THE WHIPPIAD, A SATIRICAL POEM.
BY REGINALD HEBER, BISHOP OF CALCUTTA.
In offering this little poem to the public, some few words, by way of explanation, are deemed necessary. Most of the circumstances alluded to in it will be familiar to Oxford readers of Bishop Heber's standing, but especially to those of his own college, Brazenose. The origin of the poem was simply this:—A young friend of his, B——d P——t, went to call upon him at Brazenose, and, without being aware of the heinous crime he was committing, cracked a four-horse whip in the quadrangle. This moved the ire of a certain doctor, a fellow and tutor, and at that time also dean of the college, commonly called Dr Toe from a defect in one of his feet. The doctor had unfortunately made himself obnoxious to most of those of his own college, under-graduates as well as others, by his absurd conduct and regulations. On the following day Mr P——t cracked the whip in the quadrangle, when the doctor issued from his rooms in great wrath, and after remonstrating with Mr P——t, and endeavouring to take the whip from him, a scuffle ensued, in which the whip was broken, and the doctor overpowered and thrown down by the victorious P——t, who had fortunately taken his degree of Master of Arts. Heber, then an under-graduate of only a few terms' standing, wrote the first canto the same evening, and the intrinsic merit of the poem will recommend it to most readers. But it will be doubly interesting when considered as one of the first, if not the very first, of the poetical productions of that eminent and distinguished scholar. In it may be traced the dawnings of that genius which was afterwards to delight the world in an enlarged sphere of usefulness.
K.
CANTO FIRST.
Where whiten'd Cain the curse of heaven defies,[[18]]
And leaden slumber seals his brother's eyes,
Where o'er the porch in brazen splendour glows
The vast projection of the mystic nose,
Triumph erewhile of Bacon's fabled arts,[[19]]
Now well-hung symbol of the student's parts;
'Midst those unhallow'd walls and gloomy cells
Where every thing but Contemplation dwells,
Dire was the feud our sculptured Alfred saw,[[20]]
And thy grim-bearded bust, Erigena,
When scouts came flocking from the empty hall,
And porters trembled at the Doctor's call;
Ah! call'd in vain, with laugh supprest they stood
And bit their nails, a dirty-finger'd brood.
E'en Looker gloried in his master's plight,[[21]]
And John beheld, and chuckled at the sight.[[22]]
Genius of discord! thou whose murky flight
With iron pennons more obscured the night—
Thou, too, of British birth, who dost reside
In Syms's or in Goodwin's blushing tide,[[23]]
Say, spirit, say, for thy enlivening bowl
With fell ambition fired thy favourite's soul,
From what dread cause began the bloodless fray
Pregnant with shame, with laughter, and dismay?
Calm was the night, and all was sunk to rest,
Save Shawstone's party, and the Doctor's breast:
He saw with pain his ancient glory fled,
And thick oblivion gathering round his head.
Alas! no more his pupils crowding come,
To wait indignant in their tyrant's room,[[24]]
No more in hall the fluttering theme he tears,
Or lolling, picks his teeth at morning prayers;
Unmark'd, unfear'd, on dogs he vents his hate,
And spurns the terrier from his guarded gate.
But now to listless indolence a prey,
Stretch'd on his couch, he sad and darkling lay;
As not unlike in venom and in size,
Close in his hole the hungry spider lies.
"And oh!" he cries, "am I so powerless grown,
That I am fear'd by cooks and scouts alone?
Oh! for some nobler strife, some senior foe,
To swell by his defeat the name of Toe!"
He spoke—the powers of mischief heard his cries,
And steep'd in sullen sleep his rheumy eyes.
He slept—but rested not, his guardian sprite
Rose to his view in visions of the night,
And thus, with many a tear and many a sigh,
He heard, or seem'd to hear, the mimic demon cry:—[[25]]
"Is this a time for distant strife to pray,
When all my power is melting fast away,
Like mists dissolving at the beams of day,
When masters dare their ancient rights resume,
And bold intruders fill the common room,
Whilst thou, poor wretch, forsaken, shunn'd by all,
Must pick thy commons in the empty hall?
Nay more! regardless of thy hours and thee,
They scorn the ancient, frugal hour of three.[[26]]
Good Heavens! at four their costly treat is spread,
And juniors lord it at the table's head;
See fellows' benches sleeveless striplings bear,[[27]]
Whilst Smith and Sutton from the canvass stare.[[28]]
Hear'st thou through all this consecrated ground,
The rattling thong's unwonted clangour sound?
Awake! arise! though many a danger lour,
By one bright deed to vindicate thy power."
He ceased; as loud the fatal whip resounds,
With throbbing heart the eager Doctor bounds.
So when some bear from Russia's clime convey'd,
Politer grown, has learnt the dancer's trade,
If weary with his toil perchance, he hears
His master's lash re-echoing in his ears,
Though loath, he lifts his paws, and bounds in air,
And hops and rages whilst the rabble stare.
CANTO THE SECOND.
You the great foe of this Assembly!
I the great foe? Why the great foe?
In that being one of the meanest, barest, poorest,
——Thou goest foremost.—SHAKSPEARE'S Coriolanus.
Forth from his cell the wily warrior hies,
And swift to seize the unwary victim flies.
For sure he deem'd, since now declining day
Had dimn'd the brightness of his visual ray,
He deem'd on helpless under-graduate foes
To purge the bile that in his liver rose.
Fierce schemes of vengeance in his bosom swell,
Jobations dire, and Impositions fell.
And now a cross he'd meditate, and swear[[29]]
Six ells of Virgil should the crime repair.[[30]]
Along the grass with heedless haste he trod,[[31]]
And with unequal footsteps press'd the sod—
That hallow'd sod, that consecrated ground,
By eclogues, fines, and crosses fenced around.
When lo! he sees, yet scarcely can believe,
The destined victim wears a master's sleeve;
So when those heroes, Britain's pride and care,
In dark Batavian meadows urge the war;
Oft as they roam'd, in fogs and darkness lost,
They found a Frenchman what they deem'd a post.
The Doctor saw; and, filled with wild amaze,
He fix'd on P——t[[32]] his quick convulsive gaze.
Thus shrunk the trembling thief, when first he saw,
Hung high in air, the waving Abershaw.[[33]]
Thus the pale bawd, with agonizing heart,
Shrieks when she hears the beadle's rumbling cart.
"And oh! what noise," he cries, "what sounds unblest,
Presume to break a senior's holy rest?[[34]]
Full well you know, who thus my anger dare,
To horse-whips what antipathy I bear.
Shall I, in vain, immersed in logic lore,
O'er Saunderson and Allrick try to pore—
I, who the major to the minor join,
And prove conclusively that seven's not nine?
With expectation big, and hope elate,
The critic world my learned labours wait:
And shall not Strabo then respect command,
And shall not Strabo stay thy insulting hand?
Strabo![[35]] whose pages, eighteen years and more,
Have been my public shame, my private bore?
Hence, to thy room, audacious wretch! retire,
Nor think thy sleeves shall save thee from mine ire."
He spoke; such fury sparkled in his face,
The Buttery trembled to its tottering base,
The frighted rats in corners laid them down,
And all but P——t was daunted at his frown;
Firm and intrepid stood the reverend man,
As thrice he stroked his face, and thus began:
"And hopest thou then," the injured Bernard said,
"To launch thy thunders on a master's head?
O, wont to deal the trope and dart the fist,
Half-learn'd logician, half-form'd pugilist,
Censor impure, who dar'st, with slanderous aim,
And envy's dart, assault a H——r's name.
Senior, self-called, can I forget the day,
When titt'ring under-graduates mock'd thy sway,
And drove thee foaming from the Hall away?
Gods, with what raps the conscious tables rung,
From every form how shrill the cuckoo sung![[36]]
Oh! sounds unblest—Oh! notes of deadliest fear—
Harsh to the tutor's or the lover's ear,
The hint, perchance, thy warmest hopes may quell,
And cuckoo mingle with the thoughts of Bel."[[37]]
At that loved name, with fury doubly keen,
Fierce on the Deacon rush'd the raging Dean;
Nor less the dauntless Deacon dare withstand
The brandish'd weight of Toe's uplifted hand.
[[38]]The ghost of themes departed, that, of yore,
Disgraced alike, the Doctor praised or tore,
On paper wings flit dimly through the night,
And, hovering low in air, beheld the fight.
Each ill-starr'd verse its filthy den forsakes,
Black from the spit, or reeking from the jakes;
The blot-stain'd troop their shadowy pages spread,
And call for vengeance on the murderer's head.
CANTO THE THIRD.