He cursed him in living, he cursed him in dying:
Never was heard such a terrible curse.
But what gave rise
To no little surprise—
Nobody seemed one penny the worse.'
When after awhile the mystery was out— when the poor little comminated jackdaw presented himself in a sad state, so that of the cathedral officers, sacristans, and vergers, and the like, it is recorded,
'That heedless of grammar, they all cried,
"That's him!"'
the absurdity reached its climax. For our own part, though these humours are not of the highest or deepest order, we laugh at them. Life has its follies; Shakspeare had his clowns. In the old forgotten coaching days, there was wonderful humour at the wayside inns. Sam Weller was possible then: a railway porter has no time to be humorous. Of the Ingoldsby humour, as practised by Barham himself, there is this to be said: it was always harmless, and it was directed against absurdity and nonsense. Ingoldsby has had disciples, who have not disgraced their master, yet who have never quite equalled him in certain peculiar points. There is Hood's admirable story of 'Miss Killmannsegg,' wherein, if we remember aright, he depicts certain folks as—
'Washing, their hands with invisible soap