And there, with hands that grasp one's very soul,
Frowns Headache, scalper of the studious poll;
Headache, who lurks at noon about the courts,
And whets his tomahawk on East's Reports.
Chief of this social game, behind me stands,
Pale, peevish, perriwigg'd, with itching hands,
A goblin, double-tail'd, and cloak'd in black,
Who, while I'm gravely thinking, bites my back.
Around his head flits many a harpy shape
With jaws of parchment and long hairs of tape,
Threatening to pounce, and turn whate'er I write,
With their own venom into foul despite.
Let me but name the court, they swear and curse,
And din me with hard names; and what is worse,
'Tis now three times that I have miss'd my purse.
No wonder poor Torquato went distracted,
On whose gall'd senses just such pranks were acted;
When the small tyrant, God knows on what ground,
With dungeons and with doctors hemm'd him round.*
Last, but not least, (methinks I see him now!)
With stare expectant, and a ragged brow,
Comes the foul fiend, who-let it rain or shine,
Let it be clear or cloudy, foul or fine,
Or freezing, thawing, drizzling, hailing, snowing,
Or mild, or warm, or hot, or bleak and blowing,
Or damp, or dry, or dull, or sharp, or sloppy,
Is sure to come-the Devil who comes for copy !
If sights like these my gentle Muse can bear,
Thy visage may be seen, capricious fair,
In courts and taverns, and the Lord knows where!
Gifford may yet his courtly chains forego,
Or leave Reviews to those who dare say no;
Old Brinsley, too, with whiskey dead-alive,
Look up once more, and feel his flame revive;
And Canning, for a public joke, prefer
Some merrier fiction than his character.
* See Black's Life of Torquato Tasso.
Even Walter Scott may see thee now and then,
Spite of the worn-out sword he wields for pen,
And all that ancient state in which he sits,
Of spears, plaids, bugles, helms, and border wits;
Enchanter Scott! who in black letter read,
Gains a rank life by raising of the dead,
Sure but to fix his destiny more fast,
And dying like themselves, be damn'd at last.
But see! e'en now thy wondrous charm prevails;
The shapes are moved; the stricken circle fails:
With backward grins of malice they retire,
Scared at thy seraph looks and smiles of fire.
That instant, as the hindmost shuts the door.
The bursting sunshine smites the window'd floor;
Bursts, too, on every side, the sparkling sound
Of birds abroad; th' elastic spirits bound,
And the fresh mirth of morning breathes around.
Away, ye clouds-dull politics give place-
Off, cares, and wants, and threats, and all the race
Of foes to freedom and to graceful leisure!
To-day is for the Muse and dancing pleasure!
O for a seat in some poetic nook,
Just hid with trees, and sparkling with a brook,
Where through the quivering boughs the sunbeams shoot
Their arrowy diamonds upon flower and fruit,
While stealing airs come fuming o'er the stream,
And lull the fancy to a waking dream!
There should'st thou come, O first of my desires!
What time the noon had spent its fiercer fires,
And all the bower, with chequer'd shadows strown,
Glow'd with a mellow twilight of its own.
There should'st thou come, and there sometimes with thee
Might deign repair the staid philosophy,
To taste thy freshening brook, and trim thy groves,
And tell us what good taste true glory loves.
I see it now! I pierce the fairy glade,
And feel th' enclosing influence of the shade.
A thousand forms, that sport on summer eves,
Glance through the light, and whisper in the leaves;
While every bough seems nodding with a sprite,
And every air seems hushing the delight;
And the calm bliss, fix'd on itself awhile,
Dimples th' unconscious lips into a smile.
Anon, strange music breathes-the fairies show
Their pranksome crowd, and in grave order go
Beside the water, singing, small and clear,
New harmonies, unknown to mortal ear,
Caught upon moonlight nights from some nigh-wandering I turn to thee, and listen with fixed eyes,
And feel my spirits mount on winged ecstasies.
In vain :-For now with looks that doubly burn,
Shamed of their late defeat, my foes return.
They know their foil is short; and shorter still
The bliss that waits upon the Muse's will.
Back to their seats they rush, and reassume
Their ghastly rites, and sadden all the room.
O'er ears and brain the bursting wrath descends,
Cabals, mis-statements, noise of private ends,
Doubts, hazards, crosses, cloud-compelling vapours,
With dire necessity to read the papers,
Judicial slaps that would have stung Saint Paul,
Costs, pityings, warnings, wits, and, worse than all,
(O for a dose of Thelwall or of poppy!)
The fiend, the punctual fiend, that bawls for copy!
Full in the midst, like that Gorgonian spell
Whose ravening features glared collected hell,
The well-wigg'd pest his curling horror shakes,
And a fourth snap of threatening vengeance tikes!
At that dread sight the Muse at last turns pale,
Freedom and Fiction's self no more avail;
And, lo, my bower of bliss is turn'd into a jail!
What then? what then? my better genius cries,—
Scandals and jails -All these you may despise.
Th' enduring soul, that, to keep others free,;
Dares to give up its darling liberty,
Lives wheresoe'er its countrymen applaud,
And in their great enlargement walks abroad.
But toils alone, and struggles, hour by hour,
Against th' insatiate, gold-flush'd lust of power,
Can keep the fainting virtue of thy land
From the rank slaves that gather round his hand.
Be poor in purse, and law will soon undo thee;
Be poor in soul, and self-contempt will rue thee!
I yield, I yield.—Once more I turn to you,
Harsh politics! and once more bid adieu
To the soft dreaming of the Muse's bowers,
Their sun-streak'd fruits and fairy-painted flowers.
Farewell, for gentler times, ye laurell'd shades!
Farewell, ye sparkling brooks and haunted glades!
Where the trim shapes, that bathe in moonlight eves,
Glance through the light, and whisper in the leaves,
While every bough seems nodding with a sprite,
And every air seems hushing the delight.
Farewell, farewell, dear Muse! and all thy pleasure!
He conquers ease who would be crown'd with leisure.
SONG " RATIONAL MADNESS."
TO THE LOVERS OF CURIOUS AND RARE OLD BOOKS.
COME, boys, fill your glasses, and fill to the brim,
Here's the essence of humour, the soul too of whim!
Attend and receive (and sure this is no vapour)
A "ha'p'worth of wit in a penn'worth of paper."
Strange songs have strange songsters, thus madness to praise,
A man must be mad ere his voice he can raise ;
By our madness alone, then, without more pretence,
We'll prove to the world that we're all men of sense.
• A poet, dramatic writer, and essayist,--was born October 19th, 1784. He was one of the founders of the Examiner, and in 1819 he commenced the Indicator, a weekly publication. His poetry is full of sprightly fancy and animated description, and his essays are deservedly popular.
Those joys which the Bibliomania affords
Are felt and acknowledged by dukes and by lords,
And the finest estate would be offer'd in vain
For an exemplar bound by the famed Roger Payne.*
To a proverb goes madness with love hand in hand,
But our senses we yield to a double command;
The dear frenzy in both is first raised by fair looks,
Here's our sweethearts, my boys, not forgetting our books.
Though all ruled by one wish, and though beauty is rare,
If we miss a tall copy, we find one that's fair,
Our delight may this prove, and though often reprinted,
To one copy alone the impression be stinted.
By learning ennobled, we're careless of gain,
Of envy or malice we ne'er know the pain,
Take away the world's prize, we remain still unvext,
We've our "meadow of margin and river of text."
Thus our time may we pass with rare books and rare friends,
Growing wiser and better till life itself ends;
And may those who delight not in black-letter lore,
By some obsolete act be sent far from our shore.
May some worthy brother his finger soon put
On a Caxton unique, or a Wynkyn uncut!
Yet pardon, I pray, this offence of my pen,
May a soft" Pricke of Conscience" occur now and then.
Thus blessed with possession unrivalled on earth,
May each coming day to new pleasure give birth,
And our joys be unmix'd and secure to the last,
If we look to the future, or think on the past.
A very celebrated bookbinder, but one whose abilities were rendered nearly useless by the dissoluteness of his habits. He died Nov. 20th, 1797, in Duke's Court, St. Martin's Lane, London, to the no small regret of several founders of magnificent libraries.-See Arnett's Books of the Ancients.
|