Then out spoke noble Fox: You may let the prisoner go;
The lady's oath has cleared him, as the Jury all may know.
She has released her own true love, she has renewed his name ;
May her honour bright gain high estate, and her offspring rise to
fame!'

THE NIGHT BEFORE LARRY WAS STRETCHED

The authorship of this extraordinary piece of poetic ribaldry has been much discussed, but the name of the modern Villon who uttered such an authentic strain from Là Bas has never been discovered, if indeed it had any single author. Probably it was mainly a sense of humorous contrast which led it for a long time to be attributed to a dignitary of the Established Church, Dean Burrowes. It is written in Dublin slang of the end of last century.

THE night before Larry was stretched,

The boys they all paid him a visit ;
A bait in their sacks, too, they fetched;
They sweated their duds till they riz it:
For Larry was ever the lad,

When a boy was condemned to the squeezer,
Would fence all the duds that he had
To help a poor friend to a sneezer,
And warm his gob 'fore he died.

The boys they came crowding in fast,

They drew all their stools round about him,
Six glims round his trap-case were placed,
He couldn't be well waked without 'em.
When one of us asked could he die
Without having duly repented,
Says Larry, That's all in my eye;
And first by the clargy invented,

To get a fat bit for themselves.'

'I'm sorry, dear Larry,' says I,

To see you in this situation
And, blister my limbs if I lie,

I'd as lieve it had been my own station.'
'Ochone! it's all over,' says he,

'For the neckcloth I'll be forced to put on,

And by this time to-morrow you'll see
Your poor Larry as dead as a mutton,
Because, why, his courage was good.
And I'll be cut up like a pie,

And my nob from my body be parted.' 'You're in the wrong box, then,' says I,

For blast me if they're so hard-hearted : A chalk on the back of your neck

Is all that Jack Ketch dares to give you ; Then mind not such trifles a feck,

For why should the likes of them grieve you? And now, boys, come tip us the deck.'

The cards being called for, they played,
Till Larry found one of them cheated;

A dart at his napper he made

(The boy being easily heated):

'Oh, by the hokey, you thief,

I'll scuttle your nob with my daddle!
You cheat me because I'm in grief,
But soon I'll demolish your noddle,
And leave you your claret to drink.'

Then the clergy came in with his book,
He spoke him so smooth and so civil;
Larry tipped him a Kilmainham look,

And pitched his big wig to the devil ;
Then sighing, he threw back his head
To get a sweet drop of the bottle,

And pitiful sighing, he said :

Oh, the hemp will be soon round my throttle
And choke my poor windpipe to death.

'Though sure it's the best way to die,
Oh, the devil a better a-livin'!
For, sure, when the gallows is high
Your journey is shorter to Heaven :
But what harasses Larry the most,

And makes his poor soul melancholy,

Is to think of the time when his ghost
Will come in a sheet to sweet Molly-
Oh, sure it will kill her alive!'

So moving these last words he spoke,
We all vented our tears in a shower;
For my part, I thought my heart broke,
To see him cut down like a flower.
On his travels we watched him next day ;

Oh, the throttler! I thought I could kill him ;
But Larry not one word did say,

Nor changed till he come to King William
Then, musha! his colour grew white.

When he came to the nubbling chit,

He was tucked up so neat and so pretty,
The rumbler jogged off from his feet,
And he died with his face to the city;
He kicked, too-but that was all pride,
For soon you might see 'twas all over ;
Soon after the noose was untied,

And at darky we waked him in clover,
And sent him to take a ground sweat.

'JOHNNY, I HARDLY KNEW YE'

While going the road to sweet Athy,
Hurroo hurroo !

While going the road to sweet Athy,
Hurroo hurroo !

While going the road to sweet Athy,
A stick in my hand and a drop in my eye,

A doleful damsel I heard cry:

With drums and guns, and guns and drums

The enemy nearly slew ye;

My darling dear, you look so queer,

Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

'Where are your eyes that looked so mild? Hurroo hurroo !

Where are your eyes that looked so mild?
Hurroo hurroo !

Where are your eyes that looked so mild,
When my poor heart you first beguiled?
Why did you run from me and the child?
Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!
With drums, &c.

'Where are the legs with which you run?
Hurroo hurroo !

Where are the legs with which you run?
Hurroo hurroo !

Where are the legs with which you run
When you went to carry a gun?
Indeed, your dancing days are done!
Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

With drums, &c.

'It grieved my heart to see you sail,
Hurroo hurroo !

It grieved my heart to see you sail,
Hurroo hurroo !

It grieved my heart to see you sail,
Though from my heart you took leg-bail;
Like a cod you're doubled up head and tail.
Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

With drums, &c.

'You haven't an arm and you haven't a leg,

Hurroo hurroo !

You haven't an arm

and you haven't a leg,

Hurroo hurroo !

You haven't an arm and you haven't a leg, You're an eyeless, noseless, chickenless egg You'll have to be put wid a bowl to beg : Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

With drums, &c.

'I'm happy for to see you home,
Hurroo hurroo !

I'm happy for to see you home,
Hurroo hurroo !

I'm happy for to see you home,
All from the island of Sulloon,'
So low in flesh, so high in bone;
Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!
With drums, &c.

'But sad as it is to see you so,
Hurroo hurroo !

But sad as it is to see you so,
Hurroo hurroo !

But sad as it is to see you so,

And to think of you now as an object of woe,
Your Peggy'll still keep ye on as her beau ;

Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

With drums and guns, and guns and drums,

The enemy nearly slew ye;

My darling dear, you look so queer,

Och, Johnny, I hardly knew ye!

THE CRUISKEEN LAWN

It would be difficult to imagine a more jovial, sly, rollicking and altogether irresistible bacchanalian song than the immortalCruiskeen Lawn.' The English words and the Irish blend together most happily. The chorus is pronounced something like

Grá-ma-chree ma crooskeen,

Shlántya gal ma-voorneen

'S grá-ma-chree a cooleen bán, &c.

á being pronounced as in 'shawl.' The meaning is:

Love of my heart, my little jug!

Bright health to my darling!

The love of my heart is her fair hair, &c.

The origin of the poem is lost in obscurity. It probably sprang up, in its present form, in the convivial circles of eighteenth-century Ireland, and no doubt has a reminiscence of some Gaelic original. Lán full.

› Ceylon.