The Revival.
Peace to his soul! new prospects bloom,
And toil rebuilds what fires consume!
Eat we and drink we, be our ditty,
"Joy to the managing committee."
Eat we and drink we, join to rum
Roast beef and pudding of the plum;
Forth from thy nook, John Horner, come,
With bread of ginger brown thy thumb,
For this is Drury's gay day:
Roll, roll thy hoop, and twirl thy tops,
And buy, to glad thy smiling chops,
Crisp parliament with lollipops,
And fingers of the lady.
Didst mark, how toil'd the busy train
From morn to eve, till Drury Lane
Leap'd like a roebuck from the plain?
Ropes rose and sunk, and rose again,
And nimble workmen trod;
To realize bold Wyatt's plan
Rush'd many a howling Irishman,
Loud clatter'd many a porter can,
And many a ragamuffin clan,
With trowel and with hod.
Drury revives! her rounded pate
Is blue, is heavenly blue with slate;
She "wings the midway air" elate,
As magpie, crow, or chough;
White paint her modish visage smears,
Yellow and pointed are her ears,
No pendant portico appears
Dangling beneath, for Whitbread's shears
Have cut the bauble off.
Yes, she exalts her stately head,
And, but that solid bulk outspread,
Opposed you on your onward tread,
And posts and pillars warranted
That all was true that Wyatt said,
You might have deem'd her walls so thick,
Were not composed of stone or brick,
But all a phantom, all a trick,
Of brain disturb'd and fancy-sick,
So high she soars, so vast, so quick.
JOHNSON'S GHOST.
Ghost of Dr. Johnson rises from trap-door P.S. and Ghost of Boswell, from trap-door O.P. The latter bows respectfully to the House, and obsequiously to the Doctor's Ghost, and retires.
Doctor's Ghost loquitur.
That which was organized by the moral ability of one, has been executed by the physical efforts of many, and Drury Lane Theatre is now complete. Of that part behind the curtain, which has not yet been destined to glow beneath the brush of the varnisher, or vibrate to the hammer of the carpenter, little is thought by the public, and little need be said by the committee. Truth, however, is not to be sacrificed for the accommodation of either, and he who should pronounce that our edifice has received its final embellishment, would be disseminating falsehood without incurring favour, and risking the disgrace of detection without participating the advantage of success.
Professions lavishly effused and parsimoniously verified are alike inconsistent with the precepts of innate rectitude and the practice of external policy: let it not then be conjectured, that because we are unassuming, we are imbecile; that forbearance is any indication of despondency, or humility of demerit. He that is the most assured of success will make the fewest appeals to favour, and where nothing is claimed that is undue, nothing that is due will be withheld. A swelling opening is too often succeeded by an insignificant conclusion. Parturient mountains have ere now produced muscipular abortions, and the auditor who compares incipient grandeur with final vulgarity, is reminded of the pious hawkers of Constantinople, who solemnly perambulate her streets, exclaiming, "In the name of the Prophet—figs!"
Of many who think themselves wise, and of some who are thought wise by others, the exertions are directed to the revival of mouldering and obscure dramas; to endeavours to exalt that which is now rare only because it was always worthless, and whose deterioration, while it condemned it to living obscurity, by a strange obliquity of moral perception constitutes its title to posthumous renown. To embody the flying colours of folly, to arrest evanescence, to give to bubbles the globular consistency as well as form, to exhibit on the stage the piebald denizen of the stable, and the half-reasoning parent of combs, to display the brisk locomotion of Columbine, or the tortuous attitudinizing of Punch; these are the occupations of others, whose ambition, limited to the applause of unintellectual fatuity, is too innocuous for the application of satire, and too humble for the incitement of jealousy.
Our refectory will be found to contain every species of fruit, from the cooling nectarine and luscious peach, to the puny pippin and the noxious nut. There indolence may repose, and inebriety revel; and the spruce apprentice, rushing in at second account, may there chatter with impunity, debarred by a barrier of brick and mortar from marring that scenic interest in others, which nature and education have disqualified him from comprehending himself.
Permanent stage-doors we have none. That which is permanent cannot be removed, for if removed it soon ceases to be permanent. What stationary absurdity can vie with that ligneous barricado, which, decorated with frappant and tintinabulant appendages, now serves, as the entrance of the lowly cottage, and now as the exit of a lady's bed-chamber; at one time insinuating plastic Harlequin into a butcher's shop, and at another, yawning as the flood-gate to precipitate the Cyprians of St. Giles's into the embraces of Macheath. To elude this glaring absurdity, to give to each respective mansion the door which the carpenter would doubtless have given, we vary our portal with the varying scene, passing from deal to mahogany, and from mahogany to oak, as the opposite claims of cottage, palace, or castle may appear to require.
Amid the general hum of gratulation which flatters us in front, it is fit that some regard should be paid to the murmurs of despondence that assail us in the rear. They, as I have elsewhere expressed it, "who live to please," should not have their own pleasures entirely overlooked. The children of Thespis are general in their censures of the architect in having placed the locality of exit at such a distance from the oily irradiators which now dazzle the eyes of him who addresses you. I am, cries the Queen of Terrors, robbed of my fair proportions. When the king-killing Thane hints to the breathless auditory the murders he means to perpetrate in the castle of Macduff "ere his purpose cool," so vast is the interval he has to travel before he can escape from the stage, that his purpose has even time to freeze. Your condition, cries the Muse of Smiles, is hard, but it is cygnet's down in comparison with mine. The peerless peer of capers and congees has laid it down as a rule, that the best good thing uttered by the morning visitor should conduct him rapidly to the doorway, last impressions vieing in durability with first. But when on this boarded elongation it falls to my lot to say a good thing, to ejaculate "keep moving," or to chaunt "hic hoc horum genetivo," many are the moments that must elapse ere I can hide myself from public vision in the recesses of O.P. or P.S.
To objections like these, captiously urged and querulously maintained, it is time that equity should conclusively reply. Deviation from scenic propriety has only to vituperate itself for the consequences it generates. Let the actor consider the line of exit as that line beyond which he should not soar in quest of spurious applause: let him reflect that in proportion as he advances to the lamps, he recedes from nature; that the truncheon of Hotspur acquires no additional charm from encountering the cheek of beauty in the stage-box, and that the bravura of Mandane may produce effect, although the throat of her who warbles it should not overhang the orchestra. The Jove of the modern critical Olympus, Lord Mayor of the theatric sky, has, ex cathedrâ, asserted that a natural actor looks upon the audience part of the theatre as the third side of the chamber he inhabits. Surely of the third wall thus fancifully erected, our actors should by ridicule or reason be withheld from knocking their heads against the stucco.
Time forcibly reminds me that all things which have a limit must be brought to a conclusion. Let me, ere that conclusion arrives, recall to your recollection that the pillars which rise on either side of me, blooming in varied antiquity, like two massy evergreens, had yet slumbered in their native quarry, but for the ardent exertions of the individual who called them into life: to his never-slumbering talents you are indebted for whatever pleasure this haunt of the Muses is calculated to afford. If, in defiance of chaotic malevolence, the destroyer of the temple of Diana yet survives in the name of Erostratus, surely we may confidently predict, that the rebuilder of the temple of Apollo will stand recorded to distant posterity in that of—Samuel Whitbread.
THE BEAUTIFUL INCENDIARY.
By the Hon. W. S.
Formosam resonare doces Amaryllida silvas.—Virgil.
Scene draws, and discovers a Lady asleep on a couch. Enter Philander.
Philander.
I.
Sobriety, cease to be sober,
Cease, Labour, to dig and to delve,
And hail to this tenth of October,
One thousand eight hundred and twelve.
Hah! whom do my peepers remark?
'Tis Hebe with Jupiter's jug;
Oh no, 'tis the pride of the Park,
Fair Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
II.
Why, beautiful nymph, do you close
The curtain that fringes your eye?
Why veil in the clouds of repose
The sun that should brighten our sky?
Perhaps jealous Venus has oil'd
Thy hair with some opiate drug,
Not choosing her charms should be foil'd
By Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
III.
But ah! why awaken the blaze
The bright burning-glasses contain,
Whose lens with concentrated rays
Proved fatal to old Drury Lane.
'Twas all accidental they cry,—
Away with the flimsy humbug!
'Twas tired by a flash from the eye
Of Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
IV.
Thy glance can in us raise a flame,
Then why should old Drury be free?
Our doom and its doom are the same,
Both subject to beauty's decree.
No candles the workmen consum'd,
When deep in the ruins they dug,
Thy flash still their progress illum'd,
Sweet Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
V.
Thy face a rich fireplace displays;
The mantel-piece marble—thy brows;
Thine eyes are the bright beaming blaze,
Thy bib which no trespass allows,
The fender's tall barrier marks;
Thy tippet's the fire-quelling rug,
Which serves to extinguish the sparks
Of Lady Elizabeth Mugg.
VI.
The Countess a lily appears,
Whose tresses the dewdrops emboss;
The Marchioness blooming in years,
A rosebud envelop'd in moss;
But thou art the sweet passion-flower,
For who would not slavery hug,
To pass but one exquisite hour
In the arms of Elizabeth Mugg?
VII.
When at Court, or some dowager's rout,
Her diamond aigrette meets our view,
She looks like a glow-worm dress'd out,
Or tulips bespangled with dew.
Her two lips denied to man's suit,
Are shared with her favourite Pug;
What lord would not change with the brute,
To live with Elizabeth Mugg?
VIII.
Could the stage be a large vis-à-vis,
Reserv'd for the polish'd and great,
Where each happy lover might see
The nymph he adores tête-à-tête;
No longer I'd gaze on the ground,
And the load of despondency lug,
For I'd book myself all the year round,
To ride with the sweet Lady Mugg.
IX.
Yes, she in herself is a host,
And if she were here all alone,
Our house might nocturnally boast
A bumper of fashion and ton.
Again should it burst in a blaze,
In vain would they ply Congreve's plug,
For nought could extinguish the rays
From the glance of divine Lady Mugg.
X.
O could I as Harlequin frisk,
And thou be my Columbine fair,
My wand should with one magic whisk
Transport us to Hanover Square;
St. George should lend us his shrine,
The parson his shoulders might shrug,
But a licence should force him to join
My hand in the hand of my Mugg.
XI.
Court-plaister the weapons should tip,
By Cupid shot down from above,
Which cut into spots for thy lip,
Should still barb the arrows of love.
The god who from others flies quick,
With us should be slow as a slug,
As close as a leech he should stick
To me and Elizabeth Mugg.
XII.
For Time would, like us, 'stead of sand,
Put filings of steel in his glass,
To dry up the blots of his hand,
And spangle life's page as they pass.
Since all flesh is grass ere 'tis hay,
O may I in clover live snug,
And when old Time mows me away,
Be stack'd with defunct Lady Mugg.
FIRE AND ALE.
By M. G. L.
Omnia transformat sese in miracula rerum.—Virgil.
My palate is parch'd with Pierian thirst,
Away to Parnassus I'm beckon'd;
List, warriors and dames, while my lay is rehears'd,
I sing of the singe of Miss Drury the first,
And the birth of Miss Drury the second.
The Fire King one day rather amorous felt;
He mounted his hot copper filly;
His breeches and boots were of tin, and the belt
Was made of cast iron, for fear it should melt
With the heat of the copper colt's belly.
Sure never was skin half so scalding as his!
When an infant, 'twas equally horrid,
For the water when he was baptized gave a fizz,
And bubbled and simmer'd and started off, whizz!
As soon as it sprinkled his forehead.
Oh! then there was glitter and fire in each eye,
For two living coals were the symbols;
His teeth were calcined, and his tongue was so dry,
It rattled against them as though you should try
To play the piano in thimbles.
From his nostrils a lava sulphureous flows,
Which scorches wherever it lingers,
A snivelling fellow he's call'd by his foes,
For he can't raise his paw up to blow his red nose,
For fear it should blister his fingers.
His wig is of flames curling over his head,
Well powder'd with white smoking ashes;
He drinks gunpowder tea, melted sugar of lead,
Cream of tartar, and dines on hot spice gingerbread,
Which black from the oven he gnashes.
Each fire nymph his kiss from her countenance shields,
'Twould soon set her cheekbone a-frying
He spit in the tenter-ground near Spitalfields,
And the hole that it burnt and the chalk that it yields
Make a capital limekiln for drying.
When he open'd his mouth out there issued a blast,
(Nota bene, I do not mean swearing,)
But the noise that it made and the heat that it cast,
I've heard it from those who have seen it, surpass'd
A shot manufactory flaring.
He blaz'd and he blaz'd as he gallop'd to snatch
His bride, little dreaming of danger;
His whip was a torch, and his spur was a match,
And over the horse's left eye was a patch,
To keep it from burning the manger.
And who is the housemaid he means to enthral
In his cinder-producing alliance?
'Tis Drury Lane Playhouse, so wide, and so tall,
Who, like other combustible ladies, must fall,
If she cannot set sparks at defiance.
On his warming-pan knee-pan he clattering roll'd,
And the housemaid his hand would have taken,
But his hand, like his passion, was too hot to hold,
And she soon let it go, but her new ring of gold
All melted, like butter or bacon!
Oh! then she look'd sour, and indeed well she might,
For Vinegar Yard was before her,
But, spite of her shrieks, the ignipotent knight,
Enrobing the maid in a flame of gas-light,
To the skies in a sky-rocket bore her.
Look! look! 'tis the Ale King, so stately and starch,
Whose votaries scorn to be sober;
He pops from his vat, like a cedar or larch:
Brown stout is his doublet, he hops in his march,
And froths at the mouth in October.
His spear is a spigot, his shield is a bung;
He taps where the housemaid no more is,
When lo! at his magical bidding, upsprung
A second Miss Drury, tall, tidy, and young,
And sported in loco sororis.
Back, lurid in air, for a second regale,
The Cinder King, hot with desire,
To Brydges Street hied; but the Monarch of Ale,
With uplifted spigot and faucet, and pail,
Thus chided the Monarch of Fire:
"Vile tyrant, beware of the ferment I brew,
I rule the roast here, dash the wig o' me!
If, spite of your marriage with Old Drury, you
Come here with your tinderbox, courting the New,
I'll have you indicted for bigamy!"
PLAYHOUSE MUSINGS.
By S. T. C.
Ille velut fidis aroana sodalibus olim
Credebat libris; neque si male cesserat, usquam
Decurrens alio, neque si bene.—Horat.
My pensive public, wherefore look you sad?
I had a grandmother, she kept a donkey
To carry to the mart her crockery ware,
And when that donkey look'd me in the face,
His face was sad! and you are sad, my public!
Joy should be yours: this tenth day of October
Again assembles us in Drury Lane.
Long wept my eye to see the timber planks
That hid our ruins; many a day I cried,
"Ah me! I fear they never will rebuild it!"
Till on one eve, one joyful Monday eve,
As along Charles Street I prepared to walk,
Just at the corner, by the pastry-cook's,
I heard a trowel tick against a brick.
I look'd me up, and straight a parapet
Uprose at least seven inches o'er the planks.
"Joy to thee, Drury!" to myself I said:
"He of Blackfriars Road who hymn'd thy downfall
In loud hosannahs, and who prophesied
That flames, like those from prostrate Solyma,
Would scorch the hand that ventured to rebuild thee,
Has proved a lying prophet." From that hour,
As leisure offer'd, close to Mr. Spring's
Box-office door, I've stood and eyed the builders.
They had a plan to render less their labours;
Workmen in elder times would mount a ladder
With hodded heads, but these stretch'd forth a pole
From the wall's pinnacle, they placed a pulley
Athwart the pole, a rope athwart the pulley;
To this a basket dangled; mortar and bricks
Thus freighted, swung securely to the top,
And in the empty basket workmen twain
Precipitate, unhurt, accosted earth.
Oh! 'twas a goodly sound to hear the people
Who watch'd the work, express their various thoughts!
While some believ'd it never would be finish'd,
Some on the contrary believ'd it would.
I've heard our front that faces Drury Lane
Much criticis'd; they say 'tis vulgar brick-work,
A mimic manufactory of floor-cloth.
One of the morning papers wish'd that front
Cemented like the front in Brydges Street;
As it now looks they call it Wyatt's Mermaid,
A handsome woman with a fish's tail.
White is the steeple of St. Bride's in Fleet Street,
The Albion (as its name denotes) is white;
Morgan and Saunders' shop for chairs and tables
Gleams like a snowball in the setting sun;
White is Whitehall. But not St. Bride's in Fleet Street,
The spotless Albion, Morgan, no, nor Saunders,
Nor white Whitehall is white as Drury's face.
Oh, Mr. Whitbread! fie upon you, sir!
I think you should have built a colonnade;
When tender Beauty, looking for her coach,
Protrudes her gloveless hand, perceives the shower,
And draws the tippet closer round her throat.
Perchance her coach stands half a dozen off,
And, ere she mounts the step, the oozing mud
Soaks thro' her pale kid slipper. On the morrow
She coughs at breakfast, and her gruff papa
Cries, "There you go! this comes of playhouses!"
To build no portico is penny wise:
Heaven grant it prove not in the end pound foolish!
Hail to thee, Drury! Queen of Theatres!
What is the Regency in Tottenham Street,
The Royal Amphitheatre of Arts,
Astley's Olympic, or the Sans Pareil,
Compar'd with thee? Yet when I view thee push'd
Back from the narrow street that christen'd thee,
I know not why they call thee Drury Lane.
Amid the freaks that modern fashion sanctions,
It grieves me much to see live animals
Brought on the stage. Grimaldi has his rabbit,
Laurent his cat, and Bradbury his pig;
Fie on such tricks! Johnson, the machinist
Of former Drury, imitated life
Quite to the life. The elephant in Blue Beard,
Stuff'd by his hand, wound round his lithe proboscis,
As spruce as he who roar'd in Padmanaba.
Nought born on earth should die. On hackney stands
I reverence the coachman who cries "Gee,"
And spares the lash. When I behold a spider
Prey on a fly, a magpie on a worm,
Or view a butcher with horn-handle knife
Slaughter a tender lamb as dead as mutton,
Indeed, indeed, I'm very, very sick! [Exit hastily.
DRURY LANE HUSTINGS.
A NEW HALFPENNY BALLAD.
By a Pic-nic Poet.
This is the very age of promise. To promise is most courtly and fashionable. Performance is a kind of will or testament, which argues a great sickness in his judgment that makes it.—Timon of Athens.
To be sung by Mr. Johnstone in the character of Looney M'Twolter.
I.
"Mr. Jack, your address," says the prompter to me,
So I gave him my card—"No, that a'nt it," says he,
"'Tis your public address." "Oh!" says I, "never fear,
If address you are bother'd for, only look here." [Puts on hat affectedly.
Tol de rol lol, &c.
II.
With Drurys for sartain we'll never have done,
We've built up another, and yet there's but one;
The old one was best, yet I'd say, if I durst,
The new one is better—the last is the first.
Tol de rol, &c.
III.
These pillars are called by a Frenchified word,
A something that's jumbled of antique and verd,
The boxes may show us some verdant antiques,
Some bold harridans who beplaster their cheeks.
Tol de rol, &c.
IV.
Only look how high Tragedy, Comedy, stick,
Lest their rivals, the horses, should give them a kick!
If you will not descend when our authors beseech ye,
You'll stop there for life, for I'm sure they can't reach ye.
Tol de rol, &c.
V.
Each one shilling god within reach of a nod is,
And plain are the charms of each gallery goddess,
You, brandy-faced Moll, don't be looking askew,
When I talked of a goddess I didn't mean you.
Tol de rol, &c
VI.
Our stage is so prettily fashion'd for viewing,
The whole house can see what the whole house is doing.
'Tis just like the hustings, we kick up a bother,
But saying is one thing and doing's another.
Tol de rol, &c.
VII.
We've many new houses, and some of them rum ones,
But the newest of all is the new House of Commons,
'Tis a rickety sort of a bantling I'm told,
It will die of old age when it's seven years old.
Tol de rol, &c.
VIII.
As I don't know on whom the election will fall,
I move in return for returning them all;
But for fear Mr. Speaker my meaning should miss,
The house that I wish 'em to sit in is this.
Tol de rol, &c.
IX.
Let us cheer our great Commoner, but for whose aid
We all should have gone with short commons to bed,
And since he has saved all the fat from the fire,
I move that the House be call'd Whitbread's Entire.
Tol de rol, &c.
ARCHITECTURAL ATOMS.
Translated by Dr. B.
Lege, Dick, Lege!—Joseph Andrews.
To be recited by the Translator's Son.
Away, fond dupes! who smit with sacred lore,
Mosaic dreams in Genesis explore,
Dote with Copernicus, or darkling stray
With Newton, Ptolemy, or Tycho Brahe:
To you I sing not, for I sing of truth,
Primæval systems, and creation's youth;
Such as of old, with magic wisdom fraught,
Inspired Lucretius to the Latians taught.
I sing how casual bricks, in airy climb,
Encounter'd casual horse-hair, casual lime;
How rafters borne through wondering clouds elate,
Kiss'd in their slope blue elemental slate,
Clasp'd solid beams in chance-directed fury,
And gave to birth our renovated Drury.
Thee, son of Jove, whose sceptre was confessed,
Where fair Œolia springs from Tethys' breast:
Thence on Olympus 'mid Celestials placed,
God of the winds, and Ether's boundless waste,
Thee I invoke! Oh, puff my bold design,
Prompt the bright thought, and swell the harmonious line;
Uphold my pinions, and my verse inspire
With Winsor's patent gas, or wind of fire,
In whose pure blaze thy embryo form enroll'd,
The dark enlightens, and enchafes the cold.
But while I court thy gifts, be mine to shun
The deprecated prize Ulysses won;
Who sailing homeward from thy breezy shore,
The prison'd winds in skins of parchment bore:—
Speeds the fleet bark, till o'er the billowy green
The azure heights of Ithaca are seen;
But while with favouring gales her way she wins,
His curious comrades ope the mystic skins:
When lo! the rescued winds, with boisterous sweep,
Roar to the clouds, and lash the rocking deep;
Heaves the smote vessel in the howling blast,
Splits the stretch'd sail, and cracks the tottering mast.
Launch'd on a plank, the buoyant hero rides
Where ebon Afric stems the sable tides,
While his duck'd comrades o'er the ocean fly,
And sleep not in the whole skins they untie.
So when to raise the wind some lawyer tries,
Mysterious skins of parchment meet our eyes.
On speed the smiling suit, "Pleas of our Lord
The King" shine jetty on the wide record:
Nods the prunella'd bar, attornies smile,
And siren jurors flatter to beguile;
Till stript—nonsuited—he is doom'd to toss
In legal shipwreck, and redeemless loss;
Lucky, if, like Ulysses, he can keep
His head above the waters of the deep.
Æolian monarch! Emperor of Puffs!
We modern sailors dread not thy rebuffs;
See to thy golden shore promiscuous come
Quacks for the lame, the blind, the deaf, the dumb;
Fools are their bankers—a prolific line,
And every mortal malady's a mine.
Each sly Sangrado, with his poisonous pill,
Flies to the printer's devil with his bill,
Whose Midas touch can gild his asses' ears,
And load a knave with folly's rich arrears.
And lo! a second miracle is thine,
For sloe-juiced water stands transform'd to wine.
Where Day and Martin's patent blacking roll'd,
Burst from the vase Pactolian streams of gold;
Laugh the sly wizards glorying in their stealth,
Quit the black art, and loll in lazy wealth.
See Britain's Algerines, the Lottery fry,
Win annual tribute by the annual lie.
Aided by thee—but whither do I stray?
Court, city, borough, own thy sovereign sway:
An age of puffs the age of gold succeeds,
And windy bubbles are the spawn it breeds.
If such thy power, O hear the Muse's prayer!
Swell thy loud lungs, and wave thy wings of air;
Spread, viewless giant, all thy arms of mist
Like windmill sails to bring the poet grist;
As erst thy roaring son with eddying gale
Whirl'd Orithyia from her native vale—
So, while Lucretian wonders I rehearse,
Augusta's sons shall patronize my verse.
I sing of Atoms, whose creative brain,
With eddying impulse, built new Drury Lane;
Not to the labours of subservient man,
To no young Wyatt appertains the plan;
We mortals stalk, like horses in a mill,
Impassive media of Atomic will;
Ye stare! then truth's broad talisman discern—
'Tis Demonstration speaks.—Attend and learn!
From floating elements in chaos hurl'd,
Self-form'd of atoms, sprang the infant world.
No great First Cause inspired the happy plot,
But all was matter, and no matter what.
Atoms, attracted by some law occult,
Settling in spheres, the globe was the result;
Pure child of Chance, which still directs the ball,
As rotatory atoms rise or fall.
In ether launch'd, the peopled bubble floats,
A mass of particles and confluent motes,
So nicely pois'd, that if one atom flings
Its weight away, aloft the planet springs,
And wings its course thro' realms of boundless space,
Outstripping comets in eccentric race.
Add but one atom more, it sinks outright
Down to the realms of Tartarus and night.
What waters melt or scorching fires consume,
In different forms their being reassume;
Hence can no change arise, except in name,
For weight and substance ever are the same.
Thus with the flames that from old Drury rise,
Its elements primæval sought the skies,
There, pendulous to wait the happy hour,
When new attractions should restore their power.
So in this procreant theatre elate,
Echoes unborn their future life await;
Here embryo sounds in ether lie conceal'd,
Like words in northern atmosphere congeal'd.
Here many a fœtus laugh and half encore
Clings to the roof, or creeps along the floor.
By puffs concipient some in ether flit,
And soar in bravos from the thundering pit;
Some forth on ticket nights from tradesmen break,
To mar the actor they design to make;
While some this mortal life abortive miss,
Crush'd by a groan, or strangled by a hiss.
So, when "dog's-meat" re-echoes through the streets,
Rush sympathetic dogs from their retreats,
Beam with bright blaze their supplicating eyes,
Sink their hind-legs, ascend their joyful cries;
Each, wild with hope, and maddening to prevail,
Points the pleased ear, and wags the expectant tail.
Ye fallen bricks! in Drury's fire calcined,
Since doom'd to slumber, couch'd upon the wind,
Sweet was the hour, when tempted by your freaks,
Congenial trowels smooth'd your yellow cheeks.
Float dulcet serenades upon the ear,
Bends every atom from its ruddy sphere,
Twinkles each eye, and, peeping from its veil,
Marks in the adverse crowd its destined male.
The oblong beauties clap their hands of grit,
And brick-dust titterings on the breezes flit;
Then down they rush in amatory race,
Their dusty bridegrooms eager to embrace.
Some choose old lovers, some decide for new,
But each, when fix'd, is to her station true.
Thus various bricks are made as tastes invite,
The red, the grey, the dingy, or the white.
Perhaps some half-baked rover, frank and free,
To alien beauty bends the lawless knee,
But of unhallow'd fascinations sick,
Soon quits his Cyprian for his married brick;
The Dido atom calls and scolds in vain,
No crisp Æneas soothes the widow's pain.
So in Cheapside, what time Aurora peeps,
A mingled noise of dustmen, milk, and sweeps,
Falls on the housemaid's ear; amaz'd she stands,
Then opes the door with cinder-sabled hands,
And "matches" calls. The dustman, bubbled flat,
Thinks 'tis for him, and doffs his fan-tail'd hat;
The milkman, whom her second cries assail,
With sudden sink, unyokes the clinking pail;
Now louder grown, by turns she screams and weeps;
Alas! her screaming only brings the sweeps.
Sweeps but put out—she wants to raise a flame,
And calls for matches, but 'tis still the same.
Atoms and housemaids! mark the moral true,
If once ye go astray, no match for you!
As atoms in one mass united mix,
So bricks attraction feel for kindred bricks;
Some in the cellar view, perchance, on high,
Fair chimney chums on beds of mortar lie;
Enamour'd of the sympathetic clod,
Leaps the red bridegroom to the labourer's hod,
And up the ladder bears the workman, taught
To think he bears the bricks—mistaken thought!
A proof behold—if near the top they find
The nymphs or broken corner'd, or unkind,
Back to the bottom leaping with a bound,
They bear their bleeding carriers to the ground.
So legends tell, along the lofty hill
Paced the twin heroes, gallant Jack and Jill;
On trudged the Gemini to reach the rail
That shields the well's top from the expectant pail,
When ah! Jack falls; and, rolling in the rear,
Jill feels the attraction of his kindred sphere;
Head over heels begins his toppling track,
Throws sympathetic somersets with Jack,
And at the mountain's base, bobbs plump against him, whack!
Ye living atoms, who unconscious sit,
Jumbled by chance in gallery, box, and pit,
For you no Peter opes the fabled door,
No churlish Charon plies the shadowy oar;—
Breathe but a space, and Boreas' casual sweep
Shall bear your scatter'd corses o'er the deep,
To gorge the greedy elements, and mix
With water, marl, and clay, and stones and sticks;
While, charged with fancied souls, sticks, stones and clay,
Shall take your seats, and hiss or clap the play.
O happy age! when convert Christians read
No sacred writings but the Pagan creed;
O happy age! when spurning Newton's dreams,
Our poet's sons recite Lucretian themes,
Abjure the idle systems of their youth,
And turn again to atoms and to truth.
O happier still! when England's dauntless dames,
Awed by no chaste alarms, no latent shames,
The bard's fourth book unblushingly peruse,
And learn the rampant lessons of the stews!
All hail, Lucretius, renovated sage!
Unfold the modest mystics of thy page;
Return no more to thy sepulchral shelf,
But live, kind bard,—that I may live myself!
THEATRICAL ALARM BELL.
By the Editor of the M. P.
Bounce, Jupiter, bounce!—O'Hara.
Ladies and Gentlemen,
As it is now the universally-admitted, and indeed pretty-generally-suspected aim of Mr. Whitbread and the infamous, bloodthirsty, and, in fact, illiberal faction to which he belongs, to burn to the ground this free and happy Protestant city, and establish himself in St. James's Palace, his fellow committee-men have thought it their duty to watch the principles of a theatre built under his auspices. The information they have received from undoubted authority, particularly from an old fruit-woman who had turned king's evidence, and whose name for obvious reasons we forbear to mention, though we have had it some weeks in our possession, has induced them to introduce various reforms: not such reforms as the vile faction clamour for, meaning thereby revolution, but such reforms as are necessary to preserve the glorious constitution of the only free, happy, and prosperous country now left upon the face of the earth. From the valuable and authentic source above alluded to, we have learnt that a sanguinary plot has been formed by some united Irishmen, combined with a gang of Luddites, and a special committee sent over by the Pope at the instigation of the beastly Corsican fiend, for destroying all the loyal part of the audience on the anniversary of that deeply-to-be-abhorred and highly-to-be-blamed stratagem, the gunpowder plot, which falls this year on Thursday, the 5th of November. The whole is under the direction of a delegated committee of O.P.'s, whose treasonable exploits at Covent Garden you all recollect, and all of whom would have been hung from the chandeliers at that time but for the mistaken lenity of government. At a given signal a well-known O.P. was to cry out from the gallery, "Nosey! Music!" whereupon all the O.P.'s were to produce from their inside pockets a long pair of shears, edged with felt to prevent their making any noise, manufactured expressly by a wretch at Birmingham, one of Mr. Brougham's evidences, and now in custody. With these they were to cut off the heads of all the loyal N.P.'s in the house, without distinction of sex or age. At the signal, similarly given, of "Throw him over," which it now appears always alluded to the overthrow of our never-sufficiently-enough-to-be-deeply-and-universally-to-be-venerated constitution, all the heads of the N.P.'s were to be thrown at the fiddlers, to prevent their appearing in evidence, or perhaps as a false and illiberal insinuation that they have no heads of their own. All that we know of the further designs of these incendiaries is, that they are by-a-great-deal-too-much too-horrible-to-be-mentioned.
The manager has acted with his usual promptitude on this trying occasion. He has contracted for 300 tons of gunpowder, which are at this moment placed in a small barrel under the pit, and a descendant of Guy Faux, assisted by Colonel Congreve, has undertaken to blow up the house, when necessary, in so novel and ingenious a manner, that every O.P. shall be annihilated, while not a whisker of the N.P.'s shall be singed. This strikingly displays the advantages of loyalty and attachment to government. Several other hints have been taken from the theatrical regulations of the not-a-bit-the-less-on-that-account-to-be-universally-execrated monster Bonaparte. A park of artillery, provided with chain-shot, is to be stationed on the stage, and play upon the audience in case of any indication of misplaced applause or popular discontent (which accounts for the large space between the curtain and the lamps); and the public will participate our satisfaction in learning that the indecorous custom of standing up with the hat on is to be abolished, as the Bow Street officers are provided with daggers, and have orders to stab all such persons to the heart, and send their bodies to Surgeons' Hall; gentlemen who cough are only to be slightly wounded. Fruit-women bawling "Bill of the Play" are to be forthwith shot, for which purpose soldiers will be stationed in the slips, and ball-cartridge is to be served out with the lemonade. If any of the spectators happen to sneeze or spit they are to be transported for life, and any person who is so tall as to prevent another seeing, is to be dragged out and sent on board the tender, or, by an instrument taken out of the pocket of Procrustes, to be forthwith cut shorter, either at the head or foot, according as his own convenience may dictate.
Thus, ladies and gentlemen, have the committee, through my medium, set forth the not-in-a-hurry-to-be-paralleled plan they have adopted for preserving order and decorum within the walls of their magnificent edifice. Nor have they, while attentive to their own concerns, by any means overlooked those of the cities of London and Westminster. Finding, on enumeration, that they have with a with-two-hands-and-one-tongue-to-be-applauded liberality, contracted for more gunpowder than they want, they have parted with the surplus to the mattock-carrying and hustings-hammering high bailiff of Westminster, who has, with his own shovel, dug a large hole in the front of the parish church of St. Paul, Covent Garden, that, upon the least symptom of ill-breeding in the mob at the general election, the whole of the market may be blown into the air. This, ladies and gentlemen, may at first make provisions rise, but we pledge the credit of our theatre that they will soon fall again, and people be supplied as usual with vegetables in the in-general-strewed-with-cabbage-stalks-but-on-Saturday-night-lighted-up-with-lamps market of Covent Garden.
I should expatiate more largely on the other advantages of the glorious constitution of these by-the-whole-of-Europe-envied realms, but I am called away to take an account of the ladies, and other artificial flowers, at a fashionable rout, of which a full and particular account will hereafter appear. For the present, my fashionable intelligence is scanty, on account of the opening of Drury Lane; and the ladies and gentlemen who honour me with their attention, will not be surprised if they find nothing under my usual head!
THE THEATRE.
By the Rev. G. C.
Nil intentatum nostri liquôre poetæ,
Nec minimum meruère decus, vestigia Græca
Ausi desesere, et celebrare domestica facta.—Horat.