Modern Love and Poems of the English Roadside, with Poems and Ballads
Page 10
Conscience, for that, in men don’t quail.9
I’ve made bread from the bump of wonder:10
That’s my business, and there’s my tale.
Fashion and rank all praised the professor:
Ay! and I’ve had my smile from the Queen:
Bravo, Jerry! she meant: God bless her!
Ain’t this a sermon on that scene?
VII.
I’ve studied men from my topsy-turvy
Close, and, I reckon, rather true.
Some are fine fellows: some, right scurvy:11
Most, a dash between the two.
But it’s a woman, old girl, that makes me
Think more kindly of the race:
And it’s a woman, old girl, that shakes me
When the Great Juggler I must face.
VIII.
We two were married, due and legal:
Honest we’ve lived since we’ve been one.
Lord! I could then jump like an eagle:
You danced bright as a bit o’ the sun.
Birds in a May-bush we were! right merry!
All night we kiss’d—we juggled all day.
Joy was the heart of Juggling Jerry!
Now from his old girl he’s juggled away.
IX.
It’s past parsons to console us:
No, nor no doctor fetch for me:
I can die without my bolus;12
Two of a trade, lass, never agree!
Parson and Doctor!—don’t they love rarely,
Fighting the devil in other men’s fields!
Stand up yourself and match him fairly:
Then see how the rascal yields!
X.
I, lass, have lived no gipsy, flaunting
Finery while his poor helpmate grubs:
Coin I’ve stored, and you won’t be wanting:
You shan’t beg from the troughs and tubs.
Nobly you’ve stuck to me, though in his kitchen
Many a Marquis would hail you Cook!
Palaces you could have ruled and grown rich in,
But your old Jerry you never forsook.
XI.
Hand up the chirper!13 ripe ale winks in it;
Let’s have comfort and be at peace.
Once a stout draught made me light as a linnet.14
Cheer up! the Lord must have his lease.
May be—for none see in that black hollow—
It’s just a place where we’re held in pawn,
And, when the Great Juggler makes as to swallow,
It’s just the sword-trick—I ain’t quite gone!
XII.
Yonder came smells of the gorse, so nutty,
Gold-like and warm: it’s the prime of May.
Better than mortar, brick, and putty,
Is God’s house on a blowing day.
Lean me more up the mound; now I feel it:
All the old heath-smells! Ain’t it strange?
There’s the world laughing, as if to conceal it,
But He’s by us, juggling the change.
XIII.
I mind it well, by the sea-beach lying,
Once—it’s long gone—when two gulls we beheld,
Which, as the moon got up, were flying
Down a big wave that spark’d and swell’d.
Crack! went a gun: one fell: the second
Wheel’d round him twice, and was off for new luck:
There in the dark her white wing beckon’d:—
Drop me a kiss—I’m the bird dead-struck!
Notes
1. Originally published in Once a Week on 3 September 1859 under the title “The Last Words of Juggling Jerry,” and illustrated by H. K. Browne (see fig. 5).
2. It’s nigh . . . daisies: last night alive; he thinks he’ll die the next day.
3. One that outjuggles all: God
4. common: unenclosed and uncultivated land belonging to the community
5. gorse: evergreen shrub
6. Couldn’t I . . . wicket?: In a game of cricket, the wicket consists of three vertical posts set into the ground with two crossbars on top, called bales.
7. halts: stops
8. victual: food
9. quail: recoil, flinch
10. bump of wonder: In phrenology, the study of the personality based on the shape of one’s head; various “bumps” on the skull correspond to certain faculties. Those with pronounced “bumps of wonder” would likely be curious about the juggler’s abilities and would pay to see him.
11. scurvy: low, base, or miserable
12. bolus: medication or drug
13. chirper: cup to toast with
14. linnet: small finch
The Old Chartist1
I.
Whate’er I be, old England is my dam!2
So there’s my answer to the judges, clear.
I’m nothing of a fox, nor of a lamb;
I don’t know how to bleat nor how to leer:
I’m for the nation!
That’s why you see me by the wayside here,
Returning home from transportation.3
II.
It’s Summer in her bath this morn, I think.
I’m fresh as dew, and chirpy as the birds:
And just for joy to see old England wink
Thro’ leaves again, I could harangue4 the herds:
Isn’t it something
To speak out like a man when you’ve got words,
And prove you’re not a stupid dumb thing?
III.
They shipp’d me off for it: I’m here again.
Old England is my dam, whate’er I be!
Says I, I’ll tramp it home, and see the grain:
If you see well, you’re king of what you see:
Eyesight is having,
If you’re not given, I said, to gluttony.
Such talk to ignorance sounds as raving.
IV.
You dear old brook, that from his Grace’s park
Come bounding! on you run near my old town:
My lord can’t lock the water; nor the lark,
Unless he kills him, can my lord keep down.
Up, is the song-note!
I’ve tried it, too:—for comfort and renown,
I rather pitch’d upon the wrong note.
V.
I’m not ashamed: Not beaten’s still my boast:
Again I’ll rouse the people up to strike.5
But home’s where different politics jar most.
Respectability the women like.
This form, or that form—
The Government may be hungry pike,6
But don’t you mount a Chartist platform!
VI.
Well, well! Not beaten—spite of them, I shout;
And my estate is suffering for the Cause.—
Now, what is yon brown water-rat about,
Who washes his old poll7 with busy paws?
What does he mean by’t?
It’s like defying all our natural laws,
For him to hope that he’ll get clean by’t.
VII.
His seat is on a mud-bank, and his trade
Is dirt:—he’s quite contemptible; and yet
The fellow’s all as anxious as a maid
To show a decent dress, and dry the wet.
Now it’s his whisker,
And now his nose, and ear: he seems to get
Each moment at the motion brisker!
VIII.
To see him squat like little chaps at school,
I can’t help laughing out with all my might.
He peers, hangs both his fore-paws:—bless that fool,
He’s bobbing at his frill8 now!—what a sight!
Licking the dish up,
As if he thought to pass from black to white,
Like parson into lawny9 bishop.
IX.
The elms and yellow reed-flags in the sun,
Look on quite grave:�
��the sunlight flecks his side;
And links of bindweed-flowers10 round him run,
And shine up doubled with him in the tide.
I’m nearly splitting,
But nature seems like seconding his pride,
And thinks that his behaviour’s fitting.
X.
That isle o’ mud looks baking dry with gold.
His needle-muzzle still works out and in.
It really is a wonder to behold,
And makes me feel the bristles of my chin.
Judged by appearance,
I fancy of the two I’m nearer Sin,
And might as well commence a clearance.
XI.
And that’s what my fine daughter said:—she meant:
Pray, hold your tongue, and wear a Sunday face.
Her husband, the young linendraper, spent
Much argument thereon:—I’m their disgrace.
Bother the couple!
I feel superior to a chap whose place
Commands him to be neat and supple.
XII.
But if I go and say to my old hen:11
I’ll mend the gentry’s boots, and keep discreet,
Until they grow too violent,—why, then,
A warmer welcome I might chance to meet:
Warmer and better.
And if she fancies her old cock is beat,
And drops upon her knees—so let her!
XIII.
She suffered for me:—women, you’ll observe,
Don’t suffer for a Cause, but for a man.
When I was in the dock she show’d her nerve:
I saw beneath her shawl my old tea-can12
Trembling. . . . she brought it
To screw13 me for my work: she loath’d my plan,
And therefore doubly kind I thought it.
XIV.
I’ve never lost the taste of that same tea:
That liquor on my logic floats like oil,
When I state facts, and fellows disagree.
For human creatures all are in a coil;
All may want pardon.
I see a day when every pot will boil
Harmonious in one great Tea-garden!
XV.
We wait the setting of the Dandy’s day,
Before that time!—He’s furbishing his dress—
He will be ready for it!—and I say,
That yon old dandy rat amid the cress,—14
Thanks to hard labour!—
If cleanliness is next to godliness,
The old fat fellow’s Heaven’s neighbour!
XVI.
You teach me a fine lesson, my old boy!
I’ve looked on my superiors far too long,
And small has been my profit as my joy.
You’ve done the right while I’ve denounced the wrong.
Prosper me later!
Like you I will despise the sniggering throng,
And please myself and my Creator.
XVII.
I’ll bring the linendraper and his wife
Some day to see you; taking off my hat.
Should they ask why, I’ll answer: in my life
I never found so true a democrat.
Base occupation
Can’t rob you of your own esteem, old rat!
I’ll preach you to the British nation.
Notes
1. Chartism was a social and political reform movement peaking in England between 1838 and 1848. Chartists sought the expansion of the vote to the working classes. A series of coordinated labor strikes and uprisings led to violent interactions with the state, and ultimately, many Chartist leaders were, as was the speaker of the poem, arrested and transported to Australia. The poem was originally published in Once a Week on 8 February 1862, illustrated by Frederick Sandys (see fig. 6).
2. dam!: mother (female parent); also, a barrier
3. Returning . . . transportation: The speaker had been sent to Australia after arrest for participation in Chartist activities and has now returned to England.
4. harangue: rant; to deliver a forceful address
5. Again I’ll . . . strike: The Chartist was likely transported for inciting a strike among workers.
6. pike: fish
7. poll: head
8. frill: neck
9. lawny: Lawn is a kind of crisp white cloth commonly used in liturgical vestments; the parson would normally wear black, but the bishop would wear white lawn.
10. bindweed-flowers: bell-shaped flowers on a climbing vine
11. old hen: his wife
12. tea-can: Laborers would bring their tea to work in a can, which they set in the sun to warm.
13. screw: to encourage, to steady
14. cress: low lying green plant
The Beggar’s Soliloquy1
I.
Now, this, to my notion, is pleasant cheer,
To lie all alone on a ragged heath,
Where your nose isn’t sniffing for bones or beer,
But a peat-fire2 smells like a garden beneath.
The cottagers bustle about the door,
And the girl at the window ties her strings.
She’s a dish for a man who’s a mind to be poor;
Lord! women are such expensive things.
II.
We don’t marry beggars, says she: why, no:
It seems that to make ’em is what you do;
And as I can cook, and scour, and sew,
I needn’t pay half my victuals for you.
A man for himself should be able to scratch,
But tickling’s a luxury:—love, indeed!
Love burns as long as the lucifer match,3
Wedlock’s the candle! Now, that’s my creed.
III.
The church-bells sound water-like over the wheat;
And up the long path troop pair after pair.
The man’s well-brushed, and the woman looks neat:
It’s man and woman everywhere!
Unless, like me, you lie here flat,
With a donkey for friend, you must have a wife:
She pulls out your hair, but she brushes your hat.
Appearances make the best half of life.
IV.
You nice little madam! you know you’re nice.
I remember hearing a parson say
You’re a plateful of vanity pepper’d with vice;
Yon chap at the gate thinks t’other way.
On his waistcoat you read both his head and his heart:
There’s a whole week’s wages there figured in gold!
Yes! when you turn round you may well give a start:
It’s fun to a fellow who’s getting old.
V.
Now, that’s a good craft, weaving waistcoats and flowers,
And selling of ribbons, and scenting of lard:4
It gives you a house to get in from the showers,
And food when your appetite jockeys you hard.
You live a respectable man; but I ask
If it’s worth the trouble? You use your tools,
And spend your time, and what’s your task?
Why, to make a slide for a couple of fools.
VI.
You can’t match the colour o’ these heath5 mounds,
Nor better that peat-fire’s agreeable smell.
I’m cloth’d-like with natural sights and sounds;
To myself I’m in tune: I hope you’re as well.
You jolly old cot! though you don’t own coal:
It’s a generous pot that’s boil’d with peat.
Let the Lord Mayor o’ London roast oxen whole:
His smoke, at least, don’t smell so sweet.
VII.
I’m not a low Radical, hating the laws,
Who’d the aristocracy rebuke.
I talk o’ the Lord Mayor o’ London because
I once was on intimate terms with his cook.
I served him a turn, an
d got pensioned on scraps,
And, Lord, Sir! didn’t I envy his place,
Till Death knock’d him down with the softest of taps,
And I knew what was meant by a tallowy6 face!
VIII.
On the contrary, I’m Conservative quite;
There’s beggars in Scripture ’mongst Gentiles and Jews:
It’s nonsense, trying to set things right,
For if people will give, why, who’ll refuse?
That stopping cold custom wakes my spleen:
The poor and the rich both in giving agree:
Your tight-fisted shopman’s the Radical mean:
There’s nothing in common ’twixt him and me.
IX.
He says I’m no use! but I won’t reply.
You’re lucky not being of use to him!
On week-days he’s playing at Spider and Fly,7
And on Sundays he sings about Cherubim!8
Nailing shillings to counters is his chief work:
He nods now and then at the name on his door:
But judge of us two at a bow and a smirk,
I think I’m his match: and I’m honest—that’s more.
X.
No use! well, I mayn’t be. You ring a pig’s snout,
And then call the animal glutton! Now, he,
Mr. Shopman, he’s nought but a pipe and a spout
Who won’t let the goods o’ this world pass free.
This blazing blue weather all round the brown crop,
He can’t enjoy! all but cash he hates.
He’s only a snail that crawls under his shop;
Though he has got the ear o’ the magistrates.
XI.
Now, giving and taking’s a proper exchange,
Like question and answer: you’re both content.
But buying and selling seems always strange;
You’re hostile, and that’s the thing that’s meant.
It’s man against man—you’re almost brutes;
There’s here no thanks, and there’s there no pride.
If Charity’s Christian, don’t blame my pursuits,
I carry a touchstone by which you’re tried.
XII.
—“Take it,” says she, “it’s all I’ve got”:
I remember a girl in London streets:
She stood by a coffee-stall, nice and hot,
My belly was like a lamb that bleats.
Says I to myself, as her shilling I seized,
You haven’t a character9 here, my dear!
But for making a rascal like me so pleased,
I’ll give you one, in a better sphere!10
XIII.
And that’s where it is—she made me feel
I was a rascal: but people who scorn,
And tell a poor patch-breech11 he isn’t genteel,
Why, they make him kick up—and he treads on a corn.
It isn’t liking, it’s curst ill-luck,