Broad Grins Part 5

There was, in the Knight's family, a man Cast in the roughest mould Dame Nature boasts; With shoulders wider than a dripping pan, And legs as thick, about the calves, as posts.

All the domesticks, viewing, in this hulk, So large a specimen of Nature's whims, With kitchen wit, allusive to his bulk, Had christen'd him the Duke of Limbs.

Thro'out the Castle, every whipper-snapper Was canva.s.sing the merits of this strapper: Most of the Men voted his size alarming; But all the Maids, _nem. con._ declare'd it charming!

This wight possess'd a quality most rare;-- I tremble when I mention it, I swear!

Lest pretty Ladies question my veracity: 'Twas--when he had a secret in his care, To keep it, with the greatest pertinacity.

Pour but a secret in him, and 'twould glue him Like rosin, on a well-cork'd bottle's snout; Had twenty devils come with cork-screws to him, They never could have screw'd the secret out.

Now, when Sir Thomas, in the dark, alone, Had kill'd a Friar, weighing twenty stone, Whose carca.s.s must be hid, before the dawn, Judging he might as hopelessly desire To move a Convent as the Friar, He thought on this man's secresy, and brawn;-- And, like a swallow, o'er the lawn he skims, Up to the c.o.c.k-loft of the Duke of Limbs:

Where Somnus, son of Nox, the humble copy Of his own daughter Mors,[8] had made a.s.sault On the Duke's eye-lids,--not with juice of poppy, But potent draughts, distill'd from hops and malt.

Certainly, nothing operates much quicker Against two persons' secret dialogues, Than one of them being asleep, in liquor, Snoring like twenty thousand hogs.

Yet circ.u.mstance did, presently, require The Knight to tell his tale; And to instruct his Man, knock'd down with ale, That he (Sir Thomas) had knock'd down a Friar.

How wake a man, in such a case?

Sir, the best method--I have tried a score-- Is, when his nose is playing thoro' ba.s.s, To pull it, till you make him roar.

A Sleeper's nose is made on the same plan As the small wire 'twixt a Doll's wooden thighs; For pull the nose, or wire, the Doll, or Man, Will open, in a minute, both their eyes.

This mode Sir Thomas took,--and, in a trice, Grasp'd, with his thumb and finger, like a vice, That feature which the human face embosses, And pull'd the Duke of Limbs by the proboscis.

The Man awoke, and goggle'd on his master;-- He saw his Master goggling upon him;-- Fresh from concluding, on a Friar's n.o.b, What Coroners would call an awkward job, He glare'd, all horror-struck and grim,-- Paler than Paris-plaister!

His hair stuck up, like bristles on a pig;-- So Garrick look'd, when he perform'd Macbeth; Who, ere he entered, after Duncan's death, Rumple'd his wig.

The Knight cried, "Follow me!"--with strange grimaces; The Man arose,-- And began "sacrificing to the Graces,"[9]

By putting on his clothes;

But he reverse'd, in making himself smart, A Scotchman's toilet, altogether: And merely clapp'd a cover on that part The Highlanders expose to wind and weather.

They reach'd the bower where the Friar lay; When, to his Man, The Knight began, In doleful accents, thus to say:

"Here a fat Friar lies, kill'd with a mauling, For coming, in the dark, a-caterwauling; Whom I (O cursed spite!) did lay so!"

Thus, solemnly, Sir Thomas spake, and sigh'd;-- To whom the Duke of Limbs replied-- "Odrabbit it! Sir Thomas! you don't say so!"

Then, taking the huge Friar _per_ the hocks, He whirl'd the ton of blubber three times round, And swung it on his shoulders, from the ground, With strength that yields, in any age, to no man's,-- Tho' Milo's ghost should rise, bearing the Ox He carried at the games of the old Romans.

Nay, I opine--let Fame say what it can-- Of ancient vigour, (Fame is, oft, a Liar) That Milo was a pigmy to this Man, And his fat Ox quite skinny to the Friar.

Besides,--I hold it in much doubt If Roman graziers (should the truth come out) Were, like the English, knowing in the matter;-- --I wouldn't breed my beast _more Romano_;-- For, I suspect, in fatt'ning they were dull, And when they made an ox out of a bull, They fed him ill,--and, then, he got no fatter Than a fat opera _Soprano_.[10]

[10] I am aware that much has been said, of old, relative to the "_cura boum_," and the "_optuma torvae forma bovis_;"--but, for a show of cattle, I would back Smithfield, or most of our English market Towns, against any _forum boarium_ of the Romans.

Over the moat, (the draw-bridge being down) Gallantly stalk'd the brawny Duke of Limbs, Bearing _Johannes_, of the shaven crown, Fame'd, when alive, for spoiling maids, and hymns; For mangling _Pater-Nosters_, and goose-pies, And telling sundry beads,--and sundry lies.

Across a marsh he strode, with steadier gait Than Satan trod the Syrtis, at his fall, And perch'd himself, with his monastick weight, Upon the Convent-garden's wall;--

Whence, on the grounds within it, as he gaze'd, To find a spot where he might leave his load, He 'spied a _House_ so _little_, it seem'd raise'd More for Man's visits, than his fix'd abode;-- And Cynthia aided him to gaze his fill, For, now, she sought Endymion on the hill.

Arise, Tarquinius![11] shew thy lofty face!

While I describe, with dignity, the place.

[11] _Tarquinius Superbus_, the last King of Rome;--he was a haughty Monarch, and built the _Cloaca maxima_.

Snug in an English garden's shadiest spot, A structure stands, and welcomes many a breeze; Lonely, and simple as a Ploughman's cot, Where Monarchs may unbend, who wish for ease.

There sit Philosophers; and sitting read; And to some end apply the dullest pages; And pity the Barbarians, north of Tweed, Who scout these fabricks of the southern Sages.

Sure, for an Edifice in estimation, Never was any less presuming seen!

It shrinks, so modestly, from observation!

And hides behind all sorts of evergreen;-- Like a coy Maid, design'd for filthy Man, Peeping, at his approach, behind her fan.

Into this place, unnotice'd by beholders, The Duke of Limbs, most circ.u.mspectly, stole, And shot the Friar off his shoulders, Just like a sack of round Newcastle coal:

Not taking any pains, Nor caring, in the least, How he deposited the Friar's remains, No more than if a Friar were a beast.

No funeral, of which you ever heard, Was mark'd with ceremonies half so slight; For John was left, not like the dead interr'd, But, like the living, sitting bolt upright!

Has no shrewd Reader, of one s.e.x or t'other, Recurring to the facts already stated, Thought on a certain Roger?--that same brother Who hated John, and whom John hated?

'Tis, now, a necessary thing to say That, at this juncture, Roger wasn't well; Poor Man! he had been rubbing, all the day, His stomach with coa.r.s.e towels: And clapping trenchers, hot as h.e.l.l, Upon his bowels; Where spasms were kicking up a furious frolick, Afflicting him with mulligrubs and cholick.

He also had imbibe'd, to sooth his pains, Of _pulvis rhei_ very many grains; And to the garden's deepest shade was bent, To give, quite privily, his sorrows vent:

When, _there_,--alive and merry to appearance-- He 'spied his ancient foe, by the moon's light!-- Who sat erect, with so much perseverance, It look'd as if he kept his post in spite.

A case it is of piteous distress, If, carrying a secret grief about, We wish to bury it in a recess, And find another there, who keeps us out.

Expecting, soon, his enemy to go, Roger, at first, walk'd to and fro, With tolerably tranquil paces; But finding John determine'd to remain, Roger, each time he pa.s.s'd, thro' spite or pain, Made, at his adversary, hideous faces.

How misery will lower human pride!

And make us buckle!-- Roger, who, all his life, had John defied, Was now oblige'd to speak him fair,--and truckle.

"Behold me," Roger cried, "behold me, John!

Entreating as a _favour_ you'll be gone; Me! your sworn foe, tho' fellow-lodger; Me!--who, in agony, tho' suing now to you, Would, once, have seen you d.a.m.n'd ere make a bow to you.

Me,--Roger!"[12]

[12] This is a palpable plagiarism. _Rolla_ thus addresses _Pizarro_: "_Behold me_, at thy feet--_Me_,--_Rolla!_--Me, that never yet have bent or _bow'd_--in humble _agony_ I _sue_ to you."--The theft is more glaring, as the Apostrophe, both here, and in the original, occurs in the midst of a strong incident, and is address'd to an Enemy by a proud spirit, in very moving circ.u.mstances.

To this address, so fraught with the pathetick, John remain'd dumb, as a Pythagorean; Seeming to hint, "Roger, you're a plebeian Peripatetick."

When such choice oratory has not hit, When it is, e'en, unanswer'd by a grunt, 'Twould justify tame Job to curse a bit, And set an Angler swearing, in his punt.

Cholerick Roger could not brook it;-- So seeing a huge brick-bat, up he took it; And aiming, like a marksman at a crow, Plump on the breast he hit his deadly foe; Who fell, like Pedants' periods, to the ground,-- Very inanimate, and very round.