The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore Part 214

[2] The inextenguishable fire of St. Bridget, at Kildare.

[3] "We understand that several applications have lately been made to the Protestant clergymen of this town by fellows, inquiring 'What are they giving a head for converts?'"--_Wexford Post_.

[4] Of the rook species--_Corvus frugilegus_, i.e. a great consumer of corn.

TOUT POUR LA TRIPE.

"If in China or among the natives of India, we claimed civil advantages which were connected with religious usages, little as we might value those forms in our hearts, we should think common decency required us to abstain from treating them with offensive contumely; and, though unable to consider them sacred, we would not sneer at the name of _Fot_, or laugh at the imputed divinity of _Visthnou_."--_Courier, Tuesday. Jan_. 16.

1827.

Come take my advice, never trouble your cranium, When "civil advantages" are to be gained, What G.o.d or what G.o.ddess may help to obtain you 'em, Hindoo or Chinese, so they're only obtained.

In this world (let me hint in your organ auricular) All the good things to good hypocrites fall; And he who in swallowing creeds is particular, Soon will have nothing to swallow at all.

Oh place me where _Fo_ (or, as some call him, _Fot_) Is the G.o.d from whom "civil advantages" flow, And you'll find, if there's anything snug to be got, I shall soon be on excellent terms with old _Fo_.

Or were I where _Vishnu_, that four-handed G.o.d, Is the quadruple giver of pensions and places, I own I should feel it unchristian and odd Not to find myself also in _Vishnu's_ good graces.

For among all the G.o.ds that humanely attend To our wants in this planet, the G.o.ds to _my_ wishes Are those that, like _Vishnu_ and others, descend In the form so attractive, of loaves and of fishes![1]

So take my advice--for if even the devil Should tempt men again as an idol to try him, 'Twere best for us Tories even then to be civil, As n.o.body doubts we should get something by him.

[1] Vishnu was (as Sir W. Jones calls him) "a pisciform G.o.d,"--his first Avatar being in the shape of a fish.

ENIGMA.

_monstrum nulla virtute_ redemptum.

Come, riddle-me-ree, come, riddle-me-ree, And tell me what my name may be.

I am nearly one hundred and thirty years old, And therefore no chicken, as you may suppose;-- Tho' a dwarf in my youth (as my nurses have told), I have, every year since, been out-growing my clothes: Till at last such a corpulent giant I stand, That if folks were to furnish me now with a suit, It would take every morsel of _scrip_ in the land But to measure my bulk from the head to the foot.

Hence they who maintain me, grown sick of my stature, To cover me nothing but _rags_ will supply; And the doctors declare that in due course of nature About the year 30 in rags I shall die.

Meanwhile, I stalk hungry and bloated around, An object of _interest_ most painful to all; In the warehouse, the cottage, the place I'm found, Holding citizen, peasant, and king in nay thrall.

Then riddle-me-ree, oh riddle-me-ree, Come tell me what my name may be.

When the lord of the counting-house bends o'er his book, Bright pictures of profit delighting to draw, O'er his shoulders with large cipher eyeb.a.l.l.s I look, And down drops the pen from his paralyzed paw!

When the Premier lies dreaming of dear Waterloo, And expects thro' _another_ to caper and prank it, You'd laugh did you see, when I bellow out "Boo!"

How he hides his brave Waterloo head in the blanket.

When mighty Belshazzar brims high in the hall His cup, full of gout, to the Gaul's overthrow, Lo, "_Eight Hundred Millions_" I write on the wall, And the cup falls to earth and--the gout to his toe!

But the joy of my heart is when largely I cram My maw with the fruits of the Squirearchy's acres, And knowing who made me the thing that I am, Like the monster of Frankenstein, worry my makers.

Then riddle-me-ree, come, riddle-me-ree, And tell, if thou know'st, who _I_ may be.

DOG-DAY REFLECTIONS.

BY A DANDY KEPT IN TOWN.

_"vox clamantis in deserto."_

1827.

Said Malthus one day to a clown Lying stretched on the beach in the sun,-- "What's the number of souls in this town?"-- "The number! Lord bless you, there's none.

"We have nothing but _dabs_ in this place, "Of them a great plenty there are;-- But the _soles_, please your reverence and grace, "Are all t'other side of the bar."

And so 'tis in London just now, Not a soul to be seen up or down;-- Of _dabs_? a great glut, I allow, But your _soles_, every one, out of town.

East or west nothing wondrous or new, No courts.h.i.+p or scandal worth knowing; Mrs. B---, and a Mermaid[1] or two, Are the only loose fish that are going.

Ah, where is that dear house of Peers That some weeks ago kept us merry?

Where, Eldon, art thou with thy tears?

And thou with thy sense, Londonderry?

Wise Marquis, how much the Lord Mayor, In the dog-days, with _thee_ must be puzzled!-- It being his task to take care That such animals shan't go unmuzzled.

Thou too whose political toils Are so worthy a captain of horse-- Whose amendments[2] (like honest Sir Boyle's) Are "_amendments_, that make matters _worse_;"[3]

Great Chieftain, who takest such pains To prove--what is granted, _nem_. _con_.-- With how moderate a portion of brains Some heroes contrive to get on.

And thou too my Redesdale, ah! where Is the peer with a star at his b.u.t.ton, Whose _quarters_ could ever compare With Redesdale's five quarters of mutton?[4]

Why, why have ye taken your flight, Ye diverting and dignified crew?

How ill do three farces a night, At the Haymarket, pay us for you!

For what is Bombastes to thee, My Ellenbro', when thou look'st big Or where's the burletta can be Like Lauderdale's wit and his wig?