/7xx^< / HUMOROUS POEMS ; Marched as mourners march.' 1 HUMOROUS POEMS BY THOMAS HOOD WITH A PREFACE BY ALFRED AINGER AND ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ILLUSTRATIONS BY CHARLES E. BROCK MACMILLAN AND CO. AND NEW YORK All rights reserved 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 tvas 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 clozvn, and so forth. An acute critic might, even then, I think, have detected not only that these fresh and amusing productions ivere of unequal viii SKLKCTIOXS 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 itcd on very dingy outsides, lay on the table, which the cover informed me was circulating in our book-club, so very Grub Sircctish 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. I .east 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 una cum you. I know none of your frequent visitors, capacious and assimilative enough of your converse, to have reproduced you so honestly, supposing PREFACE ix you had left yourself in pledge in his lock-up house. Gill/nan, 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! / 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 unplcasance 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 tJie 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 x SELECTIONS FROM HOOD letter : " Hood has jus I conic in ; his sick eyes sparkled ivitli health when he read your approbation." The " silctitish young man an invalid " was then just six-and-twenty years of age. He had been forced to abandon, for health's sake, the engravers 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 wade 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 merit, bearing strong marks of the Keatsian influence. Hood PREFACE xi 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 tJie same influence his " Lycus the Centaur' 1 " The Two Peacocks of Bedfont" the " Ode to Autumn" and others. But very early in his editorial career lie 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 afterivards 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 much 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 xii 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 tivo 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, " Tlie Plea of the Mid- summer Fairies." Tliis poem was dedicated to Charles Lamb, the volume, as a whole, to Coleridge, in grateful recognition of the praise he had bestowed on 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 tip 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 of a poet and humorist ', the pun that so-called " verbal wit" -was to take higher rank and subserve quite other purposes than anytJiing of the kind in our literature before. Samuel Johnson once remarked that " little tilings are not valued, but when they arc 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, ivho 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 ivas possessed by Dickens, Hood possessed with regard to ztwds 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 wearisome and disgusting. To hear of any ordinary man that he makes puns is properly a warning to avoid his society. For %vith the xiv SELECTIONS FROM HOOD funny man tlie verbal coincidence is everything ; there, is nothing underlying it, or beyond it. In the liands 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 xv * Ah / who can tell how hard it is to teach Miss Nancy Daw son on her bed of straw- To make Long Sal sew up the endless breach She made in manners to write heaveifs own law On hearts of granite j 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, conies the one ending with the play on words tJiat so fascinated Coleridge : / like your chocolate, good Mistress Fry ! I like your cookery in every way ; I like your Shrove-tide sen>ice and siipply ; I like to hear your sweet Pandeans play j I like the pity in your full-brimmed eye j I like your carriage, and your silken grey, Your dove-like habits, and your silent preaching; Rut I dorit like yottr Newgatory teaching! The distinctive quality of Hood's puns is exempli- fied here, but not more notably than in a hundred other instances that croivd upon the memory. The ordinary pirn 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 " zvhich 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 Jiis brother-in-law Reynolds, which our grandmothers used to sing to an equally pretty tune, beginning Go where the water glide th gently ever, Glideth by meadows that the greenest be ; Go, listen to our own beloved rh'er A nd 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 PREFACE xvii into their place so obviously, like the i-liyines of a consummate lyrist, tliat it would have seemed pedantic to go out of tJie way to avoid them. The verses in the present collection supply instances in abundance. Every one remembers Lieutenant Luff's apology for his particular -weakness in respect of stimulants If wine's a poison, so is Tea, Though in another shape : ll'/mf matter whether one is kilTd By canister, or grape .' In anotJier poem Jure given, and less known (suggested by Burns 's Twa Dogs), the Pointer bitterly complains that his master is such a novice that he never hits a bird, and that now he has taken to a double-barrel the "aggravation" is worse than before : A ttif now, as girls a-walking do, His misses go by two and two .' In these last-quoted jests the purpose is, of course, J i amorous and fantastic, and is little more ; but Hood never hesitated to make the pun minister to higher ends, and vindicate its right to a share in quickening metis best sympathies. An apparently little known copy of verses will be found in the present volume, b xviii SELECTIONS FROM H|> ^vrittcn to support an " ILarly Closing More incut " 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-li tiling 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 v A/i .' who can tell the miseries of men That serve the very cheapest shops in town .' Till faint and weary, they leave off at ten, KnocKd up by ladies beating of 'em down .' (Sydney Smith laid it down as a rule that wit and pathos cannot dwell toget/icr, that one must needs kill the ot/ter ; but he wrote his famous lecture without knowing Thomas Hood.} And tlicn 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 iime, Overwhelm our counters, and unload our shelves ; PREFACE xix Torment its all until the seventh cJiimc, But let us have the remnant to ourselves .' M'e 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 \l 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 lie absurd to pretend t licit Hood's ligJiter verse is always up to the same level. It tvas 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 SKLKCTIONS FROM llool) ticcnty years had deceit " in company with pain." ll'e probably owe to tJiis circumstance that not only in his serious poetry, his " Bridge of SigJis" " Song of the Shirt" the " Haunted If oust" and tJie "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 hoiv 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 oivn deep compassion and his sense of man's inhumanity was, doubtless, quickened by his own experience of pain and disappointment, and by the shadozv of decay and doom that never lifted. But he made no boast of it, or capital out of it; tJie pessimistic accent is never lieard in his verse ; he never lost his own cheerful faith in providence, though he early learned that Therms 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 tJie 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, Jiis faitJiful 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 Jie 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 tJie 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), tJie point of which is t lie 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 mars 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 tJie anguish of Eugene Aram : the " Mermaid of Margate " is a playful parody of the Romantic legend of Burger and his English folloivers ; while others, such as " Sally Brown " and " Nelly Gray" shoiv the humorous possi- bilities of the Percy Ballad. The " Epping Hunt " is undisguisedly suggested by "Jo An Gilpin" a PREFACE xxiii "Death's Ramble" is by the ''Devil's Walk" of Coleridge and Southey and " Queen Mab " shoivs hoiv tvcll Hood might have written for cJiildren, 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 mucJi 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 muck 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 xxiv SKI.FCTIOXS FROM HOOD literature, and they will not grudge Hood tJiat certain immortality which lie won by paths so different. TJie large- hearted Landor was certainly not wanting in the qualities which he confessed his despair of attaining' in presence of such a writer as this, and yet lie clearly felt the difference between his own power, and that which is destined to survive in the "general heart of men" when he wrote Jealous, I mun it, / was once, 77m/ wickedness I here renounce. 7 tried at wit, it would not do ; At tenderness, that failed me too ; He/ore me on each path there stood The wittv and the tender J food. A. A. HASRI.EY MAXOR, Oxox. Oct. 1893. CONTCNTS 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 . SELECTIONS FROM HOOD OUR VILLAGE .... JOHN DAY .... l.ii;rii.NA\T LUFF . THE CHINA-MENDER PLAYING AT SOLDIERS QUEEN MAI; .... MORNING MEDITATIONS . THE DEMON SHIP . THE DROWNING DUCKS . THE LOST HEIR THE ASSISTANT DRAPER'S PETITION THE VOLUNTEER HIT OR Miss PACT '34 142. 148 153 162 170 174 178 187 193 203 208 216 ' 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 ' . ' His spouse had made him \o\v ' ' " Hallo ! " cried they ; " come, trot away " ' " Now welcome, lads," quoth he ' ' Enjoyed their "early purl " ' ' Each thicket served to thin it ' PAGE Frontispiece vii xxiv xxv xxvi xxvii xxxi I 3 5 7 9 ii H 17 21 xxviii SKLF.CTIONS FROM HOOD PAGE ' And like a bird was singing out" ...... 24 ' So up on Huggins" horse he got '...... 27 'Whilst I Fuggins in the stirrup stood ' ..... 29 '" Beasts of draught !"' 31 ' When he was rubbed '........ 33 Heading to Faithless Sally Brown ...... 36 '"Now, young woman," said he ' ...... 38 ' He found she'd got another Ben '...... 40 Tailpiece to Faithless Sally Brown . . . . . . 41 Heading to The Mermaid of Margate ..... 42 ' And clasped him by the hand '...... 44 ' His hair began to stiffen '....... 45 ' " Ahoy ! " ' . . . . 49 Heading to A Fairy Tale . . . . . . . 51 ' Reading, and wept "... 54 'A horn-pipe' ......... 55 ' " Took to the road " again ! ' ...... 57 '" Well ! this is Fairy Work '" 58 Heading to Equestrian Courtship ...... 60 ' They rode by a churchyard, and then he spoke ' . . . 61 Heading to Tim Turpin 63 ' Now Tim he wooed a servant maid '..... 64 ' He saw her very plain ' ....... 66 ' A dozen men to try the fact ' 68 ' A great judge, and a little judge' ...... 70 Heading to Death's Ramble . 71 ' lie saw a watchman fast in his box ' 73 ' A patient that pulled out his purse '..... 74 ' He saw a sailor mixing his grog' ...... 75 Heading to A Parthian Glance 77 ' To comfort my woes ' 79 ' Was your face ever sent to the housemaid to scrub?' . . Si Tailpiece to A Parthian (Ilance 82 Heading to A Sailor's Apology for Bow-Leg* .... 83 ' 'Twas all along of Poll ' 84 ' To splice me, heel to heel '....... 86 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS xxix PAGE My legs began to bend like \\inkin '..... 88 Tailpiece to A Sailor's Apology for Bow- Legs ... 89 Heading to John Trot ........ go ' Took her quite amazed '....... 93 ' They stripped his coat, and gave him kicks' .... 95 ' Huzza ! the sergeant cried '....... 96 Heading to Mary's Ghost ....... 98 ' They've come and boned your Mary '..... 99 ' In spirits and a phial '........ 101 Tailpiece to Mary's Ghost ....... 102 Heading to The Carelesse Nurse Mayd ..... 103 Tailpiece to The Carelesse Nurse Mayd ..... 104 Heading to A Report from Below ...... 105 ' Suppose the couple standing so ' . . . . . . 106 '" Come," says she, quite in a huff' ..... 108 ' Up goes the copper '........ 109 ' A-staring at the wash-house roof . . . . . .112 Heading to The Duel . . . . . . . .114 ' I'll pop it into you ' . . . . . . . .116 'Said Mr. C. to Mr. B.' 118 Tailpiece to The Duel . . . . . . . .119 Heading to The Supper Superstition ..... 120 ' Don't sup on that 'ere Cod ' . . . . . . .123 ' To see what brutes would do ' ...... 124 Tailpiece to The Supper Superstition . . . . .126 Heading to Faithless Nelly Gray . . . . . .127 ' She made him quite a scoff' 129 ' Some other man ' . . . . . . . . .131 ' In four cross roads ' ........ 132 Heading to Our Village . . 134 ' Right before the wicket ' ....... 135 'The Green Man' . . 137 ' A select establishment . . . . . . . . 139 ' There's a barber's '........ 140 Heading to John Day . 142 ' And made an offer plump ' 144 xxx >KLF(TIi >.\S FROM HOOD PACK ' lie fretted all the way to Struiul . . . . . . 14, ' I've !v rearing up within The way he ought to QO." 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 arts, 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. 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 And lo ! a cart that held a squad Of costermonger line ; With one poor hack, like Pegasus, That slaved for all the Nine ! ' " Hallo /" cried they ; "come, trot away. 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 ; EITIXG 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 ride ; '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 Howbeit he tumbled down in time To join with Tom and Bob, All in Fair Mead, which held that day Its own fair meed of mob. "JVoTV welcome, lads," quoth he.' Idlers to wit no Guardians some, Of Tattlers in a squeeze ; Ramblers, in heavy carts and vans, Spectators, up in trees. EPPING HUNT 15 Butchers on backs of butchers' hacks, That shambled to and fro ! Bakers intent upon a buck, Neglectful of the dough ! Change Alley Bears to speculate, As usual, for a fall ; And green and scarlet runners, such As never climbed a wall ! 'Twas strange to think what difference A single creature made ; A single stag had caused a whole Stagnation in their trade. Now Huggins from his saddle rose, And in the stirrups stood : And lo ! a little cart that came Hard by a little wood. In shape like half a hearse, tho' not For corpses in the least ; For this contained the deer alive, And not the dear deceased ! 16 SELECTIONS KRU.M HOUl) 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 rctl, Bedecked with ribbons fine ; Like other bucks that come to 'list The hawbucks in the line. One curious gaze of mild amaxc, 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." % sp ^ 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 ; i8 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 19 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 ? 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. SELECTIONS FROM HOOD Another squadron charging now, Went off at furious pitch ; A perfect Tarn o' Shantcr 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 Some gave a shout, some rolled about, And anticked as they rode, And butchers whistled on their curs, And milkmen tally-hoed. ' Each thicket 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. KITING HUNT 23 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 SKI.KCTIOXS 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 ! ' --^- tJ like a hint 7ms 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 hunger is He squatted all forlorn ; 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 SKLKCTIONS 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 And off they set, in double chase, For such was fortune's whim, The farmer rode to hunt the stag, And Huggins hunted him ! 1 So up on Hitggins' horse lie 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 ! 28 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD And here of Nature's kindly care Behold a curious proof, As nags are meant to leap, she puts A frog in every hoof ! Whereas the mare, altho' her share She had of hoof and frog, On coming to a gate stopped short As stiff as any log ; Whilst Huggins in the stirrup stood With neck like neck of crane, As sings the Scottish song " to see The gate his hart had gane." And lo ! the dim and distant hunt Diminished in a trice : The steeds, like Cinderella's team, Seemed dwindling into mice ; And, far remote, each scarlet coat Soon flitted like a spark, Tho' still the forest murmured back An echo of the bark ! EPPING HUNT But sad at soul John Huggins turned : No comfort could he find ; Whilst thus the " Hunting Chorus " sped, To stay five bars behind. 29 ' IVIMst Muggins in the stirrup stood.' For tho' by dint of spur he got A leap in spite of fate 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 When thus forlorn, a merry horn Struck up without the door, The mounted mob were all returned ; The Epping Hunt was o'er ! ' "Jieasts ofdrangltt .' " ' And many a horse was taken out Of saddle and of shaft ; And men, by dint of drink, became The only " beasts of draught ! " 32 SI-I.KCTIONS FROM HOOD 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. ' When he was rutted.' fJte 1893 *y J/or jV/a .S- Co. I) 34 SELECTIONS I-ROM 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. EPPING HUNT 35 ADVERTISEMENT TO THE SECOND EDITION OF EPPING HUNT. The Publisher begs leave to say that he has had the following letter from the Author of this little book : " Dear Sir, I am much gratified to learn from you, that the Epping Hunt has had such a run that it is quite exhausted, and that you intend, therefore, to give the work what may be called ' second wind] by a new impression. " I attended the last Anniversary of the Festival, and am concerned to say that the sport does not improve, but appears an ebbing as well as Epping custom. The run was miserable indeed ; but what was to be expected ? The chase was a Doe, and, consequently, the Hunt set off with the Hind part before. It was, therefore, quite in character for so many Nimrods to start, as they did, before the hounds, but which, as you know, is quite contrary to the Lex Tallyho-nis, or Laws of Hunting. " I dined with the Master of the Revel, who is as hale as ever, and promises to reside some time in the Wells ere he kicks the bucket. He is an honest, hearty, worthy man, and when he dies there will be ' a cry of dogs ' in his kennel. " I am, dear Sir, yours, &c., "T. HOOD. " WINCHMORE HILL, June 1830." 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 ! ' " A'ozf, 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 ! FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN 39 " Oh ! would I were a mermaid now, For then I'd follow him ; But oh ! I'm not a fish-woman, And so I cannot swim. " Alas ! I was not born beneath The Virgin and the Scales, So I must curse my cruel stars, And walk about in Wales." Now Ben had sailed to many a place That's underneath the world ; But In two years the ship came home, And all her sails were furled. But when he called on Sally Brown, To see how she went on, He found she'd got another Ben, Whose Christian name was John. " O Sally Brown, O Sally Brown ! How could you serve me so ? I've met with many a breeze before, But never such a blow." 40 SMLKCTIOXS 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. ' He found she'd got another Ben,- Cofyrifht 1893 by Macmillan & Co. And then he tried to sing " All's Well," But could not though he tried : FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN 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. " Alas ! what perils do environ That man who meddles with a siren ! " Iftidibras. T\ 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 ? " 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, Xo honeycomb e'er was sweeter ; Poor wretch ! how little he dreamt for this That Peter should be salt-Peter : And clasftd 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 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. 45 His hair began to stiffen.' 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 : 46 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 47 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 moments 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. SKLI'XTIONS 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 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 ! " 49 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, 50 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 drain, as he lay, And chafed his shivering skin ; And the Angel returned that was flying away With the spirit of Peter Fin. Hounslow Heath and close beside the road, As western travellers may oft have seen, A little house some years ago there stood, A minikin abode ; And built like Mr. Birkbeck's, all of wood : The walls of white, the window-shutters green, Four wheels it had at North, South, East, and West (Though now at rest), On which it used to wander to and fro, Because its master ne'er maintained a rider, Like those who trade in Paternoster Row ; 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 53 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 Person, 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, 54 SELECTION'S FROM HOOD Both were quite drunk from the enchanted flagons ; When as it fell upon a summer's day, Reading, and -weft. 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 TALK 55 Long-horned, and short, of many a different breed, Tall, tawny brutes, from famous Lincoln-levels Or Durham feed, 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, 56 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 ! 57 ' " 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 SKLKCTIOXS 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 59 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 far den, Little Prince Silverwings has ketch'd me up, And set me down in some one else's garden ! " > 1 p-*' L 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 " My pretty maiden, if you'll agree, You shall always amble through life with me." 61 They rode by a churchyard, and then he spoke.' Copyright 1893 by Macmillan & Co. ihe 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. 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 ! u B ITTV, 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 : 64 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD But Tim had specks within his eyes, And could not see at all. ' \tnt' Tim he 7voo(it a sen'ant i/taiif.' 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 V. By day she led him up and down, Where'er he wished to log. J o * A happy wife, altho' she led The life of any dog. VI. 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. F 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. 'He SOTV 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 67 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 Ah ! when he hid his bloody work In ashes round about, How little he supposed the truth Would soon be sifted out. XVI. But when the parish dustman came, His rubbish to withdraw, He found more dust within the heap Than he contracted for ! \vir. A dozen men to try the fact Were sworn that very day ; TIM TURPIN 69 But though they all were jurors, yet Xo 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, 70 SF.LKCTIUXS FROM HOOD And sentenced Tim by law to hang Till he was three times dead. jftfflrti * . ' 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. |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 quietly 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. 72 SKLKCTKjNS 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 stiffen 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." He met a coachman driving his coach, So slow, that his fare grew sick ; DEATH'S RAMBLE But he let him stray on his tedious way, For Death only wars on the quick. Death saw a toll-man taking a toll, In the spirit of his fraternity ; 73 But he knew that sort of man would extort Though summoned to all eternity. He found an author writing his life, But he let him write no further ; For Death, who strikes whenever he likes, Is jealous of all self-murther ! 74 SELECTIONS I-KOM HOOD 1 )eath saw a patient that pulled out his purse, And a doctor that took the sum ; But he let them be for he knew that the " fee \\'as a prelude to " fa\v " and " fum." ' A patient that piilUd out his ft, He met a dustman ringing a bell, And he gave him a mortal thrust ; For himself, by law, since Adam's flaw, Is contractor for all our dust. DEATH'S RAMBLE He saw a sailor mixing his grog, And he marked him out for slaughter ; 75 ' He saw a sailor mining 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 ! " Sweet Memory, wafted by thy gentle gale, Oft up the stream of time I turn my sail." ROGERS. OME, my Crony, let's think upon far-away days, And lift up a little Oblivion's veil ; Let's consider the past with a lingering gaze, Like a peacock whose eyes are inclined to his tail. II. Ay, come, let us turn our attention behind, Like those critics whose heads are so heavy, I fear, That they cannot keep up with the march of the mind, And so turn face about for reviewing the rear. 7 8 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? A PARTHIAN GLANCE 79 VII. Did you ever go up to the roof with a bounce? Did you ever come down to the floor with the same ? ' To comfort my -woes.' Oh ! I can't but agree with both ends, and pronounce " Head or tails " with a child, an unpleasantish game ! 8o 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 ? x. 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 ; A PARTHIAN GLANCE 81 Whilst I told of the chief that was killed by my stroke, And extended my arms as "the arms that he wore!" ' Ifas your face ever sent to the housemaid to scrub ? ' XII. Next a Lover Oh ! say, were you ever in love ? With a lady too cold and your bosom too hot ! Have you bowed to a shoe-tie, and knelt to a glove, Like a beau that desired to be tied in a knot ? G 82 SKLl-XTIOXS KKO.M 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. 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, ' 'Ttvas a'.l along ..- " Come," says she, guilt in a huff.' 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. A REPORT FROM BELOW 109 Well, when the pinch is over ' Teach your grandmother to suck A powder-horn,' says she ' Well,' says I, ' I wish you luck.' 'Up goes tfu coffer. ' Them words sets up her back, so with her hands upon her hips, ' Come,' says she, quite in a huff, ' come, keep your tongue inside your lips ; no 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. A REPORT FROM BELOW in Well, I crooks her little fingers, and crumps them well up together, As humanity pints out, and burnt her nostrums with a feather : But for all as I can do, to restore her to her mortality, She never gives a sign of a return to sensuality. Thinks I, well there she lies, as dead as my own late departed mother, Well, she'll wash no more in this world, whatever she does in t'other. So I gives myself to scramble up the linens for a minute, Lawk, sich a shirt ! thinks I, it's well my master wasn't in it ; Oh ! I never, never, never, never, never, see a sight so shockin' ; Here lays a leg, and there a leg I mean, you know, a stockin' Bodies all slit and torn to rags, and many a tattered skirt, And arms burnt off, and sides and backs all scotched and black with dirt ; But as nobody was in 'em none but nobody was hurt ! 112 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, ' 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 I13 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 ? ' " " Like the two Kings of Brentford smelling at one nosegay. N Brentford town, of old renown, 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 115 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. Il6 SKI.KCTIOXS 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. ' Til pof it into you.' But first they sought a friend apiece, This pleasant thought to give THE DUKI. 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. ii8 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD I do confess I did attach Misconduct to your name ; If I withdraw the charge, will then Your ramrod do the same ? r m I heard a loud and sudden cry That chill'd my very blood ; And lo ! from out a dirty alley, Where pigs and Irish wont to rally, I saw a crazy woman sally, Bedaub'd with grease and mud. O 194 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD She turn'd her East, she turn'd her West, Staring like Pythoness possest, With streaming hair and heaving breast, As one stark mad with grief. This way and that she wildly ran, Jostling with woman and with man Her right hand held a frying pan, The left a lump of beef. At last her frenzy scem'd to reach A point just capable of speech, And with a tone almost a screech, As wild as ocean birds, Or female Ranter mov'd to preach, She gave her " sorrow words." " Oh Lord ! oh dear, my heart will break, I shall go stick stark staring wild ! Has ever a one seen anything about the streets like a crying lost-looking child ? Lawk help me, I don't know where to look, or to run, if I only knew which way A child as is lost about London streets, and especially Seven Dials, is a needle in a bottle of hay. I am all in a quiver get out of my sight, do, you wretch, you little Kitty M'Nab ! 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 M'Farlane ! 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 ; 196 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD He'd a very good jacket, for certain, for I bought it myself for a shilling one day in Rag Fair ; 'Oil Sfi-jcaiil M-J'arlane !' And his trousers considering not very much patch'd, and red plush, they was once his Father's best pair. His shirt, it's very lucky I'd got washing in the tub, or that might have gone with the rest ; 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 ! 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. 200 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD He's blue eyes, and not to be call'd a squint, though a little cast he's certainly got ; And his nose is still a good un, tho' the bridge is broke, by his falling on a pewter pint pot ; He's got the most elegant wide mouth in the world, and very large teeth for his age ; And quite as fit as Mrs. Murdockson's child to play Cupid on the Drury Lane stage. And then he has got such dear winning ways but oh, I never never shall see him no more ! Oh dear! to think of losing him just after nursing him back from death's door ! Only the very last month when the windfalls, hang 'em, was at twenty a penny ! And the threepence he'd got by grottoing was spent in plums, and sixty for a child is too many. And the cholera man came and whitewash'd us all, and, drat him, made a seize of our hog. It's no use to send the Crier to cry him about, he's such a blunderin' drunken old dog ; The last time he was fetched to find a lost child, he was guzzling with his bell at the Crown, THE LOST HEIR 201 And went and cried a boy instead of a girl, for a distracted Mother and Father about Town. Billy where arc you, Billy, I say ? come Billy, come home, to your best of mothers ! I'm scared when I think of them cabroleys, they drive so, they'd run over their own Sisters and Brothers. Or may be he's stole by some chimbly -sweeping wretch, to stick fast in narrow flues and what not, And be poked up behind with a picked pointed pole, when the soot has ketch'd, and the chimbly's red hot. Oh I'd give the whole wide world, if the world was mine, to clap my two longin' eyes on his face. For he's my darlin' of darlin's, and if he don't soon come back, you'll see me drop stone dead on the place. I only wish I'd got him safe in these two motherly arms, and wouldn't I hug him and kiss him ! Lawk ! I never knew what a precious he was but a child don't not feel like a child till you miss him. 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 ! " TTHE /4S8IST/WTT 9 PETITION ITY the sorrows of a class of men, Who, though they bow to fashion and frivolity, No fancied claims or woes fictitious pen, But wrongs ell-wide, and of a lasting quality. Oppress'd and discontented with our lot, Amongst the clamorous we take our station ; A host of Ribbon men yet is there not One piece of Irish in our agitation. 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 \ve 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 \ve 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. 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. 2o6 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 ! 'For oh ! the brain ftfs -.try dull atid 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 ASSISTANT DRAPER'S PETITION 207 Till sick with toil, and lassitude extreme, \Yc often think, when we are dull and vapoury, The bliss of Paradise was so supreme, Because that Adam did not deal in drapery. " The clashing of my armour in my cars Sounds like a passing bell ; my buckler puts me In mind of a bier ; this, my broadsword, a pickaxe To dig my grave." The Lover s Progress. I. WAS in that memorable year France threatened to put off in Flat-bottomed boats, intending each To be a British coffin, To make sad widows of our wives, And every babe an orphan : THE VOLUNTEER 209 II. When coats were made of scarlet cloaks, And heads were dredged with flour, I 'listed in the Lawyers' Corps, Against the battle hour ; A perfect Volunteer for why ? I brought my " will and pow'r." III. One dreary day a day of dread, Like Gate's, over-cast About the hour of six (the morn And I were breaking fast), There came a loud and sudden sound, That struck me all aghast ! IV. A dismal sort of morning roll, That was not to be eaten : Although it was no skin of mine But parchment that was beaten, I felt tattooed through all my flesh, Like any Otaheitan. 210 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD V. My jaws with utter dread enclosed The morsel I was munching, And terror locked them up so tight, My very teeth went crunching All through my bread and tongue at once, Like sandwich made at lunching. VI. My hand that held the teapot fast, Stiffened, but yet unsteady, Kept pouring, pouring, pouring o'er The cup in one long eddy, Till both my hose were marked with tea, As they were marked already. VII. I felt my visage turn from red To white from cold to hot ; But it was nothing wonderful My colour changed, I wot, For, like some variable silks, I felt that I was shot. THE VOLUNTEER VIII. And looking forth with anxious eye, From my snug upper story, ' Looking 'forth with anxious eye.' I saw our melancholy corps Going to beds all gory ; The pioneers seemed very loth To axe their way to glory. 212 SELECTIONS IKOM HOOD IX. The captain marched as mourners march, The ensign too seemed lagging, And many more, although they were No ensigns, took to flagging Like corpses in the Serpentine, Methought they wanted dragging. x. But while I watched, the thought of death Came like a chilly gust, And lo ! I shut the window down, With very little lust To join so many marching men. That soon might be March dust. XI. Quoth I, " Since Fate ordains it so, Our foe the coast must land on ; " I felt so warm beside the fire I cared not to abandon ; Our hearths and homes are always things That patriots make a stand on. 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. 2I 4 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD XV. My plume seemed borrowed from a hearse, An undertaker's crest ; 1 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 He At once upon my breast. XVI. My brazen breastplate only lack'd A little heap of salt, To make me like a corpse full dress'd, 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. " Twa dogs, that were na thrang at liame, 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, early : The sky grey, sober, still, and pearly, With sundry orange streaks and tinges Through daylight's door, at cracks and hinges ; HIT OR MISS 217 The air calm, bracing, freshly cool, As if just skimm'd from off a pool ; The scene, red, russet, yellow, leaden, From stubble, fern, and leaves that deaden, Save here and there a turnip patch, Too verdant with the rest to match ; And far a-field a hazy figure, Some roaming lover of the trigger. Meanwhile the level light perchance Pick'd out his barrel with a glance ; For all around a distant popping Told birds were flying off or dropping. Such was the morn a morn right fair To seek for covey or for hare When, lo ! too far from human feet For even Ranger's boldest beat, A Dog, as in some doggish trouble, Came cant'ring through the crispy stubble, With dappled head in lowly droop, But not the scientific stoop ; And flagging, dull, desponding ears, As if they had been soaked in tears, And not the beaded dew that hung The filmy stalks and weeds among, 218 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD His pace, indeed, seemed not to know An errand, why, or where to go, To trot, to walk, or scamper swift- In short, he seemed a dog adrift ; ^v'^^'/V / / /? ; 1 - J ' " : *" . ' ' f. . |.i ' Ht seemed a dcg adrift.' His very tail, a listless thing, With just an accidental swing, Like rudder to the ripple veering, When nobody on board is steering. So, dull and moody, cantered on Our vagrant pointer, christen'd Don ; 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 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 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, ' 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 2 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 Squire We hit as often as we fire." HIT OR MISS " 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 ! " 223 ' Putting Ms gravest visage an.' " 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." 224 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD " Me ! running running wide and hit ! Me shot ! what, pepper'd ! Deuce a bit ! I almost wish I had ! That Dunce, My master, then would hit for once ! Hit me ! Lord, how you talk ! why zounds ! He couldn't hit a pack of hounds ! " " Well, that must be a case provoking. What, never but, you dog, you're joking ! I see a sort of wicked grin About your jaw you're keeping in." " A joke ! an old tin kettle's clatter Would be as much a joking matter. To tell the truth, that dog-disaster Is just the type of me and master, When fagging over hill and dale, With his vain rattle at my tail. Bang, bang, and bang, the whole day's run, But leading nothing but his gun The very shot, I fancy, hisses, It's sent upon such awful misses." " Of course it does ! But perhaps the fact is Your master's hand is out of practice ! " HIT OR MISS " Practice ? No doctor, where you will, Has finer -but he cannot kill ! These three years past, thro' furze and furrow, All covers I have hunted thorough ; 225 ' About the moors' Flush'd cocks and snipes about the moors ; And put up hares by scores and scores ; Coveys of birds, and lots of pheasants ; Yes, game enough to send in presents To ev'ry friend he has in town, Provided he had knock'd it down : Q 226 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD But no the whole three years together, He has not giv'n me flick or feather For all that I have had to do I wish I had been missing too ! " o " Well, such a hand would drive me mad But is he truly quite so bad ? " " Bad ! worse ! you cannot underscore him ; If I could put up, just before him, The great Balloon that paid the visit Across the water, he would miss it ! Bite him ! I do believe, indeed, It's in his very blood and breed ! It marks his life, and runs all through it ; What can be miss'd, he's sure to do it. Last Monday he came home to Tooting, Dog-tired, as if he'd been a-shooting, And kicks at me to vent his rage ' Get out ! ' says he ' I've miss'd the stage ! ' Of course, thought I what chance of hitting ? You'd miss the Norwich waggon, sitting ! " HIT OR MISS " Why, he must be the county's scoff ! He ought to leave, and not let, off! 227 1 To -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?" Q2 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 ; Xay, 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 \vith 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 And shoot like blazes ! fly or sit, And none would stare, unless we hit. But no to make the more combustion, 229 1 For keepers, shy of such encroac)urs.' 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, 230 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD Dog us about like common poachers ! Many's the covey I've gone by, When underneath a sporting eye ; Many a puss I've twigg'd, and pass'd her I miss 'em to prevent my master ! " " And so should I, in such a case ! There's nothing feels so like disgrace, Or gives you such a scurvy look A kick and pail of slush from Cook, Cleftsticks, or kettle, all in one, As standing to a missing gun ! It's whirr ! and bang ! and off you bound, To catch your bird before the ground ; But no a pump and ginger pop As soon would get a bird to drop ! So there you stand, quite struck a-heap, Till all your tail is gone to sleep ; A sort of stiffness in your nape, Holding your head well up to gape ; While off go birds across the ridges, First small as flies, and then as midges, Cocksure, as they are living chicks, Death's Door is not at Number Six ! " HIT OR MISS " Yes ! yes ! and then you look at master, The cause of all the late disaster, Who gives a stamp, and raps an oath 231 ' And r,ips an oath.' At gun, or birds, or maybe both ; P'raps curses you, and all your kin, To raise the hair upon your skin ! Then loads, rams down, and fits new caps, To go and hunt for more miss-haps ! " 232 SI '.LECTIONS FROM HOOD " Yes ! yes ! but, sick and sad, you feel But one long wish to go to heel ; You cannot scent, for cutting mugs Your nose is turning up, like Pug's ; You can't hold up, but plod and mope ; Your tail like sodden end of rope, That o'er a wind-bound vessel's side Has soak'd in harbour, tide and tide. On thorns and scratches, till that moment Unnoticed, you begin to comment ; You never felt such bitter brambles, Such heavy soil, in all your rambles ! You never felt your fleas so vicious ! Till, sick of life so unpropitious, You wish at last, to end the passage, That you were dead, and in your sassage ! " " Yes ! that's a miss from end to end ! But, zounds ! you draw so well, my friend, You've made me shiver, skin and gristle, As if I heard my master's whistle ! Though how you came to learn the knack I thought your squire was quite a crack !" HIT OR MISS 233 " And so he is ! He always hits And sometimes hard, and all to bits. But ere with him our tongues we task, I've still one little thing to ask ; Namely, with such a random master, Of course you sometimes want a plaster ? Such missing hands make game of more Than ever passed for game before A pounded pig a widow's cat A patent ventilating hat For shot, like mud, when thrown so thick, Will find a coat whereon to stick ! " " What ! accidentals, as they're term'd ? No, never none- since I was worm'd Not e'en the Keeper's fatted calves, My master does not miss by halves ! His shot are like poor orphans, hurl'd Abroad upon the whole wide world, But whether they be blown to dust, As oftentimes I think they must, Or melted down too near the sun, What comes of them is known to none 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 ahvays 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 236 SELECTIONS FROM HOOD Had felt the touch of shoes and nails, Away they scamper'd down the slope, As fast as other pairs elope, Resolv'd, instead of sporting rackets, To 'beg, or dance in fancy jackets ; At butchers' shops to try their luck ; To help to draw a cart or truck ; Or lead Stone Blind poor men, at most Who would but hit or miss a post." Printed by R. & R. CLARK, Edinburgh. FEB 3 1986 University of California Library Los Angeles below. 000 563 899