Sulky the boy marched on, and did not mind him,
Altho' the boatswain flogging kept behind him
"Flog," cried the boy, "flog—curse me, flog away—
I'll go—but mind—G—d d—n me if I'll PRAY."
BIENSEANCE PETER PINDAR.
There is a little moral thing in France,
Called by the natives bienseance,
Much are the English mob inclined to scout it,
But rarely is Monsieur Canaille without it.
To bienseance 'tis tedious to incline,
In many cases;
To flatter, par example, keep smooth faces
When kicked, or suffering grievous want of coin.
To vulgars, bienseance may seem an oddity—
I deem it a most portable commodity,
A sort of magic wand,
Which, if 'tis used with ingenuity,
Although a utensil of much tenuity,
In place of something solid, it will stand
For verily I've marveled times enow
To see an Englishman, the ninny,
Give people for their services a guinea,
Which Frenchmen have rewarded with a bow.
Bows are a bit of bienseance
Much practiced too in that same France
Yet called by Quakers, children of inanity,
But as they pay their court to people's vanity,
Like rolling-pins they smooth where er they go
The souls and faces of mankind like dough!
With some, indeed, may bienseance prevail
To folly—see the under-written tale:
THE PETIT MAITRE, AND THE MAN ON THE WHEEL
At Paris some time since, a murdering man,
A German, and a most unlucky chap,
Sad, stumbling at the threshold of his plan,
Fell into Justice's strong trap
The bungler was condemned to grace the wheel,
On which the dullest fibers learn to feel,
His limbs secundum artem to be broke
Amid ten thousand people, perhaps, or more;
Whenever Monsieur Ketch applied a stroke,
The culprit, like a bullock made a roar.