Old Grimes is dead, that good old man,—
We ne’er shall see him more;
He used to wear a long black coat,
All buttoned down before.
His heart was open as the day,
His feelings all were true;
His hair was some inclined to gray,—
He wore it in a queue.
Whene’er he heard the voice of pain,
His breast with pity...
Good people all, with one accord,
Lament for Madam Blaize;
Who never wanted a good word—
From those who spoke her praise.
The needy seldom passed her door,
And always found her kind;
She freely lent to all the poor—
Who left a pledge behind.
She strove the neighborhood to please,
With manner wondrous winning...
From “a Fable for Critics”
LET us glance for a moment, ’t is well worth the pains,
And note what an average grave-yard contains;
There lie levellers levelled, duns done up themselves,
There are booksellers finally laid on their shelves,
Horizontally there lie upright politicians,
Dose-a-dose with their patients sleep faultless physicians,
...
A Pathetic Ballad
BEN BATTLE was a soldier bold,
And used to war’s alarms;
But a cannon-ball took off his legs,
So he laid down his arms.
Now as they bore him off the field,
Said he, “Let others shoot;
For here I leave my second leg,
And the Forty-second Foot.”
The army-surgeons made him limbs:
Said he...
Young Ben he was a nice young man,
A carpenter by trade;
And he fell in love with Sally Brown,
That was a lady’s maid.
But as they fetched a walk one day,
They met a press-gang crew;
And Sally she did faint away,
Whilst Ben he was brought to.
The boatswain swore with wicked words
Enough to shock a saint,...
Mr. Orator PUFF had two tones in his voice,
The one squeaking thus, and the other down so;
In each sentence he uttered he gave you your choice,
For one half was B alt, and the rest G below.
O! O! Orator Puff,
One voice for an orator ’s surely enough.
But he still talked away, spite of coughs and of frowns,
So distracting...
In Broad Street building (on a winter night),
Snug by his parlor-fire, a gouty wight
Sat all alone, with one hand rubbing
His feet rolled up in fleecy hose:
With t’ other he ’d beneath his nose
The Public Ledger, in whose columns grubbing,
He noted all the sales of hops,
Ships, shops, and slops;
Gum, galls, and groceries;...
Showing How He Went Farther Than He Intended, and Came Safe Home Again
JOHN GILPIN was a citizen
Of credit and renown,
A trainband captain eke was he
Of famous London town.
John Gilpin’s spouse said to her dear—
“Though wedded we have been
These twice ten tedious years, yet we
No holiday have seen.
“To-morrow...
Cologne
IN Köln, a town of monks and bones,
And pavements fanged with murderous stones,
And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches,—
I counted two-and-seventy stenches,
All well-defined and several stinks!
Ye nymphs that reign o’er sewers and sinks,
The river Rhine, it is well known,
Doth wash your city of Cologne;
But tell me...
A Fellow in a market-town,
Most musical, cried razors up and down,
And offered twelve for eighteen pence;
Which certainly seemed wondrous cheap,
And, for the money, quite a heap,
As every man would buy, with cash and sense.
A country bumpkin the great offer heard,—
Poor Hodge, who suffered by a broad black beard,
That seemed...
