A RECENT DIALOGUE.

1825.

A BISHOP and a bold dragoon,
Both heroes in their way

Did thus, of late, one afternoon,

Unto each other say:—

"Dear bishop," quoth the brave hussar, "As nobody denies

"That you a wise logician are,

"'Tis fit that in this question, we

"Stick each to his own art

"That yours should be the sophistry, "And mine the fighting part.

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My creed, I need not tell you, is

"Like that of W- -n,

"To whom no harlot comes amiss,

"Save her of Babylon*;

"And when we're at a loss for words, "If laughing reasoners flout us,

* Cui nulla meretrix displicuit præter Babylonicam.

"For lack of sense we'll draw our swords
"The sole thing sharp about us."—
"Dear bold dragoon," the bishop said,
""Tis true for war thou art meant ;
"And reasoning-bless that dandy head!
"Is not in thy department.

"So leave the argument to me—

"And, when my holy labour

"Hath lit the fires of bigotry,

"Thou'lt poke them with thy sabre. "From pulpit and from sentry-box, "We'll make our joint attacks, "I at the head of my Cassocks, "And you, of your Cossacks.

"So here's your health, my brave hussar, "My exquisite old fighter

"Success to bigotry and war,

"The musket and the mitre!"

Thus pray'd the minister of heaven-
While Y-k, just entering then,

Snor'd out (as if some Clerk had given
His nose the cue)" Amen.”

T B.

THE WELLINGTON SPA.

"And drink oblivion to our woes." ANNA MATIlda.

1829.

TALK no more of your Cheltenham and Harrowgate

springs,

'Tis from Lethe we now our potations must draw; Your Lethe's a cure for-all possible things,

And the doctors have nam'd it the Wellington

Spa.

Other physical waters but cure you in part;

One cobbles your gout-t'other mends your

digestion

Some settle your stomach, but this

heart!

bless your

It will settle, for ever, your Catholic Question.

Unlike, too, the potions in fashion at present,

This Wellington nostrum, restoring by stealth,

So purges the memʼry of all that's unpleasant, That patients forget themselves into rude health.

For instance, the' inventor-his having once said "He should think himself mad, if, at any one's

call,

"He became what he is"-is so purg'd from his head,

That he now doesn't think he's a madman at all.

Of course, for your mem'ries of very long standing

Old chronic diseases, that date back, undaunted, To Brian Boroo and Fitz-Stephens' first landing— A dev❜l of a dose of the Lethe is wanted.

But ev'n Irish patients can hardly regret

An oblivion, so much in their own native style, So conveniently plann'd, that, whate'er they forget, They may go on rememb'ring it still, all the while! *

* The only parallel I know to this sort of oblivion is to be found in a line of the late Mr. R. P. Knight

"The pleasing memory of things forgot."

A CHARACTER.

1834.

HALF Whig, half Tory, like those midway things,
'Twixt bird and beast, that by mistake have wings;
A mongrel Statesman, 'twixt two factions nurst,
Who, of the faults of each, combines the worst-
The Tory's loftiness, the Whigling's sneer,
The leveller's rashness, and the bigot's fear;
The thirst for meddling, restless still to show
How Freedom's clock, repair'd by Whigs, will go;
The alarm when others, more sincere than they,
Advance the hands to the true time of day.

By Mother Church, high-fed and haughty dame,
The boy was dandled, in his dawn of fame;
List'ning, she smil'd, and bless'd the flippant tongue
On which the fate of unborn tithe-pigs hung.
Ah, who shall paint the grandam's grim dismay,
When loose Reform entic'd her boy away;
When shock'd she heard him ape the rabble's tone,
And, in Old Sarum's fate, foredoom her own!