KNOW ye the Inn where the laurel and myrtle

Well emblem the green who are done 'neath its sign? Where they serve you on plate which is mock as their turtle, Now fleecing the tourist, now maddening the Times? Know ye the shams of that ill-managed house, Where the host ever bows, and the bills ever chouse; Where the "wax-lights" that don't half illumine your room Give a muttonish rather than waxy perfume; Where although you don't see half a waiter all day, For attendance" as much as a lawyer's you pay, And find even then there's an extra for " Boots." Nor the porters in asking for liquids are mutes; Where your "bottle of sherry" (Cape under disguise,) Scarce equals the vinegar-cruet in size,

And analysation completely defies;

Where the sofas are soft as yourself if you dine
At eight shillings a head-perchance even nine,
With the heaviest price for the lightest of wine?—
'Tis the English Hotel: and 'tis twenty to one
That, where'er you may enter it, brown you'll be done.
For more than e'en Punch in a volume could tell,
Are the shams they serve there, and the victims they sell.
Punch, 1853.

GENERAL VIEW OF GREECE.

"Greece sided with Russia until France and England sent troops to the Piræus, whereupon King Otho promised to observe strict neutrality."

KNOWS'T thou the land were a sly press's dirt'll
Be flung upon all that won't pay for it's slime,
When the merchant's a Doo, and the soldier's a
Thurtell,

And the lawyer's their trusty accomplice in crime?
Knows't thou the land once beloved of the Nine,
More lately the scene of Pacifico's shine,

Where a soft head like Otho's the crown could
assume,

A King-with the mien of an underbred groom-
Where the traders in feats of rascality vie

Where they cheat if you sell, and they cheat if you
buy,

And to list to a native's to list to a lie.

Where, if trees (as we say) may be known by their fruit,

A LESSON FOR LADIES.

"While the Lord Mayor elect and some friends were inspecting the preparations for the Guildhall feast, the Lady Mayoress unhesitatingly declared with reference to the turtle, that she did not like the nasty stuff!'"-Daily News.

Know you the Lady who doesn't like turtle,

And had the fine courage to speak out her mind; Though Aldermen round her stood scowling like Thurtell

And even her Chaplain lisped,

"

Rather unkyind,"

Long life to the woman who dared to declare it,
Be her gay Lady-Mayoralty marked by good luck :
Her robe fit divinely-her health last to wear it-

We don't share her taste, but we honour her pluck.

The good City Queen sets a lesson to ladies

Who haven't got minds, or have minds they don't know:

Who don't care if wine comes from China or Cadiz, And simper alike over venison and veau !

We like a companion who knows what she's eating,
(What chance for your tastes if she's none of her
own?)

So hip, hip, hurrah, for November that's seating
A Sovereign like this on the Mansion House throne.
SHIRLEY BROOKS, 1856.

JAMAICA,

(Written in 1866, when Governor Eyre was being prosecuted for his excessive severity in suppressing the negro insurrection in Jamaica.)

KNOW ye the land of molasses, and rum

Emblems of deeds that are done in their clime
Where the cant of the nigger or the beat of his drum
Now melts into humbug, now maddens to crime-
Know ye the land of the cocoa and pine,
Where the trees that would blossom are left to decline
Where those who would toil must bear the attacks
Of those blood-thirsty vipers, Liberty's Blacks?
Where murder and treason are the fairest of fruit,
And the voice of sedition never is mute
Where the sloth of the negro, cries aloud to the sky
And his vices tho' varied, in horror may vie
With those crimes of man that are deepest in dye.
Where whites must bow down, if the negroes combine
For is not a nigger a spirit divine?

'Tis the land of the negro who once was a slave
How has he deserved the freedom we gave?
'Tis the clime of the west, 'tis the land of the sun
Can he smile on the deeds that these darkies have done?
Oh! fierce as the accents of foemen's farewell

Are the hearts which they bear, and the lies which they
tell.
W.H

DESCRIPTION OF THE MURTLE LECTURE DELIVERED
IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL,

KNOW ye the Hall where the birch and the myrtle
Are emblems of things half profane, half divine,
Where the hiss of the serpent, the coo of the turtle,
Are counted cheap fun at a sixpenny fine?
Know ye the Hall of the pulpit and form,
With its air ever mouldy, its stove never warm;
Where the chill blasts of Eurus, oppressed with the stench
Wax faint at the window, and strong at the bench;
Where Tertian and Semi are hot in dispute,
And the voice of the Magistrand never is mute;
Where the scrape of the foot and the audible sigh
In nature though varied, in discord may vie,
Till the accents of Wisdom are stifled and die;
Where the Bajuns are dense as the cookies they chew,
And all save the Regents have something to do :-
'Tis our Hall of Assembly, our high moral School,
Must its walls never rest from the bray of the fool?
Oh, vain as the prospect of summer in May

Are the lessons they learn and the fines that they pay.

All the public discipline, fines, &c., are arranged and levied at the Public School. The Bajuns, Semis, Tertians, and Magistrands are the four years of men. The Regents are the four Professors-Greek, Nat. Hist., Nat. Phil,, and Mor. Phil.

From "Life of Professor James Clerk Maxwell" by Lewis Campbell and William Garrett, 1882.

A LUNATIC'S LOVE SONG.

O, KNOW you the land where the cheese tree grows,
And the unicorn spins on the end of his nose;
Where the sea-mew scowls on the circling bat,
And the elephant hunts in an opera hat?

'Tis there that I lie with my head in a pond,
And play with a valueless Tichborne bond;
'Tis there that I sip pure Horniman's tea
To the sound of the gong and the howling sea.

'Tis there that I revel in soapsuds and rum,
And wait till my creditors choose to come;
'Tis there that I dream of the days when I
Shall soar to the moon through the red-hot sky.

Then come, oh! come to that happy land!
And don't forget your galvanic band;
We will play at cards in the lions den,
And go to bed when the clock strikes ten.

AN ADDRESS TO LORD BYRON.

KNOW'ST thou the land where the hardy green thistle,
The red-blooming heather and harebell abound?
Where oft o'er the mountains the shepherd's shrill whistle
Is heard in the gloaming so sweetly to sound?
Know'st thou the land of the mountain and flood,
Where the pine of the forest for ages has stood,
Where the eagle comes forth on the wings of the storm,
And her young ones are rocked on high Cairngorm ?
Know'st thou the land where the cold Celtic wave
Encircles the hills which its blue waters lave?
Where the virgins are pure as the gems of the sea,
And their spirits are light as their actions are free?
Know'st thou the land where the sun's lingering ray

Streaks with gold the horizon, till dawns the new day,
Whilst the cold feeble beam which he sheds on the sight
Scarce breaks through the gloom of the cold winter's
night?

'Tis the land of thy sires!-'tis the land of thy youth,
Where first thy young heart glowed with honour and truth;
Where the wild fire of genius first caught thy young soul,
And thy feet and thy fancy roamed free from control !
Ah, why does that fancy still dwell on a clime
Where Love leads to Madness, and Madness to Crime:
Where courage itself is more savage than brave;—
Where man is a despot, and woman a slave ?
Though soft are the breezes, and sweet the perfume,
And fair are the "gardens of Gul" in their bloom;
Can the roses they twine, or the vines which they bear,
Speak peace to the heart of suspicion and fear?
Let Phoebus' bright ray the Egean wave,
But say, can it lighten the lot of a slave-
Or all that is beauteous in nature impart
One virtue to soften the Moslem's proud heart?
Ah, no! 'tis the magic that glows in thy strain,
Gives life to the action and soul to the scene!

And the deeds which they do, and the tales which they tell,

Enchant us alone by the power of thy spell!

And is there no charm in thine own native earth?
Does no talisman rest in the place of thy birth?
Are the daughters of Albion less worthy thy care,
Less soft than Zuleika, less bright than Gulnare ?
Are her sons less renowned, or her warriors less brave,
Than the slaves of a Prince who himself is a slave ?
Then strike thy wild lyre, let it swell with the strain,
Let the mighty in arms live and conquer again;
Their past deeds of valour thy lays shall rehearse,
And the fame of thy country revive in thy verse.
The proud wreath of victory round heroes may twine,
'Tis the poet who crowns them with honour divine;
And thy laurels, Pelides, had sunk in the tomb,
Had the bard not preserved them immortal in bloom!
ANONYMOUS.

JON DUAN'S TALE.

A STORY OF THE CONFESSIONAL.

KNOW ye the place where they press and they hurtle,
And do daring deeds for greed and for gain,
Where the mellow milk-punch and the green-fatted turtle
Now mildly digest, and now madden with pain?
Know ye the land of Stone and of Vine,
Where mayors ever banquet and aldermen dine;
Where Emma* was wooed, and Abbott laid low,
And they fly paper kites and big bubbles blow;
Where Gold is a god unassail'd in his might,
And neck-ties are loosened when stocks get too tight?
If this district you know-it is E. C.to guess,
And you go up a street which the Hebrews possess,
And turn to the right,-why, then, for a wager,
You come to the Church of St. Wackslite the Major;
And list, as o'er noises that constantly swell,
Comes the soul-stirring scund of its evensong bell.
From Jon Duan. London: Weldon and Co., 1874.

THE COLORADO BEETLE.

A "Native of the Great American Desert" writes from Rosario on Colorado and its bug:-"We knew that potato bug before he was introduced into polite society

*The Emma Mines,

and world-wide fame; he was then called the 'camote spoiler, a name derived from a sweet tuber that grows wild all over Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. Generations would have died ignorant of the very name of our newest State had it not been for the potato bug; newspapers wrote, orators eulogized, and poets sang about the advantages of Colorado, but all combined they could not command the attention of anybody east of the Mississippi river until that bug went booming across the Atlantic States aud Ocean, and actually entered the House of Lords and the Privy Councils of various European monarchs. Since that day Colorado has become universally known, and one of its mountain_poets something in ideas like Goethe, but in style after Byron, has chanted

Is it where the cabbage grows so fast

That it bursts with a noise like a thunder's blast,
Is it where thro' the rich deep mellow soil
The beet strikes down as if digging for oil,
Is it where each irrigating sluice

Is fed with water-melon juice,

Where tatoes and onions are hard to beat

And the cattle get fat on nothing to eat,

Where everything grows to such a wondrous size
That the simplest stories appear like lies,

Tell me in sooth I'd like to know

Is this the land they call Colorado?
You bet! old hoss, it is !"

PARODY.

BY AN OLD SOLDIER.

KNOW ye the land of reeds and of rushes,
Emblems of dampness innate in the clime,
Where the toad and the viper to show itself blushes,
And the damp air comes heavy impregnate with
crime;

Where landlords in daylight like woodcocks they shoot
And the voice of the mendicant never is mute.
'Tis a land of the West, fair, glorious, and free,
First flower of the land, first gem of the sea;
I would we poor soldiers some method could learn,
To the depths of its bosom, this gem to return.

tember, 1879," treated in the style of Lord Byron's Siege of Corinth.

'Tis done the murd'rous work complete,
The turbaned hordes acclaim the feat:
Had fallen to a craven shot

The chiefest victim of a plot :

Brave leader! all too brave to date
A warning from Macnaughten's fate.
His gallant comrades round him strown,
An English youth stands-stands alone.*
His gallant comrades round him lie
Dead; it remains for one to die.
Forth on the foe the soldier leapt ;
And, as his blade a circle swept,
Five traitors felt the avenging brand,
Ere dropped it from the lifeless hand-
A glorious tale indeed to tell-
'Neath thousand blows one hero fell,

'Tis done-the slaughtered guests are spread
Under a hecatomb of dead.

No need of marble pile to show

Where sleep the illustrious slain below;

No need of graver's art to trace

In lettered brass their resting place,
Their own right arms, in death still feared,
Eternal monument have reared:

Where, ere they fell, these warriors stood,
They wrote their epitaph in blood.

These devotees of Islam's creed
Shrink not to violate at need
The laws they worship; the behest
Of reverence due to hallowed guest.
Ah, but it were a goodly boast-
A stranger murdered by his host!
Yet think not, dastards, England slow
To recompense so foul a blow,

If payment meet could deal the sword
To miscreants honoured by the cord.
Where to the skies their summits push
The giant Alps of Hindu Kush;
Where Cabul's river hastes to hide
His shame beneath a mightier tide;
Where, with a scorn of time, proclaim
The records of a bygone fame
The ravished fanes, whose ruins trace
The march of Timour's conquering race
And, mid her oft-beleagured towers,
Dark Ghuzni's fortress sternly lowers;
Where many mouthèd Helmund makes
His briny home in Seistan's lakes-
Not long delayed, the cannon's boom
Shall sound the knell of Cabul's doom.
The World, October 1, 1879.

:0:

MERTON

-:0:

CABUL-SEPTEMBER, 1879.

The following poem obtained the first prize in a parody competition in The World. Subject: Cabul in Sep

THE CIVIC MAZEPPA.

"THE disappearance of GIBBS from the civic procession created some little astonishment, and many were the inquiries as to what had become of him. The following Poem gives a bold, but very probable, notion of how the Alderman was really occupied on the day of the opening of the Royal Exchange. It is supposed that some of his fellow parishioners, meeting with him in a back street, caught hold of him, and tied him on to a horse, which got dreadfully into a-rear, and

* Sir Louis Cavagnari murdered in Cabul,

was then suffered to run on without the smallest check-thus typifying the state of the accounts of St. Stephen's, Walbrook. The Poem begins at the period when the Alderman is about to undergo his equestrian martyrdom."

"BRING forth the horse!" the horse was brought;
In truth he was a noble steed-

A creature of the hackney sort,

Dash'd slightly with the dray-horse breed,

His sire had drawn a fly,

Into which six would often cram ;

His mother was of lineage high,

Himself was worth-well worth his dam.

He plunged, he kick'd, he reared, he snorted,

With ears erect and eye distorted;

He switched his tail, he show'd his hoof

E'en WIDDICOMB had kept aloof
At sight of such a noble steed,
He was a precious beast indeed.
They seized me fiercely by the daddle;
They thrust me down into the saddle;
They tied me strongly by the bridle :
The horrid brute began to shy,
To kick, to amble, and to sidle,

And then away they let him fly;
Away, away! my breath is gone;
Still gallop, gallop, gallop on,

Down, down the street, and up the Strand,
Over the woman's apple-stand.
We pass the cabs, and here we are,

Plunged at one bound through Temple Bar.
The courser's fleetness seems to mock
The slowness of St. Dunstan's Clock.
Away, away, we madly whisk
Along! past Waithman's Obelisk !
On, on we go, we gallop still

Up Ludgate's gently rising hill.

A moment now our way seems barr'd,

Oh! shall we stop at last?

'Tis the barrier at St. Paul's Church Yard

No, no, he gallops past.

I pull'd the bridle, but in vain,

The horse refused my will to heed;
Each motion of the useless rein

But madden'd him to wilder speed.
I tried my voice; but nonsense, pooh!
Onwards the brute contemptuous flew :
At times I thought he must have stopp'd,
When 'gainst an omnibus he whopp'd ;
But vain my hopes! the sudden blow
Served but to make him faster go.
Away, away, we turn and wind,
Leaving the city far behind.

He tears away, hock touching hock,
Swift up the hill of Haverstock :
Until, with just exhausted breath,
At last he reaches Hampstead Heath.
The brute has only strength to bound
Into the well remembered Pound;
Where in the morning we were found
By a policeman going his round.

Punch 1844,

The above poem was accompanied by a spirited, and very comical illustration, showing the worthy Alderman strapped on the bare-backed steed, which is urging on his wild career, followed by astonished beadles and policemen.)

BEN DIZZY! You're a humbug-Humbug-laureate,
And representative of all the race;
Although 'tis true that you turned out a Tory at
Last, yours is still an enigmatic face.

And now, O Sphyntic renegade, what are you at
With all the Rurals in and out of place?
Where will you leave the boobies in the lurch-
Have you resolved to double D the Church?
You've dished the Whigs before; we now would sing.
What is the pie that you're so busy making?

A dainty dish to set before the Thing-
Or aught that its digestion will be shaking?-
Or is it Discord's apple that you bring?

Or will you set the good old Tories quaking,
By saying that they hitherto have missed tricks,
By not going in for equal polling districts?
You'll educate them, won't you, Master Ben?

And make them think that they are clever, very,
Until the trick is won, and they'll wish then,
They'd taken you cum grano Salis-bury.
No wonder Mr. Miall's making merry,

And rallying his Liberation men

He sees your tongue so plainly in your cheek,
When in your Church's champion rôle you speak.

Go on, neat humbug, laughing in your sleeve.
And winking, as you bid the Church not falter ;
We joy to see her aid from you receive,

To guard her 'gainst the dangers that assault her;
The English Church has had her last reprieve,
Now you are standing boldly by her altar.-
Already in the glass we see the image,

Of an impending, big religious scrimmage.

Jon Duan, by the authors of The Coming K. 1874.

--:0:

DON JUAN

THE isles of Greece, the isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,
Where grew the arts of war and peace,-
Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung.
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.

The Scian and the Teian muse,

The hero's harp, the lover's lute, Have found the fame your shores refuse; Their place of birth alone is mute To sounds which echo further west Than your sires' "Islands of the Blest."

The mountains look on Marathon-
And Marathon looks on the sea:
And musing there an hour alone,

I dream'd that Greece might still be free; For standing on the Persian's grave,

I could not deem myself a slave.

And fishing there with Nelson's Ghost, I'm sure I'd catch as much as here! Doudney and line no more be mine-Dash down-no, don't-that ginger wine! Punch, 1844.

;

Trust not for freedom to the Franks-
They have a king who buys and sells :
In native swords and native ranks,
The only hope of courage dwells
But Turkish force and Latin fraud,
Would break your shield, however broad.
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine!
Our virgins dance beneath the shade-
I see their glorious black eyes shine;
But, gazing on each glowing maid,
My own the burning tear-drop laves,
To think such breasts must suckle slaves.

Place me on Sunium's marbled steep,

Where nothing, save the waves and I, May hear our mutual murmurs sweep; There, swan-like, let me sing and die : A land of slaves shall ne'er be mineDash down yon cup of Samian wine!

MEDITATIONS BY A DESPAIRING ANGLER.

THE Isle of Eels! The Isle of Eels!

Where Mrs. Hopkins dined and sung;
Where first (as this seared heart reveals),
My passion for the Widow sprung!
The pies are good, and so's the ale-
But all to me is flat and stale!

Where Richmond looks on Teddington,
In patient guise I threw my line;
And fishing there (and catching none)

I dreamt, that she might still be mine: For, dressed in Doudney's light gambroon, I could not deem myself a spoon.

Fill high the glass with ginger wine!We will not think on this here theme; Nor for the charming Widow pine;

Others may yet more charming seem. More charming? Ah, it cannot beHer equal never made the tea!

Fill high the glass with ginger wine !

BYRON.

On Richmond's bridge, or Twit'nam's shore,
Oft had I held my rod and line,—
But never had a bite before !
There was a downright tug that day ;—
But ah! he tugged, and swam away!

And where is he? And where art thou,
My widow? At the Angler's heart
7 hou gav'st one mighty tug, and now

Art fled-but hast received no smart!
Such loss would sure a Stoic move-
My only fish! My only love!

Place me on Railton's stunted post*
(Queer pedestal for France's Fear);

*The Nelson Column.

THE SMILES OF PEACE,

THE Smiles of Peace, the Smiles of Peace,
By Foreign need from England wrung,
Have bid the cannon's war-shout cease,
The Thanks be said, the Anthem sung:
But there is that (besides our Debt)
Which English hearts should not forget.

It was not, surely, to amuse

The gossip's hour of Club dispute,

We sat down daily to peruse

Those tales from Camp, where man and brute Alike endured the sternest test

That ever crushed our brave, our best.

Disraeli looks on Palmerston,

And Palmerston on Mr. D., And in debates that last till one

They taunt each other skilfully; But there be questions far too grave To edge a mere debater's glaive.

Ten thousand men of fearless brow,

On lips they loved laid parting kissO, titled soldiers! answer how

A needless Death has claimed them his. They went, one well-remembered day— Some few brief months, and where were they?

What! silent still, and silent all?

O no, the damning charge is read-
Even now, in Chelsea's trophied Hall,

The judges sit, the scrolls are spread,
And haughty blunderers blustering come-
Unknown the shame that makes men dumb.

In vain, in vain accuse those Lords,
All Lords are right, by right divine,
No, gild anew their tarnished swords,
And let bereft plebeians whine :
You ask for proof of soldier's skill-
How vaunts each bungling Bobadil!
You've Lord John Russell's lectures yet,
Where's William Russell's teaching gone:
Of two such lessons, why forget

The bolder and the manlier one?

You have the letters William gave

Think you he meant them for a Shave?

Trust not men who lodge in banks
The price of swords your System sells ;
Seek, in the people's healthier ranks
The fire that no disaster quells;
But slang Routine, and jobbing Fraud
Will break your back, however broad.

Along Pall-Mall a martial line!

Our Life-Guards ride with helm and blade.

I see each glittering cuirass shine,

But, gazing on the gay parade,

I own a wish to bite my nails,

To think such horses ate their tails.