Musa Pedestris - Three Centuries of Canting Songs and Slang Rhymes [1536 - 1896] Part 53

Douze longes de tirade, [43]

Pour un rigolade, [44]

Pour un moment d'attrait.

[1: Evening in Paris.]

[2: A good booty.]

[3: Chamber.]

[4: Full of goods.]

[5: Money in the pocket.]

[6: Without fear or uneasiness.]

[7: Without care.]

[8: An increase.]

[9: A handsome mistress.]

[10: Drinking wine without water.]

[11: Unadulterated wine.]

[12: Stockings.]

[13: Lace.]

[14: Laced hat.]

[15: Clad]

[16: Citizen]

[17: A gold watch]

[18: Dance]

[19: Following him in the boulevard.]

[20: I stun him.]

[21: I take off his s.h.i.+rt.]

[22: I steal his watch, clothes and shoes.]

[23: The receiving house.]

[24: Coward]

[25: Enters a shop.]

[26: Steals money.]

[27: They call for the guard.]

[28: I fly]

[29: Taken in the fact.]

[30: The commissary questions him.]

[31: Denounces his accomplices.]

[32: Tell a falsehood.]

[33: They tie me.]

[34: My fine bed, my loves.]

[35: The dock.]

[36: They condemn me to the galleys.]

[37: To exposure.]

[38: Old.]

[39: Rouge.]

[40: In this world.]

[41: Whatever people say.]

[42: Lot.]

[43: Twelve years of fetters.]

[44: Fool.]

Stanza II, line 2. _So gay, so nutty and so knowing_--See _Don Juan_, Canto XI, stanza ...

Stanza VI, line i. Sir Richard Birnie the chief magistrate at Bow St.

_"Nix My Doll, Pals, Fake Away"_

Ainsworth in his preface to _Rookwood_ makes the following remarks on this and the three following songs:--"As I have casually alluded to the flash song of Jerry Juniper, I may be allowed to make a few observations upon this branch of versification. It is somewhat curious with a dialect so racy, idiomatic, and plastic as our own cant, that its metrical capabilities should have been so little essayed. The French have numerous _chansons d'argot_, ranging from the time of Charles Bourdigne and Villon down to that of Vidocq and Victor Hugo, the last of whom has enlivened the horrors of his '_Dernier Jour d'un Cond.a.m.ne_" by a festive song of this cla.s.s.

The Spaniards possess a large collection of _Romances de Germania_, by various authors, amongst whom Quevedo holds a distinguished place. We on the contrary, have scarcely any slang songs of merit. This barreness is not attributable to the poverty of the soil, but to the want of due cultivation. Materials are at hand in abundance, but there have been few operators. Dekker, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Ben Jonson, have all dealt largely in this jargon, but not lyrically; and one of the earliest and best specimens of a canting-song occurs in Brome's '_Jovial Crew;_' and in the '_Adventures of Bamfylde Moore Carew_' there is a solitary ode addressed by the mendicant fraternity to their newly-elected monarch; but it has little humour, and can scarcely be called a genuine canting-song. This ode brings us down to our own time; to the effusions of the ill.u.s.trious Pierce Egan; to Tom Moore's Flights of '_Fancy;_' to John Jackson's famous chant, '_On the High Toby Spice flash the Muzzle,_' cited by Lord Byron in a note to '_Don Juan;_' and to the glorious Irish ballad, worth them all put together, ent.i.tled '_The Night before Larry was stretched_.' This is attributed to the late Dean Burrowes, of Cork. [_See_ Note, p.

220 _Ed_.]. It is worthy of note, that almost all modern aspirants to the graces of the _Musa Pedestris_ are Irishmen. Of all rhymesters of the '_Road_,' however, Dean Burrowes is, as yet, most fully ent.i.tled to the laurel. Larry is quite 'the potato!'

"I venture to affirm that I have done something more than has been accomplished by my predecessors, or contemporaries, with the significant language under consideration. I have written _a purely flash song_; of which the great and peculiar merit consists in its being utterly incomprehensible to the uninformed understanding, while its meaning must be perfectly clear and perspicuous to the practised _patterer_ of _Romany_, or _Pedler's French_. I have, moreover, been the first to introduce and naturalize amongst us a measure which, though common enough in the Argotic minstrelsy of France, has been hitherto utterly unknown to our _pedestrian_ poetry." How mistaken Ainsworth was in his claim, thus ambiguously preferred, the present volume shows. Some years after the song alluded to, better known under the t.i.tle of '_Nix my dolly, pals,--fake away!'_ sprang into extra-ordinary popularity, being set to music by Rodwell, and chanted by glorious Paul Bedford and clever little Mrs. Keeley.

_The Game Of High Toby_

and

_The Double Cross_

_See_ note to "Nix my Doll, Pals, etc.," _ante_.

_The House Breaker's Song_

G. W. M. Reynolds followed closely on the heels of d.i.c.kens when the latter scored his great success in _The Pickwick Papers_. He was a most voluminous scribbler, but none of his productions are of high literary merit.

_The Faking Boy To The c.r.a.p Is Gone_

_The Nutty Blowen_

_The Faker's New Toast_

and

_My Mother_

"Bon Gualtier" was the joint _nom-de-plume_ of W. E. Aytoun and Sir Theodore Martin. Between 1840 and 1844 they worked together in the production of _The Bon Gualtier Ballads_, which acquired such great popularity that thirteen large editions of them were called for between 1855 and 1877. They were also a.s.sociated at this time in writing many prose magazine articles of a humorous character, as well as a series of translations of Goethe's ballads and minor poems, which, after appearing in _Blackwood's Magazine_, were some years afterwards (1858) collected and published in a volume. The four pieces above mentioned appeared as stated in _Tails Edinburgh Magazine_ under the t.i.tle of "Flowers of Hemp, or the Newgate Garland," and are parodies of well-known songs.

_The High Pad's Frolic_

and

_The Dashy, Splashy.... Little Stringer_

Leman Rede (1802-47) an author of numerous successful dramatic pieces, and a contributor to the weekly and monthly journals of the day, chiefly to the _New Monthly_ and _Bentley's_. He was born in Hamburgh, his father a barrister.

Some of the best parts ever played by Liston, John Reeve, Charles Mathews, Keeley, and G. Wild were written by him.

_The Bould Yeoman_

_The Bridle-Cull and his little Pop-Gun_