Works

A GENTLEMAN of City fame
Now claims your kind attention;
East India broking was his game,
His name I shall not mention:
No one of finely-pointed sense
Would violate a confidence,
And shall _I_ go...

Two better friends you wouldn't pass
Throughout a summer's day,
Than DAMON and his PYTHIAS,
Two merchant princes they.

At school together they contrived
All sorts of boyish larks;...

Oh, that my soul its gods could see
As years ago they seemed to me
When first I painted them;
Invested with the circumstance
Of old conventional romance:
Exploded theorem!
...

Now, Marco dear,
My wishes hear:
While you're away
It's understood
You will be good,
And not too gay.
To every trace
Of maiden grace
You will be blind,
And will not glance...

Emily Jane was a nursery maid,
James was a bold Life Guard,
John was a constable, poorly paid
(And I am a doggerel bard).

A very good girl was Emily Jane,
Jimmy was good and true,...

Bold-faced ranger
(Perfect stranger)
Meets two well-behaved young ladies
He's attractive,
Young and active -
Each a little bit afraid is.
Youth advances,
At his glances...

A tar, but poorly prized,
Long, shambling, and unsightly,
Thrashed, bullied, and despised,
Was wretched JOE GOLIGHTLY.

He bore a workhouse brand;
No Pa or Ma had claimed him,...

DALILAH DE DARDY adored
The very correctest of cards,
LORENZO DE LARDY, a lord
He was one of Her Majesty's Guards.

DALILAH DE DARDY was fat,
DALILAH DE DARDY was old...

The other night, from cares exempt,
I slept and what d'you think I dreamt?
I dreamt that somehow I had come
To dwell in Topsy-Turveydom -

Where vice is virtue virtue, vice:...

Only a dancing girl,
With an unromantic style,
With borrowed color and curl,
With fixed mechanical smile,
With many a hackneyed wile,
With ungrammatical lips,
And corns that mar her trips!
...

I shipped, d'ye see, in a Revenue sloop,
And, off Cape Finistere,
A merchantman we see,
A Frenchman, going free,
So we made for the bold Mounseer.
D'ye see?
We made for the bold Mounseer!...

If you give me your attention, I will tell you what I am:
I'm a genuine philanthropist all other kinds are sham.
Each little fault of temper and each social defect...

A tenor, all singers above
(This doesn't admit of a question),
Should keep himself quiet,
Attend to his diet,
And carefully nurse his digestion.
But when he is madly in love,...

[THE DUKE.]
Small titles and orders
For Mayors and Recorders
I get - and they're highly delighted.
M.P.s baronetted,
Sham Colonels gazetted,
And second-rate Aldermen knighted....

In enterprise of martial kind,
When there was any fighting,
He led his regiment from behind,
He found it less exciting.
But when away his regiment ran,
His place was at the fore, O
That celebrated,...

If you want a receipt for that popular mystery
Known to the world as a Heavy Dragoon,
Take all the remarkable people in history,
Rattle them off to a popular tune!...

The story of Frederick Gowler,
A mariner of the sea,
Who quitted his ship, the Howler,
A-sailing in Caribbee.
For many a day he wandered,
Till he met in a state of rum...

My boy, you may take it from me,
That of all the afflictions accurst
With which a man's saddled
And hampered and addled,
A diffident nature's the worst.
Though clever as clever can be...