Howl at my wake! ’twill be but kind;
And if I leave, as I’ve design’d,
Some little Tooleywhaggs behind,
They’ll sarve to comfort thee, Judy!
Several other parts of this parody might be quoted, but unfortunately Mr. Colman’s muse was not quite so chaste as that of Walter Scott.
The libretto of an Italian opera was founded upon The Lady of the Lake (and such librettos are always burlesques on the original poem), besides which it has been frequently represented, in various forms, on the stage. One very amusing version, by Andrew Halliday, entitled “Mountain Dhu; or, the Knight, the Lady, and the Lake,” was produced at the Adelphi Theatre, on December 26, 1866. This burlesque was full of parodies of Scotch songs with topical allusions. The leading parts were performed by Mrs. Alfred Mellon, Miss Furtado, and Paul Bedford, with J. L. Toole as Rhoderick Dhu. About the same time Miss M. Oliver produced “The Lady of the Lake plaid in a new Tartan, an ephemeral burlesque,” by R. Reece, at the New Royalty Theatre, London, but this was decidedly inferior in literary merit to Mr. Halliday’s Mountain Dhu.
“Hail to the Chief!”
(A Popular Pæan. After Sir Walter.)