Think me not false, for I am true:
Nay, frown not—yes,—to Love and you.
Reason and int'rest told me both,
To this old man to plight my troth.
I had but little—you had less;
No brilliant view of happiness:
And though, within the lowest cot,
I would have shar'd your humble lot,
Yet, when the means I could possess
Which would our future union bless,
I gave my hand, th' allotted price,
And made myself the sacrifice.
When I was to the altar led,
Age and decrepitude to wed,
The old man's wealth seduc'd me there,
Which gen'rous Hymen bid me share;
And all, within a month or two,
I hope, brave boy, to give to you.
Behold, and see the stroke of Fate
Suspended o'er my palsied mate:
For Death, who fills his goblet high,
Tells him to drink it, and to die.
And now, my Henry dear, depart
With this assurance from my heart.
I married him, by Heaven, 'tis true,
With all his riches in my view,
To see him die—and marry you.
Plate 14. The Fox Hunter Unkennelled.
Yes, Nimrod, you may look aghast.
I have unkennel'd you at last.
A party of fox-hunters, getting ready to start for the chase, are refreshing themselves from substantial joints, and potent stirrup-cups. Death, the grim hunter, uninvited and unannounced, has joined the party, to the consternation of both men and dogs; one disconcerted Nimrod, in palsied affright, has vainly sought concealment under the table; Death, with true sportsman's instinct, is raising the cloth, and simultaneously striking the refugee, 'run to cover,' with his weapon.
While Jack, as quick as he was able,
Sunk, slyly, underneath the table.
The phantom drew the drap'ry back,
And, in a trice, unkennell'd Jack:
When, after crying Tally-ho!—
He pois'd his dart and gave the blow:
Then told his friends to shove Jack Rover
Into the hearse which he leap'd over.
One or two prints of the series are not treated from a grotesquely horrible point of view.
Plate 15. The Good Man, Death, and the Doctor.
No scene so blest in virtue's eyes,
As when the man of virtue dies.
In this picture the artist has been at the pains to illustrate, without travesty, the end of a good man, stretched stiff on his last couch. By the side of his bed kneel various members of his family, plunged into the deepest affliction; at the head of the bed stands a benevolent-visaged pastor of the church, who has evidently just administered the last consolations of religion to the departed. The burlesque element, which does not interfere with the main group of the sketch, is settled on the action of Death, who, emblematic as usual, is thrusting before him an evil-looking and overfed quackish practitioner, the extortionate physician, who has boldly declared 'he has no time for praying, but demands his honorarium.' The arch foe has fixed his unrelaxing grip upon the shoulder of Doctor Bolus, who it may be presumed has received his last fee.