MATTHEW GREGORY LEWIS.
Born 1775.—Died May 14, 1818.
The first work of this author that attracted general attention was a somewhat licentious romance, published in 1795, entitled Ambrosio, or the Monk, from which circumstance he was afterwards generally styled “Monk Lewis.” He had a morbid taste for the horrible and supernatural in literature, and having achieved some fame by his Monk and Castle Spectre he continued to write ghost stories till, following as he did in the wake of Mrs. Radcliffe, he quite overstocked the market. Upon one occasion Lewis, speaking to Lady Holland about The Rejected Addresses, remarked
“Many of them are very fair, but mine is not at all like; they have made me write burlesque, which I never do.” “You don’t know your own talent,” answered the lady. Lewis was very small in stature, he had large grey eyes, thick features, and an inexpressive countenance, he was, however, exceedingly vain, and very foppish in his dress. But he was a generous, kind hearted man, Sir Walter Scott spoke highly of him, and Byron wrote
“I’d give a world of sugar cane,
That Mat. Lewis were alive again.”
He was for some time M.P. for Hindon, but he obtained no parliamentary distinction.
The following, which is his best known poem, first appeared in his novel The Monk:—
ALONZO THE BRAVE,
And the Fair Imogine.
A warrior so bold, and a virgin so bright,
Convers’d as they sat on the green;
They gaz’d on each other with tender delight;
Alonzo the Brave was the name of the knight;
The maid’s was the Fair Imogine.
“And Oh!” said the youth, “since to morrow I go
“To fight in a far distant land,
“Your tears for my absence soon ceasing to flow,
“Some other will court you, and you will bestow
“On a wealthier suitor your hand.”
“Oh! hush these suspicions,” Fair Imogine said,
“Offensive to love and to me!
“For, if you be living, or if you be dead,
“I swear by the Virgin, that none in your stead
“Shall husband of Imogine be.”
“And if e’er for another my heart should decide,
“Forgetting Alonzo the Brave,
“God grant that, to punish my falsehood and pride,
“Your ghost at the marriage may sit by my side,
“May tax me with perjury, claim me as bride,
“And bear me away to the grave.”
To Palestine hasten’d the hero so bold!
His love she lamented him sore;
But scarce had a twelvemonth elaps’d, when, behold,
A Baron all cover’d with jewels and gold,
Arriv’d at Fair Imogine’s door,
His treasure, his presents, his spacious domain,
Soon made her untrue to her vows;
He dazzled her eyes, he bewilder’d her brain,
He caught her affections, so light and so vain,
And carried her home as his spouse.
And now had the marriage been blest by the priest,
The revelry now was begun;
The tables they groan’d with the weight of the feast:
Nor yet had the laughter and merriment ceas’d
When the bell of the castle toll’d “One!”
Then first, with amazement Fair Imogine found
That a stranger was plac’d by her side;
His air was terrific, he utter’d no sound,
He spoke not, he mov’d not, he look’d not around,
But earnestly gaz’d on the bride.
His vizor was clos’d, and gigantic his height,
His armour was sable to view!
All pleasure and laughter were hush’d at his sight,
The dogs as they eye’d him drew back in affright,
The lights in the chamber burn’d blue!
His presence all bosoms appear’d to dismay,
The guests sat in silence and fear;
At length spoke the bride, while she trembled, “I pray,
“Sir Knight, that your helmet aside you would lay,
“And deign to partake of our cheer.”
The lady is silent; the stranger complies,
His vizor he slowly unclos’d;
Oh! then what a sight met Fair Imogine’s eyes!
What words can express her dismay and surprise,
When a skeleton’s head was expos’d!
All present then utter’d a terrified shout;
All turn’d with disgust from the scene:
The worms they crept in, and the worms they crept out,
And sported his eyes and his temples about,
While the spectre address’d Imogine:—
“Behold me! thou false one! behold me!” he cried,
“Remember Alonzo the Brave!
“God grants, that to punish thy falsehood and pride,
“My ghost at thy marriage should sit by thy side,
“Should tax thee with perjury, claim thee as bride,
“And bear thee away to the grave!”
Thus saying, his arms round the lady he wound,
While loudly she shriek’d in dismay;
Then sank with his prey, through the wide yawning ground,
Nor ever again was Fair Imogine found,
Or the spectre who bore her away.
Not long liv’d the Baron; and none since that time,
To inhabit the castle presume;
For chronicles tell, that by order sublime,
There Imogine suffers the pain of her crime,
And mourns her deplorable doom.
At midnight, four times in each year, does her sprite,
When mortals in slumber are bound,
Array’d in her bridal apparel of white,
Appear in the hall with the skeleton knight,
And shriek as he whirls her around.
While they drink out of skulls newly torn from the grave,
Dancing round them pale spectres are seen;
Their liquor is blood, and this horrible stave
They howl,—“To the health of Alonzo the Brave,
“And his consort, the false Imogine!”
M. G. Lewis.
It is somewhat unusual for an author to parody himself, but in a volume entitled “Tales of Wonder” written and collected by M. G. Lewis, Esq., London 1801, he inserted “Alonzo the Brave,” with a parody written by himself. Of this, he remarked, that the idea of making an apothecary of the Knight, and a brewer of the baron, and some few of the lines, were taken from a parody which appeared in one of the newspapers under the title of “Pil-Garlic the Brave, and Brown Celestine.”
It is to be regretted that he did not mention the author of the latter parody, nor the paper in which it originally appeared.
Giles Jollup the Grave and Brown Sally Green.
A Doctor so prim, and a sempstress so tight,
Hob-a-nobb’d in some right maresquin,
They suck’d up the cordial with truest delight:
Giles Jollup the Grave was just five feet in height,
And four feet the Brown Sally Green.
“And as,” said Giles Jollup, “to-morrow I go
“To physic a feverish land,
“At some sixpenny-hop, or perhaps the mayor’s show,
“You’ll tumble in love with some smart city beau,
“And with him share your shop in the Strand.”
“Lord, how can you think so?” Brown Sally Green said,
“You must know mighty little of me,
“For if you be living, or if you be dead,
“I swear, ’pon my honor, that none in your stead
“Shall husband of Sally Green be.
“And if e’er for another my heart should decide,
“False to you and the faith which I gave,
“God grant that at dinner too amply supply’d,
“Over-eating may give me a pain in my side;
“May your ghost then bring rhubarb to physic the bride,
“And send her well dos’d to the grave.”
Away went poor Giles, to what place is not told;
Sally wept till she blew her nose sore!
But scarce had a twelve-month elaps’d, when, behold,
A Brewer, quite stylish, his gig that way roll’d,
And stopp’d it at Sally Green’s door.
His wealth, his pot-belly, and whisky of cane,
Soon made her untrue to her vows;
The steam of strong beer now bewilder’d her brain,
He caught her while tipsy! denials were vain,
So he carried her home as his spouse.
And now the roast beef had been blest by the priest,
To cram now the guests had begun;
Tooth and nail, like a wolf, fell the bride on the feast,
Nor yet had the clash of her knife and fork ceas’d,
When a bell (’twas a dustman’s) toll’d “One!”
Then first, with amazement Brown Sally Green found
That a stranger was stuck by her side;
His cravat and his ruffles with snuff were embrown’d;
He ate not, he drank not, but turning him round,
Sent some pudding away to be fried!!!
His wig was turn’d forwards, and short was his height,
His apron was dirty to view;
The women (oh! wond’rous) were hush’d at his sight;
The cats, as they ey’d him, drew back, (well they might)
For his body was pea-green and blue!
Now as all wish’d to speak, but none knew what to say,
They look’d mighty foolish and queer;
At length spoke the bride, while she trembled, “I pray,
“Dear sir, your peruke that aside you wou’d lay,
“And partake of some strong or small beer!”
The sempstress is silent; the stranger complies,
And his wig from his phiz deigns to pull;
Adzooks! what a squall Sally gave thro’ surprize!
Like a pig that is stuck, how she open’d her eyes,
When she recogniz’d Jollup’s bare skull!
Each miss! then exclaim’d, while she turn’d up her snout,
“Sir, your head isn’t fit to be seen!”
The pot-boys ran in, and the pot-boys ran out,
And could not conceive what the noise was about,
While the doctor address’d Sally Green.
“Behold me! thou jilt-flirt! behold me!” he cried,
“You have broken the faith which you gave!
“God grants, that to punish your falsehood and pride,
“Over-eating should give you a pain in your side;
“Come, swallow this rhubarb! I’ll physic the bride,
“And send her well dosed to the grave!”
Thus saying, the physic her throat he forc’d down,
In spite of whate’er she could say,
Then bore to his chariot the damsel so brown;
Nor ever again was she seen in that town,
Or the doctor who whisk’d her away.
Not long liv’d the Brewer; and none since that time,
To make use of the brewhouse presume;
For ’tis firmly believ’d that, by order sublime,
There Sally Green suffers the pain of her crime,
And bawls to get out of the room.
At midnight, four times in each year, does her sprite
With shrieks make the chamber resound,
“I won’t take the rhubarb!” she squalls in affright,
While, a cup in his left hand, a draught in his right,
Giles Jollup pursues her around!
With wigs so well powder’d, their fees while they crave,
Dancing round them, twelve doctors are seen;
They drink chicken broth, while this horrible stave
Is twang’d thro’ each nose,—“To Giles Jollup the Grave,
“And his patient, the sick Sally Green!”
M. G. Lewis.
St. George and Caroline.
A loose parody of “Alonzo the Brave, and the Fair Imogine,” relating to George IV. and Queen Caroline.
(Written in October 1820.)
A warrior so bold, and a virgin so bright,
Conversed as they sat o’er their wine;
They gaz’d on each other with tender delight;
St. George was the name of that pot-belly’d knight,[91]
The maid’s was the Fair Caroline.
And “Oh!” said in rapture, the amorous beau,
As of Champagne he tipp’d off a quart,
The passion’s so ardent with which I now glow,
That ne’er on another a thought I’ll bestow,
You shall share both my throne and my heart.
“Then hush all suspicion,” the Cavalier said,
“Believe me, this heart’s all your own;
For whilst I am living, if you be not dead,
I swear by these whiskers, that none in your stead,
Shall sit by my side on the throne.”[92]
But alas! by caprice or intrigue led aside,
His recreant affections soon roam;
He spurn’d the fair damsel who late was his pride,
E’en access to her own belov’d infant deny’d,
And the poor childless mother, the sad widow’d bride,
An exile became from her home.
* * * * *
For the grand coronation, now see the Archbishop,
Prepare; for at hand was the day.
At a cabinet dinner, they’d just served the fish up,
And a waiter had brought a spare rib, the top dish up,
When a belle struck them all with dismay.
Then, oh! with amazement, the courtiers found,
’Twas fair Caroline stood by their side;
St. George was confounded, he utter’d no sound;
He spoke not, he mov’d not, nor dar’d look around,
Lest his eyes should encounter his bride.
Her mien was majestic, her aspect so bright,
That her enemies shrunk from the view;
All their pleasure and laughter were hushed at the sight,
Callous Canning and Castlereagh shrunk in affright,
Pious Eldon and Sidmouth look’d blue!
* * * * *
“Begone!” to the base borough-faction she cry’d;
“Your malice and hatred I brave;
To deceive England’s monarch all arts you have try’d,
He has sworn that none else but his own lawful bride
At the grand coronation should sit by his side,
Unless I should be in my grave.”
(Here follow four more verses.)
From The Melange, Liverpool, 1834.
Colenso the Brave.
By our own Monk Lewis.
A Bishop so wise, and a native so tame,
Conversed in an African mead,
Colenso the Brave was the Suffragan’s name,
But the pensive Zulu’s is not given to fame,
And they talked upon questions of creed.
“O hush those suspicions,” the Suffragan said,
“Offensive to Church and to me.”
But something the native put into his head,
He mused on at board, and he mused on in bed,
And he talked of the same in his see.
Then over to England the Suffragan flew,
And published some tomes full of lore,
Which brought on his Lordship each savage Review;
Some called him a sceptic, some called him untrue,
Some said he’d been answer’d before.
A dreadful sensation, too dreadful to tell
To the Bench of the Bishops he gave,
As when Mr. Whitworth explodes a big shell;
But they rallied, and all in a body they fell
To demolish Colenso the Brave.
From the Cape, demon-haunted, a Spirit[93] arose,
It was clad in a mantle of gray,
And it stalked to Colenso, and said, “I depose
A priest who can propagate volumes like those!”
But a stern apparition cried “Nay!”
In a voice full of sweetness, but cold as a stone,
“I forbid you to touch him!” it said.
“You are phantoms alike—if you want flesh and bone,
Go pray Three Estates; for a Monarch alone
Is nought to the Church but a Head.
“He is free to return to his pensive Zulu,
By whom it appears he was posed,
He knows no allegiance to Longley or you:
Behold me, and know what I tell you is true!”
Then a Chancellor’s[94] face was disclosed.
The sentence was final and left not a doubt,
His smile of derision they saw;
The lawyers ran in, and the lawyers ran out,
They hooted and mooted the Temple about,
But no one could challenge the law.
And while all the Bishops look awfully grave,
Dancing round them Dissenters are seen,
Their liquor’s Cape-port, and as horrid the stave,
They chant “To the health of Colenso the Brave[95]
And his convert, the native so clean;”
Shirley Brooks. 1865.
A Bishop there was at Natal
A Zulu he had for his “Pal,”
Said the Zulu, “Look here,
This here Pentateuch’s queer,”
Which converted his Grace of Natal.
“Between the Acts;”
Or, Spain and the Spanish.
A School-boy so stout, and a Maiden so mad—
She a hag, he a youth in his teens—
T’other day made a match, be ’t for good or for bad,
Alfonso the Twelfth was the name of the lad,
And L’Espana the maniac quean’s.
* * * * *
And this school-boy, with hands and with heart still so clean,
Conscience clear of offence as a lamb—
If ever the world, flesh, and devil were seen,
In a foul female Cerberus, crown’d as a Queen,
’Twas in her he’d to blush for as dam!
“But how,” said the Boy, “for as mad as you seemed,
So much wits did you e’er come to show,
As to hurl down the idols that gods you late deemed,
Leave the fools that you followed, the dreams that you dreamed,
And kick out Sagasta & Co.?”
“She!” in scorn cried the keeper,—Armed Force,—who stood there,
With his whip and strait-waistcoat, fair shown,
“Don’t think her craze cured, or her turned head set square,
Poor L’Espana’s still mad as was ever March hare.
It is me you’ve to thank for your throne.
“How bonds both a curse and a blessing may be
Poor L’Espana is destined to know:
In the bonds I put on her salvation you see,
Through the bonds she got off bankrupt beggar is she,
A world’s warning, a scoff, and a show!”
The maniac looked fierce, but her wrath died away
To dead calm, that strait-waistcoat displayed,
And she crouched and she whined, “’Pon my honour I’ll pay—
And get credit—who knows?—to run more ticks some day,
When my ‘passives’ once ‘actives’ are made.
“Then come to my arms—be Alfonso the Brave—
And I’ll be thy fair Imogine.”
Here the maniac looked wild, and the keeper looked grave,
While Alfonso, poor boy, scarce knew how to behave,—
When a third party stepped on the scene.
’Twas Le Lor Maire of London—that mythical Lord,
Who had deigned upon Paris to shine,
With herald and trumpeters, sword-bearer, sword,
Mace, flags, running footmen—in friendly accord
Come England and France to combine!
* * * * *
Did Alfonso to Stone—Yo El Rey to Lord Mayor—
Give a pledge Spain’s bad debts in to call?
And if a pledge—what pledge—and whence when and where
Is the money to come, that, betwixt bull and bear,
Like a bone of contention will fall?
Punch. January 16, 1875.
A Terrible Tale.
The night it was dark, not a star in the sky,
As the Lord Mayor of London passed nervously by
A charnel-house crammed with the bodies of those
Who had died ’neath grim Radicals’ murderous blows.
The wind howled a dirge and the moon hid its face,
There were skulls and dry blade-bones all over the place;
But the Lord Mayor of London, no tremor had he—
Said his lordship, “It’s here that the thieves will put me.”
So he crept past the tombs and the graves of the dead,
In spite of grim spectres, with eye-sockets red;
And he hid him away in a newly-made grave,
Just to see how at midnight the ghosts would behave.
Thought he, “I will watch these poor victims arise—
They shall tell me their sorrows, I’ll gather their sighs;
And I’ll hie me away at the crow of the cock
To give the good people of England a shock.
“I shall hear how these noble old corpses were killed—
They’ll describe how their innocent claret was spilled;
And I’ll never take breath through my burning harangue
Till the world knows the crimes of the Radical gang.”
Just then a wild tempest broke over the scene—
The bells clanged out midnight, his lordship turned green;
For, with clamour and cry, in their shrouds from their graves,
There arose the dead victims of Radical knaves.
O, the language they used, and the pranks that they played;
O, the terrible tricks that those spectres essayed;
O, the sentiments shocking that came from their lips;
O, the crimes that they had at their finger-bones’ tips!
It was “Bedlam” and Newgate and Hanwell “broke loose,”
And their language!—their mildest expression was “deuce!”—
The Lord Mayor he shuddered and fell on his knees;
He had never before seen such infamous sprees.
But just as his lordship was checking a sob,
Right into the place burst a horrible mob;
The vilest of vile and the lowest of low,
And these cuddled the corpses and snivelled their woe.
They were folks who regretted the jolly old days
When humbugs and robbers had all their own ways;
They wept for the crew by the Radicals slain,
And they wished back the old days of darkness again.
He crept from the churchyard, and, wiser, more sad,
He confessed that the City was hopelessly bad;
He confessed that in feasting and pageant and show
They squandered the wealth filched from want and from woe.
That scene in the charnel-house burnt in his brain;
He went to Sir William[96] at once by the train,
And explained that his soul would be harassed until
He had helped with his vote the Municipal Bill.
The Referee. April 20, 1884.
——:o:——
The Poems of M. G. Lewis were deemed worthy of imitation by the authors of The Rejected Addresses, and Horace Smith accordingly wrote one entitled “Fire and Ale,” of which Lord Jeffrey said in the Edinburgh Review, “Fire and Ale,” by M. G. Lewis, exhibits not only a faithful copy of the spirited, loose, and flowing versification of that singular author, but a very just representation of that mixture of extravagance and jocularity which has impressed most of his writings with the character of a sort of farcical horror.”
Fire and Ale.
My palate is parched with Pierian thirst,
Away to Parnassus I’m beckoned;
List, warriors and dames, while my lay is rehearsed,
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 baptised, gave a fizz,
And bubbled and simmer’d and started off, whizz!
As soon as it sprinkled his forehead.
O! 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 Spital-fields,
And the hole that it burnt, and the chalk that it yields,
Make a capital lime-kiln 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, surpassed
A shot manufactory flaring.
He blazed, and he blazed, 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,[97] 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!”
Horace Smith.
The Rejected Addresses. 1812.
As an instance of a burlesque—of a burlesque, a few verses may be quoted from one which was given in Punch:—
Fire and Water.[98]
(With Apologies to the Shades of the Authors of
“Rejected Addresses.”)
The Fire Fiend was curst with unquenchable thirst,
And his gnomes to his aid having beckoned,
From Cornhill to Clapham he flew at a burst,
And furious flames soon arose from the first,
And volumes of smoke from the second.
The Fire Fiend was hungry as Moloch of old,
And knew not the meaning of pity:
The new Edax Rerum; voraciously bold,
His maw a red gulf that was ready to hold
The calcined remains of a City.
That Phlegethon-gorge might have served as the grave
Of man and his works altogether;
But Shaw, the new Life-guardsman, swordless but brave,
Was ever at hand to extinguish and save,
And hold the Red Ogre in tether.
The Fire Fiend as usual went at full pelt,
But Shaw at his heels followed faster,
Of leather well tanned were Shaw’s boots and his belt,
And his helmet was brazen for fear it should melt,
And the Fire Demon knew him as master.
The Fire Fiend possessed a most hideous phiz,
Polyphemus’s was not more horrid,
Unkempt and unwashed was that visage of his,
For water that touched it went off with a whiz!
It was so tremendously torrid.
But Shaw on his enemy kept a cool eye,
Of vigilant valour the symbol,
Affrighted no more by the Fire Demon’s cry
Than the squeak of a rat; if the Fire Fiend was spry,
His opponent was equally nimble.
For Water, Fire’s foe, at his best freely flows,
And the Fire Demon dares not to linger
Whenever his enemy turns on the hose;
He stands in much fear of this foeman, and those
Who flock at the lift of his finger.
The Fire Fiend has schemes, it is credibly said,
For laying half London in ashes;
But Water—and Shaw—are the things he must dread,
And at sight of an engine he shakes his red head,
And his teeth like a lunatic gnashes.
But his fire-gnomes he multiplies lately so fast
That the task of repressing them’s trying;
The flare that they make and the heat that they cast,
Are so great that the Fiend seems resolved in one blast
To set the Metropolis frying.
He blazes and blazes; Shaw gallops to snatch
His prey from its desperate danger;
But the Demon’s a deuce of a rider to catch,
And it taxes brave Shaw to continue a match
For the fiery noctivagant ranger.
And if London is wise she assistance will call,
For the Water King needs the alliance
Of hands that are sturdy and limbs that are tall,
To give the Fire Demon a rattling good fall,
And set all his imps at defiance.
(Eight verses omitted.)
Punch. August 20, 1887.
“Tales of Wonder,” written and collected by M. G. Lewis, contained two ballads entitled “The Erl King” and “The Cloud King,” both written by Lewis in his accustomed style of grim horror, with thunder, shrieks, and fury, and in the same volume he inserted an anonymous burlesque of these entitled “The Cinder King,” the humour of which would not be very apparent unless the two first-named poems were reprinted in full. They are neither of sufficient interest to merit the space this would require. A somewhat similar parody may be found in “The Blue Bag: or Toryana.” London; Effingham Wilson, 1832. It is called “The Fire King, The Water King, and The Cotton King,” and relates the quarrels of some politicians, well-known sixty years since, but now well nigh forgotten.
One more parody of Lewis remains to be noted, it occurs in an exceedingly scarce volume of poems, “The School for Satire.” London, 1802, and is exceedingly interesting on account of its allusions to Monk Lewis’s personal appearance, and his literary productions:—
The Old Hag in a Red Cloak.
(Inscribed to Matthew G. Lewis, Esq., M.P.)
Mat Lewis was little, Mat Lewis was young,
The words they lisp’d prettily over his tongue;
A spy-glass he us’d, for he could not well see,
A spy-glass he us’d, for near sighted was he.
With his spy-glass once spying in Parliament Street,
He chanc’d an old Hag in a red cloak to meet;
When the Hag in a red cloak thus awfully said,
“Pray give me a sixpence to buy me some bread.”
“No sixpence I’ll give thee to buy thee some bread,”
To the Hag in a red cloak Mat feelingly said;
Then down to the House in a huff strutted he,
Sure all the world knows little Mat’s an M.P.
But as onward he strutted, and push’d thro’ the crowd,
The Hag in a red cloak still curst him aloud;
Strange words of mysterious intent struck his ear,
And could he be frighten’d he’d then have known fear.
“Though cold be thy heart, and thy feelings as cold,
Though bold be thy mien, and thy language as bold,
Ere the clock at St. Giles’s is heard to strike one,
A deed to confound thee, a deed shall be done.”
She spoke: and then vanish’d at once from his sight,
In a cellar as dark as the darkness of night;
But ev’ry five minutes this horrible strain
Rush’d in fearful recurrence o’er Mat’s tortur’d brain.
From the House about twelve to his house he repairs;
To creak seem’d the doors, and to crack seem’d the stairs;
He put out the candle, his clothes off he threw,
When St. Giles’s struck one, and the door open flew.
Then the Hag in a red cloak of Parliament Street,
The Hag in a red cloak whom Mat chanc’d to meet,
The Hag in a red cloak, who to him once said,
Pray give me a sixpence to buy me some bread.
By a sort of a blue and a glimmering light
Rode quite round his bedstead and full in his sight;
She rode in a carriage, that hight a birch broom,
And her breath breath’d the whiffings of gin through the room.
“I ask’d thee,” she cried, in a hoarse, hollow voice,
“For sixpence, thou gav’st not while yet in thy choice;
For punishment dread then, pretender, prepare,
Which e’en to repentance I now cannot spare.
“Know that she who so lately sustain’d your abuse,
Is thy mother, oh shame! and my name Mother Goose;
To a German Romancer thee dreaming I bore,
And we both dipp’d thee deep in the tale telling lore.
“Too soon thou outdidst all my wonders of old,
And instead of my stories thy nonsense was told;
With nurses and children I lost my high place,
And from Newberry’s shop I was turn’d in disgrace.
“Depriv’d of a corner to hide my old head,
I wander’d about, begging e’en for my bread;
When thou too, my child, to complete my despair,
Refused my own spoils with thy mother to share.
“But vain are thy hopes to supplant me on earth,
For know that immortal I am in my birth,
Can defeat all thy arts by a magical spell,
And all thy productions in paper dispel.
“Ye ghosts and hobgoblins, and horrible shapes,
Ye lions, and wolves, and ye griffins and apes,
Ye strange jumbled figures from river or den,
Ye fire-born monsters, and fishified men.
“Ye raw-heads and bloody-bones, spectres and shades,
And water-sprite swains, and transmogrified maids,
As your grandmother’s curses on each of you fall,
To hell and the devil fly one and fly all!”
Then the ghosts and hobgoblins, and horrible shapes,
And lions and wolves, and the griffins and apes,
And strange jumbled figures from river or den,
And fire-born monsters, and fishified men,
And raw-heads and bloody bones, spectres and shades,
And water-sprite swains, and transmogrified maids,
When they heard the goose curses on each of them fall,
To hell and the devil fled one, and fled all.
Fled in fire and in water, in smoke and in hail,
Some green, and some red, some black and some pale,
Fled in accents of horror, of spirit, of wit,
Tralira, tralara, or fal-de-ral tit.
While as fast as away Matty’s progeny flew,
Mother Goose summon’d up her original crew,
Who with loud peals of laughter and sallies of fun,
Quizz’d, pinch’d, and tormented her reprobate son.
A Knight led them on, who was first to assail,
Who was arm’d cap-a-pie in a dear coat of mail.
Sir Horn-Book hight he; at the very first glance
Mat saw he was Lord o’er the Field of Romance.
Then little Red Riding-Hood’s wolf howled amain,
Fear shook all his limbs, and unsettled his brain;
But the horrors he suffer’d can ne’er be surpass’d,
When little Cock-Robin’s sad funeral pass’d.
As Blue-Beard for blood loudly howl’d o’er his wife,
And sister Anne pleaded so well for her life,
Mat’s fav’rite spectre he saw dance in air,
And he gave up his spirit a prey to despair.
To his parent he bow’d, and now penitent groan,
Cried “Thy strength and my empty pretences I own,
“In vain were my hopes to supplant thee on earth,
“And immortal, O mother, thou art in thy birth!
“As now you behold me in penitence sunk,
“Take all my Romances, nay, take too my Monk;
“But leave me, since thus I acknowledge my crime,
“My epilogues, sonnets, and lady-like rhyme.”
Mother Goose, as her son was in penitence sunk,
Took all his Romances, but took, too, his Monk;
And left him in pity to trifle his time
In epilogues, sonnets, and lady-like rhyme.
If you wish me the moral, dear Mat, to rehearse,
’Tis that nonsense is nonsense in prose or in verse;
That the man who to talent makes any pretence,
Should write not at all, or should write common sense!
Anonymous.
(First printed in 1801.)
——:o:——
Champagne Goschen is my name!
Champagne Goschen is my name!
Good for any sort of tax, dear boys,
Put it on to wheels and pleasure hacks, my boys,
Champagne Goschen is my name!
Beautiful to look on is my game!
Good for any sort of tax, my boys!
Oh, that’s the little game of Jokin’ G!
Punch. 1888.
The Right Hon. G. Joachim Goschen, Chancellor of the Exchequer, proposed an increased duty on bottled wines.)
