Just at the corner, by the pastry cook's,
I heard a trowel tick against a brick.

I look'd me up, and straight a parapet

Uprose at least seven inches o'er the planks.
Joy to thee, Drury! to myself I said:

He of Blackfriars Road who hymn'd thy downfal
In loud Hosannahs, and who prophesied

That flames, like those from prostrate Solyma,
Would scorch the hand that ventured to rebuild thee,
Has proved a lying prophet. From that hour,
As leisure offer'd, close to Mr Spring's
Box-office door, I've stood and eyed the builders.
They had a plan to render less their labours;
Workmen in elder times would mount a ladder
With hodded heads, but these stretch'd forth a pole
From the wall's pinnacle, they placed a pulley
Athwart the pole, a rope athwart the pulley;
To this a basket dangled; mortar and bricks
Thus freighted, swung securely to the top,
And in the empty basket workmen twain
Precipitate, unhurt, accosted earth.

Oh! 'twas a goodly sound to hear the people Who watch'd the work, express their various thoughts!

While some believ'd it never would be finish'd,
Some on the contrary believ'd it would.

I've heard our front that faces Drury Lane Much criticised; they say 'tis vulgar brick-work, A mimic manufactory of floor-cloth.

One of the morning papers wish'd that front
Cemented like the front in Brydges-Street;
As it now looks they call it Wyatt's Mermaid,
A handsome woman with a fish's tail.

White is the steeple of St Bride's in Fleet-Street, The Albion (as its name denotes) is white; Morgan and Saunders' shop for chairs and tables Gleams like a snow-ball in the setting sun; White is Whitehall. But not St Bride's in Fleet-Street, The spotless Albion, Morgan, no, nor Saunders, Nor white Whitehall is white as Drury's face.

Oh, Mr Whitbread! fie upon you, sir!

I think

you should have built a colonnade;

When tender Beauty, looking for her coach, Protrudes her gloveless hand, perceives the shower, And draws the tippet closer round her throat,

6

1

Perchance her coach stands half a dozen off,
And, ere she mounts the step, the oozing mud
Soaks thro' her pale kid slipper. On the morrow
She coughs at breakfast, and her gruff papa

Cries, "There you go! this comes of playhouses!" To build no portico is penny wise:

Heaven grant it prove not in the end pound foolish!

Hail to thee, Drury! Queen of Theatres ! What is the Regency in Tottenham-Street, The Royal Amphitheatre of Arts,

Astley's Olympic, or the Sans Pareil,

Compared with thee? Yet when I view thee push'd
Back from the narrow street that christen'd thee,
I know not why they call thee Drury Lane.

Amid the freaks that modern fashion sanctions, It grieves me much to see live animals

Brought on the stage. Grimaldi has his rabbit,
Laurent his cat, and Bradbury his pig;

Fie on such tricks! Johnson, the machinist
Of former Drury, imitated life

Quite to the life. The elephant in Blue Beard,

Stuff'd by his hand, wound round his lithe proboscis,

As spruce as he who roar'd in Padmanaba.

Nought born on earth should die. On hackney stands
I reverence the coachman who cries "Gee,"
And spares the lash. When I behold a spider
Prey on a fly, a magpie on a worm,

Or view a Butcher with horn-handle knife
Slaughter a tender lamb as dead as mutton,
Indeed, indeed, I'm very, very sick!

[Exit hastily.

DRURY LANE HUSTINGS.

A NEW HALFPENNY BALLAD,

By a PIC NIC POET.

This is the very age of promise: To promise is most courtly and fashionable. Performance is a kind of will or testament, which argues a great sickness in his judgment that makes it.

TIMON OF ATHENS.

To be sung by Mr JOHNSTONE in the Character of LOONEY M'Twolter.

1.

MR Jack, your address, says the Prompter to me,

So I gave him my

card-no, that a'nt it, says he,

'Tis your public address. Oh! says I, never fear,

If address you are bother'd for, only look here.

[Puts on hat affectedly.

Tol de rol lol, &c.