Have you heard of Philip Slingsby,Slingsby of the manly chest;How he slew the Snapping TurtleIn the regions of the West?
Every day the huge CawanaLifted up its monstrous jaws;And it swallowed Langton Bennett,And digested Rufus Dawes.
Riled, I ween, was Philip Slingsby,Their untimely deaths to hear;For one author owed him money,And the other loved him dear.
“Listen now, sagacious Tyler,Whom the loafers all obey;What reward will Congress give me,If I take this pest away?”
Then sagacious Tyler answered,“You’re the ring-tailed squealer! LessThan a hundred heavy dollarsWon’t be offered you, I guess!
“And a lot of wooden nutmegsIn the bargain, too, we’ll throw—Only you just fix the critter.Won’t you liquor ere you go?”
Straightway leaped the valiant SlingsbyInto armour of Seville,With a strong Arkansas toothpickScrewed in every joint of steel.
“Come thou with me, Cullen Bryant,Come with me, as squire, I pray;Be the Homer of the battleWhich I go to wage to-day.”
So they went along careeringWith a loud and martial tramp,Till they neared the Snapping TurtleIn the dreary Swindle Swamp.
But when Slingsby saw the water,Somewhat pale, I ween, was he.“If I come not back, dear Bryant,Tell the tale to Melanie!
“Tell her that I died devoted,Victim to a noble task!Han’t you got a drop of brandyIn the bottom of your flask?”
As he spoke, an alligatorSwam across the sullen creek;And the two Columbians started,When they heard the monster shriek;
For a snout of huge dimensionsRose above the waters high,And took down the alligator,As a trout takes down a fly.
“’Tarnal death! the Snapping Turtle!”Thus the squire in terror cried;But the noble Slingsby straightwayDrew the toothpick from his side.
“Fare thee well!” he cried, and dashingThrough the waters, strongly swam:Meanwhile, Cullen Bryant, watching,Breathed a prayer and sucked a dram.
Sudden from the slimy bottomWas the snout again upreared,With a snap as loud as thunder,—And the Slingsby disappeared.
Like a mighty steam-ship foundering,Down the monstrous vision sank;And the ripple, slowly rolling,Plashed and played upon the bank.
Still and stiller grew the water,Hushed the canes within the brake;There was but a kind of coughingAt the bottom of the lake.
Bryant wept as loud and deeplyAs a father for a son—“He’s a finished ’coon, is Slingsby,And the brandy’s nearly done!”
In a trance of sickening anguish,Cold and stiff, and sore and damp,For two days did Bryant lingerBy the dreary Swindle Swamp;
Always peering at the water,Always waiting for the hourWhen those monstrous jaws should openAs he saw them ope before.
Still in vain;—the alligatorsScrambled through the marshy brake,And the vampire leeches gailySucked the garfish in the lake.
But the Snapping Turtle neverRose for food or rose for rest,Since he lodged the steel depositIn the bottom of his chest.
Only always from the bottomSounds of frequent coughing rolled,Just as if the huge CawanaHad a most confounded cold.
On the banks lay Cullen Bryant,As the second moon arose,Gouging on the sloping greenswardSome imaginary foes;
When the swamp began to tremble,And the canes to rustle fast,As though some stupendous bodyThrough their roots were crushing past.
And the waters boiled and bubbled,And, in groups of twos and threes,Several alligators bounded,Smart as squirrels, up the trees.
Then a hideous head was lifted,With such huge distended jaws,That they might have held GoliathQuite as well as Rufus Dawes.
Paws of elephantine thicknessDragged its body from the bay,And it glared at Cullen BryantIn a most unpleasant way.
Then it writhed as if in torture,And it staggered to and fro;And its very shell was shakenIn the anguish of its throe:
And its cough grew loud and louder,And its sob more husky thick!For, indeed, it was apparentThat the beast was very sick.
Till, at last, a spasmy vomitShook its carcass through and through,And as if from out a cannon,All in armour Slingsby flew.
Bent and bloody was the bowieWhich he held within his grasp;And he seemed so much exhaustedThat he scarce had strength to gasp—
“Gouge him, Bryant! darn ye, gouge him!Gouge him while he’s on the shore!”Bryant’s thumbs were straightway buriedWhere no thumbs had pierced before.
Right from out their bony socketsDid he scoop the monstrous balls;And, with one convulsive shudder,Dead the Snapping Turtle falls!
* * * * *
“Post the tin, sagacious Tyler!”But the old experienced file,Leering first at Clay and Webster,Answered, with a quiet smile—
“Since you dragged the ’tarnal critturFrom the bottom of the ponds,Here’s the hundred dollars due you,All in Pennsylvanian Bonds!”[44]
“The only Good American Securities.”
[The story of Mr Colt, of which our Lay contains merely the sequel, is this: A New York printer, of the name of Adams, had the effrontery to call upon him one day for payment of an account, which the independent Colt settled by cutting his creditor’s head to fragments with an axe. He then packed his body in a box, and sprinkling it with salt, despatched it to a packet bound for New Orleans. Suspicions having been excited, he was seized and tried before Judge Kent. The trial is, perhaps, the most disgraceful upon the records of any country. The ruffian’s mistress was produced in court, and examined, in disgusting detail, as to her connection with Colt, and his movements during the days and nights succeeding the murder. The head of the murdered man was bandied to and fro in the court, handed up to the jury, and commented on by witnesses and counsel; and to crown the horrors of the whole proceeding, the wretch’s own counsel, a Mr Emmet, commencing the defence with a cool admission that his client took the life of Adams, and following it up by a detail of the whole circumstances of this most brutal murder in the first person, as though he himself had been the murderer, ended by telling the jury, that his client was “entitled to the sympathyof a jury of his country,” as “a young man just entering into life,whose prospects, probably, have been permanently blasted.” Colt was found guilty; but a variety of exceptions were taken to the charge by the judge, and after a long series of appeals, whichoccupied more than a year from the date of conviction, the sentence of death was ratified by Governor Seward. The rest of Colt’s story is told in our ballad.]
* * * *
And now the sacred rite was done, and the marriage-knot was tied,And Colt withdrew his blushing wife a little way aside;“Let’s go,” he said, “into my cell; let’s go alone, my dear;I fain would shelter that sweet face from the sheriff’s odious leer.The jailer and the hangman, they are waiting both for me,—I cannot bear to see them wink so knowingly at thee!Oh, how I loved thee, dearest! They say that I am wild,That a mother dares not trust me with the weasand of her child;They say my bowie-knife is keen to sliver into halvesThe carcass of my enemy, as butchers slay their calves.They say that I am stern of mood, because, like salted beef,I packed my quartered foeman up, and marked him ‘prime tariff;’Because I thought to palm him on the simple-souled John Bull,And clear a small percentage on the sale at Liverpool;It may be so, I do not know—these things, perhaps, may be;But surely I have always been a gentleman to thee!Then come, my love, into my cell, short bridal space is ours,—Nay, sheriff, never con thy watch—I guess there’s good two hours.We’ll shut the prison doors and keep the gaping world at bay,For love is long as ’tarnity, though I must die to-day!”
The clock is ticking onward,It nears the hour of doom,And no one yet hath enteredInto that ghastly room.The jailer and the sheriff,They are walking to and fro:And the hangman sits upon the steps,And smokes his pipe below.In grisly expectationThe prison all is bound,And, save expectoration,You cannot hear a sound.
The turnkey stands and ponders;—His hand upon the bolt,—“In twenty minutes more, I guess,’Twill all be up with Colt!”But see, the door is opened!Forth comes the weeping bride;The courteous sheriff lifts his hat,And saunters to her side,—“I beg your pardon, Mrs C.,But is your husband ready?”“I guess you’d better ask himself,”Replied the woeful lady.
The clock is ticking onward,The minutes almost run,The hangman’s pipe is nearly out,’Tis on the stroke of one.At every grated window,Unshaven faces glare;There’s Puke, the judge of Tennessee,And Lynch, of Delaware;And Batter, with the long black beard,Whom Hartford’s maids know well;
And Winkinson, from Fish Kill Reach,The pride of New Rochelle;Elkanah Nutts, from Tarry Town,The gallant gouging boy;And ’coon-faced Bushwhack, from the hillsThat frown o’er modern Troy;Young Julep, whom our Willis loves,Because, ’tis said, that heOne morning from a bookstall filchedThe tale of “Melanie;”And Skunk, who fought his country’s fightBeneath the stripes and stars,—All thronging at the windows stood,And gazed between the bars.The little boys that stood behind(Young thievish imps were they!)Displayed considerablenousOn that eventful day;For bits of broken looking-glassThey held aslant on high,And there a mirrored gallows-treeMet their delighted eye.[49]The clock is ticking onward;Hark! hark! it striketh one!Each felon draws a whistling breath,“Time’s up with Colt! he’s done!”
The sheriff cons his watch again,Then puts it in his fob,And turning to the hangman, says—“Get ready for the job.”The jailer knocketh loudly,The turnkey draws the bolt,And pleasantly the sheriff says,“We’re waiting, Mister Colt!”
No answer! no! no answer!All’s still as death within;The sheriff eyes the jailer,The jailer strokes his chin.“I shouldn’t wonder, Nahum, ifIt were as you suppose.”The hangman looked unhappy, andThe turnkey blew his nose.
They entered. On his palletThe noble convict lay,—The bridegroom on his marriage-bedBut not in trim array.His red right hand a razor held,Fresh sharpened from the hone,And his ivory neck was severed,And gashed into the bone.
* * * *
And when the lamp is lightedIn the long November days,And lads and lasses mingleAt the shucking of the maize;When pies of smoking pumpkinUpon the table stand,And bowls of black molassesGo round from hand to hand;When slap-jacks, maple-sugared,Are hissing in the pan,And cider, with a dash of gin,Foams in the social can;
When the goodman wets his whistle,And the goodwife scolds the child;And the girls exclaim convulsively,“Have done, or I’ll be riled!”When the loafer sitting next themAttempts a sly caress,And whispers, “Oh, you ’possum,You’ve fixed my heart, I guess!”With laughter and with weeping,Then shall they tell the tale,How Colt his foeman quartered,And died within the jail.
“The Unwilling Colt.”
[Before the following poem, which originally appeared in ‘Fraser’s Magazine,’ could have reached America, intelligence was received in this country of an affray in Congress, very nearly the counterpart of that which the Author has here imagined in jest. It was very clear, to any one who observed the then state of public planners in America, that such occurrences must happen, sooner or later. The Americans apparently felt the force of the satire, as the poem was widely reprinted throughout the States. It subsequently returned to this country, embodied in an American work on American manners, where it characteristically appeared as the writer’s own production; and it afterwards went the round of British newspapers, as an amusing satire, by an American, of his countrymen’s foibles!]
The Congress met, the day was wet, Van Buren took the chair;On either side, the statesman pride of far Kentuck was there.With moody frown, there sat Calhoun, and slowly in his cheekHis quid he thrust, and slaked the dust, as Webster rose to speak.
Upon that day, near gifted Clay, a youthful member sat,And like a free American upon the floor he spat;Then turning round to Clay, he said, and wiped his manly chin,“What kind of Locofoco’s that, as wears the painter’s skin?”
“Young man,” quoth Clay, “avoid the way of Slick of Tennessee;Of gougers fierce, the eyes that pierce, the fiercest gouger he;He chews and spits, as there he sits, and whittles at the chairs,And in his hand, for deadly strife, a bowie-knife he bears.
“Avoid that knife. In frequent strife its blade, so long and thin,Has found itself a resting-place his rivals’ ribs within.”But coward fear came never near young Jabez Dollar’s heart,—“Were he an alligator, I would rile him pretty smart!”
Then up he rose, and cleared his nose, and looked toward the chair;He saw the stately stripes and stars,—our country’s flag was there!His heart beat high, with eldritch cry upon the floor he sprang,Then raised his wrist, and shook his fist, and spoke his first harangue.
“Who sold the nutmegs made of wood—the clocks that wouldn’t figure?Who grinned the bark off gum-trees dark—the everlasting nigger?For twenty cents, ye Congress gents, through ’tarnity I’ll kickThat man, I guess, though nothing less than ’coonfaced Colonel Slick!”
The Colonel smiled—with frenzy wild,—his very beard waxed blue,—His shirt it could not hold him, so wrathy riled he grew;He foams and frets, his knife he whets upon his seat below—He sharpens it on either side, and whittles at his toe.
“Oh! waken snakes, and walk your chalks!” he cried, with ire elate;“Darn my old mother, but I will in wild cats whip my weight!Oh! ’tarnal death, I’ll spoil your breath, young Dollar, and your chaffing,—Look to your ribs, for here is that will tickle them without laughing!”
His knife he raised—with fury crazed, he sprang across the hall;He cut a caper in the air—he stood before them all:He never stopped to look or think if he the deed should do,But spinning sent the President, and on young Dollar flew.
They met—they closed—they sank—they rose,—in vain young Dollar strove—For, like a streak of lightning greased, the infuriate Colonel droveHis bowie-blade deep in his side, and to the ground they rolled,And, drenched in gore, wheeled o’er and o’er, locked in each other’s hold.
With fury dumb—with nail and thumb—they struggled and they thrust,The blood ran red from Dollar’s side, like rain, upon the dust;He nerved his might for one last spring, and as he sank and died,Reft of an eye, his enemy fell groaning by his side.
Thus did he fall within the hall of Congress, that brave youth;The bowie-knife has quenched his life of valour and of truth;And still among the statesmen throng at Washington they tellHow nobly Dollar gouged his man—how gallantly he fell.
“Young chaps, give ear, the case is clear. You, Silas Fixings, youPay Mister Nehemiah Dodge them dollars as you’re due.You are a bloody cheat,—you are. But spite of all your tricks, itIs not in you Judge Lynch to do. No! nohow you can fix it!”
Thus spake Judge Lynch, as there he sat in Alabama’s forum,Around he gazed, with legs upraised upon the bench before him;And, as he gave this sentence stern to him who stood beneath,Still with his gleaming bowie-knife he slowly picked his teeth.
It was high noon, the month was June, and sultry was the air,A cool gin-sling stood by his hand, his coat hung o’er his chair;All naked were his manly arms, and shaded by his hat,Like an old senator of Rome that simple Archon sat.
“A bloody cheat?—Oh, legs and feet!” in wrath young Silas cried;And springing high into the air, he jerked his quid aside.“No man shall put my dander up, or with my feelings trifle,As long as Silas Fixings wears a bowie-knife and rifle.”
“If your shoes pinch,” replied Judge Lynch, “you’ll very soon have ease;I’ll give you satisfaction, squire, in any way you please;What are your weapons?—knife or gun?—at both I’m pretty spry!”;“Oh! ’tarnal death, you’re spry, you are?” quoth Silas; “so am I!”
Hard by the town a forest stands, dark with the shades of time,And they have sought that forest dark at morning’s early prime;Lynch, backed by Nehemiah Dodge, and Silas with a friend,And half the town in glee came down to see that contest’s end.
They led their men two miles apart, they measured out the ground;A belt of that vast wood it was, they notched the trees around;Into the tangled brake they turned them off, and neither knewWhere he should seek his wagered foe, how get him into view.
With stealthy tread, and stooping head, from tree to tree they passed,They crept beneath the crackling furze, they held their rifles fast:Hour passed on hour, the noonday sun smote fiercely down, but yetNo sound to the expectant crowd proclaimed that they had met.
And now the sun was going down, when, hark! a rifle’s crack!Hush—hush! another strikes the air, and all their breath draw back,—Then crashing on through bush and briar, the crowd from either sideRush in to see whose rifle sure with blood the moss has dyed.
Weary with watching up and down, brave Lynch conceived a plan,An artful dodge whereby to take at unawares his man;He hung his hat upon a bush, and hid himself hard by;Young Silas thought he had him fast, and at the hat let fly.
It fell; up sprang young Silas,—he hurled his gun away;Lynch fixed him with his rifle, from the ambush where he lay.The bullet pierced his manly breast—yet, valiant to the last,Young Fixings drew his bowie-knife, and up his foxtail[64]cast.
With tottering step and glazing eye he cleared the space between,And stabbed the air as stabs in grim Macbeth the younger Kean:Brave Lynch received him with a bang that stretched him on the ground,Then sat himself serenely down till all the crowd drew round.
They hailed him with triumphant cheers—in him each loafer sawThe bearing bold that could uphold the majesty of law;And, raising him aloft, they bore him homewards at his ease,—That noble judge, whose daring hand enforced his own decrees.
They buried Silas Fixings in the hollow where he fell,And gum-trees wave above his grave—that tree he loved so well;And the ’coons sit chattering o’er him when the nights are long and damp;But he sleeps well in that lonely dell, the Dreary ’Possum Swamp.
[So rapidly does oblivion do its work nowadays that the burst of amiable indignation with which America received the issue of hisAmerican NotesandMartin Chuzzlewitis now almost wholly forgotten. Not content with waging a universal rivalry in the piracy of the Notes, Columbia showered upon its author the riches of its own choice vocabulary of abuse; while some of her more fiery spirits threw out playful hints as to the propriety of gouging the “stranger,” and furnishing him with a permanent suit of tar and feathers, in the then very improbable event of his paying them a second visit. The perusal of these animated expressions of free opinion suggested the following lines, which those who remember Boz’s book, and the festivities with which he was all but hunted to death, will at once understand. The object aimed at was to do justice to the bitterness and “immortal hate” of these thin-skinned sons of freedom. Happily the storm passed over: Dickens paid, in 1867-68, a second visit to the States, was well received, made a not inconsiderable fortune by his Readings there, and confessed that he had judged his American hosts harshly on his former visit.]
Sneak across the wide Atlantic, worthless London’s puling child,Better that its waves should bear thee, than the land thou hast reviled;Better in the stifling cabin, on the sofa thou shouldst lie,Sickening as the fetid nigger bears the greens and bacon by;Better, when the midnight horrors haunt the strained and creaking ship,Thou shouldst yell in vain for brandy with a fever-sodden lip;When amid the deepening darkness and the lamp’s expiring shade,From the bagman’s berth above thee comes the bountiful cascade,Better than upon the Broadway thou shouldst be at noonday seen,Smirking like a Tracy Tupman with a Mantalini mien,With a rivulet of satin falling o’er thy puny chest,Worse than even N. P. Willis for an evening party drest!
We received thee warmly—kindly—though we knew thou wert a quiz,Partly for thyself it may be, chiefly for the sake of Phiz!Much we bore, and much we suffered, listening to remorseless spellsOf that Smike’s unceasing drivellings, and these everlasting Nells.When you talked of babes and sunshine, fields, and all that sort of thing,Each Columbian inly chuckled, as he slowly sucked his sling;And though all our sleeves were bursting, from the many hundreds nearNot one single scornful titter rose on thy complacent ear.Then to show thee to the ladies, with our usual want of senseWe engaged the place in Park Street at a ruinous expense;Even our own three-volumed Cooper waived his old prescriptive right,And deluded Dickens figured first on that eventful night.Clusters of uncoated Yorkers, vainly striving to be cool,Saw thee desperately plunging through the perils of la Poule:And their muttered exclamation drowned the tenor of the tune,—”Don’t he beat all natur hollow? Don’t he foot it like a ’coon?”
Did we spare our brandy-cocktails, stint thee of our whisky-grogs?Half the juleps that we gave thee would have floored a Newman Noggs;And thou took’st them in so kindly, little was there then to blame,To thy parched and panting palate sweet as mother’s milk they came.Did the hams of old Virginny find no favour in thine eyes?Came no soft compunction o’er thee at the thought of pumpkin pies?Could not all our chicken fixings into silence fix thy scorn?Did not all our cakes rebuke thee,—Johnny, waffle, dander, corn?Could not all our care and coddling teach thee how to draw it mild?Well, no matter, we deserve it. Serves us right! We spoilt the child!You, forsooth, must come crusading, boring us with broadest hintsOf your own peculiar losses by American reprints.
Such an impudent remonstrance never in our face was flung;Lever stands it, so does Ainsworth;you, I guess, may hold your tongue.Down our throats you’d cram your projects, thick and hard as pickled salmon,That, I s’pose, you call free trading,—I pronounce it utter gammon.No, my lad, a ’cuter vision than your own might soon have seen,That a true Columbian ogle carries little that is green;That we never will surrender useful privateering rights,Stoutly won at glorious Bunker’s Hill, and other famous fights;That we keep our native dollars for our native scribbling gents,And on British manufacture only waste our straggling cents;Quite enough we pay, I reckon, when we stump of these a fewFor the voyages and travels of a freshman such as you.
I have been at Niagara, I have stood beneath the Falls,I have marked the water twisting over its rampagious walls;But “a holy calm sensation,” one, in fact, of perfect peace,Was as much my first idea as the thought of Christmas geese.As for “old familiar faces,” looking through the misty air,Surely you were strongly liquored when you saw your Chuckster there.One familiar face, however, you will very likely see,If you’ll only treat the natives to a call in Tennessee,Of a certain individual, true Columbian every inch,In a high judicial station, called by ’mancipators Lynch.Half an hour of conversation with his worship in a wood,Would, I strongly notion, do you an infernal deal of good.Then you’d understand more clearly than you ever did before,Why an independent patriot freely spits upon the floor,Why he gouges when he pleases, why he whittles at the chairs,Why for swift and deadly combat still the bowie-knife he bears,—Why he sneers at the old country with republican disdain,And, unheedful of the negro’s cry, still tighter draws his chain.All these things the judge shall teach thee of the land thou hast reviled;Get thee o’er the wide Atlantic, worthless London’s puling child!
Once—’twas when I lived at Jena—At a Wirthshaus’ door I sat;And in pensive contemplationAte the sausage thick and fat;Ate the kraut that never sourerTasted to my lips than here;Smoked my pipe of strong canaster,Sipped my fifteenth jug of beer;Gazed upon the glancing river,Gazed upon the tranquil pool,Whence the silver-voiced Undine,When the nights were calm and cool,As the Baron Fouqué tells us,Rose from out her shelly grot,Casting glamour o’er the waters,Witching that enchanted spot.From the shadow which the coppiceFlings across the rippling stream,Did I hear a sound of music—Was it thought or was it dream?There, beside a pile of linen,Stretched along the daisied sward,Stood a young and blooming maiden—’Twas her thrush-like song I heard.Evermore within the eddyDid she plunge the white chemise;And her robes were loosely gatheredRather far above her knees;Then my breath at once forsook me,For too surely did I deemThat I saw the fair UndineStanding in the glancing stream—And I felt the charm of knighthood;And from that remembered day,Every evening to the WirthshausTook I my enchanted way.
Shortly to relate my story,Many a week of summer longCame I there, when beer-o’ertaken,With my lute and with my song;Sang in mellow-toned sopranoAll my love and all my woe,Till the river-maiden answered,Lilting in the stream below:—“Fair Undine! sweet Undine!Dost thou love as I love thee?”“Love is free as running water,”Was the answer made to me.
Thus, in interchange seraphic,Did I woo my phantom fay,Till the nights grew long and chilly,Short and shorter grew the day;Till at last—’twas dark and gloomy,Dull and starless was the sky,And my steps were all unsteadyFor a little flushed was I,—To the well-accustomed signalNo response the maiden gave;But I heard the waters washingAnd the moaning of the wave.Vanished was my own Undine,All her linen, too, was gone;And I walked about lamentingOn the river bank alone.Idiot that I was, for neverHad I asked the maiden’s name.Was it Lieschen—was it Gretchen?Had she tin, or whence she came?So I took my trusty meerschaum,And I took my lute likewise;Wandered forth in minstrel fashion,Underneath the louring skies:Sang before each comely Wirthshaus,Sang beside each purling stream,That same ditty which I chantedWhen Undine was my theme,Singing, as I sang at Jena,When the shifts were hung to dry,“Fair Undine! young Undine!Dost thou love as well as I?”
But, alas! in field or village,Or beside the pebbly shore,Did I see those glancing ankles,And the white robe never more;And no answer came to greet me,No sweet voice to mine replied;But I heard the waters rippling,And the moaning of the tide.
“The moaning of the TIED.”
There is a sound that’s dear to me,It haunts me in my sleep;I wake, and, if I hear it not,I cannot choose but weep.Above the roaring of the wind,Above the river’s flow,Methinks I hear the mystic cryOf “Clo!—Old Clo!”
The exile’s song, it thrills amongThe dwellings of the free,Its sound is strange to English ears,But ’tis not strange to me;For it hath shook the tented fieldIn ages long ago,And hosts have quailed before the cryOf “Clo!—Old Clo!”
Oh, lose it not! forsake it not!And let no time effaceThe memory of that solemn sound,The watchword of our race;For not by dark and eagle eyeThe Hebrew shall you know,So well as by the plaintive cryOf “Clo!—Old Clo!”
Even now, perchance, by Jordan’s banks,Or Sidon’s sunny walls,Where, dial-like, to portion time,The palm-tree’s shadow falls,The pilgrims, wending on their way,Will linger as they go,And listen to the distant cryOf “Clo!—Old Clo!”
[after the manner of schiller.]
“Bursch! if foaming beer content ye,Come and drink your fill;In our cellars there is plenty;Himmel! how you swill!That the liquor hath allurance,Well I understand:But ’tis really past endurance,When you squeeze my hand!”
And he heard her as if dreaming,Heard her half in awe;And the meerschaum’s smoke came streamingFrom his open jaw:And his pulse beat somewhat quickerThan it did before,And he finished off his liquor,Staggered through the door;
Bolted off direct to Munich,And within the yearUnderneath his German tunicStowed whole butts of beer.And he drank like fifty fishes,Drank till all was blue;For he felt extremely vicious—Somewhat thirsty too.
But at length this dire deboshingDrew towards an end;Few of all his silver groschenHad he left to spend.And he knew it was not prudentLonger to remain;So, with weary feet, the studentWended home again.
At the tavern’s well-known portalKnocks he as before,And a waiter, rather mortal,Hiccups through the door—“Master’s sleeping in the kitchen;You’ll alarm the house;Yesterday the Jungfrau FritchenMarried baker Kraus!”
Like a fiery comet bristling,Rose the young man’s hair,And, poor soul! he fell a-whistlingOut of sheer despair.Down the gloomy street in silence,Savage-calm he goes;But he did no deed of vi’lence—Only blew his nose.
Then he hired an airy garretNear her dwelling-place;Grew a beard of fiercest carrot,Never washed his face;Sate all day beside the casement,Sate a dreary man;Found in smoking such an easementAs the wretched can;
Stared for hours and hours together,Stared yet more and more;Till in fine and sunny weather,At the baker’s door,Stood, in apron white and mealy,That belovèd dame,Counting out the loaves so freely,Selling of the same.
Then like a volcano puffing,Smoked he out his pipe;Sighed and supped on ducks and stuffing,Ham and kraut and tripe;Went to bed, and, in the morning,Waited as before,Still his eyes in anguish turningTo the baker’s door;
Till, with apron white and mealy,Came the lovely dame,Counting out the loaves so freely,Selling of the same.So one day—the fact’s amazing!—On his post he died!And they found the body gazingAt the baker’s bride.
[not by sir e. bulwer lytton.]
“Thy coffee, Tom, ’s untasted,And thy egg is very cold;Thy cheeks are wan and wasted,Not rosy as of old.My boy, what has come o’er ye?You surely are not well!Try some of that ham before ye,And then, Tom, ring the bell!”
“I cannot eat, my mother,My tongue is parched and bound,And my head, somehow or other,Is swimming round and round.In my eyes there is a fulness,And my pulse is beating quick;On my brain is a weight of dulness:Oh, mother, I am sick!”
“These long, long nights of watchingAre killing you outright;The evening dews are catching,And you’re out every night.Why does that horrid grumbler,Old Inkpen, work you so?”
(TOM—lene susurrans)
“My head! Oh, that tenth tumbler!’Twas that which wrought my woe!”
The sun is in the sky, mother, the flowers are springing fair,And the melody of woodland birds is stirring in the air;The river, smiling to the sky, glides onward to the sea,And happiness is everywhere, oh mother, but with me!
They are going to the church, mother,—I hear the marriage-bell;It booms along the upland,—oh! it haunts me like a knell;He leads her on his arm, mother, he cheers her faltering step,And closely to his side she clings,—she does, the demirep!
They are crossing by the stile, mother, where we so oft have stood,The stile beside the shady thorn, at the corner of the wood;And the boughs, that wont to murmur back the words that won my ear,Wave their silver blossoms o’er him, as he leads his bridal fere.
He will pass beside the stream, mother, where first my hand he pressed,By the meadow where, with quivering lip, his passion he confessed;And down the hedgerows where we’ve strayed again and yet again;But he will not think of me, mother, his broken-hearted Jane!
He said that I was proud, mother,—that I looked for rank and gold;He said I did not love him,—he said my words were cold;He said I kept him off and on, in hopes of higher game,—And it may be that I did, mother; but who hasn’t done the same?
I did not know my heart, mother,—I know it now too late;I thought that I without a pang could wed some nobler mate;But no nobler suitor sought me,—and he has taken wing,And my heart is gone, and I am left a lone and blighted thing.
You may lay me in my bed, mother,—my head is throbbing sore;And, mother, prithee, let the sheets be duly aired before;And, if you’d do a kindness to your poor desponding child,Draw me a pot of beer, mother—and, mother, draw it mild!
“Love gone to pot.”
Thy skin is dark as jet, ladye,Thy cheek is sharp and high,And there’s a cruel leer, love,Within thy rolling eye:These tangled ebon tressesNo comb hath e’er gone through;And thy forehead, it is furrowed byThe elegant tattoo!
I love thee,—oh, I love thee,Thou strangely-feeding maid!Nay, lift not thus thy boomerang,I meant not to upbraid!Come, let me taste those yellow lipsThat ne’er were tasted yet,Save when the shipwrecked marinerPassed through them for a whet.
Nay, squeeze me not so tightly!For I am gaunt and thin;There’s little flesh to tempt theeBeneath a convict’s skin.I came not to be eaten;I sought thee, love, to woo;Besides, bethink thee, dearest,Thou’st dined on cockatoo.
Thy father is a chieftain!Why, that’s the very thing!Within my native countryI too have been a king.Behold this branded letter,Which nothing can efface!It is the royal emblem,The token of my race!
But rebels rose against me,And dared my power disown—You’ve heard, love, of the judges?They drove me from my throne.And I have wandered hither,Across the stormy sea,In search of glorious freedom,—In search, my sweet, of thee!
The bush is now my empire,The knife my sceptre keen;Come with me to the desert wild,And be my dusky queen.I cannot give thee jewels,I have nor sheep nor cow,Yet there are kangaroos, love,And colonists enow.
We’ll meet the unwary settler,As whistling home he goes,And I’ll take tribute from him,His money and his clothes.Then on his bleeding carcassThou’lt lay thy pretty paw,And lunch upon him roasted,Or, if you like it, raw!
Then come with me, my princess,My own Australian dear,Within this grove of gum-treesWe’ll hold our bridal cheer!Thy heart with love is beating,I feel it through my side:—Hurrah, then, for the noble pair,The Convict and his Bride!
Come and listen, lords and ladies,To a woeful lay of mine;He whose tailor’s bill unpaid is,Let him now his ear incline!Let him hearken to my story,How the noblest of the landPined in piteous purgatory,’Neath a sponging Bailiff’s hand.
I. O. Uwins! I. O. Uwins!Baron’s son although thou be,Thou must pay for thy misdoingsIn the country of the free!None of all thy sire’s retainersTo thy rescue now may come;And there lie some score detainersWith Abednego, the bum.
Little recked he of his prisonWhilst the sun was in the sky:Only when the moon was risenDid you hear the captive’s cry.For till then, cigars and claretLulled him in oblivion sweet;And he much preferred a garret,For his drinking, to the street.
But the moonlight, pale and broken,Pained at soul the baron’s son;For he knew, by that soft token,That the larking had begun;—That the stout and valiant Marquis[97]Then was leading forth his swells,Milling some policeman’s carcass,Or purloining private bells.
So he sat in grief and sorrow,Rather drunk than otherwise,Till the golden gush of morrowDawned once more upon his eyes:Till the sponging Bailiff’s daughter,Lightly tapping at the door,Brought his draught of soda-water,Brandy-bottomed as before.
“Sweet Rebecca! has your father,Think you, made a deal of brass?”And she answered—“Sir, I ratherShould imagine that he has.”Uwins then, his whiskers scratching,Leered upon the maiden’s face,And, her hand with ardour catching,Folded her in close embrace.
“La, Sir! let alone—you fright me!”Said the daughter of the Jew:“Dearest, how those eyes delight me!Let me love thee, darling, do!”“Vat is dish?” the Bailiff muttered,Rushing in with fury wild;“Ish your muffins so vell buttered,Dat you darsh insult ma shild?”
“Honourable my intentions,Good Abednego, I swear!And I have some small pretensions,For I am a Baron’s heir.If you’ll only clear my credit,And advance athou[99]or so,She’s a peeress—I have said it:Don’t you twig, Abednego?”
“Datsh a very different matter,”Said the Bailiff, with a leer;“But you musht not cut it fatterThan ta slish will shtand, ma tear!If you seeksh ma approbation,You musht quite give up your rigsh,Alsho you musht join our nashun,And renounsh ta flesh of pigsh.”
Fast as one of Fagin’s pupils,I. O. Uwins did agree!Little plagued with holy scruplesFrom the starting-post was he.But at times a baleful visionRose before his shuddering view,For he knew that circumcisionWas expected from a Jew.
At a meeting of the Rabbis,Held about the Whitsuntide,Was this thorough-paced BarabbasWedded to his Hebrew bride:All his previous debts compounded,From the sponging-house he came,And his father’s feelings woundedWith reflections on the same.
But the sire his son accosted—“Split my wig! if any moreSuch a double-dyed apostateShall presume to cross my door!Not a penny-piece to save yeFrom the kennel or the spout;—Dinner, John! the pig and gravy!—Kick this dirty scoundrel out!”
Forth rushed I. O. Uwins, fasterThan all winking—much afraidThat the orders of the masterWould be punctually obeyed:Sought his club, and then the sentenceOf expulsion first he saw;No one dared to own acquaintanceWith a Bailiff’s son-in-law.
Uselessly, down Bond Street strutting,Did he greet his friends of yore:Such a universal cuttingNever man received before:Till at last his pride revolted—Pale, and lean, and stern he grew;And his wife Rebecca boltedWith a missionary Jew.
Ye who read this doleful ditty,Ask ye where is Uwins now?Wend your way through London city,Climb to Holborn’s lofty brow;Near the sign-post of the “Nigger,”Near the baked-potato shed,You may see a ghastly figureWith three hats upon his head.
When the evening shades are dusky,Then the phantom form draws near,And, with accents low and husky,Pours effluvium in your ear;Craving an immediate barterOf your trousers or surtout;And you know the Hebrew martyr,Once the peerless I. O. U.
Did you ever hear the story—Old the legend is, and true—How a knyghte of fame and gloryAll aside his armour threw;Spouted spear and pawned habergeon,Pledged his sword and surcoat gay,Sate down cross-legged on the shop-board,Sate and stitched the livelong day?
“Taylzeour! not one single shillingDoes my breeches-pocket hold:I to pay am really willing,If I only had the gold.Farmers none can I encounter,Graziers there are none to kill;Therefore, prithee, gentle taylzeour,Bother not about thy bill.”
“Good Sir Knyghte, just once too oftenHave you tried that slippery trick;Hearts like mine you cannot soften,Vainly do you ask for tick.Christmas and its bills are coming,Soon will they be showering in;Therefore, once for all, my rum un,I expect you’ll post the tin.
“Mark, Sir Knyghte, that gloomy bayliffeIn the palmer’s amice brown;He shall lead you unto jail, ifInstantly you stump not down.”Deeply swore the young crusader,But the taylzeour would not hear;And the gloomy, bearded bayliffeEvermore kept sneaking near.
“Neither groat nor maravediHave I got my soul to bless;And I’d feel extremely seedy,Languishing in vile duresse.Therefore listen, ruthless taylzeour,Take my steed and armour free,Pawn them at thy Hebrew uncle’s,And I’ll work the rest for thee.”
Lightly leaped he on the shop-board,Lightly crooked his manly limb,Lightly drove the glancing needleThrough the growing doublet’s rimGaberdines in countless numberDid the taylzeour knyghte repair,And entirely on cucumberAnd on cabbage lived he there.
Once his weary task beguilingWith a low and plaintive song,That good knyghte o’er miles of broadclothDrove the hissing goose along;From her lofty latticed windowLooked the taylzeour’s daughter down,And she instantly discoveredThat her heart was not her own.
“Canst thou love me, gentle stranger?”Picking at a pink she stood—And the knyghte at once admittedThat he rather thought he could.“He who weds me shall have riches,Gold, and lands, and houses free.”“For a single pair of—small-clothes,I would roam the world with thee!”
Then she flung him down the ticketsWell the knyghte their import knew—“Take this gold, and win thy armourFrom the unbelieving Jew.Though in garments mean and lowlyThou wouldst roam the world with me,Only as a belted warrior,Stranger, will I wed with thee!”
At the feast of good Saint Stitchem,In the middle of the spring,There was some superior jousting,By the order of the King.“Valiant knyghtes!” proclaimed the monarch,“You will please to understand,He who bears himself most bravelyShall obtain my daughter’s hand.”
Well and bravely did they bear them,Bravely battled, one and all;But the bravest in the tourneyWas a warrior stout and tall.None could tell his name or lineage,None could meet him in the field,And a goose regardant properHissed along his azure shield.
“Warrior, thou hast won my daughter!”But the champion bowed his knee,“Royal blood may not be wastedOn a simple knyghte like me.She I love is meek and lowly;But her heart is kind and free;Also, there is tin forthcoming,Though she is of low degree.”
Slowly rose that nameless warrior,Slowly turned his steps aside,Passed the lattice where the princessSate in beauty, sate in pride.Passed the row of noble ladies,Hied him to an humbler seat,And in silence laid the chapletAt the taylzeour’s daughter’s feet.
It was the Lord of Castlereagh, he sat within his room,His arms were crossed upon his breast, his face was marked with gloom;They said that St Helena’s Isle had rendered up its charge,That France was bristling high in arms—the Emperor at large.
’Twas midnight! all the lamps were dim, and dull as death the street,It might be that the watchman slept that night upon his beat,When lo! a heavy foot was heard to creak upon the stair,The door revolved upon its hinge—Great Heaven!—What enters there?
A little man, of stately mien, with slow and solemn stride;His hands are crossed upon his back, his coat is opened wide;And on his vest of green he wears an eagle and a star,—Saint George! protect us! ’tisThe Man,—the thunder-bolt of war!
Is that the famous hat that waved along Marengo’s ridge?Are these the spurs of Austerlitz—the boots of Lodi’s bridge?Leads he the conscript swarm again from France’s hornet hive?What seeks the fell usurper here, in Britain, and alive?
Pale grew the Lord of Castlereagh, his tongue was parched and dry,As in his brain he felt the glare of that tremendous eye;What wonder if he shrank in fear, for who could meet the glanceOf him who rear’d, ’mid Russian snows, the gonfalon of France?
From the side-pocket of his vest a pinch the despot took,Yet not a whit did he relax the sternness of his look:“Thou thoughtst the lion was afar, but he hath burst the chain—The watchword for to-night is France—the answer St Heléne.
“And didst thou deem the barren isle, or ocean waves, could bindThe master of the universe—the monarch of mankind?I tell thee, fool! the world itself is all too small for me;I laugh to scorn thy bolts and bars—I burst them, and am free.
“Thou thinkst that England hates me! Mark!—This very night my nameWas thundered in its capital with tumult and acclaim!They saw me, knew me, owned my power—Proud lord! I say, beware!There be men within the Surrey side, who know to do and dare!
“To-morrow in thy very teeth my standard will I rear—Ay, well that ashen cheek of thine may blanch and shrink with fear!To-morrow night another town shall sink in ghastly flames;And as I crossed the Borodin, so shall I cross the Thames!
“Thou’lt seize me, wilt thou, ere the dawn? Weak lordling, do thy worst!These hands ere now have broke thy chains, thy fetters they have burst.Yet, wouldst thou know my resting-place? Behold, ’tis written there!And let thy coward myrmidons approach me if they dare!”
Another pinch, another stride—he passes through the door—“Was it a phantom or a man was standing on the floor?And could that be the Emperor that moved before my eyes?Ah, yes! too sure it was himself, for here the paper lies!”
With trembling hands Lord Castlereagh undid the mystic scroll,With glassy eye essayed to read, for fear was on his soul—“What’s here?—‘At Astley’s, every night, the play ofMoscow’s Fall!Napoleon, for the thousandth time, by MrGomersal!’”
Comrades, you may pass the rosy. With permission of the chair,I shall leave you for a little, for I’d like to take the air.
Whether ’twas the sauce at dinner, or that glass of ginger-beer,Or these strong cheroots, I know not, but I feel a little queer.
Let me go. Nay, Chuckster, blow me, ’pon my soul, this is too bad!When you want me, ask the waiter; he knows where I’m to be had.
Whew! This is a great relief now! Let me but undo my stock;Resting here beneath the porch, my nerves will steady like a rock.
In my ears I hear the singing of a lot of favourite tunes—Bless my heart, how very odd! Why, surely there’s a brace of moons!
See! the stars! how bright they twinkle, winking with a frosty glare,Like my faithless cousin Amy when she drove me to despair.
Oh, my cousin, spider-hearted! Oh, my Amy! No, confound it!I must wear the mournful willow,—all around my heart I’ve bound it.[117]
Falser than the bank of fancy, frailer than a shilling glove,Puppet to a father’s anger, minion to a nabob’s love!
Is it well to wish thee happy? Having known me, could you everStoop to marry half a heart, and little more than half a liver?
Happy! Damme! Thou shalt lower to his level day by day,Changing from the best of china to the commonest of clay.
As the husband is, the wife is,—he is stomach-plagued and old;And his curry soups will make thy cheek the colour of his gold.
When his feeble love is sated, he will hold thee surely thenSomething lower than his hookah,—something less than his cayenne.
What is this? His eyes are pinky. Was’t the claret? Oh, no, no,—Bless your soul! it was the salmon,—salmon always makes him so.
Take him to thy dainty chamber—soothe him with thy lightest fancies;He will understand thee, won’t he?—pay thee with a lover’s glances?
Louder than the loudest trumpet, harsh as harshest ophicleide,Nasal respirations answer the endearments of his bride.
Sweet response, delightful music! Gaze upon thy noble charge,Till the spirit fill thy bosom that inspired the meek Laffarge.[119a]
Better thou wert dead before me,—better, better that I stood,Looking on thy murdered body, like the injured Daniel Good![119b]
Better thou and I were lying, cold and timber-stiff and dead,With a pan of burning charcoal underneath our nuptial bed!
Cursed be the Bank of England’s notes, that tempt the soul to sin!Cursed be the want of acres,—doubly cursed the want of tin!
Cursed be the marriage-contract, that enslaved thy soul to greed!Cursed be the sallow lawyer, that prepared and drew the deed!
Cursed be his foul apprentice, who the loathsome fees did earn!Cursed be the clerk and parson,—cursed be the whole concern!
* * * *
Oh, ’tis well that I should bluster,—much I’m like to make of that;Better comfort have I found in singing “All Around my Hat.”
But that song, so wildly plaintive, palls upon my British ears.’Twill not do to pine for ever,—I am getting up in years.
Can’t I turn the honest penny, scribbling for the weekly press,And in writing Sunday libels drown my private wretchedness![121]
Oh, to feel the wild pulsation that in manhood’s dawn I knew,When my days were all before me, and my years were twenty-two!
When I smoked my independent pipe along the Quadrant wide,[122a]With the many larks of London flaring up on every side;
When I went the pace so wildly, caring little what might come;Coffee-milling care and sorrow, with a nose-adapted thumb;[122b]
Felt the exquisite enjoyment, tossing nightly off, oh heavens!Brandies at the Cider Cellars, kidneys smoking-hot at Evans’![122c]
Or in the Adelphi sitting, half in rapture, half in tears,Saw the glorious melodrama conjure up the shades of years!
Saw Jack Sheppard, noble stripling, act his wondrous feats again,Snapping Newgate’s bars of iron, like an infant’s daisy chain.
Might was right, and all the terrors, which had held the world in awe,Were despised, and prigging prospered, spite of Laurie,[123]spite of law.
In such scenes as these I triumphed, ere my passion’s edge was rusted,And my cousin’s cold refusal left me very much disgusted!
Since, my heart is sere and withered, and I do not care a curse,Whether worse shall be the better, or the better be the worse.
Hark! my merry comrades call me, bawling for another jorum;They would mock me in derision, should I thus appear before ’em.
Womankind no more shall vex me, such at least as go arrayedIn the most expensive satins and the newest silk brocade.
I’ll to Afric, lion-haunted, where the giant forest yieldsRarer robes and finer tissue than are sold at Spital fields.
Or to burst all chains of habit, flinging habit’s self aside,I shall walk the tangled jungle in mankind’s primeval pride;
Feeding on the luscious berries and the rich cassava root,Lots of dates and lots of guavas, clusters of forbidden fruit.
Never comes the trader thither, never o’er the purple mainSounds the oath of British commerce, or the accent of Cockaigne.
There, methinks, would be enjoyment, where no envious rule prevents;Sink the steamboats! cuss the railways! rot, O rot the Three per Cents!