When this was read, no Congreve rocket,
Discharged into the Gallic trenches
E'er equalled the tremendous shock it
Produced upon the Nursery benches.
The Bishops, who of course had votes,
By right of age and petticoats,
Were first and foremost in the fuss—
"What, whip a Lama! suffer birch
"To touch his sacred—infamous!
"Deistical!—assailing thus
"The fundamentals of the Church!—
"No—no—such patriot plans as these,
"(So help them Heaven—and their Sees!)
"They held to be rank blasphemies."
The alarm thus given, by these and other
Grave ladies of the Nursery side,
Spread thro' the land, till, such a pother,
Such party squabbles, far and wide,
Never in history's page had been
Recorded, as were then between
The Whippers and Non-whippers seen.
Till, things arriving at a state,
Which gave some fears of revolution,
The patriot lords' advice, tho' late,
Was put at last in execution.
The Parliament of Thibet met—
The little Lama, called before it,
Did, then and there, his whipping get,
And (as the Nursery Gazette
Assures us) like a hero bore it.
And tho', 'mong Thibet Tories, some
Lament that Royal Martyrdom
(Please to observe, the letter D
In this last word's pronounced like B),
Yet to the example of that Prince
So much is Thibet's land a debtor,
That her long line of Lamas, since,
Have all behaved themselves much better.
[1] Andreas.
FABLE VII.
THE EXTINGUISHERS.
PROEM.
Tho' soldiers are the true supports,
The natural allies of Courts,
Woe to the Monarch, who depends
Too much on his red-coated friends;
For even soldiers sometimes think—
Nay, Colonels have been known to reason,—
And reasoners, whether clad in pink
Or red or blue, are on the brink
(Nine cases out of ten) of treason
Not many soldiers, I believe, are
As fond of liberty as Mina;
Else—woe to Kings! when Freedom's fever
Once turns into a Scarletina!
For then—but hold—'tis best to veil
My meaning in the following tale:—