Rejected Addresses | Page 9

exceeding our commission, and abusing the patience
of the reader. If we are doing so, we might urge extenuating
circumstances, which will explain, though they may not excuse, our
diffuseness. To one of us the totally unexpected success of this little
work proved an important event, since it mainly decided him, some
years afterwards, to embark in the literary career which the continued
favour of that novel-reading world has rendered both pleasant and
profitable to him. This is the first, as it will probably be the last,
occasion upon which we shall ever intrude ourselves personally on the
public notice; and we trust that our now doing so will stand excused by
the reasons we have adduced.
LONDON, March, 1833

REJECTED ADDRESSES

LOYAL EFFUSION by W. T. F. {7a}

Quicquid dicunt, lando: id rursum si negant, Lando id quoque."
TERENCE.
Hail, glorious edifice, stupendous work! God bless the Regent and the
Duke of York! Ye Muses! by whose aid I cried down Fox, Grant me in
Drury Lane a private box, Where I may loll, cry Bravo! and profess
The boundless powers of England's glorious press; While Afric's sons
exclaim, from shore to shore, "Quashee ma boo!"--the slave-trade is no
more! In fair Arabia (happy once, now stony, Since ruined by that arch
apostate Boney), A Phoenix late was caught: the Arab host Long
ponder'd--part would boil it, part would roast, But while they ponder,
up the pot-lid flies, Fledged, beak'd, and claw'd, alive they see him rise
To heaven, and caw defiance in the skies. So Drury, first in roasting
flames consumed, Then by old renters to hot water doom'd, By Wyatt's
{8} trowel patted, plump and sleek, Soars without wings, and caws
without a beak. Gallia's stern despot shall in vain advance From Paris,
the metropolis of France; By this day month the monster shall not gain
A foot of land in Portugal or Spain. See Wellington in Salamanca's
field Forces his favourite general to yield, Breaks through his lines, and
leaves his boasted Marmont Expiring on the plain without his arm on;
Madrid he enters at the cannon's mouth, And then the villages still
further south. Base Buonaparte, fill'd with deadly ire, Sets, one by one,
our playhouses on fire. Some years ago he pounced with deadly glee on
The Opera House, then burnt down the Pantheon; Nay, still unsated, in
a coat of flames, Next at Millbank he cross'd the river Thames; Thy
hatch, O Halfpenny! {9} pass'd in a trice, Boil'd some black pitch, and
burnt down Astley's twice; Then buzzing on through ether with a vile
hum, Turn'd to the left hand, fronting the Asylum, And burnt the Royal
Circus in a hurry - ('Twas call'd the Circus then, but now the Surrey).
Who burnt (confound his soul!) the houses twain Of Covent Garden
and of Drury Lane? {10} Who, while the British squadron lay off Cork,
(God bless the Regent and the Duke of York!) With a foul earthquake
ravaged the Caraccas, And raised the price of dry goods and tobaccos?
Who makes the quartern loaf and Luddites rise? Who fills the butchers'
shops with large blue flies? Who thought in flames St. James's court to
pinch? {11} Who burnt the wardrobe of poor Lady Finch? - Why he,
who, forging for this isle a yoke, Reminds me of a line I lately spoke,
"The tree of freedom is the British oak." Bless every man possess'd of

aught to give; Long may Long Tylney Wellesley Long Pole live; {12}
God bless the Army, bless their coats of scarlet, God bless the Navy,
bless the Princess Charlotte; God bless the Guards, though worsted
Gallia scoff; God bless their pig-tails, though they're now cut off; And,
oh! in Downing Street should Old Nick revel, England's prime minister,
then bless the devil!

THE BABY'S DEBUT {13} BY W. W. {99}

"Thy lisping prattle and thy mincing gait. All thy false mimic fooleries
I hate; For thou art Folly's counterfeit, and she Who is right foolish hath
the better plea; Nature's true Idiot I prefer to thee" CUMBERLAND.
[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, {14} 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, O, my stars! He
pokes her head between the bars, And melts off half her nose!
Quite cross, a bit of string