My jaws with utter dread enclosed And terror locked them up so tight, All through my bread and tongue at once, My hand, that held the tea-pot fast, Kept pouring, pouring, pouring o'er Till both my hose were marked with tea, I felt my visage turn from red And, 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. The captain marched as mourners march, The ensign too seemed lagging, And many more, although they were No ensigns, took to flagging- 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, Quoth I, "Since Fate ordains it so, Our hearths and homes are always things "The fools that fight abroad for home,” The mirror here confirmed me this 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 himself, The Bony of all Bonies. A horrid sight it was, and sad And then begin to clap My helmet on-ah me! it felt Like any felon's cap. My plume seemed borrowed from a hearse, An undertaker's crest My epaulettes like coffin-plates; My belt so heavy pressed, Four pipe-clay cross-roads seemed to lie At once upon my breast. My brazen breast-plate only lacked To make me like a corpse full dressed, Preparing for the vault To set up what the Poet calls My everlasting halt. This funeral show inclined me quite peace and here I am! To peace: While better lions go to war, Enjoying with the lamb A lengthened life, that might have been A martial epigram. THE FALL OF THE DEER. [FROM AN OLD MS.] Now the loud Crye is up, and harke ! The barkye Trees give back the Bark! The House Wyfe heares the merrie rout, And runnes—and lets the beere run out, Leaving her Babes to weepe-for why? She likes to heare the Deer Dogges crye, And see the wild Stag how he stretches The naturall Buck-skin of his Breeches, As well as anye Hart may wish, A RISE AT THE FATHER OF ANGLING. THE memory of Izaak Walton has hitherto floated down the stream of time without even a nibble at it; but, alas! where is the long line so pure and even that does not come sooner or later to have a weak length detected in it? The severest critic of Moliere was an old woman; and now a censor of the same sex takes upon herself to tax the immortal work of our Piscator, with holding out an evil temptation to the rising generation. Instead of concurring in the general admiration of his fascinating pictures of fishing, she boldly asserts that the rod has been the spoiling of her child; and insists that in calling the Angler gentle and inoffensive, the Author was altogether wrong in his dubbing. To render her strictures more attractive, she has thrown them into a poetical form; having probably learned by experience that a rhyme at the end of a line is a very taking bait to the generality of readers. Hark! how she rates the meek Palmer, whom Winifred Jenkins would have called "an angle upon earth." TO MR. IZAAK WALTON, AT MR. MAJOR'S THE BOOKSELLER'S, IN FLEET STREET. Mr. Walton, it's harsh to say it, but as a Parent I can't help wishing You'd been hung before you published your book, to set all the young people a fishing! There's my Robert, the trouble I've had with him it surpasses a mortal's bearing, And all through those devilish angling works-the Lord forgive me for swearing! I thought he were took with the Morbus one day, I did, with his nasty angle! |