Frank E. Smedley

“ Pardon Loridon’s sins, forgive hers, and so let her
Rejoin, and remain with, one whom she loved better
Far than life; then o’ercome by conflicting emotions,
A fainting fit ended her tears and devotions.
Alas! it is a cruel thing to die,
To leave these hopes and fears, these loves and hates,
For other, though it may be happier, fates;
To go we know not where, we know not why!
To cease to be the thing that we have been,
To be perchance a higher, but a new,
To leave the few we love, the chosen few,
To quit for ever each familiar scene. ”

“ Thus spake he, in metre sometimes used by you,
Which is always successful, let me try it, too!
“Many a morning have I wandered, strolling o’er the barren plain
Which surrounds this noble castle, and is part of your domain;
Many an evening have I staggered homeward o’er the blasted heath,
Singing, ‘wont go home till morning,’ with a spirit-tainted breath;
Many a time I’ve passed the ruined abbey hidden in the trees,
Covered with a mouldy mantle like an ancient Schweitzer cheese,
Joyous thoughts I always nourished! now what misery lurks beneath! ”

“ And Eppo shouts “Bagged him, by all that is glorious!” [52]
No billing and cooing,
You must up and be doing.
Depend on’t, Sir Knight, this is no time for wooing;
You’ll discover, unless you progress rather smarter,
That catching a giant’s like catching a Tartar:
He still has some thirty-five minutes to sleep.
Close to this spot hangs a precipice steep,
Like Shakspeare’s tall cliff which they show one at Dover;
Drag him down to the brink, and then let him roll over;
As they scarce make a capital crime of infanticide,
There can’t be any harm in a little giganticide. ”

“ And this time she was there!
She said, ‘I will,’ as if a pill
Had stuck within her throat,
But fortune kind was still inclined
To grant an antidote;
“For scarce beside the altar stone,
The nuptial knot was tied,
When some vile party, name unknown,
Stabbed Cort’ryke in the side!
His anguish sore, not long he bore,
Physicians wor in vain,
Death did consider, him and his widder,
And eased him of his pain.”
So the lovely Yolenta was “quit for the fright”
Took the name, tin, and castle (a rare widow’s mite)
And wondered how Loridon fared in the fight. ”

“ He sings to her, now mould’ring in the tomb,
Ere Age and Poverty’s overwhelming blight
From Life’s first blushing flowers had robbed the bloom.
Sweet season, long expected, quickly past,
In youth Love’s fire too fiercely burns to last! [77]
The minstrel’s song was no sooner done,
Than ’twas plain that his lay had extinguished the fun,
And yawning fearfully, one by one,
They vanished knights and ladies.
The lights were put out, not a single “glim”
Shed its ray o’er the walls of that castle grim;
And the banqueting hall was soon as dim
As ’tis said to be in Hades. ”

“ If you intend to change or bend some stalwart female mind,
In this Amazonian century, precocious child of Time.
If by external signs you seek this strength of mind to trace,
You’ll observe a very “powerful” expression in her face;
The lady’s stockings will be blue, and inky be her hand,
And her head quite full of something hard she doesn’t understand,
Like a puzzle-pated Bluestocking, one of the modern time.
And her dress will be peculiar, both in fabric and in make,
An artistic classic tragic highly-talented mistake ”

“ And a thorough-bred air, and a look of command,
As noble a lady as one in the land.
Yet Yolenta had “suffered;”—her little affairs
Of the heart had gone roughly, a custom of theirs [57]
From time immemorial, since Helen lost Troy,
And pious Æneas made Dido a toy
Of the moment, then left her, a striking variety,
In the uniform course of his orthodox piety.
A young gent was her first love, of birth and condition,
Whose very name, Loridon, seemed an admission
He was formed to adore, but then what’s in a name? ”

“ It is a melancholy pleasure to me to wander among these vestiges of the departed great man; to trace his various thoughts from his earliest infancy to the time when death robbed the world of what should have been its brightest ornament, and left to it merely the paste and tinsel, the gewgaw and tomfoolery of literature.
Of his father he has left many records. This person, upon whom the honour of being Pellucid’s progenitor devolved, appears to have been a worthy undertaker; an unprofitable one, however, for he never undertook anything well, nor carried it out successfully. ”

“ Stood Blutwurst the brave,
Who’d arrived just in time his poor sister to save.
Sir Rupert gazed at him a second or more,
Made one strong exclamation, then sunk on the floor.
From every side a swarming tide of vassals pour amain,
And, struggling with each other, the fatal room they gain,
And quickly entering, they find fair Margaret in a swoon,
They cut the lace that holds her ⸺, base must be the man who’d own
That such a garment now exists ”

“ To their eyes much bigger
Than great Gog or Magog, more black than a nigger,
In armour accoutred from head to heel,—
Black rusty old armour, not polished steel.
His vizor is down, but he takes a sight,
Though he moves not his eyes to the left or right;
He says not a word, but he walks straight on,
The hall door opes at his step! he’s gone!
He clanks ’cross the court-yard, and enters the stable;
His footsteps are heard by the guests ’neath the table,
For there they have hidden them every one. ”

“ Therefore learn that the dame for whom shelter I crave,
Is Margaret, the sister of Blutwurst the Brave!”
Thus spake the gay herald. Sir Rupert replied,
“’Tis well known that my castle is never denied
To pilgrims of all countries, nations, and hues,
From swaggering English to gold-lending Jews; [75]
How great, then, my joy ’neath my roof to receive
The sister of one
Whom I loved as a son,
For whose tragical end I have ne’er ceased to grieve.” ”

“ From a deep hurt the flood of life
Proves, as its current stains the sod,
How man defiles the work of God.
With eager haste the servants raise
The head, and on the features gaze,
Then backward start in sad surprise
As that pale face they recognise.
Good reason theirs, although, in sooth,
They knew but half the fatal truth;
For, strange as doth the tale appear,
One startling fact is all too clear,
The robber, who on No-Man’s-Land
Was shot by Blaker’s ruthless hand,—
That highwayman of evil fame
Is beauteous Maude of Allinghame! L’ENVOI.
“Well, but that’s not the end?” ”

“ By the way, this last rhyme
Appertains to a time
Much thought of in childhood, by schoolboys called “prime,”
When young Hopeful’s small pockets
Are emptied for rockets,
And eyebrows are burnt, and arms torn out of sockets—
When you’re begged (and the tyrants take care you do not)
Ne’er to cease to remember the Gunpowder-plot.
The herald stept forth, and he made a low bow—
If you’ve seen Mr. Payne
At old Drury Lane,
In the opening part of a grand Christmas pantomime,
Do tricks, to describe which my Muse fails for want o’ rhyme—
Please to fancy my herald does just the same now ”

“ These are the green woods of Cliefden. The glorious oaks and the chestnuts
All appertain to the Duke, whose residence stands in the distance—
Stands like a toyhouse of childhood, besprinkled all over with windows—
Stands like a pudding at Christmas, a white surface dotted with black things.
Loud from the neighbouring river, the deep-voiced clamorous bargée
Roars, and in accents opprobrious hollas to have the lock opened. [103]
These are the green woods of Cliefden. ”

“ Pr’aps there’s time for it still—Mein auge (my eye) ,
’Tis the only chance left, so here goes for a try.”
Oh, faster spur thy flagging steed,
Still faster,—fearful is thy need.
Oh, heed not now his failing breath,
Life lies before, behind thee death!
Warning all vainly given! too late
To shield thee from the stroke of fate.
One glance the fierce pursuer threw,
A pistol from his holster drew,
Levelled and fired, the echoes still
Prolong the sound from wood to hill;
But ere the last vibrations die,
A WOMAN’S shriek of agony
Rings out beneath that midnight sky! ”

“ List to a joyous tradition of one which was held once at Cliefden—
List to a tale of cold chicken, champagne, bitter beer, lobster salad!
Brilliantly burst forth the sun o’er the pleasant meadows of Cliefden,
Bathed in his beautiful light, the daisies and daffydowndillies
Shone like those fanciful gems made by Beverly, at the Lyceum:
Calmly the whole of the morning untrodden, unseen, and unnoticed,
Lay all the valley around ”

“ Who ventured to falsely imprison a great man,
Viz. the Ottoman captor of noble Lord Bateman;
For we’re told in that ballad, which makes our eyes water,
That this terrible Turk had got one only daughter;
And although our good knight had twice seen twins arrive, a
Young lady named Maude was the only survivor.
So there being no entail
On some horrid heir-male,
And no far-away cousin or distant relation
To lay claim to the lands and commence litigation,
’Tis well known through the county, by each one and all,
That fair Maude is the heiress of Allinghame Hall.
Yes! she was very fair to view ”

“ When Henri Quatre ruled in France there was a gay young knight,
The loudest in the banquet-hall, the foremost in the fight.
No dame, howe’er fatigued, to tread a measure could refuse
When she heard the silver accents of Count Louis of Toulouse.
But not only to a dance would these gentle tones invite,
But to “measures” of more dangerous kind, confounding wrong with right.
Won over by his sophistry, what conscience could accuse?
But the dread of every husband was Count Louis of Toulouse.
The man above all others who the direst hate did feel
Was the husband of fair Eleanor, the Marquis de St. ”

“ Nought I saw there but a Tankard, from the which that night I’d drank hard,—
Drank as drank our good forefathers in the merry days of yore,—
In the corner stood the Tankard, where it oft had stood before,—
Stood and muttered, “Pay your score!”
Much I marvelled at this pewter, surely ne’er in past or future
Has been, will be, such a wonder, such a Tankard learned in lore! ”

“ To the time when society mourned for the loss
(All felt it, but no one like poor Mr. Cross) [24]
Of the elephant “Chuney,” who went mad, ’tis said,
With the pressure and pain
He felt in his brain
From constantly bearing a trunk on his head.
And I have set eye on
That magnanimous lion,
Brave Wallace—oh, fye on
The brutes who could hie on
Fierce bull-dogs to fly on
His monarchical mane! I declare I could cry on
The bare thought, as one weeps when one goes to see “Ion.” ”

“ From the heiress, with whom he’d been anxious to mate, [5]
Is jogging along, in a low state of mind,
When a horseman comes rapidly up from behind,
And a voice in his ear
Shouts in tones round and clear,
“Ho, there! stand and deliver! your money or life!” ”

“ And by language and gesture most earnestly tries
To convince her that ne’er from his knees will he rise,
Till to wed on the morrow she freely complies.
If you’ve seen Mrs. Kean
In that excellent scene
Which she with Mr. Wigan so forcibly plays,
In Bourcicault’s comedy, “Love in a Maze,”
When her scorn for her tempter, her love for her spouse,
In language theatrical, “bring down the house,”
You can fancy how Margaret, deeply enraged,
And backed up by the feeling that she was engaged
To Otto Von Rosen, the dearest of men,
Rejected Sir Rupert at once, there and then. ”

“ MIRTH AND METRE. MAUDE ALLINGHAME;
A LEGEND OF HERTFORDSHIRE. [1] Part the First.
There is weeping and wailing in Allinghame Hall,
From many an eye does the tear-drop fall,
Swollen with sorrow is many a lip,
Many a nose is red at the tip ”

“ As tears stream from her eyes,—
A lady-like weakness we must not despise
(And here, let me add, I have been much to blame,
As I long ago ought to have mentioned her name) :
“Here he comes! now do hide yourself, dear Eppo, pray;
For my sake, I entreat you, keep out of his way.”
Scarce had the knight
Time to get out of sight
Among some thick bushes, which covered him quite,
Ere the giant appeared. Oh! he was such a fright! ”

“ To Rupert no blame e’er attached in the matter;
Poor Blutwurst was called mad, “as mad as a hatter,”
For drinking so much as to fall from his perch.
And now, if you please, we’ll return to the castle,
Where I think we shall find that, fatigued by the wassail,
With two small exceptions, each master and vassal
May safely be reckoned as “fast as a church.” [79]
Fair Margaret sits at her toilette-glass,
And rests her head on her snow-white hand;
Through her throbbing brain what visions pass,
As over her shoulders there falls a mass
Of curls, ne’er touched by the crimping brand ”

“ If any one of those mysterious autocrats who “do” the reviews “on” some newspaper or serial shall, in his condescension, deign to inform public opinion what he may think about Mirth and Metre, that autocrat, unless he be in an unhoped-for state of benignity, will, doubtless, commence with the agreeable remark that “the work before us consists of certain Lays and Legends, written in paltry imitation of the productions of the inimitable Thomas Ingoldsby.” ”

“ To Geraldus, in time for the next quarter sessions.
Unhappy Yolenta! Geraldus confined her
In a dungeon, deep, damp, and unpleasant; behind her
Was a ring in the wall, and some rusty old chains,
And there lay in one corner a skull void of brains,
And a horrid leg-bone stood upright in another,
Which must once have belonged to “a man and a brother;” ”

“ It curdles my blood to think that some obscure person in America, who has latterly been indulging in dactyllic and spondaic metre, has dared to name himself [102] partly in imitation of the sobriquét by which we designated our friend.
Recollecting poor Pellucid’s warm admiration of the hexameter then, I have made strict search among his papers, on the chance of finding some classical Latin or Greek poem of his composition, but without success. At one time a ray of hope darted through me, as I came upon a paper carefully folded, and docketted, “Notions for a Fight between Hector and Achilles;” ”