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Harvard College
Library
VER1
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THE BEQUEST OF
ARTHUR STUART WALCOTT
Class of 1891
JUNE 1, 1923








200
HUMOROUS POEMS






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HUMOROUS POEMS
THOMAS HOOD
WITH A PREFACE BY
ALFRED AINGER
AND ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ILLUSTRATIONS
CHARLES E. BROCK
London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
AND NEW YORK
1893
All rights reserved





HUMOROUS POEMS
E
:
BY
THOMAS HOOD
WITH A PREFACE BY
ALFRED AINGER
AND ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ILLUSTRATIONS
BY
CHARLES E. BROCK
London
MACMILLAN AND CO.
AND NEW YORK
1893
All rights reserved


23454.19
NARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY
BEQUEST OF
ARTHUR STUART WALCOTT
JUNE 1, 1923


PŘETACH
NAMIC TANU
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.
:::::
...
Some time in the year 1825 there was published in
London a thin duodecimo volume having for title
Odes and Addresses to Great People. It bore no
author's name on the title-page,—only a quotation
from the Citizen of the World, “Catching all the
oddities, the whimsies, the absurdities and the little-
nesses of conscious greatness by the way.” The little
book proved, on examination, to contain some fifteen
humorous poems addressed to various public characters
of greater or less claim to distinction at that day.
There was one to Mr. Graham, the aeronaut; another
to M'Adam, the maker of roads; another to
Mrs. Fry, the Quaker philanthropist ; another to
Grimaldi, the clown, and so forth. An acute critic
might, even then, I think, have detected not only that
these fresh and amusing productions were of unequal


viji
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
merit, but that they were not all by the same hand.
But he would, most assuredly, have allowed that wit
and ingenuity of a rare kind were to be found among
them.
The little volume quickly attracted attention, and
was soon in a second edition. Among those into
whose hands it fell was Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
then residing under Mr. Gillman's roof at Highgate.
His delight was great, and in the absence of any in-
formation as to the authorship, he at once assumed that
such mingled fun and poetry could have emanated from
but one living man—and that, the author of Elia.
Accordingly Coleridge wrote off at once to Charles
Lamb :-
MY DEAR CHARLES—This afternoon a little thin mean-
looking sort of a foolscap sub-octavo of poems, printed on very
dingy outsides, lay on the table, which the cover informed me
was circulating in our book-club, so very Grub Streetish in all
its appearance, internal as well as external, that I cannot
explain by what accident of impulse (assuredly there was no
motive in play) I came to look into it. Least of all the title,
Odes and Addresses to Great Men, which connected itself in
my head with Rejected Addresses, and all the Smith and
Theodore Hook squad. But, my dear Charles, it was certainly
written by you, or under you, or unâ cum you. I know none
of your frequent visitors, capacious and assimilative enough of
your converse, to have reproduced you so honestly, supposing
W
once


PREFACE
you had left yourself in pledge in his lock-up house. Gillman,
to whom I read the spirited parody on the Introduction to Peter
Bell, the Ode to the Great Unknown, and to Mrs. Fry—he
speaks doubtfully of Reynolds and Hood. ...
Thursday night, 10 o`clock—No! Charles, it is you! I
have read them over again, and I understand why you have
anoned the book. The puns are nine in ten good—many
excellent,—the Newgatory, transcendent! And then the
exemplum sine exemplo of a volume of personalities and con-
temporaneities without a single line that could inflict the in-
finitesimal of an unpleasance on any man in his senses—saving
and except, perhaps, in the envy-addled brain of the despiser of
your Lays. If not a triumph over him, it is, at least, an
Ovation. Then moreover and besides (to speak with becoming
modesty), excepting my own self, who is there but you who
could write the musical lines and stanzas that are intermixed ?
Lamb writes back on the second of July from
Colebrooke Row, Islington, and after telling Coleridge
of his own recent illness and the weariness of being
without occupation - he had just retired from the
India House-he proceeds :-
The Odes are, four-fifths, done by Hood—a silentish young
man you met at Islington one day, an invalid. The rest are
Reynolds's, whose sister Hood has lately married. I have not
had a broken finger in them. . . . Hood will be gratified, as
much as I am, by your mistake.
And Lamb is able to add at the close of his


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
letter : “ Hood has just come in; his sick eyes
sparkled with health when he read your approbation."
The “silentish young man—an invalid” was then
just six-and-twenty years of age. He had been forced
to abandon, for health's sake, the engraver's desk to
which he had been bound; had become in 1821 sub-
editor of the London Magazine, and in that service,
and at the hospitable table of the publishers, Taylor
and Hessey, had both practised his poetic gift and
made the most valuable and inspiring friendships of
his life,—with Hazlitt, De Quincey, Hartley Coleridge,
and, above all, in Hood's affection and admiration,
Charles Lamb, then just beginning to contribute his
essays to the magazine. One greater genius than any
in the list it was not given to Hood to know in the
flesh. John Keats had closed his brief life of suffering
at Rome in the February of the year in which Hood
joined the staff. But it was under the spell of that
poetic genius that Hood began his career as poet.
Among the friends he owed to the magazine was
John Hamilton Reynolds, his future brother-in-law.
Reynolds had been one of Keats's closest friends, and
himself wrote verse of considerable mnerit, bearing
strong marks of the Keatsian influence. Hood


PREFACE
remained sub-editor for two or three years, and
contributed many of his longer serious poems, clearly
due in subject as well as style to the same influence—
his “ Lycus the Centaur,” “ The Two Peacocks of
Bedfont,” the “ Ode to Autumn,” and others. But very
early in his editorial career he had also printed in
the magazine, modestly, among certain imaginary
and whimsical “ Notices to Correspondents," a short
and facetious “ Ode to Dr. Kitchener," prelude and
model of those which afterwards SO captivated
Coleridge. But this, with all other of Hood's con-
tributions at this time, was anonymous, and together
with the serious poetry, seems to have attracted scant
notice. Unsigned poetry, even seventy years ago, was
sufficiently abundant, and, for the most part, sufficiently
commonplace, for the general reader to pass it by as so
inuch padding. And when the Odes and Addresses,
the joint-production of Hood and Reynolds, appeared
anonymously in 1825, even those who lived in the
world of literature were in some doubt as to the
authorship.
In 1824 Hood married Jane Reynolds, contrary, it
would seem, to the wishes of her family, and indeed,
with his health and uncertain prospects, the match
en s
IS


хії
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
may well have been deemed imprudent. In any case
the “bread and cheese" question had become urgent.
The Odes and Addresses came out in the year
following, to be soon followed by the two series of
Whims and Oddities; and in 1827 Hood reprinted
his Serious Poems from the London Magazine with
some new matter, including the graceful poem which
gave its name to the volume, “ The Plea of the Mid-
summer Fairies.” This poem was dedicated to
Charles Lamb,the volume, as a whole, to Coleridge,
in grateful recognition of the praise he had bestowed
01 Hood's earlier efforts, —but neither poems nor
dedications availed to awaken any interest in the
reading public. The volume fell all but dead from the
press; and the author, his son and daughter tell us,
bought up a large number of the remainder copies,
“ to save them from the butter-shop."
It now became evident that if Hood was to live by
writing, it must be by his humorous, not his serious
verse ; and though happily his poetic genius was not
discouraged, the remaining eighteen years of his life
were spent mainly in working that rich and unique
vein of which he had given earliest proof in his Odes
and Addresses. He was to show that in the hands


PREFACE
xiii
of a poet and humorist, the pun—that so-called “ verbal
wit” —was to take higher rank and subserve quite other
purposes than anything of the kind in our literature
before. Samuel Johnson once remarked that “little
things are not valued, but when they are done by those
who can do greater things.” But he might have gone
further, and said that the little things only become
great when they proceed from those who can do greater,
—who come to them, that is to say, from a higher
ground.
And, with Hood, this higher ground was the poetic
heart, and a vividness and rapidity of imagination
such as never before had found such an outlet. The
same instantaneous perception of the analogies and
relations between, apparently, incongruous things that
was possessed by Dickens, Hood possessed with regard
to words and ideas. The pun, as ordinarily under-
stood, is a play upon the double meanings of words, or
on the resemblance of one word to another; and in the
hands of one destitute of humour or fancy the pun
begins and ends there. It may be purely mechanical,
and if so, speedily becomes wearisoine and disgusting.
To hear of any ordinary man that he makes puns is
properly a warning to avoid his society. For with the


xiv
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
funny man the verbal coincidence is everything ; there
is nothing underlying it, or beyond it. In the
hands of a Hood the pun becomes an element in his
fancy, his humour, his ethical teaching, even his
pathos. As ordinarily experienced, the pun is the irre-
concilable enemy of these things. It could not dwell
with them “in one house." Hood saw, and was the
first to show, that the pun might become even their
handmaid, and in this confidence dared to use it often
in his serious poems, when he was conveying some
moral truth, or expressing some profound human
emotion. Coleridge, as we have seen, remarking on
the excellence of the puns in the Odes and Addresses,
added, “The Newgatory is transcendent !” Hood was
addressing the admirable Mrs. Fry, who, as every one
knows, set up a school in Newgate to teach the poor
neglected outcasts what they had never heard from
Christian lips before. One of the chief points made
by Hood is this,—how much better, kinder, wiser, more
politic even, it would be to multiply these schools
outside, not inside the Prison walls, so that pre-
vention might take the place of cure. “Keep your
school out of Newgate” is the burden of Hood's
remonstrance :-


PREFACE
Ah! who can tell how hard it is to teach
Miss Nancy Dawson on her bed of straw-
To make Long Sal sew up the endless breach
She made in manners-to write heaven's own law
On hearts of granite; nay, how hard to preach,
In cells, that are not memory's- to draw
The moral thread thro the immoral eye
Of blunt Whitechapel natures, Mrs. Fry!!
And then, after a stanza or two, comes the one
ending with the play on words that so fascinated
Coleridge :-
I like your chocolate, good Mistress Fry!
I like your cookery in every way;
I like your Shrove-tide service and supply;
I like to hear your sweet Pandeans play;
I like the pity in your full-brimmed eye;
I like your carriage, and your silken grey,
Your dove-like habits, and your silent preaching;
But I don't like your Newgatory teaching!
The distinctive quality of Hood's puns is exempli-
fied here, but not more notably than in a hundred other
instances that crowd upon the memory. The ordinary
pun is, for the most part, profoundly depressing, being
generally an impertinence ; while Hood's at their best
exhilarate and fill the reader with a glow of admira-
tion and surprise. The“ sudden glory” which Hobbes
pronounced to be the secret of the pleasure derived from
wit is true of Hood's. There was a pretty drawing-


xvi
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
room ballad by his brother-in-law Reynolds, which
our grandmothers used to sing to an equally pretty
tune, beginning-
Go where the water glideth gently ever,
Glideth by meadows that the greenest be;
Go, listen to our own beloved river
And think of me!
Hood had a young lady friend who was going to
India, and he writes her a playful copy of verses, imi-
tating Reynolds's poem in metre and refrain Hood
noticed that the matrimonial market, already in his
day, was somewhat overstocked, and that watchful
parents had the comfort of hoping that daughters who
lingered in England might yet find husbands in the
smaller society of Bombay or Madras, and he adds
Go where the maiden on a mariage plan goes,
Consigned for wedlock to Calcutta's quay,
Where woman goes for mart, the same as mangos,
And think of me !
The same as man goes! How utter the
surprise, and yet how inevitable the simile appears !
It is just as if the writer had not foreseen it—as if
it had been mere accident—as if he had discovered
the coincidence rather than arranged it. This is
a special note of Hood's best puns. They fall


xviii
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
written to support an “ Early Closing Movement” of
Hood's day, in which his interest was keen as it was
in all proposed remedies for suffering and oppression.
It seems strange that the verses have never been
reprinted in behalf of grievances that still, after
fifty years, cry aloud for redress. The poem is “ The
Assistant Draper's Petition, and the prodigal flow
of wit and fancy that marks it, so far from be-littling
its purpose, is surely fraught with a rare pathos, -
though the point of the jests is chiefly got from the
double meanings in well-known trade phrases :
Ah! who can tell the miseries of men
That serve the very cheapest shops in town ?
Till faint and weary, they leave off at ten,
Knock'd up by ladies beating of 'em down.'
(Sydney Smith laid it down as a rule that wit and
pathos cannot dwell together,—that one must needs kill
the other; but he wrote his famous lecture without
knowing Thomas Hood.) And then there follows a
plea for leisure-leisure to read and to think,—the
leisure which noble Institutions like Toynbee Hall
are doing so much to foster and improve :
O come then, gentle ladies, come in time,
O’erwhelm our counters, and unload our shelves ;


PREFACE
xix
Torment us all until the seventh chime,
But let us have the remnant to ourselves.'
We wish of knowledge to lay in a stock,
And not remain in ignorance incurable ;-
To study Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, Locke,
And other fabrics that have proved so durable.
We long for thoughts of intellectual kind,
And not to go bewilder'd to our beds;
With stuff and fustian taking up the mind,
And pins and needles running in our heads .
For oh! the brain gets very dull and dry,
Selling from morn till night for cash or credit ;
Or with a vacant face and vacant eye,
Watching cheap prints that Knight did never edit.
Till sick with toil, and lassitude extreme,
We often think, when we are dull and vapoury,
The bliss of Paradise was so supreme,
Because that Adam did not deal in drapery.
It would be absurd to pretend that Hood's lighter
verse is always up to the same level. It was his mis-
fortune to have to write for bread, and to struggle for
half a lifetime against poverty and ill-health. Much
of his “comic copy” was manufactured, and that too
when he was gravely ill, sitting propped up with
pillows. The marvel is not that the quality was often
so poor, but that he wrote so much that will live.
He was only forty-five when he died, and for the last


XX
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
twenty years had dwelt" in company with pain.” We
probably owe to this circumstance that not only in his
serious poetry, his “Bridge of Sighs," " Song of, the
Shirt,” the “ Haunted House," and the “Elm Tree,” but
also in his humorous verse, his fancy turned so
habitually to some or other form of death or suffering.
A glance at the titles in our index will show how often
he found suggestions of humour in “violent ends,” in
accident and disaster. In the serious poems, indeed, a
different origin may be found for this. Hood's own deep
compassion and his sense of man's inhumanity was,
doubtless, quickened by his own experience of pain and
disappointment, and by the shadow of decay and doom
that never lifted. But he made no boast of it, or
capital out of it; the pessimistic accent is never
heard in his verse ; he never lost his own cheerful
faith in providence, though he early learned that
There's not a string attuned to mirth,
But has its chord in Melancholy.
And the treatment of " catastrophe" in his lighter
verse is too purely fantastic to be even grim, still less to
leave any ill flavour of bad taste. He could never over-
look the humorous analogies of things, even when they
were his own sufferings. “I am obliged to lead a very


PREFACE
xxi
sedentary life," he wrote to a correspondent—" in fact,
to be very chair-y of myself.” And when for his poor
wasted frame, his faithful wife was preparing a mus-
tard plaster, he murmured, “ Ah! Jane—a great deal
of mustard to a very little meat !”
What has been said of Hood's punning faculty
applies to the general quality of his humorous verse,
namely, that the writer comes to it from a higher ground.
Owing to ill-health he had been from childhood an
omnivorous reader, but his sympathies were with all
that is best in literature. He had trained himself on
the best poetic models. Shakespeare and Keats were
the inspiration of his earliest verse ; and often in the
hastiest of comic effusions the eye and practised hand
of the poet are discernible. Just as he did not hesitate
to let a pun heighten the effect of some poignant reflec-
tion, as in the “Ode to Melancholy," —
Even the bright extremes of joy
Bring on conclusions of disgust,
Like the sweet blossoms of the May
Whose fragrance ends in must,-
so he did not grudge a really noble fancy even to
some perfunctory copy for a magazine, where the first aim
was to raise a laugh. There is a poem of his about


xxii
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
a somnambulist (suggested by a once popular story,
Edgar Huntly), the point of which is the contrast of the
sleeper's romantic dream with the hard reality of the
kitchen stairs down which he falls. The dreamer
imagines himself in the rapids above Niagara, and as
he nears the brink, he notices the rainbow hovering in
the spray below, and feels that the old pledge and
covenant of Hope is, in his case, the emblem of despair,
-a thought that might have made the fortune of a
sonnet or other lyric, had its author reserved it,—but
he leaves it there. And this habit makes it difficult to
classify his verse, the serious poetry often adopting the
humorist's methods and the humorous often containing
elements of genuine poetry. The present selection,
while excluding the former of these, succeeds, I think,
in showing Hood's versatility and ingenuity in the
latter. The “Demon Ship” exhibits the same
hand that depicted the anguish of Eugene Aram :
the “Mermaid of Margate” is a playful parody
of the Romantic legend of Birger and his English
followers; while others, such as “Sally Brown”
and “Nelly Gray,” show the luinorous possi-
bilities of the Percy Ballad. The “ Epping Hunt”
is undisguisedly suggested by “ John Gilpin," a


PREFACE
xxiii
“Death's Ramble” is by the “ Devil's Walk” of
Coleridge and Southey — and “Queen Mab” shows
how well Hood might have written for children,
had he chosen to work the vein, in the delightful
fashion of Mr. R. L. Stevenson.
True poet and true humorist, Hood doubtless
produced too much in both kinds for his fame.
Struggling against “ two weak evils," poverty and
disease, he too often wrote when the fountains of his
fancy were dry. But if he diluted his reputation in
some ways, he was growing and “making himself”
in others more important. He was a learner to the
end—widening as well as deepening in his human
insight, recognising, as he told Sir Robert Peel in
his last pathetic letter, the dangers of a "one-sided
humanity, opposite to that Catholic Shakespearian
sympathy, which felt with king as well as peasant,
and duly estimated the mortal temptations of both
stations.” Hood's position among our minor poets
is peculiar and interesting. He is much loved,
but not much written about. Critics will seldom be
found analysing and dissecting his "work.” The
scholar and the artist, the classic and the student
of form, have their just and necessary place in our



.
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CONTENTS
HA
1,SEB
PAGE
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111
PREFACE . . . . .
EPPING HUNT. . .
FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN
THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
A FAIRY TALE . .
EQUESTRIAN COURTSHIP . .
TIM TURPIN : : ..
DEATH'S RAMBLE . .
A PARTHIAN GLANCE
A SAILOR'S APOLOGY FOR BOW-LEGS
JOHN TROT . . . .
MARY'S GHOST
THE CARELESSE NURSE MAYD .
A REPORT FROM BELOW:
THE DUEL . . . . .
THE SUPPER SUPERSTITION
FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY. . .
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114
120
127
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PAGE
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148
153
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OUR VILLAGE . .
JOHN DAY . . . . .
LIEUTENANT LUFF.
THE CHINA-MENDER
PLAYING AT SOLDIERS .
QUEEN MAB .
MORNING MEDITATIONS .
THE DEMON SHIP . .
THE DROWNING DUCKS.
THE LOST HEIR .
THE ASSISTANT DRAPER'S PETITION
THE VOLUNTEER
HIT OR Miss . . .
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Marched as mourners marched' . .
Heading to Preface
Tailpiece to Preface
Heading to Contents . . . .
Tailpiece to Contents . .
Heading to List of Illustrations
Tailpiece to List of Illustrations
Heading to Epping Hunt .
"At counter'. . . .
Of lustre superfine' . .
As he began to show'. .
'Flis spouse had made him vow' .
““Hallo !” cried they ; "come, trot away
“Now welcome, lads," quoth he' .
* Enjoyed their "early purl"
d their 56 early purl”! . .
Each thicket served to thin it' :
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* And like a bird was singing out'. . .
'So up on Huggins' horse he got'. .
* Whilst Huggins in the stirrup stood'
““ Beasts of draught !”'. . .
* When he was rubbed'. . .
Heading to Faithless Sally Brown.
"“Now, young woman,” said he'..
'He found she'd got another Ben'.
Tailpiece to Faithless Sally Brown .
Heading to The Mermaid of Margate .
"And clasped him by the hand'
His hair began to stiffen' ..
56 Ahoy!” . . . .
Heading to A Fairy Tale .
* Reading,—and wept'. .
' A horn-pipe' . . .
«« Took to the road” again!
«« Well! this is Fairy Work"
Heading to Equestrian Courtship . .
• They rode by a churchyard, and then he spoke'
Heading to Tim Turpin . . . .
Now Tim he wooed a servant maid' .
' He saw her very plain . .
"A dozen men to try the fact'. . . . .
* A great judge, and a little judge'.
Heading to Death's Ramble. .
* He saw a watchman fast in his box
A patient that pulled out his purse'
' He saw a sailor mixing his grog'. .
Heading to A Parthian Glance . .
* To comfort my woes'. . .
‘Was your face ever sent to the housemaid to scrub?'
Tailpiece to A Parthian Glance . . . .
Heading to A Sailor's Apology for Bow-Legs . .
''Twas all along of Poll' : : : : :
'To splice me, heel to heel'. . . . .
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
xxix
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‘My legs began to bend like winkin' . .
Tailpiece to A Sailor's Apology for Bow-Legs
Heading to John Trot. . . . .
' Took her quite amazed . .
• They stripped his coat, and gave him kicks :
* Huzza ! the sergeant cried'. . .
Heading to Mary's Ghost . .
• They've come and boned your Mary'.
'In spirits and a phial'.
Tailpiece to Mary's Ghost . . .
Heading to The Carelesse Nurse Mayd.
Tailpiece to The Carelesse Nurse Mayd.
Heading to A Report from Below . .
'Suppose the couple standing so'.
““Come,” says she, quite in a huff'
Up goes the copper' . . .
* A-staring at the wash-house roof'.
Heading to The Duel . . .
“I'll pop it into you’ . . .
‘Said Mr. C. to Mr. B.' . .
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Tailpiece to The Duel. .
Heading to The Supper Superstition
‘Don't sup on that 'ere Cod'. .
'To see what brutes would do' . .
Tailpiece to The Supper Superstition
Heading to Faithless Nelly Gray .
‘She made him quite a scoff' .
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* Some other man'. . . .
'In four cross roads' . .
Heading to Our Village . .
· Right before the wicket'
‘The Green Man'.
' A select establishment'.
“There's a barber's' . .
Heading to John Day . .
‘And made an offer plump'. . . .
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XXX
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
PAGE
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• He fretted all the way to Stroud'. . . .
I've lost my better half' . .
Heading to Lieutenant Luff. .
* That old enemy the gout' .
‘Said he, “This barrel is my last ”.
Heading to The China-mender .
“He will so finger and touch'. .
“Stupid Mr. Lambert'. .
“A hearty woman for her years'
Heading to Playing at Soldiers
‘Or storm the garden gates' .
“That would hold up the flag
· And laid it out in cakes' .
I've got a substitute' . . .
.
Heading to Queen Mab . .
*And ogres draw their cruel knives' .
Heading to Morning Meditations . .
With charwomen and sweeps such early hours agree
Heading to The Demon Ship . . . .
“That Grimly One' . . . . . .
'They crowed their fill'. . .
Heading to The Drowning Ducks
*The thing was strange'. .
* There crawled some eels' ..
Heading to The Lost Heir .
Oh Serjeant M‘Farlane!' .
* Playing like angels' . .
Tailpiece to The Lost Heir . . .
Heading to The Assistant Draper’s Petition .
* For oh ! the brain gets very dull and dry'
Heading to The Volunteer . . .
Looking forth with anxious eye'. ..
“The mirror here confirmed me this?
Heading to Hit or Miss . . . .
'He seemed a dog adrift' . .
“Some savage nations use the style' . . .
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
xxxi
PAGE
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* Putting his gravest visage on’ .
* About the moors’. . .
"To vent his rage'. . . .
* For keepers, shy of such encroachers' .
* And raps an oath' . . . .
Tailpiece to Hit or Miss . . . .
223
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UN
ch






EPPING HUNTY
Illic Brak
ADVERTISEMENT
TRIDING in the Steps of Strutt—the historian of
A y the old English Sports--the author of the following
EQA pages has endeavoured to record a yearly revel,
already fast hastening to decay. The Easter Chase will soon
be numbered with the pastimes of past times : its dogs will
have had their day, and its Deer will be Fallow. A few
more seasons, and this City Common Hunt will become un-
common.
In proof of this melancholy decadence, the ensuing epistle
is inserted. It was penned by an underling at the Wells, a
person more accustomed to riding than writing :-
“Sir,--About the Hunt. In anser to your Innqueries, their
as been a great falling off laterally, so much so this year that
there was nobody allmost. We did a mear nothing provisionally,
B


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
hardly a Bottle extra, wich is a proof in Pint. In short our
Hunt may be said to be in the last Stag of a decline.
“I am, Sir,
“With respects from your humble Servant,
“ BARTHOLOMEW RUTT."
“On Monday they began to hunt.”—Chevy Chase.
en TOHN HUGGINS was as bold a man
As trade did ever know,
A warehouse good he had, that stood
Hard by the church of Bow.
There people bought Dutch cheeses round,
And single Glo'ster flat,-
And English butter in a lump,
And Irish-in a pat.
Six days a week beheld him stand,
His business next his heart,
At counter, with his apron tied
About his counter-part.
The seventh in a Sluice-house box,
He took his pipe and pot ;


EPPING HUNT
On Sundays for eel-piety,
A very noted spot.

ca
CF Brock
Hay.1593.
At counter.'
Ah, blest if he had never gone
Beyond its rural shed !
One Easter-tide, some evil guide
Put Epping in his head;
Epping for butter justly famed,
And pork in sausage popp'd;
Where winter time, or summer time,
Pig's flesh is always chopt.


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But famous more, as annals tell,
Because of Easter Chase :
There ev'ry year, 'twixt dog and deer,
There is a gallant race.
With Monday's sun John Huggins rose,
And slapt his leather thigh,
And sang the burthen of the song,
“This day a stag must die.”
For all the livelong day before,
And all the night in bed,
Like Beckford, he had nourished“ Thoughts
On Hunting” in his head.
Of horn and morn, and hark and bark,
And echo's answering sounds,
All poets' wit hath ever writ
In dog-rel verse of hounds.
Alas! there was no warning voice
To whisper in his ear,
Thou art a fool in leaving Cheap
To go and hunt the deer !


EPPING HUNT
No thought he had of twisted spine,
Or broken arms or legs ;
Not chicken-hearted he, altho’
'Twas whispered of his eggs !

W3
Of lustre superfine.'
Ride out he would, and hunt he would,
Nor dreamt of ending ill;
Mayhap with Dr. Ridout's fee,
· And Surgeon Hunter's bill.


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
So he drew on his Sunday boots,
Of lustre superfine ;
The liquid black they wore that day,
Was Warren-ted to shine.
His yellow buckskins fitted close,
As once upon a stag ;
Thus well equipt he gaily skipt,
At once, upon his nag.
But first to him that held the rein,
A crown he nimbly flung :
For holding of the horse ?—why, no-
For holding of his tongue.
To say the horse was Huggins' own,
Would only be a brag ;
His neighbour Fig and he went halves,
Like Centaurs, in a nag.
And he that day had got the grey,
Unknown to brother cit ;
The horse he knew would never tell,
Altho' it was a tit.


EPPING HUNT
A well-bred horse he was, I wis,
As he began to show,
By quickly “rearing up within
The way he ought to go.”

HUGGINS
MED
Dr.
دواع
As he began to show.'
Copyright 1833 by Macmillan & Co.
But Huggins, like a wary man,
Was ne'er from saddle cast ;
Resolved, by going very slow,
On sitting very fast.


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And so he jogged to Tot'n'am Cross,
An ancient town well known,
Where Edward wept for Eleanor
In mortar and in stone.
A royal game of fox and goose,
To play on such a loss;
Wherever she set down her orts,
Thereby he put a cross.
Now Huggins had a crony here,
That lived beside the way ;
One that had promised sure to be
His comrade for the day.
Whereas the man had changed his mind,
Meanwhile upon the case !
And meaning not to hunt at all,
Had gone to Enfield Chase.
For why, his spouse had made him vow
To let a game alone,
Where folks that ride a bit of blood,
May break a bit of bone.


EPPING HUNT
“Now, be his wife a plague for life!
A coward sure is he: ”
Then Huggins turned his horse's head,
And crossed the bridge of Lea.
3 PM
UN
•His spouse had made him vow.
Thence slowly on thro' Laytonstone,
Past many a Quaker's box,-
No friends to hunters after deer,
Tho' followers of a Fox.


IO
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And many a score behind-before-
The self-same route inclined,
And minded all to march one way,
Made one great march of mind.
Gentle and simple, he and she,
And swell, and blood, and prig ;
And some had carts, and some a chaise,
According to their gig.
Some long-eared jacks, some knacker's hacks
(However odd it sounds),
Let out that day to hunt, instead
Of going to the hounds !
And some had horses of their own,
And some were forced to job it :
And some, while they inclined to Hunt,
Betook themselves to Cob-it.
All sorts of vehicles and vans,
Bad, middling, and the smart ;
Here rolled along the gay barouche,
And there a dirty cart !


EPPING HUNT
II
And lo! a cart that held a squad
Of costermonger line ;
With one poor hack, like Pegasus,
That slaved for all the Nine !

CEBrock
1893
• " Hallo !" cried they; "come, trot away.
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Yet marvel not at any load,
That any horse might drag,
When all, that morn, at once were drawn
Together by a stag !


12
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Now when they saw John Huggins go
At such a sober pace;
“Hallo !” cried they ; "come, trot away,
You'll never see the chase ! ”
But John, as grave as any judge,
Made answer quite as blunt ;
“ It will be time enough to trot,
When I begin to hunt !”
And so he paced to Woodford Wells,
Where many a horseman met,
And letting go the reins, of course,
Prepared for heavy wet.
And lo! within the crowded door,
Stood Rounding, jovial elf ;
Here shall the Muse frame no excuse,
But frame the man himself.
A snow-white head, a merry eye,
A cheek of jolly blush ;
A claret tint laid on by health,
With Master Reynard's brush ;


EPPING HUNT
13
A hearty frame, a courteous bow,
The prince he learned it from ;
His age about threescore and ten,
And there you have Old Tom.
In merriest key I trow was he,
So many guests to boast;
So certain congregations meet,
And elevate the host.
"Now welcome, lads,” quoth he, “ and prads,
You're all in glorious luck :
Old Robin has a run to-day,
A noted forest buck.
"Fair Mead's the place, where Bob and Tom,
In red already ridc ;
'Tis but a step, and on a horse
You soon may go a stride."
So off they scampered, man and horse,
As time and temper pressed--
But Huggins, hitching on a tree,
Branched off from all the rest.


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And now began a sudden stir,
And then a sudden shout,
The prison-doors were opened wide,
And Robin bounded out !
His antlered head shone blue and red,
Bedecked with ribbons fine;
Like other bucks that come to 'list
The hawbucks in the line.
One curious gaze of mild amaze,
He turned and shortly took ;
Then gently ran adown the mead,
And bounded o'er the brook.
Now Huggins, standing far aloof,
Had never seen the deer,
Till all at once he saw the beast
Come charging in his rear.
Away he went, and many a score
Of riders did the same,
On horse and ass—like High and Low
And Jack pursuing Game !


EPPING HUNT
Good Lord ! to see the riders now,
Thrown off with sudden whirl,
A score within the purling brook,
Enjoyed their “early purl.”

á
*Enjoyed their "early purl.”'
A score were sprawling on the grass,
And beavers fell in showers ;
There was another Floorer there,
Beside the Queen of Flowers !
Some lost their stirrups, some their whips,
Some had no caps to show ;


18
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But few, like Charles at Charing Cross,
Rode on in Statue quo.
"O dear! O dear !” now might you hear,
" I've surely broke a bone ;”
“My head is sore,”—with many more
Such speeches from the thrown.
Howbeit their wailings never moved
The wide Satanic clan,
Who grinned, as once the Devil grinned,
To see the fall of Man.
And hunters good, that understood,
Their laughter knew no bounds,
To see the horses “throwing off,"
So long before the hounds.
For deer must have due course of law,
Like men the Courts among ;
Before those Barristers the dogs
Proceed to "giving tongue.”


EPPING HUNT
And now Old Robin's foes were set,
That fatal taint to find,
That always is scent after him,
Yet always left behind.
And here observe how dog and man
A different temper shows,
What hound resents that he is sent
To follow his own nose ?
was
Towler and Jowler—howlers all,
No single tongue was mute ;
The stag had led a hart, and lo !
The whole pack followed suit.
No spur he lacked ; fear stuck a knife
And fork in either haunch;
And every dog he knew had got
An eye-tooth to his paunch !
Away, away! he scudded like
A ship before the gale ;
Now flew to “hills we know not of,”
Now, nun-like, took the vale.


20
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Another squadron charging now,
Went off at furious pitch ;-
A perfect Tam o' Shanter mob,
Without a single witch.
But who was he with flying skirts,
A hunter did endorse,
And like a poet seemed to ride
Upon a winged horse, —
A whipper-in ?—no whipper-in :
A huntsman ? no such soul.
A connoisseur, or amateur ?
Why yes,-a Horse Patrol.
A member of police, for whom
The county found a nag,
And, like Acteon in the tale,
He found himself in stag !
Away they went then, dog and deer,
And hunters all away,—
The maddest horses never knew
Mad staggers such as they !


EPPING HUNT
21
Some gave a shout, some rolled about,
And anticked as they rode,
And butchers whistled on their curs,
And milkmen tally-hoed.

e
Cry
2462
W
ill CEBrock -
IS3
M2
2
'Each thickct served to thin it,'
About two score there were, not more,
That galloped in the race ;
The rest, alas ! lay on the grass,
As once in Chevy Chase !


22
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But even those that galloped on
Were fewer every minute,—-
The field kept getting more select,
Each thicket served to thin it.
For some pulled up, and left the hunt,
Some fell in miry bogs,
And vainly rose and “ran a muck,"
To overtake the dogs.
And some, in charging hurdle stakes,
Were left bereft of sense-
What else could be premised of blades
That never learned to fence ?
But Rounding, Tom, and Bob, no gate,
Nor hedge, nor ditch, could stay ;
O'er all they went, and did the work
Of leap years in a day.
And by their side see Huggins ride,
As fast as he could speed ;
For, like Mazeppa, he was quite
At mercy of his steed.


EPPING HUNT
No means he had, by timely check,
The gallop to remit,
For firm and fast, between his teeth,
The biter held the bit.
Trees raced along, all Essex fled
Beneath him as he sate,-
He never saw a county go
At such a county rate !
"Hold hard ! hold hard ! you'll lame the dogs.”
Quoth Huggins, “So I do,—
I've got the saddle well in hand,
And hold as hard as you !”
Good Lord ! to see him ride along,
And throw his arms about,
As if with stitches in the side,
That he was drawing out !
And now he bounded up and down,
Now like a jelly shook :
Till bumped and galled—yet not where Gall
For bumps did ever look !


24
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And rowing with his legs the while,
As tars are apt to ride,
With every kick he gave a prick,
Deep in the horse's side !
when
71
G.
ITU
AI
TERIS
'And like a bird was singing out.'
But soon the horse was well avenged,
For cruel smart of spurs,
For, riding through a moor, he pitched
His master in a furze !
Where sharper set than hunget is
He squatted all ſorlorn ;


EPPING HUNT
25
And like a bird was singing out
While sitting on a thorn !
Right glad was he, as well might be,
Such cushion to resign :
“ Possession is nine points,” but his
Seemed more than ninety-nine.
Yet worse than all the prickly points
That entered in his skin,
His nag was running off the while
The thorns were running in !
Now had a Papist seen his sport
Thus laid upon the shelf,
Altho' no horse he had to cross,
He might have crossed himself.
Yet surely still the wind is ill
That none can say is fair ;
A jolly wight there was, that rode
Upon a sorry mare !


26
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
A sorry mare, that surely came
Of pagan blood and bone ;
For down upon her knees she went
To many a stock and stone !
Now seeing Huggins' nag adrift,
This farmer, shrewd and sage,
Resolved, by changing horses here,
To hunt another stage !
Tho’ felony, yet who would let
Another's horse alone,
Whose neck is placed in jeopardy
By riding on his own ?
And yet the conduct of the man
Seemed honest-like and fair ;
For he seemed willing, horse and all,
To go before the mare !
So up on Huggins' horse he got,
And swiftly rode away,
While Huggins mounted on the mare,
Done brown upon a bay!


EPPING HUNT
27
And off they set, in double chase,
For such was fortune's whim,
The farmer rode to hunt the stag,
And Huggins hunted him !

So up on Huggins' horse he got.'
Alas! with one that rode so well
In vain it was to strive ;
A dab was he, as dabs should be-
All leaping and alive !


30
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Howbeit there was no toll at all,
They could not clear the gate.
And, like Fitzjames, he cursed the hunt,
And sorely cursed the day,
And mused a new Gray's elegy
On his departed grey !
Now many a sign at Woodford town
Its Inn-vitation tells :
But Huggins, full of ills, of course,
Betook him to the Wells.
Where Rounding tried to cheer him up
With many a merry laugh ;
But Huggins thought of neighbour Fig,
And called for half-and-half.
Yet, 'spite of drink, he could not blink
Remembrance of his loss ;
To drown a care like his, required
Enough to drown a horse.


EPPING HUNT
:
31
When thus forlorn, a merry horn
Struck up without the door,-
The mounted mob were all returned ;
The Epping Hunt was o'er !

IN
12
LU
S
с.EBRock
""Beasts of draught!"'
And many a horse was taken out
Of saddle and of shaft;
And men, by dint of drink, became
The only “ beasts of draught !”


.
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
32
For now begun a harder run
On wine, and gin, and beer ;
And overtaken man discussed
The overtaken deer.
How far he ran, and eke how fast,
And how at bay he stood,
Deer-like, resolved to sell his life
As dearly as he could ;
And how the hunters stood aloof,
Regardful of their lives,
And shunned a beast, whose very horns
They knew could handle knives !
How Huggins stood when he was rubbed
By help and ostler kind,
And when they cleaned the clay before,
How worse “ remained behind.”
And one, how he had found a horse
Adrift—a goodly grey!
And kindly rode the nag, for fear
The nag should go astray.



AFE
En
30
CO
ANN
POGO
JU
may 1893.
When he was rubbed.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.


34
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Now Huggins, when he heard the tale,
Jumped up with sudden glee ;
“ A goodly grey! why, then, I say
That grey belongs to me!
“Let me endorse again my horse,
Delivered safe and sound;
And, gladly, I will give the man
A bottle and a pound !”
The wine was drunk,—the money paid,
Tho' not without remorse,
To pay another man so much,
For riding on his horse.
And let the chase again take place,
For many a long, long year,
John Huggins will not ride again
To hunt the Epping Deer!
MORAL.
Thus pleasure oft eludes our grasp,
Just when we think to grip her ;
And hunting after happiness,
We only hunt a slipper.



FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN
-
N O P BALLAS
(OUNG Ben he was a nice young man,
- A carpenter by trade ;
And he fell in love with Sally Brown,
That was a lady's maid.
But as they fetched a walk one day,
They met a press-gang crew ;
And Sally she did faint away,
Whilst Ben he was brought to.


FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN
37
The Boatswain swore with wicked words,
Enough to shock a saint,
That though she did seem in a fit,
'Twas nothing but a feint.
“Come, girl,” said he, “hold up your head,
He'll be as good as me ;
For when your swain is in our boat,
A boatswain he will be.”
So when they'd made their game of her,
And taken off her elf,
She roused, and found she only was
A coming to herself.
“ And is he gone, and is he gone?”
She cried, and wept outright :
“ Then I will to the water side,
And see him out of sight.”
A waterman came up to her,
“Now, young woman,” said he,
“ If you weep on so, you will make
Eye-water in the sea.”


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
“ Alas! they've taken my beau Ben
To sail with old Benbow ;” .
And her woe began to run afresh,
As if she'd said Gee woe !

CFBO
3
""Now, young woman,” said he.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Says he, “ They've only taken him
To the Tender ship, you see ;”
“The Tender ship,” cried Sally Brown,
“What a hard-ship that must be !


40
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Then reading on his 'bacco box,
He heaved a bitter sigh,
And then began to eye his pipe,
And then to pipe his eye.

Brock
1593
* He found she'd got another Ben,'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
And then he tried to sing “ All's Well,”
But could not though he tried :


FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN
41
41
His head was turned, and so he chewed
His pigtail till he died.
His death, which happened in his berth,
At forty-odd befell :
They went and told the sexton, and
The sexton toll’d the bell.
cobacter



THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
fare
UM
FOTOT
CEB 93
“ Alas! what perils do environ
That man who meddles with a siren!"
Hudibras.
n Margate Beach, where the sick one roams,
And the sentimental reads;
Where the maiden flirts, and the widow comes
Like the ocean—to cast her weeds ;-
Where urchins wander to pick up shells,
And the Cit to spy at the ships, —
Like the water gala at Sadler's Wells,—
And the Chandler for watery dips ;-


THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
.
43
There's a maiden sits by the ocean brim,
As lovely and fair as sin !
But woe, deep water and woe to him,
That she snareth like Peter Fin!
Her head is crowned with pretty sea-wares,
And her locks are golden and loose,
And seek to her feet, like other folks' heirs,
To stand, of course, in her shoes !
And all day long she combeth them well,
With a sea-shark's prickly jaw ;
And her mouth is just like a rose-lipped shell,
The fairest that man e'er saw !
And the Fishmonger, humble as love may be,
Hath planted his seat by her side ;
“Good even, fair maid! Is thy lover at sea,
To make thee so watch the tide ? ”
arta,
She turned about with her pearly brows,
And clasped him by the hand ;
“Come, love, with me; I've a bonny house
On the golden Goodwin sand.”


.44
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And then she gave him a siren kiss,
No honeycomb e'er was sweeter ;
Poor wretch ! how little he dreamt for this
That Peter should be salt-Peter :

PALETTAR
RE
BSP
. And clasped him by the hand.
And away with her prize to the wave she leapt,
Not walking, as damsels do,
With toe and heel, as she ought to have stept,
But she hopt like a Kangaroo ;


THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
45
One plunge, and then the victim was blind,
Whilst they galloped across the tide ;
At last, on the bank he waked in his mind,
And the Beauty was by his side.
• His hair began to stiffin.'
One half on the sand, and half in the sea,
But his hair began to stiffen ;
For when he looked where her feet should be,
She had no more feet than Miss Biffen !
But a scaly tail, of a dolphin's growth,
In the dabbling brine did soak :


16
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
At last she opened her pearly mouth,
Like an oyster, and thus she spoke :
“You crimpt my father, who was a skate,---
And my sister you sold—a maid ;
So here remain for a fish'ry fate,
For lost you are, and betrayed ! ”
And away she went, with a sea-gull's scream,
And a splash of her saucy tail ;
In a moment he lost the silvery gleam
That shone on her splendid mail !
The sun went down with a blood-red flame,
And the sky grew cloudy and black,
And the tumbling billows like leap-frog came,
Each over the other's back!
Ah me! it had been a beautiful scene,
With the safe terra-firma round;
But the green water-hillocks all seem'd to him,
Like those in a churchyard ground;


THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
And Christians love in the turf to lie,
Not in watery graves to be ;
Nay, the very fishes will sooner die
On the land than in the sea.
And whilst he stood, the watery strife
Encroached on every hand,
And the ground decreased-—his inoments of life
Seemed measured, like Time's, by sand;
And still the waters foamed in, like ale,
In front, and on either flank,
He knew that Goodwin and Co. must fail,
There was such a run on the bank.
A little more, and a little more,
The surges came tumbling in,
He sang the evening hymn twice o'er,
And thought of every sin !
Each flounder and plaice lay cold at his heart,
As cold as his marble slab;
And he thought he felt, in every part,
The pincers of scalded crab.


$
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
The squealing lobsters that he had boiled,
And the little potted shrimps,
All the horny prawns he had ever spoiled,
Gnawed into his soul, like imps !
And the billows were wandering to and fro,
And the glorious sun was sunk,
And Day, getting black in the face, as though
Of the night-shade she had drunk !
Had there been but a smuggler's cargo adrift,
One tub, or keg, to be seen,
It might have given his spirits a lift
Or an anker where Hope might lean !
But there was not a box or a beam afloat,
To raft him from that sad place;
Not a skiff, not a yawl, or a mackerel boat,
Nor a smack upon Neptune's face.
At last, his lingering hopes to buoy,
He saw a sail and a mast,
And called “ Ahoy!”—but it was not a hoy,
And so the vessel went past.


THE MERMAID OF MARGATE
49
And with saucy wing that flapped in his face,
The wild bird about him flew,
With a shrilly scream, that twitted his case,
“Why, thou art a sea-gull too ! ”

01573
"" Ahoy!"
And lo! the tide was over his feet;
Oh! his heart began to freeze,
And slowly to pulse :-in another beat
The wave was up to his knees !
He was deafened amidst the mountain tops,
And the salt spray blinded his eyes,


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And washed away the other salt drops
That grief had caused to arise :-
But just as his body was all afloat,
And the surges above him broke,
He was saved from the hungry deep by a boat
Of Deal—(but builded of oak).
The skipper gave him a dram, as he lay,
And chafed his shivering skin ;
And the Angel returned that was flying away
With the spirit of Peter Fin.


52
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But made his business travel for itself,
Till he had made his pelf,
And then retired—if one may call it so,
Of a roadsider.
Perchance, the very race and constant riot
Of stages, long and short, which thereby ran,
Made him more relish the repose and quiet
Of his now sedentary caravan ; .
Perchance, he loved the ground because 'twas common,
And so he might impale a strip of soil
That furnished, by his toil,
Some dusty greens, for him and his old woman ;-
And five tall hollyhocks, in dingy flower :
Howbeit, the thoroughfare did no ways spoil
His peace, unless, in some unlucky hour,
A stray horse came, and gobbled up his bow'r.
But tired of always looking at the coaches,
The same to come,—when they had seen them one
day!
And, used to brisker life, both man and wife
Began to suffer N U E's approaches,
And feel retirement like a long wet Sunday,-


A FAIRY TALE
So, having had some quarters of school breeding,
They turned themselves, like other folks, to reading ;
But setting out where others nigh have done,
And being ripened in the seventh stage,
The childhood of old age,
Began, as other children have begun,-
Not with the pastorals of Mr. Pope,
Or Bard of Hope,
Or Paley ethical, or learned Porson,
But spelt, on Sabbaths, in St. Mark, or John,
And then relax'd themselves with Whittington,
Or Valentine and Orson-
But chiefly fairy tales they loved to con,
And being easily melted in their dotage,
* Slobber'd,—and kept
Reading, -and wept
Over the White Cat, in their wooden cottage,
Thus reading on the longer
They read, of course, their childish faith grew stronger
In Gnomes, and Hags, and Elves, and Giants grim,--
If talking Trees and Birds revealed to him,
She saw the flight of Fairyland's fly-waggons,
And magic fishes swim
In puddle ponds, and took old crows for dragons,-


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Both were quite drunk from the enchanted flagons ;
When as it fell upon a summer's day,

have
'Reading, -and wept.
As the old man sat a feeding
On the old-babe reading,
Beside his open street-and-parlour door,
A hideous roar
Proclaimed a drove of beasts was coming by the way.


A FAIRY TALE
Long-horned, and short, of many a different breed,
Tall, tawny brutes, from famous Lincoln-levels
Or Durham feed,

'A horn-pipe.
With some of those unquiet black dwarf devils
From nether side of Tweed,
Or Firth of Forth ;
Looking half wild with joy to leave the North,
With dusty hides, all mobbing on together,-


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
When,—whether from a fly's malicious comment
Upon his tender flank, from which he shrank;
Or whether
Only in some enthusiastic moment,-
However, one brown monster, in a frisk,
Giving his tail a perpendicular whisk,
Kicked out a passage through the beastly rabble ;
And after a pas seul,—-or, if you will, a
Horn-pipe before the basket-maker's villa,
Leapt o'er the tiny pale,-
Backed his beefsteaks against the wooden gable,
And thrust his brawny bell-rope of a tail
Right o'er the page,
Wherein the sage
Just then was spelling some romantic fable.
The old man, half a scholar, half a dunce,
Could not peruse, who could ?—two tales at once ;
And being huffed
At what he knew was none of Riquet's Tuft,
Banged-to the door,
But most unluckily enclosed a morsel
Of the intruding tail, and all the tassel :-
The monster gave a roar,


A FAIRY TALE
And bolting off with speed increased by pain,
The little house became a coach once more,
And, like Macheath, “took to the road” again !

sammen med
UNLUIGHEATIVIT
"" Took to the road" again!'
Just then, by fortune's whimsical decree,
The ancient woman stooping with her crupper
Towards sweet home, or where sweet home should be,
Was getting up some household herbs for supper ;
Thoughtful of Cinderella, in the tale,
And, quaintly wondering if magic shifts


58
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Could o'er a common pumpkin so prevail,
To turn it to a coach ;--what pretty gifts
Might come of cabbages, and curly kale ;
.
Meanwhile she never heard her old man's wail,
Nor turned, till home had turned a corner, quite
Gone out of sight!
At last, conceive her, rising from the ground,
Weary of sitting on her russet clothing,


A FAIRY TALE
And looking round
Where rest was to be found,
There was no house—no villa there--no nothing !
No house !
The change was quite amazing ;
It made her senses stagger for a minute,
The riddle's explication seemed to harden ;
But soon her superannuated nous
Explain'd the horrid mystery ;-and raising
Her hand to heaven, with the cabbage in it,
On which she meant to sup,-
“ Well ! this is Fairy Work! I'll bet a farden,
Little Prince Silverwings has ketch'd me up,
And set me down in some one else's garden !”



AN (OURTSHIP
T
th
2
t was a young maiden went forth to ride,
* And there was a wooer to pace by her side ;
His horse was so little, and hers so high,
He thought his angel was up in the sky.
His love was great, though his wit was small;
He bade her ride easy—and that was all.
The very horses began to neigh,--
Because their betters had nought to say.
They rode by elm, and they rode by oak,
They rode by a churchyard, and then he spoke :


EQUESTRIAN COURTSHIP
67
“My pretty maiden, if you'll agree,
.You shall always amble through life with me."

GEBrock
• They rode by a churchyard, and then he spoke.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
The damsel answered him never a word,
But kicked the grey mare, and away she spurred,


62.
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
The wooer still followed behind the jade,
And enjoyed—like a wooer—the dust she made.
They rode thro' moss, and they rode thro' moor,-
The gallant behind and the lass before :-
At last they came to a miry place,
And there the sad wooer gave up the chase..
ue.
Quoth he, “ If my nag was better to ride,
I'd follow her over the world so wide.
Oh, it is not my love that begins to fail,
But I've lost the last glimpse of the grey mare's tail !”



TURPIN
A PATHETIC BALLAD
1.
Tim TURPIN he was gravel blind,
And ne'er had seen the skies ;
For Nature when his head was made,
Forgot to dot his eyes.
II.
So, like a Christmas pedagogue,
Poor Tim was forced to do—
Look out for pupils ; for he had
. A vacancy for two.
III.
There's some have specs to help their sight
Of objects dim and small :


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But Tim had specks within his eyes,
And could not see at all.

UN
ch
Now Tim he wooed a servant maid.'
IV.
Now Tim he wooed a servant maid,
And took her to his arms;
For he, like Pyramus, had cast
A wall-eye on her charms.


TIM TURPIN
By day she led him up and down,
Where'er he wished to jog,
A happy wife, altho’ she led
The life of any dog.
But just when Tim had lived a month
In honey with his wife,
A surgeon op'd his Milton eyes,
Like oysters, with a knife.
VII.
But when his eyes were opened thus,
He wished them dark again :
For when he look'd upon his wife,
He saw her very plain.
VIII.
Her face was bad, her figure worse,
He couldn't bear to eat :
For she was anything but like
A grace before his meat.


66
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
IX.
Now Tim he was a feeling man ;
For when his sight was thick
It made him feel for everything-
But that was with a stick.

SE33 134
'He saw her very plain.'
X.
So, with a cudgel in his hand-
It was not light or slim-
He knocked at his wife's head until
It opened unto him.


TIM TURPIN
XI.
And when the corpse was stiff and cold,
He took his slaughtered spouse,
And laid her in a heap with all
The ashes of her house.
XII.
But like a wicked murderer,
He lived in constant fear
From day to day, and so he cut
His throat from ear to ear.
XIII.
The neighbours fetched a doctor in ;
Said he, “ This wound I dread
Can hardly be sewed up—his life
Is hanging on a thread.”
XIV.
But when another week was gone,
He gave him stronger hope--
Instead of hanging on a thread,
Of hanging on a rope.


68
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XV.
Ah! when he hid his bloody work
In ashes round about,
How little he supposed the truth
Would soon be sifted out.

A dozen men to try the fact.
XVI.
But when the parish dustman came,
His rubbish to withdraw,
He found more dust within the heap
Than he contracted for!
XVII.
A dozen men to try the fact
Were sworn that very day ;


TIM TURPIN
But though they all were jurors, yet
No conjurors were they.
XVIII.
Said Tim unto those jurymen,
You need not waste your breath,
For I confess myself at once
The author of her death.
XIX.
And, oh! when I reflect upon
The blood that I have spilt,
Just like a button is my soul,
Inscribed with double guilt !
XX.
Then turning round his head again,
He saw before his eyes,
A great judge, and a little judge,
The judges of a-size !
XXI.
The great judge took his judgment cap,
And put it on his head,


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And sentenced Tim by law to hang
Till he was three times dead.

A great judge, and a little judge.'
XXII.
So he was tried, and he was hung
(Fit punishment for such)
On Horsham-drop, and none can say
It was a drop too much.


DEATHS
RAMBLE
cele
2015 NE day the dreary old King of Death
Inclined for some sport with the carnal,
So he tied a pack of darts on his back,
And quictly stole from his charnel.
His head was bald of flesh and of hair,
His body was lean and lank,
His joints at each stir made a crack, and the cur
Took a gnaw, by the way, at his shank.
And what did he do with his deadly darts,
This goblin of grisly bone ?
He dabbled and spilled man's blood, and he killed
Like a butcher that kills his own.


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
The first he slaughtered it made him laugh
(For the man was a coffin-maker),
To think how the mutes, and men in black suits,
Would mourn for an undertaker.
Death saw two Quakers sitting at church,
Quoth he, “We shall not differ.”
And he let them alone, like figures of stone,
For he could not make them stiffer.
He saw two duellists going to fight,
In fear they could not smother ;
And he shot one through at once—for he knew
They never would shoot each other.
He saw a watchman fast in his box,
And he gave a snore infernal ;
Said Death, “ He may keep his breath, for his
sleep
Can never be more eternal.”
sleep.
He met a coachman driving his coach,
So slow, that his fare grew sick ;


DEATH'S RAMBLE
75
He saw a sailor mixing his grog,
And he marked him out for slaughter ;
VA
CEB
He saw a sailor miring his grog.'
For on water he scarcely had cared for Death,
And never on rum-and-water.


76
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Death saw two players playing at cards,
But the game wasn't worth a dump,
For he quickly laid them flat with a spade,
To wait for the final trump!


78
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
III.
Looking over Time's crupper and over his tail,
Oh! what ages and pages there are to revise !
And as farther our back-searching glances prevail,
Like the emmets, “ how little we are in our eyes !”
'IV.
What a sweet pretty innocent, half a yard long,
On a dimity lap of true nursery make !
I can fancy I hear the old lullaby song
That was meant to compose me, but kept me awake.
V.
Methinks I still suffer the infantine throes,
When my flesh was a cushion for any long pin-
Whilst they patted my body to comfort my woes,
Oh! how little they dreamt they were driving them
in !
VI.
Infant sorrows are strong—infant pleasures as weak-
But no grief was allowed to indulge in its note ;
Did you ever attempt a small “ bubble and squeak,"
Thro' the Dalby's Carminative down in your throat?


so
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
VIII.
Then an urchin—I see myself urchin, indeed,
With a smooth Sunday face for a mother's delight;
Why should weeks have an end ?-I am sure there
was need
Of a Sabbath to follow each Saturday night.
IX.
Was your face ever sent to the housemaid to scrub?
Have you ever felt huckaback softened with sand ?
Had you ever your nose towelled up to a snub,
And your eyes knuckled out with the back of the
hand ?
Then a schoolboy—my tailor was nothing in fault,
For an urchin will grow to a lad by degrees -
But how well I remember that “pepper and salt "
That was down to the elbows, and up to the knees !
XI.
What a figure it cut when as Norval I spoke !
With a lanky right leg duly planted before ;


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XIII.
With the bride all in white, and your body in blue,
Did you walk up the aisle—the genteelest of men ?
When I think of that beautiful vision anew,
Oh! I seem but the biffin of what I was then !
XIV.
I am withered and worn by a premature care,
And my wrinkles confess the decline of my days ;
Old Time's busy hand has made free with my hair,
And I'm seeking to hide it-by writing for bays.



SAILOR'S APOLOGY FOR BOW-LEcs.
BE
P HERE'S some is born with their legs
straight by natur-
And some is born with bow-legs from the
first-
And some that should have growed a good deal
straighter,
But they were badly nursed,
And set, you see, like Bacchus, with their pegs
Astride of casks and kegs.
I've got myself a sort of bow to larboard,
And starboard,
And this is what it was that warped my legs :


84
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
'Twas all along of Poll, as I may say,
That foul'd my cable when I ought to slip;
But on the tenth of May,
When I gets under weigh,

som
''Twas all along of Poll.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Down there in Hartfordshire, to join my ship,
I sees the mail
Get under sail,
The only one there was to make the trip.


A SAILOR'S APOLOGY FOR BOW-LEGS
Well, I gives chase,
But as she run
Two knots to one,
There warn't no use in keeping on the race !
Well, casting round about, what next to try on,
And how to spin,
I spies an ensign with a Bloody Lion,
And bears away to leeward for the inn,
Beats round the gable,
And fetches up before the coach horse stable.
Well, there they stand, four kickers in a row,
And so
I just makes free to cut a brown ’un's cable.
But riding isn't in a seaman's natur ;
So I whips out a toughish end of yarn,
And gets a kind of sort of a land-waiter
To splice me, heel to heel,
Under the she-mare's keel,
And off I goes, and leaves the inn a-starn!
My eyes ! how she did pitch !
And wouldn't keep her own to go in no line,


86
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Tho' I kept bowsing, bowsing at her bow-line,
But always making lee-way to the ditch,

SITUTE
ANAX
.
CEB 1893
To splice me, heel to heel.'
And yawed her head about all sorts of ways.
The devil sink the craft!
And wasn't she tremendous slack in stays !
We couldn't, no how, keep the inn abaft!
Well, I suppose


A SAILOR'S APOLOGY FOR BOW-LEGS
We hadn't run a knot-or much beyond
(What will you have on it?)—but off she goes,
Up to her bends in a fresh-water pond !
There I am! all a-back!
So I looks forward for her bridle-gears,
To heave her head round on the t'other tack;
But when I starts,
The leather parts,
And goes away right over by the ears !
What could a fellow do,
Whose legs, like mine, you know, were in the bilboes,
But trim myself upright for bringing-to,
And square his yard-arms and brace up his elbows,
In rig all snug and clever,
Just while his craft was taking in her water ?
I didn't like my berth, though, howsomdever,
Because the yarn, you see, kept getting tauter.
Says I--I wish this job was rayther shorter !
The chase had gained a mile
Ahead, and still the she-mare stood a-drinking ;
Now, all the while
Her body didn't take, of course, to shrinking.
Says I, she's letting out her reefs, I'm thinking ;


88
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD

lead
My legs began to bend like winkin.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
And so she swelled and swelled,
And yet the tackle held,
Till both my legs began to bend like winkin.
My eyes ! but she took in enough to founder !
And there's my timbers straining every bit,


A SAILOR'S APOLOGY FOR BOW-LEGS
89
Ready to split,
And her tarnation hull a-growing rounder !
Well, there—off Hartford Ness
We lay both lashed and water-logged together,
And can't contrive a signal of distress.
Thinks I, we must ride out this here foul weather,
Tho' sick of riding out, and nothing less ;
When, looking round, I sees a man a-starn :
“Hollo !” says I, “come underneath her quarter ! ”
And hands him out my knife to cut the yarn.
So I gets off, and lands upon the road,
And leaves the she-mare to her own consarn,
A-standing by the water.
If I get on another, I'll be blowed !
And that's the way, you see, my legs got bowed !



John Trotter
CS-sce01
S
.
JOHN TROT he was as tall a lad
As York did ever rear-
As his dear Granny used to say,
He'd make a grenadier.
II.
A sergeant soon came down to York,
With ribbons and a frill ;
My lads, said he, let broadcast be,
And come away to drill.


JOHN TROT
III.
But when he wanted John to 'list,
In war he saw no fun,
Where what is called a raw recruit
Gets often over-done.
IV.
Let others carry guns, said he,
And go to war's alarms,
But I have got a shoulder-knot
Imposed upon my arms.
For John he had a footman's place
To wait on Lady Wye-
She was a dumpy woman, tho’
Her family was high.
VI.
Now when two years had passed away,
Her lord took very ill,
And left her to her widowhood,
Of course more dumpy still.
urse more


92
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
VII.
Said John, I am a proper man,
And very tall to see ;
Who knows, but now her lord is low,
She may look up to me?
VIII.
A cunning woman told me once,
Such fortune would turn up ;
She was a kind of sorceress,
But studied in a cup!
IX.
So he walked up to Lady Wye,
And took her quite amazed, -
She thought, tho’ John was tall enough,
He wanted to be raised.
X.
But John—for why? she was a dame
Of such a dwarfish sort-
Had only come to bid her make
Her mourning very short.


JOHN TROT
XI.
.
Said he, your lord is dead and cold,
You only cry in vain ;

«Կառլյա
un
"logs (
OD WIR
LULUI
W
-
CEB ings
'He took her quite amazed.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Not all the cries of London now
Could call him back again !


SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XII.
You'll soon have many a noble beau,
To dry your noble tears—
But just consider this, that I
Have followed you for years.
XIII.
And tho' you are above me far,
What matters high degree,
When you are only four foot nine,
And I am six foot three !
XIV.
For tho' you are of lofty race,
And I'm a low-born elf ;
Yet none among your friends could say,
You matched beneath yourself.
Said she, such insolence as this
Can be no common case;
Tho' you are in my service, sir,
Your love is out of place.


IN TROT
XVI.
O Lady Wye! O Lady Wye !
Consider what you do ;
How can you be so short with me,
I am not so with you!

OOTD
LA
FO
They stripped his coat, and gave him kicks.
XVII.
Then ringing for her serving men,
They showed him to the door :
Said they, you turn out better now,
Why didn't you before ?


96
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XVIII.
They stripped his coat, and gave him kicks
For all his wages due ;
And off, instead of green and gold,
He went in black and blue.
CA. 193
““Huzza !" the sergeant cried:
XIX.
No family would take him in,
Because of his discharge ;
So he made up his mind to serve
The country all at large.


JOHN TROT
XX.
Huzza! the sergeant cried, and put
The money in his hand,
And with a shilling cut him off
From his paternal land.
XXI.
For when his regiment went to fight
At Saragossa town,
A Frenchman thought he looked too tall,
And so he cut him down !


MARY'S CHOST

CE19
WADA
4 РАТңєтіс В244D
I.
He was in the middle of the night,
To sleep young William tried ;
When Mary's ghost came stealing in,
And stood at his bed-side.
II.
O William dear! O William dear!
My rest eternal ceases ;
Alas! my everlasting peace
Is broken into pieces.
III.
I thought the last of all my cares
Would end with my last minute ;


MARY'S GHOST
99
But though I went to my long home,
I didn't stay long in it.

WILOW
. They've come and boned your Mary.'
IV.
The body-snatchers they have come,
And made a snatch at me ;
It's very hard them kind of men
Won't let a body be!


100
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
v.
You thought that I was buried deep,
Quite decent like and chary,
But from her grave in Mary-bone,
They've come and boned your Mary.
VI.
The arm that used to take your arm
Is took to Dr. Vyse ;
And both my legs are gone to walk
The hospital at Guy's.
VII.
I vowed that you should have my hand,
But fate gives us denial ;
You'll find it there, at Dr. Bell's,
In spirits and a phial.
VIII.
As for my feet, the little feet
You used to call so pretty,
There's one, I know, in Bedford Row,
The t'other's in the City.


MARY'S GHOST
IOI
IX.
I can't tell where my head is gone,
But Doctor Carpue can ;
As for my trunk it's all packed up
To go by Pickford's van.
vini
In spirits and a phial.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan ở
X.
I wish you'd go to Mr. P.
And save me such a ride ;
I don't half like the outside place,
They've took for my inside.


102
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XI.
The cock it crows—I must be gone!
My William, we must part !
But I'll be yours in death, altho'
Sir Astley has my heart.
XII.
Don't go to weep upon my grave,
And think that there I be ;
They haven't left an atom there
Of my anatomie.



Il
TIFF
WORDEN
TS
11UY
The Careleſſe
Nvrſe Mayd.
SAWE a Mayd sitte on a Bank,
Beguiled by Wooer fayne and fond !
And whiles His flatterynge Vowes She drank,
Her Nurselynge slipt within a Pond !
All Even Tide they Talkde and Kist,
For She was Fayre and He was Kinde;
The Sunne went down before She wist
Another Sonne had sett behinde !
With angrie Hands and frownynge Browe,
That deemd Her owne the Urchine's Sinne,
She pluckt Him out, but he was nowe
Past being Whipt for fallynge in.


104
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
She then beginnes to wayle the Ladde
With Shrikes that Echo answered round-
O foolishe Mayd ! to be soe sadde
The Momente that her Care was drownd !
il


106
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Our nature will not grovel ;
One impulse moved both man and dame,
He seized the tongs—she did the same,
Leaving the ruffian, if he came,
The poker and the shovel.

flugs
• Suppose the couple standing so.'
Suppose the couple standing so,
When rushing footsteps from below
Made pulses fast and fervent,
And first burst in the frantic cat,
All steaming like a brewer's vat,
And then—as white as my cravat-
Poor Mary May, the servant !


108
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And empties every grain alive for to set the fue
exploding.
Lawk, Mrs. Round !' says I, and stares, 'that
quantum is unproper,

W
ALLET
Cosmeh
mer
""Come," says she, quite in a hufi'
I'm sartin sure it can't not take a pound to sky a
copper ;
You'll powder both our heads off, so I tells you,
with its puff,
But she only dried her fingers, and she takes a
pinch of snuff.


UIO
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Afore ever you was born, I was well used to
things like these ;
I shall put it in the grate, and let it turn up by
degrees.'
So in it goes, and bounce—O Lord ! it gives us
such a rattle,
I thought we both were canonised, like sogers in
a battle!
Up goes the copper like a squib, and us on both
our backs,
And bless the tubs, they bundled off, and split all
into cracks.
Well, there I fainted dead away, and might have
been cut shorter,
But Providence was kind, and brought me to
with scalding water.
I first looks round for Mrs. Round, and sees her
at a distance,
As stiff as starch, and looked as dead as anything
in existence;
All scorched and grimed, and more than that, I
sees the copper slap
Right on her head, for all the world like a per-
cussion copper cap.


II2
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Well, there I am, a-scrambling up the things, all
in a lump,
When, mercy on us ! such a groan as makes my
heart to jump.
And there she is, a-lying with a crazy sort of eye,

Bnet
A-staring at the wash-house roof.'
A-staring at the wash-house roof, laid open to the
sky;
Then she beckons with a finger, and so down to
her I reaches,
And puts my ear agin her mouth to hear her
dying speeches,


A REPORT FROM BELOW
113
For, poor soul! she has a husband and young
orphans, as I knew ;
Well, Ma'am, you won't believe it, but it's Gospel
fact and true,
But these words is all she whispered—Why,
where is the powder blew ?'”


(THE DUEL
WI
A SERIOUS BALLAD
yu
“ Like the two Kings of Brentford smelling at one nosegay.”
MOTAN Brentford town, of old renown,
Let There lived a Mister Bray,
Who fell in love with Lucy Bell,
And so did Mr. Clay.
To see her ride from Hammersmith,
By all it was allowed,
Such fair outsides are seldom seen,
Such Angels on a Cloud,


THE DUEL
I15
Said Mr. Bray to Mr. Clay,
You choose to rival me,
And court Miss Bell, but there your court
No thoroughfare shall be.
Unless you now give up your suit,
You may repent your love ;
I who have shot a pigeon match
Can shoot a turtle dove.
So pray before you woo her more,
Consider what you do ;
If you pop aught to Lucy Bell—
I'll pop it into you.
Said Mr. Clay to Mr. Bray,
Your threats I quite explode ;
One who has been a volunteer
Knows how to prime and load.
And so I say to you unless
Your passion quiet keeps,
I who have shot and hit bulls' eyes,
May chance to hit a sheep's.


I 16
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Now gold is oft for silver changed,
And that for copper red ;
But these two went away to give
Each other change for lead.
LA
CEB
Apel 1893
'ril pop it into you.'
But first they sought a friend apiece,
This pleasant thought to give


THE DUEL
117
When they were dead, they thus should have
Two seconds still to live.
To measure out the ground not long
The seconds then forbore,
And having taken one rash step,
They took a dozen more.
They next prepared each pistol-pan
Against the deadly strife,
By putting in the prime of death
Against the prime of life.
Now all was ready for the foes,
But when they took their stands,
Fear made them tremble so, they found
They both were shaking hands.
Said Mr. C. to Mr. B.,
Here one of us may fall,
And like St. Paul's Cathedral now
Be doomed to have a ball.


THE DUEL
119
But look, the morning now is bright,
Though cloudy it begun :
Why can't we aim above, as if
We had called out the sun ?
So up into the harmless air
Their bullets they did send ;
And may all other duels have
That upshot in the end !
rii


THE SUPPER SUPERSTITION
A PATHETIC
BALLAD
“Oh flesh, flesh, how art thou fishified !”-SHAKSPEARE.
WAS twelve o'clock by Chelsea chimes,
When all in hungry trim,
Good Mister Jupp sat down to sup
With wife, and Kate, and Jim.
II.
Said he, “Upon this dainty cod
How bravely I shall sup”-
When, whiter than the tablecloth,
A GHOST came rising up!


122
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
When down she went with all our hands,
Right in the Channel's Chops.
VII.
"Just give a look in Norey's chart,
The very place it tells;
I think it says twelve fathoms deep,
Clay bottom, mixed with shells.
VIII.
“Well, there we are till ‘hands aloft,
We have at last a call ;
The pug I had for brother Jim,
Kate's parrot too, and all.
IX.
“But oh, my spirit cannot rest :
In Davy Jones's sod,
Till I've appeared to you and said,
Don't sup on that 'ere Cod !


THE SUPPER SUPERSTITION
123
-
123
“ You live on land, and little think
What passes in the sea ;
Last Sunday week, at 2 P.M.,
That Cod was picking me!

BALL
ir
Don't sup on that'ere Cod.'
.
XI.
“Those oysters, too, that look so plump,
And seem so nicely done,


I 24
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
They put my corpse in many shells,
Instead of only one.
XII.
“Oh, do not eat those oysters then,
And do not touch the shrimps ;
When I was in my briny grave,
They sucked my blood like imps !

CEBroek
April isge
'To see what brutes would do.'
XIII.
“Don't eat what brutes would never cat,
The brutes I used to pat,


THE SUPPER SUPERSTITION
125
125
They'll know the smell they used to smell,
Just try the dog and cat !”
XIV.
The spirit fled—they wept his fate,
And cried, Alack, alack !
At last up started brother Jim,
“ Let's try if Jack was Jack ! ”
XV.
They called the dog, they called the cat,
And little kitten too,
And down they put the Cod and sauce,
To see what brutes would do.
XVI.
Old Tray licked all the oysters up,
Puss never stood at crimps,
But munched the Cod--and little kit
Quite feasted on the shrimps !


126
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XVII.
The thing was odd, and minus Cod
And sauce, they stood like posts ;
Oh, prudent folks, for fear of hoax,
Put no belief in Ghosts !
AL
35


UV
DEL
FAITHLESS, NELLY

GRAY
A PATHETIC BALLAD
EN BATTLE was a soldier bold,
And used to war’s alarms;
But a cannon ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms !
Now as they bore him off the field,
Said he, “Let others shoot,
For here I leave my second leg,
And the Forty-second Foot !”


I28
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
The army-surgeons made him limbs :
Said he,—“They're only pegs :
But there's as wooden members quite
As represent my legs!”
Now Ben he loved a pretty maid,
Her name was Nelly Gray ;
So he went to pay her his devours
When he'd devoured his pay!
But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff ;
And when she saw his wooden legs,
Began to take them off!
“O Nelly Gray! O Nelly Gray!
Is this your love so warm ?
The love that loves a scarlet coat
Should be more uniform!”
She said, “I loved a soldier once,
For he was blithe and brave;
But I will never have a man
With both legs in the grave !


130
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
At duty's call I left my legs
In Badajos's breaches !”
"Why then,” said she, “ you've lost the feet
Of legs in war's alarms,
And now you cannot wear your shoes
Upon your feats of arms !”
"Oh, false and fickle Nelly Gray,
I know why you refuse :-
Though I've no feet-some other man
Is standing in my shoes !
“I wish I ne'er had seen your face ;
But now a long farewell !
For you will be my death ;-alas !
You will not be my Nell !”
Now when he went from Nelly Gray,
His heart so heavy got— .
And life was such a burthen grown,
It made him take a knot !


FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY
133
A dozen men sat on his corpse,
To find out why he died-
And they buried Ben in four cross-roads,
With a stake in his inside !



JILLACE
Othe
TAT:
EN
BYTA VILLAGER
nwy
UR village, that's to say, not Miss Mitford's
village, but our village of Bullock's
Smithy,
Is come into by an avenue of trees, three oak pollards,
two elders, and a withy ;
And in the middle there's a green, of about not ex-
ceeding an acre and a half;
It's common to all and fed off by nineteen cows, six
ponies, three horses, five asses, two foals, seven
pigs, and a calf !


OUR VILLAGE
135
Besides a pond in the middle, as is held by a sort of
common law lease,

LIVRE
Right before the wicket.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
And contains twenty ducks, six drakes, three ganders,
two dead dogs, four drowned kittens, and twelve
geese.
Of course the green's cropt very close, and does
famous for bowling when the little village boys
play at cricket;


OUR VILLAGE
137
I can't speak of the stocks, as nothing remains of
them but the upright post;
But the pound is kept in repairs for the sake of Cob's
horse as is always there almost.

CREEN
MAN
• The Green Jan.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Theres a smithy of course, where that queer sort of
a chap in his way, Old Joe Bradley,
Perpetually hammers and stammers, for he stutters
and shoes horses very badly.


138
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
There's a shop of all sorts that sells everything, kept
by the widow of Mr. Task;
But when you go there it's ten to one she's out of
everything you ask.
You'll know her house by the swarm of boys, like
flies, about the old sugary cask :
There are six empty houses and not so well papered
inside as out,
For bill-stickers won't beware, but stick notices of
sales and election placards all about.
That's the Doctor's with a green door, where the
garden pots in the window is seen;
A weakly monthly rose that don't blow, and a dead
geranium, and a teaplant with five black leaves,
and one green.
As for hollyhocks at the cottage doors, and honey-
suckles and jasmines, you may go and whistle ;
But the Tailor's front garden grows two cabbages, a
dock, a ha'porth of pennyroyal, two dandelions,
and a thistle !
There are three small orchards — Mr. Busby's the
schoolmaster's is the chief-
With two pear trees that don't bear ; one plum, and
an apple that every year is stripped by a thief.


OUR VILLAGE
139
There's another small day-school too, kept by, the
respectable Mrs. Gaby,

ta
sz
a
CEBrook!
1899
• A select establishment.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
A select establishment for six little boys, and one
big, and four little girls and a baby ;
There's a rectory with pointed gables and strange odd
chịmneys that never smokes,


140
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
For the Rector don't live on his living like other
Christian sort of folks ;

Cetwock
• There's a barber's.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
There's a barber's once a week well filled with rough
black-bearded, shock-headed churls,
And a window with two feminine men's heads, and
two masculine ladies in false curls ;


OUR VILLAGE
141
There's a butcher, and a carpenter's, and a plumber,
and a small greengrocer's, and a baker,
But he won't bake on a Sunday; and there's a
sexton that's a coal merchant besides, and an
undertaker ;
And a toyshop, but not a whole one, for a village
can't compare with the London shops;
One window sells drums, dolls, kites, carts, bats,
Clout's balls, and the other sells malt and hops.
And Mrs. Brown in domestic economy not to be a
bit behind her betters,
Lets her house to a milliner, a watchmaker, a rat-
catcher, a cobbler, lives in it herself, and it's the
post-office for letters.
Now I've gone through all the village—ay, from end
to end, save and except one more house,
But I haven't come to that—and I hope I never
shall—and that's the village Poor House !



JOHN
DAY
> PATHETIC
BALLAD
“A day after the fair.”—Old Proverb.
OHN DAY he was the biggest man
Of all the coachman kind,
With back too broad to be conceived
By any narrow mind.
The very horses knew his weight,
When he was in the rear,
And wished his box a Christmas box,
To come but once a year.


JOHN DAY
143
Alas! against the shafts of love,
What armour can avail ?
Soon Cupid sent an arrow through
His scarlet coat of mail.
The barmaid of the Crown he loved,
From whom he never ranged,
For though he changed his horses there,
His love he never changed.
He thought her fairest of all fares,
So fondly love prefers ;
And often, among twelve outsides,
Deemed no outside like hers!
One day, as she was sitting down
Beside the porter-pump-
He came, and knelt with all his fat,
And made an offer plump.
Said she, my taste will never learn
To like so huge a man,
So I must beg you will come here
As little as you can.


144
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
But still he stoutly urged his suit
With vows, and sighs, and tears,

114
-1893
• And made an offer plump.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
Yet could not pierce her heart, altho
He drove the Dart for years.


JOHN DAY
145
In vain he wooed, in vain he sued,
The maid was cold and proud,
And sent him off to Coventry,
While on his way to Stroud.

of Brock
He fretted all the way to Stroud.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
He fretted all the way to Stroud,
And thence all back to town,
The course of love was never smooth,
So his went up and down.


146
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
At last her coldness made him pine
To merely bones and skin, .
But still he loved like one resolved
To love through thick and thin.

CEB
• I've lost my better halj.
O Mary! view my wasted back,
And see my dwindled calf ;
Tho' I have never had a wife,
I've lost my better half.


JOHN DAY
147
Alas, in vain he still assaild,
Her heart withstood the dint;
Though he had carried sixteen stone
He could not move a fint.
Worn out, at last he made a vow
To break his being's link;
For he was so reduced in size,
At nothing he could shrink.
Now some will talk in water's praise,
And waste a deal of breath,
But John, tho’ he drank nothing else,
He drank himself to death!
The cruel maid that caused his love
Found out the fatal close,
For looking in the butt, she saw
The butt-end of his woes.
Some say his spirit haunts the Crown,
But that is only talk—.
For after riding all his life,
His ghost objects to walk !



I LIEUTENANT LUFF
25
é
A se
COMIC
BALLADY
EB
A
- you that are too fond of wine,
Or any other stuff,
Take warning by the disinal fate
Of one Lieutenant Luff.
A sober man he might have been,
Except in one regard,
He did not like soft water,
So he took to drinking hard !
Said he, “ Let others fancy slops,
And talk in praise of Tea,


150
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Full soon the sad effects of this
His frame began to show,

JUST
Lub
CK Brock
1893
"That old enemy the gout.'
For that old enemy the gout
Had taken him in toe!


152
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Against his lungs he aimed the slugs,
And not against his brain,
So he blew out his lights—and none
Could blow them in again !
A Jury for a Verdict met,
And gave it in these terms :-
“ We find as how as certain slugs
Has sent him to the worms !”
CEB
*Said he, “ This barrel is my last." :


FEO CHINA FINA-MEN TENER
DER
CEBisga
D-MORNING, Mr. What-d'ye-call !
Well ! here's another pretty job!
Lord help my Lady !—what a smash !—if you had
only heard her sob!
It was all through Mr. Lambert : but for certain he
was winey,
To think for to go to sit down on a table full of
Chiney.
“ Deuce take your stupid head !” says my Lady to
his very face ;


THE CHINA-MENDER
155
And breaks a broken spout, and fresh chips a tea-
cup handle :

strimit
M
UIME
CE Broch
1833
He will so finger and touch.'
He's a dear, sweet little child, but he will so finger
and touch,


156
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
And that's why my Lady doesn't take to children
much.

SE Breek
1893
Stupid Mr. Lambert.'
Well, there's stupid Mr. Lambert, with his two great-
coat flaps,
Must go and sit down on the Dresden shepherdesses'
laps,


158
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Lawk! I never saw a man in all my life in such a
taking ;
I could find it in my heart to pity him for all his
mischief-making.
To see him stand a-hammering and stammering, like
a zany ;
But what signifies apologies, if they won't mend old
Chaney!
If he sent her up whole crates full, from Wedgwood's
and Mr. Spode's,
He couldn't make amends for the crack'd mandarins
and smash'd toads.
Well! every one has their tastes, but, for my part,
my own self,
I'd rather have the figures on my poor dear grand-
mother's old shelf:
A nice pea-green poll-parrot, and two reapers with
brown ears of corns,
And a shepherd with a crook after a lamb with two
gilt horns,
And such a Jemmy Jessamy in top-boots and sky-
blue vest,
And a frill and flower'd waistcoat, with a fine bow-
pot at the breast.


THE CHINA-MENDER
159

CALE
WÁC
k
1 hearty woman for her years.'
God help her, poor old soul! I shall come into 'em
at her death,


160
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
160
Though she's a hearty woman for her years, except
her shortness of breath.
Well ! you may think the things will mend—if they
won't, Lord mend us all !
My lady will go in fits, and Mr. Lambert won't need
to call ;
I'll be bound in any money, if I had a guinea to
give,
He won't sit down again on Chiney the longest day
he has to live.
Poor soul! I only hope it won't forbid his banns of
marriage ;
Or he'd better have sat behind on the spikes of my
Lady's carriage.
But you'll join 'em all of course, and stand poor Mr.
Lambert's friend,
I'll look in twice a day, just to see, like, how they
mend.
To be sure it is a sight that might draw tears from
dogs and cats,
Here's this pretty little pagoda, now, has lost four of
its cocked hats.
Be particular with the pagoda : and then here's this
pretty bowl-


THE CHINA-MENDER
161
The Chinese Prince is making love to nothing be-
cause of this hole ;
And here's another Chinese man, with a face just
like a doll,
Do stick his pigtail on again, and just mend his
parasol.
But I needn't tell you what to do ; only do it out of
hand,
And charge whatever you like to charge—my Lady
won't make a stand.
Well! good morning, Mr. What-d'ye-call, for it's
1 time our gossip ended :
And you know the proverb, the less as is said, the
sooner the Chiney's mended.
M


PLAYING AT SOLDIERS
163
Just like that ancient shape of mist,
In Hamlet, crying “ 'List, oh 'list!”
Come, who will serve the king,
And strike frog-eating Frenchmen dead,
And cut off Bonyparty's head ?-
And all that sort of thing.
So used I, when I was a boy,
To march with military toy,
And ape the soldier's life ;--
And with a whistle or a hum,
I thought myself a Duke of Drum
At least, or Earl of Fife.
With gun of tin and sword of lath,
Lord ! how I walk'd in glory's path
With regimental mates,
By sound of trump and rub-a-dubs--
To 'siege the washhouse--charge the tubs ---
Or storm the garden gates.
Ah me! my retrospective soul !
As over memory's muster-roll


PLAYING AT SOLDIERS
167
And those two greedy Blakes
That took our money to the fair,

benutututtaa huu
CES
And laid it out in cakes.'
Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co.
To buy the corps a trumpet there,
And laid it out in cakes.


PLAYING AT SOLDIERS
169
The marts of silk and lace-
Bird's drums are filled with figs, and mute,
And I—I've got a substitute
To Soldier in my place!
(236
I've got a substitute.'



UEEN M
10
.
CE Brock
1993
A LITTLE fairy comes at night,
Her eyes are blue, her hair is brown,
With silver spots upon her wings,
And from the moon she flutters down.
She has a little silver wand,
And when a good child goes to bed
She waves her wand from right to left,
And makes a circle round its head.


QUEEN MAB
171
And then it dreams of pleasant things,
Of fountains filled with fairy fish,
And trees that bear delicious fruit,
And bow their branches at a wish :
Of arbours filled with dainty scents
From lovely flowers that never fade ;
Bright flies that glitter in the sun,
And glow-worms shining in the shade..
And talking birds with gifted tongues,
For singing songs and telling tales,
And pretty dwarfs to show the way
Through fairy hills and fairy dales.
But when a bad child goes to bed,
From left to right she weaves her rings,
And then it dreams all through the night
Of only ugly, horrid things!
Then lions come with glaring eyes,
And tigers growl, a dreadful noise,
And ogres draw their cruel knives,
To shed the blood of girls and boys.


172
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD

CEBrock
July 1893
And ogres draw their cruel knives.
Then stormy waves rush on to drown,
Or raging flames come scorching round,
Fierce dragons hover in the air,
And serpents crawl along the ground.



RODODICAS
DZACIONS
ET Taylor preach upon a morning
breezy,
How well to rise while nights and larks are flying,—
For my part getting up seems not so easy
By half as lying.
What if the lark does carol in the sky,
Soaring beyond the sight to find him out-
Wherefore am I to rise at such a fly?
I'm not a trout.


MORNING MEDITATIONS
177
177
So here I'll lie, my morning calls deferring,
Till something nearer to the stroke of noon ;
A man that's fond precociously of stirring,
Must be a spoon..


me

po
WAS off the Wash--the sun went
down — the sea looked black and
grim,
For stormy clouds, with murky fleece, were muster-
ing at the brim ;
Titanic shades ! enormous gloom !-as if the solid
night
Of Erebus rose suddenly to seize upon the light !
It was a time for mariners to bear a wary eye,
With such a dark conspiracy between the sea and
sky!


180
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Still flew my boat; alas ! alas ! her course was nearly
run !
Behold yon fatal billow rise-ten billows heap'd in
one!
With fearful speed the dreary mass came rolling,
rolling fast,
As if the scooping sea contain'd one only wave at
last !
Still on it came, with horrid roar, a swift pursuing
grave;
It seemed as though some cloud had turn'd its huge-
ness to a wave!
Its briny sleet began to beat beforehand in my
face-
I felt the rearward keel begin to climb its swelling
base!
I saw its alpine hoary head impending over mine !
Another pulse--and down it rush'd-an avalanche
of brine !
Brief pause had I, on God to cry, or think of wife
and home;
The waters closed—and when I shriek’d, I shriek'd
below the foam !
Beyond that rush I have no hint of any after deed-


THE DEMON SHIP
181
For I was tossing on the waste, as senseless as a
weed.
“Where am I?—in the breathing world, or in the
world of death ?”
With sharp and sudden pang I drew another birth
of breath ;
My eyes drank in a doubtful light, my ears a doubt-
ful sound-
And was that ship a real ship whose tackle seem'd
around ?
A moon, as if the earthly moon, was shining up aloft ;
But were those beams the very beams that I had
seen so oft ?
A face, that mocked the human face, before me
watched alone ;
But were those eyes the eyes of man that look'd
against my own ?
Oh, never may the moon again disclose me such a
sight
As met my gaze, when first I look’d, on that
accursèd night!


182
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
I've seen a thousand horrid shapes begot of fierce
extremes

* That Grimly One.'
Of fever ; and most frightful things have haunted in
my dreams-
Hyenas—cats-blood-loving bats—and apes with
hateful stare-


THE DEMON SHIP
183
Pernicious snakes, and shaggy bulls—the lion, and
she-bear-
Strong enemies, with Judas looks, of treachery and
spite-
Detested features, hardly dimmed and banished by
the light!
Pale-sheeted ghosts, with gory locks, upstarting from
their tombs—
All phantasies and images that fit in midnight
glooms—
Hags, goblins, demons, lemures, have made me all
aghast, -
But nothing like that GRIMLY ONE who stood beside
the mast!
His cheek was black_his brow was black_his eyes
and hair as dark :
His hand was black, and where it touched, it left a
sable mark ;
His throat was black, his vest the same, and when
I looked beneath,
His breast was black—all, all was black, except his
grinning teeth.


184
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
His sooty crew were like in hue, as black as Afric
slaves !
Oh horror ! c'en the ship was black that ploughed
the inky waves !
“Alas !” I cried, “ for love of truth and blessed
mercy's sake!
Where am I? in what dreadful ship? upon what
dreadful lake?
What shape is that, so very grim, and black as any
coal ?
It is Mahound, the Evil One, and he has gained my
soul !
Oh, mother dear! my tender nurse! dear meadows
that beguild
My happy days, when I was yet a little sinless child, -
My mother dear—my native fields, I never more
shall see :
I'm sailing in the Devil's Ship, úpon the Devil's
Sea!”
Loud laughed that SABLE MARINER, and loudly in
return


186
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
They crowed their fill, and then the Chief made
answer for the whole ;-
“Our skins," said he, “are black, ye see, because we
carry coal ;
You'll find your mother sure enough, and see your
native fields—
For this here ship has picked you up—the Mary
Ann of Shields !”



lisasi
THE
DROWNINC
DUCKS
cort
O
MONGST the sights that Mrs. Bond
Enjoyed yet grieved at more than others,
Were little ducklings in a pond,
Swimming about beside their mothers-
Small things like living water-lilies,
But yellow as the daffo-dillies.
" It's very hard,” she used to moan,
“That other people have their ducklings
To grace their waters—mine alone
Have never any pretty chucklings."


THE DROWNING DUCKS
189
No peccant humour in a gander
Brought havoc on her little folks,-
No poaching cook—a frying pander
To appetite,—destroyed their yolks,-
Beneath her very eyes, Od rot 'em !
They went, like plummets, to the bottom.
The thing was strange--a contradiction
It seemed of nature and her works !
For little ducks, beyond conviction,
Should float without the help of corks :
Great Johnson it bewildered him-
To hear of ducks that could not swim !
Poor Mrs. Bond! what could she do
But change the breed—and she tried divers
Which dived as all seemed born to do ;
No little ones were e'er survivors-
Like those that copy gems I'm thinking,
They all were given to die-sinking !
In vain their downy coats were shorn ;
They floundered still !--- Batch after batch went !


190
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD

umu
CEBrock
• The thing was strange.'
Copyright 1893 by Macanilla - Co.
The little fools seemed only born
And hatched for nothing but a hatchment !
Whene'er they launched—oh, sight of wonder !
Like fires the water “got them under !”


THE LOST HEIR
195
You promised to have half an eye to him, you know
you did, you dirty deceitful young drab.
The last time as ever I see him, poor thing, was with
my own blessed motherly eyes,
Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a-playing at
making little dirt pies.
I wonder he left the court where he was better off
than all the other young boys,
With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells, and
a dead kitten by way of toys.
When his Father comes home, and he always comes
home as sure as ever the clock strikes one,
He'll be rampant, he will, at his child being lost; and
the beef and the inguns not done!
La bless you, good folks, mind your own consarns,
and don't be making a mob in the street ;
Oh Serjeant MʻFarlane ! you have not come
across my poor little boy, have you, in your
beat ?
Do, good people, move on! don't stand staring at me
like a parcel of stupid stuck pigs;
Saints forbid ! but he's p'r’aps been inviggled away
up a court for the sake of his clothes by the
prigs ;
come


THE LOST HEIR
197
But he'd got on a very good pinafore with only two
slits and a burn on the breast.
He'd a goodish sort of hat, if the crown was sew'd in,
and: not quite so much jagg’d at the brim,
With one shoe on, and the other shoe is a boot,
and not a fit, and you'll know by that if it's
him.
Except being so well dress'd my mind would mis-
give, some old beggar woman in want of an
orphan,
Had borrow'd the child to go a-begging with, but I'd
rather see him laid out in his coffin !
Do, good people, move on, such a rabble of boys !
I'll break every bone of 'em I come near,
Go home--you're spilling the porter — go home-
Tommy Jones, go along home with your beer.
This day is the sorrowfullest day of my life, ever since
my name was Betty Morgan,
Them vile Savoyards! they lost him once before all
along of following a monkey and an organ.
Oh my Billy—my head will turn right round—if he's
got kiddynapp'd with them Italians,
They'll make him a plaster parish image boy, they
will, the outlandish tatterdemalions.


198
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Billy--where are you, Billy ? I'm as hoarse as a
crow, with screaming for ye, you young sorrow !

AU
much
a
nd de
'Playing like angels.'
And shan't have half a voice, no more I shan't, for
crying fresh herrings to-morrow.
Oh Billy, you're bursting my heart in two, and my
life won't be of no more vally,
If I'm to see other folks' darlin's, and none of mine,
playing like angels in our alley.


THE LOST HEIR
199
And what shall I do but cry out my eyes, when I
looks at the old three-legged chair
As Billy used to make coach and horses of, and there
a’n’t no Billy there !
I would run all the wide world over to find him, if I
only know'd where to run,
Little Murphy, now I remember, was once lost for a
month through stealing a penny bun,-
The Lord forbid of any child of mine! I think it
would kill me railey,
To find my Bill holdin' up his little innocent hand at
the Old Bailey.
For though I say it as oughtn't, yet I will say, you
may search for miles and mileses,
And not find one better brought up, and more pretty
behaved, from one end to t’other of St. Giles's.
And if I called him a beauty, it's no lie, but only as
a mother ought to speak ;
You never set eyes on a more handsomer face, only
it hasn't been washed for a week ;
As for hair, tho’ it's red, it's the most nicest hair when
I've time to just show it the comb;
I'll owe 'em five pounds, and a blessing besides, as
will only bring him safe and sound home.


202
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Why there he is ! Punch and Judy hunting, the
young wretch, it's that Billy as sartin as sin !
But let me get him home, with a good grip of his
hair, and I'm blest if he shall have a whole bone
in his skin!”


204
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
We do revere Her Majesty the Queen ;
We venerate our Glorious Constitution ;
We joy King William's advent should have been,
And only want a Counter Revolution.
'Tis not Lord Russell and his final measure,
'Tis not Lord Melbourne's counsel to the throne,
'Tis not this Bill, or that, gives us displeasure,
The measures we dislike are all our own.
The Cash Law the “Great Western ” loves to name,
The tone our foreign policy pervading ;
The Corn Laws—none of these we care to blame, —
Our evils we refer to over-trading.
By tax or Tithe our murmurs are not drawn;
We reverence the Church—but hang the cloth !
We love her ministers—but curse the lawn !
We have, alas ! too much to do with both !
We love the sex ;—to serve them is a bliss !
We trust they find us civil, never surly ;


THE ASSISTANT DRAPER’S PETITION
205
All that we hope of female friends is this,
That their last linen may be wanted early.
Ah! who can tell the miseries of men
That serve the very cheapest shops in town?
Till faint and weary, they leave off at ten,
Knock'd up by ladies beating of 'em down !
But has not Hamlet his opinion given-
O Hamlet had a heart for Drapers' servants !
“ That custom is ”_say custom after seven-
“ More honour'd in the breach than the observance.”
ryance
O come then, gentle ladies, come in time,
O’erwhelm our counters, and unload our shelves ;
Torment us all until the seventh chime,
But let us have the remnant to ourselves !
We wish of knowledge to lay in a stock,
And not remain in ignorance incurable ;-
To study Shakespeare, Milton, Dryden, Locke,
And other fabrics that have proved so durable.


206
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
We long for thoughts of intellectual kind,
And not to go bewilder'd to our beds ;
With stuff and fustian taking up the mind,
And pins and needles running in our heads !

@
"
CA Brucking
Aug 1893
'For oh! the brain gets very dull and dry.'
For oh! the brain gets very dull and dry,
Selling from morn till night for cash or credit ;
Or with a vacant face and vacant eye,
Watching cheap prints that Knight did never edit.


THE VOLUNTEER
213
XII.
“ The fools that fight abroad for home,”
Thought I, “ may get a wrong one;
Let those that have no home at all
Go battle for a long one.”
The mirror here confirmed me this
Reflection, by a strong one :
XIII.
For there, where I was wont to shave,
And deck me like Adonis,
There stood the leader of our foes,
With vultures for his cronies
No Corsican, but Death itself,
The Bony of all Bonies.
XIV.
A horrid sight it was, and sad,
To see the grisly chap
Put on my crimson livery,
And then begin to clap
My helmet on—ah me! it felt
Like any felon's cap.


214
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
XV.
My plume seemed borrowed from a hearse,
An undertaker's crest;

litinin
(வறா
CE Brock
Aug. 1893
• The mirror here confirmed me this.'
My epaulettes like coffin-plates ;
My belt so heavy press’d,


THE VOLUNTEER
215
Four pipeclay cross-roads seem'd to lie
At once upon my breast.
XVI.
My brazen breastplate only lack'd
A little heap of salt,
To make me like a corpse full dressid,
Preparing for the vault-
To set up what the Poet calls
My everlasting halt.
XVII.
This funeral show inclined me quite
To peace :—and here I am !
Whilst better lions go to war,
Enjoying with the lamb
A lengthen'd life, that might have been
A Martial Epigram.



con
O
U
f
eia
Seks
VE
, cle. Is93
“Twa dogs, that were na thrang at hame,
Forgather'd ance upon a time.”—BURNS.
NE morn—it was the very morn
September's sportive month was born-
The hour, about the sunrise, carly :
The sky grey, sober, still, and pearly,
With sundry orange streaks and tinges
Through daylight's door, at cracks and hinges ;


HIT OR MISS
219
When, rising o'er a gentle slope,
That gave his view a better scope,
He spied, some dozen furrows distant,
But in a spot as inconsistent,
A second dog across his track,
Without a master to his back ;
As if for wages, workman-like,
The sporting breed had made a strike,
Resolved nor birds nor puss to seek,
Without another paunch a week!
This other was a truant curly,
But, for a spaniel, wondrous surly ;
Instead of curvets gay and brisk,
He slouched along without a frisk,
With dogged air, as if he had
A good half mind to running mad ;
Mayhap the shaking at his ear
Had been a quaver too severe ;
Mayhap the whip’s “exclusive dealing”
Had too much hurt e’en spaniel feeling,
Nor if he had been cut, 'twas plain
He did not mean to come again.


220
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
220
18,
Of course the pair soon spied each other ;
But neither seemed to own a brother ;
The course on both sides took a curve,
As dogs when shy are apt to swerve ;
But each o'er back and shoulder throwing
A look to watch the other's going,
Till, having cleared sufficient ground,
With one accord they turned them round,
And squatting down, for forms not caring,
At one another fell to staring;
As if not proof against a touch
Of what plagues humankind so much,
A prying itch to get at notions
Of all their neighbours' looks and motions.
Sir Don at length was first to rise-
The better dog in point of size,
And, snuffing all the ground between,
Set off, with easy jaunty mien ;
While Dash, the stranger, rose to greet him,
And made a dozen steps to meet him—
Their noses touch’d, and rubbed awhile
(Some savage nations use the style),
And then their tails a wag began,
Though on a very cautious plan,


HIT OR MISS
221
But in their signals quantum suff.
To say “A civil dog enough.”
Thus having held out olive branches,
They sank again, though not on haunches,

SIM
Behr
COS
CE Brrek
Fyn (
1
1
/
S1893
Follow
Some savage nations use the style.'
But couchant, with their under jaws
Resting between the two forepaws,
The prelude, on a luckier day,
Or sequel, to a game of play:
But now they were in dumps, and thus


222
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
Began their worries to discuss,
The pointer, coming to the point
The first, on times so out of joint.
“Well, Friend,—so here's a new September
As fine a first as I remember ;
And, thanks to such an early Spring,
Plenty of birds, and strong on wing.”
“ Birds !” cried the crusty little chap,
As sharp and sudden as a snap,
“A weasel suck them in the shell !
What matter birds, or flying well,
Or fly at all, or sporting weather,
If fools with guns can't hit a feather !”,
“Ay, there's the rub, indeed,” said Don,
Putting his gravest visage on ;
“ In vain we beat our beaten way,
And bring our organs into play,
Unless the proper killing kind
Of barrel tunes are played behind :
But when we shoot—that's me and Squirem
We hit as often as we fire.”


HIT OR MISS
223
“ More luck for you!” cried little Woolly,
Who felt the cruel contrast fully ;
“More luck for you, and Squire to boot !
We miss as often as we shoot ! ”
'Putting his gravest visage on.'
“ Indeed !-No wonder you're unhappy!
I thought you looking rather snappy ;
But fancied, when I saw you jogging,
You'd had an overdose of flogging ;
Or p'raps the gun its range had tried
While you were ranging rather wide.”


HIT OR MISS
227
“Why, he must be the county's scoff !
He ought to leave, and not let, off!
2018
2,99
CE Brock
liggs
e-
m
Te vent his rage.'
As fate denies his shooting wishes,
Why don't he take to catching fishes ?
Or any other sporting game,
That don't require a bit of aim ?”
Q 2


228
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
“Not he !—Some dogs of human kind
Will hunt by sight, because they're blind,
My master angle !—no such luck!
There he might strike, who never struck !
My master shoots because he can't,
And has an eye that aims aslant;
Nay, just by way of making trouble,
He's changed his single gun for double ;
And now, as girls a-walking do,
His misses go by two and two !
I wish he had the mange, or reason
As good, to miss the shooting season!”
“Why yes, it must be main unpleasant
To point to covey, or to pheasant ;
For snobs, who, when the point is mooting,
Think letting fly as good as shooting !”
“ Snobs !—if he'd wear his ruffled shirts,
Or coats with water-wagtail skirts,
Or trowsers in the place of smalls,
Or those tight fits he wears at balls,
Or pumps, and boots with tops, mayhap,
Why we might pass for Snip and Snap,


HIT OR MISS
229
And shoot like blazes ! fly or sit,
And none would stare, unless we hit.
But no—to make the more combustion,

-
-
e Brock
Sep 1893
* For keepers, shy of such encroachers.'
He goes in gaiters and in fustian,
Like Captain Ross, or Topping Sparks,
And deuce a miss but some one marks !
For keepers, shy of such encroachers,


234
SELECTIONS FROM HOOD
I never found, since I could bark,
A Barn that bore my master's mark!”
“Is that the case ?—why then, my brother,
Would we could swap with one another!
Or take the Squire, with all my heart,
Nay, all my liver, so we part !
He'll hit you hares—(he uses cartridge)
He'll hit you cocks—he'll hit a partridge ;
He'll hit a snipe—he'll hit a pheasant ;
He'll hit—he'll hit whatever's present ;
He'll always hit,----as that's your wish-.
His pepper never lacks a dish!”
“Come, come, you banter--let's be serious ;
I'm sure that I am half delirious,
Your picture set me so a-sighing-
But does he shoot so well-shoot flying ?”
“ Shoot flying? Yes--and running, walking, -
I've seen him shoot two farmers talking-
He'll hit the game, whene'er he can,
But failing that he'll hit a man,
A boy—a horse's tail or head-


HIT OR MISS
235
Or make a pig a pig of lead,-
Oh, friend ! they say no dog as yet,
However hot, was known to sweat,
But sure I am that I perspire
Sometimes before my master's fire !
Misses ! no, no, he always hits,
But so as puts me into fits !
He shot my fellow dog this morning,
Which seemed to me sufficient warning !”
“Quite, quite enough !--So that's a hitter !
Why, my own fate I thought was bitter,
And full excuse for cut and run ;
But give me still the missing gun!
Or rather, Sirius ! send me this,
No gun at all, to hit or miss,
Since sporting seems to shoot thus double,
That right or left it brings us trouble!”
So ended Dash ;—and Pointer Don
Prepared to urge the moral on ;
But here a whistle long and shrill
Came sounding o'er the council hill,
And starting up, as if their tails