PARODY FOR A REFORMED PARLIAMENT.
THE quality of bribery is deep stained;
It droppeth from a hand behind the door
Into the voter's palm. It is twice dirty:
It dirts both him that gives, and him that takes.
'Tis basest in the basest, and becomes
Low blacklegs more than servants of the Crown.
Those swindlers show the force of venal power,
The attribute to trick and roguery,
Whereby 'tis managed that a bad horse wins:
But bribery is below their knavish "lay."
It is the vilest of dishonest things;
It was the attribute to Gatton's self;
And other boroughs most like Gatton show
When bribery smothers conscience. Therefore, you,
Whose conscience takes the fee, consider this-
That in the cause of just reform, you all
Should lose your franchise: we do dislike bribery;
And that dislike doth cause us to object to
The deeds of W. B.
I MET the waiter in his prime
At a magnificent hotel;
His hair, untinged by care or time,
Was oiled and brushed exceeding well.
When "waiter," was the impatient cry,
In accents growing stronger,
He seem'd to murmur "By and by,
Wait a little longer."
Within a year we met once more,
'T was in another part of town—
An humbler air the waiter wore,
I fancied he was going down.
Still, when I shouted "Waiter, bread!"
He came out rather stronger,
As if he'd say with toss of head,
"Wait a little longer."
Time takes us on through many a grade;
Of" ups and downs" I've had my run,
Passing full often through the shade
And sometimes loitering in the sun.
I and the waiter met again
At a small inn at Ongar;
Still, when I call'd, 't was almost vain-
He bade me wait the longer.
I've marked him now for many a year;
I've seen his coat more rusty grow;
His linen is less bright and clear,
His polished pumps are on the go.
Torn are, alas! his Berlin gloves-
They used to be much stronger;
The waiter's whole appearance proves
He can not wait much longer.
I sometimes see the waiter still;
'Gainst want he wages feeble strife;
He's at the bottom of the hill,
Downward has been his path through life
Of" waiter, waiter," there are cries,
Which louder grow and stronger;
'Tis to old Time he now replies,
"Wait a little longer."
THE LAST APPENDIX TO "YANKEE DOODLE."
YANKEE DOODLE sent to Town
His goods for exhibition;
Every body ran him down,
And laugh'd at his position.
They thought him all the world behind ;
A goney, muff, or noodle;
Laugh on, good people-never mind
Says quiet YANKEE DOODLE.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
YANKEE DOODLE had a craft,
A rather tidy clipper,
And he challenged, while they laughed,
The Britishers to whip her.
Their whole yacht-squadron she outsped,
And that on their own water;
Of all the lot she went a-head,
And they came nowhere arter.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
O'er Panamà there was a scheme
Long talk'd of, to pursue a
Short route-which many thought a dream--
By Lake Nicaragua.
JOHN BULL discussed the plan on foot,
With slow irresolution,
While YANKEE DOODLE went and put
It into execution.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
A steamer of the COLLINS line,
A YANKEE DOODLE's notion,
Has also quickest cut the brine
Across the Atlantic Ocean.
And British agents, no ways slow
Her merits to discover,
Have been and bought her-just to tow
The CUNARD packets over.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
Your gunsmiths of their skill may crack,
But that again don't mention:
I guess that COLTS' revolvers whack
Their very first invention.
By YANKEE DOODLE, too, you're beat
Downright in Agriculture,
With his machine for reaping wheat,
Chaw'd up as by a vulture.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
You also fancied, in your pride,
Which truly is tarnation,
Them British locks of yourn defied
The rogues of all creation;
But CHUBBS' and BRAMAH'S HOBBS has pick'd,
And you must now be view'd all
As having been completely licked
By glorious YANKEE DOODLE.
Chorus.-YANKEE DOODLE, etc.
COME Strike me the harp with its soul-stirring twang,
The drum shall reply with its hollowest bang;
Up, up in the air with the light tamborine,
And let the dull ophecleide's groan intervene;
For such is our life, lads, a chaos of sounds,
Through which the gay traveler actively bounds.
With the voice of the public the statesman must chime,
And change the key-note, boys, exactly in time;
The lawyer will coolly his client survey,
As an instrument merely whereon he can play.
Then harp, drum, and cymbals together shall clang,
With a loud-tooral lira, right tooral, bang, bang!
The Scene represents Ludgate Hill in the middle of the day; Passengers, Omnibuses, etc., etc., passing to and fro.
Meadows. I stand at last on Ludgate's famous hill;
I've traversed Farringdon's frequented vale,
I've quitted Holborn's heights-the slopes of Snow,
Where Skinner's sinuous street, with tortuous track,
Trepans the traveler toward the field of Smith;
That field, whose scents burst on the offended nose
With foulest flavor, while the thrice shocked ear,
Thrice shocked with bellowing blasphemy and blows,
Making one compound of Satanic sound,
Is stunned, in physical and moral sense.
But this is Ludgate Hill-here commerce thrives;
Here, merchants carry trade to such a height
That competition, bursting builders' bonds,
Starts from the shop, and rushing through the roof,
Unites the basement with the floors above;
Till, like a giant, that outgrows his strength,
The whole concern, struck with abrupt collapse,
In one
"tremendous failure" totters down!—
'Tis food on which philosophy may fatten.
[Turns round, musing, and looks into a shop window.
Enter PRIGWELL, talking to himself.
Prigwell. I've made a sorry day of it thus far;
I've fathomed fifty pockets, all in vain;
I've spent in omnibuses half-a-crown;
I've ransacked forty female reticules—
And nothing found-some business must be done.
|