Punch: Punch (101.1891)

October 3, 1891.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

165

That o'er the stubble fields did pass

(Together Will caught 'em).

In the time of autumn, [about;

When M.P.'s spout, and "manoeuvre"

M.P.'s (who are "out") love autumn.

About three acres and a cow,

With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino;
The artful country folks know now.

In the time of autumn, &c.

Since that the franchise was their dower,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonino,

The Country Voters are a power.
In the time of autumn, &c.

And, therefore, at the present time, [ho !—
With "an Agricultural Policy"—funny,

Both Parties simple Hodge would lime,
In the time of autumn, &c.

Will, {aside). Truly, though there is no
great matter in the ditty, yet the note is very
untuneable. [ Exit.

Touch. Trip, Audrey, trip, Audrey,—I
attend,—I attend ! [Exeunt.

Jaq. {appearing). There is surely another
political deluge forward, and these motley
would-be couples are seeking the official ark!

{Exit.

THE TRUE TENNYSON.

We have all been startled to find from the
researches of Mr. Woodall in Notes and
Queries, that "Between the story sung by
the Poet Laureate in his romantic poem The
Lord of Burlei h, and the actual fact, there
seems to be little in common." Henry Cecil,
Earl and afterwards Marquis of Exeter,
married Miss Sarah Hoggins under the name
of John Jones, having a wife alive at the
time, and she did not die as the poem relates.
It is obvious then that Tennyson must be
re-written, and we offer his Lordship the
following humble suggestions. The Lord of
Burleigh should henceforward run somewhat
as follows :—

Quoth he, " Gentle Sarah Hoggins,"

Speaking in seductive tones,
" You must wed no Hodge or Scroggins,

But espouse your own J. Jones."
Oh ! he was an artful party,

And that marriage was a crime.
He'd a wife alive and hearty,

Though she 'd left him for a time.

The above discovery has, of course, led to
doubts regarding other Tennysonian heroines.
Was Lady Clara Vere de Vere, for example,
as black as the poet has painted her ? Perish
the thought! Here are a couple of specimen
stanzas for an amended version:—

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

I vow that you were not a flirt,
The daughter of a hundred Earls

Would not a single creature hurt.
"Kind hearts are more than coronets,"

What abject twaddle, on my word;
And then the joke is in the end,—

We know they made the bard a Lord.

The tale of how young Laurence died,

In some audacious print began ;
The fact is that he took to drink,

He always was that sort of man.
And as for Alfred, why, of course

Tou snubbed him; but was that a crime,
That he should go and call you names,

And print his atrabilious rhyme ?

Then, again, was the Amu of Locksley
Hall quite as shallow-hearted and so forth
as the angry rhymester declares? It will
probably turn out that she was not. Hence
the verses should run in this fashion :—

And I said, " My Cousin Amy, speak the truth, my
heart to ease.

Shall it be bv banns or license ? " And she whis-
pered, " Which you please."

Love took up the glass of Time and waved it gaily
in the air, [Camden Square.

Married life was sweet at Number Twenty-Six in

Amy faithless! Bless your heart, Sir, that was
not the case at all: [Hall.
It was pure imagination that I wrote in Locksley

This process will doubtless have to be
applied to many of the poems, but we must
leave the congenial task to the Laureate.

A SONNET OF VAIN DESIRE.

After the Holidays.

As when th' industrious windmill vainly
yearns [head,

To pause, and scratch its swallow-haunted
Yet at the wind's relentless urging turns

Its flying arms in wild appeal outspread ;
So am I vex'd by vain desire, that burns [fled,

These barren places whence the hair hath
To wander far amid the woodland ferns,

Where dewdrops shine along the gossamer
thread;

Where its own sunlight on the reddening leaf
Sleeps, when soft mists have swathed the
sunless tree, [dance;

Or where the innumerous billows merrily

Yet must I busily dissemble grief

Whirl'dinthe pitiless round of circumstance,
Rigid with trained respectability.

New Way out of a Wager.

Desmond, Theosophist Colonel, now thinks
better

Of his rash vow his gift to "demonstrate,"
Receiving a " precipitated letter "

Warning him not to be—precipitate.
Many a Betting Man who 'd hedge or tack
Must wish he had Mahatmas at his back.

The Beggar's Petition.

(New Version?)

Life must not be lost, Sir, with lightness,

To labour for life gives me pain ;
My exchequer's affected with tightness,
Butbegging's the pink of politeness,
Like Scribes, Sir, " I beg—to remain ! " *

* And didn't Charles Lamb, in his most de-
ligbtful essay On the Decay of Beggars, deplore
their gradual disappearance ?

DOCTOR LAURIE.

Song by a Scotch Student. Air—"Annie Laurie."

[" According to Dr. Laurie, of Edinburgh
University, the " teaching of Greek, so far as it is
attempted in our secondary schools, is positively
harmful."—Daily News.]

Pedagogue brays are bonnie,
AVhen Greek they'd fain taboo ;

And 'tis here that Doctor Laurie
Gi'es utterance strictly true,
Gi'es utterance strictly true,
Which ne'er forgot should be,

And for bonnie Doctor Laurie,
A Scottish boy would dee.

Auld Hoiier is a humbug,

Anacreon is an ass ;
Sumphs scrape enoo o' baith o' them,

The " Little-go" to pass,

The Little-go to pass—

It affects them " harmfullee."
Ah! but bonnie Doctor Laurie,

He kens Greek 's a' my ee !

Like diplomas fause and lying,

Are " passes" such as this.
Why should Scotch lads sit sighing

O'er the Anabasis ?—

O'er the Anabasis f

Xenophon 's fiddle-de-dee ?
Oh, for bonnie Doctor Laurie,

I 'd shout with three times three !

TJnder-Lyne'd.—Said Sir W. Vernon
Harcourt, at Ashton-under-Lyne, "I am
very glad to be enabled to come here from
the "hospitable roof of Mr. Rupert Mason."
. . . . And again, "I have come here also
from the roof of Mr. Mather." Quite a Sir
William Roofus ! But what was he doing
on the roof ? Was there a tile off in each
case ? Something wrong with the first house
that a Mason couldn't set right ? And with
the second, did Sir Roofus sing, "Oh dear,
what can the Mather be?" And why the
invidious distinction between the two roofs P
The first being hospitable, and the second
having no pleasant epithet to recommend it.

Proposed New Title for Lord Gr-m-
th-rpe.—Baron (H)alter Ego.