558 HUMANITY AND THE KNIFE-GRINDER.

Weary Knife-grinder! little think the proud ones,
Who, in their coaches, roll along the turnpike-
Road, what hard work 'tis crying all day, "Knives and
Scissors to grind, O!"

Tell me, Knife-grinder, how came you to grind knives?
Did some rich man tyrannically use you?
Was it the squire, or parson of the parish,
Or the attorney?

Was it the squire, for killing of his game? or
Covetous parson, for his tithes distraining?
Or roguish lawyer, made you lose your little
All in a lawsuit?

(Have you not read the Rights of Man, by Tom Paine?)
Drops of compassion tremble on my eyelids,
have told your
Pitiful story.

Ready to fall, as soon as you

Knife-grinder.

Story! God bless you, I have none to tell, Sit:
Only last night, a-drinking at the Chequers,
This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were
Torn in a scuffle.

Constables came up for to take me into
Custody; they took me before the justice;
Justice Oldmixon put me in the parish

Stocks for a vagrant.

I should be glad to drink your honour's health in
A pot of beer, if you will give me sixpence ;

But for my part, I never love to meddle

With politics, Sir.

Friend of Humanity.

I give thee sixpence! I will see thee hanged first-
Wretch, whom no sense of wrongs can rouse to vengeance –
Sordid, unfeeling, reprobate, degraded,

Spiritless outcast!

[Kicks the Knife-grinder, overturns his wheel, and exit in a transport of republican enthusiasm, and universal philanthropy.]

THE BABY'S DEBUT.

559

JAMES SMITH.
(1775-1839.)

FROM REJECTED ADDRESSES.

THE BABY'S DEBUT.

[Spoken in the character of Nancy Lake, a girl eight years of age, who is drawn upon the stage in a child's chaise by Samuel Hughes, her uncle's porter.]

My brother Jack was nine in May,
And I was eight on New Year's day;
So in Kate Wilson's shop

Papa (he's my papa and Jack's)
Bought me, last week, a doll of wax,
And brother Jack a top.

Jack's in the pouts, and this it is,-
He thinks mine came to more than his ;
So to my drawer he goes,

Takes out the doll, and, oh my stars!
He pokes her head between the bars,
And melts off half her nose!

Quite cross, a bit of string I beg,
And tie it to his peg-top's peg,

And bang, with might and main,
Its head against the parlour door;
Off flies the head, and hits the floor,
And breaks a window pane.

This made him cry with rage and spite;
Well, let him cry, it serves him right,
A pretty thing, forsooth!

If he's to melt, all scalding hot,
Half my doll's nose, and I am not

To draw his peg-top's tooth!

Aunt Hannah heard the window break,
And cried, "O naughty Nancy Lake,
Thus to distress your aunt:

No Drury Lane for you to-day!"

And while Papa said,

66 Pooh, she

may!"

Mamma said, "No, she shan't!"

at the

1 The "Rejected Addresses" were suggested to the "witty brothers" James and Horace Smith, by the offer of a "premium for an Address to be spoken opening of the new Drury Lane Theatre in 1812: the former building had been destroyed by fire. The "Addresses" bore the names of the most popular writers, and are felicitous burlesques of their styles: that in the text imitates Wordsworth's manner, as evinced in his early lyrical ballads.

Well, after many a sad reproach,
They got into a hackney coach,
And trotted down the street.

I saw them go one horse was blind;
The tails of both hung down behind.
Their shoes were on their feet.

The chaise in which poor brother Bill
Used to be drawn to Pentonville,
Stood in the lumber room:

I wiped the dust from off the top,
While Molly mopped it with a mop,
And brushed it with a broom.

My uncle's porter, Samuel Hughes,
Came in at six to black the shoes
(I always talk to Sam):

So what does he, but takes and drags
Me in the chaise along the flags,
And leaves me where I am?

My father's walls are made of brick,
But not so tall, and not so thick

As these; and goodness me!

My father's beams are made of wood,
But never, never half so good
As these that now I see.

What a large floor! 'tis like a town!
The carpet, when they lay it down,
Won't hide it, I'll be bound:
And there's a row of lamps;—my eye!
How they do blaze! I wonder why
They keep them on the ground.

At first I caught hold of the wing,
And kept away; but Mr. Thing-
Umbob, the prompter man,
Gave with his hand my chaise a shove,
And said," Go on, my pretty love;
Speak to 'em, little Nan.

"You've only got to curtsey, whisp-
Er, hold your chin up, laugh, and lisp.
And then you're sure to take :
I've known the day when brats not quite
Thirteen, got fifty pounds a night,
Then why not Nancy Lake?"

ADDRESS TO A MUMMY.

But while I'm speaking, where's papa?
And where's my aunt? and where's mamma?
Where's Jack? Oh, there they sit !
They smile, they nod; I'll go my ways
And order round poor Billy's chaise,
To join them in the pit.

And now, good gentlefolks, I go
To join mamma, and see the show;
So, bidding you adieu,

I curtsey, like a pretty Miss,
And if you'll blow to me a kiss,
I'll blow a kiss to you.

[Blows kiss, and exit.]

HORACE SMITH.

(1779-1849.)

ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY IN BELZONI'S EXHIBITION.

AND thou hast walked about (how strange a story!)
In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago,
When the Memnonium was in all its glory,

And time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous,
Of which the very ruins are tremendous !

Speak! for thou long enough hast acted dumby;
Thou hast a tongue, come, let us hear its tune;
Thou'rt standing on thy legs above ground, mummy!
Revisiting the glimpses of the moon.

Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures,

But with thy bones and flesh, and limbs and features.

Tell us for doubtless thou canst recollect

To whom we should assign the Sphinx's fame?

Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect

Of either Pyramid that bears his name?

Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer?

Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer?

Perhaps thou wert a mason, and forbidden

By oath to tell the secrets of thy tradeThen say, what secret melody was hidden

In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played? Perhaps thou wert a Priest-if so, my struggles Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.

561

Perchance that very hand, now pinioned flat,
Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass;
Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat,

Or doffed thine own to let Queen Dido pass,
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great Temple's dedication.

I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed,
Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled,
For thou wert dead, and buried, and embalmed
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled :
Antiquity appears to have begun

Long after thy primeval race was run.

Thou couldst develope, if that withered tongue
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have seen,
How the world looked when it was fresh and young,
And the great deluge still had left it green;
Or was it then so old, that history's pages
Contained no record of its early ages?

Still silent, incommunicative elf!

Art sworn to secrecy? then keep thy vows;

But prythee tell us something of thyself,

Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house;

Since in the world of spirits thou hast slumbered,

What hast thou seen-what strange adventures numbered?

Since first thy form was in this box extended,

We have, above ground, seen some strange mutations; The Roman empire has begun and ended,

New worlds have risen-we have lost old nations,
And countless kings have into dust been humbled,
Whilst not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head,
When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses,
Marched armies o'er thy tomb with thundering tread,
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis,

And shook the pyramids with fear and wonder,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder?

If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed,
The nature of thy private life unfold:

A heart has throbbed beneath that leathern breast,
And tears adown that dusky cheek have roll'd;

Have children climbed those knees and kissed that face?
What was thy name and station, age and race?

Statue of flesh-immortal of the dead!
Imperishable type of evanescence!