The Ingoldsby Legends :: :: University of Virginia Library

St. Dunstan stood in his ivy'd tower,
Alembic, crucible, all were there;
When in came Nick to play him a trick,
In guise of a damsel passing fair.
Every one knows
How the story goes:
He took up the tongs and caught hold of his nose.
But I beg that you won't for a moment suppose
That I mean to go through, in detail, to you
A story at least as trite as it's true;
Nor do I intend
An instant to spend
On the tale, how he treated his monarch and friend,
When, bolting away to a chamber remote,
Inconceivably bored by his Witen-gemote,
Edwy left them all joking,
And drinking, and smoking,
So tipsily grand, they'd stand nonsense from no King,
But sent the Archbishop
Their Sovereign to fish up,

224

With a hint that perchance on his crown he might feel taps,
Unless he came back straight and took off his heel-taps.
You don't want to be plagued with the same story twice,
And may have seen this one, by W. Dyce,
In last year's Exhibition—'t was very well done,
And stood mark'd in the catalogue Four, seven, one.

You might there view the Saint, who in sable array'd is,
Coercing the Monarch away from the Ladies;
His right hand has hold of his Majesty's jerkin,
The left points to the door, and he seems to say, “Sir King,
Your most faithful Commons won't hear of your shirking;
Quit your tea, and return to your Barclai and Perkyn,
Or, by Jingo, ere morning, no longer alive, a
Sad victim you'll lie to your love for Elgiva!”

No farther to treat
Of this ungallant feat,
What I mean to do now is succinctly to paint
A particular fact in the life of the Saint,
Which somehow, for want of due care, I presume,
Has escaped the researches of Rapin and Hume,
In recounting a miracle, both of them men who a
Great deal fall short of Jaques Bishop of Genoa,
An Historian who likes deeds like these to record—
See his Aurea Legenda, by Wynkyn de Worde.

St. Dunstan stood again in his tower,
Alembic, crucible, all complete;

225

He had been standing a good half hour,
And now he utter'd the words of power,
And call'd to his Broomstick to bring him a seat.

The words of power!—and what be they
To which e'en Broomsticks bow and obey?
Why, 'twere uncommonly hard to say,
As the prelate I named has recorded none of them,
What they may be,
But I know they are three,
And ABRACADABRA, I take it, is one of them:
For I'm told that most Cabalists use that identical
Word, written thus, in what they call “a Pentacle:”

However that be,
You'll doubtless agree
It signifies little to you or to me,
As not being dabblers in Grammarye;
Still, it must be confess'd, for a Saint to repeat
Such language aloud is scarcely discreet;

226

For, as Solomon hints to folks given to chatter,
“A bird of the air may carry the matter;”
And, in sooth,
From my youth
I remember a truth
Insisted on much in my earlier years,
To wit, “Little Pitchers have very long ears!”
Now, just such a “Pitcher” as those I allude to
Was outside the door, which his “ears” appear'd glued to.

Peter, the Lay-brother, meagre and thin,
Five feet one in his sandal-shoon,
While the Saint thought him sleeping,
Was listening and peeping,
And watching his master the whole afternoon.

This Peter the Saint had pick'd out from his fellows,
To look to his fire, and to blow with the bellows,
To put on the Wall's-Ends and Lambton's whenever he
Chose to indulge in a little orfeverie;
For, of course, you have read
That St. Dunstan was bred
A Goldsmith, and never quite gave up the trade;
The Company—richest in London, 'tis said—
Acknowledge him still as their Patron and Head;
Nor is it so long
Since a capital song
In his praise—now recorded their archives among—
Delighted the noble and dignified throng
Of their guests, who, the newspapers told the whole town,
With cheers “pledged the wine-cup to Dunstan's renown,”
When Lord Lyndhurst, The Duke, and Sir Robert, were dining,
At the Hall some time since with the Prime Warden Twining.

227

I am sadly digressing—a fault which sometimes
One can hardly avoid in these gossiping rhymes—
A slight deviation's forgiven; but then this is
Too long, I fear, for a decent parenthesis,
So I'll rein up my Pegasus sharp, and retreat, or
You'll think I've forgotten the Lay-brother Peter,
Whom the Saint, as I said,
Kept to turn down his bed,
Dress his palfreys and cobs,
And do other odd jobs,—
As reducing to writing
Whatever he might, in
The course of the day or the night, be inditing,
And cleaning the plate of his mitre with whiting;
Performing, in short, all those duties and offices
Abbots exact from Lay-brothers and Novices.

It occurs to me here
You'll perhaps think it queer
That St. Dunstan should have such a personage near,
When he'd only to say
Those words,—be what they may,—
And his Broomstick at once his commands would obey.—
That's true—but the fact is
'Twas rarely his practice
Such aid to resort to, or such means apply,
Unless he'd some “dignified knot” to untie,
Adopting, though sometimes, as now, he'd reverse it,
Old Horace's maxim, “Nec Broomstick intersit.”
Peter, the Lay-brother, meagre and thin,
Heard all the Saint was saying within;
Peter, the Lay-brother, sallow and spare,
Peep'd through the key-hole, and—what saw he there?—
Why,—A Broomstick BRINGING A RUSH-BOTTOM'D CHAIR!

228

What Shakspeare observes, in his play of King John,
Is undoubtedly right,
That “ofttimes the sight
Of means to do ill deeds will make ill deeds done.”

Here's Peter, the Lay-brother, pale-faced and meagre,
A good sort of man, only rather too eager
To listen to what other people are saying,
When he ought to be minding his business, or praying,
Gets into a scrape,—and an awkward one too,
As you'll find, if you've patience enough to go through
The whole of the story
I'm laying before ye,
Entirely from having “the means” in his view
Of doing a thing which he ought not to do!

Still rings in his ear
Distinct and clear
Abracadabra! that word of fear!
And the two which I never yet happen'd to hear.
Still doth he spy
With Fancy's eye
The Broomstick at work, and the Saint standing by;
And he chuckles, and says to himself with glee,
“Aha! that Broomstick shall work for me!”

Hark!—that swell
O'er flood and o'er fell,
Mountain, and dingle, and moss-cover'd dell!
List!—'tis the sound of the Compline bell,
And St. Dunstan is quitting his ivy'd cell;
Peter, I wot,
Is off like a shot,
Or a little dog scalded by something that's hot,
For he hears his Master approaching the spot

229

Where he'd listen'd so long, though he knew he ought not:
Peter remember'd his Master's frown—
He trembled—he'd not have been caught for a crown;
Howe'er you may laugh,
He had rather, by half,
Have run up to the top of the tower and jump'd down.

St. Jingo, or Gengo (Gengulphus), sometimes styled ``The LivingJingo,” from the great tenaciousness of vitality exhibited by his severed members. See his Legend, as recorded in p. 237 of the present volume.