The Works of John Hall-Stevenson ... Corrected and Enlarged. With Several Original Poems, Now First Printed, and Explanatory Notes. In Three Volumes |
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| I. | CANTO I. |
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 | The Works of John Hall-Stevenson |  |
218
CANTO I.
THE ARGUMENT.
A preliminary discourse—The origin of police—The divine right of kings asserted upon new principles, more suitable to the goodness of God and good sense than the old principles that are taught at Oxford—The nature of courts—The court of Heaven—The court of requests—Angels—Ministers—The bee-piper—A speech—A prayer—A curse, in which all good people are desired to join—The conclusion.
219
I never yet beheld that man,
(With all the temper that you please)
That started fair, and fairly ran
Through the old fable of the bees:
Because the verse the author chose,
If verse, like ours, be verse indeed,
Was made to introduce the prose,
But never meant to take the lead;
Whereas it should be the reverse,
The prose should be the 'squire, or usher,
To grace and wait upon the verse,
Not a competitor or pusher.
Verse ill-conducted or misplac'd,
Meets with cold treatment and distaste;
Much like a sermon, or discourse,
With which you have been tir'd and vex'd;
Neither begot in a right course
Upon the body of a text,
Made nor created, but proceeding,
Incomprehensibly from reading.
Through a variety of matter,
And learned dirt, you splash and walk,
Both for impertinence and chatter,
Like his own lady's table-talk:
But a good parson hates to poach;
All his delight is in fair sporting,
No harlot-text will he approach,
But first to scripture goes a courting:
A text by wooing he obtains,
He takes her in a proper trim,
And so begets with proper pains
A sermon sound in wind and limb.
It is a spurious production
Begot in any other shape;
Either the offspring of seduction,
Or lawless issue of a rape.
All kinds of governments that are,
That of an emperor or king,
Or of a queen like that of fairies,
Nay, even down to my lord-mayor,
Or, what's exactly the same thing,
Down even to my lady mayoress.
Accordingly the wits of Greece,
And idle poets of all nations,
Have studied bees for the police
Of kingdoms, states, and corporations:
That there are queens that rule the bees,
Has been a point agreed long since:
The learned say e'en lice and fleas
Are govern'd by a sovereign prince;
Through microscopes they plainly trace,
In vermin that escape the sight,
Monarchy and a royal race;
Nature in Kings takes such delight;
A fact that leads by steps direct,
Farther, perhaps, than you suspect;
That monarchs are of right divine
Is evidently prov'd from hence;
For Filmer's patriarchal line
Proves nothing but his want of sense:
This proves, to every apprehension,
What none but wicked Whigs condemn,
That monarchy is God's invention,
Far too ingenious for them:
But then 'twill follow full as plain,
That, as they're kings by God appointed,
All kings by the same patent reign;
Sovereigns equally anointed;
For the Creator of all creatures
Is neither fond of shape nor size,
Nor loves queen Bessy's eyes and features
More than a Spider's face and eyes;
Equally Source and God of all,
All kings are equal in his sight,
Whether the monarch's great or small,
Whether a Brunswick or a mite.
When treason spawns and traitors work,
God will weigh both in equal scales,
Whether a desperate Damien lurk
Within a rotten cheese, or at Versailles.
Kings, therefore, by God's charter reign,
Monarchy seems to be a plan,
Contriv'd to punish and restrain
Licentious insects and vain man.
Wherever there are kings and queens
There must be plenty of intrigues;
Variety of ways and means,
Enmities, jealousies, and leagues;
Both courts and Heaven, as David sings,
In waiting, place their chief ambition,
To see God's face, the queen's or king's,
Both call the Beatific Vision:
If heaven be a happier place,
There are no sexes thereabout,
No ministers but those of grace;
For all the devils are turn'd out.
Ladies, I own, one must be spiteful,
Bad as a Turk, worse than a Jew,
To think that Heaven could be delightful,
If Heaven had no place for you:
Heaven's harmony, as fools report,
Would be quite drown'd in female noise:
Heaven is not shut, like the Pope's court,
To all but priests, eunuchs and boys.
Yes, there are ladies in those bowers,
Ladies that once were made like ours;
But then they level all distinction,
Before they enter into bliss;
Each sex must suffer an extinction,
They neither marry there nor p---ss.
Our courts are the reverse of Heaven's,
In everlasting change delighting;
Always at sixes and at sevens,
Intriguing, catterwauling, fighting:
Here we abound in nought but sin,
Here peace and rest were never known;
Here all the devils are kept in,
All that have any grace are flown.
Within a hive a wand'ring drone,
Of an uncommon size and mien,
Stole by, unnotic'd, near the throne,
And struck the fancy of the queen:
When once a royal fancy's struck,
The striker never leaves it short,
Not only strikes, pushing his luck,
But kicks the proudest of the court:
'Tis not a mighty pleasant thing,
Nor much in favour of the many,
Who, though allow'd to wear a sting,
Are kick'd by creatures without any:
He kick'd them up and down by dozens,
But that which cut them to the quick,
He sent for all his dirty cozens,
And gave them liberty to kick.
Gentle or simple 'twas the same,
Once they began, all was fair game.
A humble Bee , once much in vogue,
Who in an instant could inflame;
Or, when enrag'd, the demagogue
Could make an apiary tame:
In an assembly held apart,
Display'd the wonders of his art;
First he deplor'd their present state,
Then he amus'd them with a hum,
Then he grew noisy and elate,
And rais'd their spirits like a drum:
Drummers and orators by noise,
By drumming and by elocution,
Often inspire both men and boys
With eagerness and resolution.
When their drum's brac'd, if they have skill,
They move their audience as they will.
Just so, by varying his notes,
And adding action to the tone,
He could have made them cut the throats
Both of the courtiers and the drone.
For Humble Bees to grandeur climb
By oratory humbuzzonic,
Like the great speakers of our time,
By rhetoric stentorophonic;
My dearest countrymen, said he,
Far be it from me to despise
A Drone for being not a Bee,
I hate him for not being wise;
When there's no wisdom in a guide,
When once the guide loses his way,
Whether we walk, or sail, or ride,
'Tis ten to one we go astray.
Horrid and desperatious case,
Big with terrificable woe,
If any Bees within this place
Are willingly Bee-wilder'd so,
Such Bees I heartily renounce,
However dignify'd and styled;
Such Bees must be, I do pronounce,
Bee-fooled, Bee-sotted, and Bee-guiled.
What wickedness is left undone?
What folly has not been committed?
You are not only over-run,
By stupid drones you are out-witted:
Our colonies do they not bleed?
Are not our brothers scorn'd and slighted,
Except our brethren from the Tweed,
With us mellifluously united?
Is not the cause of this well known?
You all of you know what I mean,
You know the bagpipe of the drone
Fascinates our gracious queen.
What flesh alive can bear his scheamers,
And their abominable schemes?
Or, who can listen to his dreamers,
And his interpreters of dreams?
One of his Tools try'd to be funny,
Talk'd of his savings and his sparings,
Attempted to seize all your honey,
And make you live on apple-parings;
A Drone (perdition catch his soul!)
Full of pretensions and vain-glory;
So very like a certain mole,
I cannot help telling the story :
“With intellects by nature muddy,
A Mole kept moiling under ground,
Liv'd, like Duns Scotus, in his study,
And got the name of the profound:
At last by labouring and boring
Amongst the blind and the Bee-nighted;
And, by continually poring,
He was accounted second-sighted:
His mother, a discreet old dame,
Knew well the genius of the youth;
She was not such a dupe to Fame,
To take all her reports for truth;
She left her house, she came, in short,
To judge herself of the report:
Mother, said he, by all that's bright,
I saw you tripping o'er the plain;
What a fine thing is second-sight!
'Tis the perfection of the brain.
I knew you, mother, well enough,
I heard your step an hour ago,
And smelt the fragrance of your ruff,
As I was studying below.
That you, says she, were always blind,
Was not a point that wanted clearing,
But now, alas, I also find,
You've neither feeling, smell, nor hearing,
Therefore, to keep your reputation,
Lock yourself up, my learned son,
Avoid all kind of conversation;
If you converse, you are undone.
Such is this Treasurer of yours,
Who should be sent, might I advise,
To banishment, far from our flowers,
And live on excrements with flies:
There let him, without interruption,
As a reward for his invention,
Grow sleek and wanton with corruption;
Let him enjoy a stinking pension.”
(With all the temper that you please)
That started fair, and fairly ran
Through the old fable of the bees:
Because the verse the author chose,
If verse, like ours, be verse indeed,
Was made to introduce the prose,
But never meant to take the lead;
Whereas it should be the reverse,
The prose should be the 'squire, or usher,
To grace and wait upon the verse,
Not a competitor or pusher.
Verse ill-conducted or misplac'd,
Meets with cold treatment and distaste;
Much like a sermon, or discourse,
With which you have been tir'd and vex'd;
220
Upon the body of a text,
Made nor created, but proceeding,
Incomprehensibly from reading.
Through a variety of matter,
And learned dirt, you splash and walk,
Both for impertinence and chatter,
Like his own lady's table-talk:
But a good parson hates to poach;
All his delight is in fair sporting,
No harlot-text will he approach,
But first to scripture goes a courting:
A text by wooing he obtains,
He takes her in a proper trim,
And so begets with proper pains
A sermon sound in wind and limb.
It is a spurious production
Begot in any other shape;
Either the offspring of seduction,
Or lawless issue of a rape.
All kinds of governments that are,
That of an emperor or king,
221
Nay, even down to my lord-mayor,
Or, what's exactly the same thing,
Down even to my lady mayoress.
Accordingly the wits of Greece,
And idle poets of all nations,
Have studied bees for the police
Of kingdoms, states, and corporations:
That there are queens that rule the bees,
Has been a point agreed long since:
The learned say e'en lice and fleas
Are govern'd by a sovereign prince;
Through microscopes they plainly trace,
In vermin that escape the sight,
Monarchy and a royal race;
Nature in Kings takes such delight;
A fact that leads by steps direct,
Farther, perhaps, than you suspect;
That monarchs are of right divine
Is evidently prov'd from hence;
For Filmer's patriarchal line
Proves nothing but his want of sense:
222
What none but wicked Whigs condemn,
That monarchy is God's invention,
Far too ingenious for them:
But then 'twill follow full as plain,
That, as they're kings by God appointed,
All kings by the same patent reign;
Sovereigns equally anointed;
For the Creator of all creatures
Is neither fond of shape nor size,
Nor loves queen Bessy's eyes and features
More than a Spider's face and eyes;
Equally Source and God of all,
All kings are equal in his sight,
Whether the monarch's great or small,
Whether a Brunswick or a mite.
When treason spawns and traitors work,
God will weigh both in equal scales,
Whether a desperate Damien lurk
Within a rotten cheese, or at Versailles.
Kings, therefore, by God's charter reign,
Monarchy seems to be a plan,
223
Licentious insects and vain man.
Wherever there are kings and queens
There must be plenty of intrigues;
Variety of ways and means,
Enmities, jealousies, and leagues;
Both courts and Heaven, as David sings,
In waiting, place their chief ambition,
To see God's face, the queen's or king's,
Both call the Beatific Vision:
If heaven be a happier place,
There are no sexes thereabout,
No ministers but those of grace;
For all the devils are turn'd out.
Ladies, I own, one must be spiteful,
Bad as a Turk, worse than a Jew,
To think that Heaven could be delightful,
If Heaven had no place for you:
Heaven's harmony, as fools report,
Would be quite drown'd in female noise:
Heaven is not shut, like the Pope's court,
To all but priests, eunuchs and boys.
224
Ladies that once were made like ours;
But then they level all distinction,
Before they enter into bliss;
Each sex must suffer an extinction,
They neither marry there nor p---ss.
Our courts are the reverse of Heaven's,
In everlasting change delighting;
Always at sixes and at sevens,
Intriguing, catterwauling, fighting:
Here we abound in nought but sin,
Here peace and rest were never known;
Here all the devils are kept in,
All that have any grace are flown.
Within a hive a wand'ring drone,
Of an uncommon size and mien,
Stole by, unnotic'd, near the throne,
And struck the fancy of the queen:
When once a royal fancy's struck,
The striker never leaves it short,
Not only strikes, pushing his luck,
But kicks the proudest of the court:
225
Nor much in favour of the many,
Who, though allow'd to wear a sting,
Are kick'd by creatures without any:
He kick'd them up and down by dozens,
But that which cut them to the quick,
He sent for all his dirty cozens,
And gave them liberty to kick.
Gentle or simple 'twas the same,
Once they began, all was fair game.
A humble Bee , once much in vogue,
Who in an instant could inflame;
Or, when enrag'd, the demagogue
Could make an apiary tame:
In an assembly held apart,
Display'd the wonders of his art;
First he deplor'd their present state,
Then he amus'd them with a hum,
Then he grew noisy and elate,
And rais'd their spirits like a drum:
226
By drumming and by elocution,
Often inspire both men and boys
With eagerness and resolution.
When their drum's brac'd, if they have skill,
They move their audience as they will.
Just so, by varying his notes,
And adding action to the tone,
He could have made them cut the throats
Both of the courtiers and the drone.
For Humble Bees to grandeur climb
By oratory humbuzzonic,
Like the great speakers of our time,
By rhetoric stentorophonic;
My dearest countrymen, said he,
Far be it from me to despise
A Drone for being not a Bee,
I hate him for not being wise;
When there's no wisdom in a guide,
When once the guide loses his way,
Whether we walk, or sail, or ride,
'Tis ten to one we go astray.
227
Big with terrificable woe,
If any Bees within this place
Are willingly Bee-wilder'd so,
Such Bees I heartily renounce,
However dignify'd and styled;
Such Bees must be, I do pronounce,
Bee-fooled, Bee-sotted, and Bee-guiled.
What wickedness is left undone?
What folly has not been committed?
You are not only over-run,
By stupid drones you are out-witted:
Our colonies do they not bleed?
Are not our brothers scorn'd and slighted,
Except our brethren from the Tweed,
With us mellifluously united?
Is not the cause of this well known?
You all of you know what I mean,
You know the bagpipe of the drone
Fascinates our gracious queen.
What flesh alive can bear his scheamers,
And their abominable schemes?
228
And his interpreters of dreams?
One of his Tools try'd to be funny,
Talk'd of his savings and his sparings,
Attempted to seize all your honey,
And make you live on apple-parings;
A Drone (perdition catch his soul!)
Full of pretensions and vain-glory;
So very like a certain mole,
I cannot help telling the story :
“With intellects by nature muddy,
A Mole kept moiling under ground,
Liv'd, like Duns Scotus, in his study,
And got the name of the profound:
At last by labouring and boring
Amongst the blind and the Bee-nighted;
And, by continually poring,
He was accounted second-sighted:
229
Knew well the genius of the youth;
She was not such a dupe to Fame,
To take all her reports for truth;
She left her house, she came, in short,
To judge herself of the report:
Mother, said he, by all that's bright,
I saw you tripping o'er the plain;
What a fine thing is second-sight!
'Tis the perfection of the brain.
I knew you, mother, well enough,
I heard your step an hour ago,
And smelt the fragrance of your ruff,
As I was studying below.
That you, says she, were always blind,
Was not a point that wanted clearing,
But now, alas, I also find,
You've neither feeling, smell, nor hearing,
Therefore, to keep your reputation,
Lock yourself up, my learned son,
230
If you converse, you are undone.
Such is this Treasurer of yours,
Who should be sent, might I advise,
To banishment, far from our flowers,
And live on excrements with flies:
There let him, without interruption,
As a reward for his invention,
Grow sleek and wanton with corruption;
Let him enjoy a stinking pension.”
Just gods! your kind assistance lend;
Watch and protect the royal comb!
Confound his instrument, and send
The Piper to his native home:
Dismiss his mercenary Drones,
Expose them to contempt and laughter,
And finally break all their bones,
If they attempt to enter after.
Whilst he was speaking all was quiet,
But perorating in that fashion,
They rose up like a Polish Diet,
And drew their sabres in a passion.
Had he been there in that confusion,
They were so heated with this actor,
He had not 'scap'd for a contusion,
Nor even for a simple fracture.
Watch and protect the royal comb!
Confound his instrument, and send
The Piper to his native home:
Dismiss his mercenary Drones,
Expose them to contempt and laughter,
And finally break all their bones,
If they attempt to enter after.
231
But perorating in that fashion,
They rose up like a Polish Diet,
And drew their sabres in a passion.
Had he been there in that confusion,
They were so heated with this actor,
He had not 'scap'd for a contusion,
Nor even for a simple fracture.
| The Works of John Hall-Stevenson | |