The Poetical Works of Laman Blanchard :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Races, the Races, the Races!
Wherever we turn in this life,
What still stares us all in our faces?
A race of ridiculous strife.
We all start against one another,
Unnoticed or backed by a dozen;
Each man runs a race with his brother,
Each dame with her sister or cousin.
The world is a race-course, we're told,
And mortals still keep up their paces;
Either middle-aged, youthful, or old—
So the Races, the Races, the Races!

Lay odds on the Ladies! 'Tis said
You may find it a capital spec.;
Thought man may have won by a head,
'Tis woman who wins by a neck.
Back those who, in virtues so ample,
Would forfeit the winner's renown,
Much rather than heedlessly trample
On rivals knocked up or knocked down.

284

But still hurry on through the crowd,
Whatever your gout, or your graces,
For Time is still crying aloud,
Oh! the Races, the Races, the Races!

What candidates take up their stand,
All panting and eager to start;
Some outwardly, linked hand in hand—
Some inwardly, linked heart in heart.
Some pairs seem to ride on for ever,
Some break with the very first bound;
Some smooth as the course of a river,
Some rough as macadamised ground.
Some dash on a track of their own,
And some take their ancestor's places;
Oh! who would be left quite alone,
In the Races, the Races, the Races!

See the Houses of Parliament run!
How equal—uneven—the race!
The Lower all fierceness and fun,
The Upper with gravity's pace.
This now seems to shoot far ahead,
Now that seems to suffer a check;
Which wins? Which is first? ‘Go it, Ned!’
The Houses now seem neck and neck.
Whigs, Tories, and Rads are alive,
Rare gamesters, all eager for aces;
And all three resolving to thrive
In the Races, the Races, the Races!

285

In the publishing world what a start!
The ink flows from infinite springs;
Each pen is a fast-flying dart,
And books spread their covers for wings.
A library leaps into life
At each turn of the press every day;
And there's no time to read, in the strife,
To write history, novel and play.
One treads on the other; the song,
The sermon or treatise displaces;
Prose rubs against Rhyme, in the throng
To the Races, the Races, the Races!

And ‘rapid’ is ever the word
In this life throughout all its conditions;
Death flies with the speed of a bird
From the College of Surgeons, Physicians.
The doctors and surgeons all drive
Through the town, as each day were their last,
And yet, while themselves are alive,
Their patients go off rather fast.
The lawyers are hastening meanwhile,
They run on through all sorts of cases,
And arguments spun by the mile,
To the Races, the Races, the Races!

The Theatre! say, will the rule
Apply, as it once did, to them?
Each seems to be turned to a school
For teaching what scholars condemn.

286

Yet the rule will apply; for each one
Is a true ‘moving spectacle’ still;
Though the dramas performed do not run
Quite so fast as a racer or rill.
The Church and the Chapel compete,
And each one security's basis
Presents for our wandering feet
In the Races, the Races, the Races.

But what, in the week that has fled,
Was the scene of Life's liveliest race?
Was it Epsom? Oh, no! 'twill be read
That Kensington bore off the grace.
Who started? the names—‘Caravan?’
Was it ‘Phosphorus?’ No. ‘Dardanelles!’
Or ‘Rat-trap,’ or ‘Wisdom’—which man
Had not when he backed ‘Mickle Fell's?’
Was it ‘Triolus,’ ‘Pegasus,’ ‘Critic,’
‘Hybiscus,’ ‘Mahometan’—graces
That never were yet paralytic
In Races, the Races, the Races!

Was it ‘Benedict,’ ‘Norgrove,’ or ‘Mango,’
Or, ‘Hercules (Pocket)’—Why ask?
The guess goes as far as it can go,
The fact is the easier task.
The Race was the race of three nations,
A contest of city and town,
To wreathe with the heart's aspirations
The brow that may yet bear a crown.

287

The Princess!—oh, be it impressed
On her heart, which is Britons' oasis,
That the old English race is the best,
Of the Races, the Races, the Races.

1837.