Last of all doth appear, With some symptoms of fear, Sir Thopas in person to bring up the rear, In a mix'd kind of costume half Pontificalibus, Half what scholars denominate Pure Naturalibus; Nay, the truth to express, As you'll easily guess, They have none of them time to attend much to dress; But He, or She, As the case may be, He or She seizes what He or She pleases, Trunk-hosen or kirtles, and shirts or chemises, And thus one and all, great and small, short and tall, Muster at once in the Vicarage-hall, With upstanding locks, starting eyes, shorten'd breath, Like the folks in the Gallery Scene in Macbeth, When Macduff is announcing their Sovereign's death. And hark!—what accents clear and strong, To the listening throng came floating along! 'Tis Robin encoring himself in a song— "Very good song! very well sung! Jolly companions every one!"
On, on to the cellar! away! away! On, on to the cellar without more delay! The whole posse rush onwards in battle array— Conceive the dismay of the party so gay, Old Goody Jones, Goody Price, and Madge Gray, When the door bursting wide, they descried the allied Troops, prepared for the onslaught, roll in like a tide, And the spits, and the tongs, and the pokers beside!— "Boot and saddle's the word! mount, Cummers, and ride!"— Alarm was ne'er caused more strong and indigenous By cats among rats, or a hawk in a pigeon-house; Quick from the view Away they all flew, With a yell, and a screech, and a halliballoo, "Hey up the chimney! Hey after you!"— The Volscians themselves made an exit less speedy From Corioli, "flutter'd like doves" by Macready.
They are gone,—save one, Robin alone! Robin, whose high state of civilisation Precludes all idea of aërostation, And who now has no notion Of more locomotion Than suffices to kick, with much zeal and devotion, Right and left at the party, who pounced on their victim, And maul'd him, and kick'd him, and lick'd him, and prick'd him, As they bore him away scarce aware what was done, And believing it all but a part of the fun, Hic—hiccoughing out the same strain he'd begun, "Jol—jolly companions every one!"
Morning grey Scarce bursts into day Ere at Tappington Hall there's the deuce to pay; The tables and chairs are all placed in array In the old oak-parlour, and in and out Domestics and neighbours, a motley rout, Are walking, and whispering, and standing about; And the Squire is there In his large arm-chair, Leaning back with a grave magisterial air; In the front of a seat a Huge volume, called Fleta, And Bracton, a tome of an old-fashion'd look, And Coke upon Lyttleton, then a new book; And he moistens his lips With occasional sips From a luscious sack-posset that smiles in a tankard Close by on a side-table—not that he drank hard, But because at that day, I hardly need say, The Hong Merchants had not yet invented How Qua, Nor as yet would you see Souchong or Bohea At the tables of persons of any degree: How our ancestors managed to do without tea I must fairly confess is a mystery to me; Yet your Lydgates and Chaucers Had no cups and saucers; Their breakfast, in fact, and the best they could get, Was a sort of a déjeûner à la fourchette; Instead of our slops They had cutlets and chops, And sack-possets, and ale in stoups, tankards, and pots; And they wound up the meal with rumpsteaks and 'schalots.
Now the Squire lifts his hand With an air of command, And gives them a sign, which they all understand, To bring in the culprit; and straightway the carter And huntsman drag in that unfortunate martyr, Still kicking, and crying, "Come,—what are you arter?" The charge is prepared, and the evidence clear, "He was caught in the cellar a-drinking the beer! And came there, there's very great reason to fear, With companions,—to say but the least of them,—queer; Such as Witches, and creatures With horrible features, And horrible grins, And hook'd noses and chins, Who'd been playing the deuce with his Reverence's binns."
The face of his worship grows graver and graver, As the parties detail Robin's shameful behaviour; Mister Buzzard, the clerk, while the tale is reciting, Sits down to reduce the affair into writing, With all proper diction, And due "legal fiction;" Viz.: "That he, the said prisoner, as clearly was shown, Conspiring with folks to deponents unknown, With divers, that is to say, two thousand people, In two thousand hats, each hat peak'd like a steeple, With force and with arms, And with sorcery and charms, Upon two thousand brooms; Enter'd four thousand rooms, To wit, two thousand pantries, and two thousand cellars, Put in bodily fear twenty thousand in-dwellers, And with sundry,—that is to say, two thousand,—forks, Drew divers,—that is to say, ten thousand—corks, And, with malice prepense, down their two thousand throttles, Emptied various,—that is to say, ten thousand—bottles; All in breach of the peace,—moved by Satan's malignity— And in spite of King James, and his Crown, and his Dignity."
At words so profound Rob gazes around, But no glance sympathetic to cheer him is found. —No glance, did I say? Yes, one!—Madge Gray!— She is there in the midst of the crowd standing by, And she gives him one glance from her coal-black eye, One touch to his hand, and one word to his ear,— (That's a line which I've stolen from Sir Walter, I fear,)— While nobody near Seems to see her or hear; As his worship takes up, and surveys, with a strict eye, The broom now produced as the corpus delicti, Ere his fingers can clasp, It is snatch'd from his grasp, The end poked in his chest with a force makes him gasp, And, despite the decorum so due to the Quorum, His worship's upset, and so too is his jorum And Madge is astride on the broomstick before 'em. "Hocus Pocus! Quick, Presto! and Hey Cockalorum! Mount, mount for your life, Rob!—Sir Justice, adieu!— —Hey up the chimney-pot! hey after you!"
Through the mystified group, With a halloo and a whoop, Madge on the pommel, and Robin en croupe, The pair through the air ride as if in a chair, While the party below stand mouth open and stare! "Clean bumbaized" and amazed, and fix'd, all the room stick, "Oh! what's gone with Robin,—and Madge,—and the broomstick?" Ay, "what's gone" indeed, Ned?—of what befell Madge Gray, and the broomstick, I never heard tell: But Robin was found, that morn, on the ground, In yon old grey Ruin again, safe and sound, Except that at first he complained much of thirst, And a shocking bad headache, of all ills the worst, And close by his knee A flask you might see, But an empty one, smelling of eau-de-vie.
Rob from this hour is an alter'd man; He runs home to his lodgings as fast as he can, Sticks to his trade, Marries Miss Slade, Becomes a Te-totaller—that is the same As Te-totallers now, one in all but the name; Grows fond of Small-beer, which is always a steady sign, Never drinks spirits except as a medicine; Learns to despise Coal-black eyes, Minds pretty girls no more than so many Guys; Has a family, lives to be sixty, and dies!