Particularly Me:
Or else the random rage of ruthless Rome,
The fickle falsehood of fair fawning France,
Bismarckian braggadocia from Berlin,
The mystic Muscovite’s most monstrous maw,
Home-Rulers hoarsely howling hideous humbug, where, smug
They batten on their melancholy isle,” etc.
Burns’s Impromptu
A specimen of Burns’s facility in impromptu satire, when provoked by anything which he considered mean, is one of the memories of Brownhill Inn. It is related that he was washing at the horse-trough, having apparently been drinking all night. Just then a black-coated parson, who had slept at the inn, came out and ordered his horse. Before he mounted he said to the hostler, taking fourpence out of his pocket, “You see, I ought to give you all this fourpence, but I shall want to pay threepence for the ferry hard by, so I can only give you a penny.” Burns, who had been looking on all the time, roared out,—
“Black’s your coat,