I puff and roar, and shriek and blow For men may scull and men may row Judy, April 2, 1879. THE SONG OF THE STEAM LAUNCH I STEAM from snug up river lairs, I make a sudden sally, And spread dismay among the "pairs,' Which by the rushes dally. On tiny craft I love to dash (As swallow darts on midges) : The women scream as down I crash, Ay, helter-skelter, on I go, Adown the crowded river, For tide may ebb and tide may flow, I drown with my shrill whistle's scream I churn up mud and foul the stream With many a wave the punts I fret, And spoil her dress completely. I clatter, splatter, as I go, A-muck upon the river, For tide may ebb and tide may flow, I twist about, dash in and out, And here and there receive a shout Of malediction hearty. Yes! here and there the worm may turn, And curse me as I travel; But victims, as a rule, I learn, Are far too scared to cavil, Or check me as along I go, Where tide may ebb and tide may flow, I steal by lawns when all is dark, I start, I dart, I screech, I blare, I make the angry oarsmen swear I murder quiet 'neath the stars; I cut away young yachtsmen's spars; I reek with blacks and engine oil, I carry cads for cargo. I swill, I kill, I hoot, I snort, A river demon I disport, Yet you've to grin and bear me ! Yes, on again I wildly go, To curse the crowded river; For tide may ebb and tide may flow, Truth, August 11, 1881. THE SHERBROOKE. (Not by Tennyson.) I COME from haunts of statesmen hard, My life has run o'er stony ways, I on my Peer's soft cushion fret, I steal away from Whiggish plots To Poesy's green covers, I try my hand at true-love knots, I rhyme with HUDIBRAS's dash With here a touch of CANNING's flash, I sing Swiss glaciers, southern stars, I sneer at old Colonial jars, And Antipodean messes. I fancy my old foes will quake, As this new path I travel; I think my rhymes the bards will shake, And all the critics gravel. Bravo, BOB LOWE! for do you know I think this dodge is clever, For Statesmen come and Statesmen go, But Bards live on for ever! Punch, May 23, 1885. Lord Sherbrooke, better known, perhaps, as Mr. Robert Lowe, had just produced a small volume of Poems, a piece of temerity on his part which is now quite forgotten and forgiven. A LAY OF LAWN TENNIS. WITH rackets poised against the foe, We roam the verdant lawn about, We rush for many a ball that strays We play upon the grassy plots, The "Court" the garden covers; We wear the blue forget-me-nots, Like TENNYSON'S young lovers. We skip, we slide, with many a glance, And as the gay balls bound and dance, We murmur when the stern net bars We've played beneath the moon and stars, And how to "screw" and "twist " we know, ', For other games may come and go, Punch, August 8, 1885. —:0: - PARODIES OF SONGS IN "THE PRINCESS." THE WORRIER AND HIS WIFE. So they thought, and so they said; Of my husbands senseless plight! "Put him down-oh, anywhere!- Drop him on the carpet-there! One by one they slowly went ; Then she locked and barred the door, Then-above her worrier bent, Frowned and smiled and crossed the floor. From a corner back she tripped, Knelt beside her helpless mate, And, with scissors, clipped and clipped, Then she rose and left him there Left him there, and went to bed-Left him there without his hair, With his hair around him spread! In her bed she lay and slept, On the floor he passed the night. In the house for weeks he keptSober-hairless-such a fright! Not in vain was he deprived Of his glossy locks, I trow: With new hair new strength arrived― Let me lie here: no dry old brewer's sieve Let me lie here: the secret is revealed; JOHN COTTON. [The above appeared in the Central Literary Magazine, Birmingham, 1878.] San Francisco Free Public Library, Jan. 20, 1885. To Walter Hamilton, Esq. Dear Sir,-I venture to interrupt you again with a transcript of a Tennyson Parody which you may not have seen. It can't have the local flavour with you which it had when first printed, in the middle of General Butler's political and oratorical campaign for the governorship of Massachusettsnot his successful one, but one of the others, about 1875. It first came out in the Springfield (Massachusetts) Republican newspaper.-Very truly yours, (Signed) F. B. PERKINS. BUGLE SONG. (After Tennyson—and Butler.) THE slander falls in different halls THE LIGHT (BLUE) BRIGAde. (The University Boat Race.) Rowed the Eights, onward! Rowed the Eights, onward! Steamers to right of them, Snorted and thundered! Rowed the Eights, onwards. O but the sight was fair, All the world wondered. Nobody blundered; Snorted and thundered; Came through Barnes Railway Bridge, Since they rowed onward! Fun, April 27, 1867. THE GAS STOKERS' STRIKE. DARK were the streets and wet; Questioned and wondered. Therefore the gasmen struck Struck by the hundred. Darkness to right of them, Darkness to left of them, Darkness in front of them,-- Many an oath and yell Shovelling the Wallsend there, Strike-men all wondered. Plunging in flame and smoke, Cheering them thundered. Blasphemed and thundered. Stormed at with drunken yell, Boldly they worked and well, Rushing through flame and smoke, O'er piles of coal and coke, Saving from darkness then, Millions of Englishmen. Gallant Six Hundred. By the flame wearily, On they worked cheerily. JOSEPH VEREY. The Hornet, December 11, 1872. (Published when the stokers of several of the London Gas Works were out on strike.) The same journal also published another Parody of the Charge of Balaklava, by the same author, on "Clapham Junction," October 23, 1872. THE CHARGE OF THE "LIGHT" BRIGAde. "What Ho! there, lights; lights!" (Enter servants with a rush.) Old Play. HALF a league, half a league, Half a league onward; Pausing I pondered. "Forward the Light Brigade!" Rushed half-a-hundred. Rushed the half hundred. Cabmen in front of them, Holla'ed and thundered. Stormed at by "slop" and swell, Into the road pell-mell; Into the jaws of Death, Out of the paws of L, Wary policeman L, Rushed the half hundred. Flashed all their ankles bare, Dodging the bobby, while Reeled from their neighbour's stroke Spattered and sundered; Ne'er till they'd served the "bloke " Cabmen to right of them, Bobbies behind them Followed and thundered. But though policeman L Right thro' the jaws of Death, Slipped the half hundred. Long thrive their simple trade, May they escape any; Honour the Light Brigade! 'Twas but a ha penny. From The Rocking of the Lilies, and other Poems, by Charles T. Druery, (Clayton & Co., London), 1882. RECITATION.-THE CHARGE OF THE HEAVY BRIGADE AT KASSASSIN. By a Life Guards' Officer. HALF a league (more or less), Rode the Six Hundred. Out into the pale moonlight Rode the Six Hundred ! In all the Six Hundred, Desert in front of them, Yet on they thundered; Whilst far above their head Bullets by dozens sped, Still not a man As into the desert wild Rode the Six H Hundred! "Forward, Cavalry Brigade!" Blindly they blundered. Whilst "fellahs" wondered. Plenty had sunder'd; Yet on they thundered; At which the world wondered? Silly Six Hundred ! Not so with our Brigade; They, when their charge they'd made, Rode back to their parade Still a Six Hundred ! "At this point of the programme the prompter announced that the Egyptian Honours would be distributed, on which there at once came such a rain of stars, crosses, medals, K.C.B.'s, &c., from the "flies," that the gallant veterans on the stage were glad to put up their umbrellas to guard their skulls from fracture." Truth Christmas Number, 1882. The Porcupine (Liverpool) published a parody on July 11, 1885, entitled "The Charge of the Fire Brigade," but it was of purely local interest, and destitute of humour, or any other literary merit. Welcome her myriads of horses so fleet, Frenchman's mare, from over the way, We are all of us French in our welcome of thee, P.S.-Frenchman's mare from over the sea, Since these ere lines I'd been and done, For I forgot that "Asteroid." From Lays of the Turf, by Rose Grey. London, G. H. Nichols, 1863. ·:0: IN TENNYSONIAM. "We have had the following Stanzas forwarded us, with the signature of "A**** d T • nn ***n." Can they be from the Laureate? We have our doubts. And yet there is a wild, mystical, logical, sentimental, and general obscurity of expression throughout the lines which inclines us to think (from their internal evidence) that they could have proceeded from no other pen than the author of In Memoriam.'" WE seek to know, and knowing seek; We ask too much, we seek too oft, A something comes from out the gloom; I know it not, nor seek to know: I only see it swell and grow, And more than this would not presume. Meseems, a circling void I fill, And I, unchanged where all is change; I hear the oceans surging tide O Sea! whose ancient ripples lie On red-ribbed sands where sea-weeds shone ; O Moon! whose golden-sickles gone : O Voices all! like ye I die! From "The Month," by Albert Smith and John Leech. December, 1851. :0: THE BATTLE OF THE REVIEWS. "The sonnet written by Mr. Tennyson as an introduction to the Nineteenth Century has excited universal attention and admiration. Some people, however, are understood to have complained that they cannot exactly penetrate the meaning which the poet wishes to convey. But this is entirely their own fault, as, if they had studied the whole history of the secession from the Contemporary, they would fully appreciate the charm, and the appropriateness of the Laureates' verses." "For the benefit of these, Mr. Tennyson, with his customary kindness, has forwarded to us the following lines, which our readers will at once perceive to be an explanation of his sonnet, as clear as the latter is beautiful :" OF old the murmurs of the Delphian shrine, And crocus, which to them are clear as light, |