Albeit, when thieves in penitence begin
To weep their guilty deeds, and fly from sin,
The world oft profits by their former vice,
Should chance enroll them in the state police;
They follow crime as some old fox might do,
Who hunted once, another should pursue,
Woe to the wretch, that struggles to evade
The wary cunning of such renegade;
In vain each wile, each mazy turn he tries,
For justice triumphs, and the culprit dies.
So hopes the world that Eldon, now resigned,
Will own the faults to which his eyes were blind;
Chase out corruption from his dark abode,
And cleanse each path where fraud the usurper strode;
Thus may he by that dying act efface
The burning stigma of a life’s disgrace.
Shrink not, my lord, whate’er the muse appears,
She wars but feebly with declining years;
Compassion fetters what she fain would sing,
And robs severity of half its sting:
Those hoary locks command respect from youth,
But cannot wholly close the lips of truth.
Suppose the judgment given[24]; but after years
Of endless labour, and a million tears:
Suppose the minutes by his lordship’s scrawl
Drawn out and settled, after many a brawl;
Wherein loquacious Agar[25] bears the bell—
An empty clapper in a brazen shell.
Hark! how the frothy nonsense from his lips
Involves the audience in one black eclipse,
From which in vain they struggle to be free.
When darkness triumphs, who can hope to see?
Gods! what a tongue, and what a lack of wits!
How well the former with the latter sits!
In him the worst of causes finds a friend;
He tears to tatters what he cannot mend.
But still his eloquence is most sublime,
In points of practice and in tricks for time;
In petty motions for some end absurd,
To please his Frowd, or gratify his Hurd.
When broken down, he next resorts to lies,
Disputes another’s word, his own denies,
Insists that all the law is on his side
And Truth proclaims a perjured Suicide!
When on his legs, ’tis hard to get him down,
Tho’ counsel cough, and oft his Lordship frown.
He bungles on; while dulness weaves a wreathe
To crown his head when fairly out of breath,—
A wreath of poppies mingled with night-bane,
That once asleep, he ne’er may wake again.
Blest consummation! may it happen soon,
Or those, who hear, will first essay, the boon.
Agar farewell, but ere I cease to greet
Let me conduct thee to thy country seat.
Abode of taste, where all the graces shine,—
The prospect charming, and the site divine!
The road that leads from Battle Bridge pursue
To Kentish Town, and keep a dexter view;
There mark the walls of many coloured-brick,
With here and there a withered poplar stick.
A dirty gate straight walks of gravel shews,
The new canal around in silence flows;
Its fetid waters, stinking as they pass,
Contend in sweetness with the scent of gas.
Here Pancras rears it’s charitable dome,
There limekilns smoke, and cloud the air in gloom;
Wheree’r you wander, or the sight divert,
One scene prevails of darkness, stench, and dirt.
Well in one picture might the muse record
How fine the mansion, and how wise it’s lord.
Ye passengers! who from the road admire,
Let no wild transports tempt you to go nigher;
The rights of soil he zealously protects
By transportation, as the law directs!
Not mine the purpose step by step to shew
What makes the progress of a cause more slow:
Nor yet to trace the current of expense
Through all its mazes, but the whole condense.
The same complaints through all the system fly;—
Thus what I censure will to all apply.
Omit each intermediate step, and see
The cause at last from all incumbrance free,
And brought to issue;—then let Spence[26] prepare
Interrogations for your friends to swear.
Propose each question so distinctly nice,
That all may keep within it, like a vice;
For should some idle word escape, who knows
But it might prove more fatal than from foes?
Avoid the hostile camp, and, if you can,
Before he speaks, examine well your man;
Teach him the lesson he has got to learn,
And let him thoroughly his cue discern;
Hold out large promise, if he meet your will,
And ere he comes to swear his belly fill.
If still reluctant, coax him with a bribe,
Persuading all—but most the Jewish tribe.
To strike commissioners is next the thing,
Four names a piece let either party bring;
Then from the four let each their two erase;
Seal quick the dedimus, and name a place;
Bespeak provision for a month at least,
And call your brother tigers to the feast;
So may they well that courtesy repay
By like invite upon a future day!
Of wine be careful to secure a stock—
Port, Champagne, Claret, Burgundy, and Hock.
Your guns arrange, call out your steeds and dogs,
For too much toil the mental action clogs.[27]
What—if to keep your trust an oath be given;
Secure of hell, no longer think of heaven;
Enjoy the goods that knavery has sent,
And laugh and revel to your heart’s content.
One day with opening the commission fill;
The next, with prefatory measures kill;
The third, discuss what will not question bear;
The fourth, for relaxation course a hare.
But why thus hunt a subject off it’s legs?
I do but teach my grandam to suck eggs:—
An art attornies practice far too well,—
Yoke white, their own—a client takes the shell.
What if he grumble, theirs has been the toil,
With profit scarce to make the kettle boil.
A porter’s lot would suit them better far;
No anxious cares his peaceful dream can mar;
While their reward for nightly want of ease,
Just adds a pint of ale to bread and cheese.
The scene is changed; behold that child of want
On dainties feeding, like a cormorant.
A venison pasty serves to make his lunch;
For dinner turtle soup with gelid punch,
Pheasant and partridge, quail, and ortolan,
Jellies, blancmange, pies, custards, parmesan,
To him it boots not what the price or fare,
Provided all be exquisite and rare.
When others pay the piper who would dine
On vulgar viands and a common wine?
The bill is paid, unnoticed all details,
And smirking waiters hail unusual vails.
The landlord smiles, tho’ not of shame bereft
To be the pander of so base a theft.
The licens’d robber walks un-hang’d away,
And baffled ketch is cheated of his prey,
Not but that Jack to noose a friend might falter,
Tho’ neck of none would better fit the halter.
Despair not, Grabble; give thy talents scope,
And in the end be certain of a rope—
It needs not much prophetic skill to trace
The gibbet’s symbol pictured in thy face.
Six weeks or more in idle feasting spent,
The depositions then to town are sent,
Seal’d, and entrusted to a faithful guard,
Who will demand a guinea for reward.
The cause set down and publication pass,
Then seek of evidence the copied mass.
Peruse it well with all your cunning’s stress;—
A trifling error will the whole suppress.[28]
Then may the genial board again be spread,
And hungry friends at hostile cost be fed.
What! not a fault? has right at last prevail’d
And Agar’s genius in it’s zenith fail’d?
Did Spence so well th’ interrogations draw
That ingenuity can find no flaw?
No leading question fatal to the whole?
No jurat faulty—not too scrawl’d the roll?
Examine all around the parchment skin
And find a part, in which it seems too thin.
Are all the words in orthographic dress?
No chance omission of the letter “s”
That letter, lately in a jurat missed,
Implied an oath on one “Evangelist”
Instead of four—on which unlucky grounds
The plaintiff lost a sum of eighty pounds.
What; from sworn clerks, to break their fealty hir’d,
Has nothing secret ere it’s time transpired?
Has no false wretch in shame at last reveal’d
A truth his wilful tongue at first conceal’d?
Then foul Procrastication hide thy face;—
’Tis something gain’d if causes keep their place;
As some weak foe against a stronger lance
May still withstand, though failing to advance.
Meanwhile the parties die away like martyrs,
Felo de se—shot—drown’d—or hung in garters—
A motley crew, who haunt the court in crowds,
And scream for justice from their tatter’d shrouds;—
Not rent by worms, for they would scorn to knaw
The wretched victim of a suit at law,—
Would turn with pity from the mould’ring frame,
And give to nobler animals the shame.
No, in each tattered shroud behold the sack
Some parish gave when law had stripp’d the back,
Had stripp’d it bare as on the day of birth,
And, but for this, had sent it bare to earth.