At the last hour of Fannia’s rout,When Dukes walked in, and lamps went out,Fair Chloe sat; a sighing crowdOf high adorers round her bowed,And ever flattery’s incense roseTo lull the idol to repose.Sudden some Gnome that stood unseen,Or lurked disguised in mortal mien,Whispered in Beauty’s trembling earThe word of bondage and of fear—“Marriage!”—her lips their silence broke,And smiled on Vapid as they spoke,—“I hate a drunkard or a lout,I hate the the sullens and the gout;If e’er I wed—let danglers know it—I wed with no one but a poet.”And who but feels a poet’s fireWhen Chloe’s smiles, as now, inspire?Who can the bidden verse refuseWhen Chloe is his verse and Muse?Thus Flattery whispered round;And straight the humorous fancy grew,That lyres are sweet when hearts are true;And all who feel a lover’s flameMust rhyme to-night on Chloe’s name;And he’s unworthy of the dameWho silent here is found.Since head must plead the cause of heart,Some put their trust in answer smartOr pointed repartee;Some joy that they have hoarded upThose genii of the jovial cup,Chorus, and catch, and glee;And for one evening all prepareTo be “Apollo’s chiefest care.”Then Vapid rose—no Stentor this,And his no Homer’s lay;Meek victim of antithesis,He sighed and died away:—“Despair my sorrowing bosom rives,And anguish on me liesChloe may die, while Vapid lives,Or live while Vapid dies!You smile!—the horrid vision flies,And Hope this promise gives;I cannot live while Chloe dies,Nor die while Chloe lives!”Next, Snaffle, foe to tears and sadness,Drew fire from Chloe’s eyes;And warm with drunkenness and madness,He started for the prize.“Let the glad cymbals loudly clash,Full bumpers let’s be quaffing!No poet I!—Hip, hip!—here goes!Blow,—blow the trumpet, blow the——”Here he was puzzled for a rhyme,And Lucy whispered “nose” in time,And so they fell a-laughing.“Gods!” cried a minister of State,“You know not, Empress of my fate,How long my passion would endure,If passion were a sinecure;But since, in Love’s despotic clime,Fondness is taxed, and pays in rhyme,Glad to retire, I shun disgrace,And make my bow, and quit my place.”And thus the jest went circling round,And ladies smiled and sneered,As smooth fourteen and weak fourscoreProfessed they ne’er had rhymed before,And drunkards blushed, and doctors swore,And soldiers owned they feared;Unwonted Muses were invokedBy pugilists and whips,And many a belle looked half provoked,When favoured swains stood dumb and choked;And warblers whined, and punsters joked,And dandies bit their lips.At last an old Ecclesiastic,Who looked half kind and half sarcastic,And seemed in every transient lookAt once to flatter and rebuke,Cut off the sport with “Pshaw! enough:”And then took breath,—and then took snuff:“Chloe,” he said, “you’re like the moon;You shine as bright, you change as soon;Your wit is like the moon’s fair beam,In borrowed light ’tis over us thrown;Yet, like the moon’s, that sparkling streamTo careless eyes appears your own;Your cheek by turns is pale and red,And then to close the simile,(From which methinks you turn your head,As half in anger, half in glee,)Dark would the night appear without you,And—twenty fools have rhymed about you!”
At the last hour of Fannia’s rout,When Dukes walked in, and lamps went out,Fair Chloe sat; a sighing crowdOf high adorers round her bowed,And ever flattery’s incense roseTo lull the idol to repose.Sudden some Gnome that stood unseen,Or lurked disguised in mortal mien,Whispered in Beauty’s trembling earThe word of bondage and of fear—“Marriage!”—her lips their silence broke,And smiled on Vapid as they spoke,—“I hate a drunkard or a lout,I hate the the sullens and the gout;If e’er I wed—let danglers know it—I wed with no one but a poet.”And who but feels a poet’s fireWhen Chloe’s smiles, as now, inspire?Who can the bidden verse refuseWhen Chloe is his verse and Muse?Thus Flattery whispered round;And straight the humorous fancy grew,That lyres are sweet when hearts are true;And all who feel a lover’s flameMust rhyme to-night on Chloe’s name;And he’s unworthy of the dameWho silent here is found.Since head must plead the cause of heart,Some put their trust in answer smartOr pointed repartee;Some joy that they have hoarded upThose genii of the jovial cup,Chorus, and catch, and glee;And for one evening all prepareTo be “Apollo’s chiefest care.”Then Vapid rose—no Stentor this,And his no Homer’s lay;Meek victim of antithesis,He sighed and died away:—“Despair my sorrowing bosom rives,And anguish on me liesChloe may die, while Vapid lives,Or live while Vapid dies!You smile!—the horrid vision flies,And Hope this promise gives;I cannot live while Chloe dies,Nor die while Chloe lives!”Next, Snaffle, foe to tears and sadness,Drew fire from Chloe’s eyes;And warm with drunkenness and madness,He started for the prize.“Let the glad cymbals loudly clash,Full bumpers let’s be quaffing!No poet I!—Hip, hip!—here goes!Blow,—blow the trumpet, blow the——”Here he was puzzled for a rhyme,And Lucy whispered “nose” in time,And so they fell a-laughing.“Gods!” cried a minister of State,“You know not, Empress of my fate,How long my passion would endure,If passion were a sinecure;But since, in Love’s despotic clime,Fondness is taxed, and pays in rhyme,Glad to retire, I shun disgrace,And make my bow, and quit my place.”And thus the jest went circling round,And ladies smiled and sneered,As smooth fourteen and weak fourscoreProfessed they ne’er had rhymed before,And drunkards blushed, and doctors swore,And soldiers owned they feared;Unwonted Muses were invokedBy pugilists and whips,And many a belle looked half provoked,When favoured swains stood dumb and choked;And warblers whined, and punsters joked,And dandies bit their lips.At last an old Ecclesiastic,Who looked half kind and half sarcastic,And seemed in every transient lookAt once to flatter and rebuke,Cut off the sport with “Pshaw! enough:”And then took breath,—and then took snuff:“Chloe,” he said, “you’re like the moon;You shine as bright, you change as soon;Your wit is like the moon’s fair beam,In borrowed light ’tis over us thrown;Yet, like the moon’s, that sparkling streamTo careless eyes appears your own;Your cheek by turns is pale and red,And then to close the simile,(From which methinks you turn your head,As half in anger, half in glee,)Dark would the night appear without you,And—twenty fools have rhymed about you!”
At the last hour of Fannia’s rout,When Dukes walked in, and lamps went out,Fair Chloe sat; a sighing crowdOf high adorers round her bowed,And ever flattery’s incense roseTo lull the idol to repose.Sudden some Gnome that stood unseen,Or lurked disguised in mortal mien,Whispered in Beauty’s trembling earThe word of bondage and of fear—“Marriage!”—her lips their silence broke,And smiled on Vapid as they spoke,—“I hate a drunkard or a lout,I hate the the sullens and the gout;If e’er I wed—let danglers know it—I wed with no one but a poet.”
And who but feels a poet’s fireWhen Chloe’s smiles, as now, inspire?Who can the bidden verse refuseWhen Chloe is his verse and Muse?Thus Flattery whispered round;And straight the humorous fancy grew,That lyres are sweet when hearts are true;And all who feel a lover’s flameMust rhyme to-night on Chloe’s name;And he’s unworthy of the dameWho silent here is found.Since head must plead the cause of heart,Some put their trust in answer smartOr pointed repartee;Some joy that they have hoarded upThose genii of the jovial cup,Chorus, and catch, and glee;And for one evening all prepareTo be “Apollo’s chiefest care.”
Then Vapid rose—no Stentor this,And his no Homer’s lay;Meek victim of antithesis,He sighed and died away:—“Despair my sorrowing bosom rives,And anguish on me liesChloe may die, while Vapid lives,Or live while Vapid dies!You smile!—the horrid vision flies,And Hope this promise gives;I cannot live while Chloe dies,Nor die while Chloe lives!”
Next, Snaffle, foe to tears and sadness,Drew fire from Chloe’s eyes;And warm with drunkenness and madness,He started for the prize.“Let the glad cymbals loudly clash,Full bumpers let’s be quaffing!No poet I!—Hip, hip!—here goes!Blow,—blow the trumpet, blow the——”Here he was puzzled for a rhyme,And Lucy whispered “nose” in time,And so they fell a-laughing.
“Gods!” cried a minister of State,“You know not, Empress of my fate,How long my passion would endure,If passion were a sinecure;But since, in Love’s despotic clime,Fondness is taxed, and pays in rhyme,Glad to retire, I shun disgrace,And make my bow, and quit my place.”
And thus the jest went circling round,And ladies smiled and sneered,As smooth fourteen and weak fourscoreProfessed they ne’er had rhymed before,And drunkards blushed, and doctors swore,And soldiers owned they feared;Unwonted Muses were invokedBy pugilists and whips,And many a belle looked half provoked,When favoured swains stood dumb and choked;And warblers whined, and punsters joked,And dandies bit their lips.
At last an old Ecclesiastic,Who looked half kind and half sarcastic,And seemed in every transient lookAt once to flatter and rebuke,Cut off the sport with “Pshaw! enough:”And then took breath,—and then took snuff:“Chloe,” he said, “you’re like the moon;You shine as bright, you change as soon;Your wit is like the moon’s fair beam,In borrowed light ’tis over us thrown;Yet, like the moon’s, that sparkling streamTo careless eyes appears your own;Your cheek by turns is pale and red,And then to close the simile,(From which methinks you turn your head,As half in anger, half in glee,)Dark would the night appear without you,And—twenty fools have rhymed about you!”
“Mercy o’ me, what a multitude are here!They grow still, too; from all parts they are coming,As if we kept a fair here.”—Shakespeare.
“Mercy o’ me, what a multitude are here!They grow still, too; from all parts they are coming,As if we kept a fair here.”—Shakespeare.
“Mercy o’ me, what a multitude are here!They grow still, too; from all parts they are coming,As if we kept a fair here.”—Shakespeare.
The sun hath shed a mellower beam,Fair Thames, upon thy silver stream,And air and water, earth and heaven,Lie in the calm repose of even.How silently the breeze moves on,Flutters, and whispers, and is gone!How calmly does the quiet skySleep in its cold serenity!Alas! how sweet a scene were hereFor shepherd or for sonnetteer;How fit the place, how fit the time,For making love, or making rhyme!But though the sun’s descending raySmiles warmly on the close of day,’Tis not to gaze upon his lightThat Eton’s sons are here to-night;And though the river, calm and clear,Makes music to the poet’s ear,’Tis not to listen to the soundThat Eton’s sons are thronging round:The sun unheeded may decline—Blue eyes send out a brighter shine;The wave may cease its gurgling moan—Glad voices have a sweeter tone;For in our calendar of blissWe have no hour so gay as this,When the kind hearts and brilliant eyesOf those we know, and love, and prize,Are come to cheer the captive’s thrall,And smile upon his festival.Stay, Pegasus!—and let me askEre I go onward in my task,—Pray, reader, were you ever here,Just at this season of the year?No!—then the end of next JulyShould bring you, with admiring eye,To hear usrow, and see us row,And cry, “How fastthemboysdoesgo!”For Father Thames beholds to-nightA thousand visions of delight;Tearing and swearing, jeering, cheering,Lame steeds to right and left careering,Displays, dismays, disputes, distresses,Ruffling of temper and of dresses;Wounds on the heart—and on the knuckles;Losing of patience—and of buckles.An interdict is laid on Latin,And scholars smirk in silk and satin,And dandies start their thinnest pumps,And Michael Oakley’s in the dumps;And there is nought beneath the sunBut dash, and splash, and falls, and fun.Lord! what would be the Cynic’s mirth,If fate would lift him to the earth,And set his tub, with magic jump,Squat down beside the Brocas Clump!What scoffs the sage would utter thereFrom his unpolished elbow-chair,To see the sempstress’ handiwork,The Greek confounded with the Turk,Parisian mixed with Piedmontese,And Persian joined to Portuguese;And mantles short, and mantles long,And mantles right, and mantles wrong,Mis-shaped, mis-coloured, and mis-placedWith what the tailor calls ataste!And then the badges and the boats,The flags, the drums, the paint, the coats;But more than these, and more than all,The puller’s intermitted call—“Easy!”—“Hard all!”—“Now pick her up!”—“Upon my life, how I shall sup!”Would be a fine and merry matterTo wake the sage’s love of satire.Kind readers, at my laughing ageI thank my stars I’m not a sage;I, an unthinking, scribbling elf,Love to please others—and myself;Therefore I flya malo joco,But likedesipere in loco.Excuse me, that I wander so;All modern pens digress, you know.Now to my theme! Thou Being gay,Houri or goddess, nymph or fay,Whoe’er—whate’er—where’er thou art—Who, with thy warm and kindly heart,Hast made these blest abodes thy care,—Being of water, earth, or air,—Beneath the moonbeam hasten hither,Enjoy thy blessings ere they wither,And witness with thy gladdest faceThe glories of thy dwelling-place!The boats put off; throughout the crowdThe tumult thickens; wide and loudThe din re-echoes; man and horsePlunge onward in their mingled course.Look at the troop! I love to seeOur real Etonian cavalry:They start in such a pretty trim,And such sweet scorn of life and limb.I must confess I never foundA horse much worse for being sound;I wish my nag not wholly blind,And like to have a tail behind;And though he certainly may hearCorrectly with a single ear,I think, to look genteel and neat,He ought to have his two complete.But these are trifles!—off they goBeside the wondering river’s flow;And if, by dint of spur and whip,They shamble on without a trip,Well have they done! I make no questionThey’re shaken into good digestion.I and my Muse—my Muse and I—Will follow with the company,And get to Surly Hall in timeTo make a supper, and a rhyme.Yes! while the animating crowd,The gay, and fair, and kind, and proud,With eager voice and eager glance,Wait till the pageantry advance,We’ll throw around a hasty view,And try to get a sketch or two.First in the race is William Tag,Thalia’s most industrious fag;Whate’er the subject he essaysTo dress in never-dying lays,A chief, a cheese, a dearth, a dinner,A cot, a castle, cards, Corinna,Hibernia, Baffin’s Bay, Parnassus,Beef, Bonaparte, beer, Bonassus—Will hath his ordered words, and rhymesFor various scenes and various times;Which suit alike for this or that,And come, like volunteers, quitepat.He hath his elegy, or sonnet,For Lucy’s bier, or Lucy’s bonnet;And celebrates with equal ardourA monarch’s sceptre, or his larder.Poor William, when he wants a hint,All other poet’s are his mint;He coins his epic or his lyric,His satire or his panegyric,From all the gravity and witOf what the ancients thought and writ.Armed with his Ovid and his FlaccusHe comes like thunder to attack us;In pilfered mail he bursts to view,The cleverest thief I ever knew.Thou noble Bard! at any timeBorrow my measure and my rhyme;Borrow (I’ll cancel all the debt)An epigram or epithet;Borrow my mountains, or my trees,My paintings, or my similes;Nay, borrow all my pretty names,My real or my fancied flames;Eliza, Alice, Leonora,Mary, Melina, and Medora;And borrow all my “mutual vows,”My “ruby lips,” and “cruel brows,”And all my stupors and my startings,And all my meetings, and my partings;Thus far, my friend, you’ll find me willing;Borrow all things save one—a shilling!Drunken, and loud, and mad, and rash,Joe Tarrell wields his ceaseless lash;The would-be sportsman; o’er the sidesOf the lank charger he bestridesThe foam lies painfully, and bloodIs trickling in a ruddier floodBeneath the fury of the steel,Projecting from his armed heel.E’en from his childhood’s earliest bloom,All studies that become a groomEton’sspes gregis, honest Joe,Or knows, or would be thought to know;He picks a hunter’s hoof quite finely,And spells a horse’s teeth divinely.Prime terror of molesting duns,Sole judge of greyhounds and of guns,A skilful whip, a steady shot,Joe swears he is!—who says he’s not?And then he has such knowing facesFor all the week of Ascot races,And talks with such a mystic speech,Untangible to vulgar reach,Of Sultan, Highflyer, and Ranter,Potatoes, Quiz, and Tam O’Shanter,Bay colts and brown colts, sires and dams,Bribings and bullyings, bets and bams;And how the favouriteshouldhave won,And how the little Earl wasdone;And how the filly failed in strength,And how some faces grew in length;And how some people—if they’d show—Know something more than others know.Such is his talk; and while we wonderAt that interminable thunder,The undiscriminating snarlerAstounds the ladies in the parlour,And broaches at his mother’s tableThe slang of kennel and of stable.And when he’s drunk, he roars before yeOne excellent unfailing story,About a gun, Lord knows how long,With a discharge, Lord knows how strong,Which always needs an oath and frownTo make the monstrous dose go down.O! oft and oft the Muses prayThat wondrous tube may burst some day,And then the world will ascertainWhether its master hath a brain!Then, on the stone that hides his sleep,These accents shall be graven deep,—Or “Upton” and “C. B.”[4]betweenShine in theSporting Magazine;—“Civil to none, except his brutes;Polished in nought, except his boots;Here lie the relics of Joe Tarrell:Also, Joe Tarrell’s double-barrel!”Ho!—by the muttered sounds that slipUnwilling from his curling lip;By the grey glimmer of his eye,That shines so unrelentingly;By the stern sneer upon his snout,I know the critic, Andrew Crout!The boy-reviler! amply filledWith venomed virulence, and skilledTo look on what is good and fairAnd find or make a blemish there.For Fortune to his cradle sentSelf-satisfying discontent,And he hath caught from cold ReviewsThe one great talent, to abuse;And so he sallies sternly forth,Like the cold Genius of the North,To check the heart’s exuberant fulness,And chill good-humour into dulness:Where’er he comes, his fellows shrinkBefore his awful nod and wink;And wheresoe’er these features plasticAssume the savage or sarcastic,Mirth stands abashed, and Laughter flies,And Humour faints, and Quibble dies.How sour he seems!—and hark! he spoke;We’ll stop and listen to the croak;’Twill charm us, if these happy laysAre honoured by a fool’s dispraise!—“You think the boats well manned this year!To you they may perhaps appear!—I who have seen those frames of steel,Tuckfield, and Dixon, and Bulteel,Can swear—no matter what I swear—Only things are not as they were!And then our cricket!—think of that!We ha’n’t a tolerable bat;It’s very true, that Mr. Tucker,Who puts the field in such a pucker,Contrives to make his fifty runs;—What then?—we had a Hardinge once!As for our talents, where are they?Griffin and Grildrig had their day;And who’s the star of modern time?Octosyllabic Peregrine;Who pirates, puns, and talks sedition,Without a moment’s intermission;And if he did not get a liftSometimes fromme—and Doctor Swift,I can’t tell what the deuce he’d do!—But this, you know, isentre nous!I’ve tried to talk him into taste,But found my labour quite misplaced;He nibs his pen, and twists his ear,And says he’s deaf and cannot hear;And if I mention right or rule,—Egad! he takes me for a fool!”Gazing upon this varied sceneWith a new artist’s absent mien,I see thee silent and alone,My friend, ingenious Hamilton.I see thee there—(nay, do not blush!)Knight of the Pallet and the Brush,Dreaming of straight and crooked lines,And planning portraits and designs.I like him hugely!—well I wis,No despicable skill is his,Whether his sportive canvas showsArabia’s sands or Zembla’s snows,A lion, or a bed of lilies,Fair Caroline, or fierce Achilles;I love to see him taking downA schoolfellow’s unconscious frown,Describing twist, grimace, contortion,In most becoming disproportion,While o’er his merry paper glideRivers of wit; and by his sideCaricatura takes her stand,Inspires the thought and guides the hand;I love to see his honoured booksAdorned with rivulets and brooks;Troy frowning with her ancient towers,Or Ida gay with fruit and flowers;I love to see fantastic shapes,Dragons and griffins, birds and apes,And pigmy forms and forms gigantic,Forms natural, and forms romantic,Of dwarf and ogres, dames and knights,Scrawled by the side of Homer’s fights,And portraits daubed on Maro’s poems,And profiles penned to Tulley’s Proems;In short, I view with partial eyesWhate’er my brother painter tries.To each belongs his own utensil;I sketch with pen, as he with pencil;And each, with pencil or with pen,Hits off a likeness now and then.He drewmeonce—the spiteful creature!’Twas voted—“like in every feature;”It might have been so!—(’twas lopsided,And squinted worse than ever I did:)However, from that hapless day,I owed the debt, which here I pay;And now I’ll give my friend a hint:—Unless you want to shine in print,Paint lords and ladies, nymphs and fairies,And demi-gods, and dromedaries;But never be an author’s creditor,Nor paint the picture of an Editor!Who is the youth with stare confounded,And tender arms so neatly rounded,And moveless eyes, and glowing face,And attitude of studied grace?Now Venus, pour your lustre o’er us!Your would-be servant stands before us!Hail, Corydon! let others blameThe fury of his fictioned flame;I love to hear the beardless youthTalking of constancy and truth,Swearing more darts are in his liverThan ever gleamed in Cupid’s quiver,And wondering at those hearts of stoneWhich never melted like his own.Ah! when I look on Fashion’s moth,Wrapt in his visions and his cloth,I would not, for a nation’s gold,Disturb the dream—or spoil the fold!And who the maid, whose gilded chain,Hath bound the heart of such a swain?Oh! look on those surrounding graces!There is no lack of pretty faces;M——l, the goddess of the night,Looks beautiful with all her might;And M——, in that simple dress,Enthralls us more by studying less;D——, in your becoming pride,Ye march to conquest, side by side;And A——, thou fleetest byBright in thine arch simplicity;Slight are the links thy power hath wreathed;Yet, by the tone thy voice hath breathed,By thy glad smile and ringlets curled,I would not break them for the world!But this is idle! Paying courtI know was never yet my forte;And all I say of nymph and queen,To cut it short, can only meanThat when I throw my gaze aroundI see much beauty on the ground.Hark! hark! a mellowed noteOver the water seemed to float!Hark! the note repeated!A sweet, and soft, and soothing strainEchoed, and died, and rose again,As if the Nymphs of Fairy reignWere holding to-night their revel rout,And pouring their fragrant voices out,On the blue water seated.Hark to the tremulous tones that flow,And the voice of the boatmen as they row,Cheerfully to the heart they go,And touch a thousand pleasant stringsOf triumph and pride, and hope and joy,And thoughts that are only known to boy,And young imaginings!The note is near, the voice comes clear,And we catch its echo on the earWith a feeling of delight;And, as the gladdening sounds we hear,There’s many an eager listener here,And many a straining sight.One moment,—and ye seeWhere, fluttering quick, as the breezes blow,Backwards and forwards, to and fro,Bright with the beam of retiring day,Old Eton’s flag, on its watery way,Moves on triumphantly!But what that ancient poets have toldOf Amphitrite’s car of gold,With the Nymphs behind, and the Nymphs before,And the Nereid’s song, and the Triton’s roar,Could equal half the prideThat heralds the Monarch’s plashing oarOver the swelling tide?And look!—they land those gallant crews,With their jackets light, and their bellying trews;And Ashley walks applauded by,With a world’s talent in his eye;And Kinglake, dear to poetry,And dearer to his friends;Hibernian Roberts, you are there,With that unthinking, merry stareWhich still its influence lendsTo make us drown our devils blue,In laughing at ourselves,—and you!Still I could lengthen out the tale,And sing Sir Thomas with his aleTo all that like to read;Still I could choose to linger longWhere Friendship bids the willing songFlow out for honest Meade!Yet e’en on this triumphant dayOne thought of grief will rise;And though I bid my fancy play,And jest and laugh through all the lay,Yet sadness still will have its way,And burst the vain disguise!Yes! when the pageant shall have passed,I shall have looked upon my last;I shall not e’er behold againOur pullers’ unremitted strain;Nor listen to the charming cryOf contest or of victoryThat speaks what those young bosoms feel,As keel is pressing fast on keel;Oh! bright these glories still shall be,But they shall never dawn for me!E’en when a realm’s congratulationSang Pæans for the Coronation,Amidst the pleasure that was round me,A melancholy spirit found me;And while all else were singing “Io!”I couldn’t speak a word but “Heigh-ho!”And so, instead of laughing gaily,I dropped a tear,—and wrote my “Vale.”Vale!Eton, the Monarch of thy prayersE’en now receives his load of cares;Throned in the consecrated choirHe takes the sceptre of his sire,And wears the crown his father wore,And swears the oath his father swore,And therefore sounds of joy resound,Fair Eton, on thy classic ground.A gladder gale is round thee breathed;And on thy mansions thou hast wreathedA thousand lamps, whose various hueWaits but the night to burst to view.Woe to the poets that refuseTo wake and woo their idle Muse,When those glad notes, “God save the King,”From hill, and vale, and hamlet ring!Hark, how the loved inspiring tunePeals forth from every loyal loonWho loves his country, and excelsIn drinking beer or ringing bells!It is a day of shouts and greeting;A day of idleness and eating;And triumph swells in every soul,And mighty beeves are roasted whole,And ale, unbought, is set a-running,And pleasure’s hymn grows rather stunning,And children roll upon the green,And cry, “Confusion to the Queen!”And Sorrow flies, and Labour slumbers:And Clio pours her loudest numbers;And hundreds of that joyous throngWith whom my life hath lingered longGive their glad raptures to the gale,In one united echoing “Hail!”I took the harp, I smote the string,I strove to soar on Fancy’s wing,And murmur in my sovereign’s praiseThe latest of my boyhood’s lays.Alas! the theme was too divineTo suit so weak a Muse as mine:I saw—I felt it could not be;No song of triumph flows from me;The harp from which those sounds ye askIs all unfit for such a task;And the last echo of its tone,Dear Eton, must be thine alone!A few short hours, and I am borneFar from the fetters I have worn;A few short hours, and I am free!—And yet I shrink from liberty,And look, and long to give my soulBack to thy cherishing control.Control? Ah no! thy chain was meantFar less for bond than ornament;And though its links are firmly set,I never found them gall me yet.Oh still, through many chequered years,’Mid anxious toils, and hopes, and fears,Still I have doted on thy fame,And only gloried in thy name.How I have loved thee! Thou hast beenMy Hope, my Mistress, and my Queen;I always found thee kind, and thouHast never seen me weep—till now.I knew that time was fleeting fast,I knew thy pleasures could not last;I knew too well that riper ageMust step upon a busier stage;Yet when around thine ancient towersI passed secure my tranquil hours,Or heard beneath thine aged treesThe drowsy humming of the bees,Or wandered by thy winding stream,I would not check my fancy’s dream;Glad in my transitory bliss,I recked not of an hour like this;And now the truth comes swiftly on,The truth I would not think upon,The last sad thought, so oft delayed,—“These joys are only born to fade.”Ye Guardians of my earliest days,Ye Patrons of my earliest lays,Custom reminds me, that to youThanks and farewell to-day are due.Thanks and farewell I give you,—not(As some that leave this holy spot)In laboured phrase and polished lieWrought by the forge of flattery,But with a heart that cannot tellThe half of what it feels so well.If I am backward to express,Believe, my love is not the less;Be kind as you are wont, and viewA thousand thanks in one Adieu.My future life shall strive to showI wish to pay the debt I owe;The labours that ye give to MaySeptember’s fruits shall best repay.And you, my friends, who loved to shareWhate’er was mine of sport or care,Antagonists at fives or chess,Friends in the play-ground or the press,I leave ye now; and all that restsOf mutual tastes, and loving breasts,In the lone vision that shall come,Where’er my studies and my home,To cheer my labour and my painAnd make me feel a boy again.Yes! when at last I sit me down,A scholar, in my cap and gown,—When learned doctrines, dark and deep,Move me to passion or to sleep,—When Clio yields to logic’s wrangles,And Long and Short give place to angles,—When stern Mathesis makes it treasonTo like a rhyme, or scorn a reason—With aching head and weary witYour parted friend shall often sit,Till Fancy’s magic spell hath bound him,And lonely musings flit around him;Then shall ye come with all your wiles,Of gladdening sounds and warming smiles,And nought shall meet his eye or ear,—Yet shall he deem your souls are near.Others may clothe their valedictionWith all the tinsel charms of fiction;And one may sing of Father Thames,And Naiads with a hundred names,And find a Pindus here, and ownThe College pump a Helicon,And search for gods about the College,Of which old Homer had no knowledge;And one may eloquently tellThe triumphs of the Windsor belle,And sing of Mira’s lips and eyes,In oft-repeated ecstasies.Oh! he hath much and wondrous skillTo paint the looks that wound and kill,As the poor maid is doomed to brook,Unconsciously, her lover’s look,And smiles, and talks, until the poetHears the band play, and does not know it.To speak the plain and simple truth,—I always was a jesting youth,A friend to merriment and fun,No foe to quibble and to pun;Therefore I cannot feign a tear;And, now that I have uttered hereA few unrounded accents, bredMore from the heart than from the head,Honestly felt, and plainly told,My lyre is still, my fancy cold.
The sun hath shed a mellower beam,Fair Thames, upon thy silver stream,And air and water, earth and heaven,Lie in the calm repose of even.How silently the breeze moves on,Flutters, and whispers, and is gone!How calmly does the quiet skySleep in its cold serenity!Alas! how sweet a scene were hereFor shepherd or for sonnetteer;How fit the place, how fit the time,For making love, or making rhyme!But though the sun’s descending raySmiles warmly on the close of day,’Tis not to gaze upon his lightThat Eton’s sons are here to-night;And though the river, calm and clear,Makes music to the poet’s ear,’Tis not to listen to the soundThat Eton’s sons are thronging round:The sun unheeded may decline—Blue eyes send out a brighter shine;The wave may cease its gurgling moan—Glad voices have a sweeter tone;For in our calendar of blissWe have no hour so gay as this,When the kind hearts and brilliant eyesOf those we know, and love, and prize,Are come to cheer the captive’s thrall,And smile upon his festival.Stay, Pegasus!—and let me askEre I go onward in my task,—Pray, reader, were you ever here,Just at this season of the year?No!—then the end of next JulyShould bring you, with admiring eye,To hear usrow, and see us row,And cry, “How fastthemboysdoesgo!”For Father Thames beholds to-nightA thousand visions of delight;Tearing and swearing, jeering, cheering,Lame steeds to right and left careering,Displays, dismays, disputes, distresses,Ruffling of temper and of dresses;Wounds on the heart—and on the knuckles;Losing of patience—and of buckles.An interdict is laid on Latin,And scholars smirk in silk and satin,And dandies start their thinnest pumps,And Michael Oakley’s in the dumps;And there is nought beneath the sunBut dash, and splash, and falls, and fun.Lord! what would be the Cynic’s mirth,If fate would lift him to the earth,And set his tub, with magic jump,Squat down beside the Brocas Clump!What scoffs the sage would utter thereFrom his unpolished elbow-chair,To see the sempstress’ handiwork,The Greek confounded with the Turk,Parisian mixed with Piedmontese,And Persian joined to Portuguese;And mantles short, and mantles long,And mantles right, and mantles wrong,Mis-shaped, mis-coloured, and mis-placedWith what the tailor calls ataste!And then the badges and the boats,The flags, the drums, the paint, the coats;But more than these, and more than all,The puller’s intermitted call—“Easy!”—“Hard all!”—“Now pick her up!”—“Upon my life, how I shall sup!”Would be a fine and merry matterTo wake the sage’s love of satire.Kind readers, at my laughing ageI thank my stars I’m not a sage;I, an unthinking, scribbling elf,Love to please others—and myself;Therefore I flya malo joco,But likedesipere in loco.Excuse me, that I wander so;All modern pens digress, you know.Now to my theme! Thou Being gay,Houri or goddess, nymph or fay,Whoe’er—whate’er—where’er thou art—Who, with thy warm and kindly heart,Hast made these blest abodes thy care,—Being of water, earth, or air,—Beneath the moonbeam hasten hither,Enjoy thy blessings ere they wither,And witness with thy gladdest faceThe glories of thy dwelling-place!The boats put off; throughout the crowdThe tumult thickens; wide and loudThe din re-echoes; man and horsePlunge onward in their mingled course.Look at the troop! I love to seeOur real Etonian cavalry:They start in such a pretty trim,And such sweet scorn of life and limb.I must confess I never foundA horse much worse for being sound;I wish my nag not wholly blind,And like to have a tail behind;And though he certainly may hearCorrectly with a single ear,I think, to look genteel and neat,He ought to have his two complete.But these are trifles!—off they goBeside the wondering river’s flow;And if, by dint of spur and whip,They shamble on without a trip,Well have they done! I make no questionThey’re shaken into good digestion.I and my Muse—my Muse and I—Will follow with the company,And get to Surly Hall in timeTo make a supper, and a rhyme.Yes! while the animating crowd,The gay, and fair, and kind, and proud,With eager voice and eager glance,Wait till the pageantry advance,We’ll throw around a hasty view,And try to get a sketch or two.First in the race is William Tag,Thalia’s most industrious fag;Whate’er the subject he essaysTo dress in never-dying lays,A chief, a cheese, a dearth, a dinner,A cot, a castle, cards, Corinna,Hibernia, Baffin’s Bay, Parnassus,Beef, Bonaparte, beer, Bonassus—Will hath his ordered words, and rhymesFor various scenes and various times;Which suit alike for this or that,And come, like volunteers, quitepat.He hath his elegy, or sonnet,For Lucy’s bier, or Lucy’s bonnet;And celebrates with equal ardourA monarch’s sceptre, or his larder.Poor William, when he wants a hint,All other poet’s are his mint;He coins his epic or his lyric,His satire or his panegyric,From all the gravity and witOf what the ancients thought and writ.Armed with his Ovid and his FlaccusHe comes like thunder to attack us;In pilfered mail he bursts to view,The cleverest thief I ever knew.Thou noble Bard! at any timeBorrow my measure and my rhyme;Borrow (I’ll cancel all the debt)An epigram or epithet;Borrow my mountains, or my trees,My paintings, or my similes;Nay, borrow all my pretty names,My real or my fancied flames;Eliza, Alice, Leonora,Mary, Melina, and Medora;And borrow all my “mutual vows,”My “ruby lips,” and “cruel brows,”And all my stupors and my startings,And all my meetings, and my partings;Thus far, my friend, you’ll find me willing;Borrow all things save one—a shilling!Drunken, and loud, and mad, and rash,Joe Tarrell wields his ceaseless lash;The would-be sportsman; o’er the sidesOf the lank charger he bestridesThe foam lies painfully, and bloodIs trickling in a ruddier floodBeneath the fury of the steel,Projecting from his armed heel.E’en from his childhood’s earliest bloom,All studies that become a groomEton’sspes gregis, honest Joe,Or knows, or would be thought to know;He picks a hunter’s hoof quite finely,And spells a horse’s teeth divinely.Prime terror of molesting duns,Sole judge of greyhounds and of guns,A skilful whip, a steady shot,Joe swears he is!—who says he’s not?And then he has such knowing facesFor all the week of Ascot races,And talks with such a mystic speech,Untangible to vulgar reach,Of Sultan, Highflyer, and Ranter,Potatoes, Quiz, and Tam O’Shanter,Bay colts and brown colts, sires and dams,Bribings and bullyings, bets and bams;And how the favouriteshouldhave won,And how the little Earl wasdone;And how the filly failed in strength,And how some faces grew in length;And how some people—if they’d show—Know something more than others know.Such is his talk; and while we wonderAt that interminable thunder,The undiscriminating snarlerAstounds the ladies in the parlour,And broaches at his mother’s tableThe slang of kennel and of stable.And when he’s drunk, he roars before yeOne excellent unfailing story,About a gun, Lord knows how long,With a discharge, Lord knows how strong,Which always needs an oath and frownTo make the monstrous dose go down.O! oft and oft the Muses prayThat wondrous tube may burst some day,And then the world will ascertainWhether its master hath a brain!Then, on the stone that hides his sleep,These accents shall be graven deep,—Or “Upton” and “C. B.”[4]betweenShine in theSporting Magazine;—“Civil to none, except his brutes;Polished in nought, except his boots;Here lie the relics of Joe Tarrell:Also, Joe Tarrell’s double-barrel!”Ho!—by the muttered sounds that slipUnwilling from his curling lip;By the grey glimmer of his eye,That shines so unrelentingly;By the stern sneer upon his snout,I know the critic, Andrew Crout!The boy-reviler! amply filledWith venomed virulence, and skilledTo look on what is good and fairAnd find or make a blemish there.For Fortune to his cradle sentSelf-satisfying discontent,And he hath caught from cold ReviewsThe one great talent, to abuse;And so he sallies sternly forth,Like the cold Genius of the North,To check the heart’s exuberant fulness,And chill good-humour into dulness:Where’er he comes, his fellows shrinkBefore his awful nod and wink;And wheresoe’er these features plasticAssume the savage or sarcastic,Mirth stands abashed, and Laughter flies,And Humour faints, and Quibble dies.How sour he seems!—and hark! he spoke;We’ll stop and listen to the croak;’Twill charm us, if these happy laysAre honoured by a fool’s dispraise!—“You think the boats well manned this year!To you they may perhaps appear!—I who have seen those frames of steel,Tuckfield, and Dixon, and Bulteel,Can swear—no matter what I swear—Only things are not as they were!And then our cricket!—think of that!We ha’n’t a tolerable bat;It’s very true, that Mr. Tucker,Who puts the field in such a pucker,Contrives to make his fifty runs;—What then?—we had a Hardinge once!As for our talents, where are they?Griffin and Grildrig had their day;And who’s the star of modern time?Octosyllabic Peregrine;Who pirates, puns, and talks sedition,Without a moment’s intermission;And if he did not get a liftSometimes fromme—and Doctor Swift,I can’t tell what the deuce he’d do!—But this, you know, isentre nous!I’ve tried to talk him into taste,But found my labour quite misplaced;He nibs his pen, and twists his ear,And says he’s deaf and cannot hear;And if I mention right or rule,—Egad! he takes me for a fool!”Gazing upon this varied sceneWith a new artist’s absent mien,I see thee silent and alone,My friend, ingenious Hamilton.I see thee there—(nay, do not blush!)Knight of the Pallet and the Brush,Dreaming of straight and crooked lines,And planning portraits and designs.I like him hugely!—well I wis,No despicable skill is his,Whether his sportive canvas showsArabia’s sands or Zembla’s snows,A lion, or a bed of lilies,Fair Caroline, or fierce Achilles;I love to see him taking downA schoolfellow’s unconscious frown,Describing twist, grimace, contortion,In most becoming disproportion,While o’er his merry paper glideRivers of wit; and by his sideCaricatura takes her stand,Inspires the thought and guides the hand;I love to see his honoured booksAdorned with rivulets and brooks;Troy frowning with her ancient towers,Or Ida gay with fruit and flowers;I love to see fantastic shapes,Dragons and griffins, birds and apes,And pigmy forms and forms gigantic,Forms natural, and forms romantic,Of dwarf and ogres, dames and knights,Scrawled by the side of Homer’s fights,And portraits daubed on Maro’s poems,And profiles penned to Tulley’s Proems;In short, I view with partial eyesWhate’er my brother painter tries.To each belongs his own utensil;I sketch with pen, as he with pencil;And each, with pencil or with pen,Hits off a likeness now and then.He drewmeonce—the spiteful creature!’Twas voted—“like in every feature;”It might have been so!—(’twas lopsided,And squinted worse than ever I did:)However, from that hapless day,I owed the debt, which here I pay;And now I’ll give my friend a hint:—Unless you want to shine in print,Paint lords and ladies, nymphs and fairies,And demi-gods, and dromedaries;But never be an author’s creditor,Nor paint the picture of an Editor!Who is the youth with stare confounded,And tender arms so neatly rounded,And moveless eyes, and glowing face,And attitude of studied grace?Now Venus, pour your lustre o’er us!Your would-be servant stands before us!Hail, Corydon! let others blameThe fury of his fictioned flame;I love to hear the beardless youthTalking of constancy and truth,Swearing more darts are in his liverThan ever gleamed in Cupid’s quiver,And wondering at those hearts of stoneWhich never melted like his own.Ah! when I look on Fashion’s moth,Wrapt in his visions and his cloth,I would not, for a nation’s gold,Disturb the dream—or spoil the fold!And who the maid, whose gilded chain,Hath bound the heart of such a swain?Oh! look on those surrounding graces!There is no lack of pretty faces;M——l, the goddess of the night,Looks beautiful with all her might;And M——, in that simple dress,Enthralls us more by studying less;D——, in your becoming pride,Ye march to conquest, side by side;And A——, thou fleetest byBright in thine arch simplicity;Slight are the links thy power hath wreathed;Yet, by the tone thy voice hath breathed,By thy glad smile and ringlets curled,I would not break them for the world!But this is idle! Paying courtI know was never yet my forte;And all I say of nymph and queen,To cut it short, can only meanThat when I throw my gaze aroundI see much beauty on the ground.Hark! hark! a mellowed noteOver the water seemed to float!Hark! the note repeated!A sweet, and soft, and soothing strainEchoed, and died, and rose again,As if the Nymphs of Fairy reignWere holding to-night their revel rout,And pouring their fragrant voices out,On the blue water seated.Hark to the tremulous tones that flow,And the voice of the boatmen as they row,Cheerfully to the heart they go,And touch a thousand pleasant stringsOf triumph and pride, and hope and joy,And thoughts that are only known to boy,And young imaginings!The note is near, the voice comes clear,And we catch its echo on the earWith a feeling of delight;And, as the gladdening sounds we hear,There’s many an eager listener here,And many a straining sight.One moment,—and ye seeWhere, fluttering quick, as the breezes blow,Backwards and forwards, to and fro,Bright with the beam of retiring day,Old Eton’s flag, on its watery way,Moves on triumphantly!But what that ancient poets have toldOf Amphitrite’s car of gold,With the Nymphs behind, and the Nymphs before,And the Nereid’s song, and the Triton’s roar,Could equal half the prideThat heralds the Monarch’s plashing oarOver the swelling tide?And look!—they land those gallant crews,With their jackets light, and their bellying trews;And Ashley walks applauded by,With a world’s talent in his eye;And Kinglake, dear to poetry,And dearer to his friends;Hibernian Roberts, you are there,With that unthinking, merry stareWhich still its influence lendsTo make us drown our devils blue,In laughing at ourselves,—and you!Still I could lengthen out the tale,And sing Sir Thomas with his aleTo all that like to read;Still I could choose to linger longWhere Friendship bids the willing songFlow out for honest Meade!Yet e’en on this triumphant dayOne thought of grief will rise;And though I bid my fancy play,And jest and laugh through all the lay,Yet sadness still will have its way,And burst the vain disguise!Yes! when the pageant shall have passed,I shall have looked upon my last;I shall not e’er behold againOur pullers’ unremitted strain;Nor listen to the charming cryOf contest or of victoryThat speaks what those young bosoms feel,As keel is pressing fast on keel;Oh! bright these glories still shall be,But they shall never dawn for me!E’en when a realm’s congratulationSang Pæans for the Coronation,Amidst the pleasure that was round me,A melancholy spirit found me;And while all else were singing “Io!”I couldn’t speak a word but “Heigh-ho!”And so, instead of laughing gaily,I dropped a tear,—and wrote my “Vale.”Vale!Eton, the Monarch of thy prayersE’en now receives his load of cares;Throned in the consecrated choirHe takes the sceptre of his sire,And wears the crown his father wore,And swears the oath his father swore,And therefore sounds of joy resound,Fair Eton, on thy classic ground.A gladder gale is round thee breathed;And on thy mansions thou hast wreathedA thousand lamps, whose various hueWaits but the night to burst to view.Woe to the poets that refuseTo wake and woo their idle Muse,When those glad notes, “God save the King,”From hill, and vale, and hamlet ring!Hark, how the loved inspiring tunePeals forth from every loyal loonWho loves his country, and excelsIn drinking beer or ringing bells!It is a day of shouts and greeting;A day of idleness and eating;And triumph swells in every soul,And mighty beeves are roasted whole,And ale, unbought, is set a-running,And pleasure’s hymn grows rather stunning,And children roll upon the green,And cry, “Confusion to the Queen!”And Sorrow flies, and Labour slumbers:And Clio pours her loudest numbers;And hundreds of that joyous throngWith whom my life hath lingered longGive their glad raptures to the gale,In one united echoing “Hail!”I took the harp, I smote the string,I strove to soar on Fancy’s wing,And murmur in my sovereign’s praiseThe latest of my boyhood’s lays.Alas! the theme was too divineTo suit so weak a Muse as mine:I saw—I felt it could not be;No song of triumph flows from me;The harp from which those sounds ye askIs all unfit for such a task;And the last echo of its tone,Dear Eton, must be thine alone!A few short hours, and I am borneFar from the fetters I have worn;A few short hours, and I am free!—And yet I shrink from liberty,And look, and long to give my soulBack to thy cherishing control.Control? Ah no! thy chain was meantFar less for bond than ornament;And though its links are firmly set,I never found them gall me yet.Oh still, through many chequered years,’Mid anxious toils, and hopes, and fears,Still I have doted on thy fame,And only gloried in thy name.How I have loved thee! Thou hast beenMy Hope, my Mistress, and my Queen;I always found thee kind, and thouHast never seen me weep—till now.I knew that time was fleeting fast,I knew thy pleasures could not last;I knew too well that riper ageMust step upon a busier stage;Yet when around thine ancient towersI passed secure my tranquil hours,Or heard beneath thine aged treesThe drowsy humming of the bees,Or wandered by thy winding stream,I would not check my fancy’s dream;Glad in my transitory bliss,I recked not of an hour like this;And now the truth comes swiftly on,The truth I would not think upon,The last sad thought, so oft delayed,—“These joys are only born to fade.”Ye Guardians of my earliest days,Ye Patrons of my earliest lays,Custom reminds me, that to youThanks and farewell to-day are due.Thanks and farewell I give you,—not(As some that leave this holy spot)In laboured phrase and polished lieWrought by the forge of flattery,But with a heart that cannot tellThe half of what it feels so well.If I am backward to express,Believe, my love is not the less;Be kind as you are wont, and viewA thousand thanks in one Adieu.My future life shall strive to showI wish to pay the debt I owe;The labours that ye give to MaySeptember’s fruits shall best repay.And you, my friends, who loved to shareWhate’er was mine of sport or care,Antagonists at fives or chess,Friends in the play-ground or the press,I leave ye now; and all that restsOf mutual tastes, and loving breasts,In the lone vision that shall come,Where’er my studies and my home,To cheer my labour and my painAnd make me feel a boy again.Yes! when at last I sit me down,A scholar, in my cap and gown,—When learned doctrines, dark and deep,Move me to passion or to sleep,—When Clio yields to logic’s wrangles,And Long and Short give place to angles,—When stern Mathesis makes it treasonTo like a rhyme, or scorn a reason—With aching head and weary witYour parted friend shall often sit,Till Fancy’s magic spell hath bound him,And lonely musings flit around him;Then shall ye come with all your wiles,Of gladdening sounds and warming smiles,And nought shall meet his eye or ear,—Yet shall he deem your souls are near.Others may clothe their valedictionWith all the tinsel charms of fiction;And one may sing of Father Thames,And Naiads with a hundred names,And find a Pindus here, and ownThe College pump a Helicon,And search for gods about the College,Of which old Homer had no knowledge;And one may eloquently tellThe triumphs of the Windsor belle,And sing of Mira’s lips and eyes,In oft-repeated ecstasies.Oh! he hath much and wondrous skillTo paint the looks that wound and kill,As the poor maid is doomed to brook,Unconsciously, her lover’s look,And smiles, and talks, until the poetHears the band play, and does not know it.To speak the plain and simple truth,—I always was a jesting youth,A friend to merriment and fun,No foe to quibble and to pun;Therefore I cannot feign a tear;And, now that I have uttered hereA few unrounded accents, bredMore from the heart than from the head,Honestly felt, and plainly told,My lyre is still, my fancy cold.
The sun hath shed a mellower beam,Fair Thames, upon thy silver stream,And air and water, earth and heaven,Lie in the calm repose of even.How silently the breeze moves on,Flutters, and whispers, and is gone!How calmly does the quiet skySleep in its cold serenity!Alas! how sweet a scene were hereFor shepherd or for sonnetteer;How fit the place, how fit the time,For making love, or making rhyme!But though the sun’s descending raySmiles warmly on the close of day,’Tis not to gaze upon his lightThat Eton’s sons are here to-night;And though the river, calm and clear,Makes music to the poet’s ear,’Tis not to listen to the soundThat Eton’s sons are thronging round:The sun unheeded may decline—Blue eyes send out a brighter shine;The wave may cease its gurgling moan—Glad voices have a sweeter tone;For in our calendar of blissWe have no hour so gay as this,When the kind hearts and brilliant eyesOf those we know, and love, and prize,Are come to cheer the captive’s thrall,And smile upon his festival.
Stay, Pegasus!—and let me askEre I go onward in my task,—Pray, reader, were you ever here,Just at this season of the year?No!—then the end of next JulyShould bring you, with admiring eye,To hear usrow, and see us row,And cry, “How fastthemboysdoesgo!”For Father Thames beholds to-nightA thousand visions of delight;Tearing and swearing, jeering, cheering,Lame steeds to right and left careering,Displays, dismays, disputes, distresses,Ruffling of temper and of dresses;Wounds on the heart—and on the knuckles;Losing of patience—and of buckles.An interdict is laid on Latin,And scholars smirk in silk and satin,And dandies start their thinnest pumps,And Michael Oakley’s in the dumps;And there is nought beneath the sunBut dash, and splash, and falls, and fun.
Lord! what would be the Cynic’s mirth,If fate would lift him to the earth,And set his tub, with magic jump,Squat down beside the Brocas Clump!What scoffs the sage would utter thereFrom his unpolished elbow-chair,To see the sempstress’ handiwork,The Greek confounded with the Turk,Parisian mixed with Piedmontese,And Persian joined to Portuguese;And mantles short, and mantles long,And mantles right, and mantles wrong,Mis-shaped, mis-coloured, and mis-placedWith what the tailor calls ataste!And then the badges and the boats,The flags, the drums, the paint, the coats;But more than these, and more than all,The puller’s intermitted call—“Easy!”—“Hard all!”—“Now pick her up!”—“Upon my life, how I shall sup!”Would be a fine and merry matterTo wake the sage’s love of satire.Kind readers, at my laughing ageI thank my stars I’m not a sage;I, an unthinking, scribbling elf,Love to please others—and myself;Therefore I flya malo joco,But likedesipere in loco.Excuse me, that I wander so;All modern pens digress, you know.Now to my theme! Thou Being gay,Houri or goddess, nymph or fay,Whoe’er—whate’er—where’er thou art—Who, with thy warm and kindly heart,Hast made these blest abodes thy care,—Being of water, earth, or air,—Beneath the moonbeam hasten hither,Enjoy thy blessings ere they wither,And witness with thy gladdest faceThe glories of thy dwelling-place!
The boats put off; throughout the crowdThe tumult thickens; wide and loudThe din re-echoes; man and horsePlunge onward in their mingled course.Look at the troop! I love to seeOur real Etonian cavalry:They start in such a pretty trim,And such sweet scorn of life and limb.I must confess I never foundA horse much worse for being sound;I wish my nag not wholly blind,And like to have a tail behind;And though he certainly may hearCorrectly with a single ear,I think, to look genteel and neat,He ought to have his two complete.But these are trifles!—off they goBeside the wondering river’s flow;And if, by dint of spur and whip,They shamble on without a trip,Well have they done! I make no questionThey’re shaken into good digestion.
I and my Muse—my Muse and I—Will follow with the company,And get to Surly Hall in timeTo make a supper, and a rhyme.Yes! while the animating crowd,The gay, and fair, and kind, and proud,With eager voice and eager glance,Wait till the pageantry advance,We’ll throw around a hasty view,And try to get a sketch or two.
First in the race is William Tag,Thalia’s most industrious fag;Whate’er the subject he essaysTo dress in never-dying lays,A chief, a cheese, a dearth, a dinner,A cot, a castle, cards, Corinna,Hibernia, Baffin’s Bay, Parnassus,Beef, Bonaparte, beer, Bonassus—Will hath his ordered words, and rhymesFor various scenes and various times;Which suit alike for this or that,And come, like volunteers, quitepat.He hath his elegy, or sonnet,For Lucy’s bier, or Lucy’s bonnet;And celebrates with equal ardourA monarch’s sceptre, or his larder.Poor William, when he wants a hint,All other poet’s are his mint;He coins his epic or his lyric,His satire or his panegyric,From all the gravity and witOf what the ancients thought and writ.Armed with his Ovid and his FlaccusHe comes like thunder to attack us;In pilfered mail he bursts to view,The cleverest thief I ever knew.Thou noble Bard! at any timeBorrow my measure and my rhyme;Borrow (I’ll cancel all the debt)An epigram or epithet;Borrow my mountains, or my trees,My paintings, or my similes;Nay, borrow all my pretty names,My real or my fancied flames;Eliza, Alice, Leonora,Mary, Melina, and Medora;And borrow all my “mutual vows,”My “ruby lips,” and “cruel brows,”And all my stupors and my startings,And all my meetings, and my partings;Thus far, my friend, you’ll find me willing;Borrow all things save one—a shilling!
Drunken, and loud, and mad, and rash,Joe Tarrell wields his ceaseless lash;The would-be sportsman; o’er the sidesOf the lank charger he bestridesThe foam lies painfully, and bloodIs trickling in a ruddier floodBeneath the fury of the steel,Projecting from his armed heel.E’en from his childhood’s earliest bloom,All studies that become a groomEton’sspes gregis, honest Joe,Or knows, or would be thought to know;He picks a hunter’s hoof quite finely,And spells a horse’s teeth divinely.Prime terror of molesting duns,Sole judge of greyhounds and of guns,A skilful whip, a steady shot,Joe swears he is!—who says he’s not?And then he has such knowing facesFor all the week of Ascot races,And talks with such a mystic speech,Untangible to vulgar reach,Of Sultan, Highflyer, and Ranter,Potatoes, Quiz, and Tam O’Shanter,Bay colts and brown colts, sires and dams,Bribings and bullyings, bets and bams;And how the favouriteshouldhave won,And how the little Earl wasdone;And how the filly failed in strength,And how some faces grew in length;And how some people—if they’d show—Know something more than others know.Such is his talk; and while we wonderAt that interminable thunder,The undiscriminating snarlerAstounds the ladies in the parlour,And broaches at his mother’s tableThe slang of kennel and of stable.And when he’s drunk, he roars before yeOne excellent unfailing story,About a gun, Lord knows how long,With a discharge, Lord knows how strong,Which always needs an oath and frownTo make the monstrous dose go down.O! oft and oft the Muses prayThat wondrous tube may burst some day,And then the world will ascertainWhether its master hath a brain!Then, on the stone that hides his sleep,These accents shall be graven deep,—Or “Upton” and “C. B.”[4]betweenShine in theSporting Magazine;—“Civil to none, except his brutes;Polished in nought, except his boots;Here lie the relics of Joe Tarrell:Also, Joe Tarrell’s double-barrel!”Ho!—by the muttered sounds that slipUnwilling from his curling lip;By the grey glimmer of his eye,That shines so unrelentingly;By the stern sneer upon his snout,I know the critic, Andrew Crout!The boy-reviler! amply filledWith venomed virulence, and skilledTo look on what is good and fairAnd find or make a blemish there.For Fortune to his cradle sentSelf-satisfying discontent,And he hath caught from cold ReviewsThe one great talent, to abuse;And so he sallies sternly forth,Like the cold Genius of the North,To check the heart’s exuberant fulness,And chill good-humour into dulness:Where’er he comes, his fellows shrinkBefore his awful nod and wink;And wheresoe’er these features plasticAssume the savage or sarcastic,Mirth stands abashed, and Laughter flies,And Humour faints, and Quibble dies.How sour he seems!—and hark! he spoke;We’ll stop and listen to the croak;’Twill charm us, if these happy laysAre honoured by a fool’s dispraise!—“You think the boats well manned this year!To you they may perhaps appear!—I who have seen those frames of steel,Tuckfield, and Dixon, and Bulteel,Can swear—no matter what I swear—Only things are not as they were!And then our cricket!—think of that!We ha’n’t a tolerable bat;It’s very true, that Mr. Tucker,Who puts the field in such a pucker,Contrives to make his fifty runs;—What then?—we had a Hardinge once!As for our talents, where are they?Griffin and Grildrig had their day;And who’s the star of modern time?Octosyllabic Peregrine;Who pirates, puns, and talks sedition,Without a moment’s intermission;And if he did not get a liftSometimes fromme—and Doctor Swift,I can’t tell what the deuce he’d do!—But this, you know, isentre nous!I’ve tried to talk him into taste,But found my labour quite misplaced;He nibs his pen, and twists his ear,And says he’s deaf and cannot hear;And if I mention right or rule,—Egad! he takes me for a fool!”
Gazing upon this varied sceneWith a new artist’s absent mien,I see thee silent and alone,My friend, ingenious Hamilton.I see thee there—(nay, do not blush!)Knight of the Pallet and the Brush,Dreaming of straight and crooked lines,And planning portraits and designs.I like him hugely!—well I wis,No despicable skill is his,Whether his sportive canvas showsArabia’s sands or Zembla’s snows,A lion, or a bed of lilies,Fair Caroline, or fierce Achilles;I love to see him taking downA schoolfellow’s unconscious frown,Describing twist, grimace, contortion,In most becoming disproportion,While o’er his merry paper glideRivers of wit; and by his sideCaricatura takes her stand,Inspires the thought and guides the hand;I love to see his honoured booksAdorned with rivulets and brooks;Troy frowning with her ancient towers,Or Ida gay with fruit and flowers;I love to see fantastic shapes,Dragons and griffins, birds and apes,And pigmy forms and forms gigantic,Forms natural, and forms romantic,Of dwarf and ogres, dames and knights,Scrawled by the side of Homer’s fights,And portraits daubed on Maro’s poems,And profiles penned to Tulley’s Proems;In short, I view with partial eyesWhate’er my brother painter tries.To each belongs his own utensil;I sketch with pen, as he with pencil;And each, with pencil or with pen,Hits off a likeness now and then.He drewmeonce—the spiteful creature!’Twas voted—“like in every feature;”It might have been so!—(’twas lopsided,And squinted worse than ever I did:)However, from that hapless day,I owed the debt, which here I pay;And now I’ll give my friend a hint:—Unless you want to shine in print,Paint lords and ladies, nymphs and fairies,And demi-gods, and dromedaries;But never be an author’s creditor,Nor paint the picture of an Editor!
Who is the youth with stare confounded,And tender arms so neatly rounded,And moveless eyes, and glowing face,And attitude of studied grace?Now Venus, pour your lustre o’er us!Your would-be servant stands before us!Hail, Corydon! let others blameThe fury of his fictioned flame;I love to hear the beardless youthTalking of constancy and truth,Swearing more darts are in his liverThan ever gleamed in Cupid’s quiver,And wondering at those hearts of stoneWhich never melted like his own.Ah! when I look on Fashion’s moth,Wrapt in his visions and his cloth,I would not, for a nation’s gold,Disturb the dream—or spoil the fold!
And who the maid, whose gilded chain,Hath bound the heart of such a swain?Oh! look on those surrounding graces!There is no lack of pretty faces;M——l, the goddess of the night,Looks beautiful with all her might;And M——, in that simple dress,Enthralls us more by studying less;D——, in your becoming pride,Ye march to conquest, side by side;And A——, thou fleetest byBright in thine arch simplicity;Slight are the links thy power hath wreathed;Yet, by the tone thy voice hath breathed,By thy glad smile and ringlets curled,I would not break them for the world!But this is idle! Paying courtI know was never yet my forte;And all I say of nymph and queen,To cut it short, can only meanThat when I throw my gaze aroundI see much beauty on the ground.
Hark! hark! a mellowed noteOver the water seemed to float!Hark! the note repeated!A sweet, and soft, and soothing strainEchoed, and died, and rose again,As if the Nymphs of Fairy reignWere holding to-night their revel rout,And pouring their fragrant voices out,On the blue water seated.Hark to the tremulous tones that flow,And the voice of the boatmen as they row,Cheerfully to the heart they go,And touch a thousand pleasant stringsOf triumph and pride, and hope and joy,And thoughts that are only known to boy,And young imaginings!The note is near, the voice comes clear,And we catch its echo on the earWith a feeling of delight;And, as the gladdening sounds we hear,There’s many an eager listener here,And many a straining sight.
One moment,—and ye seeWhere, fluttering quick, as the breezes blow,Backwards and forwards, to and fro,Bright with the beam of retiring day,Old Eton’s flag, on its watery way,Moves on triumphantly!But what that ancient poets have toldOf Amphitrite’s car of gold,With the Nymphs behind, and the Nymphs before,And the Nereid’s song, and the Triton’s roar,Could equal half the prideThat heralds the Monarch’s plashing oarOver the swelling tide?And look!—they land those gallant crews,With their jackets light, and their bellying trews;And Ashley walks applauded by,With a world’s talent in his eye;And Kinglake, dear to poetry,And dearer to his friends;Hibernian Roberts, you are there,With that unthinking, merry stareWhich still its influence lendsTo make us drown our devils blue,In laughing at ourselves,—and you!Still I could lengthen out the tale,And sing Sir Thomas with his aleTo all that like to read;Still I could choose to linger longWhere Friendship bids the willing songFlow out for honest Meade!
Yet e’en on this triumphant dayOne thought of grief will rise;And though I bid my fancy play,And jest and laugh through all the lay,Yet sadness still will have its way,And burst the vain disguise!Yes! when the pageant shall have passed,I shall have looked upon my last;I shall not e’er behold againOur pullers’ unremitted strain;Nor listen to the charming cryOf contest or of victoryThat speaks what those young bosoms feel,As keel is pressing fast on keel;Oh! bright these glories still shall be,But they shall never dawn for me!
E’en when a realm’s congratulationSang Pæans for the Coronation,Amidst the pleasure that was round me,A melancholy spirit found me;And while all else were singing “Io!”I couldn’t speak a word but “Heigh-ho!”And so, instead of laughing gaily,I dropped a tear,—and wrote my “Vale.”
Vale!
Eton, the Monarch of thy prayersE’en now receives his load of cares;Throned in the consecrated choirHe takes the sceptre of his sire,And wears the crown his father wore,And swears the oath his father swore,And therefore sounds of joy resound,Fair Eton, on thy classic ground.A gladder gale is round thee breathed;And on thy mansions thou hast wreathedA thousand lamps, whose various hueWaits but the night to burst to view.Woe to the poets that refuseTo wake and woo their idle Muse,When those glad notes, “God save the King,”From hill, and vale, and hamlet ring!Hark, how the loved inspiring tunePeals forth from every loyal loonWho loves his country, and excelsIn drinking beer or ringing bells!It is a day of shouts and greeting;A day of idleness and eating;And triumph swells in every soul,And mighty beeves are roasted whole,And ale, unbought, is set a-running,And pleasure’s hymn grows rather stunning,And children roll upon the green,And cry, “Confusion to the Queen!”And Sorrow flies, and Labour slumbers:And Clio pours her loudest numbers;And hundreds of that joyous throngWith whom my life hath lingered longGive their glad raptures to the gale,In one united echoing “Hail!”
I took the harp, I smote the string,I strove to soar on Fancy’s wing,And murmur in my sovereign’s praiseThe latest of my boyhood’s lays.Alas! the theme was too divineTo suit so weak a Muse as mine:I saw—I felt it could not be;No song of triumph flows from me;The harp from which those sounds ye askIs all unfit for such a task;And the last echo of its tone,Dear Eton, must be thine alone!
A few short hours, and I am borneFar from the fetters I have worn;A few short hours, and I am free!—And yet I shrink from liberty,And look, and long to give my soulBack to thy cherishing control.Control? Ah no! thy chain was meantFar less for bond than ornament;And though its links are firmly set,I never found them gall me yet.Oh still, through many chequered years,’Mid anxious toils, and hopes, and fears,Still I have doted on thy fame,And only gloried in thy name.How I have loved thee! Thou hast beenMy Hope, my Mistress, and my Queen;I always found thee kind, and thouHast never seen me weep—till now.
I knew that time was fleeting fast,I knew thy pleasures could not last;I knew too well that riper ageMust step upon a busier stage;Yet when around thine ancient towersI passed secure my tranquil hours,Or heard beneath thine aged treesThe drowsy humming of the bees,Or wandered by thy winding stream,I would not check my fancy’s dream;Glad in my transitory bliss,I recked not of an hour like this;And now the truth comes swiftly on,The truth I would not think upon,The last sad thought, so oft delayed,—“These joys are only born to fade.”
Ye Guardians of my earliest days,Ye Patrons of my earliest lays,Custom reminds me, that to youThanks and farewell to-day are due.Thanks and farewell I give you,—not(As some that leave this holy spot)In laboured phrase and polished lieWrought by the forge of flattery,But with a heart that cannot tellThe half of what it feels so well.If I am backward to express,Believe, my love is not the less;Be kind as you are wont, and viewA thousand thanks in one Adieu.My future life shall strive to showI wish to pay the debt I owe;The labours that ye give to MaySeptember’s fruits shall best repay.And you, my friends, who loved to shareWhate’er was mine of sport or care,Antagonists at fives or chess,Friends in the play-ground or the press,I leave ye now; and all that restsOf mutual tastes, and loving breasts,In the lone vision that shall come,Where’er my studies and my home,To cheer my labour and my painAnd make me feel a boy again.
Yes! when at last I sit me down,A scholar, in my cap and gown,—When learned doctrines, dark and deep,Move me to passion or to sleep,—When Clio yields to logic’s wrangles,And Long and Short give place to angles,—When stern Mathesis makes it treasonTo like a rhyme, or scorn a reason—With aching head and weary witYour parted friend shall often sit,Till Fancy’s magic spell hath bound him,And lonely musings flit around him;Then shall ye come with all your wiles,Of gladdening sounds and warming smiles,And nought shall meet his eye or ear,—Yet shall he deem your souls are near.
Others may clothe their valedictionWith all the tinsel charms of fiction;And one may sing of Father Thames,And Naiads with a hundred names,And find a Pindus here, and ownThe College pump a Helicon,And search for gods about the College,Of which old Homer had no knowledge;And one may eloquently tellThe triumphs of the Windsor belle,And sing of Mira’s lips and eyes,In oft-repeated ecstasies.Oh! he hath much and wondrous skillTo paint the looks that wound and kill,As the poor maid is doomed to brook,Unconsciously, her lover’s look,And smiles, and talks, until the poetHears the band play, and does not know it.To speak the plain and simple truth,—I always was a jesting youth,A friend to merriment and fun,No foe to quibble and to pun;Therefore I cannot feign a tear;And, now that I have uttered hereA few unrounded accents, bredMore from the heart than from the head,Honestly felt, and plainly told,My lyre is still, my fancy cold.
Pretty Coquette, the ceaseless playOf thine unstudied wit,And thy dark eye’s remembered rayBy buoyant fancy lit,And thy young forehead’s clear expanse,Where the locks slept, as through the dance,Dreamlike, I saw thee flit,Are far too warm, and far too fairTo mix with aught of earthly care;But the vision shall come when my day is done,A frail and a fair and a fleeting one!And if the many boldly gazeOn that bright brow of thine,And if thine eye’s undying raysOn countless coxcombs shine,And if thy wit flings out its mirth,Which echoes more of air than earth,For other ears than mine,I heed not this; ye are fickle things,And I like your very wanderings;I gaze, and if thousands share the bliss,Pretty Capricious! I heed not this.In sooth I am a wayward youth,As fickle as the sea,And very apt to speak the truth,Unpleasing though it be;I am no lover; yet as longAs I have heart for jest or song,An image, sweet, of thee,Locked in my heart’s remotest treasures,Shall ever be one of its hoarded pleasures;—This from the scoffer thou hast won,And more than this he gives to none.
Pretty Coquette, the ceaseless playOf thine unstudied wit,And thy dark eye’s remembered rayBy buoyant fancy lit,And thy young forehead’s clear expanse,Where the locks slept, as through the dance,Dreamlike, I saw thee flit,Are far too warm, and far too fairTo mix with aught of earthly care;But the vision shall come when my day is done,A frail and a fair and a fleeting one!And if the many boldly gazeOn that bright brow of thine,And if thine eye’s undying raysOn countless coxcombs shine,And if thy wit flings out its mirth,Which echoes more of air than earth,For other ears than mine,I heed not this; ye are fickle things,And I like your very wanderings;I gaze, and if thousands share the bliss,Pretty Capricious! I heed not this.In sooth I am a wayward youth,As fickle as the sea,And very apt to speak the truth,Unpleasing though it be;I am no lover; yet as longAs I have heart for jest or song,An image, sweet, of thee,Locked in my heart’s remotest treasures,Shall ever be one of its hoarded pleasures;—This from the scoffer thou hast won,And more than this he gives to none.
Pretty Coquette, the ceaseless playOf thine unstudied wit,And thy dark eye’s remembered rayBy buoyant fancy lit,And thy young forehead’s clear expanse,Where the locks slept, as through the dance,Dreamlike, I saw thee flit,Are far too warm, and far too fairTo mix with aught of earthly care;But the vision shall come when my day is done,A frail and a fair and a fleeting one!
And if the many boldly gazeOn that bright brow of thine,And if thine eye’s undying raysOn countless coxcombs shine,And if thy wit flings out its mirth,Which echoes more of air than earth,For other ears than mine,I heed not this; ye are fickle things,And I like your very wanderings;I gaze, and if thousands share the bliss,Pretty Capricious! I heed not this.
In sooth I am a wayward youth,As fickle as the sea,And very apt to speak the truth,Unpleasing though it be;I am no lover; yet as longAs I have heart for jest or song,An image, sweet, of thee,Locked in my heart’s remotest treasures,Shall ever be one of its hoarded pleasures;—This from the scoffer thou hast won,And more than this he gives to none.