! who dost stand
Striding ten thousand turnpikes on the land!
Oh universal Leveller! all hail!
To thee, a good, yet stony-hearted man,
The kindest one, and yet the flintiest going,--
To thee,--how much for thy commodious plan,
Lanark Reformer of the Ruts, is Owing!
The Bristol mail
Gliding o’er ways, hitherto deem’d invincible,
When carrying Patriots, now shall never fail
Those of the most “_unshaken_ public principle.”
Hail to thee, Scot of Scots!
Thou northern light, amid those heavy men!
Foe to Stonehenge, yet friend to all beside,
Thou scatter’st flints and favours far and wide,
From palaces to cots;--
Dispenser of coagulated good!
Distributor of granite and of food!
Long may thy fame its even path march on,
E’en when thy sons are dead!
Best benefactor! though thou giv’st a stone
To those who ask for bread!

Thy first great trial in this mighty town
Was, if I rightly recollect, upon
That gentle hill which goeth
Down from “the County” to the Palace gate,
And, like a river, thanks to thee, now floweth
Past the Old Horticultural Society,--
The chemist Cobb’s, the house of Howell and James,
Where ladies play high shawl and satin games--
A little _Hell_ of lace!
And past the Athenæum, made of late,
Severs a sweet variety
Of milliners and booksellers who grace
Waterloo Place,
Making division, the Muse fears and guesses,
’Twixt Mr. Rivington’s and Mr Hessey’s.
Thou stood’st thy trial, Mac! and shaved the road
From Barber Beaumont’s to the King’s abode
So well, that paviours threw their rammers by,
Let down their tuck’d shirt sleeves, and with a sigh
Prepared themselves, poor souls, to chip or die!

Next, from the palace to the prison, thou
Didst go, the highway’s watchman, to thy beat,--
Preventing though the _rattling_ in the street,
Yet kicking up a row,
Upon the stones--ah! truly watchman-like,
Encouraging thy victims all to strike,
To further thy own purpose, Adam, daily;--
Thou hast smoothed, alas, the path to the Old Bailey!
And to the stony bowers
Of Newgate, to encourage the approach,
By caravan or coach,--
Hast strewed the way with flints as soft as flowers.

Who shall dispute thy name!
Insculpt in stone in every street,
We soon shall greet
Thy trodden down, yet all unconquered fame!
Where’er we take, even at this time, our way,
Nought see we, but mankind in open air,
Hammering thy fame, as Chantrey would not dare;--
And with a patient care
Chipping thy immortality all day!
Demosthenes, of old,--that rare old man,--
Prophetically _followed_, Mac! thy plan:--
For he, we know,
(History says so,)
Put _pebbles_ in his mouth when he would speak
The _smoothest_ Greek!
It is “impossible, and cannot be,”
But that thy genius hath,
Besides the turnpike, many another path
Trod, to arrive at popularity.
O’er Pegasus, perchance, thou hast thrown a thigh,
Nor ridden a roadster only;--mighty Mac!
And ‘faith I’d swear, when on that wingèd hack,
Thou hast observed the highways in the sky!
Is the path up Parnassus rough and steep,
And “hard to climb,” as Dr. B. would say?
Dost think it best for Sons of Song to keep
The noiseless _tenor_ of their way? (see Gray.)
What line of road _should_ poets take to bring
Themselves unto those waters, loved the first!--
Those waters which can wet a man to sing!
Which, like thy fame, “from _granite_ basins burst,
Leap into life, and, sparkling, woo the thirst?”

That thou’rt a proser, even thy birthplace might
Vouchsafe;--and Mr. Cadell _may_, God wot,
Have paid thee many a pound for many a blot,--
Cadell’s a wayward wight!
Although no Walter, still thou art a Scot,
And I can throw, I think, a little light
Upon some works thou hast written for the town,--
And published, like a Lilliput Unknown!
“Highways and Byeways” is thy book, no doubt,
(One whole edition’s out,)
And next, for it is fair
That Fame,
Seeing her children, should confess she had ’em;--
“Some _Passages_ from the life of Adam Blair,”--
(Blair is a Scottish name,)
What are they, but thy own good roads, M‘Adam?

O! indefatigable labourer
In the paths of men! when thou shalt die, ’twill be
A mark of thy surpassing industry,
That of the monument, which men shall rear
Over thy most inestimable bone,
Thou didst thy very self lay the first stone!--
Of a right ancient line thou comest,--through
Each crook and turn we trace the unbroken clue,
Until we see thy sire before our eyes,--
Rolling his gravel walks in Paradise!
But he, our great Mac Parent, erred, and ne’er
Have our walks since been fair?
Yet Time, who, like the merchant, lives on ‘Change,
For ever varying, through his varying range,
Time maketh all things even!
In this strange world, turning beneath high heaven,
He hath redeemed the Adams, and contrived,--
(How are time’s wonders hived!)
In pity to mankind, and to befriend ’em,--
(Time is above all praise,)
That he, who first did make our evil ways,
Reborn in Scotland, should be first to mend ’em!

A _FRIENDLY_ EPISTLE TO MRS. FRY, _IN_ NEWGATE.

“Sermons in stones.”--_As You Like It._
“Out! out! damned spot!”--_Macbeth._

I like you, Mrs. Fry! I like your name!
It speaks the very warmth you feel in pressing
In daily act round Charity’s great flame--
I like the crisp brown way you have of dressing,
Good Mrs. Fry! I like the placid claim
You make to Christianity,--professing
Love, and good _works_--of course you buy of Barton,
Beside the young _fry’s_ bookseller, Friend Darton!

I like, good Mrs. Fry, your brethren mute--
Those serious, solemn gentlemen that sport--
I should have said, that _wear_, the sober suit
Shaped like a court dress--but for heaven’s court.
I like your sisters too,--sweet Rachel’s fruit--
Protestant nuns! I like their stiff support
Of virtue--and I like to see them clad
With such a difference--just like good from bad!

I like the sober colours--not the wet;
Those gaudy manufactures of the rainbow--
Green, orange, crimson, purple, violet--
In which the fair, the flirting, and the vain, go--
The others are a chaste, severer set,
In which the good, the pious, and the plain, go--
They’re moral _standards_, to know Christians by--
In short, they are your _colours_, Mrs. Fry!

As for the naughty tinges of the prism--
Crimson’s the cruel uniform of war--
Blue--hue of brimstone! minds no catechism;
And green is young and gay--not noted for
Goodness, or gravity, or quietism,
Till it is saddened down to tea-green, or
Olive--and purple’s given to wine, I guess;
And yellow is a convict by its dress!

They’re all the devil’s liveries, that men
And women wear in servitude to sin--
But how will they come off; poor motleys, when
Sin’s wages are paid down, and they stand in
The Evil presence? You and I know, then
How all the party colours will begin
To part--the _Pit_tite hues will sadden there,
Whereas the _Fox_ite shades will all show fair!

Witness their goodly labours one by one!
_Russet_ makes garments for the needy poor--
_Dove-colour_ preaches love to all--and _dun_
Calls every day at Charity’s street-door--
_Brown_ studies scripture, and bids woman shun
All gaudy furnishing--_olive_ doth pour
Oil into wounds: and _drab_ and _slate_ supply
Scholar and book in Newgate, Mrs. Fry!

Well! Heaven forbid that I should discommend
The gratis, charitable, jail-endeavour!
When all persuasions in your praises blend--
The Methodist’s creed and cry are, _Fry_ for ever!
No--I will be your friend--and, like a friend,
Point out your very worst defect--Nay, never
Start at that word!--But I _must_ ask you why
You keep your school _in_ Newgate, Mrs. Fry?

Too well I know the price our mother Eve
Paid for _her_ schooling: but must all her daughters
Commit a petty larceny, and thieve--
Pay down a crime for “_entrance_” to your “_quarters_?”
Your classes may increase, but I must grieve
Over your pupils at their bread-and-waters!
Oh, tho’ it cost you rent--(and rooms run high!)
Keep your school _out_ of Newgate, Mrs. Fry!

O save the vulgar soul before it’s spoiled!
Set up your mounted sign _without_ the gate--
And there inform the mind before ’tis soiled!
’Tis sorry writing on a greasy slate!
Nay, if you would not have your labours foiled,
Take it _inclining_ tow’rds a virtuous state,
Not prostrate and laid flat--else, woman meek!
The _upright_ pencil will but hop and shriek!

Ah, who can tell how hard it is to drain
The evil spirit from the heart it preys in,--
To bring sobriety to life again,
Choked with the vile Anacreontic raisin,--
To wash Black Betty when her black’s ingrain,--
To stick a moral lacquer on Moll Brazen,
Of Suky Tawdry’s habits to deprive her;
To tame the wild-fowl-ways of Jenny Diver!

Ah, who can tell how hard it is to teach
Miss Nancy Dawson on her bed of straw--
To make Long Sal sew up the endless breach
She made in manners--to write heaven’s own law
On hearts of granite.--Nay, how hard to preach,
In cells, that are not memory’s--to draw
The moral thread, through the immoral eye
Of blunt Whitechapel natures, Mrs. Fry!

In vain you teach them baby-work within:
’Tis but a clumsy botchery of crime;
’Tis but a tedious darning of old sin--
Come out yourself, and stitch up souls in time--
It is too late for scouring to begin
When virtue’s ravelled out, when all the prime
Is worn away, and nothing sound remains;
You’ll fret the fabric out before the stains!

I like your chocolate, good Mrs. Fry!
I like your cookery in every way;
I like your shrove-tide service and supply;

I like to hear your sweet _Pandeans_ play;
I like the pity in your full-brimmed eye;
I like your carriage, and your silken grey,
Your dove-like habits, and your silent preaching;
But I don’t like your Newgatory teaching.

Come out of Newgate, Mrs. Fry! Repair
Abroad, and find your pupils in the streets.
O, come abroad into the wholesome air,
And take your moral place, before Sin seats
Her wicked self in the Professor’s chair.
Suppose some morals raw! the true receipt’s
To dress them in the pan, but do not try
To cook them in the fire, good Mrs. Fry!

Put on your decent bonnet, and come out!
Good lack! the ancients did not set up schools
In jail--but at the _Porch_! hinting, no doubt,
That Vice should have a lesson in the rules
Before ’twas whipt by law.--O come about,
Good Mrs. Fry! and set up forms and stools
All down the Old Bailey, and thro’ Newgate-street,
But not in Mr. Wontner’s proper seat!

Teach Lady Barrymore, if, teaching, you
That peerless Peeress can absolve from dolour;
Teach her it is not virtue to pursue
Ruin of blue, or any other colour;
Teach her it is not Virtue’s crown to rue,
Month after month, the unpaid drunken dollar;
Teach her that “flooring Charleys” is a game
Unworthy one that bears a Christian name.

O come and teach our children--that ar’n’t _ours_--
That heaven’s straight pathway is a narrow way,
Not Broad St. Giles’s, where fierce Sin devours
Children, like Time--or rather they both prey
On youth together--meanwhile Newgate low’rs
Ev’n like a black cloud at the close of day,
To shut them out from any more blue sky:
Think of these hopeless wretches, Mrs. Fry!

You are not nice--go into their retreats,
And make them Quakers, if you will.--’Twere best
They wore straight collars, and their shirts sans _pleats_;
That they had hats _with_ brims,--that they were drest
In garbs without _lappels_--than shame the streets
With so much raggedness.--You may invest
Much cash this way--but it will cost its price,
To give a good, round, real _cheque_ to Vice!

In brief,--Oh teach the child its moral rote,
Not _in_ the way from which ’twill not depart,--
But _out_--out--out! Oh, bid it walk remote!
And if the skies are closed against the smart,
Ev’n let him wear the single-breasted coat,
For that ensureth singleness of heart.--
Do what you will, his every want supply,
_Keep_ him--but _out_ of Newgate, Mrs. Fry!

TO MR. DYMOKE.

THE CHAMPION OF ENGLAND.

“---- Arma Virumque cano!”--VIRGIL.

Mr. Dymoke! Sir Knight! if I may be so bold--
(I’m a poor simple gentleman just come to town,)
Is your armour put by, like the sheep in a fold?--
Is your gauntlet ta’en up, which you lately flung down?

Are you--who _that_ day rode so mail’d and admired,
Now sitting at ease in a library chair?
Have you sent back to Astley the war-horse you hired,
With a cheque upon Chambers to settle the fare?

What’s become of the cup? Great tin-plate worker! say!
Cup and ball is a game which some people deem fun!
Oh: _three golden balls_ haven’t lured you to play
Rather false, Mr. D., to all pledges but one?

How defunct is the show that was chivalry’s mimic!
The breastplate--the feathers--the gallant array!
So fades, so grows dim, and so dies, Mr. Dymoke!
The day of brass breeches! as Wordsworth would say!

Perchance in some village remote, with a cot,
And a cow, and a pig, and a barndoor, and all;--
You show to the parish that peace is your lot,
And plenty,--though absent from Westminster Hall!

And of course you turn every accoutrement now
To its separate use, that your wants may be well-met;--
You toss in your breastplate your pancakes, and grow
A salad of mustard and cress in your helmet.

And you delve the fresh earth with your falchion, less bright
Since hung up in sloth from its Westminster task;
And you bake your own bread in your tin; and, Sir Knight,
Instead of your brow, put your beer in the casque!

How delightful to sit by your beans and your peas,
With a goblet of gooseberry gallantly clutched,
And chat of the blood that had deluged the Pleas
And drenched the King’s Bench,--if the glove had been touched!

If Sir Columbine Daniel, with knightly pretensions
Had snatched your “best doe,”--he’d have flooded the floor;--
Nor would even the best of his crafty inventions,
“Life Preservers,” have floated him out of his gore!

Oh, you and your horse! what a couple was there!
The man and his _backer_,--to win a great fight!
Though the trumpet was loud,--you’d an undisturbed air!
And the nag snuffed the feast and the fray _sans_ affright!

Yet strange was the course which the good Cato bore
When he waddled tail-wise with the cup to his stall;--
For though his departure was at the front door,
Still he went the back way out of Westminster Hall.

He went,--and ’twould puzzle historians to say,
When they trust Time’s conveyance to carry your _mail_,--
Whether caution or courage inspired him that day,
For though he retreated, he never turned tail.

By my life, he’s a wonderful charger!--The best!
Though not for a Parthian corps!--yet for you!--
Distinguished alike at a fray and a feast,
What a horse for a grand Retrospective Review!

What a creature to keep a hot warrior cool
When the sun’s in the face, and the shade’s far aloof!--
What a _tailpiece_ for Bewick!--or piebald for Poole,
To bear him in safety from Elliston’s hoof!

Well! hail to old Cato! the hero of scenes
May Astley or age ne’er his comforts abridge;--
Oh, long may he munch Amphitheatre beans,
Well “pent up in Utica” over the Bridge!

And to you, Mr. Dymoke, Cribb’s rival, I keep
Wishing all country pleasures, the bravest and best!
And oh! when you come to the Hummums to sleep,
May you lie “like a warrior taking his rest!”

TO JOSEPH GRIMALDI, SENIOR.

“This fellow’s wise enough to play the fool,
And to do that well craves a kind of wit.”

--_Twelfth Night._

Joseph! they say thou’st left the stage,
To toddle down the hill of life,
And taste the flannell’d ease of age,
Apart from pantomimic strife--
“Retired--[for Young would call it so]--
The world shut out”--in Pleasant Row!

And hast thou really wash’d at last
From each white cheek the red half-moon!
And all thy public Clownship cast,
To play the private Pantaloon?
All youth--all ages yet to be
Shall have a heavy miss of thee!

Thou didst not preach to make us wise--
Thou hadst no finger in our schooling--
Thou didst not “lure us to the skies”--
Thy simple, simple trade was--Fooling!
And yet, Heav’n knows! we could--we can
Much “better spare a better man!”

Oh, had it pleased the gout to take
The reverend Croly from the stage,
Or Southey, for our quiet’s sake,
Or Mr. Fletcher, Cupid’s sage,
Or, damme! namby pamby Poole,--
Or any other clown or fool!

Go, Dibdin--all that bear the name,
Go Byeway Highway man! go! go!
Go, Skeffy--man of painted fame,
But leave thy partner, painted Joe!
I could bear Kirby on the wane,
Or Signor Paulo with a sprain!

Had Joseph Wilfred Parkins made
His grey hairs scarce in private peace--
Had Waithman sought a rural shade--
Or Cobbett ta’en a turnpike lease--
Or Lisle Bowles gone to _Balaam_ Hill--
I think I could be cheerful still!

Had Medwin left off, to his praise,
Dead-lion-kicking, like--a friend!--
Had long, long Irving gone his ways
To muse on death at _Ponder’s End_--
Or Lady Morgan taken leave
Of Letters--still I might not grieve!

But, Joseph--everybody’s Joe!--
Is gone--and grieve I will and must!
As Hamlet did for Yorick, so
Will I for thee (though not yet dust),
And talk as he did when he miss’d
The kissing-crust that he had kiss’d!

Ah, where is now thy rolling head!
Thy winking, reeling, _drunken_ eyes,
(As old Catullus would have said,)
Thy oven-mouth, that swallow’d pies--
Enormous hunger--monstrous drouth!--
Thy pockets greedy as thy mouth!

Ah, where thy ears, so often cuff’d!--
Thy funny, flapping, filching hands!--
Thy partridge body, always stuff’d
With waifs, and strays, and contrabands!--
Thy foot--like Berkeley’s _Foote_--for why?
’Twas often made to wipe an eye!

Ah, where thy legs--that witty pair!
For “great wits jump”--and so did they!
Lord! how they leap’d in lamplight air!
Caper’d--and bounced--and strode away!--
That years should tame the legs--alack!
I’ve seen spring through an Almanack!

But bounds will have their bound--the shocks
Of Time will cramp the nimblest toes;
And those that frisk’d in silken clocks
May look to limp in fleecy hose--
One only--(Champion of the ring)
Could ever make his Winter--Spring!

And gout, that owns no odds between
The toe of Czar and toe of Clown,
Will visit--but I did not mean
To moralize, though I am grown
Thus sad,--Thy going seem’d to beat
A muffled drum for Fun’s retreat!

And, may be--’tis no time to smother
A sigh, when two prime wags of London
Are gone--thou, Joseph, one,--the other,
A Joe!--“sic transit gloria _Munden_!”
A third departure some insist on,--
Stage-apoplexy threatens Liston!--

Nay, then, let Sleeping Beauty sleep
With ancient “_Dozey_” to the dregs,--
Let Mother Goose wear mourning deep,
And put a hatchment o’er her eggs!
Let Farley weep--for Magic’s man
Is gone--his Christmas Caliban!

Let Kemble, Forbes, and Willet rain,
As though they walk’d behind thy bier,--
For since thou wilt not play again,
What matters,--if in heav’n or here!
Or in thy grave, or in thy bed!--
There’s _Quick_ might just as well be dead!

Oh, how will thy departure cloud
The lamplight of the little breast!
The Christmas child will grieve aloud
To miss his broadest friend and best,--
Poor urchin! what avails to him
The cold New Monthly’s _Ghost of Grimm_?

For who like thee could ever stride!
Some dozen paces to the mile!
The motley, medley coach provide--
Or like Joe Frankenstein compile
The _vegetable man_ complete!--
A proper _Covent Garden_ feat!

Oh, who like thee could ever drink,
Or eat,--swill--swallow--bolt--and choke!
Nod, weep, and hiccup--sneeze and wink?--
Thy very yawn was quite a joke!
Though Joseph, Junior, acts not ill,
“There’s no Fool like the old Fool” still!

Joseph, farewell! dear funny Joe!
We met with mirth,--we part in pain!
For many a long, long year must go
Ere Fun can see thy like again--
For Nature does not keep great stores
Of perfect Clowns--that are not _Boors_!

TO SYLVANUS URBAN, ESQ.,

EDITOR OF THE “GENTLEMAN’S MAGAZINE.”

“Dost thou not suspect my years?”--_Much Ado about Nothing._

Oh! Mr. Urban! never must _thou_ lurch
A sober age made serious drunk by thee;
Hop in thy pleasant way from church to church,
And nurse thy little bald Biography.

Oh, my Sylvanus! what a heart is thine!
And what a page attends thee! Long may I
Hang in demure confusion o’er each line
That asks thy little questions with a sigh!

Old tottering years have nodded to their falls,
Like pensioners that creep about and die;--
But thou, Old Parr of periodicals,
Livest in monthly immortality!

How sweet!--as Byron of _his_ infant said,--
“Knowledge of objects” in thine eye to trace;
To see the mild no-meanings of thy head,
Taking a quiet nap upon thy face!

How dear through thy Obituary to roam,
And not a name of any name to catch!
To meet thy Criticism walking home
Averse from rows, and never calling “Watch!”

Rich is thy page in soporific things,--
Composing compositions,--lulling men,--
Faded old posies of unburied rings,--
Confessions dozing from an opiate pen:--

Lives of Right Reverends that have never lived,--
Deaths of good people that have really died,--
Parishioners,--hatched,--husbanded,--and wived,--
Bankrupts and Abbots breaking side by side!

The sacred query,--the remote response,--
The march of serious mind, extremely slow,--
The graver’s cut at some right agèd sconce,
Famous for nothing many years ago!

B. asks of C. if Milton e’er did write
“Comus,” obscured beneath some Ludlow lid;--
And C., next month, an answer doth indite,
Informing B. that Mr. Milton did!

X. sends the portrait of a genuine flea,
Caught upon Martin Luther years agone;--
And Mr. Parkes, of Shrewsbury, draws a bee,
Long dead, that gathered honey for King John.

There is no end of thee,--there is no end,
Sylvanus, of thy A, B, C, D-merits!
Thou dost, with alphabets, old walls attend,
And poke the letters into holes, like ferrets.

Go on, Sylvanus!--Bear a wary eye,
The churches cannot yet be quite run out!
Some parishes must yet have been passed by,--
There’s Bullock-Smithy has a church no doubt!

Go on--and close the eyes of distant ages!
Nourish the names of the undoubted dead!
So Epicures shall pick thy lobster-pages,
Heavy and lively, though but seldom _red_.

Go on! and thrive! Demurest of odd fellows!
Bottling up dulness in an ancient binn!
Still live! still prose!--continue still to tell us
Old truths! no strangers, though we take them in!

TO W. KITCHENER, M.D.,

AUTHOR OF “THE COOK’S ORACLE,” “OBSERVATIONS ON VOCAL MUSIC,” “THE
ART OF INVIGORATING AND PROLONGING LIFE,” “PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS
ON TELESCOPES, OPERA-GLASSES, AND SPECTACLES,” “THE HOUSEKEEPER’S
LEDGER,” AND “THE PLEASURE OF MAKING A WILL.”

“I rule the roast, as Milton says!”--CALEB QUOTEM.

Hail! multifarious man!
Thou Wondrous, Admirable Kitchen Crichton!
Born to enlighten
The laws of Optics, Peptics, Music, Cooking--
Master of the Piano--and the Pan--
As busy with the kitchen as the skies!
Now looking
At some rich stew through Galileo’s eyes,--
Or boiling eggs--timed to a metronome--
As much at home
In spectacles as in mere isinglass--
In the art of frying brown--as a digression
On music and poetical expression,--
Whereas, how few, of all our cooks, alas!
Could tell Calliope from “Callipee!”
How few there be
Could cleave the lowest for the highest stories,
(Observatories,)
And turn, like thee, Diana’s calculator,
However _cook’s_ synonymous with _Kater_![5]
Alas! still let me say,
How few could lay
The carving knife beside the tuning fork,
Like the proverbial _Jack_ ready for any work!

Oh, to behold thy features in thy book!
Thy proper head and shoulders in a plate,
How it would look!
With one raised eye watching the dial’s date,
And one upon the roast, gently cast down--
Thy chops--done nicely brown--
The garnish’d brow--with “a few leaves of bay”--
The hair--“done Wiggy’s way!”
And still one studious finger near thy brains,
As if thou wert just come
From editing of some
New soup--or hashing Dibdin’s cold remains!
Or, Orpheus-like,--fresh from thy dying strains
Of music,--Epping luxuries of sound,
As Milton says, “in many a bout
Of linkëd sweetness long drawn out,”
While all thy tame stuff’d leopards listen’d round!

Oh, rather thy whole proper length reveal,
Standing like Fortune,--on the jack--thy wheel.
(Thou art, like Fortune, full of chops and changes,
Thou hast a fillet too before thine eye!)
Scanning our kitchen, and our vocal ranges,
As though it were the same to sing or fry--
Nay, so it is--hear how Miss Paton’s throat
Makes “fritters” of a note!
And how Tom Cook (Fryer and Singer born
By name and nature) oh! how night and morn
He for the nicest public taste doth dish up
The good things from that Pan of music--Bishop!
And is not reading near akin to feeding,
Or why should Oxford Sausages be fit
Receptacles for wit?
Or why should Cambridge put its little, smart,
Minced brains into a Tart?
Nay, then, thou wert but wise to frame receipts,
Book-treats,
Equally to instruct the Cook and cram her--
Receipts to be devour’d, as well as read,
The Culinary Art in gingerbread--
The Kitchen’s _Eaten_ Grammar!

Oh, very pleasant is thy motley page--
Aye, very pleasant in its chatty vein--
So--in a kitchen--would have talk’d Montaigne.
That merry Gascon--humourist, and sage!
Let slender minds with single themes engage,
Like Mr. Bowles with his eternal Pope,--
Or Haydon on perpetual Haydon,--or
Hume on--“Twice three make four.”
Or Lovelass upon Wills,--Thou goest on
Plaiting ten topics, like Tate Wilkinson!
Thy brain is like a rich Kaleidoscope,
Stuff’d with a brilliant medley of odd bits,
And ever shifting on from change to change,
Saucepans--old Songs--Pills--Spectacles--and Spits!
Thy range is wider than a Rumford range!
Thy grasp a miracle!--till I recall
Th’ indubitable cause of thy variety--
Thou art, of course, th’ Epitome of all
That spying--frying--singing--mix’d Society
Of Scientific Friends, who used to meet
Welsh Rabbits--and thyself--in Warren Street!

Oh, hast thou still those Conversazioni,
Where learnëd visitors discoursed--and fed?
There came Belzoni,
Fresh from the ashes of Egyptian dead--
And gentle Poki--and that Royal Pair,
Of whom thou didst declare--
“Thanks to the greatest _Cooke_ we ever read--
They were--what _Sandwiches_ should be--half _bred_?”
There famed M‘Adam from his manual toil
Relax’d--and freely own’d he took thy hints
On “making _Broth_ with _Flints_”--
There Parry came, and show’d thee polar oil
For melted butter--Combe with his medullary
Notions about the _Skullery_,
And Mr. Poole, too partial to a broil--
There witty Rogers came, that punning elf!
Who used to swear thy book
Would really look
A _Delphic_ “Oracle,” if laid on _Delf_--
There, once a month, came Campbell and discuss’d
His own--and thy own--“_Magazine of Taste_”--
There Wilberforce the Just
Came, in his old black suit, till once he traced
Thy sly advice to _Poachers_ of Black Folks,--
That “do not break their _yolks_,”--
Which huff’d him home, in grave disgust and haste!

There came John Clare, the poet, nor forbore
Thy _Patties_--thou wert hand-and-glove with Moore,
Who call’d thee “_Kitchen Addison_”--for why?
Thou givest rules for Health and Peptic Pills,
Forms for made dishes, and receipts for Wills,
“_Teaching us how to live and how to die_?”
There came thy Cousin-Cook, good Mrs. Fry--
There Trench, the Thames Projector, first brought on
His sine _Quay_ non,--
There Martin would drop in on Monday eves,
Or Fridays, from the pens, and raise his breath
‘Gainst cattle days and death,--
Answer’d by Mellish, feeder of fat beeves,
Who swore that Frenchmen never could be eager
For fighting on soup meagre--
“And yet (as thou wouldst add) the French have seen
A Marshal _Tureen_?”
Great was thy Evening Cluster!--often graced
With Dollond--Burgess--and Sir Humphry Davy!
’Twas there M’Dermot first inclined to Taste,--
There Colburn learn’d the art of making paste
For puffs--and Accum analysed a gravy.
Colman--the Cutter of Coleman Street, ’tis said,
Came there,--and Parkins with his Ex-wise-head,
(His claim to letters)--Kater, too, the Moon’s
Crony,--and Graham, lofty on balloons,--
There Croly stalked with holy humour heated,
(Who wrote a light-horse play, which Yates completed)--
And Lady Morgan, that grinding organ,
And Brasbridge telling anecdotes of spoons,--
Madame Valbrèque thrice honour’d thee, and came
With great Rossini, his own bow and fiddle,--
The Dibdins,--Tom, Charles, Frognall, came with tuns
Of poor old books, old puns!
And even Irving spared a night from fame,
And talk’d--till thou didst stop him in the middle,
To serve round _Tewah-diddle_![6]
Then all the guests rose up, and sighed good-bye!
So let them:--thou thyself art still a _Host_!
Dibdin--Cornaro--Newton--Mrs. Fry!
Mrs. Glasse, Mr. Spec!--Lovelass and Weber,
Mathews in Quot’em--Moore’s fire-worshipping Gheber--
Thrice-worthy Worthy! seem by thee engross’d!
Howbeit the Peptic Cook still rules the roast,
Potent to hush all ventriloquial snarling,--
And ease the bosom pangs of indigestion!
Thou art, sans question,
The Corporation’s love--its Doctor _Darling_!
Look at the Civic Palate--nay, the Bed
Which set dear Mrs. Opie on supplying
“Illustrations of _Lying_!”
Ninety square feet of down from heel to head
It measured, and I dread
Was haunted by a terrible night _Mare_,
A monstrous burthen on the corporation!--
Look at the Bill of Fare for one day’s share,
Sea-turtles by the score--oxen by droves.
Geese, turkeys, by the flock--fishes and loaves
Countless, as when the Lilliputian nation
Was making up the huge man-mountain’s ration!

Oh! worthy Doctor! surely thou hast driven
The squatting Demon from great Garratt’s breast--
(His honour seems to rest!--)
And what is thy reward?--Hath London given
Thee public thanks for thy important service?
Alas! not even
The tokens it bestow’d on Howe and Jervis!--
Yet could I speak as Orators should speak
Before the Worshipful the Common Council
(Utter my bold bad grammar and pronounce ill,)
Thou shouldst not miss thy Freedom for a week,
Richly engross’d on vellum:--Reason urges
That he who rules our cookery--that he
Who edits soups and gravies, ought to be
A _Citizen_, where sauce can make a _Burgess_!

TO THE DEAN AND CHAPTER OF WESTMINSTER.

“Sure the Guardians of the Temple can never think they get enough.”--

CITIZEN OF THE WORLD.

Oh, very reverend Dean and Chapter,
Exhibitors of giant men,
Hail to each surplice-back’d adapter
Of England’s dead, in her stone den!
Ye teach us properly to prize
Two-shilling Grays, and Gays, and Handels,
And, to throw light upon our eyes,
Deal in Wax Queens like old wax candles.

Oh, reverend showmen, rank and file,
Call in your shillings, two and two;
March with them up the middle aisle,
And cloister them from public view.
Yours surely are the dusty dead,
Gladly ye look from bust to bust,
And set a price on each great head,
And make it come down with the dust.

Oh, as I see you walk along
In ample sleeves and ample back,
A pursy and well-order’d throng,
Thoroughly fed, thoroughly black!
In vain I strive me to be dumb,--
You keep each bard like fatted kid,
Grind bones for bread like Fee-faw-fum!
And drink from skulls as Byron did!

The profitable Abbey is
A sacred ‘Change for stony stock,
Not that a speculation ’tis--
The profit’s founded on a rock.
Death and the Doctors in each nave
Bony investments have inurn’d,
And hard ’twould be to find a grave
From which “no money is returned!”

Here many a pensive pilgrim, brought
By reverence for those learnëd bones,
Shall often come and walk your short
Two-shilling fare upon the stones--[7]
Ye have that talisman of Wealth
Which puddling chemists sought of old
Till ruin’d out of hope and health--
The Tomb’s the stone that turns to gold!

Oh, licensed cannibals, ye eat
Your dinners from your own dead race,
Think Gray, preserved--a “funeral meat,”
And Dryden, devil’d--after grace,
A relish;--and you take your meal
From Rare Ben Jonson underdone,
Or, whet your holy knives on Steele,
To cut away at Addison!

Oh say, of all this famous age,
Whose learnëd bones your hopes expect,
Oh have ye number’d Rydal’s sage,
Or Moore among your Ghosts elect?
Lord Byron was not doom’d to make
You richer by his final sleep--
Why don’t ye warn the Great to take
Their ashes to no other heap!

Southey’s reversion have ye got?
With Coleridge, for his body, made
A bargain?--has Sir Walter Scott,
Like Peter Schlemihl, sold his shade?
Has Rogers haggled hard, or sold
His features for your marble shows,
Or Campbell barter’d ere he’s cold,
All interest in his “_bone_ repose?”

Rare is your show, ye righteous men!
Priestly Politos,--rare, I ween;
But should ye not outside the Den
Paint up what in it may be seen?
A long green Shakspeare, with a deer
Grasp’d in the many folds it died in,--
A Butler stuff’d from ear to ear,
Wet White Bears weeping o’er a Dryden!

Paint Garrick up like Mr. Paap,
A Giant of some inches high;
Paint Handel up, that organ chap,
With you, as grinders, in his eye;
Depict some plaintive antique thing,
And say th’ original may be seen;--
Blind Milton with a dog and string
May be the Beggar o’ Bethnal Green!

Put up in Poet’s Corner, near
The little door, a platform small;
Get there a monkey--never fear,
You’ll catch the gapers, one and all!
Stand each of ye a Body Guard,
A Trumpet under either fin,
And yell away in Palace Yard
“All dead! All dead! Walk in! Walk in!”

(But when the people are inside,
Their money paid--I pray you, bid
The keepers not to mount and ride
A race around each coffin lid.--
Poor Mrs. Bodkin thought, last year,
That it was hard--the woman clacks--
To have so little in her ear--
And be so hurried through the Wax!--)

“Walk in! two shillings only! come!
Be not by country grumblers funk’d!--
Walk in, and see th’ illustrious dumb,
The Cheapest House for the defunct!”
Write up, ’twill breed some just reflection,
And every rude surmise ’twill stop--
Write up, that you have no connection
(In large)--with any other shop!

And still, to catch the Clowns the more,
With samples of your shows in Wax,
Set some old Harry near the door
To answer queries with his _axe_.--
Put up some general begging-trunk--
Since the last broke by some mishap,
You’ve all a bit of General Monk,
From the respect you bore his Cap!

ON AN UNFAVOURABLE REVIEW.

“I’ll give him dash for dash.”

Jerdan, farewell! farewell to all
Who ever praised me, great or small
Your poet’s course is run!
A weekly--no, an every-day
Reviewer takes my fame away,
And I am all undone!

I cannot live an author long!
When I did write, O I did wrong
To aim at being great;
A Diamond Poet in a pin
May twinkle on in peace, and win
No diamond critic’s hate!

No small inditer of reviews
Will analyse his tiny muse,
Or lay his sonnets waste;
Who strives to prove that Richardson,
That calls himself a diamond one,
Is but a bard of paste?

The smallest bird that wings the sky
May tempt some sparrow shot, and die;
But midges still go free!
The peace that shuns my board and bed
May settle on a lowlier head,
And dwell, “St. John, with thee!”

I aimed at higher growth; and now
My leaves are withered on the bough,
I’m choked by bitter shrubs!
O Mr. F. C. W.!
What can I christen thy review
But one of “Wormwood Scrubs?”

The very man that sought me once--
(Can I so soon be grown a dunce?)
_He_ now derides my verse;
But who, save me, will fret to find
The editor has changed his mind,--
He can’t have got a worse.

TO PEACE.

WRITTEN ON THE NIGHT OF MY MISTRESS’S GRAND ROUT.

Oh Peace! oh come with me and dwell--
But stop, for there’s the bell.
Oh Peace! for thee I go and sit in churches,
On Wednesday, when there’s very few
In loft or pew--
Another ring, the tarts are come from Birch’s.
Oh Peace! for thee I have avoided marriage--
Hush! there’s a carriage.
Oh Peace! thou art the best of earthly goods--
The five Miss Woods.
Oh Peace! thou art the Goddess I adore--
There come some more.
Oh Peace! thou child of solitude and quiet--
That’s Lord Drum’s footman, for he loves a riot.

Oh Peace!
Knocks will not cease.
Oh Peace! thou wert for human comfort plann’d--
That’s Weippert’s band.
Oh Peace! now glad I welcome thy approaches--
I hear the sound of coaches.
Oh Peace! oh Peace!--another carriage stops--
It’s early for the Blenkinsops.

Oh Peace! with thee I love to wander,
But wait till I have show’d up Lady Squander,
And now I’ve seen her up the stair,
Oh Peace!--but here comes Captain Hare.
Oh Peace! thou art the slumber of the mind,
Untroubled, calm and quiet, and unbroken,--
If that is Alderman Guzzle from Portsoken,
Alderman Gobble won’t be far behind;
Oh Peace! serene in worldly shyness,--
Make way there for his Serene Highness!

Oh Peace! if you do not disdain
To dwell amongst the menial train,
I have a silent place, and lone,
That you and I may call our own;
Where tumult never makes an entry--
Susan, what business have you in my pantry?

Oh Peace! but there is Major Monk,
At variance with his wife--Oh Peace!
And that great German, Vander Trunk,
And that great talker, Miss Apreece;
Oh Peace! so dear to poets’ quills--
They’re just beginning their quadrilles--
Oh Peace! our greatest renovator;--
I wonder where I put my waiter--
Oh Peace!--but here my Ode I’ll cease;
I have no peace to write of Peace.

FOR THE NINTH OF NOVEMBER.

O Lud! O Lud! O Lud!
I mean of course that venerable town,
Mention’d in stories of renown,
Built formerly of mud;--
O Lud, I say, why didst thou e’er
Invent the office of a Mayor,
An office that no useful purpose crowns,
But to set Aldermen against each other,
That should be Brother unto Brother,--
Sisters at least, by virtue of their gowns?
But still if one must have a Mayor
To fill the Civic chair,
O Lud, I say,
Was there no better day
To fix on, than November Ninth so shivery
And dull for showing off the Livery’s livery?
Dimming, alas!
The Brazier’s brass,
Soiling th’ Embroiderers and all the Saddlers,
Sopping the Furriers,
Draggling the Curriers,
And making Merchant Tailors dirty paddlers:
Drenching the Skinners’ Company to the skin,
Making the crusty Vintner chiller,
And turning the Distiller
To cold without instead of warm within;--
Spoiling the bran-new beavers
Of Wax-chandlers and Weavers,
Plastering the Plasterers and spotting Mercers,
Hearty November-cursers--
And showing Cordwainers and dapper Drapers
Sadly in want of brushes and of scrapers;
Making the Grocer’s company not fit
For Company a bit;
Dying the Dyers with a dingy flood,
Daubing incorporated Bakers,
And leading the Patten-makers,
Over their very pattens in the mud,--
O Lud! O Lud! O Lud!

“This is a sorry sight,”
To quote Macbeth--but oh, it grieves me quite
To see your Wives and Daughters in their plumes--
White plumes not white--
Sitting at open windows catching rheums,
Not “Angels ever bright and fair,”
But angels ever brown and sallow,
With eyes--you cannot see above one pair,
For city clouds of black and yellow--
And artificial flowers, rose, leaf, and bud,
Such sable lilies
And grim daffodilies
Drooping, but not for drought, O Lud! O Lud!

I may as well, while I’m inclined,
Just go through all the faults I find:
O Lud! then, with a bitter air, say June,
Could’st thou not find a better tune
To sound with trumpets, and with drums,
Than “See the Conquering Hero comes,”
When he who comes ne’er dealt in blood?
Thy May’r is not a War Horse, Lud,
That ever charged on Turk or Tartar,
And yet upon a march you strike
That treats him like--
A little French if I may martyr--
Lewis Cart-Horse or Henry Carter!
O Lud! I say
Do change your day
To some time when your Show can really show;
When silk can seem like silk, and gold can glow.
Look at your Sweepers, how they shine in May
Have it when there’s a sun to gild the coach,
And sparkle in tiara--bracelet--brooch--
Diamond--or paste--of sister, mother, daughter;
When grandeur really may be grand--
But if thy Pageant’s thus obscured by land--
O Lud! it’s ten times worse upon the water!
Suppose, O Lud, to show its plan,
I call, like Blue Beard’s wife, to sister Anne,
Who’s gone to Beaufort Wharf with niece and aunt
To see what she can see--and what she can’t;
Chewing a saffron bun by way of cud,
To keep the fog out of a tender lung,
While perch’d in a verandah nicely hung
Over a margin of thy own black mud,
O Lud!

Now Sister Anne, I call to thee,
Look out and see:
Of course about the bridge you view them rally
And sally,

With many a wherry, sculler, punt, and cutter;
The Fishmongers’ grand boat, but not for butter,
The Goldsmiths’ glorious galley,--
Of course you see the Lord Mayor’s coach aquatic,
With silken banners that the breezes fan,
In gold all glowing,
And men in scarlet rowing,
Like Doge of Venice to the Adriatic;
Of course you see all this, O Sister Anne?
“No, I see no such thing!
I only see the edge of Beaufort Wharf,
With two coal lighters fasten’d to a ring:
And, dim as ghosts,
Two little boys are jumping over posts;
And something farther off,
That’s rather like the shadow of a dog,
And all beyond is fog.
If there be any thing so fine and bright,
To see it I must see by second sight.
Call this a Show? It is not worth a pin!
I see no barges row,
No banners blow;
The show is merely a gallanty-show,
Without a lamp or any candle in.”

But sister Anne, my dear,
Although you cannot see, you still may hear?
Of course you hear, I’m very sure of that,
The “Water parted from the Sea” in C,
Or “Where the Bee sucks,” set in B;
Or Huntsman’s chorus from the Freyschutz frightful,
Or Handel’s Water Music in A flat.

Oh music from the water comes delightful!
It sounds as no where else it can:
You hear it first,
In some rich burst,
Then faintly sighing,
Tenderly dying
Away upon the breezes, Sister Anne.

“There is no breeze to die on;
And all their drums and trumpets, flutes and harps,
Could never cut their way with ev’n three sharps
Through such a fog as this, you may rely on.
I think, but am not sure, I hear a hum,

Like a very muffled double drum,
And then a something faintly shrill,
Like Bartlemy Fair’s old buz at Pentonville.
And now and then hear a pop,
As if from Pedley’s Soda Water shop.

I’m almost ill with the strong scent of mud,
And, not to mention sneezing,
My cough is, more than usual, teasing;
I really fear that I have chill’d my blood,
O Lud! O Lud! O Lud! O Lud! O Lud!”

ON THE CELEBRATION OF PEACE.

BY DORCAS DOVE.

And is it thus ye welcome Peace,
From Mouths of forty-pounding Bores?
Oh cease, exploding Cannons, cease!
Lest Peace, affrighted, shun our shores!

Not so the quiet Queen should come;
But like a Nurse to still our Fears,
With Shoes of List, demurely dumb,
And Wool or Cotton in her Ears!

She asks for no triumphal Arch;
No Steeples for their ropy Tongues;
Down, Drumsticks, down, She needs no March,
Or blasted Trumps from brazen Lungs.

She wants no Noise of mobbing Throats
To tell that She is drawing nigh:
Why this Parade of scarlet Coats,
When War has closed his bloodshot Eye?

Returning to Domestic Loves,
When War has ceased with all its Ills,
Captains should come like sucking Doves,
With Olive Branches in their Bills.

No need there is of vulgar Shout,
Bells, Cannons, Trumpets, Fife, and Drum,
And Soldiers marching all about,
To let Us know that Peace is come.

Oh mild should be the Signs and meek,
Sweet Peace’s Advent to proclaim!
Silence her noiseless Foot should speak,
And Echo should repeat the same.

Lo! where the Soldier walks, alas!
With Scars received on Foreign Grounds;
Shall we consume in Coloured Glass
The Oil that should be pour’d in Wounds?

The bleeding Gaps of War to close,
Will whizzing Rocket-Flight avail?
Will Squibs enliven Orphans’ Woes?
Or Crackers cheer the Widow’s Tale?

TO MR. ISAAK WALTON,

AT MR. MAJOR’S THE BOOKSELLER’S IN FLEET STREET.