And then shall each Paddy, who once on the Liffy

Perchance held the helm of some mackerelhoy,

And gilds, while it carves, her dear form on the heart,

What need has New Drury of carvers and gild

ers?

With Nature so bounteous, why call upon Art?

IV.

How well would our actors attend to their duties, Our house save in oil, and our authors in wit,

THOMAS MOORE.

VOL. II.-27

jiffy

More fishes than ever he caught when a boy.

XII.

And those who now quit their hods, shovels, and barrows,

In crowds to the bar of some ale-house to flock,

When bred to our bar shall be Gibbses and Gar

rows,

Assume the silk gown, and discard the smock

frock.

*The new Covent Garden Theatre opened on the 18th Sept. 1809, when a cry of Old Prices" (afterward diminished to O. P.) burst out from every part of the house. This continued and increased in violence till the 23d, when rattles, drums, whistles, and cat-calls having completely drowned the voices of the actors, Mr. Kemble, the stage-manager, came forward and said that a committee of gentlemen had undertaken to examine the finances of the concern, and that until they were prepared with their report the theatre would continue closed. "Name them!" was shouted from all sides. The names were declared, viz., Sir Charles Price, the Solicitor-General, the Recorder of London, the Governor of the Bank, and Mr. Angersteen. "All shareholders!" bawled a wag from the gallery. In a few days the theatre re-opened: the public paid no attention to the report of the referees, and the tumult was renewed for several weeks with even increased violence. The proprietors now sent in hired bruisers, to mill the refractory into subjection. This ir ritated most of their former friends, and, amongst the rest, the annotator, who accordingly wrote the song of "Heigh-ho, says Kemble," which was caught up by the ballad-singers, and sung under Mr. Kemble's house-windows in Great Russell-street. A dinner was given st the Crown and Anchor Tavern in the Strand, to celebrate the victory obtained by W. Clifford in his action against Brandon the box-keeper, for assaulting him for wearing the letters O. P. in his hat.

Wakes, from their humid caves, the sleeping Nine,

And pours at intervals a strain divine. "I have an iron yet in the fire," cried Yamen; "The volleyed flame rides in my breath, My blast is elemental death;

This hand shall tear your paper bonds to pieces;
Ingross your deeds, assignments, leases,
My breath shall every line erase

Soon as I blow the blaze."

The lawyers are met at the Crown and Anchor,
And Yamen's visage grows blanker and blanker;
The lawyers are met at the Anchor and Crown,
And Yamen's cheek is a russetty brown;
Veeshnoo, now thy work proceeds;
The solicitor reads,

And, merit of merit!

Red wax and green ferret Are fixed at the foot of the deeds!

Yamen beheld and shiver'd; His finger and thumb were cramped; His ear by the flea in't was bitten, When he saw by the lawyer's clerk written, Sealed and delivered,

Being first duly stamped.

"Now for my turn!" the demon cries, and blows

A blast of sulphur from his mouth and nose.
Ah! bootless aim! the critic fiend,
Sagacious Yamen, judge of hell,

Is judged in his turn;
Parchment won't burn!

His schemes of vengeance are dissolved in air,
Parchment won't tear!!

Is it not written in the Himakoot book,
(That mighty Baly from Kehama took)
"Who blows on pounce

Must the Swerga renounce?"

It is! it is! Yamen, thine hour is nigh: Like as an eagle claws an asp, Veeshnoo has caught him in his mighty grasp, And hurl'd him, in spite of his shrieks and his

squalls,

Whizzing aloft, like the Temple fountain,
Three times as high as Meru mountain,
Which is

Ninety-nine times as high as St. Paul's.
Descending, he twisted like Levy the Jew,*
Who a durable grave meant
To dig in the pavement
Of Monument-yard:

To earth by the laws of attraction he flew,
And he fell, and he fell

To the regions of hell;
Nine centuries bounced he from cavern to rock,
And his head, as he tumbled, went nickety-
nock,

Like a pebble in Carisbrook well.

Now Veeshnoo turn'd round to a capering varlet,
Arrayed in blue and white and scarlet,
And cried, "Oh! brown of slipper as of hat!
Lend me, Harlequin, thy bat!"
He seized the wooden sword, and smote the earth;
When lo! upstarting into birth

* An insolvent Israelite who threw himself from the top of the Monument a short time before.

A fabric, gorgeous to behold,
Outshone in elegance the old,

And Veeshnoo saw, and cried, "Hail, playhouse mine!"

Then, bending his head, to Surya he said:
"Soon as thy maiden sister Di
Caps with her copper lid the dark-blue sky,
And through the fissures of her clouded fan
Peeps at the naughty monster man,
Go mount yon edifice,
And shew thy steady face
In renovated pride,

More bright, more glorious than before!"
But ah! coy Surya still felt a twinge,
Still smarted from his former singe;
And to Veeshnoo replied,

In a tone rather gruff,

"No, thank you! one tumble's enough!"

DRURY'S DIRGE.

BY LAURA MATILDA.*

"You praise our sires: but though they wrote with force,
Their rhymes were vicious, and their diction coarse:
We want their strength, agreed; but we atone
For that and more, by sweetness all our own."-GIFFORD.

BALMY Zephyrs, lightly flitting,

Shade me with your azure wing;
On Parnassus' summit sitting,
Aid me, Clio, while I sing.

Softly slept the dome of Drury
O'er the empyreal crest,
When Alecto's sister-fury

Softly slumb'ring sunk to rest.

Lo! from Lemnos limping lamely,
Lags the lowly Lord of Fire,
Cytherea yielding tamely

To the Cyclops dark and dire.

Clouds of amber, dreams of gladness, Dulcet joys and sports of youth, Soon must yield to haughty sadness; Mercy holds the veil to Truth.

See Erostratus the second

Fires again Diana's fane;

By the Fates from Orcus beckon'd, Clouds enveloped Drury Lane.

Lurid smoke and frank suspicion

Hand in hand reluctant dance:
While the God fulfils his mission,
Chivalry resign thy lance.
Hark! the engines blandly thunder,
Fleecy clouds dishevell❜d lie,
And the firemen, mute with wonder,
On the son of Saturn cry.

See the bird of Ammon sailing,
Perches on the engine's peak,

The Authors, as in gallantry bound, wish this lady to continue anonymous.

And, the Eagle firemen hailing,
Soothes them with its bickering beak.

Juno saw, and mad with malice, Lost the prize that Paris gave: Jealousy's ensanguined chalice, Mantling pours the orient wave.

Pan beheld Patroclus dying, Nox to Niobe was turn'd; From Busiris Bacchus flying, Saw his Semele inurn'd.

Thus fell Drury's lofty glory,

Levell'd with the shuddering stones; Mars, with tresses black and gory, Drinks the dew of pearly groans.

Hark! what soft Eolian numbers
Gem the blushes of the morn!
Break, Amphion, break your slumbers,
Nature's ringlets deck the thorn.

Ha! I hear the strain erratic

Dimly glance from pole to pole; Raptures sweet and dreams ecstatic Fire my everlasting soul.

Where is Cupid's crimson motion?
Billowy ecstasy of woe,
Bear me straight, meandering ocean,
Where the stagnant torrents flow.
Blood in every vein is gushing,

Vixen vengeance lulls my heart; See, the Gorgon gang is rushing! Never, never let us part!

A TALE OF DRURY LANE.

BY W. S.*

"Thus he went on, stringing one extravagance upon another, in the style his books of chivalry had taught him, and imitating, as near as he could, their very phrase." DON QUIXOTE.

[To be spoken by Mr. Kemble, in a suit of the Black Prince's Armour, borrowed from the Tower.

SURVEY this shield, all bossy bright—
These cuisses twain behold!
Look on thy form in armour dight
Of steel inlaid with gold;

My knees are stiff in iron buckles,
Stiff spikes of steel protect my knuckles.
These once belonged to sable prince,
Who never did in battle wince;
With valour tart as pungent quince,

He slew the vaunting Gaul.
Rest there awhile, my bearded lance,
While from green curtain I advance
To yon foot-lights, no trivial dance,
And tell the town what sad mischance
Did Drury Lane befall.

*WALTER SCOTT.

THE NIGHT.

On fair Augusta's towers and trees
Flitted the silent midnight breeze,
Curling the foliage as it past,
Which from the moon-tipp'd plumage cast
A spangled light, like dancing spray,
Then reassumed its still array;
When, as night's lamp unclouded hung,
And down its full effulgence flung,
It shed such soft and balmy power
That cot and castle, hall and bower,
And spire and dome, and turret height,
Appeared to slumber in the light.
From Henry's chapel, Rufus' hall,
To Savoy, Temple, and St. Paul,

From Knightsbridge, Pancras, Camden Town,
To Redriff, Shadwell, Horsleydown,
No voice was heard, no eye unclosed,
But all in deepest sleep reposed.

They might have thought, who gazed around
Amid a silence so profound,

It made the senses thrill, That 'twas no place inhabited, But some vast city of the deadAll was so hush'd and still.

THE BURNING.

As Chaos, which by heavenly doom,
Had slept in everlasting gloom,
Started with terror and surprise
When light first flashed upon her eyes-
So London's sons in nightcap woke,

In bed-gown woke her dames;

For shouts were heard 'mid fire and smoke, And twice ten hundred voices spoke,

"The playhouse is in flames!"

And lo! where Catherine Street extends,
A fiery tail its lustre lends

To every window-pane;
Blushes each spout in Martlet Court,
And Barbican, moth-eaten fort,
And Covent Garden kennels sport,

A bright ensanguined drain;
Meux's new brewhouse shews the light,
Rowland Hill's chapel, and the height
Where patent shot they sell;
The Tennis Court, so fair and tall,
Partakes the ray, with Surgeons' Hall,
The ticket-porters' house of call,
Old Bedlam, close by London Wall,
Wright's shrimp and oyster shop withal,
And Richardson's Hotel.
Nor these alone, but far and wide,
Across red Thames's gleaming tide,
To distant fields the blaze was borne,
And daisy white and hoary thorn
In borrow'd lustre seem'd to sham
The rose or red sweet Wil-li-am.
To those who on the hills around
Beheld the flames from Drury's mound,
As from a lofty altar rise,
It seem'd that nations did conspire
To offer to the god of fire

Some vast stupendous sacrifice!

The summon'd firemen woke at call, And hied them to their stations all:

Starting from short and broken snooze,
Each sought his pond'rous hobnail'd shoes,
But first his worsted hosen plied,
Plush breeches next, in crimson died,
His nether bulk embraced;

Then jacket thick, of red or blue,
Whose massy shoulder gave to view
The badge of each respective crew,

In tin or copper traced.

The engines thunder'd through the street,
Fire-hook, pipe, bucket, all complete,
And torches glared, and clattering feet
Along the pavement paced.
And one, the leader of the band,
From Charing Cross along the Strand,
Like stag by beagles hunted hard,
Ran till he stopp'd at Vin'gar Yard.
The burning badge his shoulder bore,
The belt and oil-skin hat he wore,
The cane he had, his men to bang,
Show'd foreman of the British gang-
His name was Higginbottom. Now
'Tis meet that I should tell you how
The others came in view:
The Hand-in-Hand the race begun,
Then came the Phoenix and the Sun,
Th' Exchange, where old insurers run,
The Eagle, where the new;
With these came Rumford, Bumford, Cole,
Robins from Hockly in the Hole,
Lawson and Dawson, cheek by jowl,

Crump from St. Giles's Pound:
Whitford and Mitford joined the train,
Huggins and Muggins from Chick Lane,
And Clutterbuck, who got a sprain

Before the plug was found. Hobson and Jobson did not sleep, But ah! no trophy could they reap, For both were in the Donjon Keep

Of Bridewell's gloomy mound! E'en Higginbottom now was posed, For sadder scene was ne'er disclosed; Without, within, in hideous show, Devouring flames resistless glow, And blazing rafters downward go, And never halloo "Heads below!" Nor notice give at all. The firemen terrified are slow To bid the pumping torrent flow, For fear the roof should fall. Back, Robins, back! Crump, stand aloof! Whitford, keep near the walls! Huggins, regard your own behoof, For lo! the blazing rocking roof Down, down, in thunder falls! An awful pause succeeds the stroke, And o'er the ruins volumed smoke, Rolling around its pitchy shroud, Conceal'd them from th' astonished crowd. At length the mist awhile was clear'd, When, lo! amid the wreck uprear'd, Gradual a moving head appear'd,

And Eagle firemen knew

'T was Joseph Muggins, name revered,
The foreman of their crew.
Loud shouted all in signs of wo,
"A Muggins! to the rescue, ho!"
And pour'd the hissing tide:
Meanwhile the Muggins fought amain,