THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

Quite lately, a well known humorist of the present day was making an after dinner speech. A voice from the audience called out, “Louder!—and funnier!”

Some such voice must have called out to the World’s Humor at the close of the Eighteenth Century, for the beginning of the Nineteenth finds the Humorous element in literature decidedly louder and funnier.

The Romantic Revival which at this time affected all literature and art has been called both the effect and the cause of the French Revolution.

It has also been called the Renascence of Wonder, and as such it let loose hitherto hidebound fancies and imaginations on boundless and limitless flights. In these flights Humor showed speed and endurance quite equal to those of Romance or Poesy.

Both in energy and methods, Humor came to the front with tremendous strides. In quality and quantity it forged ahead, both as a component part of more serious writings and also independently.

And while this was a consummation devoutly to be wished, it makes harder the task of the Outliner.

Many great writers held to the conviction that in Romantic poetry humor has no place. Others were avowed comic writers of verse or prose. But others still allowed humor to meet and mingle with their numbers, to a greater or less degree.

And the difficulty of selection lies in the fact that the incidental humor is often funnier than the entirely humorous concept.

It is hard to omit such as Jane Austen, Sir Walter Scott, William Wordsworth, yet quotations from their works, showing their humorous vein, would occupy space demanded by the humorists themselves.

So, let us start in boldly with Sydney Smith, one of the most popular wits of all ages.

Aside from this author’s epigrams and witty sayings, he wrote with great wisdom and insight about the principles of humor itself, from which we quote his sapient remarks on punning.

“It is imagined that wit is a sort of inexplicable visitation, that it comes and goes with the rapidity of lightning, and that it is quite as unattainable as beauty or just proportion. I am so much of a contrary way of thinking, that I am convinced a man might sit down as systematically and as successfully, to the study of wit as he might to the study of mathematics; and I would answer for it that by giving up only six hours a day to being witty, he should come on prodigiously before midsummer, so that his friends should hardly know him again. For what is there to hinder the mind from gradually acquiring a habit of attending to the lighter relations of ideas in which wit consists? Punning grows upon everybody, and punning is the wit of words. I do not mean to say that it is so easy to acquire a habit of discovering new relations in ideas as in words, but the difficulty is not so much greater as to render it insuperable to habit. One man is unquestionably much better calculated for it by nature than another; but association, which gradually makes a bad speaker a good one, might give a man wit who had it not, if any man chose to be so absurd as to sit down to acquire it.

“I have mentioned puns. They are, I believe, what I have denominated them—the wit of words. They are exactly the same to words which wit is to ideas, and consist in the sudden discovery of relations in language. A pun, to be perfect in its kind, should contain two distinct meanings; the one common and obvious, the other more remote; and in the notice which the mind takes of the relation between these two sets of words, and in the surprise which that relation excites, the pleasure of a pun consists. Miss Hamilton, in her book on Education, mentions the instance of a boy so very neglectful that he could never be brought to read the word patriarchs; but whenever he met with it he always pronounced it partridges. A friend of the writer observed to her that it could hardly be considered as a mere piece of negligence, for it appeared to him that the boy, in calling them partridges, was making game of the patriarchs. Now here are two distinct meanings contained in the same phrase: for to make game of the patriarchs is to laugh at them; or to make game of them is by a very extravagant and laughable sort of ignorance of words, to rank them among pheasants, partridges, and other such delicacies, which the law takes under its protection and calls game: and the whole pleasure derived from this pun consists in the sudden discovery that two such different meanings are referable to one form of expression. I have very little to say about puns; they are in very bad repute, and so they ought to be. The wit of language is so miserably inferior to the wit of ideas that it is very deservedly driven out of good company. Sometimes, indeed, a pun makes its appearance which seems for a moment to redeem its species; but we must not be deceived by them: it is a radically bad race of wit. By unremitting persecution, it has been at last got under, and driven into cloisters—from whence it must never again be suffered to emerge into the light of the world. One invaluable blessing produced by the banishment of punning is an immediate reduction of the number of wits. It is a wit of so low an order, and in which some sort of progress is so easily made, that the number of those endowed with the gift of wit would be nearly equal to those endowed with the gift of speech. The condition of putting together ideas in order to be witty operates much in the same salutary manner as the condition of finding rhymes in poetry;—it reduces the number of performers to those who have vigour enough to overcome incipient difficulties, and make a sort of provision that that which need not be done at all should be done well whenever it is done.”

This quotation from one of Sydney Smith’s Speeches is characteristic of his style.

MRS. PARTINGTON

I do not mean to be disrespectful, but the attempt of the Lords to stop the progress of reform reminds me very forcibly of the great storm of Sidmouth, and of the conduct of the excellent Mrs. Partington on that occasion. In the winter of 1824 there set in a great flood upon that town—the tide rose to an incredible height—the waves rushed in upon the houses—and everything was threatened with destruction. In the midst of this sublime storm, Dame Partington, who lived upon the beach, was seen at the door of her house with mop and pattens, trundling her mop, and squeezing out the seawater, and vigorously pushing away the Atlantic Ocean. The Atlantic was roused; Mrs. Partington’s spirit was up; but I need not tell you that the contest was unequal. The Atlantic Ocean beat Mrs. Partington. She was excellent at a slop or a puddle, but she should not have meddled with a tempest.—(From a Speech at Taunton in 1831.)

And we add the ever popular Recipe for a Salad.

SALAD

To make this condiment, your poet begs

The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs.

Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen-sieve,

Smoothness and softness to the salad give.

Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl,

And, half-suspected, animate the whole.

Of mordant mustard add a single spoon,

Distrust the condiment that bites so soon;

But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault,

To add a double quantity of salt.

And, lastly, o’er the flavoured compound toss

A magic soup-spoon of anchovy sauce.

Oh, green and glorious! Oh, herbaceous treat!

’Twould tempt the dying anchorite to eat;

Back to the world he’d turn his fleeting soul,

And plunge his fingers in the salad bowl!

Serenely full, the epicure would say,

Fate cannot harm me, I have dined to-day!

Charles Lamb, beloved alike of the humorous and serious minded, disagrees with Sydney Smith regarding the pun.

His opinion,

“A pun is a noble thing per se. It is a sole digest of reflection; it is entire; it fills the mind; it is as perfect as a sonnet—better. It limps ashamed in the train and retinue of humour; it knows it should have an establishment of its own.”

is shown in this instance.

Lamb was reserved among strangers. A friend, about to introduce him to a circle of new faces, said, “Now will you promise, Lamb, not to be as sheepish as usual?” Charles replied, with a rustic air, “I wool.”

Such masterpieces as Lamb’s Dissertation Upon Roast Pig, and his Farewell to Tobacco are too lengthy to quote. We give some of his shorter witty allusions.

Coleridge went to Germany, and left word to Lamb that if he wished any information on any subject, he might apply to him (i.e., by letter), so Lamb sent him the following abstruse propositions, to which, however, Coleridge did not deign an answer.

Whether God loves a dying angel better than a true man?

Whether the archangel Uriel could knowingly affirm an untruth, and whether, if he could, he would?

Whether the higher order of seraphim illuminati ever sneeze?

Whether an immortal and amenable soul may not come to be damned at last, and the man never suspect it beforehand?

Good Actions.—The greatest pleasure I know is to do a good action by stealth, and to have it found out by accident.

Paying for Things.—One cannot bear to pay for articles he used to get for nothing. When Adam laid out his first penny upon nonpareils at some stall in Mesopotamia, I think it went hard with him, reflecting upon his old goodly orchard, where he had so many for nothing.

Nothing to do.—Positively the best thing a man can have to do is nothing, and, next to that, perhaps, good works.

Robert Southey, though one time Poet Laureate, is not to be too highly rated as a writer. His humorous poems are largely of the “jagged categorical” type, and are whimseys rather than wit.

Notwithstanding the aspersion even then cast upon the pun, he regards it as a legitimate vehicle.

THE TEN LOST TRIBES OF ISRAEL

That the lost ten tribes of Israel may be found in London, is a discovery which any person may suppose he has made, when he walks for the first time from the city to Wapping. That the tribes of Judah and Benjamin nourish there is known to all mankind; and from them have sprung the Scripites, and the Omniumites, and the Threepercentites.

But it is not so well known that many other tribes noticed in the Old Testament are to be found in this island of Great Britain.

There are the Hittites, who excel in one branch of gymnastics. And there are the Amorites, who are to be found in town and country; and there are the Gadites, who frequent watering-places, and take picturesque tours.

Among the Gadites I shall have some of my best readers, who being in good humour with themselves and with everything else, except on a rainy day, will even then be in good humour with me. There will be the Amorites in their company; and among the Amorites, too, there will be some who in the overflowing of their love, will have some liking to spare for the doctor and his faithful memorialist.

The poets, those especially who deal in erotics, lyrics, sentimentals, or sonnets, are the Ah-oh-ites.

The gentlemen who speculate in chapels are the Puhites.

The chief seat of the Simeonites is at Cambridge; but they are spread over the land. So are the Man-ass-ites, of whom the finest specimens are to be seen in St. James’s Street, at the fashionable time of day for exhibiting the dress and the person upon the pavement.

The freemasons are of the family of the Jachinites.

The female Haggites are to be seen, in low life wheeling barrows, and in high life seated at card-tables.

The Shuhamites are the cordwainers.

The Teamanites attend the sales of the East India Company.

Sir James Mackintosh, and Sir James Scarlett, and Sir James Graham belong to the Jim-nites.

Who are the Gazathites, if the people of London are not, where anything is to be seen? All of them are the Gettites when they can, all would be Havites if they could.

The journalists should be Geshurites, if they answered to their profession; instead of this they generally turn out to be Geshuwrongs.

There are, however, three tribes in England, not named in the Old Testament, who considerably outnumber all the rest. These are the High Vulgarites, who are the children of Rahank and Phashan, the Middle Vulgarites, who are the children of Mammon and Terade, and the Low Vulgarities, who are the children of Tahag, Rahag, and Bohobtay-il.

—From “The Doctor.”

THE WELL OF ST. KEYNE

A well there is in the West country,

And a clearer one never was seen;

There is not a wife in the West country

But has heard of the Well of St. Keyne.

An oak and an elm tree stand beside,

And behind does an ash-tree grow,

And a willow from the bank above

Droops to the water below.

A traveller came to the Well of St. Keyne;

Pleasant it was to his eye,

For from cock-crow he had been travelling,

And there was not a cloud in the sky.

He drank of the water so cool and clear,

For thirsty and hot was he,

And he sat down upon the bank,

Under the willow-tree.

There came a man from the neighboring town

At the well to fill his pail,

On the well-side he rested it,

And bade the stranger hail.

“Now art thou a bachelor, stranger?” quoth he,

“For an if thou hast a wife,

The happiest draught thou hast drank this day

That ever thou didst in thy life.

“O has your good woman, if one you have,

In Cornwall ever been?

For an if she have, I’ll venture my life

She has drunk of the Well of St. Keyne.”

“I have left a good woman who never was here,”

The stranger he made reply;

“But that my draught should be better for that,

I pray you answer me why.”

“St. Keyne,” quoth the countryman, “many a time

Drank of this crystal well,

And before the angel summoned her

She laid on the water a spell.

“If the husband of this gifted well

Shall drink before his wife,

A happy man thenceforth is he,

For he shall be master for life.

“But if the wife should drink of it first,

Heaven help the husband then!”

The stranger stooped to the Well of St. Keyne,

And drank of the waters again.

“You drank of the well, I warrant, betimes?”

He to the countryman said.

But the countryman smiled as the stranger spake,

And sheepishly shook his head.

“I hastened, as soon as the wedding was done,

And left my wife in the porch.

But i’ faith, she had been wiser than me,

For she took a bottle to church.”

Theodore Hook, recorded as “a playwright, a punster and a practical joker,” also gives a dissertation on puns and a bit of helpful advice.

“Personal deformities or constitutional calamities are always to be laid hold of. If anybody tells you that a dear friend has lost his sight, observe that it will make him more hospitable than ever, since now he would be glad to see anybody. If a clergyman breaks his leg, remark that he is no longer a clergyman, but a lame man. If a poet is seized with apoplexy, affect to disbelieve it, though you know it to be true, in order to say, ‘Poeta nascitur non fit’; and then, to carry the joke one step farther, add that “it is not a fit subject for a jest.” A man falling into a tan-pit you may call ‘sinking in the sublime’; a climbing boy suffocated in a chimney meets with a sootable death; and a pretty girl having caught the small-pox is to be much pitted. On the subject of the ear and its defects, talk first of something in which a cow sticks, and end by telling the story of the man who, having taken great pains to explain something to his companion, at last got into a rage at his apparent stupidity, and exclaimed, ‘Why, my dear sir, don’t you comprehend? The thing is as plain as A B C.’ ‘I dare say it is,’ said the other, ‘but I am D E F.’

“It may be as well to give the beginner something of a notion of the use he may make of the most ordinary words, for the purposes of quibbleism.

“The loss of a hat is always felt; if you don’t like sugar you may lump it; a glazier is a panes-taking man; candles are burnt because wick-ed things always come to light; a lady who takes you home from a party is kind in her carriage, and you say “nunc est ridendum” when you step into it; if it happens to be a chariot, she is a charitable person; birds’-nests and king-killing are synonymous, because they are high trees on; a Bill for building a bridge should be sanctioned by the Court of Arches, as well as the House of Piers; when a man is dull, he goes to the sea-side to Brighton; a Cockney lover, when sentimental, should live in Heigh Hoburn; the greatest fibber is the man most to re-lie upon; a dean expecting a bishopric looks for lawn; a suicide kills pigs, and not himself; a butcher is a gross man, but a fig-seller is a grocer; Joshua never had a father or mother, because he was the son of Nun; your grandmother and your great-grandmother were your aunt’s sisters; a leg of mutton is better than heaven, because nothing is better than heaven, and a leg of mutton is better than nothing; races are matters of course; an ass can never be a horse, although he may be a mayor; the Venerable Bede was the mother of Pearl; a baker makes bread when he kneads it; a doctor cannot be a doctor all at once, because he comes to it by degrees; a man hanged at Newgate has taken a drop too much; the bridle day is that on which a man leads a woman to the halter. Never mind the aspirate; punning’s all fair, as the archbishop said in the dream.

“Puns interrogatory are at times serviceable. You meet a man carrying a hare; ask him if it is his own hare, or a wig—there you stump him. Why is Parliament Street like a compendium? Because it goes to a bridge. Why is a man murdering his mother in a garret a worthy person? Because he is above committing a crime. Instances of this kind are innumerable. If you want to render your question particularly pointed, you are, after asking it once or twice, to say ‘D’ye give it up?’ Then favour your friends with the solution.”

Richard Harris Barham, author of the Ingoldsby Legends, was an intimate friend of Hook.

Like many another true humorist he was of the clergy, being a minor canon of St. Paul’s cathedral.

His delightful tales are too long to quote, and only some shorter pieces may be given.

Barham was among the first to raise parody to a recognized art.

A “TRUE AND ORIGINAL” VERSION

In the autumn of 1824, Captain Medwin having hinted that certain beautiful lines on the burial of Sir John Moore might have been the production of Lord Byron’s muse, the late Mr. Sidney Taylor, somewhat indignantly, claimed them for their rightful owner, the Rev. Charles Wolfe. During the controversy a third claimant started up in the person of a soi-disant “Doctor Marshall,” who turned out to be a Durham blacksmith, and his pretensions a hoax. It was then that a certain “Dr. Peppercorn” put forth his pretensions, to what he averred was the only “true and original” version, viz.—

Not a sous had he got,—not a guinea or note,

And he looked confoundedly flurried,

As he bolted away without paying his shot,

And the landlady after him hurried.

We saw him again at dead of night,

When home from the Club returning;

We twigged the Doctor beneath the light

Of the gas-lamp brilliantly burning.

All bare, and exposed to the midnight dews,

Reclined in the gutter we found him;

And he looked like a gentleman taking a snooze,

With his Marshall cloak around him.

“The Doctor’s as drunk as the devil,” we said,

And we managed a shutter to borrow;

We raised him, and sighed at the thought that his head

Would “consumedly ache” on the morrow.

We bore him home, and we put him to bed,

And we told his wife and his daughter

To give him, next morning a couple of red

Herrings, with soda water.—

Loudly they talked of his money that’s gone,

And his Lady began to upbraid him;

But little he reck’d, so they let him snore on

’Neath the counterpane just as we laid him.

We tuck’d him in, and had hardly done

When, beneath the window calling,

We heard the rough voice of a son of a gun

Of a watchman “One o’clock!” bawling.

Slowly and sadly we all walked down

From his room in the uppermost story;

A rushlight we placed on the cold hearthstone,

And we left him alone in his glory.

RAISING THE DEVIL
A LEGEND OF CORNELIUS AGRIPPA

“And hast thou nerve enough?” he said,

That gray Old Man, above whose head

Unnumbered years had rolled,—

“And hast thou nerve to view,” he cried,

“The incarnate Fiend that Heaven defied!

—Art thou indeed so bold?

“Say, canst thou, with unshrinking gaze,

Sustain, rash youth, the withering blaze

Of that unearthly eye,

That blasts where’er it lights,—the breath

That, like the Simoom, scatters death

On all that yet can die!

—“Darest thou confront that fearful form

That rides the whirlwind and the storm,

In wild unholy revel!

The terrors of that blasted brow,

Archangel’s once,—though ruined now—

—Ay,—dar’st thou face The Devil?”

“I dare!” the desperate youth replied,

And placed him by that Old Man’s side,

In fierce and frantic glee,

Unblenched his cheek, and firm his limb:

—“No paltry juggling Fiend, but Him,

—The Devil! I fain would see!—

“In all his Gorgon terrors clad,

His worst, his fellest shape!” the Lad

Rejoined in reckless tone.—

—“Have then thy wish!” Agrippa said,

And sighed, and shook his hoary head,

With many a bitter groan.

He drew the Mystic circle’s bound,

With skull and cross-bones fenced around;

He traced full many a sigil there;

He muttered many a backward pray’r,

That sounded like a curse—

“He comes!”—he cried with wild grimace,

“The fellest of Apollyon’s race!”—

—Then in his startled pupil’s face

He dashed—an Empty Purse!!

Thomas De Quincey, one of the best of humorists wrote Confessions of an Opium Eater, with alas, all the necessary conditions to speak at first hand.

His clever essay, Murder as a Fine Art, we trust, was not founded on facts. This delightful bit of foolery, one of his many witty effusions, can be given only in part.

MURDER AS ONE OF THE FINE ARTS

The first murder is familiar to you all. As the inventor of murder, and the father of the art, Cain must have been a man of first-rate genius. All the Cains were men of genius. Tubal Cain invented tubes, I think, or some such thing. But, whatever might be the originality and genius of the artist, every art was then in its infancy, and the works must be criticised with the recollection of that fact. Even Tubal’s work would probably be little approved at this day in Sheffield; and therefore of Cain (Cain senior, I mean) it is no disparagement to say, that his performance was but so-so. Milton, however, is supposed to have thought differently. By his way of relating the case, it should seem to have been rather a pet murder with him, for he retouches it with an apparent anxiety for its picturesque effect:

“Whereat he inly raged; and, as they talk’d,

Smote him into the midriff with a stone

That beat out life. He fell; and, deadly pale,

Groan’d out his soul with gushing blood effused.”

Upon this, Richardson the painter, who had an eye for effect, remarks as follows, in his Notes on Paradise Lost, p. 497: “It has been thought,” says he, “that Cain beat—as the common saying is—the breath out of his brother’s body with a great stone; Milton gives in to this, with the addition, however, of a large wound.”

But it is time that I should say a few words about the principles of murder, not with a view to regulate your practice, but your judgment. As to old women, and the mob of newspaper readers, they are pleased with anything, provided it is bloody enough; but the mind of sensibility requires something more. First, then, let us speak of the kind of person who is adapted to the purpose of the murderer; secondly, of the place where; thirdly, of the time when, and other little circumstances.

As to the person, I suppose that it is evident that he ought to be a good man; because, if he were not, he might himself, by possibility, be contemplating murder at the very time; and such “diamond-cut-diamond” tussles, though pleasant enough when nothing better is stirring, are really not what a critic can allow himself to call murders.

The subject chosen ought to be in good health: for it is absolutely barbarous to murder a sick person, who is usually quite unable to bear it. On this principle, no tailor ought to be chosen who is above twenty-five, for after that age he is sure to be dyspeptic. Or at least, if a man will hunt in that warren, he will of course think it his duty, on the old established equation, to murder some multiple of 9—say 18, 27, or 36. And here, in this benign attention to the comfort of sick people, you will observe the usual effect of a fine art to soften and refine the feelings. The world in general, gentlemen, are very bloody-minded; and all they want in a murder is a copious effusion of blood; gaudy display in this point is enough for them. But the enlightened connoisseur is more refined in his taste; and from our art, as from all the other liberal arts when thoroughly mastered, the result is, to humanise the heart.

A philosophic friend, well known for his philanthropy and general benignity, suggests that the subject chosen ought also to have a family of young children wholly dependent upon his exertions, by way of deepening the pathos. And, undoubtedly, this is a judicious caution. Yet I would not insist too keenly on such a condition. Severe good taste unquestionably suggests it; but still, where the man was otherwise unobjectionable in point of morals and health, I would not look with too curious a jealousy to a restriction which might have the effect of narrowing the artist’s sphere.

So much for the person. As to the time, the place, and the tools, I have many things to say, which at present I have no room for. The good sense of the practitioner has usually directed him to night and privacy. Yet there have not been wanting cases where this rule was departed from with excellent effect.

Lord Byron, whose works are variously adjudged by the critics, owes much to the fact that he was possessed of a distinct and definite sense of humor.

It is that which saves many of his long and dull stretches of verse from utter unreadability.

His facile rhymes, apparently tossed off with little of or no effort, embody in the best possible manner his graceful fun.

The ottava rima of Don Juan, though often careless, even slovenly as to technical details, is surely the meter best fitted for the theme.

Juan embarked—the ship got under way,

The wind was fair, the water passing rough;

A devil of a sea rolls in that bay,

As I, who’ve crossed it oft, know well enough;

And, standing upon deck, the dashing spray

Flies in one’s face, and makes it weather-tough;

And there he stood to take, and take again,

His first—perhaps his last—farewell of Spain.

I can’t but say it is an awkward sight

To see one’s native land receding through

The growing waters; it unmans one quite,

Especially when life is rather new.

I recollect Great Britain’s coast looks white,

But almost every other country’s blue,

When gazing on them, mystified by distance,

We enter on our nautical existence.

So Juan stood, bewildered on the deck:

The wind sung, cordage strained, and sailors swore,

And the ship creaked, the town became a speck,

From which away so fair and fast they bore.

The best of remedies is a beef-steak

Against sea-sickness: try it, sir, before

You sneer, and I assure you this is true,

For I have found it answer—so may you.

“And oh! if e’er I should forget, I swear—

But that’s impossible, and cannot be—

Sooner shall this blue ocean melt to air,

Sooner shall earth resolve itself to sea,

Than I resign thine image, oh, my fair!

Or think of anything excepting thee;

A mind diseased no remedy can physic.”

(Here the ship gave a lurch and he grew sea-sick.)

“Sooner shall heaven kiss earth!” (Here he fell sicker.)

“Oh, Julia! what is every other woe?

(For God’s sake let me have a glass of liquor;

Pedro, Battista, help me down below.)

Julia, my love! (you rascal, Pedro, quicker)

Oh, Julia! (this curst vessel pitches so)

Beloved Julia, hear me still beseeching!”

(Here he grew inarticulate with retching.)

He felt that chilling heaviness of heart,

Or rather stomach, which, alas! attends,

Beyond the best apothecary’s art,

The loss of love, the treachery of friends,

Or death of those we dote on, when a part

Of us dies with them as each fond hope ends.

No doubt he would have been much more pathetic,

But the sea acted as a strong emetic.

AFTER SWIMMING THE HELLESPONT

If, in the month of dark December,

Leander, who was nightly wont

(What maid will not the tale remember?)

To cross thy stream, broad Hellespont;

If, when the wint’ry tempest roar’d,

He sped to Hero nothing loath,

And thus of old thy current pour’d,

Fair Venus! how I pity both!

For me, degenerate, modern wretch,

Though in the genial month of May,

My dripping limbs I faintly stretch,

And think I’ve done a feat to-day.

But since he crossed the rapid tide,

According to the doubtful story,

To woo—and—Lord knows what beside,

And swam for Love, as I for Glory;

’Twere hard to say who fared the best:

Sad mortals, thus the gods still plague you!

He lost his labour, I my jest;

For he was drowned, and I’ve the ague.

Thomas Hood, versatile alike in humorous or pathetic vein, was a prolific and successful punster. If the form could be forgiven anybody it must be condoned in his case. He also was apt at parody and often blended pathos and tragedy with his humorous work.

FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY
A PATHETIC BALLAD

Ben Battle was a soldier bold,

And used to war’s alarms;

But a cannon-ball took off his legs,

So he laid down his arms!

Now, as they bore him off the field,

Said he, “Let others shoot,

For here I leave my second leg,

And the Forty-Second Foot!”

The army-surgeons made him limbs;

Said he, “they’re only pegs:

But there’s as wooden Members quite

As represent my legs!”

Now Ben he loved a pretty maid,

Her name was Nelly Gray;

So he went to pay her his devours,

When he devoured his pay!

But when he called on Nelly Gray,

She made him quite a scoff;

And when she saw his wooden legs,

Began to take them off!

“O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray!

Is this your love so warm?

The love that loves a scarlet coat

Should be more uniform!”

Said she, “I loved a soldier once,

For he was blithe and brave;

But I will never have a man

With both legs in the grave!

“Before you had those timber toes,

Your love I did allow;

But then, you know, you stand upon

Another footing now!”

“O, Nelly Gray! O, Nelly Gray!

For all your jeering speeches;

At duty’s call I left my legs,

In Badajos’s breeches!”

“Why then,” said she, “you’ve lost the feet

Of legs in war’s alarms,

And now you cannot wear your shoes

Upon your feats of arms!”

“O, false and fickle Nelly Gray!

I know why you refuse:—

Though I’ve no feet—some other man

Is standing in my shoes!

“I wish I ne’er had seen your face;

But now, a long farewell!

For you will be my death;—alas!

You will not be my Nell!”

Now when he went from Nelly Gray

His heart so heavy got,

And life was such a burden grown,

It made him take a knot!

So round his melancholy neck

A rope he did entwine,

And, for his second time in life,

Enlisted in the Line.

One end he tied around a beam,

And then removed his pegs,

And, as his legs were off—of course

He soon was off his legs!

And there he hung, till he was dead

As any nail in town—

For though distress had cut him up,

It could not cut him down!

A dozen men sat on his corpse,

To find out why he died—

And they buried Ben in four cross-roads,

With a stake in his inside!

NO!

No sun—no moon!

No morn—no noon—

No dawn—no dusk—no proper time of day—

No sky—no earthly view—

No distance looking blue—

No road—no street—no “t’other side the way”—

No end to any Row—

No indications where the Crescents go—

No top to any steeple—

No recognitions of familiar people—

No courtesies for showing ’em—

No knowing ’em!

To travelling at all—no locomotion,

No inkling of the way—no notion—

No go—by land or ocean—

No mail—no post—

No news from any foreign coast—

No park—no ring—no afternoon gentility—

No company—no nobility—

No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease,

No comfortable feel in any member—

No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees.

No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds.

November!

The brothers James and Horace Smith, wrote what was in their day considered lively and amusing humor, but which seems a trifle dry to us. Their greatest work was the Rejected Addresses, a series of parodies on the poets, such as Wordsworth, Southey, Coleridge, Scott, Moore and many others.

One of these, an imitation of Wordsworth’s most simple style, succeeds in parodying his mawkish affectations of childish simplicity and nursery stammering.

THE BABY’S DÉBUT

[Spoken in the character of Nancy Lake, a girl eight years of age, who is drawn upon the stage in a child’s chaise by Samuel Hughes, her uncle’s porter.]

My brother Jack was nine in May,

And I was eight on New-Year’s day;

So in Kate Wilson’s shop

Papa (he’s my papa and Jack’s)

Bought me, last week, a doll of wax,

And brother Jack a top.

Jack’s in the pouts, and this it is,—

He thinks mine came to more than his;

So to my drawer he goes,

Takes out the doll, and, oh, my stars!

He pokes her head between the bars,

And melts off half her nose!

Quite cross, a bit of string I beg,

And tie it to his peg-top’s peg,

And bang, with might and main,

Its head against the parlour-door:

Off flies the head, and hits the floor,

And breaks a window-pane.

This made him cry with rage and spite:

Well, let him cry, it serves him right.

A pretty thing, forsooth!

If he’s to melt, all scalding hot,

Half my doll’s nose, and I am not

To draw his peg-top’s tooth!

Aunt Hannah heard the window break,

And cried, “Oh naughty Nancy Lake,

Thus to distress your aunt:

No Drury-Lane for you to-day!”

And while papa said, “Pooh, she may!”

Mamma said, “No, she sha’n’t!”

Well, after many a sad reproach,

They get into a hackney coach,

And trotted down the street.

I saw them go: one horse was blind,

The tails of both hung down behind,

Their shoes were on their feet.

The chaise in which poor brother Bill

Used to be drawn to Pentonville,

Stood in the lumber-room:

I wiped the dust from off the top,

While Molly mopp’d it with a mop,

And brush’d it with a broom.

My uncle’s porter, Samuel Hughes,

Came in at six to black the shoes

(I always talk to Sam):

So what does he, but takes, and drags

Me in the chaise along the flags,

And leaves me where I am.

My father’s walls are made of brick,

But not so tall, and not so thick

As these; and, goodness me!

My father’s beams are made of wood,

But never, never half so good

As those that now I see.

What a large floor! ’tis like a town!

The carpet, when they lay it down,

Won’t hide it, I’ll be bound;

And there’s a row of lamps!—my eye!

How they do blaze! I wonder why

They keep them on the ground.

At first I caught hold of the wing,

And kept away; but Mr. Thing-

um bob, the prompter man,

Gave with his hand my chaise a shove,

And said, “Go on, my pretty love;

Speak to ’em, little Nan.

“You’ve only got to curtsey, whisp-

er, hold your chin up, laugh, and lisp,

And then you’re sure to take:

I’ve known the day when brats, not quite

Thirteen, got fifty pounds a night;

Then why not Nancy Lake?”

But while I’m speaking, where’s papa?

And where’s my aunt? and where’s mamma?

Where’s Jack? Oh, there they sit!

They smile, they nod; I’ll go my ways,

And order round poor Billy’s chaise,

To join them in the pit.

And now, good gentlefolks, I go

To join mamma, and see the show;

So, bidding you adieu,

I curtsey, like a pretty miss,

And if you’ll blow to me a kiss,

I’ll blow a kiss to you.

[Blows a kiss, and exit.

THE MILKMAID AND THE BANKER

A Milkmaid, with a pretty face,

Who lived at Acton,

Had a black cow, the ugliest in the place,

A crooked-backed one,

A beast as dangerous, too, as she was frightful,

Vicious and spiteful;

And so confirmed a truant that she bounded

Over the hedges daily and got pounded:

’Twas in vain to tie her with a tether,

For then both cow and cord eloped together.

Armed with an oaken bough—(what folly!

It should have been of thorn, or prickly holly),

Patty one day was driving home the beast,

Which had as usual slipped its anchor,

When on the road she met a certain Banker,

Who stopped to give his eyes a feast,

By gazing on her features crimsoned high

By a long cow-chase in July.

“Are you from Acton, pretty lass?” he cried;

“Yes”—with a courtesy she replied.

“Why, then, you know the laundress, Sally Wrench?”

“Yes, she’s my cousin, sir, and next-door neighbor.”

“That’s lucky—I’ve a message for the wench

Which needs despatch, and you may save my labor.

Give her this kiss, my dear, and say I sent it:

But mind, you owe me one—I’ve only lent it.”

“She shall know,” cried the girl, as she brandished her bough,

“Of the loving intentions you bore me;

But since you’re in haste for the kiss, you’ll allow,

That you’d better run forward and give it my cow,

For she, at the rate she is scampering now,

Will reach Acton some minutes before me.”

Horace Smith.

THE JESTER CONDEMNED TO DEATH

One of the Kings of Scanderoon,

A royal jester,

Had in his train a gross buffoon,

Who used to pester

The Court with tricks inopportune,

Venting on the highest folks his

Scurvy pleasantries and hoaxes.

It needs some sense to play the fool,

Which wholesome rule

Occurred not to our jackanapes,

Who consequently found his freaks

Lead to innumerable scrapes,

And quite as many kicks and tweaks,

Which only seemed to make him faster

Try the patience of his master.

Some sin, at last, beyond all measure,

Incurred the desperate displeasure

Of his serene and raging highness:

Whether he twitched his most revered

And sacred beard,

Or had intruded on the shyness

Of the seraglio, or let fly

An epigram at royalty,

None knows: his sin was an occult one,

But records tell us that the Sultan,

Meaning to terrify the knave,

Exclaimed, “’Tis time to stop that breath:

Thy doom is sealed, presumptuous slave!

Thou stand’st condemned to certain death:

Silence, base rebel! no replying!

But such is my indulgence still,

That, of my own free grace and will,

I leave to thee the mode of dying.”

“Thy royal will be done—’tis just,”

Replied the wretch, and kissed the dust;

“Since, my last moments to assuage,

Your majesty’s humane decree

Has deigned to leave the choice to me,

I’ll die, so please you, of old age!”

Horace Smith.

It is to be regretted that the feminine writers of this period showed practically no evidence of humorous scintillation, but we have searched in vain through the writings of Ann and Jane Taylor, Mary Russell Mitford, Felicia Hemans and Letitia Elizabeth Landon,—finding only some unconscious humor, not at all intentional on the part of the authoresses, as they were then called.

William Maginn was also adept at parody, but his work was ephemeral.

The rollicking rhyme of the Irishman is among the most interesting of his poems.

THE IRISHMAN

There was a lady lived at Leith,

A lady very stylish, man,

And yet, in spite of all her teeth,

She fell in love with an Irishman,

A nasty, ugly Irishman,

A wild, tremendous Irishman,

A tearing, swearing, thumping, bumping, ranting, roaring Irishman.

His face was no ways beautiful,

For with small-pox ’twas scarred across,

And the shoulders of the ugly dog

Were almost double a yard across.

Oh, the lump of an Irishman,

The whisky-devouring Irishman,

The great he-rogue, with his wonderful brogue, the fighting, rioting Irishman!

One of his eyes was bottle-green,

And the other eye was out, my dear,

And the calves of his wicked-looking legs

Were more than two feet about, my dear.

Oh, the great big Irishman,

The rattling, battling Irishman,

The stamping, ramping, swaggering, staggering, leathering swash of an Irishman!

He took so much of Lundy-foot

That he used to snort and snuffle, oh,

And in shape and size the fellow’s neck

Was as bad as the neck of a buffalo.

Oh, the horrible Irishman,

The thundering, blundering Irishman,

The slashing, dashing, smashing, lashing, thrashing, hashing Irishman!

His name was a terrible name indeed,

Being Timothy Thady Mulligan;

And whenever he emptied his tumbler of punch,

He’d not rest till he’d filled it full again.

The boozing, bruising Irishman,

The ’toxicated Irishman,

The whisky, frisky, rummy, gummy, brandy, no-dandy Irishman.

This was the lad the lady loved,

Like all the girls of quality;

And he broke the skulls of the men of Leith,

Just by the way of jollity.

Oh, the leathering Irishman,

The barbarous, savage Irishman!

The hearts of the maids and the gentlemen’s heads were bothered, I’m sure, by this Irishman.

Thomas Haynes Bayly, though not especially a humorist, showed the influence of a witty muse in his songs, which were numerous and popular.

She Wore a Wreath of Roses, Oh, No, We Never Mention Her and Gaily the Troubadour Touched his Guitar are among the best remembered.

He was the author of many bright bits of Society Verse, and wrote some deep and very real satire.

WHY DON’T THE MEN PROPOSE?

Why don’t the men propose, mamma?

Why don’t the men propose?

Each seems just coming to the point,

And then away he goes;

It is no fault of yours, mamma,

That everybody knows;

You fête the finest men in town,

Yet, oh! they won’t propose.

I’m sure I’ve done my best, mamma,

To make a proper match;

For coronets and eldest sons,

I’m ever on the watch;

I’ve hopes when some distingué beau

A glance upon me throws;

But though he’ll dance and smile and flirt,

Alas! he won’t propose.

I’ve tried to win by languishing,

And dressing like a blue;

I’ve bought big books and talked of them

As if I’d read them through!

With hair cropp’d like a man I’ve felt

The heads of all the beaux;

But Spurzheim could not touch their hearts,

And oh! they won’t propose.

I threw aside the books, and thought

That ignorance was bliss;

I felt convinced that men preferred

A simple sort of Miss;

And so I lisped out nought beyond

Plain “yesses” or plain “noes,”

And wore a sweet unmeaning smile;

Yet, oh! they won’t propose.

Last night at Lady Ramble’s rout

I heard Sir Henry Gale

Exclaim, “Now I propose again——”

I started, turning pale;

I really thought my time was come,

I blushed like any rose;

But oh! I found ’twas only at

Ecarté he’d propose.

And what is to be done, mamma?

Oh, what is to be done?

I really have no time to lose,

For I am thirty-one;

At balls I am too often left

Where spinsters sit in rows;

Why don’t the men propose, mamma?

Why won’t the men propose?

Frederick Marryat, oftener spoken of as Captain Marryat was among the most renowned writers of sea stories, and easily the most humorous of the authors who chose the sea for their fictional setting.

His books are well known in all households, and after Dickens there is probably no English novelist who has caused more real chuckles.

NAUTICAL TERMS

All the sailors were busy at work, and the first lieutenant cried out to the gunner, “Now, Mr. Dispart, if you are ready, we’ll breech these guns.”

“Now, my lads,” said the first lieutenant, “we must slug (the part the breeches cover) more forward.” As I never had heard of a gun having breeches, I was very curious to see what was going on, and went up close to the first lieutenant, who said to me, “Youngster, hand me that monkey’s tail.” I saw nothing like a monkey’s tail, but I was so frightened that I snatched up the first thing that I saw, which was a short bar of iron, and it so happened that it was the very article which he wanted. When I gave it to him, the first lieutenant looked at me, and said, “So you know what a monkey’s tail is already, do you? Now don’t you ever sham stupid after that.”

Thought I to myself, I’m very lucky, but if that’s a monkey’s tail, it’s a very stiff one!

I resolved to learn the names of everything as fast as I could, that I might be prepared, so I listened attentively to what was said; but I soon became quite confused, and despaired of remembering anything.

“How is this to be finished off, sir?” inquired a sailor of the boatswain.

“Why, I beg leave to hint to you, sir, in the most delicate manner in the world,” replied the boatswain, “that it must be with a double-wall—and be damned to you—don’t you know that yet? Captain of the foretop,” said he, “up on your horses, and take your stirrups up three inches.” “Aye, aye, sir.” I looked and looked, but I could see no horses.

“Mr. Chucks,” said the first lieutenant to the boatswain, “what blocks have we below—not on charge?”

“Let me see, sir. I’ve one sister, t’other we split in half the other day, and I think I have a couple of monkeys down in the store-room. I say, you Smith, pass that brace through the bull’s eye, and take the sheep-shank out before you come down.”

And then he asked the first lieutenant whether something should not be fitted with a mouse or only a Turk’s-head—told him the goose-neck must be spread out by the armourer as soon as the forge was up. In short, what with dead-eyes and shrouds, cats and cat-blocks, dolphins and dolphin-strikers, whips and puddings, I was so puzzled with what I heard, that I was about to leave the deck in absolute despair.

“And, Mr. Chucks, recollect this afternoon that you bleed all the buoys.”

Bleed the boys, thought I; what can that be for? At all events, the surgeon appears to be the proper person to perform that operation.

—Peter Simple.

Douglas Jerrold was an infant prodigy and later a noted playwright; beside being the author of the world famous Caudle lectures.

He was a celebrated wit and punster and though many epigrammatic sayings are wrongly attributed to him, yet he was the originator of as many more.

COLD MUTTON, PUDDING, PANCAKES

“What am I grumbling about, now? It’s very well for you to ask that! I’m sure I’d better be out of the world than—there now, Mr Caudle; there you are again! I shall speak, sir. It isn’t often I open my mouth, Heaven knows! But you like to hear nobody talk but yourself. You ought to have married a negro slave, and not any respectable woman.

“You’re to go about the house looking like thunder all the day, and I’m not to say a word. Where do you think pudding’s to come from every day? You show a nice example to your children, you do; complaining, and turning your nose up at a sweet piece of cold mutton, because there’s no pudding! You go a nice way to make ’em extravagant—teach ’em nice lessons to begin the world with. Do you know what puddings cost; or do you think they fly in at the window?

“You hate cold mutton. The more shame for you, Mr. Caudle. I’m sure you’ve the stomach of a lord, you have. No, sir; I didn’t choose to hash the mutton. It’s very easy for you to say hash it; but I know what a joint loses in hashing: it’s a day’s dinner the less, if it’s a bit. Yes, I dare say; other people may have puddings with cold mutton. No doubt of it; and other people become bankrupts. But if ever you get into the Gazette, it sha’n’t be my fault—no; I’ll do my duty as a wife to you, Mr. Caudle; you shall never have it to say that it was my housekeeping that brought you to beggary. No; you may sulk at the cold meat—ha! I hope you’ll never live to want such a piece of cold mutton as we had to-day! and you may threaten to go to a tavern to dine; but, with our present means, not a crumb of pudding do you get from me. You shall have nothing but the cold joint—nothing, as I’m a Christian sinner.

“Yes; there you are, throwing those fowls in my face again! I know you once brought home a pair of fowls; I know it; but you were mean enough to want to stop ’em out of my week’s money! Oh, the selfishness—the shabbiness of men! They can go out and throw away pounds upon pounds with a pack of people who laugh at ’em afterward; but if it’s anything wanted for their own homes, their poor wives may hunt for it. I wonder you don’t blush to name those fowls again! I wouldn’t be so little for the world, Mr. Caudle!

“What are you going to do? Going to get up? Don’t make yourself ridiculous, Mr. Caudle; I can’t say a word to you like any other wife, but you must threaten to get up. Do be ashamed of yourself.

“Puddings, indeed! Do you think I’m made of puddings? Didn’t you have some boiled rice three weeks ago? Besides, is this the time of the year for puddings? It’s all very well if I had money enough allowed me like any other wife to keep the house with; then, indeed, I might have preserves like any other woman; now, it’s impossible; and it’s cruel—yes, Mr. Caudle, cruel—of you to expect it.

“Apples ar’n’t so dear, are they? I know what apples are, Mr. Caudle, without your telling me. But I suppose you want something more than apples for dumplings? I suppose sugar costs something, doesn’t it? And that’s how it is. That’s how one expense brings on another, and that’s how people go to ruin.

“Pancakes? What’s the use of your lying muttering there about pancakes? Don’t you always have ’em once a year—every Shrove Tuesday? And what would any moderate, decent man want more?

“Pancakes, indeed! Pray, Mr. Caudle—no, it’s no use your saying fine words to me to let you go to sleep; I sha’n’t. Pray, do you know the price of eggs just now? There’s not an egg you can trust to under seven and eight a shilling; well, you’ve only just to reckon up how many eggs—don’t lie swearing there at the eggs in that manner, Mr. Caudle; unless you expect the bed to let you fall through. You call yourself a respectable tradesman, I suppose? Ha! I only wish people knew you as well as I do! Swearing at eggs, indeed! But I’m tired of this usage, Mr. Caudle; quite tired of it; and I don’t care how soon it’s ended!

“I’m sure I do nothing but work and labour, and think how to make the most of everything; and this is how I’m rewarded.”

—Mrs. Caudle’s Curtain Lectures.

“Call that a kind man,” said an actor of an absent acquaintance; “a man who is away from his family, and never sends them a farthing! Call that kindness!” “Yes, unremitting kindness,” Jerrold replied.

Some member of “Our Club,” hearing an air mentioned, exclaimed: “That always carries me away when I hear it.” “Can nobody whistle it?” exclaimed Jerrold.

A friend said to Jerrold: “Have you heard about poor R——

If an earthquake were to engulf England to-morrow, the English would meet and dine somewhere just to celebrate the event.

Of a man who had pirated one of his jests, and who was described in his hearing as an honest fellow, he said, “Oh yes, you can trust him with untold jokes.”

Jerrold met Alfred Bunn one day in Piccadilly. Bunn stopped Jerrold, and said, “I suppose you’re strolling about, picking up character.” “Well, not exactly,” said Jerrold, “but there’s plenty lost hereabouts.”

Jerrold was seriously disappointed with a certain book written by one of his friends. This friend heard that he had expressed his disappointment. Friend (to Jerrold): “I heard you said it was the worst book I ever wrote.” Jerrold: “No, I didn’t. I said it was the worst book anybody ever wrote.”

Some one was talking with him about a gentleman as celebrated for the intensity as for the shortness of his friendships. “Yes,” said Jerrold, “his friendships are so warm, that he no sooner takes them up than he puts them down again.”

Thomas Moore, called the most successful Irishman of letters of the nineteenth century, early developed a taste for music and a talent for versification. To this add his native wit, and we have a humorist of no mean order.

He wrote epistles, odes, satires and songs with equal facility, and to these he added books of travel and biography and history.

His quick wit is shown in his lighter verse and epigrams.