Or the advent of other great people:
Two bullocks dropped dead,

As if knocked on the head,
And barrels of stout

And ale ran about,

And the village-bells such a peal rang out,
That they cracked the village steeple.

In no time at all, like mushroom spawn,
all over the lawn;

Tables sprang up

Not furnished scantily or shabbily,

But on scale as vast

As that huge repast,

With its loads and cargoes

Of drink and botargoes,

At the birth of the babe in Rabelais.

Hundreds of men were turned into beasts,
Like the guests at Circe's horrible feasts,
By the magic of ale and cider :

And each country lass, and each country lad,
Began to caper and dance like mad,

And even some old ones appeared to have had A bite from the Naples spider.

Then as night came on,

It had scared King John,

Who considered such signs not risible,

To have seen the maroons,

And the whirling moons,
And the serpents of flame,

And wheels of the same,

That according to some were "whizzable."

O, happy Hope of the Kilmanseggs!
Thrice happy in head, and body, and legs,

That her parents had such full pockets!

12

For had she been born of want and thrift,
For care and nursing all adrift,

It's ten to one she had had to make shift
With rickets instead of rockets!

And how was the precious baby drest?
In a robe of the East, with lace of the West,
Like one of Croesus's issue-

Her best bibs were made

Of rich gold brocade,

And the others of silver tissue.

And when the baby inclined to nap
She was lulled on a Gros de Naples lap,
By a nurse in a modish Paris cap,

Of notions so exalted,

She drank nothing lower than Curaçoa,
Maraschino, or pink Noyau,

And on principle never malted.

From a golden boat, with a golden spoon,
The babe was fed night, morning, and noon;
And, although the tale seems fabulous,
"T is said her tops and bottoms were gilt,
Like the oats in that stable-yard palace built
For the horse of Heliogabalus.

And when she took to squall and kick-
For pain will wring and pins will prick
E'en the wealthiest nabob's daughter-
They gave her no vulgar Dalby or gin,
But a liquor with leaf of gold therein,
Videlicet,- Dantzic Water.

In short, she was born, and bred, and nurst.
And drest in the best from the very first,
To please the genteelest censor-

And then, as soon as strength would allow,
Was vaccinated, as babes are now,

With virus ta'en from the best-bred cow

Of Lord Althorpe's now Earl Spencer.

Wer Christening.

Though Shakspeare asks us "What's in a name?" (As if cognomens were much the same,) There's really a very great scope in it. A name?—why, was n't there Doctor Dodd, That servant at once of Mammon and God, Who found four thousand pounds and odd, a cart and a rope in it?

A prison

A name?—if the party had a voice,
What mortal would be a Bugg by choice?
As a Hogg, a Grubb, or a Chubb rejoice?
any such nauseous blazon?

Or

Not to mention many a vulgar name,

That would make a door-plate blush for shame,

If door-plates were not so brazen !

A name?

it has more than nominal worth,
And belongs to good or bad luck at birth-
As dames of a certain degree know.
In spite of his page's hat and hose,
His page's jacket, and buttons in rows,
Bob only sounds like a page of prose
Till turned into Rupertino.

Now, to christen the infant Kilmansegg,
For days and days it was quite a plague,
To hunt the list in the lexicon :

And scores were tried, like coin, by the ring,
Ere names were found just the proper thing,
For a minor rich as a Mexican.

Then cards were sent, the presence to beg
Of all the kin of Kilmansegg,

White, yellow, and brown relations :
Brothers, wardens of city halls,

And uncles rich as three golden balls
From taking pledges of nations.

Nephews, whom Fortune seemed to bewitch,
Rising in life like rockets

Nieces whose doweries knew no hitch

Aunts as certain of dying rich

As candles in golden sockets -
Cousins German, and cousins' sons,

All thriving and opulent some had tons

Of Kentish hops in their pockets!

For money had stuck to the race through life (As it did to the bushel when cash so rife Posed Ali Baba's brother's wife)

And, down to the cousins and coz-lings The fortunate brood of the Kilmanseggs, As if they had come out of golden eggs, Were all as wealthy as "goslings."

It would fill a Court Gazette to name
What east and west end people came

To the rite of Christianity;

The lofty lord and the titled dame,

All diamonds, plumes, and urbanity;
The Lordship the Mayor with his golden chain,
And two Gold Sticks, and the sheriffs twain,
Nine foreign counts, and other great men
With their orders or stars, to help M or N
To renounce all pomp and vanity.

To paint the maternal Kilmansegg
The pen of an Eastern poet would beg,

And need an elaborate sonnet;

How she sparkled with gems whenever she stirred,
And her head niddle-noddled at every word,
And seemed so happy, a paradise bird
Had nidificated upon it.

And Sir Jacob the father strutted and bowed,
And smiled to himself, and laughed aloud,
To think of his heiress and daughter
And then in his pockets he made a grope,
And then, in the fulness of joy and hope,
Seemed washing his hands with invisible soap
In imperceptible water.

He had rolled in money like pigs in mud,
Till it seemed to have entered into his blood
By some occult projection;

And his cheeks, instead of a healthy hue,
As yellow as any guinea grew,

Making the common phrase seem true

About a rich complexion.

And now came the nurse, and during a pause,
Her dead-leaf satin would fitly cause

So full of figure, so full of fuss,
As she carried about the babe to buss,
She seemed to be nothing but bustle.

A wealthy Nabob was godpapa,
And an Indian Begum was godmamma,
Whose jewels a queen might covet;
And the priest was a vicar, and dean withal
Of that temple we see with a golden ball,
And a golden cross above it.