The Works of Thomas Love Peacock

Falstaff.
Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound.

Shallow.
Ay, marry, Sir John, which I beseech you to let me have home with me.

Shakspeare.

Perez.
Who's that is cheated? Speak again, thou vision.

Cacafogo.
I'll let thee know I am cheated, cheated damnably.

Beaumont and Fletcher.

101

PAN IN TOWN

[_]

(Metrum Ithyphallicum cum anacrusi.)

Falstaff.
If any man will caper with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him.

Pan and Chorus of Citizens.
Pan.
The Country banks are breaking:
The London banks are shaking:
Suspicion is awaking:
E'en quakers now are quaking:
Experience seems to settle,
That paper is not metal,
And promises of payment
Are neither food nor raiment;
Then, since that, one and all, you
Are fellows of no value

102

For genius, learning, spirit,
Or any kind of merit
That mortals call substantial,
Excepting the financial,
(Which means the art of robbing
By huckstering and jobbing,
And sharing gulls and gudgeons
Among muckworms and curmudgeons)
Being each a flimsy funny
On the stream of paper money,
All riding by sheet anchors,
Of balances at Bankers;
Look out! for squalls are coming,
That if you stand hum-drumming,
Will burst with vengeance speedy,
And leave you like the needy
Who have felt your clutches greedy,
All beggarly and seedy
And not worth a maravedi.

Chorus.
Our balances, our balances,
Our balances, our balances:
Our balances we crave for:
Our balances we rave for:
Our balances we rush for:
Our balances we crush for:
Our balances we call for:
Our balances we bawl for:
Our balances we run for:
Our balances we dun for:

103

Our balances we pour for:
Our balances we roar for:
Our balances we shout for:
Our balances we rout for:
Our balances, our balances,
We bellow all about for.

Obadiah Nine-eyes.
The mighty men of Gad, yea,
Are all upon the pad, yea,
Bellowing with lungs all brazen,
Even like the bulls of Basan;
With carnal noise and shout, yea,
They compass me about, yea;
I am full of tribulation
For the sinful generation;
I shrink from the abiding
Of the wrath of their back-sliding;
Lest my feet should be up-tripp-ed,
And my outward man be stripp-ed,
And my pockets be out-clean-ed
Of the fruits which I have glean-ed.

Chorus.
Our balances, our balances,
Our balances, our balances,
Pay—pay—pay—pay—
Without delay—
Our balances, our balances.

104

Mac Fungus.
A weel sirs, what's the matter?
An' hegh sirs, what's the clatter?
Ye dinna ken,
Ye seely men,
Y'ur fortunes ne'er were batter.
There's too much population,
An' too much cultivation,
An' too much circulation,
That's a' that ails the nation.
Ye're only out o' halth, sirs,
Wi' a plathora o' walth, sirs,
Instead of glourin' hither,
Ye'd batter, I conjacture,
Just hoot awa' thegither,
To hear our braw chiel lacture:
His ecoonoomic science
Wad silence a' your clanking,
An' teach you some reliance,
On the preenciples o' banking.

Chorus.
Our balances, our balances,
Our balances, our balances.

Sir Roger Rednose (Banker).
Be quiet, lads, and steady,
Suspend this idle racket,
Your balances are ready,
Each wrapped in separate packet,

105

All ticketed and docketed,
And ready to be pocketed.

First Citizen.
As of cash you've such a heap, sir,
My balance you may keep, sir;
Have troubled you I shouldn't,
Except in the belief
That you couldn't pay or wouldn't.

[Exit.
Sir Roger Rednose.
Now there's a pretty thief.
(A scroll appears over a door.)
“Tick, Nick, Tick, Trick, and Company,
Are deeply grieved to say,
They are under the necessity
Of suspending for the day.”

Second Citizen.
This evil I portended.

Third Citizen.
Now all my hopes are ended.

Fourth Citizen.
I'm quite aground.

Fifth Citizen.
I'm all astound.

Sixth Citizen.
Would they were all suspended.

106

Chorus.
Our balances, our balances,
Our balances, our balances,
Pay, pay, pay, pay,
Without delay,
Lest ere to-morrow morning
To pot you go;
Tick, Nick, and Co.
Have given us all a warning.

Sir Flimsy Kite.
Sirs, we must stop;
We shut up shop,
Though assets here are plenty.
When up we're wound,
For every pound
We'll pay you shillings twenty.

Seventh Citizen.
What assets, sir, I pray you?

Sir Flimsy Kite.
Sir, quite enough to pay you.

Eighth Citizen.
May it please you to say what, sir?

Sir Flimsy Kite.
Good bills a monstrous lot, sir;
And Spanish Bonds a store, sir;
And Mining Shares still more, sir;

107

Columbian Scrip, and Chilian;
And Poyais half a million:
And what will make you sleek, sir,
Fine picking from the Greek, sir.

Ninth Citizen.
I think it will appear, sir,
The greatest Greek is here, sir.

Sentimental Cockney.
Oh how can Plutus deal so
By his devout adorer?

Nervous Cockney.
This hubbub makes me feel so.

Fancy Cockney.
Now this I call a floorer.

Newspaper Man.
The respectable old firm,
(We have much concern in saying,)
Kite, Grubbings, and Muckworm,
Have been forced to leave off paying.

Bystander.
The loser and the winner,
The dupe and the impostor,
May now both go to dinner
With Humphrey, Duke of Glo'ster.

108

Lawyer.
That we the fruits may pocket,
Let's go and strike a docket.

Chorus.
Da Capo.
Our balances, our balances,
Our balances, our balances.

Sir Roger Rednose.
Some are gone to-day,
More will go to-morrow:
But I will stay and pay,
And neither beg nor borrow,
Tick and Kite,
That looked so bright,
Like champagne froth have flown, sirs;
But I can tell
They both worked well
While well was let alone, sirs.

Pan, it may be necessary to tell the citizens, is the author of “Panic Terrors.” The Cockney poet, who entitled a poem The Universal Pan, which began with “Not in the town am I”; a most original demonstration of his universality; has had a good opportunity, since he wrote that poem, of seeing that Pan can be in town sometimes. Perhaps, according to his Mythology, the Pan in town was the Sylvan Pan; a fashionable arrival for the season.

The Nine-eyes or Lamprey is distinguished for its power of suction.

THE THREE LITTLE MEN

“Base is the slave that pays.” —Pistol.

There were Three Little Men,
And they made a Little Pen,
And they said, “Little Pen, you must flow, flow, flow,
And write our names away
Under promises to pay,
Which how we are to keep we do not know.”

109

Then said the Little Pen:—
“My pretty Little Men,
If you wish your pretty promises to pass, pass, pass,
You must make a little flash,
And parade a little cash,
And you're sure of every neighbour that's an ass, ass, ass.”

Then said the Little Three,
“If wiseacres there be,
They are not the sort of folks for me, me, me.
Let us have but all the fools,
And the wise ones and their rules
May just go to the devil and be d---, d---, d---.”

Then the Little Men so gay,
Wrote their promises to pay,
And lived for many moons royally, ly, ly,
Till there came a stormy day,
And they vanished all away,
Leaving many shoals of gudgeons high and dry, dry, dry.

They who sought the Little Men,
Only found the Little Pen,
Which they instantly proceeded to condemn, demn, demn;
“But,” said the Little Pen,
“Use me like the Little Men,
And I'll make you as good money as I made for them.”

The seekers with long faces,
Returned upon their traces,

110

They carried in the van the Little Pen, Pen, Pen;
And they hung it on the wall
Of their reverend Town-hall,
As an eloquent memorial of the Little Men.

PROŒMIUM OF AN EPIC

WHICH WILL SHORTLY APPEAR IN QUARTO, UNDER THE TITLE OF “FLY-BY-NIGHT,” By R--- S---, Esq., Poet Laureate.

“His promises were, as he once was, mighty;
And his performance, as he is now, nothing.”
Hen. VIII.

How troublesome is day!
It calls us from our sleep away;
It bids us from our pleasant dreams awake,
And sends us forth to keep or break
Our promises to pay.
How troublesome is day!

Now listen to my lay;
Much have I said,
Which few have heard or read,
And much have I to say,
Which hear ye while ye may.
Come listen to my lay,
Come, for ye know me, as a man
Who always praises, as he can,
All promisers to pay.

111

So they and I on terms agree,
And they but keep their faith with me,
Whate'er their deeds to others be,
They may to the minutest particle
Command my fingers for an ode or article.

Come listen while I strike the Epic string,
And, as a changeful song I sing,
Before my eyes
Bid changeful Proteus rise,
Turning his coat and skin in countless forms and dyes.

Come listen to my lay,
While I the wild and wondrous tale array,
How Fly-by-Night went down,
And set a bank up in a country town;
How like a king his head he reared;
And how the Coast of Cash he cleared;
And how one night he disappeared,
When many a scoffer jibed and jeered;
And many an old man rent his beard;
And many a young man cursed and railed;
And many a woman wept and wailed;
And many a mighty heart was quailed;
And many a wretch was caged and gaoled:
Because great Fly-by-Night had failed.
And many a miserable sinner
Went without his Sunday dinner,
Because he had not metal bright,
And waved in vain before the butcher's sight,
The promises of Fly-by-Night.

112

And little Jackey Horner
Sate sulking in the corner,
And in default of Christmas pie
Whereon his little thumb to try,
He put his finger in his eye,
And blubbered long and lustily.

Come listen to my lay,
And ye shall say,
That never tale of errant knight,
Or captive damsel bright,
Demon, or elf, or goblin sprite,
Fierce crusade, or feudal fight,
Or cloistral phantom all in white,
Or castle on accessless height,
Upreared by necromantic might,
Was half so full of rare delight,
As this whereof I now prolong,
The memory in immortal song—
The wild and wondrous tale of Fly-by-Night.

113

A MOOD OF MY OWN MIND,

OCCURRING DURING A GALE OF WIND AT MIDNIGHT, WHILE I WAS WRITING A PAPER ON THE CURRENCY, BY THE LIGHT OF TWO MOULD CANDLES.

By W. W., Esq., Distributor of Stamps.

“Quid distent æra lupinis?” —Hor.

Much grieved am I in spirit by the news of this day's post,
Which tells me of the devil to pay with the paper money host:
'Tis feared that out of all their mass of promises to pay,
The devil alone will get his due: he'll take them at his day.

I have a pleasant little nook secured from colds and damps,
From whence to paper money men I serve out many stamps;
From thence a fair percentage gilds my dwelling in the glen;
And therefore do I sympathise with the paper money men.

I muse, I muse, for much this news my spirit doth perplex,
But whilst I muse I can't refuse a pint of double X,

114

Which Mrs. W. brings to me, which she herself did brew,
Oh! doubly sweet is double X from Mistress double U.

The storm is on the mountain side, the wind is all around;
It sweeps across the lake and vale, it makes a mighty sound:
A rushing sound, that makes me think of what I've heard at sea,
“The devil in a gale of wind is as busy as a bee.”

I fear the devil is busy now with the paper money men:
I listen to the tempest's roar through mountain pass and glen;
I hear amid the eddying blast a sound among the hills,
Which to my fancy seems the sound of bursting paper mills.

A money-grinding paper mill blows up with such a sound,
As shakes the green geese from their nests for many miles around;
Oh woe to him who seeks the mill pronouncing sternly “Pay!”
A spell like “open sesame” which evil sprites obey.

115

The word of power up-blows the mill, the miller disappears:
The shattered fragments fall in showers about the intruder's ears;
And leave no trace to mark the place of what appeared so great,
But shreds of rags, and ends of quills, and bits of copper-plate.

I love the paper money, and the paper money men;
My hundred, if they go to pot, I fear would sink to ten;
The country squires would cry “Retrench!” and then I might no doubt,
Be sent about my business; yea, even right about.

I hold the paper money men say truly, when they say
They ought to pay their promises, with promises to pay;
And he is an unrighteous judge, who says they shall or may,
Be made to keep their promises in any other way.

The paper money goes about, by one, and two, and five,
A circulation like the blood, that keeps the land alive:
It pays the rent of country squires, and makes them think they thrive,
When else they might be lighting fires to smoke the loyal hive.

116

The paper money goes about: it works extremely well:
I find it buys me every thing that people have to sell:
Bread, beef, and breeches, coals and wine, and all good things in store,
The paper money buys for me: and what could gold do more?

The promise works extremely well, so that it be but broken:
'Tis not a promise to be kept, but a solemn type and token,
A type of value gone abroad on travel long ago;
And how it's to come back again, God knows, I do not know.

If ignorant impatience makes the people run for gold,
Whatever's left that paper bought must be put up and sold;
If so, perhaps they'll put up me as a purchase of the Crown;
I fear I shan't fetch sixpence, but I'm sure to be knock'd down.

The promise is not to be kept, that point is very clear;
'Twas proved so by a Scotch adept who dined with me last year,
I wish instead of viands rare, which were but thrown away,
I had dined him on a bill of fare, to be eaten at Doomsday.

117

God save the paper money and the paper money men!
God save them all from those who call to have their gold again;
God send they may be always safe against a reckoning day;
And then, God send me plenty of their promises to pay!

LOVE AND THE FLIMSIES

By T. M., Esq.

Ο δ' Ερως, χιτωνα δησας
Ψ(περ αυχενος ΠΑΠΨΡΩι.
—Anacr.

Little Cupid one day on a sunbeam was floating,
Above a green vale where a paper-mill played;
And he hovered in ether, delightedly noting
The whirl and the splash that the water-wheel made.

The air was all filled with the scent of the roses,
Round the miller's viranda that clustered and twined;
And he thought if the sky were all made up of noses,
This spot of the earth would be most to its mind.

And forth came the miller, a quaker in verity,
Rigid of limb and complacent of face,
And behind him a Scotchman was singing “Prosperity,”
And picking his pocket with infinite grace.

118

And “Walth and prosparity,” “Walth and prosparity,”
His bonny Scotch burthen arose on the air,
To a song all in praise of that primitive charity,
Which begins with sweet home and which terminates there.

But sudden a tumult arose from a distance,
And in rushed a rabble with steel and with stone,
And ere the scared miller could call for assistance,
The mill to a million of atoms was blown.

Scarce mounted the fragments in ether to hurtle,
When the quaker was vanished no eye had seen where;
And the Scotchman thrown flat on his back like a turtle,
Was sprawling and bawling with heels in the air.

Little Cupid continued to hover and flutter,
Pursuing the fragments that floated on high,
As light as the fly that is christened from butter,
Till he gathered his handsfull and flew to the sky.

“Oh mother,” he cried, as he shewed them to Venus,
“What are these little talismans cyphered—One—One?
If you think them worth having we'll share them between us,
Though their smell is like, none of the newest, poor John.”

119

“My darling,” says Venus, “away from you throw them,
They're a sort of fool's gold among mortals 'tis true;
But we want them not here, though I think you might know them,
Since on earth they so often have bought and sold you.”

THE WISE MEN OF GOTHAM

By S. T. C., Esq., Professor of Mysticism.

ΣΚΙΑΣ ΟΝΑΡ.
—Pindar.

In a bowl to sea went wise men three,
On a brilliant night of June:
They carried a net, and their hearts were set
On fishing up the moon.

The sea was calm, the air was balm,
Not a breath stirred low or high,
And the moon, I trow, lay as bright below,
And as round as in the sky.

The wise men with the current went,
Nor paddle nor oar had they,
And still as the grave they went on the wave,
That they might not disturb their prey.

Far, far at sea, were the wise men three,
When their fishing net they threw;

120

And at the throw, the moon below
In a thousand fragments flew.

The sea was bright with the dancing light
Of a million million gleams,
Which the broken moon shot forth as soon
As the net disturbed her beams.

They drew in their net: it was empty and wet,
And they had lost their pain,
Soon ceased the play of each dancing ray,
And the image was round again.

Three times they threw, three times they drew,
And all the while were mute;
And ever anew their wonder grew,
Till they could not but dispute.

Their silence they broke, and each one spoke
Full long, and loud, and clear;
A man at sea their voices three
Full three leagues off might hear.

The three wise men got home again
To their children and their wives:
But touching their trip, and their net's vain dip,
They disputed all their lives.

The wise men three could never agree,
Why they missed the promised boon;
They agreed alone that their net they had thrown,
And they had not caught the moon.

121

I have thought myself pale o'er this ancient tale,
And its sense I could not ken;
But now I see that the wise men three
Were paper-money men.

“Rub a dub dub, three men in a tub,”
Is a mystic burthen old,
Which I've pondered about till my fire went out,
And I could not sleep for cold.

I now divine each mystic sign,
Which robbed me oft of sleep,
Three men in a bowl, who went to troll,
For the moon in the midnight deep.

Three men were they who science drank
From Scottish fountains free;
The cash they sank in the Gotham bank,
Was the moon beneath the sea.

The breaking of the imaged moon,
At the fishing-net's first splash,
Was the breaking of the bank as soon
As the wise men claimed their cash.

The dispute which lasted all their lives,
Was the economic strife,
Which the son's son's son of every one
Will maintain through all his life.

The son's son's sons will baffled be,
As were their sires of old;

122

But they'll only agree, like the wise men three,
That they could not get their gold.

And they'll build systems dark and deep,
And systems broad and high;
But two of three will never agree
About the reason why.

And he who at this day will seek
The Economic Club,
Will find at least three sages there,
As ready as any that ever were
To go to sea in a tub.

CHORUS OF BUBBLE BUYERS

“When these practisers come to the last decoction, blow, blow, puff, puff, and all flies in fumo. Poor wretches! I rather pity their folly and indiscretion, than their loss of time and money: for these may be restored by industry: but to be a fool born is a disease incurable.” Ben Jonson's Volpone.

Oh! where are the hopes we have met in a morning,
As we hustled and bustled around Capel Court?
When we laughed at the croakers that bade us take warning,
Who once were our scorn and now make us their sport.

Oh! where are the regions where well-paid inspectors
Found metals omnigenous streaked and emboss'd?

123

So kindly bought for us by honest directors,
Who charged us but three times as much as they cost.

Oh! where are the riches that bubbled like fountains,
In places we neither could utter nor spell,
A thousand miles inland mid untrodden mountains,
Where silver and gold grew like heath and blue-bell?

Oh! where are the lakes overflowing with treasure?
The gold-dust that rolled in each torrent and stream?
The mines that held water by cubic-mile measure,
So easily pumped up by portable steam?

That water our prospects a damp could not throw on;
We had only a million-horse power to prepare,
Make a thousand-mile road for the engine to go on,
And send coals from Newcastle to boil it when there.

Oh! where are the bridges to span the Atlantic?
Oh! where is the gas to illumine the poles?
They came to our visions; that makes us half frantic:
They came to our pockets; that touches our souls.

124

Oh! there is the seat of most exquisite feeling:
The first pair of nerves to the pocket doth dive:
A wound in our hearts would be no time in healing,
But a wound in our pockets how can we survive?

Now curst be the projects, and curst the projectors,
And curst be the bubbles before us that rolled,
Which, bursting, have left us like desolate spectres,
Bewailing our bodies of paper and gold.

For what is a man but his coat and his breeches,
His plate and his linen, his land and his house?
Oh! we had been men had we won our mock riches,
But now we are ghosts, each as poor as a mouse.

But shades as we are, we, with shadowy bubbles,
When the midnight bell tolls will through Capel Court glide,
And the dream of the Jew shall be turmoils and troubles,
When he sees each pale ghost on its bubble astride.

And the lecturing Scots that upheld the delusion,
By prating of paper, and wealth, and free trade,
Shall see us by night to their awe and confusion,
Grim phantoms of wrath that shall never be laid.

125

A BORDER BALLAD

BY AN ENCHANTER UNKNOWN

“The Scot, to rival realms a mighty bar,
Here fixed his mountain home: a wide domain,
And rich the soil, had purple heath been grain:
But what the niggard ground of wealth denied,
From fields more blest his fearless arm supplied.”
Leyden.

The Scotts, Kerrs, and Murrays, and Deloraines all,
The Hughies o' Hawdon, and Wills-o'-the-Wall,
The Willimondswicks, and the hard-riding Dicks,
Are stanch to the last to their old border tricks;
Wine flows not from heath, and bread grinds not from stone,
They must reeve for their living, or life they'll have none.

When the Southron's strong arm, with the steel and the law,
Had tamed the Moss-troopers, so bonny and braw;
Though spiders wove webs in the rusty sword-hilt,
In the niche of the hall which their forefathers built;
Yet with sly paper credit and promise to pay,
They still drove the trade which the wise call convey.

They whitewashed the front of their old border fort;
They widened its loop-holes, and opened its court;

126

They put in sash-windows where none were before,
And they wrote the word “Bank” o'er the new-painted door;
The cross-bow and matchlock aside they did lay,
And they shot the stout Southron with promise to pay.

They shot him from far and they shot him from near,
And they laid him as flat as their fathers laid deer:
Their fathers were heroes, though some called them thieves
When they ransacked their dwellings and drove off their beeves;
But craft undermined what force battered in vain,
And the pride of the Southron was stretched on the plain.

Now joy to the Hughies and Willies so bold!
The Southron, like Dickon, is bought and is sold;
To his goods and his chattels, his house and his land,
Their promise to pay is as Harlequin's wand:
A touch and a word, and pass, presto, begone,
The Southron has lost and the Willies have won.

The Hughies and Willies may lead a glad life:
They reap without sowing, they win without strife:
The Bruce and the Wallace were sturdy and fierce,
But where Scotch steel was broken Scotch paper can pierce;
And the true meed of conquest our minstrels shall fix,
On the promise to pay of our Willimondswicks.

Steal! odious is the word—convey the wise it call. Pistol.

127

ST. PETER OF SCOTLAND

“Si bene calculum ponas, ubique naufragium est.” Petronius Arbiter.

St. Peter of Scotland set sail with a crew
Of philosophers picked from the Bluecap Review:
His boat was of paper, old rags were her freight,
And her bottom was sheathed with a spruce copperplate.

Her mast was a quill, and to catch the fair gale
The broad grey goose feather was spread for a sail;
So he ploughed his blithe way through the surge and the spray,
And the name of his boat was the Promise-to-Pay.

And swiftly and gaily she went on her track,
As if she could never be taken a-back,
As if in her progress there never could be
A chop of the wind or a swell of the sea.

She was but a fair-weather vessel, in sooth,
For winds that were gentle, and waves that were smooth;
She was built not for storm, she was armed not for strife,
But in her St. Peter risked fortune and life.

His fortune, 'tis true, was but bundles of rag,
That no pedlar, not Scotch, would have put in his bag;

128

The worth of his life none could know but the few
Who insured it on sailing from sweet Edinbroo'.

St. Peter seemed daft, and he laughed and he quaffed;
But an ill-boding wave struck his vessel right aft:
It stove in his quarters and swamped his frail boat,
Which sunk with an eddy and left him afloat.

He clung to his goose-quill and floated all night,
And he landed at daybreak in pitiful plight;
And he preached a discourse when he reached the good town,
To prove that his vessel should not have gone down.

The nautical science he took for his guide
Allowed no such force as the wind or the tide:
None but blockheads could think such a science o'erthrown,
By the breath of a gale which ought not to have blown.

LAMENT OF SCOTCH ECONOMISTS ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE ONE-POUND NOTES

“Do not halloo before you are out of the wood.” Castlereagh, of blessed memory.

Oh hone-a-rie! Oh hone-a-rie!
The pride of paper's reign is o'er,
And fall'n the flower of credit's tree:
We ne'er shall see a flimsy more.

129

Oh! sprung from great I-will-not-pay,
The chief that never feared a dun,
How hopeful was thy ne'er-come-day,
How comely thy symbolic One!

The country loons with wonder saw
The magic type perform its rounds,
Transforming many a man of straw
To men of many thousand pounds.

For northern lads blithe days were those;
They wanted neither beef nor ale,
Surprised their toes with shoes and hose,
And made Scotch broo' of English cail.

Oh! Johnny Groat, we little thought,
Tow'rds thee our noses e'er would point;
But flimsies burned, and cash returned,
Will put said noses out of joint.

Improvements vast will then be past:
The march of mind will backward lead;
For how can mind be left behind,
When we march back across the Tweed?

Scotch logic floats on one-pound notes:
When rags are cash our shirts are ore:
What else would go to scare the crow,
Becomes a myriad pounds and more.

A scarecrow's suit would furnish forth
A good Scotch bank's whole stock in trade:
The wig, for coinage nothing worth,
Might “surplus capital” be made.

130

Oh! happy land, by Scotchmen taught!
Thy fate was then indeed divine,
When every scarecrow's pole was thought
A true Real del Monte mine.

Oh mystic One, that turned out None,
When senseless panic pressed thee hard!
Who thee could hold and call out “Gold!”
Would he had feathered been and tarred.

Thy little fly-wheel kept in play
The mighty money-grinding mill;
When thou art rashly torn away,
The whole machine will stand stock still.

The host of promisers to pay
That fill their jugs on credit's hill,
Will each roll down and crack his crown,
As certainly as Jack and Jill.

And we, God knows, may doff our hose
And sell our shoes for what they're worth,
And trudge again with naked toes
Back to our land of Nod, the north.

For, should we strain our lecturing throats,
We might to walls and doors discuss:
When John Bull sees through one-pound notes,
'Tis very clear he'll see through us.

That rare hotch-potch, the College Scotch,
Reared by our art in London town,
Will be at best a standing jest,
At least until it tumbles down.

131

Of those day-dreams, our free-trade schemes,
That laid in sippets goslings green,
The world will think less brain than drink
In skulls that hatched them must have been.

Then farewell shirts, and breeks, and coats,
Cloth, linen, cambric, silk, and lawn!
Farewell! with you, dear one-pound notes,
Mac Banquo's occupation's gone.

The man who thrives with tens and fives
Must have some coin, and none have we!
Roast beef adieu! come barley broo'!
Oh hone-a-rie! Oh hone-a-rie!

CALEDONIAN WAR WHOOP

“By the Coat of our House, which is an ass rampant,
I am ready to fight under this banner.”
Shadwell's Humourists.

Chorus of Writers to The Signet.

I

Eh laird! Eh laird! an' ha' ye haird,
That we're to hae nae ae poond nots?
Ye weel may say the Hooses tway
Wad play the de'il wi' a' the Scots.
Ha' they nae fears when Scotland's tears
Flow fast as ony burnie, oh!
But they shall find we've a' one mind,
The mind of one attorney, oh!

132

II

De'il take us a' if we can ca'
To mind the day wherein we got
The idle croons o' seely loons
In ony medium but a not.
De'il take us as we hop to be
Wi' spoils o' clients bonny, oh!
If e'er we look to touch a fee
When there's nae paper money, oh!

Solo—Sir Malachi Malagrowther.

III

Quoth Hudibras—Friend Ralph, thou hast
(Hunt's blacking shines on Hyde park wall)
Outrun the Constable at last,
For gold will still be lord of all.
The ups and downs of paper poun's
Have made the English weary, oh!
And 'tis their will old Scotland's mill
Shall e'en gae Tapsalteerie, oh!

IV

Old Scotland brags, she kens of rags
Far more than all the world beside:
Her ancient mint with naught else in't,
Is all her wealth, and power, and pride.
Her ancient flag is all a rag,
So oft in battle bloody, oh!
Now well I think her blood is ink,
And rags her soul and body, oh!

133

V

Beneath that rag, our ancient flag,
We'll draw for rags our old claymore:
Our arrows still, with gray goose quill
Well fledged and tipped, in showers we'll pour:
Our ink we'll shed, both black and red,
In strokes, and points, and dashes, oh!
Ere laws purloin our native coin,
And turn it all to ashes, oh!

VI

The poorest rats of all the earth,
Were ragged Scots in days of yore,
Till paper coining's happy birth,
Made cash of all the rags they wore;
Though but the shade of smoke, 'tis plain,
Said cash is Scotland's glory, oh!
To make it real rags again
Would be a tragic story, oh!

VII

What Scot would tack in herring smack,
His living from the deep to snatch,
Without a ragman at his back
To take percentage on his catch?
Who thinks that gold a place would hold
On Scotland's soil a minute, oh!
Unless of rag we make a bag
That's full with nothing in it, oh!

134

VIII

Our Charley lad we bought and sold,
But we've no Charley now to sell:
Unless the De'il should rain up gold,
Where Scots can get it, who can tell?
The English loons have silver spoons,
And golden watches bonnie, oh!
But we'll have nought that's worth a groat,
Without our paper money, oh!

Grand Chorus of Scotchmen.
Then up claymore and down with gun,
And up with promises to pay,
And down with every Saxon's son,
That threatens us with reckoning day.
To promise aye, and never pay,
We've sworn by Scotland's fiddle, oh!
Who calls a Scot “to cash his not”
We'll cut him through the middle, oh!

135

CHORUS OF SCOTCH ECONOMISTS, ON A PROSPECT OF SCOTCH BANKS IN ENGLAND.

[_]

To the air of The Campbells are coming.

Quickly.
He pay? Alack! he is poor.

Falstaff.
Look on his face. What call you rich? Let him coin his face.

The braw lads are coming—Oho! Oho!
The braw lads are coming—Oho! Oho!
The highways they're treadin'
From bonny Dun-Edin,
With cousins by dozens—Oho! Oho!

No shoon have the braw lads—Oh no! Oh no!
No hose have the braw lads—Oh no! Oh no!
No breeks for the wearing,
No shirts for the airing,
No coin for the bearing—Oh no! Oh no!

Each leaves a braw lassie—Oho! Oho!
Each face is all brassy—Oho! Oho!
They are bound for soft places,
Where coining their faces
Will mend their lean cases—Oho! Oho!

The English they'll settle—Oho! Oho!
They'll harry their metal—Oho! Oho!
They'll coin muckle paper,
They'll make a great vapour,
To their fiddle we'll caper—Oho! Oho!

136

Come riddle my riddle—Oho! Oho!
The cat and the fiddle—Oho! Oho!
Sing high diddle diddle,
It is the Scotch fiddle,
Then lead down the middle—Oho! Oho!

The cat is the miller—Oho! Oho!
Grinds paper to siller—Oho! Oho!
He plays the Scotch fiddle,
Sing high diddle diddle,
We've riddled the riddle—Oho! Oho!

The English we'll saddle—Oho! Oho!
We'll ride them a-straddle—Oho! Oho!
They beat us in battle,
When money would rattle,
But now they're our cattle—Oho! Oho!

In parley metallic—Oho! Oho!
They bothered our Gaelic—Oho! Oho!
But with sly disputation,
And rag circulation,
We've mastered their nation—Oho! Oho!

Come, Johnny Bull, hither—Oho! Oho!
We'll make you quite lither—Oho! Oho!
Come dance for your betters
A hornpipe in fetters,
We'll teach you your letters—Oho! Oho!

Come, sing as we've said it—Oho! Oho!
Sing “Free trade and credit”—Oho! Oho!

137

Sing “Scotch education,”
And “O'er-population,”
And “Wealth of the nation,”—Oho! Oho!

Then scrape the Scotch fiddle—Oho! Oho!
Here's John in the middle—Oho! Oho!
There's nothing so bonny
As Scotch paper money,
Now dance away, Johnny—Oho! Oho!

YE KITE-FLYERS OF SCOTLAND

By T. C.

“Quel ch'io vi debbo posso di parole
Pagare in parte, e d'opera d'inchiostro.”
Ariosto.

Ye kite-flyers of Scotland,
Who live from home at ease;
Who raise the wind, from year to year,
In a long and strong trade breeze:
Your paper-kites let loose again
On all the winds that blow;
Though the shout of the rout
Lay the English ragmen low;
Though the shout for gold be fierce and bold,
And the English ragmen low.

The spirits of your fathers
Shall peep from every leaf;
For the midnight was their noon of fame,
And their prize was living beef.

138

Where Deloraine on Musgrave fell,
Your paper kites shall show,
That a way to convey
Better far than theirs you know,
When you launch your kites upon the wind
And raise the wind to blow.

Caledonia needs no bullion,
No coin in iron case;
Her treasure is a bunch of rags
And the brass upon her face;
With pellets from her paper mills
She makes the Southrons trow,
That to pay her sole way
Is by promising to owe,
By making promises to pay
When she only means to owe.

The meteor rag of Scotland
Shall float aloft like scum,
Till credit's o'erstrained line shall crack,
And the day of reckoning come:
Then, then, ye Scottish kite-flyers,
Your hone-a-rie must flow,
While you drink your own ink
With your old friend Nick below,
While you burn your bills and singe your quills
In his bonny fire below.

139

CHORUS OF NORTHUMBRIANS ON THE PROHIBITION OF SCOTCH ONE-POUND NOTES IN ENGLAND.

March, March, Make-rags of Borrowdale,
Whether ye promise to bearer or order;
March, march, Take-rag and Bawbee-tail,
All the Scotch flimsies must over the border:
Vainly you snarl anent
New Act of Parliament,
Bidding you vanish from dairy and “laurder;”
Dogs, you have had your day,
Down tail and slink away;
You'll pick no more bones on this side of the border.

Hence to the hills where your fathers stole cattle;
Hence to the glens where they skulked from the law;
Hence to the moors where they vanished from battle,
Crying, “De'il tak the hindmost,” and “Charlie's awa'.”

140

Metal is clanking here;
Off with your banking gear;
Off, ere you're paid “to Old Harry or order:”
England shall many a day
Wish you'd been far away,
Long ere your kite's-wings flew over the border.

March, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale,
Pay-the word, lads, and gold is the law,
March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale;
Tagdale, and Ragdale, and Bobdale, and a':
Person or purse, they say;
Purse you have none to pay;
Your persons who'll deal with, except the Recorder?
Yet, to retrieve your freaks,
You can just leave your breeks;
You'll want them no more when you're over the border.

High on a pole in the vernal sun's baskings,
When April has summoned your ragships away,
We'll hoist up a pair of your best galligaskins,
Entwined with young thistles to usher in May;
Types of Scotch “copital,”
They shall o'ertop-it-all,
Stripped off from bearer and brushed into order;
Then if you tarry, rogues,
Nettles you'll get for brogues,
And to the Rogue's March be drummed o'er the border.

Not the Cumberland Borrodaile, but the genuine ancient name of that district of Scotland, whatever it be called now, from which was issued the first promise-to-pay, that was made with the express purpose of being broken.

Scoticé for Tag-rag and Bob-tail: “a highly respectable old firm.” A paper kite with a bawbee at its tail is perhaps a better emblem of the safe and economical currency of Scotland than Mr. Canning's mountain of paper irrigated by a rivulet of gold.

Scoticé for larder.

141

MARGERY DAW

“Agite: inspicite: aurum est. Profecto, spectatores, Comicum.
Verum ad hanc rem agundam Philippum est.”
Plautus in Pœnulo.

Chorus of Paper Money Makers.
See-saw, Margery Daw,
Spent all her gold and made money of straw.

Margery Daw was our prototype fair:
She built the first bank ever heard of:
Her treasury ripened and dried in the air,
And governments hung on the word of
Margery Daw, Margery Daw,
Who spent all her gold and made money of straw.

Mother Goose was a blue of exceeding éclat,
She wielded a pen, not a thimble:
She made a fine ode about Margery Daw,
Which was but a mystical symbol:
“See-saw, Margery Daw,
Sold her bed and lay upon straw.”

Margery borrowed the little folks' gold,
And lent it the great folks to fight with:
They shot it abroad over woodland and wold,
Till things began not to go right with
Margery Daw, Margery Daw,
Who spent all her gold and made money of straw.

142

The little folks roared for their gold back again,
And Margery trembled with terror;
She called for relief to the land's mighty men,
And they said she must pay for her error;
“See-saw, look to your straw:
We've nothing to say to you, Margery Daw.”

Margery Daw was alarmed for her straw:
Her wishes this speech didn't suit with,
“Oho! mighty men!” said Margery then,
“You'll get no more money to shoot with;
See-saw, pile up the straw;
Bring me a flambeau,” said Margery Daw.

They looked very bold, but they very soon saw
That their coffers began to look drossy;
So they made it a law that fair Margery's straw,
Should be gold both in esse and posse.
“See-saw, Margery's straw,
Is golden by nature, and gold by the law.”

Margery Daw struck the sky with her head,
And strode o'er the earth like a goddess;
And the sword of the conqueror yielded like lead,
When it smote upon Margery's bodice.
See-saw, plenty of straw
Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw.

The conqueror fell, and the mighty men saw
That they seemed to be safer and stronger;
And then they turned round upon Margery Daw,
Saying “Straw shall be metal no longer.

143

See-saw, Margery Daw,
Get your gold back again, chop up your straw.”

Margery wearied her eloquent lips:
They had never received her so coldly:
A-kimbo they stood, with their hands on their hips,
And their right feet put forward most boldly:
“See-saw, Margery Daw,
Get your gold back again, chop up your straw.”

Margery put forth her powerful hand,
She seized on the straw all around her;
And up rose a flame at her word of command
Like the furnace of any brass-founder.
“See-saw, Margery Daw
Wants her gold back again: flames to the straw.”

The omnipotent straw, that had been the world's law,
Was soon only cinder and ember:
Such a blaze was ne'er seen round Guy Faux on a green,
On the night of the fifth of November.
“See-saw, pile up the straw,
There's a brave bonfire,” said Margery Daw.

Down fell, as beneath mighty Juggernaut's car,
The small fry of straw-money makers,
The tumult of ruin, from near and from far,
Once more made the mighty men quakers:
“See-saw, Margery Daw,
Off with the gold again: give us more straw.”

144

The Jews made a project for Margery Daw,
She thought it too ticklish for trying;
But they sent her a Scotchman exceedingly braw,
To prove 'twas as easy as lying:
“See-saw, Margery Daw,
A wee bit o' gold and a mickle of straw.”

Margery heard the Mac Puzzlehead preach,
And she was no whit a logician,
She knew little more than the eight parts of speech,
Though she wrote with amazing precision
“Margery Daw,” “Margery Daw,”
The prettiest writing the world ever saw.

Margery scattered her treasures abroad,
And who was so glorious as she then?
He who was backward in Margery's laud,
Mac Puzzlehead proved, was a heathen.
See-saw, gold in the straw,
Who was so glorious as Margery Daw?

Up started the small fry of straw-money men,
Who seemed to have fallen for ever;
They scattered their straw o'er the nation again,
And chorused as yet they had never:
“See-saw, plenty of straw,
Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw.”

Margery's glory was darkened afresh,
The great men again stood a-kimbo;
She feared she was caught in Mac Puzzlehead's mesh,
Who had argued her gold out of limbo.

145

“See-saw, pile up the straw,
Bring me a flambeau,” said Margery Daw.

Again in her anger she darkened the air
With the smoke of a vast conflagration,
And again to the earth in dismay and despair,
Fell the heroes of straw circulation.
“See-saw, Margery Daw
Owes you no courtesy: burn your own straw.”

Around and about came a glad rabble rout,
The flames from a distance discerning;
And shouting they saw, in the midst of the straw,
Mac Puzzlehead's effigy burning.
“See-saw, pile up the straw,
Roast the Mac Puzzlehead, Margery Daw.”

But then to the sky rose a terrible cry,
A long and a loud lamentation;
And Margery's halls rang with wailings and calls
That filled her with deep consternation:
“Straw, straw, give us some straw;
Straw, or we perish, sweet Margery Daw.”

And what happened then? Oh what happened then?
Oh! where is the rest of the story?
And what was devised by the land's mighty men,
To renovate Margery's glory?
Oh, there is a flaw in the volume of straw,
That tells the true story of Margery Daw.

146

But we find if we pore ancient manuscripts o'er
With deep antiquarian endeavour,
That Margery's straw became metal once more,
And she was as glorious as ever.
See-saw, plenty of straw
Will make us all glorious as Margery Daw.

“If it be not now, yet it will come: the readiness is all.” —Hamlet.

147

RICH AND POOR; OR SAINT AND SINNER

[_]

[This is a correct copy of a little poem which has been often printed, and not quite accurately. It first appeared, many years ago, in the Globe and Traveller, and was suggested by a speech in which Mr. Wilberforce, replying to an observation of Dr. Lushington, that “the Society for the Suppression of Vice meddled with the poor alone,” said that “offences of the poor came more under observation than those of the rich.”]

The poor man's sins are glaring;
In the face of ghostly warning
He is caught in the fact
Of an overt act—
Buying greens on Sunday morning.

The rich man's sins are hidden
In the pomp of wealth and station;
And escape the sight
Of the children of light,
Who are wise in their generation.

The rich man has a kitchen,
And cooks to dress his dinner;
The poor who would roast
To the baker's must post,
And thus becomes a sinner.

148

The rich man has a cellar,
And a ready butler by him;
The poor must steer
For his pint of beer
Where the saint can't choose but spy him.

The rich man's painted windows
Hide the concerts of the quality;
The poor can but share
A crack'd fiddle in the air,
Which offends all sound morality.

The rich man is invisible
In the crowd of his gay society;
But the poor man's delight
Is a sore in the sight,
And a stench in the nose of piety.

149

THE FATE OF A BROOM

AN ANTICIPATION

[_]

[These lines were published in the Examiner of August, 1831. They were then called an anticipation. They may now be fairly entitled a prophecy fulfilled.]

Lo! in Corruption's lumber-room,
The remnants of a wondrous broom,
That walking, talking, oft was seen,
Making stout promise to sweep clean,
But evermore, at every push,
Proved but a stump without a brush.
Upon its handle-top, a sconce,
Like Brahma's, looked four ways at once:
Pouring on king, lords, church, and rabble,
Long floods of favour-currying gabble;
From four-fold mouth-piece always spinning
Projects of plausible beginning,
Whereof said sconce did ne'er intend
That any one should have an end;
Yet still, by shifts and quaint inventions,
Got credit for its good intentions,
Adding no trifle to the store
Wherewith the Devil paves his floor.
Found out at last, worn bare and scrubbish,
And thrown aside with other rubbish,
We'll e'en hand o'er the enchanted stick,
As a choice present for Old Nick,
To sweep, beyond the Stygian lake,
The pavement it has helped to make.

150

BYP AND NOP

Promotion BY Purchase and by NO Purchase; or a Dialogue between Captain A. and Colonel Q.

Quoth Byp to Nop, “I made my hop
By paying for promotion:”—
Quoth Nop to Byp, “I made my skip
By aid of petticoatian.”

Quoth Nop to Byp, “You'll never trip
Ascending steps of Gold by:”—
Quoth Byp to Nop, “You'll never drop
With such a tail to hold by.”

[N.B.—Byp, for by purchase, and Nop, for no purchase, are the common official abbreviations in all returns of promotions, and ring the changes through long columns of Parliamentary papers.]

University of Virginia Library

PAPER MONEY LYRICS, AND OTHER POEMS.