LAYING DOWN THE LAW.

“Whatever is, is right.”—Pope.

THERE once was a Doctor,(No foe to the proctor,)A physic concocter,Whose dose was so pat,However it acted,One speech it extracted,—“Yes, yes,” said the doctor,“I meant it for that!”And first, all “unaisy,”Like woman that’s crazy,In flies Mistress Casey,“Do come to poor PatThe blood’s running faster!He’s torn off the plaster—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”Anon, with an antic,Quite strange and romantic,A woman comes frantic—“What could you be at?My darling dear Aleck,You’ve sent him oxalic!”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”Then in comes another,Dispatch’d by his mother,A blubbering brother,Who gives a rat-tat—“Oh, poor little sisterHas lick’d off a blister!”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”Now home comes the flunkey,His own powder-monkey,But dull as a donkey—With basket and that—“The draught for the Squire, Sir,He chuck’d in the fire, Sir—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”The next is the pompousHead Beadle, old Bumpus—“Lord! here is a rumpus:That pauper, Old Nat,In some drunken notionHas drunk up his lotion—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”At last comes a servant,In grief very fervent:“Alas! Doctor Derwent,Poor Master is flat!He’s drawn his last breath, Sir—That dose was his death, Sir.”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

THERE once was a Doctor,(No foe to the proctor,)A physic concocter,Whose dose was so pat,However it acted,One speech it extracted,—“Yes, yes,” said the doctor,“I meant it for that!”

And first, all “unaisy,”Like woman that’s crazy,In flies Mistress Casey,“Do come to poor PatThe blood’s running faster!He’s torn off the plaster—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

Anon, with an antic,Quite strange and romantic,A woman comes frantic—“What could you be at?My darling dear Aleck,You’ve sent him oxalic!”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

Then in comes another,Dispatch’d by his mother,A blubbering brother,Who gives a rat-tat—“Oh, poor little sisterHas lick’d off a blister!”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

Now home comes the flunkey,His own powder-monkey,But dull as a donkey—With basket and that—“The draught for the Squire, Sir,He chuck’d in the fire, Sir—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

The next is the pompousHead Beadle, old Bumpus—“Lord! here is a rumpus:That pauper, Old Nat,In some drunken notionHas drunk up his lotion—”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

At last comes a servant,In grief very fervent:“Alas! Doctor Derwent,Poor Master is flat!He’s drawn his last breath, Sir—That dose was his death, Sir.”“Yes, yes,” said the Doctor,“I meant it for that!”

——“I am Sir Oracle,And when I ope my lips let no dog bark.”Merchant of Venice.

“If thou wert born a Dog, remain so; but if thou wert born a Man, resume thy former shape.”—Arabian Nights.

APOODLE, Judge-like, with emphatic paw,Dogmatically laying down the law,—A batch of canine Counsel round the table,Keen-eyed, and sharp of nose, and long of jaw,At sight, at scent, at giving tongue, right able:O, Edwin Landseer, Esquire, and R.A.,Thou great Pictorial Æsop, say,What is the moral of this painted fable?O, say, accomplished artist!Was it thy purpose, by a scene so quizzical,To read a wholesome lesson to the Chartist,So over partial to the means called Physical,Sticks, staves, and swords, and guns, the tools of treason?To show, illustrating the better course,The very Brutes abandoning Brute Force,The worry and the fight,The bark and bite,In which, says Doctor Watts, the dogs delight,And lending shaggy ears to Law and Reason,As uttered in that Court of high antiquityWhere sits the Chancellor, supreme as Pope,But works—so let us hope—In equity, not iniquity?Or was it but a speculationOn transmigration,How certain of our most distinguished Daniels,Interpreters of Law’s bewildering book,Would lookTransformed to mastiffs, setters, hounds, and spaniels(As Brahmins in their Hindoo code advance)With that great lawyer of the Upper HouseWho rules all suits by equitablenous,Become—like vile Armina’s spouse—A Dog, called Chance?[4]Methinks, indeed, I recogniseIn those deep-set and meditative eyesEngaged in mental puzzle,And that portentous muzzle,A celebrated judge, too prone to tarryTo hesitate on devious ins and outs,And, on preceding doubts, to buildre-doubtsThat regiments could not carry—Prolonging even Law’s delays, and stillPutting a skid upon the wheel up-hill,Meanwhile the weary and desponding clientSeem’d—in the agonies of indecision—In Doubting Castle, with that dreadful GiantDescribed in Bunyan’s Vision!So slow, indeed, was justice in its ways,Beset by more than customary clogs,Going to law in those expensive daysWas much the same as going to the Dogs!But possibly I err,And that sagacious and judicial creature,So Chancellor-like in feature,With ears so wig-like, and a cap of fur,Looking as grave, responsible, and sage,As if he had the guardianship, in fact,Of all poor dogs, or crackt,And puppies under age—It may be that the Creature was not meantAny especial Lord to represent,Eldon or Erskine, Cottenham or Thurlow,Or Brougham (more like him whose potent jawIs holding forth the letter of the law),Or Lyndhurst, after the vacation’s furlough,Presently sitting in the House of Peers,On wool he sometimes wishes in his ears,When touching Corn Laws, Taxes, or Tithe-piggery,He hears a fierce attack,And, sitting on his sack,Listens in his great wig to greater Whiggery!So, possibly, those others,In coats so various, or sleek, or rough,Aim not at any of the legal brothers,Who wear the silken robe, or gown of stuff.Yet who that ever heard or sawThe Counsel sitting in that solemn Court,Who, having passed the Bar, are safe in port,Or those great Sergeants, learned in the Law,—Who but must trace a feature now and thenOf those forensic men,As good at finding heirs as any harrier,Renown’d like greyhounds for long tales—indeed,At worrying the ear as apt as terriers,—Good at conveyance as the hairy carriersThat bear our gloves, umbrellas, hats, and sticks,Books, baskets, bones, or bricks,In Deeds of Trust as sure as Tray the trusty,—Acute at sniffing flaws on legal grounds,—And lastly—well the catalogue it closes!—Still following their predecessors’ noses,Through ways however dull or dusty,As fond of hunting precedents, as houndsOf running after foxes more than musty.However slow or fast,Full of urbanity, or supercilious,In temper wild, serene, or atrabilious,Fluent of tongue, or prone to legal saw,The Dogs have got a Chancellor, at last,For Laying down the Law!And never may the canine race regret it,With whinings and repinings loud or deep,—Ragged in coat, and shortened in their keep,Worried by day, and troubled in their sleep,With cares that prey upon the heart and fret it—As human suitors have had cause to weep—For what is Law, unless poor Dogs can get itDog-cheap?

Or was it but a speculationOn transmigration,How certain of our most distinguished Daniels,Interpreters of Law’s bewildering book,Would lookTransformed to mastiffs, setters, hounds, and spaniels(As Brahmins in their Hindoo code advance)With that great lawyer of the Upper HouseWho rules all suits by equitablenous,Become—like vile Armina’s spouse—A Dog, called Chance?[4]Methinks, indeed, I recogniseIn those deep-set and meditative eyesEngaged in mental puzzle,And that portentous muzzle,A celebrated judge, too prone to tarryTo hesitate on devious ins and outs,And, on preceding doubts, to buildre-doubtsThat regiments could not carry—Prolonging even Law’s delays, and stillPutting a skid upon the wheel up-hill,Meanwhile the weary and desponding clientSeem’d—in the agonies of indecision—In Doubting Castle, with that dreadful GiantDescribed in Bunyan’s Vision!

So slow, indeed, was justice in its ways,Beset by more than customary clogs,Going to law in those expensive daysWas much the same as going to the Dogs!But possibly I err,And that sagacious and judicial creature,So Chancellor-like in feature,With ears so wig-like, and a cap of fur,Looking as grave, responsible, and sage,As if he had the guardianship, in fact,Of all poor dogs, or crackt,And puppies under age—It may be that the Creature was not meantAny especial Lord to represent,Eldon or Erskine, Cottenham or Thurlow,Or Brougham (more like him whose potent jawIs holding forth the letter of the law),Or Lyndhurst, after the vacation’s furlough,Presently sitting in the House of Peers,On wool he sometimes wishes in his ears,When touching Corn Laws, Taxes, or Tithe-piggery,He hears a fierce attack,And, sitting on his sack,Listens in his great wig to greater Whiggery!

So, possibly, those others,In coats so various, or sleek, or rough,Aim not at any of the legal brothers,Who wear the silken robe, or gown of stuff.Yet who that ever heard or sawThe Counsel sitting in that solemn Court,Who, having passed the Bar, are safe in port,Or those great Sergeants, learned in the Law,—Who but must trace a feature now and thenOf those forensic men,As good at finding heirs as any harrier,Renown’d like greyhounds for long tales—indeed,At worrying the ear as apt as terriers,—Good at conveyance as the hairy carriersThat bear our gloves, umbrellas, hats, and sticks,Books, baskets, bones, or bricks,In Deeds of Trust as sure as Tray the trusty,—Acute at sniffing flaws on legal grounds,—And lastly—well the catalogue it closes!—Still following their predecessors’ noses,Through ways however dull or dusty,As fond of hunting precedents, as houndsOf running after foxes more than musty.

However slow or fast,Full of urbanity, or supercilious,In temper wild, serene, or atrabilious,Fluent of tongue, or prone to legal saw,The Dogs have got a Chancellor, at last,For Laying down the Law!And never may the canine race regret it,With whinings and repinings loud or deep,—Ragged in coat, and shortened in their keep,Worried by day, and troubled in their sleep,With cares that prey upon the heart and fret it—As human suitors have had cause to weep—For what is Law, unless poor Dogs can get itDog-cheap?

“No doubt the pleasure is as great,Of being cheated as to cheat.”—Hudibras.

THE history of human-kind to trace,Since Eve—the first of dupes—our doom unriddled,A certain portion of the human raceHas certainly a taste for being diddled.Witness the famous Mississippi dreams!A rage that time seems only to redouble—The Banks, Joint-Stocks, and all the flimsy schemes,For rolling in Pactolian streams,That cost our modern rogues so little trouble.No matter what,—to pasture cows on stubble,To twist sea-sand into a solid rope,To make French bricks and fancy bread of rubble,Or light with gas the whole celestial cope—Only propose to blow a bubble,And Lord! what hundreds will subscribe for soap!Soap!—it reminds me of a little tale,Tho’ not a pig’s, the hawbuck’s glory,When rustic games and merriment prevail—But here’s my story:Once on a time—no matter when—A knot of very charitable menSet up a Philanthropical Society,Professing on a certain plan,To benefit the race of man,And in particular that dark variety,Which some suppose inferior—as in vermin,The sable is to ermine,As smut to flour, as coal to alabaster,As crows to swans, as soot to driven snow,As blacking, or as ink to “milk below,”Or yet a better simile, to show,As ragman’s dolls to images in plaster!However, as is usual in our city,They had a sort of managing CommitteeA board of grave responsible Directors—A Secretary, good at pen and ink—A Treasurer, of course, to keep the chink,And quite an army of collectors!Not merely male, but female duns,Young, old, and middle-aged—of all degrees—With many of those persevering ones,Who mite by mite would beg a cheese!And what might be their aim?To rescue Afric’s sable sons from fetters—To save their bodies from the burning shameOf branding with hot letters—Their shoulders from the cowhide’s bloody strokes,Their necks from iron yokes?To end or mitigate the ills of slavery,The Planter’s avarice, the Driver’s knavery?To school the heathen Negroes and enlighten ’em,To polish up and brighten ’em,And make them worthy of eternal bliss?Why, no—the simple end and aim was this—Reading a well-known proverb much amiss—To wash and whiten ’em!They look’d so ugly in their sable hides:So dark, so dingy, like a grubby lotOf sooty sweeps, or colliers, and besides,However the poor elvesMight wash themselves,Nobody knew if they were clean or not—On Nature’s fairness they were quite a blot!Not to forget more serious complaintsThat even while they join’d in pious hymn,So black they were and grim,In face and limb,They look’d like Devils, though they sang like Saints!The thing was undeniable!They wanted washing! not that slight ablutionTo which the skin of the White Man is liable,Merely removing transient pollution—But good, hard, honest, energetic rubbingAnd scrubbing,Sousing each sooty frame from heels to headWith stiff, strong, saponaceous lather,And pails of water—hottish rather,But not so boiling as to turn ’em red!So spoke the philanthropic manWho laid, and hatch’d, and nursed the plan—And oh! to view its glorious consummation!The brooms and mops,The tubs and slops,The baths and brushes in full operation!To see each Crow, or Jim, or John,Go in a raven and come out a swan!While fair as Cavendishes, Vanes, and Russels,Black Venus rises from the soapy surge,And all the little Niggerlings emergeAs lily-white as mussels.Sweet was the vision—but alas!However in prospectus bright and sunny,To bring such visionary scenes to passOne thing was requisite, and that was—money;Money, that pays the laundress and her bills,For socks and collars, shirts and frills,Cravats and kerchiefs—money, without whichThe negroes must remain as dark as pitch;A thing to make all Christians sad and shivery,To think of millions of immortal soulsDwelling in bodies black as coals,And living—so to speak—in Satan’s livery!Money—the root of evil,—dross, and stuff!But oh! how happy ought the rich to feel,Whose means enable them to give enoughTo blanch an African from head to heel!How blessed—yea, thrice blessed—to subscribeEnough to scour a tribe!While he whose fortune was at best a brittle one,Although he gave but pence, how sweet to knowHe helped to bleach a Hottentot’s great toe,Or little one!Moved by this logic (or appall’d)To persons of a certain turn so proper,The money came when call’d,In silver, gold, and copper,Presents from “Friends to blacks,” or foes to whites,“Trifles,” and “offerings,” and “widow’s mites,”Plump legacies, and yearly benefactions,With other giftsAnd charitable lifts,Printed in lists and quarterly transactions.As thus—Elisha Brettel,An iron kettle.The Dowager Lady Scannel,A piece of flannel.Rebecca Pope,A bar of soap.The Misses Howels,Half-a-dozen towels.The Master Rush’s,Two scrubbing-brushes.Mr. T. Groom,A stable broom,And Mrs. Grubb,A tub.Great were the sums collected!And great results in consequence expected.But somehow, in the teeth of all endeavour,According to reportsAt yearly courts,The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!Yes! spite of all the water sous’d aloft,Soap, plain and mottled, hard and soft,Soda and pearlash, huckaback and sand,Brooms, brushes, palm of hand,And scourers in the office strong and clever,In spite of all the tubbing, rubbing, scrubbing,The routing and the grubbing,The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!In fact in his perennial speech,The Chairman own’d the niggers did not bleach,As he had hoped,From being washed and soaped,A circumstance he named with grief and pity;But still he had the happiness to say,For self and the Committee,By persevering in the present wayAnd scrubbing at the Blacks from day to day,Although he could not promise perfect white,From certain symptoms that had come to light,He hoped in time to get them gray!Lull’d by this vague assurance,The friends and patrons of the sable tribeContinued to subscribe,And waited, waited on with much endurance—Many a frugal sister, thrifty daughter—Many a stinted widow, pinching mother—With income by the tax made somewhat shorter,Still paid implicitly her crown per quarter,Only to hear as ev’ry year came round,That Mr. Treasurer had spent her pound;And as she loved her sable brother,That Mr. Treasurer must have another!But, spite of pounds or guineas,Instead of giving any hintOf turning to a neutral tint,The plaguy negroes and their piccaninniesWere still the colour of the bird that caws—Only some very aged soulsShowing a little gray upon their polls,Like daws!However, nothing dashedBy such repeated failures, or abashed,The Court still met;—the Chairman and Directors,The Secretary, good at pen and ink,The worthy Treasurer, who kept the chink,And all the cash Collectors;With hundreds of that class, so kindly credulous,Without whose help, no charlatan alive,Or Bubble Company could hope to thrive,Or busy Chevalier, however sedulous—Those good and easy innocents in fact,Who willingly receiving chaff for corn,As pointed out by Butler’s tact,Still find a secret pleasure in the actOf being pluck’d and shorn!However, in long hundreds there they were,Thronging the hot, and close, and dusty court,To hear once more addresses from the Chair,And regular Report.Alas! concluding in the usual strain,That what with everlasting wear and tear,The scrubbing-brushes hadn’t got a hair—The brooms—mere stumps—would never serve again—The soap was gone, the flannels all in shreds,The towels worn to threads,The tubs and pails too shatter’d to be mended—And what was added with a deal of pain,But as accounts correctly would explain,Tho’ thirty thousand pounds had been expended—The Blackamoors had still been wash’d in vain!“In fact, the negroes were as black as ink,Yet, still as the Committee dared to think,And hoped the proposition was not rash,A rather free expenditure of cash—”But ere the prospect could be made more sunny—Up jump’d a little, lemon-coloured man,And with an eager stammer, thus began,In angry earnest, though it sounded funny:“What! More subscriptions! No—no—no,—not I!You have had time—time—time enough to try!TheyWON’Tcome white! then why—why—why—why—whyMore money?”“Why!” said the Chairman, with an accent bland,And gentle waving of his dexter hand,“Why must we have more dross, and dirt, and dust,More filthy lucre, in a word, more gold—The why, sir, very easily is told,Because Humanity declares we must!We’ve scrubb’d the negroes till we’ve nearly killed ’em,And finding that we cannot wash them white,But still their nigritude offends the sight,We mean to gild ’em?”

THE history of human-kind to trace,Since Eve—the first of dupes—our doom unriddled,A certain portion of the human raceHas certainly a taste for being diddled.

Witness the famous Mississippi dreams!A rage that time seems only to redouble—The Banks, Joint-Stocks, and all the flimsy schemes,For rolling in Pactolian streams,That cost our modern rogues so little trouble.No matter what,—to pasture cows on stubble,To twist sea-sand into a solid rope,To make French bricks and fancy bread of rubble,Or light with gas the whole celestial cope—Only propose to blow a bubble,And Lord! what hundreds will subscribe for soap!

Soap!—it reminds me of a little tale,Tho’ not a pig’s, the hawbuck’s glory,When rustic games and merriment prevail—But here’s my story:Once on a time—no matter when—A knot of very charitable menSet up a Philanthropical Society,Professing on a certain plan,To benefit the race of man,And in particular that dark variety,Which some suppose inferior—as in vermin,The sable is to ermine,As smut to flour, as coal to alabaster,As crows to swans, as soot to driven snow,As blacking, or as ink to “milk below,”Or yet a better simile, to show,As ragman’s dolls to images in plaster!

However, as is usual in our city,They had a sort of managing CommitteeA board of grave responsible Directors—A Secretary, good at pen and ink—A Treasurer, of course, to keep the chink,And quite an army of collectors!Not merely male, but female duns,Young, old, and middle-aged—of all degrees—With many of those persevering ones,Who mite by mite would beg a cheese!

And what might be their aim?To rescue Afric’s sable sons from fetters—To save their bodies from the burning shameOf branding with hot letters—Their shoulders from the cowhide’s bloody strokes,Their necks from iron yokes?To end or mitigate the ills of slavery,The Planter’s avarice, the Driver’s knavery?To school the heathen Negroes and enlighten ’em,To polish up and brighten ’em,And make them worthy of eternal bliss?Why, no—the simple end and aim was this—Reading a well-known proverb much amiss—To wash and whiten ’em!

They look’d so ugly in their sable hides:So dark, so dingy, like a grubby lotOf sooty sweeps, or colliers, and besides,However the poor elvesMight wash themselves,Nobody knew if they were clean or not—On Nature’s fairness they were quite a blot!Not to forget more serious complaintsThat even while they join’d in pious hymn,So black they were and grim,In face and limb,They look’d like Devils, though they sang like Saints!

The thing was undeniable!They wanted washing! not that slight ablutionTo which the skin of the White Man is liable,Merely removing transient pollution—But good, hard, honest, energetic rubbingAnd scrubbing,Sousing each sooty frame from heels to headWith stiff, strong, saponaceous lather,And pails of water—hottish rather,But not so boiling as to turn ’em red!

So spoke the philanthropic manWho laid, and hatch’d, and nursed the plan—And oh! to view its glorious consummation!The brooms and mops,The tubs and slops,The baths and brushes in full operation!To see each Crow, or Jim, or John,Go in a raven and come out a swan!While fair as Cavendishes, Vanes, and Russels,Black Venus rises from the soapy surge,And all the little Niggerlings emergeAs lily-white as mussels.

Sweet was the vision—but alas!However in prospectus bright and sunny,To bring such visionary scenes to passOne thing was requisite, and that was—money;Money, that pays the laundress and her bills,For socks and collars, shirts and frills,Cravats and kerchiefs—money, without whichThe negroes must remain as dark as pitch;A thing to make all Christians sad and shivery,To think of millions of immortal soulsDwelling in bodies black as coals,And living—so to speak—in Satan’s livery!

Money—the root of evil,—dross, and stuff!But oh! how happy ought the rich to feel,Whose means enable them to give enoughTo blanch an African from head to heel!How blessed—yea, thrice blessed—to subscribeEnough to scour a tribe!While he whose fortune was at best a brittle one,Although he gave but pence, how sweet to knowHe helped to bleach a Hottentot’s great toe,Or little one!Moved by this logic (or appall’d)To persons of a certain turn so proper,The money came when call’d,In silver, gold, and copper,Presents from “Friends to blacks,” or foes to whites,“Trifles,” and “offerings,” and “widow’s mites,”Plump legacies, and yearly benefactions,With other giftsAnd charitable lifts,Printed in lists and quarterly transactions.As thus—Elisha Brettel,An iron kettle.The Dowager Lady Scannel,A piece of flannel.Rebecca Pope,A bar of soap.The Misses Howels,Half-a-dozen towels.The Master Rush’s,Two scrubbing-brushes.Mr. T. Groom,A stable broom,And Mrs. Grubb,A tub.

Great were the sums collected!And great results in consequence expected.But somehow, in the teeth of all endeavour,According to reportsAt yearly courts,The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!

Yes! spite of all the water sous’d aloft,Soap, plain and mottled, hard and soft,Soda and pearlash, huckaback and sand,Brooms, brushes, palm of hand,And scourers in the office strong and clever,In spite of all the tubbing, rubbing, scrubbing,The routing and the grubbing,The blacks, confound them! were as black as ever!

In fact in his perennial speech,The Chairman own’d the niggers did not bleach,As he had hoped,From being washed and soaped,A circumstance he named with grief and pity;But still he had the happiness to say,For self and the Committee,By persevering in the present wayAnd scrubbing at the Blacks from day to day,Although he could not promise perfect white,From certain symptoms that had come to light,He hoped in time to get them gray!

Lull’d by this vague assurance,The friends and patrons of the sable tribeContinued to subscribe,And waited, waited on with much endurance—Many a frugal sister, thrifty daughter—Many a stinted widow, pinching mother—With income by the tax made somewhat shorter,Still paid implicitly her crown per quarter,Only to hear as ev’ry year came round,That Mr. Treasurer had spent her pound;And as she loved her sable brother,That Mr. Treasurer must have another!

But, spite of pounds or guineas,Instead of giving any hintOf turning to a neutral tint,The plaguy negroes and their piccaninniesWere still the colour of the bird that caws—Only some very aged soulsShowing a little gray upon their polls,Like daws!

However, nothing dashedBy such repeated failures, or abashed,The Court still met;—the Chairman and Directors,The Secretary, good at pen and ink,The worthy Treasurer, who kept the chink,And all the cash Collectors;With hundreds of that class, so kindly credulous,Without whose help, no charlatan alive,Or Bubble Company could hope to thrive,Or busy Chevalier, however sedulous—Those good and easy innocents in fact,Who willingly receiving chaff for corn,As pointed out by Butler’s tact,Still find a secret pleasure in the actOf being pluck’d and shorn!

However, in long hundreds there they were,Thronging the hot, and close, and dusty court,To hear once more addresses from the Chair,And regular Report.

Alas! concluding in the usual strain,That what with everlasting wear and tear,The scrubbing-brushes hadn’t got a hair—The brooms—mere stumps—would never serve again—The soap was gone, the flannels all in shreds,The towels worn to threads,The tubs and pails too shatter’d to be mended—And what was added with a deal of pain,But as accounts correctly would explain,Tho’ thirty thousand pounds had been expended—The Blackamoors had still been wash’d in vain!

“In fact, the negroes were as black as ink,Yet, still as the Committee dared to think,And hoped the proposition was not rash,A rather free expenditure of cash—”But ere the prospect could be made more sunny—Up jump’d a little, lemon-coloured man,And with an eager stammer, thus began,In angry earnest, though it sounded funny:“What! More subscriptions! No—no—no,—not I!You have had time—time—time enough to try!TheyWON’Tcome white! then why—why—why—why—whyMore money?”

“Why!” said the Chairman, with an accent bland,And gentle waving of his dexter hand,“Why must we have more dross, and dirt, and dust,More filthy lucre, in a word, more gold—The why, sir, very easily is told,Because Humanity declares we must!We’ve scrubb’d the negroes till we’ve nearly killed ’em,And finding that we cannot wash them white,But still their nigritude offends the sight,We mean to gild ’em?”

ONE day—I had it from a hasty mouth,Accustom’d to make many blunders daily,And therefore will not name, precisely, South,Herschell, or Baily—But one of those great men who watch the skies,With all their rolling, winking eyes,Was looking at that Orb whose ancient GodWas patron of the Ode, and Song, and Sonnet,When thus he musing cried—“It’s very oddThat no Astronomer of all the squadCan tell the nature of those spots upon it!“Lord, master!” muttered John, a liveried elf,“To wonder so at spots upon the sun!I’ll tell you what he’s done—Freckled himself!”

“Lord, master!” muttered John, a liveried elf,“To wonder so at spots upon the sun!I’ll tell you what he’s done—Freckled himself!”

SOMEWHERE in Leather Lane—I wonder that it was not Mincing,And for this reason most convincing,That Mr. BrainDealt in those well-minced cartridges of meatSome people like to eat—However, all such quibbles overstepping,In Leather Lane he lived; and drove a tradeIn porcine sausages, though London made,Call’d “Epping.”Right brisk was the demand,Seldom his goods stay’d long on hand,For out of all adjacent courts and lanes,Young Irish ladies and their swains—Such soups of girls and broths of boys!—Sought his delicious chains,Preferr’d to all polonies, saveloys,And other foreign toys—The mere chance passengersWho saw his “sassengers,”Of sweetness undeniable,So sleek, so mottled, and so “friable,”Stepp’d in, forgetting ev’ry other thought,And bought.Meanwhile a constant thumpingWas heard, a sort of subterranean chumping—Incessant was the noise!But though he had a foreman and assistant,With all the tools consistent,(Besides a wife and two fine chopping boys)His means were not yet vast enoughFor chopping fast enoughTo meet the call from streets, and lanes, and passages,For first-chop “sassages.”However, Mr. BrainWas none of those dull men and slow,Who, flying bird-like by a railway train,Sigh for the heavy mails of long ago;He did not set his face ‘gainst innovationsFor rapid operations,And therefore in a kind of waking dreamListen’d to some hot-water sprite that hintedTo have his meat chopp’d, as the Times was printed,By steam!Accordingly in happy hour,A bran-new Engine went to workChopping up pounds on pounds of porkWith all the energy of Two-Horse-Power,And wonderful celerity—

Meanwhile a constant thumpingWas heard, a sort of subterranean chumping—Incessant was the noise!But though he had a foreman and assistant,With all the tools consistent,(Besides a wife and two fine chopping boys)His means were not yet vast enoughFor chopping fast enoughTo meet the call from streets, and lanes, and passages,For first-chop “sassages.”

However, Mr. BrainWas none of those dull men and slow,Who, flying bird-like by a railway train,Sigh for the heavy mails of long ago;He did not set his face ‘gainst innovationsFor rapid operations,And therefore in a kind of waking dreamListen’d to some hot-water sprite that hintedTo have his meat chopp’d, as the Times was printed,By steam!

Accordingly in happy hour,A bran-new Engine went to workChopping up pounds on pounds of porkWith all the energy of Two-Horse-Power,And wonderful celerity—

THE JUDGES OF A-SIZE.

LONG COMMONS AND SHORT COMMONS.

When lo! when ev’rything to hope responded,Whether his head was turn’d by his prosperity,Whether he had some sly intrigue, in verity,The man absconded!His anxious Wife in vainPlacarded Leather Lane,And all the suburbs with descriptive bills,Such as are issued when from homes and tillsClerks, dogs, cats, lunatics, and children roam;Besides advertisements in all the journals,Or weeklies or diurnals,Beginning “Left his Home”—The sausage-maker, spite of white and black,Never came back.Never, alive!—But on the seventh night,Just when the yawning grave its dead releases,Filling his bedded wife with sore affrightIn walk’d his grisly Sprite,In fifty thousand pieces!“O Mary!” so it seem’dIn hollow melancholy tone to say,Whilst thro’ its airy shape the moonlight gleam’dWith scarcely dimmer ray—“O Mary! let your hopes no longer flatter,Prepare at once to drink of sorrow’s cup—It ain’t no use to mince the matter—The Engine’s chopp’d me up!”

When lo! when ev’rything to hope responded,Whether his head was turn’d by his prosperity,Whether he had some sly intrigue, in verity,The man absconded!

His anxious Wife in vainPlacarded Leather Lane,And all the suburbs with descriptive bills,Such as are issued when from homes and tillsClerks, dogs, cats, lunatics, and children roam;Besides advertisements in all the journals,Or weeklies or diurnals,Beginning “Left his Home”—The sausage-maker, spite of white and black,Never came back.

Never, alive!—But on the seventh night,Just when the yawning grave its dead releases,Filling his bedded wife with sore affrightIn walk’d his grisly Sprite,In fifty thousand pieces!“O Mary!” so it seem’dIn hollow melancholy tone to say,Whilst thro’ its airy shape the moonlight gleam’dWith scarcely dimmer ray—“O Mary! let your hopes no longer flatter,Prepare at once to drink of sorrow’s cup—It ain’t no use to mince the matter—The Engine’s chopp’d me up!”

“I lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.”

OH, Mr. Hume, thy nameIs travelling post upon the road to fame,With four fast horses and two sharp postilions;Thy reputationHas friends by numeration,Units, Tens, Hundreds, Thousands, Millions.Whenever public men together dine,They drink to theeWith three times three—That’s nine.And oft a votary proposes thenTo add unto the cheering one cheer more—Nine and One are Ten;Or somebody, for thy honour still more keen,Insists on four times four—Sixteen!In Parliament no star shines more or bigger,And yet thou dost not care to cut a figure;Equally art thou eloquent and able,Whether in showing how to serve the nationOr laying its petitions on the TableOf Multiplication.In motion thou art second unto none,Though fortune on thy motions seems to frown,For though you set a number downYou seldom carry one.Great at speech thou art, though some folks cough,But thou art greatest at aparingoff.But never blench,Although in stirring up corruption’s wormsYou make some factionsVulgar as certain fractions,Almost reduced unto their lowest terms.Go on, reform, diminish, and retrench;Go on, for ridicule not caring;Sift on from one to nine with all their noughts,And make state cyphers eat up their own orts,And only in thy saving be unsparing;At soldiers’ uniforms make awful rackets,Don’t trim though, but untrim their jackets.Allow the tin mines no tin tax,Cut off the Great Seal’s wax!Dock all the dock-yards, lower masts and sails,Search foot by foot the Infantry’s amounts,Look into all the Cavalry’s accounts,And crop their horses’ tails.Look well to Woolwich and each Money-vote,Examine all the cannons’ charges well,And those who found th’ Artillery compelTo forge twelve-pounders for a five-pound note.Watch Sandhurst too, its debts and its Cadets—Those Military pets.Take army—no, take Leggy TailorsDown to the Fleet, for no one but a nincumOut of our nation’s narrow incomeWould furnish such wide trousers to the Sailors.Next take, to wonder him,The Master of the Horse’s horse from under him;Retrench from those who tend on Royal illsWherewith to gild their pills.And tell the Stag-hound’s Master he must keepThe deer, &c., cheap.Close as new broomsScrub the Bed Chamber Grooms;Abridge the Master of the CeremoniesOf his very monies;In short, at every salary have a pull,And when folks come for payOn quarter-day,Stop half and make them give receipts in full.Oh, Mr. Hume, don’t drink,Or eat, or sleep, a wink,Till you have argued over each reduction:Let it be food to you, repose and suction;Though you should make more motions by one halfThan any telegraph,Item by item all these things enforce,Be on your legs till lame, and talk till hoarse;Have lozenges—mind, Dawson’s—in your pocket,And swing your arms till aching in their socket;Or if awake you cannot keep,Talk of retrenchment in your sleep;Expose each Peachum, and show up each Lockit—Go down to the M.P.’s before you sup,And while they’re sitting blow them up,As Guy Fawkes could not do with all his nous;But now we live in different Novembers,And safely you may walk into the House,First split its ears and then divide its members!

In Parliament no star shines more or bigger,And yet thou dost not care to cut a figure;Equally art thou eloquent and able,Whether in showing how to serve the nationOr laying its petitions on the TableOf Multiplication.In motion thou art second unto none,Though fortune on thy motions seems to frown,For though you set a number downYou seldom carry one.Great at speech thou art, though some folks cough,But thou art greatest at aparingoff.

But never blench,Although in stirring up corruption’s wormsYou make some factionsVulgar as certain fractions,Almost reduced unto their lowest terms.Go on, reform, diminish, and retrench;Go on, for ridicule not caring;Sift on from one to nine with all their noughts,And make state cyphers eat up their own orts,And only in thy saving be unsparing;At soldiers’ uniforms make awful rackets,Don’t trim though, but untrim their jackets.Allow the tin mines no tin tax,Cut off the Great Seal’s wax!

Dock all the dock-yards, lower masts and sails,Search foot by foot the Infantry’s amounts,Look into all the Cavalry’s accounts,And crop their horses’ tails.Look well to Woolwich and each Money-vote,Examine all the cannons’ charges well,And those who found th’ Artillery compelTo forge twelve-pounders for a five-pound note.Watch Sandhurst too, its debts and its Cadets—Those Military pets.Take army—no, take Leggy TailorsDown to the Fleet, for no one but a nincumOut of our nation’s narrow incomeWould furnish such wide trousers to the Sailors.Next take, to wonder him,The Master of the Horse’s horse from under him;Retrench from those who tend on Royal illsWherewith to gild their pills.And tell the Stag-hound’s Master he must keepThe deer, &c., cheap.Close as new broomsScrub the Bed Chamber Grooms;Abridge the Master of the CeremoniesOf his very monies;In short, at every salary have a pull,And when folks come for payOn quarter-day,Stop half and make them give receipts in full.

Oh, Mr. Hume, don’t drink,Or eat, or sleep, a wink,Till you have argued over each reduction:Let it be food to you, repose and suction;Though you should make more motions by one halfThan any telegraph,Item by item all these things enforce,Be on your legs till lame, and talk till hoarse;Have lozenges—mind, Dawson’s—in your pocket,And swing your arms till aching in their socket;Or if awake you cannot keep,Talk of retrenchment in your sleep;Expose each Peachum, and show up each Lockit—Go down to the M.P.’s before you sup,And while they’re sitting blow them up,As Guy Fawkes could not do with all his nous;But now we live in different Novembers,And safely you may walk into the House,First split its ears and then divide its members!

“Well, if you reclaim such as Hood, your Society will deserve the thanks of the country.”—Temperance Society’s Herald, vol. 1, No. 1, p. 8.

“My father, when last I from GuineaCame home with abundance of wealth,Said, ‘Jack, never be such a ninnyAs to drink—’ says I, ‘Father, your health?’”Nothing like Grog.

OH! Admiral Gam—I dare not mentionbierIn such a temperate ear—Oh! Admiral Gam—an admiral of the Blue,Of course to read the Navy List aright,For strictly shunning wine of either hue,You can’t be Admiral of the Red or White:—Oh, Admiral Gam! consider ere you callOn merry Englishmen to wash their throttlesWith water only; and to break their bottles,To stick, for fear of trespass, on the wallOf Exeter Hall!Consider, I beseech, the contrarietyOf cutting off our brandy, gin, and rum,And then, by tracts, inviting us to comeAnd “mixin your society!”In giving rules to dine, or sup, or lunch,Consider Nature’s ends before you league usTo strip the Isle of Rum of all its punch—To dock the Isle of Mull of all its negus—Or doom—to suit your milk and water view—The Isle of Skye to nothing but sky-blue!Consider—for appearance’ sake—considerThe sorry figure of a spirit-ridder,Going on this crusade against the suttler;A sort of Hudibras—without a Butler!Consider—ere you break the ardent spiritsOf father, mother, brother, sister, daughter;What are your beverage’s washy merits?Gin may be low—but I have known low-water!Consider well, before you thus deliver,With such authority, your sloppy cannon;Should British tars taste nothing but theriver,Because theChesapeakeonce fought theShannon!Consider, too—before all Eau-de-vie,Schiedam, or other drinkers, you rebut—To bite a bitten dog all curs agree;But who would cut a man because he’scut?Consider—ere you bid the poor to fillTheir murmuring stomach with the “murmuring rill”—Consider that their streams are not like ours,Reflecting heaven, and margined by sweet flowers;On their dark pools by day no sun reclines,By night no Jupiter, no Venus shines;Consider life’s sour taste, that bids them mixTheir rum with Acheron, or Gin with Styx;If you must pour out water to the poor, oh!Let it beaqua d’ oro!Consider—ere as furious as a griffin,Against a glass of grog you make such work,A man may like a stiff’un,And yet not be a Burke!Consider, too, before you bid all skinkersTurn water-drinkers,What sort of fluid fills their native rivers;Their Mudiboos, and Niles, and Guadalquivirs.How should you like, yourself, in glass or mug,The Bog—the Bug—The Maine—the Weser—or that freezer, Neva?Nay, take the very rill of classic ground—Lord Byron foundEven Castaly better for Geneva.Consider—if, to vote Reform’s arrears,His Majesty should please to make you peers,Your titles would be very far from trumps,To figure in a book of blue and red:—The Duke of Draw-well—what a name to dread!Marquis of Main-pipe! Earl New-River-Head!And Temperance’s chief, the Prince of Pumps!

Consider, I beseech, the contrarietyOf cutting off our brandy, gin, and rum,And then, by tracts, inviting us to comeAnd “mixin your society!”In giving rules to dine, or sup, or lunch,Consider Nature’s ends before you league usTo strip the Isle of Rum of all its punch—To dock the Isle of Mull of all its negus—Or doom—to suit your milk and water view—The Isle of Skye to nothing but sky-blue!

Consider—for appearance’ sake—considerThe sorry figure of a spirit-ridder,Going on this crusade against the suttler;A sort of Hudibras—without a Butler!

Consider—ere you break the ardent spiritsOf father, mother, brother, sister, daughter;What are your beverage’s washy merits?Gin may be low—but I have known low-water!

Consider well, before you thus deliver,With such authority, your sloppy cannon;Should British tars taste nothing but theriver,Because theChesapeakeonce fought theShannon!

Consider, too—before all Eau-de-vie,Schiedam, or other drinkers, you rebut—To bite a bitten dog all curs agree;But who would cut a man because he’scut?

Consider—ere you bid the poor to fillTheir murmuring stomach with the “murmuring rill”—Consider that their streams are not like ours,Reflecting heaven, and margined by sweet flowers;On their dark pools by day no sun reclines,By night no Jupiter, no Venus shines;Consider life’s sour taste, that bids them mixTheir rum with Acheron, or Gin with Styx;If you must pour out water to the poor, oh!Let it beaqua d’ oro!

Consider—ere as furious as a griffin,Against a glass of grog you make such work,A man may like a stiff’un,And yet not be a Burke!

Consider, too, before you bid all skinkersTurn water-drinkers,What sort of fluid fills their native rivers;Their Mudiboos, and Niles, and Guadalquivirs.How should you like, yourself, in glass or mug,The Bog—the Bug—The Maine—the Weser—or that freezer, Neva?Nay, take the very rill of classic ground—Lord Byron foundEven Castaly better for Geneva.

Consider—if, to vote Reform’s arrears,His Majesty should please to make you peers,Your titles would be very far from trumps,To figure in a book of blue and red:—The Duke of Draw-well—what a name to dread!Marquis of Main-pipe! Earl New-River-Head!And Temperance’s chief, the Prince of Pumps!

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