So the warrant was made out without more delay, Drawn, seal'd, and delivered, and (Signed) YO EL RE!
Canto II.
There is not a nation in Europe but labours To toady itself, and to humbug its neighbours— "Earth has no such folks—no folks such a city, So great, or so grand, or so fine, or so pretty," Said Louis Quatorze, "As this Paris of ours!" —Mr. Daniel O'Connell exclaims, "By the Pow'rs, Ould Ireland's on all hands admitted to be The first flow'r of the earth, and first Gim of the sea!"— —Mr. Bull will inform you that Neptune,—a lad he, With more of affection than rev'rence, styles "Daddy,"— Did not scruple to "say To Freedom, one day," That if ever he changed his aquatics for dry land, His home should be Mr. B.'s "Tight little Island."— He adds, too, that he, The said Mr. B., Of all possible Frenchmen can fight any three; That, with no greater odds, he knows well how to treat them, To meet them, defeat them, and beat them, and eat them.— —In Italy, too, 'tis the same to the letter; There each Lazzarone Will cry to his crony, "See Naples, then die![25] and the sooner the better!" The Portuguese say, as a well understood thing, "Who has not seen Lisbon[26] has not seen a good thing!"— While an old Spanish proverb runs glibly as under, "Quien no ha visto Sevilla No ha visto Maravilla!" "He who ne'er has viewed Seville has ne'er view'd a Wonder!" And from all I can learn this is no such great blunder. In fact, from the river, The fam'd Guadalquiver, Where many a knight's had cold steel through his liver,[27] The prospect is grand. The Iglesia Mayor Has a splendid effect on the opposite shore, With its lofty Giralda, while two or three score Of magnificent structures around, perhaps more, As our Irish friends have it, are there "to the fore;" Then the old Alcazar, More ancient by far, As some say, while some call it one of the palaces Built in twelve hundred and odd by Abdalasis, With its horse-shoe shaped arches of Arabesque tracery, Which the architect seems to have studied to place awry, Saracenic and rich; And more buildings, "the which," As old Lilly, in whom I've been looking a bit o' late, Says, "You'd be bored should I now recapitulate;"[28] In brief, then, the view Is so fine and so new, It would make you exclaim, 'twould so forcibly strike ye, If a Frenchman, "Superbe!"—if an Englishman, "Crikey!!"
Yes! thou art "Wonderful!"—but oh, 'Tis sad to think, 'mid scenes so bright As thine, fair Seville, sounds of woe, And shrieks of pain, and wild affright, And soul-wrung groans of deep despair, And blood, and death should mingle there!
Yes! thou art "Wonderful!"—the flames That on thy towers reflected shine, While earth's proud Lords and high-born Dames, Descendants of a mighty line, With cold unalter'd looks are by To gaze, with an unpitying eye, On wretches in their agony.
All speak thee "Wonderful"—the phrase Befits thee well—the fearful blaze Of yon piled faggots' lurid light, Where writhing victims mock the sight,— The scorch'd limb shrivelling in its chains,— The hot blood parch'd in living veins,— The crackling nerve—the fearful knell Rung out by that remorseless bell,— Those shouts from human fiends that swell,— That withering scream,—that frantic yell,— All Seville,—all too truly tell Thou art a "Marvel"—and a Hell! God!—that the worm whom thou hast made Should thus his brother worm invade! Count deeds like these good service done, And deem Thine eye looks smiling on!!
Yet there at his ease, with his whole Court around him, King Ferdinand sits "in his Glory"—confound him!— Leaning back in his chair, With a satisfied air, And enjoying the bother, the smoke, and the smother, With one knee cocked carelessly over the other; His pouncet-box goes To and fro at his nose, As somewhat misliking the smell of old clothes, And seeming to hint, by this action emphatic, That Jews, e'en when roasted, are not aromatic; There, too, fair Ladies From Xeres, and Cadiz, Catalinas, and Julias, and fair Iñesillas, In splendid lace-veils and becoming mantillas; Elviras, Antonias, and Claras, and Floras, And dark-eyed Jacinthas, and soft Isidoras, Are crowding the "boxes," and looking on coolly as Though 'twas but one of their common tertulias, Partaking, as usual, of wafers and ices, Snow-water, and melons cut out into slices, And chocolate,—furnished at coffee-house prices; While many a suitor, And gay coadjutor In the eating-and-drinking line, scorns to be neuter; One, being perhaps just return'd with his tutor From travel in England, is tempting his "future" With a luxury neat as imported, "The Pewter," And charming the dear Violantes and Iñeses With a three-corner'd Sandwich, and soupçon of "Guinness's;" While another, from Paris but newly come back, Hints "the least taste in life" of the best cogniac. Such ogling and eyeing, In short, and such sighing, And such complimenting (one must not say l—g), Of smart Cavaliers with each other still vying, Mix'd up with the crying, And groans, of the dying, All hissing, and spitting, and broiling and frying, Form a scene, which, although there can be no denying To a bon Catholique it may prove edifying, I doubt if a Protestant, smart Beau, or merry Belle Might not shrink from it as somewhat too terrible. It's a question with me if you ever survey'd a More stern-looking mortal than old Torquemada, Renown'd Father Dominic, famous for twisting dom- -estic and foreign necks all over Christendom; Morescoes or Jews, Not a penny to choose, If a dog of a heretic dared to refuse A glass of old port, or a slice from a griskin, The good Padre soon would so set him a frisking, That I would not, for—more than I'll say—be in his skin.
'Twas just the same thing with his own race and nation, And Christian Dissenters of every persuasion, Muggletonian, or Quaker, Or Jumper, or Shaker, No matter with whom in opinion partaker, George Whitfield, John Bunyan, or Thomas Gat-acre, They'd no better chance than a Bonze or a Fakir; If a woman, it skill'd not—if she did not deem as he Bade her to deem touching Papal supremacy, By the Pope, but he'd make her! From error awake her, Or else—pop her into an oven and bake her! No one, in short, ever came half so near as he Did, to the full extirpation of heresy; And if, in the times of which now I am treating, There had been such a thing as a "Manchester Meeting," "Pretty pork" he'd have made "Moderator" and "Minister," Had he but caught them on his side Cape Finisterre;— Pye Smith, and the rest of them once in his bonfire, hence- -forth you'd have heard little more of the "Conference." And—there on the opposite side of the ring, He, too, sits "in his Glory," confronting the King, With his cast-iron countenance frowning austerely, That matched with his en bon point body but queerly, For, though grim his visage, his person was pursy, Belying the rumour Of fat folks' good-humour; Above waves his banner of "Justice and Mercy," Below and around stand a terrible band ad- -ding much to the scene,—viz. The "Holy Hermandad," That's "Brotherhood,"—each looking grave as a Grand-dad. Within the arena Before them is seen a Strange, odd-looking group, each one dress'd in a garment Not "dandified" clearly, as certainly "varment," Being all over vipers and snakes, and stuck thick With multiplied silhouette profiles of NICK; And a cap of the same, All devils and flame, Extinguisher-shaped, much like Salisbury Spire, Except that the latter's of course somewhat higher; A long yellow pin-a-fore Hangs down, each chin afore, On which, ere the wearer had donn'd it, a man drew The Scotch badge, a Saltire, or Cross of St. Andrew; Though I fairly confess I am quite at a loss To guess why they should choose that particular cross, Or to make clear to you What the Scotch had to do At all with the business in hand,—though it's true That the vestment aforesaid, perhaps, from its hue, Viz. yellow, in juxta-position with blue, (A tinge of which latter tint could but accrue On the faces of wretches, of course, in a stew As to what their tormentors were going to do,) Might make people fancy, who no better knew, They were somehow connected with Jeffrey's Review; Especially too As it's certain that few Things would make Father Dominic blither or happier Than to catch hold of it, or its Chef, Macvey Napier.— No matter for that—my description to crown, All the flames and the devils were turn'd upside down On this habit, facetiously term'd San Benito, Much like the dress suit Of some nondescript brute From the show-van of Wombwell, (not George,) or Polito.
And thrice happy they,[29] Dress'd out in this way To appear with éclat at the Auto-da-Fé, Thrice happy indeed whom the good luck might fall to Of devils tail upward, and "Fuego revolto," For, only see there, In the midst of the Square, Where, perch'd up on poles six feet high in the air, Sit, chained to the stake, some two, three, or four pair Of wretches, whose eyes, nose, complexion, and hair Their Jewish descent but too plainly declare, Each clothed in a garment more frightful by far, a Smock-frock sort of gaberdine, call'd a Samarra, With three times the number of devils upon it,— A proportion observed on the sugar-loaf'd bonnet, With this farther distinction—of mischief a proof— That every fiend Jack stands upright on his hoof! While the pictured flames, spread Over body and head, Are three times as crooked, and three times as red! All, too, pointing upwards, as much as to say, "Here's the real bonne bouche of the Auto-da-fé!"
Torquemada, meanwhile, With his cold, cruel smile, Sits looking on calmly, and watching the pile, As his hooded "Familiars" (their names, as some tell, come From their being so much more "familiar" than "welcome,") Have, by this time, begun To be "poking their fun," And their firebrands, as if they were so many posies Of lilies and roses, Up to the noses Of Lazarus Levi, and Money Ben Moses; While similar treatment is forcing out hollow moans From Aby Ben Lasco, and Ikey Ben Solomons, Whose beards—this a black, that inclining to grizzle— Are smoking, and curling, and all in a fizzle; The King, at the same time, his Dons and his visitors, Sit, sporting smiles, like the Holy Inquisitors,——