The complete poetical works of Thomas Hood :: :: University of Virginia Library

THE LAMENT OF TOBY, THE LEARNED PIG

‘A little learning is a dangerous thing.’
—Pope.

O heavy day! oh day of woe!
To misery a poster,
Why was I ever farrow'd—why
Not spitted for a roaster?

In this world, pigs, as well as men,
Must dance to fortune's fiddlings,
But must I give the classics up,
For barley-meal and middlings?

Of what avail that I could spell
And read, just like my betters,
If I must come to this at last,
To litters, not to letters?

O, why are pigs made scholars of?
It baffles my discerning,
What griskins, fry, and chitterlings
Can have to do with learning.

349

Alas! my learning once drew cash,
But public fame's unstable,
So I must turn a pig again,
And fatten for the table.

To leave my literary line
My eyes get red and leaky;
But Giblett doesn't want me blue,
But red and white, and streaky.

Old Mullins used to cultivate
My learning like a gard'ner;
But Giblett only thinks of lard,
And not of Doctor Lardner.

He does not care about my brain
The value of two coppers,
All that he thinks about my head
Is, how I'm off for choppers.

Of all my literary kin
A farewell must be taken.
Goodbye to the poetic Hogg!
The philosophic Bacon!

Day after day my lessons fade,
My intellect gets muddy;
A trough I have, and not a desk,
A sty—and not a study!

Another little month, and then
My progress ends, like Bunyan's;
The seven sages that I loved
Will be chopp'd up with onions!

Then over head and ears in brine
They'll souse me, like a salmon,
My mathematics turn'd to brawn,
My logic into gammon.

My Hebrew will all retrograde,
Now I'm put up to fatten,
My Greek, it will all go to grease;
The Dogs will have my Latin!

Farewell to Oxford!—and to Bliss!
To Milman, Crowe, and Glossop,—
I now must be content with chats,
Instead of learned gossip!

Farewell to ‘Town!’ farewell to ‘Gown!’
I've quite outgrown the latter,—
Instead of Trencher-cap my head
Will soon be in a platter!

O why did I at Brazen-Nose
Rout up the roots of knowledge?
A butcher that can't read will kill
A pig that's been to college!

For sorrow I could stick myself,
But conscience is a clasher;
A thing that would be rash in man
In me would be a rasher!

One thing I ask—when I am dead,
And past the Stygian ditches—
And that is, let my schoolmaster
Have one of my two flitches:

'Twas he who taught my letters so
I ne'er mistook or miss'd 'em,
Simply by ringing at the nose,
According to Bell's system.

TO A BAD RIDER

I

Why, Mr. Rider, why
Your nag so ill indorse, man?
To make observers cry,
You're mounted, but no horseman?

II

With elbows out so far,
This thought you can't debar me—
Though no Dragoon—Hussar—
You're surely of the army!

III

I hope to turn M.P.
You have not any notion,
So awkward you would be
At ‘seconding a motion!’

350

MY SON AND HEIR

I

My mother bids me bind my heir,
But not the trade where I should bind;
To place a boy—the how and where—
It is the plague of parent-kind!

II

She does not hint the slightest plan,
Nor what indentures to indorse;
Whether to bind him to a man,—
Or, like Mazeppa, to a horse.

III

What line to choose of likely rise,
To something in the Stocks at last,—
‘Fast bind, fast find,’ the proverb cries,
I find I cannot bind so fast!

IV

A Statesman James can never be;
A Tailor?—there I only learn
His chief concern is cloth, and he
Is always cutting his concern.

V

A Seedsman?—I'd not have him so;
A Grocer's plum might disappoint;
A Butcher?—no, not that—although
I hear ‘the times are out of joint!’

VI

Too many of all trades there be,
Like Pedlars, each has such a pack;
A merchant selling coals?—we see
The buyer send to cellar back.

VII

A Hardware dealer?—that might please,
But if his trade's foundation leans
On spikes and nails, he won't have ease
When he retires upon his means.

VIII

A Soldier?—there he has not nerves,
A Sailor seldom lays up pelf:
A Baker?—no, a baker serves,
His customer before himself.

IX

Dresser of hair?—that's not the sort;
A Joiner jars with his desire—
A Churchman?—James is very short,
And cannot to a church aspire.

X

A Lawyer?—that's a hardish term!
A Publisher might give him ease,
If he could into Longman's firm,
Just plunge at once ‘in medias Rees.’

XI

A shop for pot, and pan, and cup,
Such brittle Stock I can't advise;
A Builder running houses up,
Their gains are stories—may be lies!

XII

A Coppersmith I can't endure—
Nor petty Usher A, B, C-ing;
A Publican, no father sure
Would be the author of his being!

XIII

A Paper-maker?—come he must
To rags before he sells a sheet—
A Miller?—all his toil is just
To make a meal—he does not eat.

XIV

A Currier?—that by favour goes—
A Chandler gives me great misgiving—
An Undertaker?—one of those
That do not hope to get their living!

XV

Three Golden Balls?—I like them not;
An Auctioneer I never did—
The victim of a slavish lot,
Obliged to do as he is bid!

351

XVI

A Broker watching fall and rise
Of Stock?—I'd rather deal in stone,—
A Printer?—there his toils comprise
Another's work beside his own.

XVII

A Cooper?—neither I nor Jim
Have any taste or turn for that—
A Fish retailer?—but with him,
One part of trade is always flat.

XVIII

A Painter?—long he would not live,—
An Artist's a precarious craft—
In trade Apothecaries give,
But very seldom take, a draught.

XIX

A Glazier?—what if he should smash!
A Crispin he shall not be made—
A Grazier may be losing cash,
Although he drives ‘a roaring trade.’

XX

Well, something must be done! to look
On all my little works around—
James is too big a boy, like book
To leave upon the shelf unbound.

XXI

But what to do?—my temples ache
From evening's dew till morning's pearl,
What course to take my boy to make—
O could I make my boy—a girl!