Title: Terrible Tractation and Other Poems
Author: Caustic, Christopher
Language: English
As this book started as an ASCII text book there are no pictures available.


*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Terrible Tractation and Other Poems" ***

This book is indexed by ISYS Web Indexing system to allow the reader find any word or number within the document.

POEMS ***



  [Illustration: GRAND ATTACK. Page 168]



                        TERRIBLE TRACTORATION,

                               AND OTHER

                                POEMS.

                     BY CHRISTOPHER CAUSTIC, M. D.

       FELLOW OF THE ROYAL COLLEGE OF PHYSICIANS, ABERDEEN, AND
               HONORARY MEMBER OF NO LESS THAN NINETEEN
                        VERY LEARNED SOCIETIES.


                        THIRD AMERICAN EDITION.


                                BOSTON:
                        RUSSELL, SHATTUCK & CO.
                                  AND
                      TUTTLE, WEEKS AND DENNETT.
                                 1836.


        Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1836,
                      BY THOMAS GREEN FESSENDEN,
     In the Clerk’s Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.


    Tuttle, Weeks & Dennett, Printers........School Street.



                               PREFACE.


In submitting the present edition of the following poem, entitled
_Terrible Tractoration_, to the American public, the author complies
not only with solicitations of personal friends, but with expressed
wishes of many gentlemen to whom he is personally a stranger. They say
that by stripping folly of some of its disguises, and plucking the mask
of deception from that impudent charlatanry, which encumbers the “march
of improvement,” this burlesque production may be of service to mankind.

The origin of the poem entitled Tractoration, is as follows: In the
year 1801 the author, (who is a native of Walpole, New Hampshire,)
was in London, on business as an agent for a Company in Vermont. In
that Metropolis he became acquainted with Mr Benjamin Douglas Perkins,
proprietor of a patent right for making and using certain implements,
called Metallic Tractors. These were said to cure diseases in all
or nearly all cases of topical inflammation, by conducting from the
diseased part the surplus of electric fluid which in such cases, causes
or accompanies the morbid affection. At the request of that gentleman,
the author undertook to make the Tractors the theme of a satirical
effusion in Hudibrastic verse. This was originally intended for the
corner of a newspaper, but subsequently in the first edition enlarged
to a pamphlet of about fifty pages royal octavo. It was published in
the summer of 1803, well received, and a second edition called for in
less than two months. A new and enlarged edition was put to press, and
met with a favorable reception both from the public and the reviewers.
From the success which attended Tractoration, the author was induced to
publish in London a small volume of _Original Poems_, which was well
received and favorably reviewed.

The author never would have written a syllable intended to give
Metallic Tractors favorable notoriety, had he not believed in their
efficacy. As conductors of what is called animal electricity, and in
principle allied to Galvanic stimulants, even their _modus operandi_,
he thought, might be in a great measure explained. Respectable English
Reviews and other periodicals gave favorable notices of the Tractors,
and Mr Perkins exhibited to the author testimonials in favor of those
implements from several professors of universities, many regular
physicians, surgeons, clergymen, and others, men of as high standing
and influence as any in community.

But although the author was willing to aid the proprietor of the
tractors, he did not confine himself to topics connected with those
implements. He made use of Tractoration as the title, and the tractors
as the apology for a poem, in which he essayed to paint

    ----“every idle thing
    Which Fancy finds in her excursive flight.”

Although many of the subjects alluded to, or animadverted on were
intended to be satirized, others were introduced merely to give them
notoriety, or honorable mention in a humorous way; to _laugh with_
rather than to _laugh at_ the inventors, and rather to _advertise_ than
to _stigmatise_ their inventions, &c. Persons of this description will
perceive our objects, appreciate our motives, and recollect that Dr
Caustic, by virtue of a figure in rhetoric, called _irony_, can speak
one thing and mean another, without uttering falsehood.

The author conceives that he was fortunate as regards the plan of
_Tractoration_. _Dr Caustic_, who may be styled the _hero_ of the
poem, is represented as a visionary, eccentric, would-be philosopher,
endeavoring to effect “grand discoveries and inventions” of most
“immense utility,” but had received so little encouragement that he
was impelled by necessity to petition the Royal College of Physicians
in London, for relief from penury, and assistance in his projects. In
pursuance of this plan, every thing novel, singular, relating to any
human pursuit, it was competent for Dr Caustic to make the object of
discussion or animadversion.

The miscellaneous poems, which, in this little volume succeed
_Tractoration_, are, in part, selected from a volume first published
in London, and partly from poems written in this country since
the author’s return from Europe. He hopes not to be condemned for
unpardonable egotism, if he quotes a passage or two from English and
American reviews relative to his poetical productions. If a traveller
produces passports, or a candidate for office exhibits recommendations,
we do not condemn him for pride, nor chastise him for presumption.

The Gentleman’s Magazine, published in London, Jan. 1804, contains a
long notice of _Tractoration_, from which the following passages are
extracted:

   “In the first Canto the author, in an inimitable strain of
   irony, ridicules those pretended discoveries and inventions
   of certain pseudo-philosophers both of the natural and moral
   class, which have no tendency to meliorate the condition of
   man.” After many extracts from the work, and encomiums on
   each of the four cantos, the reviewers conclude, “Whatever
   may be the merits of the Metallic Tractors, or the demerits
   of their opponents, we have no hesitation to pronounce this
   performance to be far superior to the ephemeral productions of
   ordinary dealers in rhyme. The notes, which constitute more
   than half the book, are not behind the verse in spirit. Who
   the author can be we have not the least conception; but from
   the intimate acquaintance he discovers with the different
   branches of medical science, we should imagine him to be
   some jolly son of Galen, who, not choosing to bestow all his
   arts upon his PATIENTS, has humanely applied a few
   ESCHAROTICS for the benefit of his brethren.”

The following is extracted from a review written by the Hon. Daniel
Webster, while a student at law in Boston.

   “In commending CHRISTOPHER CAUSTIC, we are only
   subscribing to the opinions expressed by the people of another
   country. To be behind that country in our appreciation of his
   merits, were a stigma; it is very pardonable to go beyond it.
   National vanity may be a folly, but national ingratitude is
   a crime. Terrible Tractoration was successful on its first
   appearance in England, and as yet seems to have lost none of
   its popularity. It belongs to that class of productions which
   have the good fortune to escape what Johnson angrily, but too
   justly, denominates the general conspiracy of human nature
   against cotemporary merit.”

                             _Monthly Anthology for April, 1805._

The eminence of Mr Webster, whose acquisitions as a scholar are
scarcely exceeded by his qualifications as a statesman, is our apology
for exhibiting the above testimony of his approbation.

We might add to the above, other extracts from about twenty English and
American Reviewers, in which the poems contained in this little volume
have been taken notice of with much commendation; but we hope the work
may meet a favorable reception without such extraneous assistance.

In the present edition of Tractoration several new subjects are
introduced and thrown into the crucible of Dr Caustic. Among these are
Phrenology, Abolition, Amalgamation, Temperance, Reformation, &c. &c.
These parts were written expressly for this edition of Tractoration,
were intended to “shoot folly as it flies,” and adapt the strictures of
satire to the topics of the times.

                                             THOMAS GREEN FESSENDEN.

BOSTON, MARCH 25, 1836.



                               CONTENTS.


                                                                  Page.
    TERRIBLE TRACTORATION.
      Canto 1.--Ourself.                                             1
      Canto 2.--Conjurations.                                       79
      Canto 3.--Manifesto.                                         111
      Canto 4.--Grand Attack.                                      149
      Additional Notes.                                            185

    AN ODE.                                                        193

    THE MORNING.                                                   197

    AN ODE.                                                        199

    ON THE DEATH OF WASHINGTON.                                    201

    DIRECTIONS FOR DOING POETRY.                                   203

    HORACE SURPASSED.                                              207

    SONG.                                                          210

    TABITHA TOWZER.                                                212

    THE SPLENDORS OF THE SETTING SUN.                              216

    THE SLEEP OF THE SLUGGARD.                                     218

    “A SOFT ANSWER TURNETH AWAY WRATH.”                            221

    “HAVING FOOD AND RAIMENT, LET US THEREWITH BE CONTENT.”        223

    HARVEST--INTEMPERANCE.                                         225

    LINES WRITTEN IN A YOUNG LADY’S ALBUM.                         227

    THE INDEPENDENT FARMER.                                        229

    THE CULTIVATOR’S ART.                                          231

    AN ODE.                                                        237

    THE COURSE OF CULTURE.                                         240

    A SONG.                                                        243

    THE EVILS OF A MISCHIEVOUS TONGUE.                             246

    CHEERFULNESS.                                                  248

    EULOGY ON THE TIMES.                                           251

    THE ART OF PRINTING.                                           255

    THE OLD BACHELOR.                                              257

    CALORIC.                                                       260

    THE ILLS OF IDLENESS.                                          262



                               CANTO I.

                               OURSELF!


                               ARGUMENT.

        Great Doctor Caustic is a sage
        Whose merit _gilds_ this _iron_ age,
        And who deserves, as you’ll discover
        When you have conn’d this canto over,
        For grand discoveries and inventions,
        A dozen peerages and pensions;
        But, having met with rubs and breakers,
        From Perkins’ metal mischief makers;
        With but three halfpence in his pocket,
        In verses blazing like sky rocket,
        He first sets forth in this petition
        His _high_ deserts but _low_ condition.


    From garret high, with cobwebs hung,
    The poorest wight that ever sung,
    Most gentle Sirs, I come before ye,
    To tell a lamentable story.

    What makes my sorry case the sadder,
    I once stood high on Fortune’s ladder;[1]
    From whence contrive the fickle jilt did,
    That your petitioner should be tilted.

    And soon th’ unconscionable flirt,
    Will tread me fairly in the dirt,
    Unless, perchance, these pithy lays
    Procure me _pence_ as well as _praise_.

    Already doom’d to hard quill-driving,
    ’Gainst spectred poverty still striving,
    When e’er I doze, from vigils pale,
    Dame Fancy locks me fast in jail.

    Necessity, though I am no wit,
    Compels me now to turn a poet;
    Not _born_, but _made_, by transmutation,
    And chymick process, call’d--_starvation_!

    Though poet’s trade, of all that I know,
    Requires the least of ready rhino,
    I find a deficit of cash is
    An obstacle to cutting dashes.

    For gods and godesses, who traffic
    In cantos, odes, and lays seraphic,
    Who erst Arcadian whistle blew sharp,
    Or now attune Apollo’s jews-harp,

    Have sworn they will not loan me, gratis,
    Their jingling sing-song apparatus,
    Nor teach me how, nor where to chime in
    My _tintinabulum_ of rhyming.[2]

    What then occurs? A lucky hit--
    I’ve found a substitute for wit;
    On Homer’s pinions mounting high,
    I’ll drink Pierian puddle dry.[3]

    Beddoes (bless the good doctor) has
    Sent me a bag full of his gas,[4]
    Which snuffed the nose up, makes wit brighter,
    And eke a dunce an airy writer.

    With this a brother bard, inflated,
    Was so stupendously elated,
    He tower’d, like Garnerin’s balloon,
    Nor stopp’d, like half wits, at the moon:

    But scarce had breath’d three times before he
    Was hous’d in heaven’s high upper story,[5]
    Where mortals none but poets enter,
    Above where Mah’met’s ass dar’d venture.

    Strange things he saw, and those who know him
    Have said that, in his Epic Poem,[6]
    To be complete within a year hence,
    They’ll make a terrible appearance.

    And now, to set my verses going,
    Like “_Joan of Arc_,” sublimely flowing,
    I’ll follow Southey’s bold exemple,
    And snuff a sconce full, for a sample.

    Good Sir, enough! enough already!
    No more, for Heaven’s sake!--steady!--steady!
    Confound your stuff!--why how you sweat me!
    I’d rather swallow all mount Etna!

    How swiftly turns this giddy world round,
    Like tortur’d top, by truant twirl’d round;
    While Nature’s capers wild amaze me,
    The beldam’s crack’d or Caustic crazy![7]

    I’m larger grown from head to tail
    Than mammoth, elephant, or whale!--
    Now feel a “tangible extension”
    Of semi-infinite dimension!--

    Inflated with supreme intensity,
    I fill three quarters of immensity!
    Should Phœbus come this way, no doubt,
    But I could blow his candle out!

    This earth’s a little dirty planet,
    And I’ll no longer help to man it,
    But off will flutter, in a tangent,
    And make a harum scarum range on’t!

    Stand ye appall’d! quake! quiver! quail!
    For lo I stride a comet’s tail!
    If my deserts you fail t’ acknowledge,
    I’ll drive it plump against your college!

    But if your Esculapian band
    Approach my highness, cap in hand,
    And show vast tokens of humility,
    I’ll treat your world with due civility.

    But now, alas! a wicked wag
    Has pull’d away the gaseous bag:
    From heaven, where thron’d, like Jove I sat,
    I’m fall’n! fall’n! fall’n! down, flat! flat! flat![8]

    Thus, as the ancient story goes,
    When o’er Avernus flew the crows,
    They were so stench’d in half a minute,
    They giddy grew and tumbled in it:

    And thus a blade, who is too handy
    To help himself to wine or brandy,
    At first gets higher, then gets lower,
    Then tumbles dead drunk on the floor!

    Such would have been my sad case, if
    I’d taken half another tiff;
    And even now, I cannot swear,
    I’m not as mad as a March hare!

    How these confounded gases serve us!
    But Beddoes says that I am nervous,
    And that this oxyd gas of nitre
    Is bad for such a _nervous_ writer!

    Indeed, Sir, Doctor, very odd it is
    That you should deal in such commodities,
    Which drive a man beside his wits,
    And women to hysteric fits![9]

    Now, since this wildering gas inflation
    Is not the thing for inspiration,
    I’ll take a glass of cordial gin,
    Ere my sad story I begin;

    And then proceed with courage stout,
    From “hard-bound brains” to hammer out
    My case forlorn, in doleful ditty,
    To melt your worships’ hearts to pity.

    Sirs, I have been in high condition,
    A right respectable PHYSICIAN;
    And passed, with men of shrewd discerning,
    For wight of most prodigious learning;

    For I could quote, with flippant ease,
    Grave Galen and Hippocrates,
    Brown, Cullen, Sydenham and such men,
    Besides a _shoal_ of learned Dutchmen.[10]

    In all disorders was so clever,
    From tooth ache, up to yellow fever,
    That I by learned men was reckon’d
    Don Esculapius the second!

    No case to me was problematic;
    Pains topical or symptomatic,
    From aching head, to gouty toes,
    The hidden cause I could disclose.

    Minute examiner of Nature,
    And most sagacious operator,
    I could descern, prescribe, apply
    And cure[11] disease in louse’s eye.

    And insects smaller, ten degrees
    Than those which float in summer’s breeze,
    Drugg’d with cathartics and emetics,
    Then doctor’d off with diuretics.

    I had a curious little lancet,
    Your worship could not help but fancy it,
    By which I show’d with skill surprising,
    The whole art of _flea_-botomizing!--

    And with it oft inoculated
    (At which friend Jenner’ll be elated)
    Flies, fleas, and gnats, with cow-pock matter,
    And not one _soul_ took small-pox a’ter!--

    Could take a microscopic mite,
    Invisible to naked sight;
    _Ad infinitum_, could divide it,
    For times _unnumber’d_ have I tried it.

    With optic glass, of great utility,
    Could make the essence of nihility
    To cut a most enormous figure,
    As big as St Paul’s church, or bigger!

    Could tell, and never be mistaken,
    What future oaks were in an acorn;
    And even calculate, at pleasure,
    The cubic inches they would measure.

    Scotland could never boast a wight,
    Could match OURSELF at second sight.[12]
    Nor Wales a wizard, who so well
    Could destiny’s decrees foretel.

    For we’d a precious knack at seeing,
    Not only matters not in being,
    But ever and anon would still be
    Foreseeing things which never will be--[13]

    Great manufacturer of weather
    Nine Lapland witches, clubb’d together,
    With all the elements a stewing,
    Are not our match at tempest brewing.

    For many a popular almanac,
    Within say half a century back,
    We foretold every shine and storm
    Which heaven can burnish or deform.

    Though no two calendars agreed,
    All were infallible indeed;
    Of course no conjurer can stand higher
    Than Caustic as a prophesier.

    Discover’d worlds within the pale
    Of tip-end of a tadpole’s tail,
    And took possession of the same
    In our good friend, Sir JOSEPH’S name;[14]

    And soon shall publish, by subscription,
    A topographical description
    Of worlds aforesaid, which shall go forth
    In _fool’s_ cap folio, gilt, and so forth,--

    Could tell how far a careless fly
    Might chance to turn this globe awry,
    If flitting round, in giddy circuit,
    With leg or wing, he kick or jerk it!--[15]

    The mystic characters of Nature,
    We read like Spurtzheim or Lavater,
    To us her lineaments are labels,
    Which stare like capitals on play bills.

    From bearings of the different osses,
    And shapes of forehead, chin, proboscis,
    The frons and occiput’s topography,
    Can write a man’s complete biography.

    Have drawn nine million diagrams,
    Which wags denominate flim flams,
    Though worth your worshipful reliance
    For shortest outlines of the science.

    By dint of scientific thumps
    Made famous phrenologic bumps,
    And always found the effect was greater
    Than when such bumps were made by nature.

    Developements, thus manufactured,
    Caused many a thick skull to be fractured
    But pity well deserves defiance
    When e’er she thwarts the march of science.

    Thus Rousseau, Voltaire, Paine, and others,
    Our revolutionizing brothers,
    Got up French freedom’s cruel farces,
    And made worse bumps than ours in masses.

    And Godwin, too, in substance said,
    Our bodies politic must be bled;
    Man’s only mode of melioration
    Is doctoring off one generation,--[16]

    And substituting in its place
    A spotless super-human race,
    Pure as an unborn infant’s dream,
    Of moonshine made, and moved by steam.

    We have for sale the seeds of bumps,
    Which, dibbled in the heads of gumps,
    Take root without the aid of thumps
    And grow as large as camels’ humps.

    Can take a wicked ugly tyke,
    And every organ we dislike
    Pull out or drive in, at a venture,
    Thus change each bump to an indenture.

    Protuberant _destructiveness_,
    Placed in our phrenologic press,
    Is render’d, by its power immense,
    Exuberant _benevolence_.

    In infancy, in half a trice,
    We thus extinguish every vice,
    Before it has had time to harden,
    As easily as weed a garden.

    We keep fine faculties ready made,
    Thus beat dame Nature at her trade
    Of manufacturing mental powers,
    For hers are not half up to ours.

    We make a thing we call NOUSOMETER,
    Or Phrenological Micrometer;
    The grand quintessence of inventions
    For measuring the mind’s dimensions.

    This shows men’s vices and propensities,
    Their aggravations and intensities,
    By marks indelible, and plain-
    Ly legible as that on Cain.

    Nousometers, our hope and trust is,
    Will supersede our courts of justice,
    By proving guilt in all gradations,
    In style of Euclid’s demonstrations.

    To crown our cheap mode of conviction
    By ready punishment’s infliction,
    The rabblement will string up _gratis_
    The convicts of our apparatus.

    By said machine and foresaid books,
    Rogues, stigmatized with _hanging looks_,
    We whip and kick and hang _ad libitum_,
    Or take the liberty to gibbet ’em.

    If you’re dissatisfied with that,
    Our all-efficient _verbum sat_
    Will _presto_ raise almighty mobs,
    Inured to cruel dirty jobs.

    Those LL. D.s’ of Lynch’s law[17]
    Don’t value dignity a straw,
    Will thump your worships into chowder
    To save expense of ropes and powder.

    Those _ne plus ultras_ of atrocity,
    By blind and tiger-like ferocity
    Disgraceful deeds and ruthless ravages
    Have shown themselves outrageous savages.

    Yet, whereas Justice has’nt yet hung them,
    Nor showers of grape-shot rain’d among them,
    We’ll use the rogues, when we think best,
    For executing our behest.

    Thus reptiles of the worst descriptions
    Coerced the obstinate Egyptians;
    And serpents erst by stings and bites
    Punish’d backsliding Israelites.

    Judge Lynch, thou dephlegmated evil,
    Double distill’d essence of the devil,
    Total depravity, we would
    Hit you still harder if we could.

    It makes one truly melancholic
    To see your mobs, most diabolic,
    Plunder and murder, with impunity,
    Innocent members of community.

    You talk of liberty, what stuff!
    A mob’s a monarch, sure enough,
    And one true liberty most dreads,
    A tyrant with ten thousand heads.

    There is no despot in creation
    However high and firm his station,
    Who feels not more responsibility
    Than Lynch’s terrible mobility.

    Our institutes of education
    Are under moral obligation
    To use said implement of ours
    For graduating mental powers.

    This criminal and dunce detector
    May save from many a useless lecture,
    From toiling quarter after quarter
    In filling riddle sieves with water.

    We license none for teaching schools,
    Unless by Gall’s and Spurzheim’s rules
    We find his sconce, in every section,
    Bears phrenological inspection.

    We apprehended Brougham’s schoolmaster,
    And took his head sheer off--in plaster,
    And found his bumps with ours accord
    Before we let him “go abroad.”

    Our said mind-measurer may be set
    To sound the cunningest coquette,
    And ascertain by mensuration
    The limits of her inclination.

    _Heu quantum suff_, we are afraid this
    Developement will shock the ladies;
    But, hush, my dears, for time to come,
    No mummy ever was more mum.

    Our far-famed system also suits
    The physiology of brutes;
    Its application never fails
    From mammoth down to snakes and snails.

    Have fourteen folios, stereotypes
    Call’d craniology of snipes,[18]
    All which will figure, with propriety,
    In annals of a learn’d society.

    As manufacturing Phrenologist
    Our articles need no apologist,
    Because our skill is ten times greater,
    As said before, than that of Nature.

    Nature, although in some things clever,
    Has but the fulcrum and the lever
    To her friend Doctor Caustic given,
    To elevate this world to heaven.

    We have made many a clever notion
    To perpetrate perpetual motion
    Which went to perpetuity’s borders,
    Then stopp’d a bit for further orders.

    Though said machines would hardly trace
    The farthest links of time or space,
    We never knew them fail to wend
    Quite to eternity’s hither end.

    For women, uglier than Gorgons,
    We manufacture beauty’s organs,
    And give them splendid shapes and faces
    Which might be envied by the Graces.

    Pimples like pepper pods, warts like squashes,
    Vanish before our beauty washes;[19]
    By help of corsets, stays and boddices,
    We transform dowdies into goddesses.[20]

    Nice ladies’ minds we manufacture,
    Cast in a mould without a fracture,
    And sell the precious things in lots,
    An art we learn’d of Doctor Watts.

    And o’er the shop where these are made,
    In nine inch letters is portray’d,
    FINE FEMALE FACULTIES FORM’D AND FURNISHED,
    With genteel educations burnished.

    This shop supplies the place, no doubt,
    Of seminaries talk’d about,
    But never put in operation,
    Fitted for female education.[21]

    We fabricate spruce dandy noddies,
    With souls adapted to their bodies,
    To wit so exquisitely small
    They might as well have none at all.[22]

    When we discern an abstract right,
    We press it ever main and might;
    Hold all correct, which suits our fancies,
    And never yield to circumstances.

    We cannot brook the serpentine,
    Our march is onward, one straight line,
    Nor flood nor fire impedes our way,
    Lickitacut--devil to pay!

    We prompt or sanction all procedures
    Of Slavery-Abolition-Leaders,
    Who “go ahead” with more display
    Than a whirlwind’s march o’er a dusty way.

    Though southern blacks, to all appearances,
    Are injured by our interferences,
    Still right is right, your most obedient
    Cares not a fig about th’ expedient.

    Let loose the blacks at any rate,
    Without delay, without debate,
    Their clanging chains asunder snap
    Suddenly as by thunder clap.

    Huzza then, for _amalgamation_
    To change our “dough-faced population,”
    In course of one more generation,
    To a nice copper-color’d nation.

    Reader it may be you’re a lady,
    Fair as the blush of morn in May day,--
    And not much smitten with our plan
    Of _union_ with a _color’d_ man.

    Bah! bah! my dear, I tell you this is
    The silliest of prejudices;
    Cupid will duly elevate him,
    And Hymen will amalgamate him.

    Thus one Othello was, you know,
    Black as the plumage of a crow,
    And yet the white Miss Desdemona
    Loved him as well as flies love honey.

    The car of Venus, bards have sung,
    Was drawn by doves, when I was young,
    But then, were black birds substituted,
    Ourself for one were better suited.

    We’re rather darkish hued ourself,
    Yet will annihilate the elf,
    Who says in earnest, or in jokes
    We’re not as good as whiter folks.

    The only _color_ of objection
    To our said _tawny_ predilection
    Is this, ’t will ruin the machinery
    Of amatory poets’ scenery.

    Bright eyes, pink lips, and cheeks of roses,
    Lily-complexions, Grecian noses,
    Fine necks, and so forth, alabasters,
    No more be themes for poetasters.

    But then the Muse’s votary may
    In rhymes like these his fair portray,--
    My Phillis has a natural varnish
    Which time nor accident can’t tarnish;

    No sickly, pale, unripen’d maid,
    “Dyed in the wool,” she cannot fade;
    Essence of ebony and logwood,
    And sweeter than the flowers of dogwood.

    Lives there a bard who would not glory
    In such epistles amatory,
    Possessing that uncommon quality,
    A sprinkling of originality.

    On advocates of colonization
    Shower demi-johns of indignation!--
    Annihilate the knaves and dolts,
    With Caustic’s _Patent Thunderbolts_!

    And, be it known, with due civility,
    To our Columbian nobility,
    Fewer _black hearts_ and more _black faces_
    Would much improve their waning races.

    To lose our _jetty_ population
    Would take the _shine_ from our great nation,
    And make us all like old shoes, lacking
    A coat of Day and Martin’s blacking.

    We’re glad to find New England beauties
    For black men’s rights and white men’s duties
    Enlisting their resistless charms,
    For all men yield to ladies’ arms.

    Do, dears, make us your generalissimo,
    An all important trust that is, you know,
    And we the hero, who can fill it
    With dazzling glory, if you will it.

    Bostonia’s beautiful brigade,
    With Doctor Caustic’s flag display’d,
    Suppose you make a general levy
    To swell the columns of your bevy.

    Bright key-stones of the Social Arch,
    Left foot foremost, forward march!
    Our _spunk_ is up, our prowess ample
    On _anti-union_ rogues to trample.

    Ourself will lead the ladies’ army on,
    Charge at its head like Scott’s brave Marmion;
    You fight as angels fought before
    In heaven, so Milton says, of yore.

    The swart south shivers like a leaf,
    M’Stuffie shoots himself for grief
    At finding all resistance vain,
    As battling with a hurricane.

    We hold in utter execration
    What ’s styled the _Temperance Reformation_.
    To live without good alcohol
    Is tantamount to tol-de-rol;--

    For nine tenths of our doctors’ fees
    From Bacchanalian devotees
    And votaries of Sir Richard Rum
    Have ever, and will ever come.

    Incipient inebriation
    From vinous alcoholization
    Is indispensable now-a-days
    To make our patriotism blaze.

    Dinner harangues would be so so,
    Stump oratory would not go
    If wine and whiskey did not aid
    The speechifying and parade.

    And where’s the patriot, who boasts
    Of excellent _cold water_ toasts?
    If such things were, and had some merit,
    They must be _destitute of spirit_.

    If Temperance should turn the scale,
    And total abstinence prevail,
    Rhyme-mongers would be flatter still,
    A million lines, not worth a mill.

    Lord Byron’s verse, so highly prized,
    Had fail’d to be immortalized,
    Unless the noble bard had been
    Exalted on the wings of gin.

    As to Anacreontic lays,
    A Moore could make no more displays,
    Ay, Thomas Moore could never more
    Make Bacchanalians shout encore.

    If Temperance chaps wont suffer wine
    Nor gin t’ inspire the maudlin nine,
    Some verse by critics dubb’d divine
    Will seem almost as flat as mine.

    Horace says _dulce est desipere_,[23]
    Drink till your way home’s rather slippery,
    But don’t indulge in gross ebriety,
    Save in the very best society.

    The lower orders too, we think,
    Unless addicted to strong drink,
    Might rise to riches and renown,
    Thus turn society up side down.

    Let paupers, therefore, swig away,
    With gin and whiskey soak their clay,
    For beggars, somebody says or sings,
    When drunk as lords are rich as kings.

    And if by temperance and frugality,
    _Shoe binding_ should be changed to _quality_,
    The mounting mobocratic masses
    May over-top US UPPER CLASSES.

    The readiest way to keep them down
    Is this, give every jade and clown
    “Lots” of intoxicating stuff,
    Gin, whiskey, and new rum enough;

    And in that case, I’ll bet my eyes,
    The rogues will never, never rise;
    Though placed in heaven, they could not fail
    To be Sir Richard Rum’s canaille.

    If ardent spirit is not handy,
    Cider’s almost as good as brandy,
    And strong beer serves to drench one’s dust,
    And keep alive the drunkard’s thirst.

    There’s nothing like intoxication
    To thin off extra population,
    And keep it at respectful distance
    Behind the means of man’s subsistence.

    By your good leave, I question whether
    War, famine, pestilence, together,
    Could fill, of alcohol, the place,
    In doctoring off the human race.

    Then, paltry pauper, swig away,
    With gin and whiskey soak your clay,
    Till you’ve diluted it to mortar,
    Á filthy mass of mud and water.

    Drink till th’ experiment you make
    Of how much liquid fire ’twill take
    To make a drunkard burn like tinder,
    And change a nuisance to a cinder.

    The devil, as Milton represented,
    Gunpowder, long ago invented;
    But genius always finds its level,
    And man, of course, has beaten the devil.

    The wight, who alcohol found out,
    Surpass’d the fiend, beyond a doubt;
    He, therefore, merits more renown,
    And ought to wear a hotter crown.

    We live on vegetable diet,
    And will not let a man be quiet,
    Unless the evidence is ample
    That he is copying our example.

    Though brother Graham, it is said,
    Stuffs christians with unbolted bread,
    Our belly _timber_, quite as good,
    Is made of any kind of _wood_.[24]

    You know the common farmer takes
    His white oak wood for fencing _stakes_,
    But Lady Caustic fits in style,
    Superior white oak _steaks_, to broil.

    She’s famous, too, for _white oak cheese_,
    Harder than granite, ten degrees;
    So hard that we’re obliged to take it
    To some trip-hammer works to break it.

    Good hemlock bark philosophized
    In soup, by epicures is prized,
    A paste of button-wood, quoth I,
    Is cap-a-pie to cap a pie.

    A stick of bass-wood, being bevill’d
    By gastronomic art bedevill’d,
    Or served as Welchmen cook their cheese,
    A man of taste will always please.

    From saw dust, bran and pebble stones,
    And _quantum suff._ of pounded bones,
    We form the most delicious dishes
    That e’er indulged the gourmand’s wishes.

    When our great plans are brought to pass,
    Mankind _en masse_ may go to grass;
    And every rover, will moreover,
    Enjoy his lot like pig in clover.

    We next crave liberty to mention
    Another wonderful invention;
    A sort of stenographic still,
    Alias a Patent Author’s mill.

    We fill its hopper with a set
    Of letters of the alphabet,
    And turn out eulogies, orations,
    Or themes for July celebrations,--

    News, both domestic and extraneous,
    Essays, and extracts miscellaneous,
    We manufacture by the means
    Of said superlative machines.

    This last invention also reaches
    To making Congress members’ speeches;
    Would they adopt it, though we’ve said it,
    T’would cent per cent enhance their credit.

    We hammer’d out a lawyer’s jaw mill,
    Which went by water like a saw-mill
    With so much clamor, fire and fury,
    It thunderstruck the judge and jury.

    A syllogism, which embraces
    All knotty, complicated cases,
    We fabricated and applied
    To every cause which could be tried.

    Oft have I quench’d man’s vital spark:
    “The soul’s old cottage,” cold and dark,
    Again, in spite of death, our grand ill,
    Illumed as one would light a candle.[25]

    Display’d a mode in Latin thesis
    To pick the human frame to pieces;
    The parts deposit by themselves,
    Like mineral specimens on shelves;--

    And having scour’d off every particle
    Which clogg’d the motions of the article,
    The vital functions to restore
    To healthier action than before.[26]

    Thus, brother Ovid said or sung once,
    The Gods of _old_ folks could make _young_ ones[27]
    By process, not one whit acuter,
    Than making _new_ pots from old pewter.

    So famed Aldini, erst in France,
    Led dead folks down a country-dance,
    And made them rigadoon and chasse
    As well as when alive, I dare say!

    And I once offer’d, very prettily,
    To patch up Frenchmen kill’d in Italy,
    Though shot, or stabb’d, or hack’d with fell blows,
    As wives patch coats when out at elbows!

    Profoundly versed in chymic science,
    I could bid matter’s law defiance;
    Was up to nature, or beyond her,
    In mimic earthquakes, rain, and thunder![28]

    And by a shock of electricity,
    (I tell the truth without duplicity)
    I did (what won’t again be soon done)
    E’en fairly knock the man in the moon down![29]

    On ocean’s bottom we can travel,
    Thorough mud and thorough gravel;
    While over head hoarse tempests hurtle
    With more adroitness than a turtle.

    Priestly first caused our head to teem
    With this most eligible scheme,
    Supplied us vital air, which stuff
    We took like macaroni snuff.[30]

    Encamp’d beneath a huge ice island,
    For nineteen years we didn’t come nigh land,
    And could have staid, as well as not,
    E’en had the sea been boiling hot.

    In car triumphant, drawn by whales,
    Tackled to their tremendous tails,
    We rode sublime, and claim’d a right
    To everything which hove in sight.

    Old Neptune’s realm, ’tis our intent,
    To make a Yankee-settlement,
    And if Britannia interferes[31]
    We’il twist her ugly lion’s ears.

    An Iceland burning mountain’s gorge
    We metamorphos’d to a forge,
    And made therein as many as
    Ten thousand tons of _solid gas_.

    This we can let off at our leisure,
    Like Shakspeare’s conjurer, wield at pleasure
    The explosive elements of thunder,
    With power to rive the globe asunder.

    And if the theory of Babbage[32]
    Is worth a single head of cabbage,
    This grand plenipotent gas of ours
    Will supersede all moving powers.

    With this will drive aerial cars,
    Send hourly coaches to the stars,
    A lightning opposition line
    Would be a snail compared to mine.

    We seized the moon, by mickle strength,
    And brought her down, within arm’s length,--
    And made her, under our protection,
    Submit to critical inspection.

    Her Natural History and Topography,
    With plates of Pendleton’s lithography,
    We mean to print and publish soon,
    And call it MIRROR OF THE MOON.

    Like us, was never man besides
    To calculate aerial tides;
    Though Volney undertook to do it
    He wanted science to go through it.[33]

    But we can let your worships know
    Which way, next year the wind will blow,
    And indicate without verbosity,
    The measure of its mean velocity.

    We gagg’d sage Darwin’s polar bear,
    And would not let him “vomit air;”[34]
    Thus spoil’d the Boreal ventilator,
    And made a _vacuum_ at the equator.

    And then, by Doctor Priestley’s aid,
    A vital atmosphere was made,
    And stretch’d abroad, and found to answer,
    From Capricorn quite on to Cancer.

    We set an air balloon in motion
    To float on th’ atmospheric ocean,
    Annex’d a log, which never fail’d,
    To give the distance which it sail’d:

    And form’d a rudder, I assure it ye,
    By which we steer’d with great security,
    And could make good our destination
    To any harbor in creation.

    And we had nineteen pair of oars,
    All mann’d with philosophic rowers,
    Could therefore sail without a breeze,
    Or stem a hurricane with ease.[35]

    We now make public our intention
    By aid of said superb invention,
    To send a well arm’d air balloon
    To take and colonize the moon.

    A most inveterate believer
    In foreign source of yellow fever,
    We say his sconce must be fuliginous,
    Who holds that plague to be indigenous.

    As to th’ extent of its dominion
    We’ll give our medical opinion;
    When next we greet your worships, please
    To give security for fees.

    This dire disorder is contagious
    And its contagion is outrageous,[36]
    ’Twill rage like wild-fire, anywhere,
    On dryest soil, in purest air.

    It is an animalcule, which
    Is propagated like the itch,--
    Communicated like small pox,
    But can’t be bred in dirty docks.

    From patient’s breath an emanation,
    By contact or approximation
    It may, as learned men have stated,
    Be everywhere disseminated.

    From friends infected, children, wives,
    Let all men scamper then, for lives;
    The wretches shun like Charon’s ferry,
    And leave the dead themselves to bury.

    ’T is true some simpletons have said
    A kind of fever may be bred
    By heat conjoin’d with putrefaction,
    Which suits contagionists to a fraction.

    They tell you, if these causes may
    Produce the plague in Africa,
    It would, to common sense, appear
    They might effect the fever here.

    That true philosophy expects
    From all _like causes like effects_;
    For Nature never play’d a prank
    To cheat us, like a mountebank.

    But these dull dolts don’t understand
    That in “Columbia’s happy land,”
    Nature, for sake of “Freedom’s cause,”
    Will set aside her general laws.

    Said yellow fever can endure
    Nothing offensive or impure,
    Bad water or mephitic air
    Or dead cats in a thoroughfare.

    Therefore, good cits, in sultry weather
    Collect your dirtiness together,
    And then contrive to lodge it pretty
    Nigh to the centre of the city.

    The fever, meeting such a mound,
    Will turn about and quit the ground,
    And leave the fortunate dirt-protected
    Inhabitants, quite uninfected.

    Filth, on earth’s surface, it is clear,
    Its like attracts from th’ atmosphere,
    And always leaves a pure vicinity,
    By laws of chemical affinity.[37]

    Our citizens, their next resource
    Should cause a “social intercourse,”
    By perforating banks and bounds
    ’Twixt vaults and wells and burying-grounds.

    For such good management ensures
    Against expense in digging sewers;
    Because a well, ’tis very plain,
    Serve all its neighborhood for a drain.

    These things accomplish’d ’twill be very
    Correct their relatives to bury
    Scarce under ground, in the most populous
    And busy part of the metropolis.

    For ’twould be decorous, at least.
    In memory of the dear deceased,
    At once to answer two good ends,
    To _drink to_ and _to drink_ our friends.

    Thus Artemisia, ’twas I think,
    Made her dead husband diet drink,
    And thereby, probably enough,
    Saved gallipots of doctor’s stuff.

    Proceed to scoop each populous place in
    To something very like a basin,
    And let the centre of your mart
    Be on or near the lowest part.

    Well, after all these things are finish’d,
    Let no man’s efforts be diminish’d,
    But this good maxim keep in view,
    That nought is done if aught’s to do.

    Then fall too, gentlemen, and grub
    Up every root and tree and shrub,
    Each trace of vegetation found
    In town and out, for ten miles round.

    Your “useful labors” to complete
    In every square, side-walk and street,
    By way of ornament then please
    To set out Bohun Upas trees.

    If after all the fiend we find
    Is not to emigrate inclined,
    But like too many a foreign caitiff
    Declares on oath he is a native,

    To counteract him, my advice is
    To tow us down the polar ices,
    And when a field or two is brought us,
    ’Twill drive him into winter quarters.

    This thing your worships well know can
    Be done on Doctor Darwin’s plan,
    And ’tis the best work, past a doubt,
    Our gun boats can be set about.

    _Paulo majora nunc canamus_,[38]
    And hope the public will not blame us
    If we should soar, (’tis our intention,)
    Above your worship’s comprehension.

    We’ve form’d the most tremendous plan,
    Which ever stretch’d the mind of man,
    And which to nothing less aspires
    Than making moons from central fires.

    If theories of Doctor Hutton
    Be worth the shadow of a button,
    And Doctor Darwin has not blunder’d,
    We’ll turn out full moons by the hundred.[39]

    We mean to bore us, at a venture,
    Some auger-holes through Hutton’s centre,
    Thus give an unexpected vent
    To Hutton’s fires in prison pent.

    We’ll fan his furnace by a pair
    Of bellows made of Franklin’s air,[40]
    For air, (a truth Count Rumford knew well,)
    Contains the very soul of fuel.

    Then pour in suddenly the ocean
    To add eclat to our explosion;--
    Water, your worships know, or may know,
    Adds terribly to a volcano.

    Each orifice will then give birth
    To grand satellites of earth,
    Disploded dreadfully, dear me!
    Like Darwin’s moon from southern sea.

    How will the universe admire,
    When my vast bickering globes of fire,
    In grand Darwinian style shall rise,
    Like flying mountains through the skies.

    Though said sublime explosions must
    Destroy good Doctor Burnet’s crust,[41]
    By Parker’s cement we’ll endeavor[42]
    To make his shell as good as ever.

    Now when we’ve made our batch of moons,
    Philosophers, unless they’re loons,
    Will, though we’re such a surly gnostic,
    Name one of them “GREAT DOCTOR CAUSTIC!”

    These, among many, are but few
    Of mighty things that I could do;
    All which I’ll state, if ’tis your pleasure,
    Much more at large when more at leisure.

    Now, it appears, from what I state here,
    My plans for mending human nature
    Entitle me to take the chair
    From Rousseau, Godwin, or Voltaire.

    They are of most immense _utility_;
    All tend to man’s perfectibility;
    And if pursued, I dare to venture ye,
    He’ll be an angel in a century.

    Although St Pierre, a knowing chap,
    Deserves a feather in his cap
    For having boldly set his foot on
    The foolish trash of Isaac Newton;[43]

    Contrived a scheme, which very nice is,
    For making tides of polar ices;
    And fed old Ocean’s tub with fountains,
    From arctic and antarctic mountains.

    Though Mister Godwin told us how
    To make a clever sort of plough,[44]
    Which would e’en set itself to work,
    And plough an acre in a jerk.

    Though Price’s projects are so clever,
    They show us how to live for ever[45]
    Unless we blunder, to our cost,
    And break our heads against a post!

    Though Darwin, thinking to dismay us,
    Made dreadful clattering in chaos,
    And form’d, with horrid quakes t’ assist him,
    His new _exploded_ solar system.[46]

    Though Volney, having in his _view_,
    First peer’d our continent through and through,[47]
    Left us a specimen of the quality
    Of _graduated_ French morality.[48]

    Though Priestley manufactured souls,
    For which we had him o’er the coals,
    A thing we had forgot to mention,
    For making use of _our_ invention.

    Buffon, with other wonders done,
    A comet dash’d athwart the sun,
    And, hitting off a flaming slice,
    Our earth _created_ in a trice.

    These wights, when taken altogether,
    Are but the shadow of a feather
    Compared with Caustic, even as
    A puff of hydrogenous gas.

    Should you pronounce my systems _lax_
    For want of some _astringent_ facts,
    I’ll knock you down, by my surprising
    New method of philosophizing.

    I first a fine new system form,
    Which none can either sap or storm;
    Then, to support my favorite plan,
    I muster all the facts I can.

    To make my theories defensible,
    Whereas some facts are indispensable,
    From east, west, north and south I rake ’em,
    And when not ready made--I make them!!

    Thus, for posterity’s behoof,
    We’ve made our systems bullet proof:
    Assailing us with ire red hot,
    Is battering walls with pigeon shot.

    But I, in spite of my renown,
    Alas! am harrass’d, hunted down;
    Completely damn’d, the simple fact is,
    By PERKINS’S METALLIC PRACTICE![49]

    Our should-be wise and learn’d societies
    Are guilty of great improprieties,
    In treating me in manner scandalous,
    As if I were a very Vandal; thus

    Determined, as I have no doubt,
    My sun of genius to put out,
    Which, once extinct, they think that so ’tis
    _Their_ glow-worm lights may claim some notice.

    Such hum-drum heads and hollow hearts
    Pretend, forsooth, t’ encourage arts!
    But that pretence, in every sense is
    The flimsiest of all pretences.

    Those noble spirited Macenases
    To me have shown the greatest meannesses;
    Have granted me for these things said all,
    Not one half-penny, nor a medal!!!



                               CANTO II.

                             CONJURATIONS!


                               ARGUMENT.

        The Bard proceeds like one that’s striving
        To practise Arnall’s art of diving;[50]
        Presents sublime and strange narrations
        Of wizards, ghosts, and conjurations;
        Next towers in Della Cruscan style
        Above old Homer half a mile;
        And flutters round in airy region,
        Just like a wild goose or a pigeon;
        _Fired_, with the theme of Haygarth’s praises
        Until his rapture fairly _blazes_;
        Then, in a duel, shows more prowess,
        Than Vandal that e’er was or now is!


    But I’m a man so meek and humble,[51]
    I do n’t allow myself to grumble,
    Am loth your patience thus to batter,
    Though _starving_ is a _serious_ matter.[52]

    Another reason too, may’t please ye,
    Why thus I dare presume to tease ye;
    If you my wrongs should not redress,
    We all must be in one sad mess![53]

    The credit of our craft is waning,
    Then rouse at this my sad complaining;
    For, though my fate now seem the rougher,
    Still _you_ as well as _I_ must suffer.

    Behold! a rising INSTITUTION,[54]
    To spread Perkinean delusion;
    Supported in their vile designs,
    By doctors, quakers, dukes, divines.

    Unless these villainous Perkineans
    Are forthwith hurl’d to Nick’s dominions,
    Those wicked tractors, I’m afraid,
    Will overturn the doctor’s trade.

    And then, alas! your worships may
    Be forced to moil the live long day,
    With hammer, pickaxe, spade, or shovel,
    And nightly tenant some old hovel.

    Or, destitute of food and lodging,
    Through dark and dirty lanes be dodging,
    Unless t’avoid such dismal lurkings,
    You put a powerful paw on PERKINS.

    Behold what ought to raise your spleen high,
    Perkins supported by Aldini![55]
    It must have been most sad, foul weather,
    From Italy to blow him hither.

    My wrath, indeed, is now so keen, I
    Ev’n wish, for sake of that Aldini,
    This ink were _poison_ for the wizard,
    This _pen_ a _dagger_ in his gizzard!

    For he (’tis told in public papers)
    Can make dead people cut droll capers;
    And shuffling off death’s iron trammels,
    To kick and hop like dancing camels.

    To raise a dead dog he was able,[56]
    Though laid in quarters on a table,
    And led him yelping, round the town,
    With two legs up, and two legs down;[57]

    And, in the presence of a posse
    Of our great men, and ANDREOSSI,
    He show’d _black art_ of worse description,
    Than e’er did conjuring Egyptian.

    He cut a bullock’s head I ween,
    Sheer off, as if by guillotine;
    Then (Satan aiding the adventure)
    He made it _bellow_ like a Stentor![58]

    And this most comical magician
    Will soon, in public exhibition,
    Perform a feat he’s often boasted,
    And animate a dead pig---- _roasted_.

    With powers of these Metallic Tractors,
    He can revive dead malefactors;
    And is reanimating daily,
    Rogues that were hung _once_, at Old Bailey![59]

    And sure I am, he’ll break the peace,
    Unless secured by our police;
    For such a chap, as you’re alive,
    Full many a felon will revive.

    And as he can (no doubt of that)
    Give rogues the _nine_ lives of a cat;
    Why then, to expiate their crimes,
    These rogues must all be hung _nine_ times.

    What more enhances this offence is,
    ’Twill ninefold government’s expenses;
    And such a load, in name of wonder,
    Pray how can JOHNNY BULL stand under?

    Theft why not rise, and make a clatter,
    And put a stop to all this matter--
    Why don’t you rouse, I say, in season,
    And cut the wicked wizard’s weasand?

    ’Tis true, alas! I’m loth to say,
    That you forsake the good old way,
    And tread a path so very odd,
    So unlike that your fathers trod.

    With what delight the poet fancies
    He sees their worships plague old FRANCIS;[60]
    While he, sad wight, wo-worn and pale,
    Is dragg’d about from jail to jail!

    For he was such a stubborn dragon,
    He would not down and worship Dagon;
    That is to say, would not acknowledge
    Supremacy of your great college!

    And what was worse, if worse could be,
    And raised their ire to such degree,
    That they to Tyburn swore they’d cart him;
    He _cured_ folks “_non secundum artem_.”

    His patients _saved_, from mere compassion,
    Though _killing_ was the most in fashion!
    Then well your father’s ire might burn as
    Hot as the famed Chaldean furnace!

    Thus, when the heretic Waldenses,
    With their co-working Albigenses,
    Found, what they thought they might rely on,
    A nearer way to go to Zion,

    Those saints who trod the beaten path,
    Were fill’d so full of godly wrath,
    They burnt them _off_, nor thought it cruel,
    As one would burn a load of fuel!

    These things I note, to bring to view
    Some noble precedents for you:
    The chapter needs not any comment;
    Then pray don’t hesitate a moment.

    But, hark! what means that moaning sound!
    That thunder rumbling under ground!
    What mean those blue sulphureous flashes,
    That make us all turn pale as ashes!

    Why in the air this dreadful drumming,
    As though the devil himself were coming;
    Provoked by magical impostors,
    To carry off a doctor Faustus!

    Why scream the bats! why hoot the owls!
    While Darwin’s midnight bull-dog howls![61]
    Say, what portends this mighty rumpus,
    To fright our senses out of compass!

    ’Tis Radcliffe’s sullen sprite now rising,[62]
    To warn you by a sight surprising,
    More solemn than a curtain lecture,
    Or Monk-y Lewis’ Spanish Spectre![63]

    Now, in a sort of moody mutter,
    These awful sounds I hear him utter,
    Which make my heart to beat and thwack it,
    And burst the buttons off my jacket!

    “’Tis not from motives of endearment
    That I have burst my marble cearment;
    No; I’m from Hades, in a hurry,
    To make above ground one d--d flurry![64]

    “Arm’d, as the dread occasion urges,
    With _Ate’s_ borrow’d snakes and scourges,
    I come to rouse ye into action,
    To crush the Perkinising faction.

    “I tell you, these detested tractors,
    The worst of Satan’s manufactures,
    Will set themselves to supersede us,
    Will even blister, cup, and bleed us;

    “And they’ll be used as diuretics,
    Cathartics, anodynes, emetics,
    And will _begin_, before they’re _done_,
    To _tap_ for dropsy, _cut_ for stone.

    “The self-same metal, it is said,
    With friar Bacon’s brazen head,
    Each point’s a more mysterious thing
    Than Goodman Gyges’ brazen ring.

    “And they will mend a wooden leg
    Much better than a walnut peg,
    Will make a rogue a pair of ears,
    Who’s had them clipp’d by Justice’s shears.

    “Make Hydra heads spring up, I ween,
    For people shaved by guillotine;
    Thus force our freedom loving neighbors
    To recommence their humane labors.

    “Why stand ye now, with stupid stare,
    Hen-hearted cowards, as you are?
    Arise! and quickly gird your might on,
    And into battle then rush right on!

    “Go! teach Perkineans their errors,
    In tampering with the king of terrors!
    Go! teach the varlets to defy
    Our great and terrible ally!

    No pusilanimous responses
    That you’re not fond of broken sconces;
    Don’t say to me, you’ve no delight in
    The dreadful, awful, trade of fighting.

    “For you might chase them many a mile, and
    E’en bid them, scampering, quit our island,
    And still your carcases be strangers
    To troublous toils, and desperate dangers.

    “Appear in field, the battle’s won;
    Your phizzes show--L--d how they’ll run!
    But you’re like sheep, a sort of cattle,
    That one can’t well drive into battle.

    “O could I but affairs contrive
    To be for one half hour alive,
    What flaming shafts of indignation
    I’d hurl at imps of Tractoration!

    “I’ll batter ye with Pluto’s bludgeon,
    Unless to battle you now budge on,
    And make more bluster with your train,
    Than devils in a hurricane!

    “I’ll drive ye down”--but dawning day
    Bids bullying phantom hie away;
    While horror makes each hair stand steadfast,
    Like quill of hedgehog in our head fast!

    So stood the PREMIER of your nation,
    When ROBSON bawl’d out “DEFALCATION!
    Government’s robb’d by wicked men,
    And cannot pay NINETEEN POUNDS TEN”!!![65]

    So petrified stood bull and bear,
    Of Stock Exchange, when the lord mayor,
    With vile chagrin and terror quaking,
    Found Hawkesbury’s letter all a take-in.[66]

    Now should you slight the dire monition
    Of this ill boding apparition,
    You truly will be well deserving
    The dreadful destiny of starving!

    O then, dread sirs, brimful of rage,
    War! horrid war! is yours to wage,
    To extirpate the deadly schism,
    The heresy of Perkinism!

    Pursue the steps that learned sage hath,
    The most redoubted doctor HAYGARTH,
    Who erst o’er Perkins’s sconce at Bath,
    Broke a whole gallipot of wrath![67]

    Oh! could I sing Haygarth’s _chef d’œuvre_,
    That mighty magical manœuvre,
    That feat, thn which, you’ll own, if candid,
    None greater ever mortal man did!

    But ere I “sweep the sounding lyre,”
    Or tune Apollo’s fiddle higher,
    I’ll steal (although it cost a halter)
    A brand from Della Crusca’s altar.

    “O THOU!” who soar’dst to heights sublimer
    Than e’er before attain’d by rhymer,
    Till even my good friend Apollo
    At distance gazed, but dared not follow,

    “GENIUS or MUSE,” who had’st propensity
    To seem to strive to stretch immensity,
    Whose “_airy lays_,” quoth Bell’s fraternity,
    Would last through more than one eternity,

    (Although it seems, the deuce is in ’t,
    Those very lays are out of print,
    A proof this age does not inherit
    One ounce of true poetic spirit)

    O come, and bring (delightful things)
    A pair of Della Cruscan wings,
    That we, by sublimated flight,
    May “STEM THE CATARACT OF LIGHT.”

    Then condescend to be my crony,
    And guide my wild Parnassian pony,
    Till our aerial cutter runs[68]
    Athwart “A WILDERNESS OF SUNS!”[69]

    But Gifford comes, with why and wherefore;[70]
    And what the devil are you there for?
    Then tells a tale about the town,
    Contrived to lessen our renown.

    Says, if we rise but one inch higher,
    We set our hat and wig on fire;
    And that he’ll bet us ten to one
    We shall be scorch’d like Phaeton.

    Then I and Clio, as the case is,
    Must now resume our former places;
    But still, to _keep up_ our renown,
    We ride a “gairish sun-beam” _down_!

    And now once more, in humble station,
    We’ll jog along in plain narration;
    And _tollutate_ o’er turnpike path,[71]
    To view the conjuring crew at Bath.

    Behold! great Haygarth and his corps[72]
    Of necromancers, just a score,
    Enter the drear abodes of pain,
    Like death of old and horrid train!

    He comes! he comes! good heaven defend us!
    With magic rites, and things tremendous!
    With such as served the witch of Endor
    To make the powers of hell surrender!

    Now draws full many a magic circle;
    Now stamps, and foams, and swears meherc’le!
    As old Canidia used to mutter once,
    Just as her demon gave her utterance!

    Now tells each trembling bed-rid zany
    Terrific tales of one Galvani;
    How Franklin kept, to make folks wonder,
    A warehouse full of bottled thunder!

    Thus Shakspeare’s Macbeth’s wicked witches
    Even carry’d matters to such pitches,
    In hoity-toity midnight revel,
    The old hags almost raised the devil!

    And now our tragi-comic actors
    Torment a pair of _wooden_ tractors;
    All which, with many things they more did,
    In Haygarth’s book you’ll find recorded.

    Since doctor Haygarth, as we’ve stated,
    These points pernicious has prostrated,
    Our college ought to canonize him;
    Instead of that, the rogues despise him.

    And there’s a certain doctor Caldwell
    May calculate on being maul’d well,
    Unless, since he’s presumed to flout him,
    He _unsays_ all he’s _said_ about him.

    What right could he have to berate his
    Opinions, which were given _gratis_,
    Or state a plausible objection
    Against his doctrine of infection?

    O _man_ of _mineral putrefaction_,[73]
    In spite of imps of fell detraction,
    We greet thee on our bended knees
    Great Britain’s great Hippocrates.

    But if Haygarthian rites infernal
    Should fail our foes to overturn all,
    Seek ways and means to lay them level,
    Without one conjurer, witch, or devil.

    If you can find some one among
    You, who don’t value being hung,
    Perhaps the readiest mode would be
    To kill the conjuring patentee.

    But still I have some hesitation
    To recommend assassination;
    Although I’m sure ’twould not be cruel,
    To pop off Perkins in a DUEL.

    For this you’ve precedents quite ample,
    Full many a glorious example,
    From Goths and Vandals, out of temper, or
    A certain crazy Russian emperor.[74]

    For if the conjurer were shot dead,
    By some rude harum-scarum hot-head;
    Then might we quickly crush the flummery
    Of tract’ring mischief-making mummery.

    Perkins destroy’d, the INSTITUTION
    Will be o’erwhelm’d in dire confusion;
    And we shall easily be able
    To overturn this modern Babel.

    So, if a wolf should silent creep
    T’ attack by night a flock of sheep,
    He’d not attempt the whole together,
    But first invade the old bell-wether.[75]

    Let not the thought of Jack Ketch scare ye,
    But at him like brave Mac Namara,
    Avenge our wrongs in mode as summary
    As he adopted with Montgomery.

    For if said Mac be crown’d with laurel,
    Who kill’d a colonel in a quarrel
    About two dogs, between two puppies,
    Most mighty sirs, my trust and hope is,

    That nobody will think it is hard
    For us to shoot a conjuring wizard,
    Since all allow, sans hesitation,
    That we’ve received vast provocation.

    And if our champion’s full of fury,
    When he kills Perkins, then the jury
    (Provided they are made to fit him)
    Will most assuredly acquit him.[76]

    And when the foe is sent to Hades,
    Our champion will please the ladies,
    Because the pretty things delight in
    The man who kills his man in fighting.



                              CANTO III.

                              MANIFESTO.


                               ARGUMENT.

        The poet now, with Discord’s clarion
        Preludes the war we mean to carry on;
        And sends abroad a PROCLAMATION
        Against Perkinean conjuration;
        Proves that we ought to hang the tractors,
        On gibbet high, like malefactors,
        And with them that pestiferous corps,
        Who keep alive the paltry poor;
        By reasons sound, as e’er were taken,
        From Aristotle, Locke, or Bacon.


    But if you cannot find some one
    As bold as Attila the Hunn,
    T’ attack the conjuring tractoring noddy,
    And fairly bore him through the body;

    Collect a host of our profession,
    With all their weapons in possession;
    And _vi et armis_, then we’ll push on,
    And crush Perkinean Institution.

    But first, in flaming MANIFESTO,
    (To let John Bull and all the rest know,
    Why we should on these fellows trample,
    And make the rogues a sad example),

    Say to the public all you can say,
    Of magic spells, and necromancy;
    That Perkins and his crew are wizards,
    Conceal’d in sanctimonious vizards.

    Say to the public all you can say,
    Of wonder-working power of fancy:
    Tell what _imagination’s_ force is
    In crows and infants, dogs and horses:[77]

    Tell how their minds--but here you old men
    May trust the younkers under Coleman;
    For graduates at horses’ college,
    Most certainly are men of knowledge!

    That though imagination _cures_,
    With aid of pair of patent skewers,
    Still such relief cannot be _real_,
    For pain itself is all _ideal_.[78]

    Say that friend Davy, when he was
    Inspired with his oraculous gas,
    Utter’d this solemn truth, that nought
    E’er had existence, only _thought_!

    What though they say, why to be sure,
    If we by Fancy’s aid can CURE,
    Then why not use imagination,
    A _cheap_ and _simple_ operation?

    SAY NATURE THROUGH HER WORKS INTENDS
    ALL THINGS TO ANSWER SOME GREAT ENDS:
    THUS SHE FORM’D DRUGS TO PURGE AND SHAKE,
    THEN MAN, OF COURSE OF THOSE DRUGS TO TAKE.[79]

    That learn’d physicians pine with hunger,[80]
    The while a spruce young patent-monger
    Contrives to wheedle simple ninnies,
    And _tractorize_ away _our_ guineas.

    That many thousand cures attested
    Show death’s cold hand full oft arrested;
    But those who from his prey would part him,
    Should manage things _secundum artem_.

    That none should ancient customs vary,
    Nor _leges physicæ mutare_;
    And thus, to gain a cure unlook’d for,
    The patient _save_, but _starve_ the doctor.[81]

    That, though the Perkinistic fellows
    May have the impudence to tell us,
    That they can muster, on emergence,
    Renown’d physicians, learned surgeons;

    With many other men of merit,
    Philanthropy and public spirit,
    Not your self-puffing sons of vanity,
    But real HOWARDS of humanity.

    Say that those surgeons and physicians
    Are but a conjuring set of rich ones,
    Who, having made their fortunes, therefore,
    Have very little else to care for.

    Since they’ve no interest nor right in
    The very cause for which they’re fighting,
    Such non-commission’d volunteers,
    In eye of law, are buccaneers.

    And as by law a man may fire at,
    At any time, a rascal pirate,
    So we, with justice on our side,
    May hang these rogues before they’re try’d.

    Then draw a just, but black comparison,
    Which, if they’ve feelings left, will harass ’em,
    ’Twixt tractoring Perkinites, so smart,
    And other dealers in the _black_ art;

    That is, the chimney-sweepers sooty,
    Whose deeds, like Perkinites, are smutty;
    But as they are _aspiring_ geniuses,
    Like Perkinites, they find Mecenases.[82]

    But chimney-sweepers and Perkineans
    Are such a scurvy set of minions,
    That not one rogue among them back’d is,
    Except by knaves retired from practice.[83]

    That though certificates he dish up,
    From surgeon, doctor, parson, bishop;
    From gentle, simple, yeomen, squires,
    ’Tis written, “_that all men are liars_!”

    That grant his tractors cure diseases,
    Folks ought to die just when God pleases;
    But most of all the dirty poor,
    Who make, quoth Darwin, good manure;[84]

    That when the Russians, logger-headed,
    Were kill’d by Frenchmen, ever dreaded,
    Darwin rejoiced the filthy creatures
    Would serve for stock to make mosquitoes;[85]

    And also urges with propriety,
    That war’s no evil in society;
    But has a charming operation,
    To check excess of population.

    “Superfluous myriads from the earth
    Are swept by pestilence and dearth;”[86]
    Which drive his philosophic plan on,
    As well as blunderbuss or cannon;


    That, in this world’s great slaughter-house,
    Not only sheep and calves and cows,
    But “man erect, with thought elate,”
    Must “_duck_” to death his stubborn pate;[87]

    That in said butcher’s shop, the weakest
    Should always be kill’d off the quickest,
    Because Dame Nature gave the strongest
    The _right_ and _power_ to live the longest;

    That since “to die is but to sleep,”[88]
    And poor, diseased, are scabby sheep,
    That none need care a single button
    If we should make them all dead mutton;

    That death is but a trivial thing,
    Because a toadstool, or a king,
    Will, after death, be sure to rise
    In bats and bed-bugs, fleas and flies.[89]

    Besides, they’ll make, when kill’d in fight,
    Vast “monuments of past delight;”[90]
    And that to _think_ of is more pleasant,
    Than such delight _enjoy’d_ at present.

    Then no Darwinian philosopher,
    His conduct can contrive to gloss over,
    And make it with his tenets tally,
    Unless he round our standard rally,

    And join in strenuous endeavor
    The wretch’s thread of fate to sever,
    That having met their final doom,
    _They_ may have rest, _we_--elbow room.[91]

    Say that the deepest politicians
    Will join their powers with us physicians;
    Assist to overset the flummery
    Of Perkins’ mischief-making mummery,

    Nor suffer tractoring rogues to cure
    Such sordid shoals of paltry poor,
    Of whom it truly may be said,
    That they were ten times better dead.

    For when the old Nick comes and fetches
    Away the dirty set of wretches,
    Times will improve, because, the fact is,
    ’Twill lessen poor rates, worst of taxes.

    Say that those wights of skill surprising
    In science of economizing,
    Who cook up most delicious farings,
    From cheese rinds, and potato parings,

    Will thank us when this paltry band
    Are “kill’d off,” to manure the land;
    And they will make, I ween, besides,
    Morocco leather from their hides;

    And so contrive that every coffin,
    Which serves to lug a dead rogue off in,
    Shall answer, if it be not made ill,
    For living child, a clever cradle.

    And though they say, on man and horse,
    The tractors act with equal force;
    Still some among us can get through it,
    And swear old Satan helps him do it!

    In proof of tractoring defection
    Proclaim that wise and learn’d objection
    The famous argument, so handy,
    About their _modus operandi_.

    That a physician should neglect
    To notice e’en a good _effect_,
    Unless the _cause_, as he supposes,
    Is nine times plainer than his nose is;

    And though it may be urg’d by some,
    That this grave reasoning’s all a hum,
    Because the learn’d are in the dark
    How opium, mercury, acts, and bark,

    To such reply you’ll make no answers,
    For much I question if you can, sirs;
    But rather for retort uncivil,
    The poker take and lay them level.[92]

    From Haygarth, borrowing a rare hint,
    Tell how these tractors, ’tis apparent,
    The most insidious thing in nature,
    Will e’en _bewitch_ the _operator_![93]

    Will break down reason’s feeble fences,
    And play the deuce with our five senses!
    And acts a part, so very scurvy,
    They turn a man’s brains topsy turvy!

    Will so bewilder and astound one,
    They make a lame horse _seem_ a sound one!
    _Appear_, with but three legs to wag on,
    A Pegasus, or flying dragon!!

    Then quote his lady’s ECCHYMOSIS,[94]
    Which rose an inch from where her nose is;
    And was not bigger much, if any,
    He states, than puny “silver penny.”

    ’Twas then assail’d, with courage hearty,
    By juggling wench of Perkins’ party,
    And soon, to her beconjured eyes,
    It _seem’d_ a thousandth part its size.

    “And now,” quoth she, “I scarce can view it,
    These tractors are the things that do it;
    Oh, la! I vow, it’s taken flight,
    And vanish’d fairly out of sight.”

    But madam Hoaxhoax, in her glass,
    Beholding what it _truly_ was,
    Exclaim’d “my last new wig I’ll burn up,
    If ’tis not bigger than a turnip!!!”

    In public papers, more’s his glory,
    The doctor advertised this story;
    And you’ll confound the tractoring folks
    By Haygarth’s tale of lady Hoax.[95]

    Tell one more tale from ancient sages,
    About the wonderous chain of ages,
    Gold, silver, brass, but not a link,
    Composed of copper, or of zinc.

    That, as it ever was the curse
    Of man to go from bad to worse,
    This age (the thought might e’en distract us)
    Is that of vile metallic tractors!

    That your last sixpence you will bet all,
    Ages will follow of worse metal,
    Unless this wickedness you stop,
    To sweepings of a black-smith’s shop!

    Say that the devil never fails[96]
    To eat a tiger, stuff’d with nails;
    With claws and head and hair on, munching
    The savage creature at a luncheon!


    That one old woman, pain distracted,
    This part of satan over acted;
    In gulping tractors down, for med’cines,[97]
    With such effect, that faith she’s dead since.

    Then make it plain, by quoting Greek,
    That this old hag, of whom we speak,
    More brass and iron took in one day,
    Than satan all the week, with Sunday.

    But should the public turn deaf ear to ’t
    Tell them that I know who will swear to ’t
    And testify the whole affair
    Before his honor, the lord mayor!

    Say Perkinism was begotten
    In wilds where science ne’er was thought on,[98]
    And had its birth and education
    Quite at the fag end of creation!


    For raree-show, to England smuggled,
    That honest Christians, all bejuggled,
    Might tamely suffer B. D. Perkins
    To pick the pockets of their jerkins.

    Say it was twinn’d with monstrous mammoth,[99]
    And to go near it you’d be d--d loth,[100]
    Because it always eats poor sinners,
    As I eat bread and cheese for dinners!


    Say that it is “_monstrum horrendum_!”
    As great a plague as God could send ’em.
    Moreover, ’tis “_informe ingens_!”
    Brought up among the western Indians:

    Go on then; “_lumen cui ademptum_,”
    A worse thing satan never dreamt on;
    And sure your worships cannot urge ill,
    Such _classic_ matter--all from Virgil.

    Although the slightest scintillation,
    Of your terrific indignation,
    Should cause the foe to topple under,
    Like rotten gate-posts struck with thunder!

    Although that pity would be folly,
    Which checks said thunder in mid volley,
    Or intercepts annihilation
    From foresaid refuse of creation--

    ’Tis possible the rebel rout
    May rashly strive to stand it out;
    And therefore we will next disclose
    How to proceed from words to blows.



                               CANTO IV.

                             GRAND ATTACK!


                               ARGUMENT.

          Great Caustic, finding logic sound,
        The conjuring crew will not confound,
        Like an indignant hero blusters,
        The MIGHTY ROYAL COLLEGE musters;
        Joins to your worships’ powerful phalanx
        “Death-doing” quacks, and men of all ranks!
        A bolder, and more desperate host,
        Than jacobinic France can boast;
        Then marches to o’erturn and knock dead
        Each tractoring Perkinistic blockhead;
        Their INSTITUTION next attacking,
        He sends them all to Satan--packing!


    Our ’foresaid MANIFESTO first done,
    Which shows our cause a good and just one;
    The _boldest_ sons of Galen call on,[101]
    That they with fire and fury fall on!

    Sound Discord’s jarring tocsin louder,
    Than Howard’s fulminating powder:[102]
    Then into battle like brave men go,
    Who late were “kill’d off,” at Marengo.[103]

    But choose a chief before you start,
    A bully bold as Buonapart’;
    And to make sure of well succeeding,
    Another chap like Charles of Sweden.

    Step forth thou POTENT PRINCE OF PUFFERS!
    Thou modern Hercules of Huffers!
    Whose name, as Sternhold used to say,
    Will ring “for ever--and a day;”

    For thou canst sound (a thing the oddest,
    Since an arch quaker should be modest,
    And never meddle with a _strumpet_[104])
    Thine own great name on _Fame’s_ brass trumpet.

    And soon that name’s continuous roar
    Shall roll sublime from shore to shore;
    Among th’ antipodes, be known,
    And _blaze_ through either _frozen_ zone.[105]

    No more shall merciless reviewers,
    Stick full of satire’s savage skewers
    The mighty chief of whom I’m boasting,
    As one would spit a _goose_ for roasting.[106]

    For should they raise with dire misprision,
    ’Gainst thee one finger in derision;
    This right hand rudest doggrel’s club in,
    Shall give the knaves a dreadful drubbing.

    But thou, the leader of our throng,
    Shalt glitter in a future song,
    Which I intend to raise sonorous,
    And QUACK! QUACK!! QUACK!!! shall be the chorus.

    Then, had I money, I would bet some,
    And faith I’ll do it (when I get some)
    One half a guinea, sirs (a net sum)
    They’ll fall before great doctor Lettsom.[107]

    Thou too, famed KNIGHT OF HORRID FIGURE!
    With wig than bushel-basket bigger;
    Which, in its orbit vast, contains,
    At least a thimble full of brains;

    Come on, with lion heart, like Hector,
    And phiz resembling monkey’s spectre;
    Prepare the batteries of thy journal,[108]
    To blast with infamy eternal.

    In medical societies pour
    Forth all thy wonted _learned_ lore:
    Tell the vile deeds by quackery done,
    By every nostrum, save _thine own_.[109]

    For thou didst play the hero rarely,
    At Westminster, when routed fairly;
    Thy genius show’d such vast resources,
    ’Gainst Belgraves, Colquhouns, Wilberforces![110]

    Though hunted down, thou would’st not yield;
    Though trodden on, didst keep the field.
    Thus Witherington, in doleful dumps,
    For lack of legs, fought stout on stumps!

    And could’st thou, pertinacious Bradley,
    But maul these mutton heads most sadly,
    Soon might thy wig (the people staring)
    _All_ in a chariot take an airing![111]

    Led on by chieftains so redoubted,
    These vile Perkineans must be routed;
    Then, if in future people be sick,
    They’ll worship us, the gods of physic.

    Why stand ye now, like drones, astounded,
    The weapons of your warfare grounded?
    Arm’d _cap-a-pe_, like heroes rush on,
    And crush this reptile institution.

    But first, to make the bigger bluster,
    Join every quack that you can muster,
    Some place in rear, and some in front on,
    From Brodum down to _gaseous_ Thornton.[112]

    Now, when the foe you first get sight on,
    Shout CA IRA, and then rush right on;
    And make as terrible a racket,
    As ever did a woman’s clack yet,

    For should you sound a loud alarum,
    Perhaps you may so sadly scare ’em,
    Like frighted sheep, they’ll huddle right in
    The Old Nick’s den, without much fighting.

    Just so a gang of Indian savages,
    When they set out to make great ravages,
    With war-whoop fright their foes (God help ’em)
    And then proceed to kill and scalp ’em.

    Prudence, by Doctor Caustic’s test,
    A sneaking virtue is at best,
    Then drive ahead by hook and crook,
    Like lions, leap before you look.

    But stop, ere further we proceed,
    To set forth every mighty deed,
    We must exchange (tho’ horror stiffen ye)
    Our Clio for a fell Tisiphone!

    For when we do these wretches batter,
    ’Twill be no water gruel matter;
    And you’ll agree then, I assure ye,
    Our muse is well changed for a fury.

    Thou sprite! thou hag! thou witch! thou spectre!
    Friend Southey’s crony and protector:
    Who led the bard, with Joan of Arc,
    Through death’s deep, dreary, dungeon dark!

    Until ye were, I dare be bound,
    Near half a mile down under ground;
    Mid screeching ghosts and dragons dreadful,
    As e’er filled dreaming madman’s head full!

    And, after mighty perils past,
    On Terra Firma, got at last,
    Didst dub thy jacobin toad eater
    The “Thalaba” of English metre.[113]

    And set the bard to brew a mess
    Of horror in a wilderness,
    So wondrous horrible, indeed it
    Might make one faint away to read it!

    Thence sent him under “_rooted waves_”
    Adown through vast Domdaniel caves,[114]
    In which the metre man and Thalaba,
    Had like to have been lost infallibly:

    But were translated in a trice
    To monsieur Mahomet’s paradise,[115]
    There to enjoy, with Houri-ladies,
    A whole eternity of play days.

    Give me in proper tone to tell,
    Between a mutter and a yell,
    How best our fierce avenging choler
    May do dire deeds of doleful dolor.

    Come on! Begin the grand attack
    With aloes, squills, and ipacac;
    And then with clyster-pipe and squirt-gun,
    There will be monstrous deal of hurt done!

    Each wry-faced rogue, and dirty trollop,
    Must well be dosed with drastic jalap,
    And though their insides you should call up,
    Still make the numskulls take it all up.

    Cram all the ninny-hammers’ gullets,
    With pills as big as pistol bullets;
    And mingle mercury enough
    To season well your doctor’s stuff.

    Dash at them escharotics gnawing,
    Their carcases to pick a flaw in;
    Of nitrous acid huge carboys,
    Filled to the brim, like Margate hoys.

    Thus when the Greeks with their commander,
    That fighting fellow, Alexander,
    Set out one morning, full of ire,
    To take and burn the town of Tyre;

    A patriotic stout old woman
    Looked out, and saw the chaps a coming;
    When on a sudden she bethought her
    To heat a kettle full of water;

    And as they went to climb the ladder,
    (Sure never vixen could be madder,
    But so the historian of the fray says)
    She fired her water in their faces!

    But to return to _our_ great battle;
    Now rant! rave! roar! and rend! and rattle![116]
    Like earth-born giants when they strove,
    To pull the ears of thundering Jove!

    Pelt the vile foe with weapons missile;
    Make vials round their sconces whistle;
    Shower on them a tremendous torrent,
    Of gallipots and bottles horrent.

    Make at ’em now like mad Mendozas;
    With forceps pinch and pull their noses,
    With tourniquet and dire tooth-drawers,
    First gird their necks, then break both jaws.

    But lo! they bid our dread alliance
    Of doctors, quacks, and drugs defiance;
    And, firm as host of cavaliers,
    Convert their tractors into spears!

    See host to host and man to man set!
    A tractor each, and each a lancet!
    Each meets his foe, so fierce attacks him!
    That sure some god or demon backs him!

    Fell Ate’s shriek the world alarms!
    Bellona bellows “ARMS! TO ARMS!”
    War’s demon dire, a great red dragon,
    Drives, Jehu-like, Death’s iron wagon!![117]

    Loud shouts and dismal yells arise!
    Rend the blue “blanket” of the skies![118]
    Grim Horror’s scream and Fury’s frantic
    Howl might be heard across the Atlantic!!

    Although a comet’s tail should hap
    To give our globe a fatal slap,
    The “crush of worlds” and “wreck of matter”
    Would make ten thousand times less clatter!

    Thus high in air two different kinds
    Of monsieur Volney’s warring winds
    Commence a most impetuous battle,
    And round the Blue Ridge make all rattle.[119]

    Loud, loud they bellow, blow and bluster,
    With all the power that all can muster;
    Harsh hurtle, howl, and hiss, but neither
    Will yield his foe an inch of ether.

    Now to the wretches give no quarter,
    Pound them in indignation’s mortar;
    Let not the women nor the men chance
    To ’scape the pestle of your vengeance!

    Make cerebrum and cerebellum,
    To rattle like a roll of vellum,
    And occiput of every numhead,
    To sound as loud as kettle-drum head.

    With fell trepaning perforator,
    Pierce every puppy’s paltry pate, or
    With chissel plied with might and main,
    Punch a huge hole in pericrane.

    And with a most tremendous process,
    With power of elephant’s proboscis,
    At once crush dura, pia mater,
    As one would mash a boil’d potato!

    Pelt, pulverize the rogues with shocks
    Like those from moon-disploded rocks,
    Sent from that mischief-making planet,
    Huge, hissing hot, and hard as granite.[120]

    Now, with harsh amputating saw,
    Slash frontal os from under jaw;
    And make a wound, by cutting slant down,
    For doctor Tasker to descant on.[121]

    Attack Medulla, hight Spinalis,
    From where the head to where the tail is;[122]
    Till every bone displays a fracture
    Of scientific manufacture.

    Thus Virgil tells of sturdy fellows,
    Dares ycleped, and old Entellus,
    Who, with a pair of iron mittens,
    Attack’d each other, like true Britons.

    Entellus, stout as Hob the giant,
    Made horrid work, you may rely on’t;
    Exceeding mightiest verse or prose deed,
    Knock’d out two teeth, and made his nose bleed!

    And now, with desperate trocar,
    Urge on the dreadful “tug of war;”
    And, having punch’d them in the crop, say
    You meant to tap them for the dropsy.

    With burning lapis infernalis,[123]
    Convince them human nature frail is;
    And taunting, tell them they’re afflicted,
    Because they are to sin addicted.

    With scalprum scrape off epidermis
    And cuticle (I think the term is)
    And all the nerves and muscles various,
    Because, say you, their bones, are carious.

    Thus rocks of primitive creation
    Are worn down by disintegration,
    Until the mountain mass is brought
    To 99 times less than 0.

    And when reduced to that condition,
    By some additional attrition,
    They furnish, by their aggregation,
    The pabulum of vegetation.

    With antimonials make them sweat away;
    Cram each snout full of asafœtida:
    Then tell them that their case you fancied
    Required some castor oil, so rancid.

    And though the drug seem somewhat baleful
    Give each a dose of half a pailful;
    Then thank them not to make wry faces,
    For mild cathartics suit their cases.

    Dash at them nitrate, hight argentum,
    And tell them, though it does torment ’em
    That papists say that purgatory
    Is but a passport into glory.

    Thus monsieur Satan was quite merry,[124]
    When erst, in Heaven, he raised old Harry;
    With jokes and cannon, _in terrorem_,
    Rush’d on and drove ’em all before him.

    Stick your keen penetrating probes
    Through right and left hepatic lobes;
    And though you pierce the diaphragm,
    You need not care a single d--n.

    So Indians, when a captive’s taken,
    And they resolve to fry his bacon,
    Their savage torture to refine,
    First stick him full of splinter’d pine.

    Dissect a rogue or two alive,
    For thus your worships may contrive
    To trace the vital springs in action
    Of nature’s movements to a fraction.

    In fine, your worships will contrive
    To leave not one vile wretch alive,
    Except those dirty sons of witches,
    Whom nature meant to dig in ditches.

    But all who would not make most topping
    Fellows to work in docks at Wapping,
    Some way or other, sirs, I’d have ye
    Give a quick passport to old Davy.

    But if with all this blood and thunder,
    The stubborn blockheads won’t knock under,
    And e’en old women bravely wield
    Their jordans like Achilles’ shield;

    No more with these _our_ weapons dabble,
    But raise a Lord-George-Gordon rabble;
    Pour on the rogues, that they be undone,
    The whole mobocracy of London!

    Go, when I bid you, order out
    A riotous and ragged rout
    From dirty lane and alley dark
    From Poplar corner to Hyde Park.

    Come on, brave fellows, quick surround ’em;
    With canes and cudgels punch and pound ’em;
    Brick-bats and broom-sticks, all together,
    Like coblers hammering sides of leather.

    Brave Belcher, Lee, Mendoza, Bourke,
    Let loose your fists in this great work!
    Here’s fine amusement for your paws,
    Without the dread of police laws.

    Let not one Perkinite be found
    Encumbering our British ground;
    But keep on pelting, banging, mauling,
    Until old Beelzy’s den they’re all in.

    And I’ll be there and blow war’s trumpet:
    Or with death’s kettle-drum will thump it,
    Till all’s “confusion, worse confounded”
    Than erst in Milton’s hell abounded.

    Thus, when the Spartans were in trouble,
    Tyrteus help’d them through their hobble,
    By singing songs, to raise their courage,
    All piping hot, as pepper-porridge.

    These are the methods of “dead doing,”
    By which to work the wizard’s ruin;
    And when with Satan all such trash is,
    We’ll rise, like Phenix, on its ashes.

    Now, sirs, consent to my PETITION,
    And send these varlets to perdition;
    So for your weal and welfare, _post hic_,
    Will ever pray--

                                   CHRISTOPHER CAUSTIC.



                           ADDITIONAL NOTES.


                                No. I.

    Fitted for female education.

Page 25. We are point blank opposed to allowing females any advantages
for education, which can possibly induce their ladyships to set up
for literata. “_Knowledge is Power_,” and whereas the “seraphic sex”
are prone to acquire knowledge with more facility, and communicate
it with more felicity than the rough samples of humanity with whom
Madam Destiny has had the impudence to connect them by ties (pretty
easily severed nowadays) we are amazingly apprehensive that ladies
will not only monopolize our trade of authorship, but usurp our
places in Church, State and Medicine. We have often shed cataracts of
tears (Della Crusca) over the following lines of Pope, which, though
addressed to lady Montague, will apply equally well to nine hundred
and ninety-nine other lady luminaries, in whose presence the light of
Dr CAUSTIC is like the glimmer of a glow worm in the glare of
sunshine.

        “In beauty or wit
        No mortal as yet
    To question your empire has dared
        But men of discerning
        Have thought that in learning
    To _yield to a woman is hard_.”

But with leave of the pope, we lords of the lower part of creation will
not “yield to a woman.” We will rather let Lord Bacon and the ladies
know, by dint of the right of the strongest, that knowledge _is not_
power, but that _physical strength is power_.

We are excessively provoked with the conductors of the North American
Review, who in the No. of that work, dated October, 1835, p. 430, have
reviewed, or rather eulogized certain Poems by Mrs Sigourney, and by
Miss Gould. And what makes such conduct the more preposterous is that
those ladies _deserve_ the encomiums of their admiring Reviewers.
They have, likewise, brought into bold relief a great number of
lady-authors, such as Miss Burney, Miss Edgworth, Miss Baillie, Miss
Martineau, Miss Mitford, Mrs Somerville, Mrs Hemans, Miss Sedgwick,
Miss Leslie, Mrs Child, Mrs Hale, &c., whose names and whose merits,
correct policy would have consigned to oblivion. Now, be it known, by
these presents, that the more merit there happens to be attached to a
lady-author, the more her productions should _not_ be taken honorable
notice of by a gentleman-critic.


                                No. II.

    In foreign source of yellow fever.

Page 54. Some doctors, however, do not coincide in opinion with Dr
Caustic on this subject. Dr Miller, in a _“Report on the malignant
disease, which prevailed in New York, in the autumn of 1805,” has the
following passage_:

“We live in the latitude of pestilence, and our climate now perhaps
is only beginning to display its tendency to produce this terrible
scourge. The impurities which time and a police, rather moulded in
conformity to the usages of more northern countries than the exigencies
of our own, have been long accumulating, are now annually exposed
to the heats of a burning summer, and send forth exhalations of the
highest virulence.”


                               No. III.

Page 82, we told your worships, that Perkins was supported by Aldini,
and promised some additional remarks by way of illustrating our
assertion. We now intend to prove not only that we were correct in our
statement, but that light, heat or caloric, electricity, Galvanism,
Perkinism, animal spirits, the social feelings, especially when _love_
is concerned, and the stimulus of society, are all intimately connected
or different modifications of the same matter.

We will show that _light_ and _heat_ are the same thing in essence, by
the authority of some of our prime philosophers whom it would be heresy
to dispute or gainsay.

“Universal space,” says Dr Franklin, “so far as we know of it, seems
filled with a subtil fluid, whose motion, or vibration, is called light.

“This fluid may possibly be the same with that which attracted by
and entering into other more solid matter, dilates the substance, by
separating the constituent particles and so rendering some _solids
fluid_, and maintaining the fluidity of others; of which fluid when
our bodies are totally deprived, they are said to be frozen; when they
have a proper quantity they are in health, and fit to perform all their
functions; it is then called natural heat; when too much, it is called
fever; and when forced into the body in too great a quantity from
without, it gives pain by separating and destroying the flesh, and is
then called burning; and the fluid so entering and acting is called
fire.” _Transactions of the American Philosophical Society_, vol. iii.
p. 5, 6.

Now we will see what Lavoisier, according to Fourcroy, can tell us on
this subject.

“The comparison which the more modern philosophers, and particularly my
illustrious friend Monge, have established between _caloric and light_,
so as to consider these two effects as the _product of modifications of
the same body_, is entitled to much more attention. It is established
on a great number of experiments; it naturally and simply explains most
of the phenomena; and it agrees with the sublime economy of nature,
which multiplies effects much more than the bodies which produce them.

“Fire,” he continues, “is disengaged, and shows itself in the form of
_heat_, when it is gently and slowly driven out of bodies into the
composition of which it entered; but it shines in the form of _light_
when it flies out of compounds, in a very compressed state, by a swift
motion.

“According to this ingenious hypothesis, _caloric_ may become _light_,
and _light_ on the other hand may become _caloric_. For this purpose
it is only necessary that the first should assume more rapidity in its
motion, and the second undergo a diminution of velocity.” _Nicholsons’
Fourcroy_, vol. i. p. 57.

Our next step in this our wonderful process is to prove, that light,
which is the same as heat, may also be identified with _electricity_.

Here I shall produce the authority of a writer in the Encyclopædia
Britannica, who appears to be a very sound philosopher. Under the title
Electricity, article 83, you will find that gunpowder has been fired by
the electric blast; from which the writer reasons as follows.

“As it therefore appears, that the electric fluid, when it moves
through bodies either with great rapidity or in very great quantity
will set them on fire, _it seems scarce disputable_, that this fluid
is the same with the _element of fire_. This being once admitted, the
source from whence the electric fluid is derived into the earth and
atmosphere must be exceedingly evident, being no other than the sun
or source of light itself.” The writer then proceeds to show, that an
iron wire has been melted by the discharge of a battery of electricity,
and furnishes proofs which must convince the most incredulous, of the
correctness of his theory.

Thus far we have proceeded triumphantly in making it abundantly
evident that light, heat, and electricity are the same in substance;
so that if your worships will permeate this subject with due retention
and some small share of true philosophical perspicacity, you will find
that heat and electricity are the dregs or sediment of light, and by
digesting Dr Black’s theory of latent heat, you will find that the
matter of heat, light, and electricity exists in very vast abundance in
all bodies and substances.

We next will prove that Galvanism is a modification of electricity.
Here we will advert to the theory of Galvani and Aldini, as stated by
C. H. Wilkinson, lecturer on Galvanism in Soho square, Member of the
Royal College of Surgeons, &c. &c. This gentleman informs us, that “the
animal body is a description of _Leyden phial_, or magic battery, in
one part of which there is an excess of electricity, and in the other
a deficiency. _The conducting body communicates the fluid of the part
where it is abundant to the part_ where it is defective; and in this
passage of the electricity, the muscular contractions are obtained in
the same way as the discharges are produced by the Leyden phial or
magic batteries. As the _conducting bodies_ in electricity are the sole
agents in the discharge of the Leyden phial, so the same bodies alone
serve likewise to excite muscular contractions.” _Wilkinson’s Elements
of Galvanism_, p. 82.

We next will prove that Perkins’s points are the proper conductors of
animal electricity. From a specification which Mr Perkins published
in the Repertory of Arts, it would seem that _zinc_ is the principal
ingredient in the tractors.

“Zinc,” says Fourcroy, “is a conductor of electricity like all other
metals, and nothing particular has hitherto been discovered in it with
respect to this property; however, the _powerful manner in which it
effects the sensibility of the human body in Galvanic experiments seems
to give it herein a sort of prerogative_ or pre-eminence over other
metallic substances. If we place a plate of zinc under the tongue,
and cover the upper surface of this organ with another metal, and
especially a piece of gold or silver, and then incline the extremity
of this last, so as to approach it to the plate of zinc, at the moment
when the two metals come into contact with each other, the person who
performs the experiments feels a very perceptible pricking sensation,
heat, irritation, and a sort of acerb taste in the tongue, almost
always accompanied with a _momentous_ glare, or luminous circle, which
suddenly appears before his eyes. No metal produces this singular
effect with such force as zinc is observed to do.”

This animal electricity is likewise a modification of what we call
_animal spirits_, and may be termed the _stimulus of society_. That
this was well known to the wisest of men, is evident from this adage
of Solomon: “Iron sharpeneth iron; so a man sharpeneth the countenance
of his friend.” The want of a proper communication among animal
Leyden phials is the cause of the gloom of the _solitaire_. The wish
to partake of the benefits of the stimulus of society makes man a
gregarious animal, and induces the human race to congregate in large
cities, and to be fond of routs, balls, assemblies, in which the
aforesaid human electric phials are beaming _animal electricity_ in
every direction, and thus a flow of animal spirits is communicated by a
pleasing contagion to all present.

When we see an animal Leyden phial superabounding with animal
electricity, we say it is a _spirited animal_. When said animal happens
to be a hero, a tiger, an irritated ram cat, or a black snake intent
on his game, visible flashes of electricity will blaze from the eyes,
and communicate very sensible shocks to a spectator. Thus the Gaul,
who was commanded to cut off the head of Marius, a celebrated Roman
general, and a personage full of the most _positive sort of animal
electricity_, received such a _stroke_ of lightning from the battery
of that hero’s head, and at the same time was so _thunderstruck_ with
the exclamation of “_Tune, homo, audes occidere Caium Marium?_” that
the dagger dropped bloodless from the hands of the ruthless assassin.
Thus Alexander, when hampered in the chief city of the Oxydracæ,
kept his foes at a distance by the fire that flashed from his eyes
in whole torrents of animal electricity. How often do we see a
Congressional spouter, or an itinerant field preacher _electrize_ a
large assembly by repeated discharges of this mysterious fluid. In all
cases of fanaticism it is mistaken for the fire of devotion, and causes
grimaces, contortions, convulsions, and other strange symptoms, which,
however, are easily accounted for by the theory of the “animal Leyden
phial.”

But the prettiest experiments ever made with animal electricity, I
have seen sometimes exhibited by a female philosopher to a levee
of her admirers. On such occasions, the lady’s eyes seem to be
fountains of _animal electricity_. This electricity, however, is not
_vitreous_ and _resinous_, but _positive_ and _negative_. The former
expressed by a _glance of approbation_, and the latter by a _flash of
disdain_. The different effects which discharges of these different
kinds of electricity exhibit in the subjects of experiment may be
rated among the most wonderful of phenomena. The former transports a
man, Southey-like, to “the atmosphere of the highest of all possible
heavens,” the latter sinks him “down! down! to the Domdaniel cave at
the roots of the ocean.” But as this is a branch of natural philosophy
to which, for forty years, past I have not paid the least attention,
I shall not attempt further to instruct your worships therein, but
refer you to the experiments so delectably set forth in the poems of
Little, Johannes Bonefonius, Secundus, and other adepts in that curious
science.



                 AN ODE.[125]


    Ye sons of Columbia, unite in the cause
    Of liberty, justice, religion, and laws;
    Should foes then invade us, to battle we’ll hie,
    For the GOD OF OUR FATHERS will be our ally!
              Let Frenchmen advance,
              And all Europe join France,
      Designing our conquest and plunder;
              United and free
              For ever we’ll be,
      And our cannon shall tell them in thunder,
    That foes to our freedom we’ll ever defy,
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry!

    When Britain assail’d us, undaunted we stood,
    Defended the land we had purchased with blood,
    Our liberty won, and it shall be our boast,
    If the old world united should menace our coast:--
              Should millions invade,
              In terror array’d,
      Our liberties bid us surrender,
              Our country they’d find
              With bayonets lined,
      And Washington here to defend her,
    For foes to our freedom we’ll ever defy
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry!

    Should Buonapart’ come with his sans culotte band,
    And a new sort of freedom we don’t understand,
    And make us an offer to give us as much
    As France has bestow’d on the Swiss and the Dutch,
              His fraud and his force
              Will be futile of course;
      We wish for no _Frenchified_ freedom:
              If folks beyond sea
              Are to bid us be free,
      We’ll send for them when we shall need ’em.
    But sans culotte Frenchmen we’ll ever defy,
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry!

    We’re anxious that Peace may continue her reign,
    We cherish the virtues which sport in her train;
    Our hearts ever melt, when the fatherless sigh,
    And we shiver at Horror’s funereal cry;
              But still, though we prize
              That child of the skies,
      We’ll never like slaves be accosted.
              In a war of defence
              Our means are immense,
      And we’ll fight till our _all_ is exhausted:
    For foes to our freedom we’ll ever defy,
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry!

    The EAGLE of FREEDOM with rapture behold!
    Overshadow our land with his plumage of gold!
    The flood-gates of glory are open on high,
    And Warren and Mercer descend from the sky!
              They come from above
              With a message of love,
      To bid us be firm and decided;
              “At liberty’s call,
              Unite one and all,
      For you conquer, unless you’re divided.
    Unite, and the foes to your freedom defy,
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry!”

    “Americans, seek no occasion for war;
    The rude deeds of rapine still ever abhor;
    But if in defence of your rights you should arm,
    Let toils ne’er discourage, nor dangers alarm.
              For foes to your peace
              Will ever increase,
      If freedom and fame you should barter,
              Let those rights be yours,
              While nature endures,
      For OMNIPOTENCE gave you the charter!”
    Then foes to our freedom we’ll ever defy,
    Till the continent sinks, and the ocean is dry.



              THE MORNING.


    Behold, my fair, the ruddy morn
      Anticipate the day;
    What beauteous tints the sky adorn,
      And gild the azure way!

    The sombre mists, which gloomy night
      Had gather’d in the vale,
    Are borne aloft, and wing their flight
      Before the rising gale.

    Now changed to clouds of varied hue,
      In airy maze they dance;
    Now sweep athwart the welkin blue,
      And gem the gay expanse.

    The plumy tenant of the grove
      Is perch’d on yonder spray,
    And serenades his little love
      With sweetest roundelay.

    To taste the pleasures of the morn
      Is bliss without alloy,
    Though fashion’s drowsy vot’ries scorn
      To quaff the cup of joy.

    But rise, my lovely charmer, rise
      To greet the early ray,
    And let my TERAMINTA’S eyes
      Add lustre to the day.



              AN ODE.[126]


    ALMIGHTY POWER!--The ONE SUPREME!
      Our souls inspire, attune our lays
    With hearts as solemn as our theme,
      To sing hosannas to thy praise!

    Then, while we swell the sacred song,
      And bid the pealing anthem rise
    May seraphim the strain prolong,
      And hymns of glory fill the skies.

    Thy word omnific form’d this earth,
      Ere time began revolving years--
    Thy fiat gave to Nature birth,
      And tuned to harmony the spheres.

    When stern oppression’s iron hand,
      Our pious fathers forced to roam,
    And o’er the wild wave seek the land
      Where freedom rears her hallow’d dome--

    When tempests howl’d, and o’er the main,
      Pale horror rear’d his haggard form;
    Thou didst the fragile bark sustain
      To stem the fury of the storm!

    Thou badest the wilderness disclose
      The varied sweets of vernal bloom--
    The desert blossom’d like the rose,
      And breath’d Arabia’s rich perfume!

    Look down from heaven’s empyreal height,
      And gild with smiles this happy day;
    Send us some chosen SON OF LIGHT
      Our feet to guide in wisdom’s way.

    The sons of faction strike with awe,
      And hush the din of party rage,
    That LIBERTY, secured by LAW,
      May realize a golden age.

    On those thy choicest blessings shower
      To whom the cares of State are given;
    May Justice wield the sword of power,
      TILL EARTH’S THE MINIATURE OF HEAVEN!



        ON THE DEATH OF WASHINGTON.


    Why moves to mournful measures slow
    Yon sable retinue of wo,
      With tearful eye and visage pale?
    And why this universal gloom?
    Sure Nature trembles o’er her tomb,
      And bids her wilder’d children wail!

    Do plagues infest, do wars alarm,
    Has God in wrath made bare his arm,
      To hurl his bolts of vengeance round?
    Have towns been sack’d by hostile ire,
    Have cities sunk in floods of fire,
      While earthquakes shook the shuddering ground?

    Ah! no, thy sons, Columbia, mourn
    A hero past that fatal “bourn
      From whence no traveller returns;”
    Before him none more good, more great,
    E’er felt the unerring shafts of fate,
      Though glory’s lamp illume their urns.

    Behold yon pallid war-worn chief,
    A marble monument of grief,
      Who once our troops to victory led;--
    The burst of sorrow now control,
    But now the tears of anguish roll,
      A tribute to the _immortal dead_!

    Fain would the muse those virtues scan,
    Which dignified the godlike man,
      And launch in seas without a shore;
    But sure his name alone conveys
    More than a thousand hymns of praise,
      The matchless WASHINGTON’S no more!



      DIRECTIONS FOR DOING POETRY.[127]

  IN THE SIMPLE STYLE OF SOUTHEY, WORDSWORTH, AND
           OTHER MODERN METRE MONGERS.


    Supposing you would sing
    About love in the Spring,
    Something like this will be just the thing.
      Tell the reader to behold
                The gay
      Tints of the cloud-dappled _morn_!
    Then streak the azure with gems set in gold,
      And bring into view
      Some Tyrian hue,
      Mix’d with indigo blue.
    Then the meads must be _spangled_,
      And glittering _grove_
      With OCEANS of dew!
            _Whew!!_

    But now you must mind
    That rhymes you must find
    For lines left behind,
        You therefore must _rove_,
              Say
      On any day
      About the fag end of May,
      And bid lilacs _adorn_
      Your beautiful _morn_;
      And the thickets must be tangled
      For the sake of your _spangled_.

    Now having found
    Yourself on firm ground,
    You may roam along the edges
    Of hawthorn hedges;
    Then bid beds of roses
    And pretty pink posies
    _Ravish_ our eyes and _captivate_ our noses!!!
    Interweave, if you will,
    The hyacinth and daffodil,
      With now and then a big weed
      Of purslain and of pig weed,
        And add fragrant crops
        Of potato tops,
    And scatter, here and thereabout,
        As many hops
    As you may please to care about;
        And, between whiles,
              Say
        That Nature smiles,
        In her new holiday
              Dress;--
            Nevertheless,
        These beauties so rare
        Can never compare
        With the dear little dove
        With whom you’re in love.

    Next glance a quick eye
    To the flame cinctur’d, multihu’d arch in the sky;--
    In our vernacular idiom call’d a rainbow,
    Which perhaps the unpoetic reader would fain know.
      Then _positively declare_,
      That Amanda the fair,
      Who really beats the Dutch,
        Exceeds as much
        All such
    As does a fine lilac silk gown
    The dirtiest grogram in town.
    Then bid your muse higher fly,
        And say your queen of lasses
        Each country wench surpasses,
        Yea, far more excels
        Your Moggies and Nells,
    Than doth the noontide blaze the scintillating fire fly.



                  HORACE SURPASSED.


    How funny ’tis, when pretty lads and lasses
    Meet altogether, just to have a caper,
    And the black fiddler plays you such a tune as
                                  Sets you a frisking.

    High bucks and ladies, standing in a row all,
    Make finer show than troops of continentals.
    Balance and foot it, rigadoon and chasse,
                                  Brimful of rapture.

    Thus poets tell us how one Mister Orpheus
    Led a rude forest to a contra-dance, and
    Play’d the brisk tune of Yankee Doodle on a
                                  New Holland fiddle.

    Spruce our gallants are, essenced with pomatum,
    Heads powder’d white as Killington-Peak snowstorm;[128]
    Ladies, how brilliant, fascinating creatures,
                                  All silk and muslin!

    But now behold a sad reverse of fortune,
    Life’s brightest scenes are checker’d with disaster,
    Clumsy Charles Clumpfoot treads on Tabby’s gown, and
                                  Tears all the tail off!

    Stop, stop the fiddler, all away this racket--
    Hartshorn and water! See the ladies fainting,
    Paler than primrose, fluttering about like
                                  Pigeons affrighted!

    Not such the turmoil, when the sturdy farmer
    Sees turbid whirlwinds beat his oats and rye down,
    And the rude hail-stones, big as pistol-bullets,
                                  Dash in his windows!

    Willy Wagnimble dancing with Flirtilla,
    Almost as light as air-balloon inflated,
    Rigadoons round her, ’till the lady’s heart is
                                  Forced to surrender.

    Benny Bamboozle cuts the drollest capers,
    Just like a camel, or a hippopot’mus,
    Jolly Jack Jumble makes as big a rout as
                                  Forty Dutch horses!

    See Angelina lead the mazy dance down,
    Never did fairy trip it so fantastic;
    How my heart flutters, while my tongue pronounces
                                  Sweet little seraph!

    Such are the joys, that flow from contra-dancing,
    Pure as the primal happiness of Eden,
    Love, mirth, and music, kindle in accordance
                                  Raptures extatic.



                SONG.[129]


    When cannons roar, when bullets fly,
    And shouts and groans affright the sky,
    Amid the battle’s dire alarms,
    I’ll think, my Mary, on thy charms;
            The crimson field
            Fresh proof shall yield
          Of thy fond soldier’s love;
            And thy dear form
            In battle’s storm
          His guardian angel prove.

    Should dangers thicken all around,
    And dying warriors strew the ground,
    In varied shapes, though death appear,
    Thy fancied form my soul shall cheer;
            The crimson field
            Fresh proof shall yield
          Of thy fond soldier’s love;
            And thy dear form
            In battle’s storm
          His guardian angel prove.

    And when loud cannons cease to roar,
    And when the din of battle’s o’er,
    When safe return’d from war’s alarms,
    O then I’ll feast on Mary’s charms!
            In ecstacy
            I’ll fly to thee
          My ardent passion prove,
            Left glory’s field,
            My life I’ll yield
          To all the joys of love.



           TABITHA TOWZER.


    Miss Tabitha Towzer is fair,
      No guinea-pig ever was neater,
    Like a hakmatak slender and spare,
      And sweet as a musk-squash, or sweeter.

    Miss Tabitha Towzer is sleek,
      When dress’d in her pretty new tucker,
    Like an otter that paddles the creek,
      In quest of a mud-pout, or sucker.[130]

    Her forehead is smooth as a tray,
      Ah! smoother than that, on my soul,
    And turn’d, as a body may say,
      Like a delicate neat wooden-bowl.

    To what shall I liken her hair,
      As straight as a carpenter’s line,
    For similes sure must be rare,
      When we speak of a nymph so divine.

    Not the head of Nazarite seer,
      That never was shaven or shorn,
    Nought equals the locks of my dear
      But the silk of an ear of green corn.

    My dear has a beautiful nose,
      With a sled-runner crook in the middle,
    Which one would be led to suppose
      Was meant for the head of a fiddle.

    Miss Tabby has two pretty eyes,
      Glass buttons shone never so bright,
    Their love-lighted lustre outvies
      The lightning-bug’s twinkle by night.

    And oft with a magical glance,
      She makes in my bosom a pother,
    When leering politely askance,
      She shuts one, and winks with the other.

    The lips of my charmer are sweet,
      As a hogshead of maple molasses,
    And the ruby red tint of her cheek,
      The gill of a salmon surpasses.

    No teeth like her’s ever were seen,
      Nor ever described in a novel,
    Of a beautiful kind of pea-green,
      And shaped like a wooden-shod-shovel.

    Her fine little ears, you would judge,
      Were wings of a bat in perfection;
    A dollar I never should grudge
      To put them in Peale’s grand collection.

    Description must fail in her chin,
      At least till our language is richer,
    Much fairer than ladle of tin,
      Or beautiful brown earthen pitcher.

    So pretty a neck, I’ll be bound,
      Never join’d head and body together,
    Like nice crook’d neck’d squash on the ground,
      Long whiten’d by winter-like weather.

    Should I set forth the rest of her charms,
      I might by some phrase that’s improper,
    Give modesty’s bosom alarms,
      Which I wouldn’t do for a copper.

    Should I mention her gait or her air,
      You might think I intended to banter;
    She moves with more grace, you would swear,
      Than a founder’d horse forced to a canter.

    She sang with a beautiful voice,
      Which ravish’d you out of your senses;
    A pig will make just such a noise
      When his hind-leg stuck fast in the fence is.



          THE SPLENDORS OF THE SETTING SUN.


    Sol, slowly sinking down the steep of heaven,
      With softened splendor greets the musing eye,
    Resigns his throne to “sober suited even,”
      But decorates while he deserts the sky.

    His noonday beams, insufferably bright,
      Are now succeeded by a milder blaze,
    And every slanting filament of light
      Heaven’s kind and cheering effluence conveys.

    Now let me wend my solitary way
      Where groves and lawns present alternate charms;--
    Gaze on the glories of the waning day,
      Till night shall fold me in her dusky arms.

    Mark how the clouds now glow like molten gold,
      Now gleam like snow-banks, heap’d on banks of snow;
    Now dash’d with azure, softer hues unfold,
      Now shift and kindle to a furnace-glow!

    Compared with these, what is the pride of art!
      Your petty palaces and pigmy spires--
    The paltry pageants of the noisy mart,
      And all the city-connoisseur admires!

    Should the whole race of man unite as one
      To celebrate some glorious festal day,
    The simple splendor of the setting sun
      Would far surpass their most superb display.



             THE SLEEP OF THE SLUGGARD.


    O list to an indolent lump of live lumber,
      Whom slothfulness binds with invisible bands,
    A little more sleep, and a little more slumber,
      A little more folding together the hands.

    “I’ve a villainous cold--and my head, how it aches!
      The north wind is blowing, and stings like a hornet,
    And as to this rising as soon as day breaks,
      ’Tis a vile vulgar habit, and gentlemen scorn it.

    “I’m none of those wretches, who labor for bread
      Through foul or fair weather, whatever may hap,
    I mean to enjoy both my table and bed,
      So let me turn over and take t’other nap.

    “I’ve money enough, and can live at my ease,
      I cannot be caught in necessity’s trap,
    Will sleep every day till the next, if I please,
      And so will indulge in another good nap.”

    His heavy hydropical carcase he turns,
      And sinks in uneasy intemperate rest,
    Till dim in his bosom the lamp of life burns,
      While snorting with nightmare and plethora prest.

    What horrible visions his bed hover o’er,
      The phantoms of spleen, the blue devils dire,
    Like Gorgons and Hydras of fabulous lore,
      Or red dragons belching whole rivers of fire.

    Now clings to the side of a prominent steep,
      O’er a rough, roaring cataract hangs by a hair,
    Now suddenly sinks in a bottomless deep,
      And starts, half awake with a shriek of despair!

    Thus rolls like a porpoise o’er billows of down,
      Grows big as a mammoth, and fat as a seal,
    Lives a plague to his friends, or a charge to the town,
      And dies to make worms a most plentiful meal.

    Ye sons of Columbia, shun the syren of sloth
      For if you submit to her leaden control,
    You will find, when too late, like a venomous moth,
      She consumes a man’s substance and poisons his soul.

    If the wizard of indolence takes you in hand,
      Quick break from his grasp, or you’re quickly undone,
    Your limbs will be lithe as a wickapy wand,[131]
      And your sinews be soften’d like wax in the sun.



  “A SOFT ANSWER TURNETH AWAY WRATH.”


    A gentle answer will assuage
      The ruthless vehemence of ire,
    But petulance opposed to rage
      Is adding fuel to the fire.

    He who is cautious, calm and cool,
      When made the subject of attack,
    May smile defiance on the fool,
      Whose anger puts him on the rack.

    If injury you must repel,
      Hard words are not of any use,
    The greatest energy as well
      Is shown without, as with abuse.

    If one should offer you offence,
      By being angry with the elf,
    Instead of gaining recompense
      You are but punishing yourself.

    But gentle answers will assuage
      The headlong vehemence of ire,
    While petulance opposed to rage,
      Adds tenfold fuel to the fire.



“HAVING FOOD AND RAIMENT, LET US THEREWITH BE CONTENT.”


    Art thou blest with food and raiment,
      Give God thanks for favors given;
    Gratitude is all the payment
      Thou can’st make indulgent Heaven.

    Clothing coarse, and scant subsistence,
      Recompense which labor brings,
    With contentment make existence
      Happier than the life of kings.

    Why in heaping useless treasure,
      Shorten life, and health destroy?
    Where’s the profit or the pleasure,
      Hoarding what you ne’er enjoy?

    Why, for Mammon’s paltry proffers,
      Sell thyself to sin a slave,
    Can the wealth which swells thy coffers,
      Buy exemption from the grave?

    Since the thread of life is brittle
      Heed the poet’s moral song,
    “Man in this world needs but little,
      And that little needs not long.”

    Wants by luxury created--
      All of artificial kind,
    By indulgence never sated,
      Weaken and debase the mind.

    To the hardy child of nature,
      Decent clothes and frugal fare,
    Furnish pure enjoyments greater
      Than the pamper’d monarch’s share.

    Gold by avarice that’s hoarded,
      Might as well be in the mine,
    Wealth that’s generously afforded,
      Can alone be counted thine.

    Then, if blest with food and raiment,
      Let thy gratitude be shown,
    No man’s merits, as a claimant,
      Give a right to these alone.



              HARVEST--INTEMPERANCE.


    The arable fields and gay meadows behold,
      And laughing luxuriant landscape accord,
    In tributes of verdure, enamell’d with gold,
      The hard-handed husbandman’s promised reward.

    But pause ere you gather the bountiful crop,
      And listen to well meant advice of a friend,
    The evils which flow from _intemperance_ stop,
      So far as your own good example may tend.

    Avoid the inveterate habit of some,
      (Excessively foolish, atrociously sinful,)
    Now bloated with brandy, now reeling with rum,
      Now stuffing with whiskey a spanish brown skin-full.

    With the fire of the elements raging without,
      If the fire of the still is consuming within,
    A body of adamant soon must give out,
      And the steel-sinew’d laborer soon must give in.

    A man had much better be burnt at the stake,
      For thus he will finish his troubles much quicker,
    Than his own carcase take a blue blaze to make,
      And be burning for years with the fire of strong liquor.



  LINES WRITTEN IN A YOUNG LADY’S ALBUM.


    Miss Ann, you are, it seems to me,
      An essence all ethereal;
    The brightest being that can be,
      Entirely immaterial.

    A pencil tipp’d with solar rays
      Your charms could scarcely blazon;
    Contrasted with your beauty’s blaze
      Bright Sol’s a pewter basin.

    Transcendent little sprig of light,
      If rhymes are always true,
    An angel is an ugly sprite,
      Compared to Sylph like you.

    You frowning tell me, “This indeed
      Is flattery past all bearing,
    I ne’er before did hear nor read
      Of any quite so glaring.”

    Yes, this is flattery, sure enough,
      And its exaggeration
    May teach you how to hold such stuff
      In utter detestation.

    Should beaux your ladyship accost
      With something like this flummery,
    Tell them their labor will be lost,
      For this transcends their mummery.

    The man whose favor’s worth a thought,
      To flattery can’t descend;
    The servile sycophant is not
      Your lover nor your friend.



        THE INDEPENDENT FARMER.


    It may very truly be said
      That his is a noble vocation,
    Whose industry leads him to spread
      About him a little Creation.

    He lives independent of all
      Except th’ Omnipotent Donor:
    Has always enough at his call--
      And more is a plague to its owner.

    He works with his hands, it is true,
      But happiness dwells with employment,
    And he who has nothing to do
      Has nothing by way of enjoyment.

    His labors are mere exercise,
      Which saves him from pains and physicians;
    Then, Farmers, you truly may prize
      Your own as the best of conditions.

    From competence, shared with content,
      Since all true felicity springs,
    The life of a farmer is blent
      With more real bliss than a king’s.



           THE CULTIVATOR’S ART.


      We’re highly gratified to find,
    The public more and more inclined
    The Cultivator’s art to practise,
    And patronize, because the fact is
    That righteousness and cultivation
    Go hand in hand t’ exalt a nation:
    And Husbandry’s a hobby which
    A world may ride with spur and switch,
    If all mankind at once bestrode him
    They could not tire nor overload him.
    Not only men, who sit astride,
    But ladies also on a side-
    Saddle so neat, or on a pillion,
    That’s big enough to hold a million,
    May ride our hobby with a cheer-up,
    And he’ll not kick, bite, plunge, nor rear up,
    But _vires in eundo crescit_,[132]
    As cousin Virgil somewhere has it
    So fire, which has obtain’d ascendence,
    When setting up for independence,
    Prepares by heat of radiation
    Combustibles for conflagration;--
    By burning fast, the mighty master
    Acquires fresh means of burning faster,
    Till blazing pyramids arise,
    Which threaten to consume the skies.

      With ken prophetic, we behold
    A brighter age than that of gold,
    Which, with accelerating pace,
    Is hurrying on to bless our race;
    And hail its grand approximation,
    Mark’d by superior cultivation,
    When wise men’s heads, and good men’s hearts,
    Devoted to the art of arts,
    And industry’s untiring hand,
    Shall make a garden of our land--
    Yea, make New England, all exceeding,
    A new edition of old Eden,
    If not quite equal, yet before it,
    In many a root, and fruit, and floret,
    Indebted for its propagation
    To modern arts of cultivation.

      We’re tranced with rapture, when we find
    The fairer moiety of mankind,
    Whose smile makes mortal man’s condition
    But little short of sheer fruition,
    By whose society is given
    Earth’s purest prototype of Heaven,
    Th’ angelic part of human nature
    Inspire and aid the cultivator.
    A plant that’s sunn’d by ladies’ eyes
    Will like an exhalation rise,
    We hope that horticulture may
    Be therefore blest with beauty’s ray,
    Till Flora’s germs gem every waste,
    And every grove’s a “Bower of Taste.”

      Adam, in Eden, we believe,
    Had been a brute without his Eve;
    An arid heath, a blasted common,
    Blest with the smiles of lovely woman,
    We should prefer to all that’s rare
    In paradise, without the fair.
    We therefore pray that friendship’s hand
    From every lady in the land,
    May be to us henceforth extended,
    From this time till our time is ended;
    And would solicit every charmer
    To please to patronize the Farmer,
    And make those gentlemen, who claim
    Her approbation, do the same;
    And common justice must require her
    To grant this boon to an admirer
    Like us, so prone to chant her praises,
    In verse which absolutely blazes.

      His head is very like a stump
    Whate’er its craniologic bump,
    Who does not see that we the tillers
    Of earth compose the nation’s pillars,
    And may be styled, with strict propriety,
    The props of civilized society.
    What would have been poor mortals’ lot--
    Yea, what were man, if we were not?
    Nature’s poor, simple, houseless child,
    The weakest wild beast of the wild,
    Must live on browse, his home must be
    A cavern or a hollow tree;
    Sometimes, in spite of fears and cares,
    Be served up raw to wolves and bears.
    Or maugre tooth, nail, fist, and truncheon,
    Make hungry catamounts a luncheon.

      Our art, moreover, claims ascendence
    As german to our independence;
    Both, commonly, are coexistent,
    And each the other’s best assistant.
    We farmers are a sort of stuff,
    Tyrants will always find too tough
    For them to work up into slaves,
    The servile tools of lordly knaves.
    Those men who till the stubborn soil,
    Enlighten’d, and inured to toil,
    Cannot be made to quail or cower
    By traitor’s art or tyrant’s power,
    They might as well attempt to chain
    The west wind in a hurricane;--
    Make rivers run up hill by frightening,
    Or steal a march on kindled lightning--
    The great sea-serpent, which we’ve read of,
    Take by the tail and snap his head off--
    The firmament on cloudy nights,
    Illume with artificial lights,
    By such an apparatus as
    Is used for lighting streets with gas--
    Or, having split the north pole till it’s
    Divided into baker’s billets,
    Make such a blaze as never shone,
    And torrefy the frozen zone--
    With clubs assail the polar bear,
    And drive the monster from his lair--
    Attack the comets as they run
    With loads of fuel for the sun,
    And overset by oppugnation
    Those shining colliers of creation--
    The Milky Way McAdamize,
    A railway raise to span the skies,
    Then make, to save Apollo’s team,
    The Solar Chariot go by steam.
    These things shall tyrants do, and more
    Than we have specified, before
    Our cultivators they subdue,
    While grass is green, or sky is blue.



                 AN ODE.


    O’er the wild Atlantic wave,
    Lo the fiends of discord rave;
        Battle’s bray is heard from far,
        Battle’s bray is heard from far,
    To Bellona’s blood-stain’d car,
    Yoked the madding _steeds of war_:--
        But no fiend of battle roars
        Round Columbia’s happy shores;
        Peace and plenty, hand in hand,
        Join to bless her happy land.


                      CHORUS.

          Laud we then the _God of Heav’n_,
          At whose behest fair peace is giv’n,
          The God, who led our fathers o’er
          To Columbia’s happy shore.


    Where th’ embattled host of France,
    To the kindling war advance,
        There shall heroes bite the dust,
        There shall heroes bite the dust,
    Blood shall tinge the rubrick waves
    Where the fiend of battle raves.
        Sons of honor, “Sons of soul,”
        Whom no tyrants can control,
        Patriotic myriads join,
        Round fair freedom’s sacred shrine.

          Ever laud the _God of Heav’n_,
          At whose behest fair peace is giv’n,
          The God, who led our fathers o’er,
          To Columbia’s happy shore.


    Where Britannia’s sons unite
    To provoke the distant fight,
        There shall countless heroes fall,
        There shall countless heroes fall,
    When the din of battle join’d,
    Hurtles in the hollow wind.
        Fiends of horror flit around,
        Dying heroes strow the ground,
        Countless ghosts shall wailing go
        To the sullen shades below.

          Laud we then the _God of Heav’n_,
          At whose behest fair peace is giv’n,
          The God who led our fathers o’er,
          To Columbia’s happy shore.


    May not _anarch’s_ hydra form,
    Thunder his voice, his breath the storm,
        Desolate our happy land,
        Desolate our happy land--
    Mid fell discord’s wild uproar,
    May no fiend of anarch roar,
        Call the rugged, meddling throng
        Of every clime, of every tongue,
        To light fair freedom’s funeral pyre,
        And bid her mid the blaze expire.

          May the gracious _God of Heav’n_,
          At whose behest fair peace is giv’n,
          The God who led our fathers o’er,
          Still protect Columbia’s shore.



        THE COURSE OF CULTURE.[133]


    Survey the world, through every zone,
      From Lima to Japan,
    In lineaments of light ’tis shown
      That CULTURE makes the man.
    By manual culture one attains
      What industry may claim,
    Another’s mental toil and pains
      Attenuate his frame.

    Some plough and plant the teeming soil
      Some cultivate the arts;
    And some devote a life of toil
      To tilling heads and hearts.
    Some train the adolescent mind,
      While buds of promise blow,
    And see each nascent twig inclined
      The way the tree should grow.

    The first man, and the first of men,
      Were tillers of the soil;
    And that was mercy’s mandate then,
      Which destined man to moil.
    Indulgence preludes fell attacks
      Of merciless disease,
    And sloth extends on fiery racks
      Her listless devotees.

    Hail, HORTICULTURE! Heaven-ordained,
      Of every art the source,
    Which man has polished, life sustained,
      Since time commenced his course.
    Where waves thy wonder-working wand
      What splendid scenes disclose!
    The blasted heath, the arid strand,
      Out-bloom the gorgeous rose!

    Even in the SERAPH-SEX is thy
      Munificence described;
    And Milton says in lady’s eye
      Is Heaven identified.
    A seedling, sprung from Adam’s side,
      A most celestial shoot!
    Became of Paradise the pride,
      And bore a world of fruit.

    The lily, rose, carnation, blent
      By Flora’s magic power,
    And tulip, feebly represent
      So elegant a flower:
    Then surely, bachelors, ye ought
      In season to transfer
    Some sprig of this sweet “TOUCH-ME-NOT,”
      To grace your own parterre;

    And every gardener should be proud,
      With tenderness and skill,
    If haply he may be allowed
      This precious plant to till.
    All that man has, had, hopes, can have,
      Past, promised, or possessed,
    Are fruits which CULTURE gives or gave
      At INDUSTRY’S behest.



                        A SONG.

    SUNG AT AN AGRICULTURAL DINNER, AT CONCORD, MASS.


    Since time in the primer first sharpen’d his scythe,
      And the sands in his glass were beginning to flow,
    There never was spectacle bonny and blithe,
      Which came fairly up to our GRAND CATTLE SHOW.
            _Derry down, down, down, derry down._

    Here’s bulls, hogs, and horses, and sheep not a few,
      Respectable animals, worthy a prize,
    Like good go-to-meeting folks, each in his _pew_,
      All sober as deacons--if not quite so wise.

    Master Pig is the Chorister, just twist his tail,
      And he’ll give you altissimo trills in high style,
    The fine diatonics which run through the scale
      Of his exquisite gamut will ring for a mile.

    Our roots have run down to gravity’s centre,
       Some went on to China, and thieves pulled them through--
    But that’s a tough story, and I shouldn’t venture,
      In a high court of Justice to swear it is true.

    And here we have oxen, stout animals, which
      Might well go to Congress, representing their race,
    Round gravity’s centre just give them a hitch,
      And I guess they would twitch the great globe out of place.

    The match of our _Ploughmen_ was ne’er matched before,
      Save when a lorn lover is matched to his fair;
    They turned the earth over as flat as this floor,
      Such chaps the great globe, like an apple can pare.

    In troth, all the world’s nothing more than a show
      Of animals, shut up, or running at large,
    You meet with queer creatures wherever you go,
      And pity their keepers, who have them in charge.

    A _calf_ sent to college comes out a great _bore_,
      An odd metamorphosis that, it is true,
    But one which has taken place over and o’er;--
      Now I do not mean you, sir, nor you, sir, nor you.

    I hate personalities, therefore won’t say,
      How a jackass conducts when made just ass of Peace,
    Such animals now and then come in my way,
      But I never shear hogs for the sake of their fleece.

    A vile pettifogger, all quibble and jaw,
      Is ninety-nine thousand times worse than a brute,
    In a sunbeam he’ll pick an indictable flaw,
       And against his own shadow show cause for a suit.

    Here’s health to our orator,[134] one who can boast
      That he practises well what he preaches about;
    But gentlemen please not to _butter_ my _toast_,
      For we like him so well we can take him without.

    Here’s “MIDDLESEX HUSBANDMEN,” doing more good
      Than all the political clubs ever known,
    Unless a man’s head is the essence of wood,
      He ranks them above any king on his throne.
            _Derry down, down, down, derry down._



          THE EVILS OF A MISCHIEVOUS TONGUE.

   Many have fallen by the edge of the sword, but not so many as
   have fallen by the tongue.--Eccl. Apoc. xxviii. 8.


    Tho’ millions, the sword of the warrior has slaughter’d,
      While fame has the homicide’s eulogy rung:
    Yet many more millions on millions are martyr’d;
      Cut off by that cowardly weapon, the tongue.

    One sword may be match’d by another as keen,
      In battle the bold man a bolder may meet,
    But the shaft of the slanderer, flying unseen
      From the quiver of malice, brings ruin complete.

    An _insolent tongue_, by a taunt or a gibe,
      Enkindles heart-burnings and bloody affrays;
    A _treacherous tongue_, when impell’d by a bribe,
      The guiltless condemns, or a nation betrays.

    A _smooth subtle tongue_ vile seducers employ
      The fair sex to lure to libidinous thrall;
    A _slip of the tongue_ may its owner destroy,
      And _the tongue of the serpent_ occasion’d the fall.

    Then be it impress’d on Columbian youth,
      That the tongue is an engine of terrible force;
    Not govern’d by reason, not guided by truth,
      A plague, which may desolate worlds in its course.



             CHEERFULNESS.

  “A merry heart doeth good like a medicine.”


    With mirth let us cherish our hearts,
      ’Tis a precept by Solomon given,
    And cheerfulness surely imparts
      The temper best fitted for heaven.

    Among all the numberless ways
      By which folly contrives to be wrong,
    There is none which more weakness displays
      Than wearing a visage too long.

    Th’ Omnipotent Donor designs
      That the gifts of His grace be enjoy’d;
    Hence, he that forever repines,
      Had better be better employ’d.

    When first was created our race,
      This earth for man’s mansion was given,
    And shall he find fault with the place
      To which he’s allotted by heav’n?

    ’Tis a thing, I believe, understood,
      In which every sect is agreed,
    This earth was declared to be good,
      And so in the Bible we read.

    Under Providence, tenants at will,
      A fine habitation we hold;
    For us to be murmuring still
      Is wicked, ungrateful and bold.

    Yet well-meaning people I’ve seen,
      Who think true religion is shown
    By a sort of a wo-begone mein,
      And a whining, conventicle tone.

    ’Tis true, there’s a season to mourn,
      As Solomon says--ne’ertheless
    Our grief should be manfully borne,
      And ’tis folly to cherish distress.

    A train of diseases await
      On a heart that forever is sad,
    And some, from a sorrowing state,
      Become irretrievably mad.

    That religion can never be true
      Which bows its disciples to earth,
    For he that has heav’n in view,
      Has the best of all titles to mirth.

    With mirth then we’ll cherish our hearts,
      ’Tis a mandate by Solomon given,
    For cheerfulness surely imparts
      The temper best fitted for heaven.



          EULOGY ON THE TIMES.


    Let poets scrawl satiric rhymes,
    And sketch the follies of the times,
      With much caricaturing;
    But I, a _bon-ton-bard_, declare
    A set of slanderers they are,
      E’en past a Job’s enduring.

    Let crabbed cynics snarl away,
    And pious parsons preach and pray
      Against the vices reigning;
    That mankind are so wicked grown,
    Morality is scarcely known,
      And true religion waning.

    Societies, who vice suppress,
    May make a rumpus; ne’ertheless,
      _Our’s is the best of ages_;
    Such hum-drum folks our _fathers_ were,
    They could no more with _us_ compare,
      Than _Hottentots_ with _sages_.

    It puts the poet in a pet
    To think of THEM, _a vulgar set_;
      But WE, thank G--d, are QUALITY!
    For we have found this eighteenth century
    What ne’er was known before, I’ll venture ye,
      _Religion’s no reality_!

    Tom Paine, and Godwin, both can tell
    That there is no such thing as hell!
      A doctrine mighty pleasant;
    Your old-wives tales of a _hereafter_
    Are things for ridicule and laughter,
      While we enjoy the _present_.

    We’ve nought to do, but frisk about,
    At midnight ball, and Sunday rout,
      And Bacchanalian revel;
    To gamble, drink, and live at ease,
    Our great and noble selves to please,
      Nor care for man, nor devil.

    In these _good times_, with little pains,
    And scarce a penny-worth of brains,
      A man with great propriety,
    With some small risk of being hung,
    May cut a pretty dash among
      The foremost in society.

    Good reader, I’ll suppose, for once,
    Thou art no better than a dunce,
      But wishest to be famous;
    I’ll tell thee how, with decent luck,
    Thou may’st become as great a buck
      As any one could name us.

    When first in high life you commence,
    To virtue, reason, common sense,
      You’ll please to bid adieu, sir;
    And, lest some brother rake be higher,
    Drink, till your blood be all on fire,
      And face of crimson hue, sir.

    Thus you’ll be dubb’d a _dashing blade_,
    And, by the genteel world be said,
      To be a _man of spirit_;
    For _stylish folks_ despise the chaps,
    Who think that they may rise, perhaps,
      By industry and merit.

    With lubric arts, and wily tongue,
    Debauch some maiden, fair and young,
      For that will be genteel;
    Be not too scrupulous; win the fair;
    Then leave the frail one to despair:
      A rake should never feel.

    When wine has made your courage stout,
    In midnight revel sally out,
      Insulting all you meet;
    Play pretty pranks about the town,
    Break windows, knock the watchmen down,
      Your frolic to complete!

    Besides exhibiting your parts,
    You’re sure to win the ladies’ hearts
      By dint of dissipation;
    Since “every woman is a rake,”
    A fool may know what steps to take
      To gain her approbation.

    By practising these famous rules,
    You’ll gain from _wicked_ men and _fools_
      A world of admiration:
    And, as we know from good authority,
    _Such folks compose a clear majority_,
      There needs no hesitation.



          THE ART OF PRINTING.


    Blest be the memory of the Sage,
    Who taught the typographic page
    To teem with symbols, heav’n-design’d,
    The mute interpreters of mind.

    The world at length had learn’d to prize
    The art of speaking to the eyes,
    Which had, by modes which CADMUS taught,
    Giv’n immortality to thought;--

    When FAUSTUS, by celestial skill,
    Found means to multiply at will,
    Those silent heralds of the kind,
    Which give ubiquity to mind,--

    Explored that Art, which brings to view,
    All that we know--our father’s knew,--
    And which developes every hour
    That knowledge, which results in power,--

    That Art, which gives to man’s control
    Celestial treasures of the soul,
    Transcending, many thousand fold,
    Golconda’s gems, and Ophir’s gold.

    What but the Printer’s Art sublime,
    Can register the deeds of time,
    Recording all that’s said and done
    Most worthy note beneath the sun?

    The poet, patriot, saint and sage
    Have habitations on his page,
    Are never absent when you call,
    Alike accessible to all.

    He introduces man to man,
    Of every nation, tribe or clan,
    The humble to the high--MOST HIGH,
    In palaces above the sky.

    Then bless the memory of the sage,
    Who taught the typographic page
    To teem with symbols, heav’n-design’d,
    The silent heralds of the mind.



          THE OLD BACHELOR:

       AN EPISTLE TO A LADY.


    What singular mortal is that,
      Who sits in yon cottage alone,
    Excepting an old tabby cat,
      Which gray with her master is grown?

    Say, would you his origin know,
      Or if the odd mortal came here
    From regions above, or below?
      The truth I will tell you, my dear.

    Dame Nature, a fanciful jade,
      As ancient philosophers say,
    When all other creatures were made,
      Had left a small portion of clay.

    The matter, indeed, was so crude
      She meant to have thrown it aside,
    At length in a frolicsome mood,
      To make something of it she tried.

    Her goody-ship, worried about,
      Was forc’d her old vessels to scrape,
    For matter to finish the lout
      To a biped, which had human shape.

    She moulded the comical stuff,
      ’Till all in one mass was combined;
    His body, though quite odd enough,
      Was _perfect_, compared with his mind.

    To a hard unsusceptible heart,
      She added a thick leaden skull,
    And threw in of pride such a part,
      As well might suffice a mogul:

    But did not implant in his breast
      A taste for those pleasures refined,
    Which give to enjoyment its zest,
      And soften the cares of the mind.

    Of wisdom she threw in a spice,
      But omitted to add common sense;
    Dutch prudence a very large slice,
      To teach him the saving of pence.

    She gave him good honesty’s phiz;
      No mummy was ever more grave,
    Although, my dear madam, the quiz,
       To his wit’s full extent is a knave.

    All this she perform’d in a jerk,
      And being well pleased with him, so far,
    She set herself gravely to work,
      And forced him to swallow a crow-bar.

    No wonder then, this queer machine,
      Which so rude, and so awkwardly made is,
    By nobody ever was seen
      _To bow to the fairest of ladies_.[135]

    At length he was usher’d to light,
      A half-alive kind of commodity,
    A thing, which you’d say, at first sight,
      Was quite the quintessence of oddity.

    She planted him down in yon hut,
      To _vegetate_ there with impunity,
    Till death shall prohibit the _Put_
      Any more from disgusting community.



               CALORIC.


    Earth, sea and air abound in rare
      Minute caloric particles,
    Invisible indeed, but still
      Most energetic articles.

    Almighty power each atom gave
      Existence at creation;
    Each would Omnipotence require
      For its annihilation.

    It now lies in a latent state,
      Anon in ardent action;
    And HE alone, who can create
      Can bring to naught a fraction.

    Chief agent in all acts of power
      Its atoms seem divinities;
    Tempests, volcanoes, earthquakes are
      Mere plays of their affinities.

    ’Tis their’s to drive the lightning’s car,
      To speed the shaft of thunder,
    Give earth an atmosphere of fire,
      And rend the globe asunder!



         THE ILLS OF IDLENESS.


    What pains and penalties attend
    The wight whose being’s aim and end
      Is wholly self-enjoyment!
    His easy chair becomes a rack,
    And all Pandora’s plagues attack
      The wretch who wants employment.

    To shun the exquisite distress
    Which ever waits on idleness,
      He flies to dissipation;
    Drinks _deep_ to keep his spirits _up_,
    And in the inebriating cup
      Drowns health and reputation.

    And now in Fashion’s vortex whirl’d,
    A dandy of the genteel world,
      He figures in the ton,
    The wise man laughs, the simple stare
    To see the consequential air
      The silly rake puts on.

    Now drives his curricle about
    To club, assembly, ball and rout,
      To waste his time and treasure;
    Gives sensual appetite the reins,
    And takes illimitable _pains_
      To _seem_ a man of _pleasure_.

    The course of life such fools pursue
    Would worry down the wand’ring Jew,--
      Worse off than galley-slaves!
    And ten to one, about the time
    The man of virtue’s in his prime,
      Such sots are in their graves.

    But if their days are lengthen’d out,
    By dint of constitution stout,
      In apathy and pain;
    A ruby and carbuncled face
    Displays the signal of disgrace
      Like mark, erst set on Cain.

    Now dire paralysis and gout
    Parade their forces round about
      The citadel of life;
    In vain the doctor tries his skill;
    His obstinate opponents still
      Are victors in the strife.

    Disease, remorse, with joint attack,
    Now put at once upon the rack
      Their bodies and their souls;
    Victims of vice, they suffer more
    Than Montezuma did of yore
      When stretch’d on burning coals.


FOOTNOTES:

[1]

    I once stood high on Fortune’s ladder.

Although Dame FORTUNA was, by ancient mythologists, represented as a
whimsical being, cutting her capers on the periphery of a large wheel,
I am justified in accommodating her goddesship with a ladder, by virtue
of a figure in rhetoric called POETICA LICENTIA (_anglice_) poets’
licentiousness.

[2]

    My _tintinabulum_ of rhyming.

“The clock-work tintinabulum of rhyme.”--COWPER.


[3]

    I’ll drink Pierian puddle dry.

Pursuant to Mr Pope’s advice;

    “Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring.”


[4]

    Sent me a bag full of his gas.

This wondrous soul-transporting modification of matter is christened by
chymists _gaseous oxyd of nitrogen_, and, as will be evident, from the
following sublime stanzas, and my judicious comments thereon (in which
I hold the _microscope_ of criticism to those my peculiar beauties
which are not visible to the _naked eye_ of common sense) is a subject
worthy the serious attention of the poet and physiologist.

Any “half-formed witling,” as Pope says (_Essay on Criticism_) “may
hammer crude conceptions into a sort of measured nonsense, vulgarly
called prose bewitched.” But the daring mortal, who aspires to “build
with lofty rhyme” an _Ævi Monumentum_, before he sets about the mighty
enterprise, must be filled with a sort of incomprehensible _quiddam_
of divine inflation. Then, if he can keep clear of Bedlam, and be
allowed the use of pen, ink, and paper, every line he scribbles, and
every phrase he utters, will be a miracle of sublimity. Thus one Miss
Sibyl remained stupid as a barber’s block, till overpowered by the
overbearing influence of Phœbus. But when

    ----ea fræna furenti
    Concutit, et stimulos sub pectore vertit Apollo,

the frantic gipsy muttered responses at once sublime, prophetic, and
unintelligible.

Indeed, this _furor mentis_, so necessary an ingredient in the
composition of the genuine poet, sometimes terminates in real madness,
as was unfortunately the case with Collins and Smart: Swift, Johnson,
and Cowper, were not without dismal apprehensions of a similar fate.
The wight, therefore, who wishes to secure to himself a sublunary
immortality by dint of poetizing, and happens not to be _poeta
nascitur_, must, like Doctor Caustic, in the present instance, seek a
sort of cow-pock-like substitute for that legitimate _rabies_, which
characterizes the true sons of Apollo.

[5]

    Was hous’d in heaven’s high upper story.

Brother Southey then made the important discovery that “the atmosphere
of the highest of all possible heavens was composed of this gas.”
                                                    _Beddoe’s Notice._


[6]

    Have said that, in his Epic Poem.

The same poem to which the gentleman alludes in his huge quarto edition
of _Joan of Arc_, in the words following--“Liberal criticism I shall
attend to, and I hope to profit by, in the execution of my MADOC, an
epic poem on the discovery of America, by that prince, on which I am
now engaged.”

As _liberal_ criticism appears to be a great desideratum with this
sublime poet, I trust he will gratefully acknowledge the specimens of
my liberality towards a worthy brother, which I propose hereafter to
exhibit.

[7]

    The beldam’s crack’d or Caustic crazy.

Or, it is possible, may it please your worships, that I--I for the
matter of that am a little te--te--tipsy, or so.--But as there may
perhaps be, as it were, now and then, one of your Right Worshipful
Fraternity, who has been in a similar predicament se--se ipse, I hope I
shall receive your worships’ permission to stagger on with a jug full
of gas in my noddle, at least, through a stanza or two.

[8]

    I’m fall’n! fall’n! fall’n! down, flat! flat! flat!

See Dryden’s Feast of Alexander, where one king Darius has a terrible
tumble down, beautifully described by half a dozen “fallens.” But I
think the Persian monarch did not after all, fall quite so _flat_ as
Doctor Caustic.

[9]

    And women to hysteric fits.

See the lamentable case of the Lady, page 16th of Dr Beddoes’s
pamphlet, who, taking a drop too much of this panacea, fell into
hysterical fits, &c.

[10]

    Besides a _shoal_ of learned Dutchmen.

Boerhaave, Steno, De Graff, Swammerdam, Zimmerman, _cum multis aliis_.
By the by, gentlemen, this epithet _shoal_ is not always to be taken
in a _shallow_ sense; but when applied to such _deep_ fellows, must be
considered as noun of multitude, as we say a _shoal_ of herrings.

[11]

    ----discern, prescribe, apply,
    And cure----

My learned friend, Dr Timothy Triangle perusing the manuscript of
this my pithy petition, discovered that my description of the _modus
operandi_ on the insect as above, compared with the celebrated “_veni,
vidi, vici_,” as a specimen of fine writing, is superior in the direct
proportion of _four_ to _three_; consequently Dr Caustic has advanced
one step higher in the climax of sublimity than Julius Cesar.

[12]

    Could match OURSELF at second sight.

That your worships may be able to form something like an idea of the
wonderful ken of our mental optics, it will be necessary to con with
diligence the opinions of Dr Johnson on this subject, as expressed in
his tour to the Hebrides. The Doctor there tells us, that though he
“never could advance his curiosity to conviction, yet he came away at
last, _willing_ to believe.” But we would have all those who anticipate
the deriving any advantage from our slight at second seeing, not only
willing, but absolutely _predetermined_ to “believe,” positive evidence
to the contrary notwithstanding.

[13]

    Foreseeing things which never will be.

Yes, gentlemen; among other great and wonderful events which we
foretold, but which never have happened, and moreover never will
happen, was the restoration of the Jews by the intervention of that
renowned pacificator, Buonaparte. We first prophecied, and many men
of our cast who had a knack at prying into futurity, echoed our
prediction, that the _pious_ emperor of the Gauls would make Jerusalem
the head quarters of the Millennium, and under our auspices many a
wandering Jew was recruited, and stood in readiness to march at a
moment’s warning to take possession of his patrimonial property.

[14]

    In our good friend, Sir JOSEPH’S name.

This was immensely proper, as I propose colonizing these hitherto
_Terræ Incognitæ_, and know of no person in existence, except _myself_
(who am now decrepit with age, and, alas, sadly poverty stricken) whose
scientific qualifications, knowledge of the coast, and well known
ardent zeal in the science of Tadpolism, so well entitle him to command
such important expedition.

[15]

    With leg or wing, he kick or jerk it.

Could we command the years of a Nestor, “the indelible ink” of a
Lettersom, and the diligence of a Dutch commentator, we should still
readily acknowledge that our powers were totally inadequate to the task
of eulogising, in proportion to their merits, the philosophical and
literary performances of that profound sage, Dr James Anderson, LL. D.,
F. R. S., _Scotland_, &c. &c. whose mysterious hints afford a clue by
which we have been enabled to add lustre to the present age, by many of
our own sublime discoveries and inventions.

In his _deep_ work called “_Recreations in Agriculture and Natural
History_,” the Doctor says, among other things not less marvelous, “The
mathematician can demonstrate with the most decisive certainty, that no
_fly_ can alight on this globe which we inhabit, without communicating
_motion_ to it; and he can ascertain, with the most accurate precision,
_if so he choose to do_” (by the by, this _sine qua non_ part of the
sentence is very beautiful, and not at all redundant) “what must be the
exact amount of the motion thus produced.” _Vol._ ii. _p._ 350.

[16]

    Is doctoring off one generation.

“Perhaps no important revolution was ever bloodless. It may be
useful in this place to recollect in what the mischief of shedding
blood consists. The abuses, which at present exist in all political
societies are so enormous, the oppressions which are exercised are so
intolerable, the ignorance and vice which they entail so dreadful,
that possibly a dispassionate inquirer might decide that, if their
annihilation could be purchased by an instant sweeping off of every
human being now arrived at maturity, from the face of the earth, the
purchase would not be too dear,” &c. &c.--_Godwin’s Political Justice._

[17]

    Those LL. D.s’ of Lynch’s Law.

_Lynch Law_, is, we believe, synonymous with _mob law_, sometimes
called _club law_. By this law summary _injustice_ is executed by an
ignorant and furious multitude, who burn and destroy, plunder and
murder, without measure and without mercy, the property and persons of
anybody and everybody who happen to be obnoxious, or are pointed out
as objects entitled to the particular attention of their mobocratic
mightinesses. Sometimes the poor individuals who are so unlucky as to
fall into the clutches of these horrible human harpies, are subjected
to mock trials, in which the accusers enact the parts of law makers,
judges and executioners. A man by the name of Lynch, who lives, or
has lived, somewhere in the West, was active in this mode of taking
cognizance of offences, whence the whole process is called _Lynch law_.
But thereby hangs a tale, which we either do not recollect, or have
never heard; and in either case, we shall not, at present, trouble your
worships with its recital.

[18]

    Call’d craniology of snipes.

It would require an immensity of books, and an eternity of time
to describe or even allude to the physiological, craniological,
physiognomical, phrenological, &c. &c. &c. theories of Dr Gall, and
a multitude of his followers. We shall, therefore, attempt no such
thing, but content ourself with the simple assertion, which we will
maintain _pugnis et calcibus_, that, as to the craniology of reptiles
and insects we are out of sight above the utmost stretch of whatsoever
these superb philosophers could possibly comprehend.

[19]

    Vanish before our beauty washes.

Mr Mackenzie, author of _five thousand receipts_, &c., deserves to be
trounced and anathematized for the following vulgar sentence:

“To set off the complexion with all the advantage it can attain,
nothing more is necessary than to wash the face with pure water, or if
anything farther be occasionally wanted, it is only the addition of a
little soap.”

[20]

    We transform dowdies into goddesses.

We here quote a passage from a popular writer merely to indicate our
utter disapprobation of the author and of his sentiments:

“The solicitude of parents, especially of mothers to make their
daughters fine ladies is truly ridiculous. How often soever the poor
child has occasion to look at anything below the parallel of the
horizon, and a little relax the muscles of the neck, it can hardly
ever escape the notice of her mamma or her governess, and she is bid
with more than common poignancy of expression, to hold up her head,
perhaps more than a thousand times in a day. If one of her shoulders
should be thought to rise but an hair’s breadth higher than the other,
she is immediately bound and braced, twisted and screwed, in a most
unmerciful manner, and tortured almost to death, in order to correct
the supposed irregularity. And lest the dear creature, in the natural
play and free use of her limbs, should contract any ungenteel habits,
the dancing master must be called in at least three times a week to put
every part of the body into its due place and attitude, and teach her
to sit, stand and walk according to the exact rules of his art, which,
to be sure, must infinitely exceed all the simplicity of untutored
nature. Should the least pimple appear on any part of the face, or
what is still more alarming, should the milk-maid’s flush begin to
betray itself in the color of the cheeks, all possible means must be
used, physic and diet must do their part, nay, health itself must be
endangered or destroyed to suppress the vulgar complexion.

“Health and beauty have been frequently destroyed by a solicitous
care to preserve them, deformity induced, and a thousand ill
habits contracted by the very means that were intended to prevent
them.”--_Ash’s Sentiments on Education._

[21] See additional note No. 1, at the end of the volume.

[22]

    They might as well have none at all.

The process by which this fabrication is effected is copied from
Nature; and her manipulations in similar performances have been thus
described in some of our heretofore publications:

      Certain sages learn’d and twistical,
    By reasoning not a whit sophistical,
    Have proved what’s wonderful, to wit,
    The smallest atom may be split,
    Then split again, _ad infinitum_;
    And diagrams, which much delight ’em,
    By Mr Martin make this out
    Beyond the shadow of a doubt.
    _Matter_ thus _splittable_, I wean,
    With half an eye it may be seen,
    That _spirit_, being much diviner,
    May be proportionably finer;
    Nor is this merely _postulatum_,
    ’Tis proved by facts, and thus I state them.

      Dame Nature erst, in mood of merriment,
    Perform’d the following odd experiment;
    She took a most diminish’d sprite,
    Smaller than microscopic mite,
    An hundred thousand such might lie
    Wedged in a cambric needle’s eye,
    And first, by dint of her divinity,
    Divided that one whole infinity,
    Then cull’d the very smallest particle,
    And shaped therefrom that worthless article,
    That tiny evanescent dole,
    Which serves for Dicky Dapper’s soul.

[23]

    Horace says, _dulce est desipere_.

The stanza with which this line commences, is a liberal, but so far as
respects meaning, a faithful translation of the famous maxim, _Dulce
est desipere in loco_.--_Horace_ L. iv. C. 12.

[24]

    Is made of any kind of wood.

The hint for this improvement was derived from an article in the
_American Farmer_, from which the following is extracted:

“A few weeks since, two of the members of the United Society of
Shakers, at Lebanon, N. Y., were at our office. They informed us that
they had tried an experiment in feeding hogs with _saw dust_, produced
in their button and other wooden ware factory, by mixing with the usual
food, in the proportion of one third; that is, two parts of the usual
food and one part of saw dust; and that the hogs thrive full as well as
when fed in the usual way. From their experiments they are satisfied
that the saw-dust was digested by the animals, was nutritious, and
answered in all respects the purposes of the usual food.”

[25]

    Illumed as one would light a candle.

In my younger days, I lived on terms of intimacy with Doctor Franklin,
highly honorable to both parties, as it showed we were both men of
discernment in choosing each a great man for his friend.

In a letter from that venerable sage, afterwards printed (_See
Franklin’s Works_, _p._ 115, _vol._ ii. _third edition_) he told _me_
that toads buried in sand, shut up in hollow trees, &c. would live
forever, as it were; and, among other things, informed me of certain
curious facts about flies, which I will relate in his own words. “I
have seen an instance of common flies preserved in a manner somewhat
similar. They had been drowned in Madeira wine, apparently about the
time when it was bottled in Virginia, to be sent to London. At the
opening of one of the bottles, at the house of a friend where I was,
three drowned flies fell into the first glass which was filled. Having
heard it remarked that drowned flies were capable of being revived by
the rays of the sun, I proposed making the experiment upon these. They
were therefore exposed to the sun upon a sieve, which had been employed
to strain them out of the wine. In less than three hours two of them
began by degrees to recover life. They commenced by some convulsive
motions of the thighs, and at length they raised themselves upon their
legs, wiped their eyes with their fore feet, beat and brushed their
wings with their hind feet, and soon after began to fly, finding
themselves in Old England, without knowing how they came thither. The
third continued lifeless until sun-set, when, losing all hopes of him,
he was thrown away.

“I wish it were possible, from this instance, to invent a method
of embalming drowned persons, in such a manner that they might be
recalled to life, at any period, however distant; for having a very
ardent desire to see and observe the state of America a hundred years
hence, I should prefer to an ordinary death, the being immersed in a
cask of Madeira wine, with a few friends, until that time, then to be
recalled to life by the solar warmth of my dear country. But since, in
all probability, we live in an age too early, and too near the infancy
of science, to see such an art brought, in our time, to perfection, I
must, for the present, content myself with the treat which you are so
kind as to promise me, of the resurrection of a fowl or turkey cock.”

[26]

    To healthier action than before.

I do not arrogate to myself the whole merit of this noble invention. Dr
Price and Mr Godwin, in divers elaborate works, especially the latter,
in his _Political Justice_, suggested some ideas which set my ingenuity
in such a ferment, that I could not rest quietly till I had brewed
a sublime treatise on the best mode of pulling down, repairing, and
rebuilding decayed and worn out animal machines.

I shall not attempt, in this place, to oblige your worships with
anything like a table of the contents of this judicious and profound
performance. I will, however, gratify your curiosity so far as to
glance cursorily at a few of the leading topics therein discussed and
illustrated, and slightly mention some of the immense advantages which
will be the result of this discovery.

In the first place, I make it apparent, by a long series of experiments
and scientific deductions, drawn therefrom, that it is very practicable
to enlighten the mind of a stupid fellow, by battering, boring, or
pulling his body to pieces.--Mr poet Waller’s authority is here to my
purpose, who tells us, that

“The soul’s dark cottage _batter’d_ and decay’d, Lets in _new light_
through chinks which time has made.”

Mr Gray, likewise, in his _Hymn to Adversity_, requests that “Daughter
of Jove” to impose _gently_ her “iron hand,” and trouble him a _little_
with her “torturing hour,” although he appears disposed to avoid, if
possible, her more dismal accompaniments, such as her “Gorgonic frown,”
and the “funereal cry of horror.”

The Spaniards, under Cortes and Pizarro, managed much in the same way,
and enlightened the natives of the mighty empires of Peru and Mexico
in the great truths of Christianity, by killing a part, reducing the
remainder to a state of servitude, and battering their souls’ cottages
at their leisure. This process is in part expressed in a poetical
epistle, which I received not long since from my correspondent settled
at Terra del Fuego, in South America, who thus expresses the conduct of
some of his acquaintance, in converting the aborigines to Christianity.

    Good folks to America came
      To curtail old Satan’s dominions;
    The natives, the more to their shame,
      Stuck fast to their ancient opinions.

    Till a method the pious men find,
      Which ne’er had occur’d to your dull wits.
    Of making sky-lights to the mind,
      By boring the body with bullets.

    Like Waller, with process so droll,
      To illume an old clod-pated noddy;
    They thought they might burnish the soul,
      By beating a hole in the body.

Good folks to America came To curtail old Satan’s dominions; The
natives, the more to their shame, Stuck fast to their ancient opinions.

Till a method the pious men find, Which ne’er had occur’d to your dull
wits. Of making sky-lights to the mind, By boring the body with bullets.

Like Waller, with process so droll, To illume an old clod-pated noddy;
They thought they might burnish the soul, By beating a hole in the body.

I have read of a great mathematician, who was uncommonly stupid till
about the age of twenty, when he accidentally pitched head first into
a deep Well, fractured his skull, and it became necessary to trepan
him. After the operation it was immediately evident that his wit was
much improved, and he soon became a prodigy of intellect. Whether
this alteration was caused by “new light let in through chinks,” the
trapanning chisel had made, or whether the texture and position of the
brain were materially changed for the better in consequence of the jar
and contusion of the fall, I shall leave to some future Lavater, or any
other gentleman, who can gauge the capacity of a statesman, or a barrel
of porter, with equal facility, to determine.

2d. I proceed to demonstrate, that man being, as our most enlightened
_modern_ philosophers allow, jumbled together by mere _chance_ (a
blind; capricious goddess, who, half her time, does not know what she
is about) it is extremely easy to understand the principles of his
texture; because the mechanism of his frame is less intricate than that
of a common spit jack. Consequently, a Solomon or a Brodum can mend
this machine when deranged, as Well as a Harvey, a Sydenham, or a Mead.

3d. I proceed to prove, from analogy, with what facility this machine
may be disjointed, pulled to pieces, and again botched together. My
friend Mahomet had his heart taken out, a drop of black blood expressed
therefrom, and went about his common concerns next day as well as ever.
So when a sighing swain is taken desperately in love, he may lose all
his insides without any Very serious inconvenience. This I can attest
from _sad experience_, as, about forty years since, I was terribly in
for’t, with a sweet little sprig of divinity, whose elbow was ever
her most prominent feature, whenever I had the audacity to attempt to
approximate the shrine of her Goddesship.

4th. The important advantages, which will undoubtedly arise from this
invention, are almost too obvious to require explanation. I shall,
however, advert to a few.

By taking the animal machine to pieces, you may divest it of such
particles as clog its wheels, and render its motions less perfect. A
decayed, worn-out gallant may have _its_ parts separated, thoroughly
burnished, botched together, and rendered as bright as a new-coined
silver sixpence. Thus my venerable Piccadilly friend, who, as Darwin
expresses it, sometimes “clasps a beauty in _Platonic_ arms;” if he
should, fifty years hence, perceive that the mechanism of his frame is
rather the worse for wear, may come to Dr Caustic, and be rebuilt into
as fine a young buck as any in Christendom.

5th. Hereditary diseases may be thus culled from the constitution, and
gouty and other deleterious particles separated from those which are
sound and healthful.

Pride may be picked from the composition of an upstart mushroom of a
nobleman, impudence from a quack, knavery from a lawyer, moroseness
from a methodist, testiness from an old bachelor, peevishness from
an old maid; in short, mankind altered from what they are to what
they ought to be, by a method at once cheap, practicable, easy and
expeditious.

The only difficulty which has ever opposed itself to my carrying this
sublime invention to the highest possible pitch of perfection, has
been the almost utter impossibility of procuring any man, woman, or
child, who is willing to become the subject of operation. Now if either
of your worships would loan me his carcase to be picked to pieces,
and again botched together in the manner above stated, provided the
experiment should not fully succeed, I will engage to pay _all_ the
damages thereby accruing to community, out of _one tenth_ part of the
profits of this publication.

[27]

    The gods of _old_ folks could make _young_ ones.

      ----Stricto Medea recludit
    Ense senis jugulum: veteremque exire cruorem
    Passa, replet succis. Quos postquam combibit Æson
    Aut ore acceptos, aut vulnere barda, comæque
    Canitie posita nigrum rapuere colorem.
    Pulsa fugit macies.

This passage, with a condensation of thought and felicity of expression
peculiar to myself, I have thus happily hit into English.

    Medea cut the wither’d weasand
    Of superannuated Æson,
    Then fill’d him with the acrid juices
    Of nettle-tops and flower-de-luces;
    Till from the defunct carcase, lo!
    Starts a full blooded Bond street beau!!

Medea cut the wither’d weasand Of superannuated Æson, Then fill’d him
with the acrid juices Of nettle-tops and flower-de-luces; Till from the
defunct carcase, lo! Starts a full blooded Bond street beau!!


[28]

    In mimic earthquakes, rain, and thunder!

Chymistry furnishes us with a method of manufacturing _artificial_
earthquakes, which will have all the great effects of those that are
natural. The old-fashioned receipt for an earthquake, however, of
iron filings and sulphur mixed in certain proportions and immersed in
the earth, I shall not take the trouble to state to your worships; as
most of you have, _perhaps_, read Mr Martin’s Philosophy nearly half
through. But my plan is to make such an earthquake as no mortal, except
Dr Darwin and myself, ever supposed possible. The former gentleman
made shift to explode the moon from the _southern_ hemisphere of our
earth, and I propose to forward other moons by artificial earthquakes
of my own invention, from the _northern_ hemisphere. I will give your
worships a specimen of Dr Darwin’s moon-producing earthquake, from
“_Botanic Garden_,” Canto I.

    “Gnomes! How you shriek’d! when through the troubled air,
    Roar’d the fierce din of elemental war;
    When rose the continents, and sunk the main,
    And earth’s huge sphere exploding burst in twain.--
    Gnomes!  How you gazed! When from her wounded side,
    Where now the _South_ sea heaves its waste of tide,
    Rose on swift wheels the Moon’s refulgent car,
    Circling the solar orb, a sister star,
    Dimpled with vales, with shining hills emboss’d,
    And roll’d round earth her airless realms of frost.”

No man will say in this case,--

    Parturiunt montes nascetur ridiculus mus.

The reaction, at the moment of explosion, of that mass of matter which
now composes our moon, is the cause of the obliquity of the polar axis
to the poles of the ecliptic, according to Dr Darwin; though Milton
says,

              “----Angels turn’d askance
    The poles of earth twice ten degrees and more:
    From the sun’s axle, they with labor push’d
    Oblique the centric globe.”--

Whether an explosion similar to that, so beautifully described by Dr
Darwin, from the _north_ side of the equator, would not set all right,
and a new era be announced, which will be, like that of old, when

                          “----Spring
    Perpetual smiled on earth, with vernal flowers,
    Equal in days and nights”----

is a problem worth the attention of our modern philosophers. But at any
rate, I, Dr Caustic, will positively try the experiment.

[29]

    E’en fairly knock the man in the moon down!

This notable exploit I think to be a very great improvement on
electrical experiments made by a number of renowned French and English
philosophers. See _Priestly’s History of Electricity_, page 94.

[30]

    We took like macaroni snuff.

Dr Darwin alludes to this wonderful performance in the following superb
lines:

    “Led by the sage, lo! Britain’s sons shall guide
    Huge SEA-BALLOONS beneath the tossing tide;
    The diving castles roof’d with spheric glass,
    Ribb’d with strong oak, and barr’d with bolts of brass,
    Buoy’d with pure air shall endless tracts pursue,
    And Priestley’s hand the vital flood renew.”
                    _Botanic Garden_, _Canto_ iv.

[31]

    And if Britannia interferes.

That Great Britain, not content with domineering on the surface,
contemplates the colonizing of the depths of the ocean, is evident from
the following lines, by Dr Darwin:

    “Then shall Britannia rule the wealthy realms,
    Which ocean’s wide insatiate wave o’erwhelms;
    Confine in netted bowers his scaly flocks,
    Part his blue plains, and people all his rocks.
    Deep in warm waves, beneath the line that roll,
    Beneath the shadowy ice-isles of the pole,
    Onward, through bright meandering vales afar,
    Obedient _sharks_[A] shall trail her sceptred car,
    With harness’d necks the pearly flood disturb,
    Stretch the silk rein, and champ the silver curb.”

But be it known by these presents to Britannia’s ladyship, that all
that part of the ocean, which lies between the centre of gravity and
six feet of the surface, including whatsoever salt water touches or
rests upon, belongs to Doctor Caustic, by the rights of discovery and
pre-occupation.

[32]

    And if the theory of Babbage, &c.

Charles Babbage, Esq. A. M., Lucasian Professor of Mathematics in
the University of Cambridge, [Eng.] and member of several academies,
has written and published a work _On the Economy of Machinery
and Manufactures_, which furnished that impulse to our _Organ of
Constructiveness_ which eventuated in the accomplishment of the solid
gas manufactory above alluded to.

“In Iceland the sources of heat [to wit, hot springs, volcanoes, &c.]
and their proximity seem almost to point out the future destiny of that
island. The use of its glaciers may enable its inhabitants to liquefy
the gases with the least expenditure of mechanical force; and the heat
of its volcanoes may supply the power necessary for their condensation.
Thus, in a future age, _power_ may become the staple commodity of the
Icelanders, and of the inhabitants of other volcanic districts; and
possibly the very process by which they will procure this article of
exchange for the luxuries of happier climates, may, in some measure
tame, the tremendous element which occasionally devastates this
province.”

By our improvement, after the gases are condensed into a liquid, they
are made solid by the total abstraction therefrom of every particle of
caloric, insomuch that a thermometer, of our invention, with its bulb
in a ball of gas, indicated 999 degrees below 0 of Fahrenheit.

[33]

    He wanted science to go through it.

Monsieur Citizen Volney, a sort of minor doctor Caustic, published a
circular letter, requesting the co-operation of men of similar views
and intellects with his own, to make observations on the course and
velocity of the winds, the times of their occurrence, &c. in different
parts of the globe. The results of these observations he wished might
be forwarded to him at Paris, that he might therefrom be able to
complete a theory, which he had partly formed for calculating the tides
and currents of the atmosphere, with as much precision as those of the
ocean are now predicted.

Dr Franklin’s theories relative to this subject also deserve the meed
of metrical immortality. His tropical hurricanes, caused by a whirling
precipitance of cold air from the upper to the lower region of the
atmosphere are very fine phenomena. His _north east storms_, which,
on our continent, begin their operations at the _south west_, in
consequence of some extra rarefaction of air somewhere on or about the
isthmus of Darien, deserve a minute inspection. The ascent of rarefied
air at the equator, which makes its way to the poles, and visits us
in the form of a frigorific north-wester, as explained by Dr Darwin,
requires your worship’s high consideration. But we do not believe it
possible by a single impulse to project all this philosophy into your
right worshipful’s pericrania. You will, therefore, please wait till we
have leisure for the operation.

[34]

    And would not let him “vomit air.”

This terrible bear is likewise a camelion, and also a dragon. But here
you have him--

    “Castled on ice, beneath the circling bear,
    A vast CAMELION drinks and _vomits_ air;
    O’er twelve degrees his ribs gigantic bend,
    And many a league his gasping jaws extend;
    _Half fish beneath_, his scaly volutes spread,
    And vegetable plumage crests his head,
    Huge fields of air his wrinkled skin receives,
    From panting gills, wide lungs, _and waving leaves_;[B]
    Then with dread throes subsides his bloated form,
    His shriek the thunder, and his sigh the storm.”
                                       _Botanic Garden._

And again in prose.

“Though the immediate cause of the destruction or reproduction of
great masses of air, at certain times when the wind changes from north
to south, or from south to north, cannot yet be ascertained; yet as
there appears greater difficulty in accounting for this change of wind
from any other known causes, we may still suspect that there exists
in the arctic and antarctic circles, a BEAR or DRAGON, yet unknown
to philosophers, which, at times, suddenly _drinks up_, and at other
times as suddenly _vomits out_, one fifteenth part of the atmosphere:
and hope that this or some future age will learn how to govern and
domesticate a monster which might be rendered of such important service
to mankind”!!!
                                         _Botanic Garden. Note XXXIII._

[35]

    Or stem a hurricane with ease.

“Many schemes” (it is said in Rees’s Cyclopædia, article Aerostation)
“have been proposed for directing the horizontal motion of balloons.
Some have thought of annexing sails to a balloon, in order to give it
the advantage of the wind; but to this proposal it has been objected,
that as the aerostatic machines are at rest with respect to the air
that surrounds them, they feel no wind, and consequently can derive no
benefit from the sails.” None but a conjurer, however, could have made
that discovery. But Dr Rees says further, that “An ingenious writer
observes, that the case of vessels at sea is quite different from that
of balloons; because that the former move with a velocity incomparably
less than that of the wind impelling them, on account of the resistance
of the water,” &c. This ingenious writer must have had a new edition of
Friar Bacon’s head on his shoulders.

Our mode of steering a balloon is an improvement on the invention
of Professor Danzel, which is thus described by Dr Rees. “Professor
Danzel has constructed two cylinders, or axles, to the ends of which
are fixed, in the form of a cross, four sails or oars, moveable at the
point of their insertion in the cylinder, in such a manner, that when
made to move round by means of a handle, the eight oars, like the cogs
of a water mill wheel, present, successively, sometimes their flat side
and sometimes their edge,” &c.

It is very possible that you may have heard of some of our American
mechanical geniuses, who have _sometimes come very nigh_ to the art of
navigating boats against the stream by the force of the current. But
our invention is very materially different from that. We manage much
like a crab or lobster that paddles himself forward under water, and
proceeds as well as if he actually carried sail.

[36]

    And its contagion is outrageous.

Some people, who appear to be fond of an opportunity of spoiling
a beautiful theory, have produced against contagion the following
arguments, and thereby very much perplexed a simple subject which
ought to have been decided solely by the _ipse dixit_ of some famous
personage of the faculty.

1. The disorder is propagated more rapidly than could be possible on
the theory of contagion; as it spreads over a large city quicker than
the small pox would pervade a single alley.

2. It assimilates to itself all other diseases, and forces them to wear
its livery; which never is the case in contagious disorders.

3. It is destroyed by frost; but frost increases the activity of
contagion.

4. It is an endemic, and must have its own local atmosphere, beyond
whose limits it cannot be communicated. Thus the attendants of the sick
in _country_ hospitals are never known to be infected.

These, and fifty other arguments of a similar nature, I overturn by the
weight of the authority of Dr Mead and other great men, which I have
found to be a concise and inclusive way of stopping the mouths of my
opponents.

[37]

    By laws of chemical affinity;

Many an elaborate argument, founded on the above philosophical
proposition has been bandied about in periodical prints and journals,
during sundry desperate disputes relative to the origin of the American
plague. Madrid and Edinburgh, it is affirmed, are rendered healthy by a
want of cleanliness, which is proverbial. This sound reasoning is made
the basis of our judicious prescriptions which adorn this and several
consecutive stanzas.

[38]

    Paulo majora nunc canamus.

    Now sweep Apollo’s sounding lyre,
    And pitch the psalm an octave higher.

[39]

    We’ll turn out full moons by the hundred.

I do not think that one in forty of your worships has ever read the
“Theory of the Earth,” as first produced by James Hutton, M. D., F. R.
S., &c. &c. and thereafter much improved by professor Playfair. As it
would, however, be highly commendable for gentlemen of your honorable
profession not to rest with a superficial view of the great operations
of nature, I will accompany you as far as the centre of gravity, in a
journey of observation, for investigating the astonishing magazines of
burning materials which Dr Hutton and professor Playfair have furnished
us for the execution of our stupendous project.

1. You will obligingly take it for granted, or run the risk of spoiling
the Huttonian Theory, that the centre of the globe is a stupendous
furnace, a million times hotter than that of Nebuchadnezzar. That this
same heat, although it never amounts to a blaze, and wastes no fuel,
is sufficiently elastic to raise the continents from the bottom of the
main.--That having once raised or blown them up, as it were, like a
bladder, it is very careful not to let them down again, because as we
shall see by and by, they must all be “_disintegrated_,” alias washed
into the ocean.

2. Moreover, Dr Hutton’s followers will thank you to suppose that
all this matter, raised as aforesaid, consisted originally of
_unstratified_ rocks, which, though they are properly called primitive
as the most ancient of the whole family of rocks, yet they are in fact
nothing better than the scrapings or “_disintegrations_” of primal
continents which existed before the commencement of the last edition of
the earth.

3. You will please to believe that all calcareous matters are formed
from the _detritus_ of the primitive rocks, delivered by rivers into
the sea, and there, after having been modified by central heat,
protruded above water as before mentioned.

4. You will likewise be convinced that no metal, mineral, or _lapidose_
substance, can possibly be formed except at the bottom of the ocean, in
the laboratory of Dr Hutton.[C]

5. That although some foolish people have supposed that the sea has
been subsiding for centuries, yet, as we know that the continents are
crumbling into the ocean, you will conclude that we shall at length
find all our _dry_ land under _water_, and the sea increased in
proportion to the square feet of earth deposited under its surface.

6. That it is evident that this central heat, having raised its
continents, and put proper supporters under them, will go to work in
due time, and raise new continents from the bottom of the ocean. Thus
the area of Dr Hutton’s centre will be enlarged, till the earth and
moon will come in contact, if our plan hereafter mentioned should not
check such progression. But we forbear, lest when it is ascertained
that “the present continents are all going to decay and their materials
descending into the ocean,” it may cause some disagreeable sensations
among our friends, who are speculators in American lands, whose
property, it seems, according to Dr Hutton’s theory, is about to take
French leave of its worthy proprietors.

When you have thoroughly _saturated_ your faculties with this theory,
we will oblige you with a fresh _solution_ from Dr Darwin, compounded
as follows:

“The variation of the compass can only be accounted for by supposing
the central parts of the earth to consist of a fluid mass, and that
part of this fluid is iron, which requiring a greater degree of heat
to bring it into fusion than glass or other metals, remains a solid
ore. The vis inertiæ of this fluid mass with the iron in it occasions
it to perform fewer revolutions than the crust of solid earth over it;
and thus it is gradually left behind, and the place where the floating
iron resides, is pointed to by the direct or retrograde motion of the
magnetic needle.”

[40]

    Of bellows made of Franklin’s air.

In the first paper of the third volume of Transactions of the American
Philosophical Society, you will find certain “Conjectures concerning
the formation of the earth,” &c. in a letter from Dr B. Franklin, to
the abbe Soulavie; which we would prescribe as _tonics_ to Hutton’s
_system_. The American sage informs us, that in the course of some
observations in Derbyshire, in England, he “imagined that the internal
part (of the earth) might be a fluid more dense, and of greater
specific gravity than any of the solids we are acquainted with; which,
therefore, might swim in or upon that fluid. Thus the surface of the
globe would be a shell, capable of being broken and disordered by any
violent movements of the fluid on which it rested. And as air has been
compressed by art so as to be twice as dense as water, in which case,
if such air and water could be contained in a strong glass vessel, the
air would be seen to take the lowest place, and the water to float
above and upon it;[D] and as we know not yet the degree of density
to which air may be compressed; and M. Amontons calculated, that its
density increasing as it approached the centre in the same proportion
as above the surface, it would at the depth of--leagues be heavier
than gold, possibly the dense fluid occupying the internal parts of
the globe might be air compressed. And as the force of expansion in
dense air, when heated, is in proportion to its density; this _central
air might afford another agent to move the surface, as well as be of
use in keeping alive the subterraneous fires_; though, as you observe,
the sudden rarefication of water coming into contact with those fires
may also be an agent sufficiently strong for that purpose, when acting
between the incumbent earth and the fluid on which it rests.

“If one might indulge imagination in supposing how such a globe was
formed, I should conceive, that all the elements in separate particles
being originally mixed in confusion, and occupying a great space, they
would, as soon as the Almighty fiat ordained gravity or the mutual
attraction of certain parts and the mutual repulsion of other parts
to exist, all move towards their common centre: That the air being a
fluid whose parts repel each other, though drawn to the common centre
by their gravity, would be densest towards the centre and rarer as more
remote; consequently all matters lighter than the central part of that
air and immersed in it, would recede from the centre and rise till
they arrived at that region of the air which was of the same specific
gravity with themselves, where they would rest; while other matter,
mixed with the lighter air would descend, and the two meeting would
form the shell of the first earth, leaving the upper atmosphere nearly
clear.[E] The original movement of the parts towards their common
centre, would naturally form a whirl there, which would continue in
the turning of the new formed globe upon its axis, and the greatest
diameter of the shell would be in its equator. If by any accident
afterwards, the axis should be changed,” [viz. by the impinging of a
Buffon’s comet’s tail or the delivery of a Darwin’s moon] “the _dense
internal fluid by altering its form must burst the shell_ and throw all
its substance into the confusion in which we find it!” There’s an air
gun for your worships!

Now, if we did not possess a particular partiality for the sage who
formed this system, we should probably break up his Eolian cave, even
at the risk of creating half a hundred hurricanes. For should we open a
vent as large as a needle’s point into this magazine of compressed air,
you would instantly be assailed by “_another guess whistling_”[F] than
was the tempest tost Trojan fleet when

    Una Eurusque Notusque ruunt creberque procellis.

[41]

    Destroy good doctor Burnet’s crust.

We should be able to make much more rapid progress in our sublime
flights of poetry, were we not under the necessity of dismounting from
our Pegasus every ten paces, in order to give your worships a heist,
and thus enable your _ponderosities_, like Mr Pope’s “slugs,” to keep
up with us. It is a thousand to one if any one of your college has ever
heard of Dr Burnet, of earth-manufacturing memory. But it is absolutely
necessary that you should know something of Dr Burnet’s theory before
you can comprehend the stanza to which this note has reference. You
will, therefore, shut up this, my volume, and _per fas aut nefas_
obtain possession of Dr Burnet’s theory of the earth’s formation; and
when you have diligently drudged through that treatise, we will again
take you in tow, and permit you to accompany us, but non passibus
equis, till our muse salutes you with procul! O procul! &c.

[42]

    By Parker’s cement we’ll endeavor.

A composition has been invented by a Mr Parker, which bids fair to
become one of the most important discoveries which has signalized the
present century. The gentleman has compounded a cement or mortar,
which, by the mere action of the air, assumes in a week or two the
durability and consistence of the hardest marble and the firmest
stone, and may be applied to all the purposes to which the strongest
grained freestone is usually applied. Bridges, aqueducts, houses, and
we suppose pavements and roads, can be as well constructed of this
material as of the ordinary matters used in their composition. The
ornaments and articles usually made of marble can also be made of the
same materials, as it admits of a high polish, is incalculably cheaper,
just as durable, much lighter, and more easily worked. It is not
unlikely, that the waters of the Croton may be brought to New York in
pipes and aqueducts made of this article, as it would be so much more
economical than if transported thither in a canal of masonry, besides
that the new canal is impervious, never leaks, and consequently no
expenses for repairing would be ever incurred. There is not an article
used in household matters, or for public purposes that has formerly
been made of stone, but admits of the substitution of this cheaper and
lighter article; and we learn that the corporation have inspected the
manufacture, and are impressed with a proper sense of its importance
and applicability to civic purposes.--_N. Y. Mirror._

[43]

    The foolish trash of Isaac Newton.

See _Studies of Nature_, by St Pierre, in which that scheming
philosopher has, with wonderful adroitness, swept away the cobweb
calculations of one Isaac Newton. Indeed, I never much admired the
writings of the last mentioned gentleman, for the substantial reasons
following.

In the first place, the inside of a man’s noddle must be better
furnished than that of St Pierre, or he will never be able to
comprehend them.

Secondly, it would be impossible to manufacture a system, like that of
St Pierre, accounting for the various phenomena of nature, in a _new_
and _simple_ method, if one were obliged to proceed, like Newton, in
his _Principia_, in a dull, plodding, mathematical manner, and _prove_,
or even render _probable_, the things he asserts. But by taking some
facts for granted, without proof, omitting to mention such as militate
against a favorite theory, we may, with great facility, erect a
splendid edifice of “airy nothings,” founded on hypotheses without
foundation.

The said Isaac had taken it into his head that the earth’s equatorial
was longer than its polar diameter. This, he surmised from the
circumstance of a pendulum vibrating slower near the equator than near
the pole, and from finding that the centrifugal force of the earth
would not fully account for the difference between the time of the
vibrations at Cayenne and at Paris.

This, with other reasons equally plausible, led him to suppose that the
earth was flattened near the poles, in the form of an oblate spheroid,
and that a degree of latitude would, of consequence, be greater near
the pole than at the equator. Actual admeasurement coincided with that
conclusion.

The abbe St Pierre, however, possessing a most laudable ambition to
manufacture tides from polar ices, and thus to overturn Sir Isaac’s
theory relative to the moon’s influence in producing those phenomena,
and finding it somewhat convenient for that purpose to place his poles
at a greater distance from the centre of gravity than the equator,
accordingly took that liberty. He likewise had another substantial
reason therefor. Unless his polar diameter was longer than his
equatorial, the tides, being caused by the fusion of polar ices, must
flow up hill.

He therefore drew a beautiful diagram with which a triangle would
(according to the scheme of the author of _The Loves of the Triangles_,
improved from Dr Darwin’s _Loves of the Plants_) certainly fall in
love at first sight. (See page xxxiv. Pref. _Studies of Nature_.) In
displaying his geometrical skill in this diagram, however, he took care
to forget that there was some little difference between an _oblong_ and
an _oblate_ spheroid.--That flattening the earth’s surface, either in a
direction perpendicular or parallel to the poles, would _increase_ the
length of a degree of latitude by _decreasing_ the earth’s convexity.
That neither an oblate, nor an oblong spheroid was quite so _spherical_
as a perfect _sphere_. This was very proper, because such facts would
have been conclusive against his new Theory of the Tides.

[44]

    To make a clever sort of plough.

If you wish, gentlemen, to know anything further relative to this
instinctive plough, you will take the trouble to consult Mr Godwin’s
_Political Justice_, in which you will find almost as many sublime
and _practicable_ schemes for meliorating the condition of man, as
in this very erudite work of my own. Let it not be inferred from my
not enlarging upon the present and other schemes of this philosopher,
that I would regard him as one whit inferior to any other _modern_
philosopher existing, not even excepting his friend Holcroft; but the
necessity of expatiating on the redundancy of Mr Godwin’s merits, is
totally precluded by the unbounded fame which his _chaste_ productions
have at length acquired among the _virtuous_ and _respectable_ classes
in community.

[45]

    They show us how to live for ever.

The learned Dr Price, in his _Tracts on Civil Liberty_, assures us
that such sublime discoveries will be hereafter made by men of science
(meaning such as Dr Caustic) that it will be possible to cure the
disease of old age, give man a perpetual sublunary existence, and
introduce the millenium, by natural causes.

[46]

    His new _exploded_ solar system.

    “Through all the realms the kindling ether runs,
    And the mass starts into a million suns;
    Earths round each sun with quick explosions burst,
    And second planets issue from the first;
    Bend, as they journey with projectile force,
    In bright ellipses their reluctant course;
    Orbs wheel in orbs, round centres centres roll,
    And form, self-balanced one revolving whole.”
                       _Botanic Garden_, Canto i.

This sublime philosopher has been most atrociously squibbed in the
following performance, which I can assure you, gentlemen, is not mine;
and, if I could meet with the author, I would teach him better than to
bespatter my favorite with the filth of his obloquy.

“Lines on a certain philosopher, who maintains that all continents and
islands were thrown from the sea by volcanoes; and that all animal life
originally sprung from the exuviæ of fishes. His family arms are three
scallop shells, and his motto, “Omnia e Conchis.”

      “From atoms in confusion hurl’d,
      Old Epicurus built a world;--
    Maintain’d that all was accidental,
    Whether corporeal powers, or mental;
    That feet were not devised for walking,
    For eating, teeth; nor tongues for talking;
    But CHANCE, the casual texture made,
    And thus each member found its trade.
    And in this hodge podge of stark nonsense,
    He buried virtue, truth and conscience--
    Darwin at last resolves to list
    Under this grand cosmogonist.
    He, too, renounces his Creator,
    And solves all sense from senseless matter;
    Makes men start up from dead fish bones,
    As old Deucalion did from stones;
    Forms mortals quick as eyes could twinkle,
    From lobster, crab, and periwinkle--
    Oh Doctor! Change thy foolish motto,
    Or keep it for some lady’s grotto:
    Else thy poor patients well may quake,
    If thou canst no more mend than make.”

“From atoms in confusion hurl’d, Old Epicurus built a world;--
Maintain’d that all was accidental, Whether corporeal powers, or
mental; That feet were not devised for walking, For eating, teeth; nor
tongues for talking; But CHANCE, the casual texture made, And thus each
member found its trade. And in this hodge podge of stark nonsense,
He buried virtue, truth and conscience-- Darwin at last resolves to
list Under this grand cosmogonist. He, too, renounces his Creator, And
solves all sense from senseless matter; Makes men start up from dead
fish bones, As old Deucalion did from stones; Forms mortals quick as
eyes could twinkle, From lobster, crab, and periwinkle-- Oh Doctor!
Change thy foolish motto, Or keep it for some lady’s grotto: Else thy
poor patients well may quake, If thou canst no more mend than make.”


[47]

    First peer’d our continent through and through.

Citizen Volney made a very curious, simple, and convenient division of
the “Interior Structure” of North America, from certain specimens of
mineral substances, collected by this industrious pedestrian in a tour
of observation through the United States. Notwithstanding the immense
extent of territory which has come under citizen Volney’s cognizance,
and the short time which he did us the honor to reside and peregrinate
among us, we find that he was able to parcel our continent into
different interior departments, with as much precision as Buonaparte
showed in marking the different provinces of his empire. He gives us
“The granite region, the grit or sandstone region, the calcareous or
limestone region,” &c. &c.

Now this division is the more ingenious, because it possesses no
foundation in nature; and therefore shows a wonderful invention in its
author. It happens, luckily for this fine theory, that granite is found
in wonderful abundance in the limestone region, and that throughout the
continent, in defiance of Mr Volney, we find that nature has jumbled
all his “regions” together. Nature, having made some confusion in this
way, has the more need of the assistance of modern philosophy to aid
her defective operations.

[48]

    Of _graduated_ French morality.

This gentleman published in America a small pamphlet, entitled, The
Law of Nature, or Principles or Morality, deduced from the Physical
Constitution of Mankind and the Universe. In this he tells us, “It
is high time to prove that morality is a physical and _geometrical_
science, and as such, susceptible, like the rest, of calculation and
mathematical demonstration.”

My friend, doctor Timothy Triangle, is much such another philosopher;
but has surpassed the Frenchman in the extent of his views, and made
systems which were entirely out of the reach of Mr Volney’s intellect.
Among others, was _a scale of national character_. By this, the
latitude and longitude of a place being given, and a sort of tare and
tret allowance made for adventitious circumstances, he could ascertain
the character of its inhabitants. The latitude of Paris, he affirmed,
was that of perfectibility made perfect, and most lucidly manifested
in the person of the _Liberty-loving_ Emperor. Rise to the equator, or
recede to the pole from that parallel, and human nature dwindles in
arithmetical progression.

This gentleman was a great admirer of the principles of the French
revolution, and made out, mathematically, how much blood, horror, and
devastation would be necessary to give that predominance to France and
French principles, which would terminate in philosophy’s millennium.

Dr Triangle likewise made _geometrical scales_ of morality; which were
not very essentially different from the principles of Volney. These
scales were adapted accurately to the interest, feelings, passions,
and prepossessions of the persons for whom they were intended, and so
_elastic_ that they would stretch to suit any case, and authorize any
action which could be conceived or perpetrated.

[49]

    By PERKINS’S METALLIC PRACTICE.

Here comes the HYDRA, which you Herculean gentlemen are requested to
destroy; but the means, by which this great end is to be accomplished,
will be fully pointed out in the succeeding cantos.

[50]

    “Not so bold ARNALL; with a weight of skull
    Furious he drives precipitately dull:
    Whirlpools and storms his circling arms invest,
    With all the weight of gravitation blest.”
                        _Pope’s Dunciad_, Book iii.

[51]

    But I’m a man so meek and humble.

If your worships have ever read the Eneid of one Virgil (which though
_possible_ is not very _probable_, as physicians in general rarely
make themselves “mad,” by “too much learning”) you will perceive a
_classical_ beauty in the commencement of this canto, which would
escape the observation of the “_ignobile vulgus_.” As I wish, however,
that you might be able to relish some of the most obvious beauties
of this, my most exquisite poetical production, you will hire some
schoolmaster to show you how happily we have imitated the “At regina
gravi” of Virgil, and the “But now t’ observe romantic method” of
Butler.

[52]

    Though _starving_ is a _serious_ matter!

Many a worthy London alderman will most feelingly sigh a dolorous
response to this pathetic complaint.

[53]

    We all must be in one sad mess.

The sound is here a most correct echo to the sense; like the

    Βη δ’ ακεων παρα θινα πολυφλοισβοιο θαλασσης,

of Homer; the

    Quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum,

of Virgil; the

    Many a lusty thwack and bang,

of Butler;

    And ten low words oft creep in one dull line,

of Pope, &c. Indeed, gentlemen, I shall almost be tempted to pronounce
that person a sorry sort of a simpleton, who does not see, or seem to
see, the lengthened visage and hanging lip of our learned Esculapian
Fraternity, depicted with the phiz-hitting pencil of a Hogarth, in
these eight beautiful and appropriate monosyllables.

[54]

    Behold a rising INSTITUTION.

The builders of this second edition of the tower of Babel must be
confounded; and that they will be, most certainly, provided the
measures herein after recommended, be fully and manfully carried into
effect. But as it may be safest to reconnoitre somewhat before we
begin the attack, we will introduce you into the midst of the enemy’s
encampment, in an additional note at the end of our poem.

[55]

    Perkins supported by Aldini!

These two wonder-working wizards are said to effect their necromantic
manœuvres by the application of similar principles to the animal
machine. But the latter does not, in so great a degree, infringe on
our privileges, for he _begins_ where we _leave_ off; that is, after
the patient is _dead_; whereas Perkins, by his pretended easy and
expeditious mode of curing those who ought to depend solely on “death
and the doctor,” is a more formidable foe to our profession. See
additional note, No. 3.

[56]

    To raise a dead dog he was able.

“Dr Aldini, now in London, lately exhibited, at the house of Mr Hunter,
some curious experiments on the body of a dog newly killed, by which
the company then present were exceedingly astonished at the powers
of _Galvanism_. The head of the animal was cut off. The head and the
body were put beside each other on a table, previously rubbed with a
solution of Ammonia. Two wires, communicating with the Galvanic trough,
were then applied, the one in the ear, the other at the anus of the
dead animal. No sooner had those applications been made, than both
head and body were thrown into the most animated muscular motions. The
body started up with a movement, by which it passed over the side of
the table. The head equally moved, its lips and teeth grinning most
violently!” Vide the _Morning Post_ of January 6th, 1803.

[57]

    With two legs up, and two legs down.

Your worships will perceive that I have detailed some particulars
relative to this famous experiment, which were omitted in the above
statement from the _Morning Post_. But should any gentleman among
you presume to intimate that I have stated one syllable which is not
strictly and literally _true_, I shall embrace the fashionable mode of
resenting the affront. I have two pistols in my garret. Let him who
dares dispute Dr Caustic take his choice. Then, unless

    “Pallas should come, in shape of rust,
    And ’twixt the lock and hammer thrust
    Her Gorgon shield, and make the cock
    Stand stiff as ’twere transform’d to stock,”

I will make it apparent that I am a man of honor, as well as veracity.

[58]

    He made it _bellow_ like a Stentor!

“Some curious Galvanic experiments were made on Friday last, by
professor Aldini, in doctor Pearson’s lecture room. They were
instituted in the presence of his excellency, the ambassador of France,
general Andreossi, lord Pelham, the duke of Roxburgh, lord Castlereagh,
lord Hervey, the Hon. Mr Upton, &c. The head of an ox, recently
decapitated, exhibited astonishing effects; for the tongue being drawn
out by a hook fixed into it, on applying the exciters, in spite of the
strength of the assistant, was retracted, so as to detach itself, by
tearing itself from the hook; at the same time, a loud noise issued
from the mouth, attended by violent contortions of the whole head and
eyes.” See _Morning Post_ of February 16th, 1803.

[59]

    Rogues that were hung _once_, at Old Bailey!

“The body of Forster, who was executed on Monday last, for murder, was
conveyed to a house not far distant, where it was subjected to the
_Galvanic_ process, by professor Aldini, under the inspection of Mr
Keate, Mr Carpue, and several other professional gentlemen. M. Aldini,
who is the nephew of the discoverer of this most interesting science,
showed the eminent and superior powers of _Galvanism_ to be far beyond
any other stimulant in nature. On the first application of the process
to the face, the jaw of the deceased criminal began to quiver; and the
adjoining muscles were horribly contorted, and one eye was actually
opened. In the subsequent part of the process, the _right hand was
raised and_ CLENCHED, and the legs and thighs were set in motion.

“It appeared to the uninformed part of the by-standers, as if
the wretched man was on the eve of being restored to life. This,
however, was impossible; as several of his friends, who were near the
scaffold, had violently pulled his legs, in order to put a more speedy
termination to his sufferings.” Vide the _Morning Post_ of January 22,
1803.

It is to be hoped, in case this Mr Professor undertakes any future
operations of this nature, that some more _choleric dead man_ will
not only clench his fist like Forster, but convince him, by dint of
_pugilistic demonstration_, that he is not to disturb with impunity
those who ought to be at “_rest from their labors_.”

[60]

    He sees their worships plague old FRANCIS.

Dr FRANCIS ANTHONY. The author of the _Biographia Britannica_ relates
a pitiful tale respecting the persecutions suffered by this obstinate
old schismatic. “He was,” says that writer, “a very learned physician
and chemist, the son of an eminent goldsmith in London. Was born April
16th, 1550. In 1569, he was sent to the university of Cambridge; in
1574, took the degree of A. M. &c. &c. He began soon after his arrival
(in London) to publish to the world the effects of his chemical
studies. But not having taken the necessary precaution of addressing
himself to the College of Physicians for their license, he fell under
their displeasure; and being some time in the year 1600 summoned before
the president and censors, he _confessed_ that he had practised physic
in London for six months, and _had cured twenty persons or more of
several diseases_.” [A most atrocious crime! I trust very few if any of
your worships would be justified in _confessing_ or _pleading guilty_
to a similar indictment.] “About one month after, he was committed
to the Counter prison, and fined in the sum of five pounds _propter
illicitam praxim_--that is, for prescribing against the statutes of
the college: but upon his application to the chief justice, he was set
at liberty, which gave so great an umbrage, that the president and
one of the censors waited on the chief justice to request his favor
in preserving the college privileges: upon which Anthony submitted
and promised to pay his fine, and was forbidden practice. He was soon
after accused again for practising physic, and upon his own confession
was fined another five pounds, which fine, on his refusing to pay, was
increased to twenty pounds, and he was sentenced to be committed to
prison till he had paid it. Nor was the college satisfied with this,
but commenced a suit at law against him, in the name of the queen and
college, in which they prevailed, and had judgment against him. It
appears that the learned society thought him ignorant; but there were
others of a different opinion, since, after all these censures, and
being tossed about from prison to prison, he became doctor of physic in
our own universities!”

This is the substance of the proceedings of our ancestors against the
arch-heretic; from which we learn the absolute necessity of a still
more rigorous prosecution of those disturbers of society, who have the
impudence to _cure_ their patients without YOUR LICENSE. Had this old
fellow been hung, or “burnt off,” as he deserved, the business would
have been finished at once, and none would afterwards have dared ever
to call in question your supremacy!

[61]

    Why scream the bats! why hoot the owls!
    While Darwin’s midnight bull-dog howls!

A delectable imitation of Dr Darwin’s delightful pair of lines--

    “Shrill scream the famish’d bats and shiverings owls,
    And long and loud the dog of midnight howls.

To prevent any _post obit_ disputes among those who may hereafter
write comments on this sublime passage, I have thought it advisable
to designate the _species_ of the dog which howls so horridly on this
great occasion.

[62]

    ’Tis Radcliffe’s sullen sprite now rising.

This shows Pluto to be a god of correct calculation. Had he sent one of
your water-gruel ghosts, it is a thousand to one if your worships would
have paid the least deference to the mandates of his sooty highness.

[63]

    Or Monk-y Lewis’ Spanish Spectre!

I would have no impudent slanderer insinuate that I mean to bestow
on the right honorable M. G. Lewis, M. P. any opprobrious epithet.
No, gentlemen, I did not say _monkey_. The term which I use is an
adjective, legitimately coined from the substantive MONK; and I affix
it to this gentleman’s name as an honorary appellation, to which he
is entitled, for having written that celebrated romance called THE
MONK. As to the _Spanish Spectre_, you will please to consult the
romance aforesaid, and you will find a most horrible ballad, by which
it appears that a certain Miss Imogene was carried off on her bridal
night, if I mistake not, by the ghost of one Don Alonzo, to whom she
had been betrothed, but proved false hearted. I would, however, caution
against reading this doleful ditty by candle light, lest the story of

    “The worms they crept in, and the worms they crept out,
    And they sported his eyes and his temples about,”

might _sport_ with the senses of the more timid reader.

[64]

    To make above ground one d--d flurry!

I earnestly request that the learned college will not do me the
injustice to suppose that a man of my delicacy and refined feelings
would _myself_ utter any phrase like the above, which has so much the
semblance of profanity. But as this personage, before he passed that
fatal “bourne” (from which _one_ “traveller” _has_ “returned”) had ever
been accustomed, like most of our profession, to rhetorical flourishes
of this kind, it must be expected that, on such an important occasion,
he would express himself with all his wonted energy; and my veracity as
a historian obliges me to give _verbatim_ the speech which the sprite
did in fact deliver.

[65]

    And cannot pay NINETEEN POUNDS TEN”!!!

The terrible shock given not only to Mr Addington, but to the credit
of the British nation, by this famous sally of that teasing, testy,
querulous, alarming, honorable, cidevant member of the House of
Commons, is undoubtedly fresh in the recollection of every person,
who has the least smattering in parliamentary debates: and every true
patriot and friend to the _peace_ of ---- our prime minister, will
congratulate the country on the failure of Mr Robson’s election, as
well as that of his co-operator, Mr Jones, into the new parliament.

[66]

    Found Hawkesbury’s letter all a take-in.

Now I know the man who cobbled up the famous humbug peace with France,
which, in my opinion, was a manœuvre that did honor to its inventor.
He tenants a garret adjacent to mine. But Dr Caustic is an honorable
man, and twice the £5000 offered by the stock exchange, with the £500
by the lord mayor, for his apprehension, would not tempt him to expose
the neck of his friend to the noose of justice. This I premise, that
the Bow street officers may not misapply their time and talents in any
futile attempts to wheedle or extort the secret.

[67]

    Broke a whole gallipot of wrath!

I beseech you, gentlemen, to suspend your impatience relative to this
wonderful achievement, till you have _soared_ through a few stanzas. In
the meantime, however, I wish that this my favorite hero, and burthen
of my song, should stand high with your worships, and be the object of
the humble admiration, not only of your honorable body, but of mankind
in general: and I, myself, shall take the liberty to trample on all
those, who dare call in question his infallibility. I have a knowledge
of but few, who more deserve to be trodden upon on this occasion than
the conductors of certain foreign literary journals, who, not aware of
the inconceivable services which Dr H. has rendered the medical host by
his ardent zeal against their common enemy, Perkinism, have expressed
their sentiments of him, and his works, with that indifference, which
must have arisen from their want of knowledge of his achievements.

Among the most prominent of this junto should be mentioned the _Medical
Repository_, at New York, conducted by professors Mitchell and Miller,
of that place, the former of whom I understand is a representative
in the Congress of the United States, an eminent physician, and the
celebrated author of what is usually termed the “Mitchellian Theory of
Contagion,” alterations in the French Chemical Nomenclature, &c. The
latter, I am told, is likewise a physician of great respectability.

Now that two such characters should presume to represent Dr H. as
a man, whose “vanity is more conspicuous than his ability,” is a
circumstance which, while it excites my surprise, rouses my resentment.
However, to accomplish their disgrace and his renown, I shall concisely
state his magnanimous conduct to them, and their ungracious return.

Dr H. in great condescension to the poor wretches of the United
States, who, through the ignorance and _inexperience_ of their medical
practitioners, were likely to be extirpated by the yellow fever,
addressed them in an affectionate letter, and proclaimed the barbarity
and unskilfulness of their physicians, in a very appropriate and
becoming manner. He even kindly apprized the Academy of Medicine,
at Philadelphia, that their proceedings and reasonings on the
disease among them were “frivolous, inadequate, and groundless,” and
communicated many other facts equally useful and important.

Now, whether his statements were true or false, those foreigners
ought to have been grateful to Dr H. for _honoring_ them with the
information. But on the contrary, they say that “a poison, which, in
the city of New York, has destroyed, within three months, the lives
of more than twenty practitioners of medicine, well deserves to be
traced and understood by the survivors.” They even have the audacity to
assert, that “American physicians and philosophers, who have viewed the
rise and progress of pestilence, walked amidst it by day and by night,
year after year, and endured its violence on their own persons, almost
to the extinction of their lives,” ought to be as competent judges of
the cause and cure of the disease as Dr Haygarth, who has never seen a
case of it.

After entering into a copious (about 20 pages) and what they seem
to think a learned investigation of my great friend’s theory and
sentiments, they have dared to refute his reasoning, and turn it to
ridicule.

These presumptuous writers finally close their unreasonable account
of Dr Haygarth, in quotations from Dr Caldwell, who, it appears, is
a fellow of the college of physicians of Philadelphia, and a very
ungentleman-like _fellow_ too, for he has also had the rashness to
descant on some of the works of Dr Haygarth in terms following.

“Perhaps he (Dr Haygarth) may found the boldness of his pretensions
as an author on the maturity of his years. Many writers less youthful
are more modest; and it is to be lamented that grey hairs give no
_infallible_ earnest of either wisdom or liberality. We will not
positively assert that he is not a man of profound erudition; but we
have no reason whatever to convince us that he is. Perhaps he may pride
himself on being a native of the same country which produced a Harvey,
a Sydenham, a Cullen, and a Hunter. We entreat him to remember, that
weeds may infest the same ground which has been overshadowed by the
lordly adansonia, and that the same clime gives birth to the lion and
the jackal.” _Medical Repository_, vol. v. p. 333. Oh, fie! fie!

[68]

    Till our aerial cutter runs.

My mode of commencing an airy tour, mounted, Muse and Co. on a poetical
_pony_, which, by the way, is metamorphosed into a _cutter_, may,
perhaps, be objected to by your fastidious critics, as a liberty even
beyond a poet’s licentiousness. But there is nothing which we men
of _genius_ more thoroughly detest than any attempt to fetter our
faculties with the frigid rules of criticism. Besides, _sense_ or
_nonsense_, _poetry_ or _gingling_, it is perfectly _Della Cruscan_.

[69]

    “A WILDERNESS OF SUNS!”

This “proud” passage, together with “O THOU!”--“GENIUS or MUSE!”--and
“CATARACT OF LIGHT!”--are the legitimate offspring of that prince of
poets, who rose to such a towering _pitch_ of poetry,

    “That oft Hibernian optics bright
    _Beheld_ him fairly _out of sight_!”

I should have been happy to have fascinated your worships with further
specimens of the same sort of sublimity, could I have retained them
in memory. I have been so solicitous for your gratification in this
particular, that I have made a painful, though bootless search,
throughout the metropolis and its suburbs, for these more than sybiline
oracles. Indeed, I have reason to fear, that all Della Crusca’s
effusions are irretrievably lost, except the few fragments which I have
here _pickled_ for the behoof of posterity.

[70]

    But Gifford comes, with why and wherefore.

The admirers of your _polite_ poetry can never sufficiently
anathematize the author of the _Baviad and Mæviad_ for extirpating,
root and branch, a species of sentimental ditty, which might be
scribbled, without the trouble of “sense to prose;” an object certainly
of no small consequence with your _bon ton_ readers and writers of
rhyme. How could a _sentimental Ensign_ or _love-lorn Lieutenant_ be
better employed than in sobbing over “Laura’s tinkling trash,” or
weeping in concert with the “mad jangle of Matilda’s lyre?” Besides,
there ought to be _whipped syllabub_ adapted to the palates of those
who cannot relish “Burns’ pure healthful nurture.” Mr Gifford should be
sensible, that reducing _poetry_ to the standard of _common sense_ is
clipping the wings of genius. For example; there is no describing what
sublime and Della Cruscan-like capers I should myself have been cutting
in this “Wilderness of suns;” for I was about to prepare a nosegay of
comets, and string the spheres like beads for a lady’s necklace; but
was not a little apprehensive lest Mr G. or some other malignant critic
should persuade the public, that my effusions of fancy were little
better than the rant of a bedlamite.

[71]

    And _tollutate_ o’er turnpike path.

    They rode, but authors having not
    Determin’d whether pace or trot,
    That is to say, whether _tollutation_,
    As they do term’t, or succussation.
                     _Hudibras_, Canto ii.


[72]

    Behold! great Haygarth and his corps.

I here wish to give a concise sketch of the doctor’s necromantic
process, so well calculated to give the tractors the kick out of Bath
and Bristol, where they were rapidly making the most sacrilegious
encroachments on the unpolluted shrine of our profession. I would
recommend similar proceedings to every member of the college, and every
worthy brother who is truly anxious to preserve the dignity and honor
of the professional character. But would premise, that, when the like
experiments are made, which, I trust, will be very generally by the
whole profession, I would particularly recommend that the doctor’s
prudence, in not admitting any of the friends of the tractors at the
scene of action, should be strictly imitated; and also his discretion
in choosing, as subjects for the experiment, the ignorant and miserable
paupers of an infirmary, whose credulity will assist very much in
operations of this sort. I also enjoin them to bear in mind his _hint_,
“That if any person would repeat the experiment with _wooden_ tractors,
it should be done with due solemnity; during the process, the wonderful
cures said to be performed by the tractors, should be particularly
related. Without these _indispensable_ aids, other trials will _not_
prove so successful as those which are here reported.” _Haygarth’s
book_, page 4.

It can scarcely be necessary for me to hint to my discreet brethren, in
addition, that should they try the _real_ tractors afterwards (which,
however, I rather advise them not to do at all) the whole of these
aids of the mind are to be as strictly avoided. I had like to have
forgotten to say, that the means used in the instance which follows to
increase the solemnity of the scene, were a capital display of wigs,
canes, stopwatches; and a still more solemn and terrific spectacle,
about a score of the brethren. The very commencement serves to show
how “_necessary_” was all this display to ensure the success of these
_wooden_ tractors.

“It was often _necessary_ to play the part of a _necromancer_, to
describe circles, squares, triangles, and half the figures in geometry,
on the parts affected, with the small end of the (wooden) tractors.
During all this time we conversed upon the discoveries of Franklin and
Galvani, laying great stress on the power of metallic points attracting
lightning, and conveying it to the earth harmless. To a more curious
farce I was never witness. We were almost afraid to look each other in
the face, lest an involuntary smile should remove the mask from our
countenances, and dispel the charm.” _Haygarth’s book_, page 16.

A very ingenious friend of Dr H. and the glorious cause in which he is
engaged, has conceived an improvement on this process. While the above
operation is going on, surely, the adroit necromancer would handle his
_virgula divinitoria_ with far greater effect, and himself appear much
more in character, by using a suitable incantation. The following has,
therefore, been proposed for the general use of the profession.

    Hocus! pocus! up and down!
    Draw the white right from the crown!
    Hocus! pocus! at a loss!
    Draw the brazen rod across!
    Hocus! pocus! down and up!
    Draw them both from foot to top!

Lest you should not have sufficient ingenuity to _comprehend_ the
_object_ of Dr Haygarth, in producing these operations on the minds
of those paupers, by the aid of such means as he employed, I must
_try_ to explain it. It was to induce an inference on the part of the
public, that if, _by any means whatsoever_, effects can be produced on
the mind of a poor bedridden patient, whether such effect be favorable
or unfavorable (as the latter was often the case in Haygarth’s
experiments) _ergo_, Perkins’s tractors _cure_ diseases by acting on
the mind also, whether on a human or brute subject. Should any person
be so uncivil and unreasonable as to start the objection to this logic,
that with the same propriety all medicines might also be supposed to
produce their effects by an action on the mind, I particularly advise
(provided such person be a noted coward) that you challenge him or
her to a duel: but if, on the contrary, he or she be a terrible Mac
Namara-like fellow, modestly reply that it was all a joke, and you hope
there was no offence.

[73]

    O _man_ of _mineral putrefaction_.

In the famous address to which we have before referred, we find a most
remarkable discovery of the hero of our tale, relative to the origin of
“_stench_,” which alone would entitle our doctor to be numbered amongst
the most profound of all philosophers, and which we shall give the
world in his own words.

“It is too obvious to escape notice, that the stench arising from the
hold of a ship proceeds from the putrefaction of substances which
belong to all the three kingdoms of nature, vegetable, animal, and
_mineral_!!”

[74]

    A certain crazy Russian emperor.

Czar Paul, emperor of all the Russias, &c. who had a very benevolent
desire to settle the disputes, which agitated Europe, by virtue of tilt
and tournament, among those potentates, whose quarrelsome dispositions
so often set their subjects by the ears.

[75]

    But first invade the old bell-wether.

This sublime simile, gentlemen, will meet the unequivocal approbation
of those who are acquainted with the rustic manners and natural history
of Kamtschatka. The leading wether of a flock of sheep is ever invested
with a bell, pendent from his neck by a collar, not only as an honorary
badge of distinction, but for the purpose of alarming the shepherd, in
case of invasion by any of the merciless tenants of the forest. The
wolf always makes it his first object to silence this jingler, that he
may with the greater impunity destroy his fleecy companions.

[76]

    Will most assuredly acquit him.

Why not, as well as acquit Capt. Mac, who evaded all harm, in
consequence of his not permitting the “sun to go down on his wrath?”
Mr Justice Grose, however, appears to me to have proved himself to
have been a very gross justice, in telling the jury that the law does
not recognise certain nice distinctions which are adopted by men of
honor. If, however, his assertion be true, it is proper that there
should be an act of parliament passed immediately, giving US GENTLEMEN
the privilege of killing each other, which would save government the
expense of hemp, hangmen, &c.

[77]

                In crows and infants, dogs and horses.

These are among the _patients_ whose cures are attested in Perkins’s
publication, in which he has introduced them to show that his tractors
do not cure by an influence on the _imagination_. The fallacy of
any deductions, drawn from such cases, in favor of the tractors,
will be apparent from the following most _learned_ and _elaborate_
investigation of the subject.

There are no animals in existence, I shall incontestably prove, that
are more susceptible of impressions from imagination, than those above
mentioned.

To begin with the _crow_. Strong mental faculties ever indicate a vivid
imagination; and what being, except Minerva’s beauty, the owl, is more
renowned for such faculties than the crow?--Who does not know that he
will smell gunpowder three miles, if it be in a gun, and he _imagine_
it be intended for his destruction? These emblems of sagacity, besides
“fetching and carrying like a spaniel,” and talking as well or better
than colonel Kelly’s parrot (which by the by I suspect to have been
a crow) are, as Edwards assures us in his _Natural History_, “the
planters of all sorts of wood and trees.” “I observed,” says he, “a
great quantity of crows very busy at their work. I went out of my way
on purpose to view their labor, and I found they were planting a grove
of oaks.” Vol. v. Pref. xxxv.

These _geniuses_ always can tell, and always have told, since the days
of Virgil, the approach of rain. That poet says,

    “Tum _cornix_ plena pluviam vocat improba voce.”

They can likewise tell when bad news is approaching, as we learn from
the same writer,

    “Sæpe sinistra cava prædixit ab ilice _cornix_.”

Now I beg leave to know what mortal can do more? and to suppose a crow
not blessed with those more brilliant parts, under which _imagination_
is classed, is to do them a singular injustice, which I shall certainly
resent on every occasion.

Now as to _infants_. Whoever has been in the way of an acquaintance
with some of the more musical sort of these little gentry (like my
seven last darlings for instance) and has been serenaded with the
dulcet sonatas of their warbling strains, will not be disposed to deny
their powers on the imagination of _others_. I have known the delusion
practised so effectually by these young conjurers, that I have myself
_imagined_ my head was actually aching most violently, even on the
point of cracking open; but on going beyond the reach of their magic
spell, that is, out of hearing, my head has been as free from pain as
it necessarily must be at this moment, while I am penning this lucid
performance. Now, I maintain it to be most unphilosophical, and totally
opposite to certain new principles in ethics, which I shall establish
in a future publication, to suppose that infants should be able to
impart either pleasure or pain, by operating on the imagination, and
not themselves possess a large share of that imagination, by the aid of
which they operate to so much effect upon others.

Next come _dogs_. Dr Shaw, in his _Zoology_, vol. i. p. 289, informs
us, “that a dog belonging to a nobleman of the Medici family always
attended his master’s table, changed the plates for him, carried him
his wine in a glass placed on a salver, without spilling the _smallest_
drop.” The celebrated Leibnitz mentions another, a _subject_ of the
elector of Saxony, _who_ could discourse in an “intelligible manner,”
especially on “tea, coffee, and chocolate;” whether in Greek, Latin,
German, or English, however, he has not stated; but Dr Shaw, alluding
to the same dog, says, undoubtedly under the influence of prejudice,
“he was somewhat of a truant, and did not willingly exert his talents,
being rather pressed into the service of literature.”

Indeed, our greatest naturalists assure us, that this animal is far
before the human species in every ennobling quality. Buffon makes man
a very devil compared with the dog; and had he come directly to the
point, I presume he would have told us that the dog is one link above
man in the great chain from the fossil to the angel. “Without the dog,”
says Buffon, “how could man have been able to tame and reduce other
animals into slavery? To serve his own safety, it was necessary to make
friends among those animals whom he found capable of attachment. _The
fruit of associating with the dog_ was the conquest and _the peaceable
possession of the earth_. The dog will always preserve his empire. He
reigns at the head of a flock, and makes himself _better_ understood
than the voice of the shepherd” (well he might, for it appears he
is more knowing, more powerful, and more just.) “Safety, order, and
discipline, are the fruits of his vigilance and activity. They are a
people submitted to his management, whom he conducts and protects, and
against whom he never employs force but for the preservation of peace
and good order.” _Barr’s Buffon_, vol. v. p. 302.

It is to me somewhat remarkable that _theorizing_ Frenchmen, many of
whose discoveries are scarcely less important than my own, cannot
make them apply in such a manner as to effect some _practical good_
in society. Buffon discovered that a dog was a species of demi-god,
and appears on the point of worshipping this great Anubis of the
Egyptians. Voltaire tells us, that Frenchmen are half monkey and half
tiger, and everybody knows that the one is insufferably mischievous,
and the other infinitely ferocious. Now it is surprising that these
philosophers could not contrive to improve the breed by a little of
the _canine_ blood. Indeed, I should advise them to import some of our
Bond street male _puppies_, to be paired with French female _monkeys_,
and I will venture to assert that there will be very little of the
_tiger_ perceivable in their offspring. And since a dog, as Buffon
says, “reigns with so much dignity at the head of a flock, will always
preserve his empire, _never employs force but for the preservation
of peace and good order_,” and is endowed with so many other great
qualifications, which seem to denote him to be a proper personage
to wield the sceptre of dominion, I would seriously advise the abbe
Sieyes, when he frames his 999th Constitution for the _free_ French
Republic (which it is said he has already begun to manufacture) so to
organize the executive branch, that at least one of the consuls should
be a true blooded English bull-dog.

After the ample proof I have now given of the infinite superiority of
the dog to man, when his merits are fairly estimated, which it is very
difficult for us, being interested, to do without prejudice, I shall
take it for granted, that he must possess all the brilliancy even of a
poet’s imagination, and therefore that he is far _more_ likely to be
cured by imagination than man.

It now remains to speak of _horses_, and these (not to mention
the Bucephalus of Alexander, or the Pegasus of doctor Caustic) I
shall show, in a very few words, can boast of performances and
qualifications, to which a lively fancy in the comparison is but
as the wit of an oyster to the wisdom of a philosopher. One of the
most scientific nations that ever existed, renowned alike for its
refinements in the arts, and prowess in war, has been compelled to
yield the palm to the superior attainments of a horse, and acknowledge
its inability to achieve what he most readily effected. Ten long
years was the whole power of Greece engaged in an ineffectual siege
of far-famed Troy. The bravest of armies, commanded by heroes allied
to the gods, assailed the foe in vain. At this disheartening period
stepped forth a _wooden_ horse, and promised a victory, provided his
plans were adopted. Aware of the horse’s _great capacity_, which
enabled him to _comprehend_ a great number of _subjects_, the sagacious
Greeks _entered into_ his measures, and Troy was levelled in the dust.

If all this could have been accomplished by a _wooden_ horse, none
but a Perkinite will be so absurd as to pretend that one composed of
_flesh and blood_, like man, does not enjoy far greater privileges,
among which are those of receiving as many cures by the influence of
imagination as he pleases.

Now then, gentlemen, I trust that if any man will con over, digest,
comprehend, and _admit_ this my ingenious and learned exposition of
the fallacy of the arguments in favor of the tractors, so much harped
upon by our adversaries, which are drawn from the circumstance of their
having cured crows and infants, dogs and horses, he will with great
facility be enabled to confound and overthrow them on all occasions,
provided he enforce and proclaim it with the ardency its importance
deserves.

[78]

    For pain itself is all _ideal_.

So said the learned bishop Berekley, in a scientific treatise called
_Principles of Human Knowledge_, in which his reverence makes it
apparent, to those who have a clue to his metaphysical labyrinth,
that there is no such thing as matter, entity, or sensation, distinct
from the mind which perceives, or thinks it perceives, such ideas or
substances. The bishop’s authority being so pat in point, I cannot but
admire that it has not more frequently been adduced in opposition to
the tractors.

[79]

    THEN MAN, OF COURSE, THOSE DRUGS TO TAKE.

This CAPITAL argument, that it might make a CAPITAL figure, I have
ordered my printer to put in CAPITAL letters, and I hope it will
make a CAPITAL impression on your worshipful intellects. But still
I have not given it half that pre-eminence which its importance
claims, under existing circumstances. A great hue and cry has been
raised by the Perkinites, by which some of the less penetrating part
of the profession have been awed into silence, respecting the _duty_
of medical practitioners. They say that it is the duty of a medical
man to employ only such means as will cure his patient in the most
_safe_, _cheap_, and _expeditious_ manner. This infamous pretension
takes its origin from no other person than Perkins himself. That
you may individually be aware of the effrontery with which it is
brought forward, I shall, in this note, copy from Perkins’s book his
manner of treating the subject. Your worships will form some idea
of the magnitude of this objection of our adversaries, in their own
estimation, and the mischief it has already occasioned, not only in
Great Britain, but abroad, when I inform you that it has been echoed
in both the English and foreign journals, and in many of them treated
as a complete refutation of the arguments of Dr Haygarth, and of
all who object against the tractors, on account of their _curing_
diseases merely by operating on the imagination. Among other foreign
publications, I observe that the 21st volume of the _Bibliothèque
Britannique_, printed at Geneva, closes a long account (40 pages) of
“_Perkinisme_” with this “petite histoire de Mr Perkins.”

“A gentleman came from the country to London, for the advantage
of medical assistance, in a complaint of peculiar obstinacy and
distress. After being under the care of an eminent physician several
weeks, and paying him upwards of thirty guineas, without any relief,
he was induced to try the tractors. To be short, they performed a
remarkable cure; the person was perfectly restored in about ten days.
The physician, calling soon after, was informed of the circumstance.
He began lamenting that so sensible a person as the patient should
be caught in the use of so contemptible a piece of quackery as the
tractors. After assuring the patient that he had thrown away his five
guineas, for that it was well established by Dr Haygarth, that a
brick-bat, tobacco-pipe, goose-quill, or even the bare finger, would
perform the same cures, he was interrupted by his patient: ‘And are
you sincere in your belief that you could have produced, by those
means, the same effects upon me, which I have experienced from the
tractors?’ ‘Do I believe it? Ay, I know it; and that a thousand similar
cures might be effected by means equally simple and ridiculous.’ ‘And
sir,’ interrupted the gentleman again, in a more stern and serious
tone, ‘why did you not cure me then, by those _simple_ means? Remember
I have paid you thirty guineas, under the supposition that you were
exerting your utmost endeavors to cure me, and that in the most safe,
cheap, and expeditious manner. You now, in substance, acknowledge,
that, although in possession of the means of restoring me to health,
for the dishonorable purpose of picking my pocket, you continued me
upon the bed of sickness! Who turns out to be the impostor? Let your
own conscience answer.’ The justness of the retort, it will be easily
believed, precluded the possibility of an exculpation.” _Perkins’s New
Cases_, p. 145.

Had I been the physician, however, I would have rejoined with
arguments, not dissimilar to that which is so beautifully expressed
in the above stanza. I would have told him that the Author of nature
most certainly would not have created either a poisonous or salubrious
vegetable, without intending that it should “dose and double dose” his
creature man.

Should it be objected that the tractors being also _created_ substances
ought also to be used, I could ingenuously retort, they were created
in America, a country whose natives are Indians, an inferior order of
beings to man, as some great philosophers before me have asserted, and
who, it is evident, are the _only_ order of creatures, on whom it was
intended the tractors should be used.

I have no particular wish to injure Dr Jenner, or I should positively
overturn him and all his adherents with my resistless arguments. If
I were not willing that he should retain his popularity, I should
make it appear that the small-pox was created with the intent of
being universally propagated among the human race for the purpose of
mortifying female vanity; and Jenner’s attempt to extirpate it, by
substituting the cow-pox, which ought to have been confined to the
quadrupeds, among which it originated, as the tractors ought to have
been to the Indians, is the extreme of presumption, and the height of
iniquity. I cannot but conceive that our bishops and clergy are very
remiss in not endeavoring to dissuade from such enormous, innovating
practices.

[80]

    That learn’d physicians pine with hunger.

No man who possesses a _heart_, certainly none who possesses _bowels_,
can view us reduced to this deplorable condition, and hear this
pathetic appeal, without the sincerest commiseration. The eminent
services that our profession have rendered mankind, in contributing
to avert some of the greatest curses that ever befel the civilized
part of the world, are too well known, and have been too frequently
acknowledged to be forgotten, ungratefully, in the day of our
adversity. The testimony to this effect of the judicious, the humane
Addison, ought often to be brought before the public eye.

“We may lay it down as a maxim,” says that intelligent writer, “that
when a nation abounds with physicians it grows thin of people. Sir
William Temple is very much puzzled to find out a reason why the
northern hive, as he calls it, does not send such prodigious swarms,
and overrun the world with Goths and Vandals, as it did formerly: but
had that excellent author observed that there were no students in
physic among the subjects of Thor and Woden, and that this science very
much flourishes in the north at present, he might have found a better
solution for this difficulty than any of those he has made use of.”
_Spectator_, No. 21.

[81]

    The patient _save_, but _starve_ the doctor.

This would be abominable. Physicians, in general, are a hale hearty
race of men, as, indeed, must be readily conceived from their prudent
maxims in regard to the preservation of their _own_ health:--they take
no physic. No; they are too well acquainted with its tendency. Now, to
starve so sturdy and powerful a body, when his majesty is in want of
such subjects to check the ambitious strides of restless Buonaparte,
as appears from the king’s declaration of this day (May the 16th,
1803,) in preference to letting their miserable _patients_ expire, whom
Providence evidently intended should die off, is, I trust, too absurd
and unreasonable an idea to be admitted.

[82]

    Like Perkinites, they find Mecenases.

The Perkineans have no cause to boast of the extent of their patronage,
for the poor tawny reptile chimney-sweepers have of late interested the
friends of humanity in their behalf quite as much. Your worships will
derive from this circumstance a very pleasant source for _sneering_
at our opponents, which I am sure you will _gladly_ embrace, whenever
opportunity presents.

[83]

    Except by knaves retired from practice.

This, gentlemen, is a circumstance of no small moment, and which I
trust you will see the necessity of looking at with some seriousness.
Some of our profession have, to their eternal disgrace, since their
retirement on their fortunes, deserted our cause, and are now to be
found in the ranks of our enemies. These fellows have the presumption
to suggest that their duty to the interests of the community supersedes
that which they owe to their old brethren, the unreasonableness of
which sentiment I conceive to be self-evident, and therefore shall
not trouble myself to prove it. Several have even addressed to the
Perkinean Institution communications in favor of the metallic tractors,
for publication, three of which are already laid before the public.
The first on this list is Mr Lyster, late of Dublin, who having been
above twenty years senior surgeon of the Dublin hospital, retired to
Bath, where he now seems even to take delight in benefitting the mean
and miserable poor, to wanton injury of his own dear brethren. To show
the extent of his malice, he has, in his communication to the Perkinean
Society, introduced statements of remarkable cures by the tractors;
among others one of total blindness of many years duration, in which
all medical skill had previously failed; and, to wind up this tale of
infamy, he has even ventured to censure, indirectly, my great champion,
Dr Haygarth, and to hint that his proceedings were not accompanied with
honorable intentions!

Next on this trio list are Mr Yatman, of Chelsea, and Dr Fuller, of
Upper Brook street; the conduct of both of whom is equally, if not
more reprehensible than Lyster’s. These two also call in the lame,
the halt, and the blind, and, as if to spite their brethren who have
drugs to sell, cure them with the tractors without fee or reward! Such
conduct is so atrocious that if your worships should think proper to
have them indicted, and Mr Erskine or Mr Garrow object to defend the
cause of such clients, I, counsellor Caustic (remember I am LL.D.) will
manage it for you, and, provided I can but get that same jury which
decided that captain Macnamara was not accessory to the death of Col.
Montgomery, I will procure the defendants to be sent to Botany Bay, or
at least as far as Coventry.

To show the barbarity and wantonness of these two men, I will close
this note by the following quotation from the letter of one of them,
Dr Fuller, who, after a practice of nearly thirty years in medicine,
and by which he has secured his own independence, seems now to amuse
himself in undermining those of us who are still dependant. After a
statement of a number of great cures by the tractors, and proving, by
his own trials on infants, &c. that they do not act on imagination,
which Dr Haygarth so laudably attempted to show, he proceeds:--“I
derive much satisfaction in noticing among the more liberal and
respectable part of my profession an increased favorable opinion of
Perkinism, and a readiness to _allow_ of its use among their patients,
when proposed by _others_. To expect more than this, would be to expect
more than human nature in its present state will admit. It must be an
_extraordinary_ exertion of virtue and humanity for a medical man,
whose livelihood depends either on the sale of drugs, or on receiving
a guinea for writing a prescription, which must relate to those drugs,
to say to his patient, ‘You had better purchase a pair of tractors
to keep in your family; they will cure you without the expense of my
attendance, or the danger of the common medical practice.’ For very
obvious reasons, medical men must _never_ be expected to recommend the
use of Perkinism. The tractors must trust for their patronage to the
enlightened and philanthropic out of the profession, or to medical men
retired from practice, and who know of no other _interest_ than the
luxury of relieving the distressed. And I do not despair of seeing the
day, when but very few of this description as well as private families
will be without them.” If Dr Fuller were obliged to live in my garret
one month, he would sing a different tune.

[84]

    Who make, quoth Darwin, good manure.

Besides the advantage of showing how reverently this great philosopher
and philanthropist could speak of religion, I am sure I shall render
an essential service to agriculturists, by adducing the following
quotation. I bring it forward the more readily, as I find that the
Board of Agriculture have been so negligent of the interest of that
noble art, as not yet to have recommended the universal adoption of
this measure.

“There should be no burial places in churches, or churchyards, _where
the monuments of departed sinners shoulder God’s altar_ and pollute his
holy places with dead men’s bones. But proper burial places should be
consecrated out of towns, and divided into two compartments, the earth
from one of which, saturated with animal decomposition, should be taken
away once in ten or twenty years _for the purposes of agriculture_, and
sand or clay, or less fertile soil brought into its place.” _Darwin’s
Phytologia_, p. 242.

Here your worships will perceive that there is a prospect, if this
advice is followed, that we may enjoy the privilege of _eating_,
instead of _drinking_ our friends, which would be something of an
improvement on our idea, communicated in page 58.

[85]

    Would serve for stock to make mosquitoes.

Among other speculations also in the cause of humanity, bequeathed us
by this _friend_ of _man_, are the following, which will prove a great
consolation to those who have foolishly supposed that the bloodshed
and devastation, produced by war, were circumstances which ought to be
lamented.

These remarks are published by Dr Darwin, as written under his own
observations in the manuscript of his book, by a “_philosophical_
friend,” whom he left in his library. It is supposed, however, that the
doctor wrote them himself. At least the sentiments have his sanction.

“It consoles me to find, as I contemplate the whole of organized
nature, that it is not in the power of any one personage, whether
statesman or hero, to produce by his ill employed activity, so much
misery as might have been supposed. Thus, if a Russian army, in these
insane times, after having endured a laborious march of many hundred
miles, is destroyed by a French army, in defence of their republic,
what has happened? Forty thousand human creatures, dragged from their
homes and connexions, cease to exist, and have _manured_ the _earth_;
but the quantity of organized matter, of which they were composed,
presently revives in the forms of millions of microscopic animals,
vegetables, and insects, and afterwards of quadrupeds and men; _the
sum of whose happiness is, perhaps, greater than that of the harrassed
soldier, by whose destruction they have gained their existence_! Is not
this a consoling idea to a mind of universal sympathy? I fear you will
think me a misanthrope, but I assure you a contrary sensation dwells in
my bosom; and though I commiserate the evils of all organized beings,
“_Homo sum, humani nihil a me alienum puto_.”” _Phytologia_, p. 558.

[86]

    Are swept by pestilence and dearth.

Last words of Dr Darwin. I take no small credit to myself, for being
one of the first to bring into notice the latest and the most sublime
of this sublime philosopher’s sublime speculations. The fountain from
which this radiant stream of illumination flows is denominated, among
booksellers, THE TEMPLE OF NATURE.

To paint all the writer’s conceptions of the mansion of that old lady,
and her own most singular qualifications, would be a task even beyond
the abilities of a Caustic. Mr Fuseli, however, has _painted_, his
_conceptions_ on the occasion, which in one of his designs, appear, so
far as I can comprehend him, to be simply these:--In his frontispiece
to the work, he represents one beautiful lady pointing at, or rather
fumbling about, (somewhat indecently, I must confess) a _middle_ or
_third_ breast of another beautiful lady, whom I suppose to be Dame
Nature;

    Than which there’s nothing can be apter
    To fill philosophers with rapture.

This _third_ breast I take to be the painter’s emblem of the
discoveries of Dr Darwin--implying that their existence is as evident
as that a woman has _three_ breasts. But, not to digress; the doctor
ascertains that

    “Human progenies, if unrestrain’d,
    By climate friended, and by food sustained
    O’er seas and soils prolific hordes would spread
    Ere long, and deluge their terraqueous bed.
    But war and pestilence, disease and dearth
    Sweep the superfluous myriads from the earth.”
                        _Temple of Nature_, Canto iv.

Some _un_philosophical theorists have foolishly supposed that this
sweeping plan of Dr Darwin, which that philosopher appears to have
introduced, lest “prolific hordes” should “deluge their terraqueous
beds,” might as well be deferred till a few of the “_superfluous_”
acres on the earth’s surface were reduced to a state of cultivation.
I should advise to employ these supernumeraries in navigating polar
ices within, the tropics, as recommended by the doctor in the _Botanic
Garden_, were I not apprehensive lest I should thereby in some measure,
destroy the operation of Saint Pierre’s tides. See note on page 70,
Canto i.

[87]

    Must “_duck_” to death his stubborn pate.

More last words of Dr Darwin.

    “The brow of man erect, with thought elate,
    _Ducks_ to the mandate of resistless fate.”
                  _Temple of Nature_, Canto iv.

I have exhibited this couplet at all the assemblages of poetizing
brethren in Grub street and St Giles’s, not omitting the inhabitants
of the “Wits’ corner, at the Chapter coffee-house, the _elevated_
tenants of the cider cellar in Maiden Lane, and Col. Hanger’s knights
of the round table,” all of whom agree in acknowledging the elegance
and correctness of the metaphor, and that its beauties are so
transcendently exquisite, and beyond the ken of mortal eye, as to be
perfectly incomprehensible.

[88]

    That since “to die is but to sleep.”

    “Long o’er the wrecks of lovely life they weep;
    Then pleased reflect, to die is but to sleep.”
                      _Temple of Nature_, Canto ii.

I suspect that my intimate friend and correspondent Buonaparte, is a
full convert to Dr Darwin’s doctrine of death and its consequences.
For, when he declared to lord Whitworth his determination to invade
England, although there were a hundred chances to one in _favor_ of his
going to the bottom, he was undoubtedly calculating on a comfortable
nap after the fatigues of government.

[89]

    In bats and bed-bugs, fleas and flies.

    “Thus, when a monarch or a mushroom dies,
    Awhile extinct the organic matter lies;
    But, as a few short hours or years revolve,
    Alchymic powers the changing mass dissolve;
    Born to new life unnumber’d insects pant,” &c.
                        _Temple of Nature_, Canto iv.

It has been a matter of curious inquiry among some of my corresponding
garreters, whether this philosopher himself, in the latter stages
of his existence, enjoyed much consolation from reflecting that the
“organic matter” which entered into his own composition, was about
to be employed for the important purpose of giving “new life” to
“unnumbered insects.”

[90]

    Vast “monuments of past delight.”

    “Thus the tall mountains, that emboss’d the lands,
    Huge isles of rock, and continents of sands,
    Whose dim extent eludes the inquiring sight,
    ARE MIGHTY MONUMENTS OF PAST DELIGHT.”

These “monuments of past delight,” Darwin says,

    “Rose from the wrecks of animal or herb.”

Thus taught by this wondrous sage, I trust the friend to humanity will
suppose it best to let the poor, infirm and decrepid die off as fast as
possible, to “manure the earth,” that the quantity of organized matter
of which they were composed, may revive in the forms of millions of
microscopic animals, vegetables and insects, make “monuments of past
delight,” &c. Therefore it is to be hoped, that the promoters of the
Perkinean institution will prove as despicable in respect to numbers,
as they are deficient in understanding, especially in comprehending the
great and glorious truths of modern philosophy.

[91]

    _They_ may have rest, _we_--elbow room.

If your worships have not read Mr Malthus’s Essay on the Principles
of Population, I advise you to buy the book immediately, and set
yourselves about something like an effort to comprehend its contents.
You will there find, I cannot now recollect the page, that _population_
has a tendency to increase in a _geometrical ratio_, but that
_subsistence_ must be limited to an _arithmetical ratio_. That the
world would soon swarm with inhabitants in such a manner that in years
of the greatest plenty we should be under the disagreeable necessity of
turning _anthropophagi_, and, like the famous Pantagruel, eat pilgrims
with our salad, were not the principle of population restrained by
two _very useful predominant principles_, viz. “VICE and MISERY;”
the former of which is happily exemplified in the extravagance and
luxury of your worships, and the latter correctly expressed in the
_poverty_ of your worships’ petitioner. You will likewise find in the
same volume, _passim_, that after war, pestilence, and famine have
laid waste a country, there is an immediate increase of births, in
consequence of the principle of population being let loose to take
its natural operation in replenishing the earth; or, in other words,
because there is more _elbow room_ for the survivors. Now, this being
correct reasoning, it must be wonderfully wrong to try to keep alive
poor folks, who are a dead weight on population, destroy the means of
subsistence, prevent early marriages, and, by keeping themselves above
ground, stand in the way of their betters.

[92]

    The poker take and lay them level.

Please not imagine that I would be understood to recommend this “retort
courteous” in the most unqualified sense, or that it be exercised on
every occasion. On the contrary, the due performance of it will require
no small degree of prudence and discretion. Indeed, I would have you
use the _poker_, or any other violent and _weighty_ arguments of this
kind, only when your antagonist happens to be a woman, a child, or some
debilitated and cowardly wretch who will submit without any chance of
your meeting with unpleasant resistance.

As to the justice of this mode of response, there exists no doubt,
and therefore dread no decisions _in foro conscientiæ_, because the
extreme heinousness of your adversaries’ provocation will appear from
the following consideration. To deprive you of an argument, for which
you have sacrificed everything dear to obtain, must, confessedly be
regarded as a most outrageous proceeding. Now, this is exactly the case
in the present instance; for in your attempt to show that medical men
believe and trust in no medicine, the _modus operandi_ of which they
do not comprehend, you make a sacrifice of _truth_, _decency_, and
_common sense_, the full reward of which sacrifice you ought to enjoy
unmolested. That no man can explain how mercury poisons, bark cures
an intermittent fever, or opium produces sleep, is confessed by every
medical author; and that all these should be used in our practice,
without any hesitation, I never heard any person deny, and for this
proper and substantial reason; their administration is _profitable_
to the faculty. I have therefore to repeat, that when the Perkinites
complain of your rejecting the use of tractors, because their _modus
operandi_ cannot be entirely explained, although you adopt the use of
drugs, the operation of which is equally or more inexplicable, your
sacrifice in support of your ground is so great, that whoever attempts
to drive you from such ground deserves to be laid low with the first
weapon that comes to hand.

[93]

    Will e’en _bewitch_ the _operator_.

No part of the learned doctor’s management, in the anti-Perkinistic
cause, merits higher eulogy than this most _rational_ explanation of
that most _irrational_ practice. So _cogently_ does an innate principle
of equity control me, that I am absolutely _coerced_ to offer, at
the shrine of the heroic doctor, my tributary dole of the incense
of admiration, for having presented our profession such a powerful
knock-me-down argument, wherewith to buffet the common enemy.

The sagacious doctor having published a scientific treatise against the
tractors, demonstrating that “they act on the _patient’s_ imagination,”
Perkins, came out in reply, with all the fury of an Irish rebel, and
declared that the doctor deserved to be trounced for not suffering
his readers to know, that the tractors pretended to cure infants and
brute animals, though numerous cases to that effect had then been
published; and in that reply proclaimed that Dr H. purposely endeavored
to suppress such facts, that he might, with greater facility, induce
the public to swallow the deductions drawn from his magical manœuvres
in the Bath and Bristol hospitals. Now, admitting the doctor managed in
this way, I am sure he was perfectly right in so doing. The _end_ in
view, according to established principles of _modern_ morality, will
ever justify the _means_ taken to accomplish that end. In this case,
the end in view was most important--nothing less than the downfall
of Perkinism, and the consequent aggrandizement of our profession.
Should any of our opponents be so captious as to assert, that such
principles and such motives of action should not be encouraged in
society--that they have a pernicious tendency, and other nonsense of
that sort, I must take the liberty to refer them to the first consul of
the French republic, whose conduct has ever been modelled according to
the principles above stated, and who is certainly the most _powerful
logician_ of the age, perfectly able to confound those who shut their
eyes against the light of conviction.

But to revert to the doctor’s treatise, and Perkins’s impudent
replication. The man who could raise the very old gentleman himself,
by the legitimate powers of necromancy, was not so easily defeated.
Accordingly he returns to the charge in another edition--admits the
existence of the numerous cases on infants, horses, &c. but lays them
all level with the following unanswerable argument.--“The proselytes of
Perkinism having been driven from every other argument, have, as a last
resource, alleged that the patent metallic tractors have removed the
disorders of infants and horses. Even this _flimsy_ pretence is capable
of a satisfactory refutation. In these cases it is not the _patient_,
but the _observer_, who is deceived by his own imagination!!!” See
_Haygarth’s book_, page 40. _Mirabile dictu!_

[94]

    Then quote his lady’s ECCHYMOSIS.

The celebrated story of the lady’s ecchymosis comes handed down to your
worships by five successive reporters. The lady _incog._ who makes so
_conspicuous_ a figure in Dr Haygarth’s narration, told another lady,
who told a medical friend of Dr H. who told Dr Caustic, who tells
your worships this important anecdote. Now, as “in the multitude of
counsellors there is _safety_,” so in a multitude of reporters there is
_certainty_. But to the story; which I shall give in the language of Dr
H.’s medical friend aforesaid.

“A _lady_ informed me, that a _lady_ of her acquaintance, who had great
faith in the efficacy of the tractors, on seeing a small _ecchymosis_,
about the size of a _silver penny_, at the corner of the eye, desired
to try on it the effect of her favorite remedy. The _lady_, who was
intended to be the subject of the trial, consented, and the _other
lady_ produced the instruments, and, after drawing them four or five
times over the spot, declared that it changed to a paler color; and
on repeating the use of them a few minutes longer, that it had almost
vanished, and was scarcely visible, and departed in high triumph at
her success. I was assured by the _lady_ who underwent the operation,
that she looked in the glass immediately after, and that not the least
visible alteration had taken place!!” (From _Haygarth’s_ book, page 40.)

I had determined to exert my influence in all the medical societies,
that the above case be read at the opening of each meeting, until there
should not be left of the tractors, in this island, “a wreck behind.”
But a far better plan of Dr H. himself has precluded the necessity
of this measure, which was to announce in all the advertisements of
his book in the public papers, that “it explains why the disorders of
infants and horses are said to have been cured by the tractors.” See
his daily advertisements in the papers.

Indeed, I am at a loss which to admire most, the pretty fanciful
relation above cited, which is all the new edition of the doctor’s
treatise against the tractors contains to justify the assertion in the
advertisements before mentioned, or his singular skill in constructing
such a fabric on this foundation. Did I possess the talents of the
doctor in the advertising department, I should announce this my pithy
performance to the public, by publishing in all the papers, that the
price of the tractors was, in consequence of Dr Caustic’s opposition,
fallen to the price of old iron, and Perkins’s pamphlets having been
proscribed by physicians, were condemned, and actually burnt by the
hangman on execution-day, at the Old Bailey, in the presence of every
individual of the college of physicians, and half the citizens of
London.

I would beg leave to add to this incomparable Haygarthian demonstration
an argument of my own, which I think is not less powerful. It is
impossible that these tractors should perform any _real_ cure, as
they act _solely_ on the _imagination_ either of the patient or the
operator. But cures performed by the power of _imagination_ must be
_imaginary_ cures, that is, no cures at all.

[95]

    By Haygarth’s tale of lady Hoax.

It is not true, as some sagacious coffee-house politicians have
asserted, that madame Hoax (or more correctly double Hoax) is the
wife of a Chinese Mandarin, settled on the mountains of the Moon, in
Abyssinia, for the purpose of ascertaining the influence of imagination
in the cure of diseases. No, gentlemen, she is a baroness of true
English breed, more sturdy than a Semiramis, a Penthesilea, or a Joan
of Arc, and will prove, in our cause, a championess of pre-eminent
prowess. Should your worships wish for further acquaintance with this
lady, which in my opinion would be for your mutual advantage, you will
take the trouble to inquire at my garret, No. 299, Dyot street, St
Giles’s (having removed from my former place of residence, third floor,
327, Grub street, with a view of being nearer my friend, Sir Joseph, in
Soho square) and her address shall be at your service.

I am now preparing a most awful tragedy for Drury lane theatre (Mr
Sheridan’s approbation being already obtained) to be entitled and
called, the DREADFUL DOWNFAL OF TERRIBLE TRACTORIZING CONFOUNDED
CONJURATION; in which I propose to introduce a new song, that I have no
doubt will be so celebrated as to be the theme of every ballad-singer
in the metropolis. I cannot forbear anticipating some small share of
that applause, which I have reason to suppose will be _piled_ on Dr
Caustic, as soon as he is publicly known as the author of such an
inimitable production, by obliging your worships with a _part_ of the
chorus to the song aforesaid.

      Come now let us coax
      Haygarth and Dame Hoax,
      Like true hearts of oaks,
      To crack off their jokes,
      While dreading their strokes,
      Those sheep-hearted folks,
    The tractoring Perkinites, quiver;

      O may they with knocks,
      “And shivering shocks,”
      Pound their jackets and frocks,
      Till dead as horse-blocks,
      (O what a sad box!)
      They’re thrown into the docks,
    Or, just like dead cats, in the river!

This song is to be set to music by Mr Kelly in his very best
style of pathos, sublimity, and crotchets, and to be delightfully
demi-semi-quavered to the admiring audience by Mrs Billington. Then, if
box, pit, and gallery, should not, _una voce_, Nick Bottom-like, cry,
“Encore! Encore! Let her roar! Let her roar! Once more, once more! Let
the squeak and the squall be swelled to a bawl, Dr Caustic will find
the door! Find the door! And never go there any more”!!

[96]

    Say that the devil never fails.

This stanza contains a legendary tale, which I dare say is as true, as
that which commemorates a notable exploit of St. Dunstan in seizing
old satan, one dark night in the tenth century, and wringing the nose
of his infernal majesty with a pair of red-hot black-smith’s pincers,
which made him roar and scold at such a rate, that he awakened and
terrified all the good people of Glastonbury and its neighborhood.

[97]

    In gulping tractors down, for med’cines.

An old lady of my acquaintance was actually advised by an _ingenious_
son of Galen, an apothecary, resident a few miles north of London, to
swallow tractors for an internal complaint. If our profession were to
follow this laudable example, and force their patients to swallow them
for pills, and then give the public a judicious detail of the terrible
consequences, ending with the death of the patients, Perkinism would
sink into that contempt in the estimation of the public which it justly
deserves.

[98]

    In wilds where science ne’er was thought on.

That is, in the United States of America, among Indians and Yankees.
You will find, gentlemen, much to the purpose relative to the state
of science, where Perkinism originated, in the _Monthly Magazine_,
of January, 1803, under the title of “Animadversions on the present
state of literature and taste in the United States, communicated by
an English gentleman lately returned from America.” This gentleman
gives information that the Americans are wretchedly “_behind_-hand in
science _with_ the Britains.” Indeed, those transatlantic younkers
ought, in half a century, to have established universities and other
seminaries of learning, at least as _old_ and respectable as those of
Oxford and Cambridge, and which should have graduated as many students
and produced as many great men. As to the parsimonious spirit of
Americans in encouraging science (which this gentleman animadverts
upon with laudable indignation) it ought truly to be exclaimed against
by us Englishmen, for the weighty reason following: Great Britain,
“from time whereof the memory of man runneth not to the contrary” (as
judge Blackstone says) hath starved some of her first poets; such for
instance as Butler, Otway, Chatterton, Dryden, Savage, &c. &c. &c.
&c. consequently (according to the same author) she ought to enjoy
the _exclusive “customary privilege”_ of inflicting the horrors of
starvation on the sons of the muses: but it must be granted, for the
honor of British munificence, that the scientific Herschel, in the
decline of life, as a reward for immortalizing his present majesty, by
inscribing Georgium Sidus in the great folio of the heavens, is allowed
the enormous pension of 80_l._ per annum!!

This instance of _liberality_, in rewarding merit, has caused me to
suspend _my_ animadversions relative to patronage afforded men of
_real science_ in Great Britain, till I can discover whether it be the
absolute determination of my countrymen to starve doctor Caustic.

[99]

    Say it was twinn’d with monstrous mammoth.

And must, of course, be a most terrible wild beast.--Ladies and
gentlemen may form a tolerable idea of the enormity of Perkinism, by
viewing the skeleton of a mammoth now exhibiting in Pall Mall, in the
very place where lately were to be seen those terrible caricatures of
the devil, &c. under the appellation of FUSELI’S MILTON GALLERY.

[100]

    And to go near it you’d be d--d loth.

This manifesto, you will please to recollect, is the language of
gentlemen physicians. Now it is well known that you possess a
privilege, sanctioned by long and invariable practice, if not founded
on act of parliament, to enforce your sentiments by certain _energetic_
expressions, which, in the mouths of people of less consequence, would
be considered as very vulgar, and nearly allied to _profane swearing_.
And since your worships ever most manfully exercise this privilege to
the full extent of its limits, the present manifesto would have been
extremely inapposite and unnatural, had not an _ornament_ of this kind
been introduced.

[101]

    The _boldest_ sons of Galen call on.

I say the _boldest_; for we cannot rely on the aid of the _whole_
Esculapian phalanx. Many white-livered dastards, who disgrace our
profession, have shown a disposition to remain neuter, or fight under
Perkinean banners!

[102]

    Than Howard’s fulminating powder.

It is a long time since the public have had any _reports_ from the
honorable Mr Howard’s fulminating powder, which, three years since,
made so much _noise_, that the world had reason to expect that the
_thunderiferous_ chymist would make no more of exploding to old Nick
a whole army of Frenchmen, with Buonaparte at its head, than would a
cockney sportsman of shooting a tame goose on the first of September.

Whether this mighty affair is all _blown up_, or what may have been the
cause of the _silence_ of those who defended a thing which so _loudly_
proclaimed its own merits, it becomes Mr Howard to explain.

Of this he may be assured, if he do not stir his stumps in order to
fulfil _some_ of the fair promises which he and his friends have made
to the Royal Society and the public, of the astonishing achievements
they were about to perform, by the demi-omnipotent power of his new
invented artificial thunder, I hereby give the _alarming_ intelligence
that I will apply my own superior talents to this _sonorous_ subject.
Should that happen, those laurels which were designed to decorate
the brow of Mr Howard will be tied in a bow-knot round my venerable
temples. For, in that case, the learned chymist’s acquisitions, in
the art of _intonation_, will bear no better comparison to those of
Dr Caustic, than the clattering wagon-wheels of Salmoneus to the
world-astounding thunderbolts of Jupiter. No person can doubt my
being able to accomplish all this, who is apprized, as he may be
from perusing this performance, of the vast quantity of the most
_detonating_ kind of _mercury_ which exists in my composition, and
which will _fulminate_ with greater effect, than the _gold_ and
_silver_ that line the _magnipotent_ purse of the honorable the heir
_apparent_ to the duke of Norfolk.

[103]

    “Kill’d off,” at Marengo.

I have several times taken a confounded deal of trouble to _haul_ into
my poem this beautiful specimen of parliamentary elocution; and, in my
opinion, nothing can be better imagined, or more happily accomplished.
Poetry and oratory, as the ancients inform us, were both _whelped_
at one litter; consequently the same phrase which glittered in the
harangue of _my_ bull-baiting friend, William Windham, a British
senator, cannot fail to cut a dash in the stanza of _his_ seraphical
friend, Christopher Caustic, a British poet.

Now, as I am a great admirer of French principles, and that new and
accommodating kind of morality, by Frenchmen discovered, and which I
ever have and ever will eulogize, to the utmost extent of my faculties,
perhaps your worships will express no small degree of wonderment why
I should be the intimate friend of a gentleman, the _blaze_ of whose
oratory, one would suppose, would have _blasted_ Buonaparte, and even
_singed_ the whole French republic. But those who are admitted behind
the political curtain will perceive that the _tendency_ of the measures
which Mr Windham supports is to _promote_ those jacobinic principles,
of which Dr Caustic _openly_ and _honestly_ professes himself to be the
determined propagator and defender.

[104]

    And never meddle with a _strumpet_.

Surely, no person will imagine that I would, for the world, allude to
any _other_ lady than madam Fame herself.

[105]

    And _blaze_ through either _frozen_ zone.

I have very substantial reasons for spreading glad tidings of our
redoubtable chieftain among the most distant inhabitants of the globe,
in preference to endeavoring to add to his great celebrity “within the
periphery of his associates.” And, whereas it has been said that this
gentleman’s reputation will ever stand highest where he is either not
known at all, or known only by those literary productions, in which
he is himself the theme of his own most “ardent praise,” mine shall
be the humble task of trumpeting the doctor’s name among the distant
inhabitants of this dirty planet; while the doctor shall himself “dip
his pen in ethereal and indelible ink, and impress his observations in
characters legible in the great volume of the heavens.”

[106]

    As one would spit a _goose_ for roasting.

True it is, though “passing strange,” that a _great_ and good
man, composed, as he _himself_ can attest, of the very essence of
humanity, is often most vilely, most audaciously, and most atrociously
bespattered by a set of saucy reviewers.

Those wicked wits, the writers in the _Monthly_ and _Critical Reviews_,
especially the latter, in a critique on one of the late works of a
certain doctor of self puffing memory, tells us that “the importance of
a man to himself was never more conspicuous than in this publication.
Dr Lettsom admits that he has been anticipated by several distinguished
authors; but modestly hints that some of his particular friends will
form no opinion [respecting the cow-pox] till they have ascertained
_his_ sentiments.” They then have the audacity to declare, that “he
merits no slight punishment for his pompous inflated language, for his
fulsome flattery, and ridiculous exaggeration of every part of the
subject.”

See how they speak of a late publication of the doctor on certain
charitable institutions:--“Unless to connect these different
institutions, to lead the different radii to a centre, while that
centre is the author and the editor, who can boast, _Quæ ipse misserima
vidi, et quorum pars magna fui!_ we see little advantage in this
edition. We mean not to intimate the slightest disapprobation of these
institutions, or of humanity in general; but when we see pomp and
egotism assuming its garb, when vanity and ostentation occasionally
peep from beneath the robe, we feel no little disgust from comparing
the fascinating exterior with the unpleasing contents,” &c. They
likewise have the impudence to assert that some of the doctor’s plans
are “better suited to the superstition of a Hindoo, than to the nature
of a rational christian.” And in another review they declare: “We mean
not to stoop to any; but will tell Dr Lettsom his faults” [consummate
assurance!!] “as well as any other author; nor will we conceal that
mean mark of a little mind, over-weening vanity. We saw it in its germ,
have watched its opening bud, till it is expanded into its blossom. The
literary life of Dr L---- may well be styled the _progress_ of vanity:
the termination is yet to come: but we have ample materials for the
subject.” See _Monthly Review_, of July, and _Critical Review_, of
Sept. 1802, and Feb. 1803.

[107]

    They’ll fall before great doctor Lettsom.

I resolved to recommend your arranging yourselves under the banners
of this Leviathan of the Galenical throng, from the moment I first
heard of his noble and spirited sally against the tractors. Disdaining
the wretched trammels of _why_ and _wherefore_, and without assigning
those paltry trifles, called _reasons_, for his opinions, on the
merits of Perkinism, our intrepid commander determined to extirpate it
root and branch, with his simple _ipse dixit_. This is what we ought
to expect from a hero of such prowess. See how well he manages these
metallic makers of mischief! In a eulogium (a very agreeable thing
to a _modest_ man during his life time) on his friend Dr Haygarth,
contained in the work which those wicked reviewers above mentioned
have treated so irreverently, he mentions (page 277) the “important
object,” which Dr Haygarth has so “happily _effected_.” This is
“arresting and _subduing_ two poisons, the most fatal to the human
race (fever and small-pox) and unveiling imposture, clothed in the
meretricious garb of bold quackery:” a note on the word “_imposture_,”
in the margin says, “Experiments on metallic tractors.” Now, unless
I can borrow the pen of the learned doctor, dipped in “ETHEREAL _and
indelible ink_,” and a whole literary apparatus in proportion, I shall
never be able to express how much I admire the matter above quoted,
on account of the important _intelligence_ therein contained. Before
Dr L. asserted it, I dare say not an individual in the kingdom knew
that Dr Haygarth had “_effected_” such an “important object,” that
fever and small-pox were subdued, altogether extinct, despoiled of
that venom which has hitherto “brought death into the world,” and so
much wo. But true it is, they are quite extirpated, and all this by Dr
Haygarth!! One cannot but exclaim against the perverseness of those
members of parliament, who, regardless of this _news_ from Dr L. voted
a reward to Dr Jenner for his services in _subduing_ the small-pox, and
to Dr Smith, for his discoveries in _subduing_ contagious fevers. In
short, I am almost ready to enforce the charge of ignorance against my
brethren in the profession; for I have not yet met with one possessed
of sufficient penetration to see, that neither fever nor small-pox “has
a local habitation and a name among us,” and that they have been both
“_subdued_,” and all this “_effected_,” by Dr Haygarth!

[108]

    Prepare the batteries of thy journal.

Here I can, with certainty, calculate on the most powerful
co-operation. This----, what shall I call it? This official Gazette
of the profession--this Medico-Chymico-_Comico_-Repository, for the
effusions of self-puffers, prescribing rules and recipes,

    “How best to fill his purse, and thin the town;”

this powerful instrument of offensive and defensive warfare, has ever,
with becoming vigilance, guarded its post against Perkinean invaders,
and suffered no occasion to pass without a squirt of the _Gallic_ acid
of satire, when there was deemed a possibility of _blackening_ the
common enemy.

I can never sufficiently express my approbation of the Carthagenian
cunning with which this journal has been conducted. Dr B. professing
great impartiality, in an early number, (see vol. ii. p. 85) invited
communications on the subject of the tractors. Subsequent management
evidently showed a slight omission in the doctor’s notice, and that
he meant _communications on one side only_; for he has omitted no
pains to procure and publish whatsoever could be suggested _against_
the tractors; but though reports of cases in their favor, and all the
publications of the patentee have been before him, not a syllable
of _these_ was ever noticed by that gentleman; neither has it ever
appeared by his journal that such facts ever existed.

[109]

    By every nostrum, save _thine own_.

I appeal to any of my brethren who have been gratified, as I often have
been, with the Demosthenes-like torrent which has been so frequently
poured forth, in our medical societies, by this “child and champion”
of the Galenical throng, against quackery and all its appurtenances,
whether it were fair to surmise, as some unconscionable rogues have
done, that Dr B. has absolutely himself become the proprietor of a
quack medicine. The fire of eloquence with which Perkinism, that most
atrocious kind of quackery, has been so frequently, and so effectually
assailed by the learned doctor at the medical society, at Guy’s,
the Lyceum Medico Londinensis, &c. &c. &c. ought to have ensured Dr
B. so much of the gratitude of the profession, that, although he
should _himself_ choose to become one of the most arrant quacks in
the kingdom, he might depend on your support of his reputation, and
your exertions to uphold him. No subsequent apostacy on his part, I
maintain, will justify a dereliction of him.

Recal to your recollection, gentlemen, the denunciations he has so
often made against every medical practitioner who should presume,
either directly or indirectly, to offer any patronage to remedies which
bore even the most distant resemblance to a nostrum. How often have the
walls of the medical theatres of Saint Thomas’s hospital, and Windmill
street, echoed loud responses to his declamations against the varlets,
who should dare to recommend means, in the profits of the consumption
of which the whole profession could not participate? How often have you
received his invitations to send him your effusions and declamations
against quackery, to receive an efficient publication in his journal?
and what number of that journal has appeared without performing his
promise, by honoring those effusions with a place in its immortal pages?

Lest even these most important considerations should still find you
inexorable, I trust I can show, by examining his conduct in regard to
the quack medicine in question, that, if it be not praise-worthy, it
is, at least, defensible.

The title of the nostrum which has had the assistance of Dr B. in being
introduced to the notice of a grateful public, is “A NEW MEDICINE FOR
THE GOUT.” The pretended discoverer of this specific is, for very
commendable, or, which is the same thing, very _prudent_ reasons, kept
behind the curtain. I wish, however, to express my utter disbelief that
either Dr Brodum or Dr Solomon is the happy mortal, however similar the
style of the pamphlet, announcing this new medicine, may be to their
erudite writings, and the pretensions of the said medicine to “balms of
Gilead” and to “nervous cordials.”

[110]

    ’Gainst Belgraves, Colquhouns, Wilberforces!

What business had these fellows to intrude their noses into the
concerns of the Westminster infirmary? Brother B. had an undoubted
right to manage, or _mis_manage, the funds of a _medical_ institution,
as best suited his own convenience, without their troublesome
interference.

[111]

    _All_ in a chariot take an airing.

I hereby enter a protest against any one of my commentators, whether
he be Vanscanderdigindich the elder, or Hansvanshognosuch, his cousin
_German_ (two _Dutch_ geniuses, who have promised to furnish the next
edition of this my pithy poem with a whole ass-load of annotations)
or any other gentlemen critics or reviewers of equal profoundity,
presuming to intimate, that I intend, by this passage, the smallest
disrespect to your _pedestrian_ physicians. Far from that; I know that
many good and great men (like myself for example) cannot even pay
a shilling for hackney-coach hire. No, gentlemen; I have two great
objects in view, to wit:

1. To encourage my brother B--to persevere in his laudable attempt to
kick Perkinism back to the country whence it originated, by reminding
him, that if the feat were once performed, he might, _perhaps_, soon
afford the expense of a chariot to transport, in a respectable manner,
_all_ that wig, without laying the entire burden on the curious sconce
it now envelopes.

2. To remind brother B--, and the profession in general, how much more
execution may be done by a charioteer than by a pedestrian physician.

Although great men frequently differ, I am happy to find Mr _Addison’s_
opinion and _mine_, in this particular, perfectly consentaneous.

“This body of men,” says he, speaking of physicians in our own country,
“may be described like the British army in Cæsar’s time. Some slay in
chariots, and some on foot. If the infantry do less execution than the
charioteers, it is because they cannot be carried, so soon, into all
parts of the town, and despatch so much business in so short a time.”
Spectator, No. 21.

Not an individual, I will venture to assert, who knows my brother B--,
but must feel the really urgent necessity of elevating him, as soon as
possible, from _le pave_ and giving those talents their full _swing_.
Then, indeed, soon might our charioteer justly boast--

    “London, with all her passing bells, can tell,
    By this right arm what mighty numbers fell.
    Whilst others meanly ask’d whole months to slay,
    I oft despatch’d the patient in a day.
    With pen in hand, I push’d to that degree,
    I scarce had left a wretch to give a fee.
    Some fell by laudanum, and some by steel,
    And death in ambush lay in every pill;
    For save, or slay, this privilege we claim,
    Though credit suffers, the reward’s the same.”


[112]

    From Brodum down to _gaseous_ Thornton.

I am fully sensible that many of my brethren, of less discernment
than myself, would have assigned this famous little genius a rank
on the empirical list even above Dr Brodum. Making _puffing_ their
criterion, they will argue that those acute half-guinea paragraphs
which we occasionally see at the fag end of the _Times_ and other
morning papers, respecting that “very learned physician,”--his “_great_
discoveries, and improvements in the medical application of the
gases,”--his “_grand national_ and botanical work,” and fifty others
of the same strain, asserting the high claims of this _airy_ writer on
the gratitude of the public, are incontestable proofs of his superior
merits in the _puffing_ department, which, say they, are some of the
most necessary ingredients in the formation of a charlatan. All this is
specious reasoning; but I trust I shall show its fallacy. Pre-eminence,
in my opinion, must be founded on some intrinsic excellence, original
and independent of adventitious circumstances. If we closely examine
the merits of this candidate, we shall find that there can be no great
claim on this score. Let any man enjoy the faculties and advantages of
a general dealer in the _airs_, who must of course have _puffs_ of all
descriptions at hand; and where is the merit of occasionally _letting
off one_?

If there be anything like originality in this industrious little
philosopher, and for the invention of which I should be inclined to
allow him the credit of ingenuity, it consists in his _meritometer_,
which proposes to measure the merits of his fellow creatures by the
degree of faith they can afford to bestow on the infallibility of
his gases as a panacea. See his plan of this instrument, or rather
the deductions drawn from his trials of it, in his large five volume
_compilation of “Extracts,”_ vol. i. page 459. From this scale it
appears, that of one thousand of mankind nine hundred and ninety-nine
are either fools or knaves, as that proportion places no confidence
in the efficacy of his catholicon. I hope, therefore, after the good
reasons here assigned for my conduct, I shall not be suspected of
partiality to Dr Brodum in retaining him at the head of the quacks, nor
ill will to Dr T. for not calling him up higher on the list.

[113]

    The Thalaba of English metre.

Mr Southey, in his work with the title of “Thalaba or the Destroyer,”
has given us a fine example of a pleasing dreadful performance,
which is neither prose, rhyme, nor reason. Indeed, nothing but the
inspiration of the gas which we have seen him inhale in the first
canto, could have generated the following effusions.

      “A Teraph stood against the cavern side,
      _A new born infant’s head_,
    That Khawla at his hour of death had seized,
      And from the shoulders wrung.
    It stood upon a plate of gold,
    An unclean spirit’s name inscribed beneath:
    The cheeks were _deathy_ dark,
    Dark the dead skin upon the hairless skull;
      The lips were _bluey_ pale;
      Only the eyes had life,
      They gleamed with demon light.”      Book ii.

Again he towers in Book v.

      “There where the narrowing chasm
      Rose loftier in the hill,
      Stood Zohak, wretched man, condemned to keep
      His cave of punishment.
      His was the frequent scream
    Which far away the prowling Chacal heard,
      And howled in terror back.
      Far from his shoulders grew
      Two snakes of monster size
      That ever at his head
        Aimed eager their keen teeth
      To satiate raving hunger with his brain.
      He in the eternal conflict oft would seize
      Their swelling necks, and in his giant grasp
      Bruise them, and rend their flesh with bloody nails,
              And howl for agony
      Feeling the pangs he gave, for of himself
      Inseparable parts his torturers grew.”

Now, if in this age of turmoils your worships should have occasion to
educate a school of assassins, to be employed as Talleyrand employs
his agents, for the purpose of promoting modern philanthropy and
French projects of universal empire, I should advise you to prepare
them intellectual food from such descriptions as we have quoted
above. By accustoming your pupils to meditate on such horrible
descriptions you will soon enable them to inflict without compunction
or remorse, sufferings like those, which they have been in the habit of
contemplating.

We are sorry to see, however, that our friend, Dr Darwin, has been
pleased to express his disapprobation of this species of the _terrible_
in style, without which your small poets can never become conspicuous.
We shall, however, quote one of his sentiments on the subject merely to
let the world know that we great wits do not always tally upon every
point.

The doctor tells us in his Botanic Garden, p. 115, that there is a
“line of boundary between the tragic and the horrid; which line,
however, will veer a little this way or that, according to the
prevailing manners of the age or country, and the peculiar association
of ideas, or idiosyncrasy of mind, of individuals.”

Now I am apprehensive that doctor Darwin would have adjudged the
greater part of Mr Southey’s sublimity to be of the “_horrid_” rather
than the _tragic_ or _sublime_ kind. Such an opinion, however, would
not only greatly tarnish the reputation of the critic who should
venture to pronounce it, but would entirely put down many pretty
good poets, who, as the Edinburgh reviewers say, must have a “_qu’il
mourut_,” and a “let there be light” in every line; and all their
characters must be in agonies and ecstacies, from their entrance to
their exit.[G]

Thalaba, having leaped into a “little car” which appears to have been
drawn by “four living pinions, headless, bodyless, sprung from one
stem that branched below, in four down arching limbs, and clenched the
carrings endlong and aside, with claws of griffin grasp;”

    “Down--down, it sank--down--down--
    Down--down--a mighty depth!--
    Down--down--and now it strikes.”

There’s the _bathos_ to perfection! Now, if we could in any way have
prevailed on Mr Southey to have stopped this side of the centre of
gravity, we should have been happy to have hired his “car” for this
our dreadful rencontre. But as it appears that the Domdaniel cave soon
after _fell in_, I fancy it would cost more to dig out this vehicle
than to get Mr Southey to make us a new one.

[114]

    Adown through vast Domdaniel cares.

That is, as Southey says, through the Domdaniel caves, “at the roots of
the ocean.”

[115]

    To monsieur Mahomet’s paradise.

    “Thalaba knew that his death-hour was come,
    And on he leapt, and springing up,
      Into the idol’s heart
      Hilt deep he drove the sword.
    The ocean-vault fell in, and all were crushed.
      In the same moment at the gate
    Of paradise, Oneiza’s Houri-form,
     Welcomed her husband to eternal bliss.”


[116]

    Now rant! rave! roar! and rend! and rattle.

I _C_hristopher _C_austic, _c_ensured by _c_ritics, for my _a_pt
_a_lliterations, though _a_rtfully _a_llied, yet _p_resume it is
_p_olicy for a _p_ennyless _p_oet to _p_olish his _p_uny lays to such
a _p_itch of _p_erfection, that _p_osterity may _p_lease to _p_lace
the _p_ithy _p_roduction _p_aramount to the _p_eaked _p_oint of the
_p_innicle of _P_ierian _P_arnassus.

[117]

    Drives, Jehu-like, Death’s iron wagon!!

A poet of less judgment than myself would have seated Mars in the
chariot of Victory, a Vauxhall car, or some other flimsy vehicle of
that kind, which would be sure to be dashed to pieces in a conflict
like this in which we are at present engaged. The carriage here
introduced was made by Vulcan, in his best style of workmanship, for
the express purpose of this attack, and in point of strength and size,
bears no more proportion to the chariot commonly used by the god of
war, than one of those huge broad-wheeled Manchester wagons to the
little whalebone _thingamy_ which the duke of Queensbury ran at New
Market.

[118]

    Rend the blue “blanket” of the skies.

This is the same “blanket” which Mr Canning said was “wet” when he
exhibited it in the House of Commons. Since his use of it on that
occasion it has been so frequently _wrung_ by the wits, that it has now
become a perfectly dry and almost thread-bare article.

[119]

    And round the Blue Ridge make all rattle.

Volney informs us in his View that the Alleghany mountain is the
frontier on which the south-west and north-west winds in America
contend; and that he beheld a spectacle of that kind at Rockfish Gap,
on the Blue Ridge. See American edition, page 148.

[120]

    Huge, hissing hot, and hard as granite.

It is to me a matter of doubt whether your worships are not absolutely
ignorant of the causes and effects of the wonderful phenomena to which
we now allude. But if you will please to take with us a stand for
observation, exactly at the centre of gravity between the earth and the
moon, and look about you with the eyes of great philosophers you will
perceive what is well worth a world of admiration.

You will perceive that what is vulgarly called the _man in the moon_ is
a prodigious volcano, in size much superior to any on our globe, and
that this volcano is continually emitting rocks, which ever and anon
are thrown beyond the sphere of the moon’s attraction, and of course
make their way down upon us.

You will likewise find, by turning to the second volume of the
Philadelphia Literary Magazine, page 389, an account of above thirty
different showers of stones, some of which have weighed not less
than 300 pounds. And you will ascertain that there has been a great
diversity of opinions among philosophers respecting the origin of
these prodigies. Some have believed them to be thrown from some
neighboring volcano. Some have thought them to have been wafted about
by hurricanes. Others have supposed them to have been concretions
formed in the atmosphere. Some have thought them to be masses which
were detached from the planets at the time of the formation; and that
they have been floating about in infinite space till they met with our
earth, which became to them a new centre of gravity.

But the truth is, as you may see through any common optical tube, from
the situation to which I have just had the honor to conduct you, that
these masses of matter are the product of _lunar volcanos_. Here we
have a cause adequate to the effect, as I shall make evident in the
following few words.

A lunar volcano similar to those on our planet would project bodies
much further from the moon than they would be thrown by the same force
from Etna or Vesuvius; for,

1. It is granted by great philosophers, such as _ourself_ and Dr
Darwin, that the moon has no atmosphere; of consequence, a body
exploded from the moon would meet with no resistance excepting from
the power of gravitation. Dr Darwin informs us, Botanic Garden, canto
ii. “If the moon had no atmosphere at the time of its elevation from
the earth; or if its atmosphere was afterwards stolen from it by the
earth’s attraction, the water on the moon would rise quickly into
vapor; and the cold produced by a certain quantity of this evaporation
would congeal the remainder of it. Hence it is not probable that the
moon is at present inhabited; _but as it seems to have suffered and to
continue to suffer much by volcanos_, a sufficient quantity of air may
in process of time be generated to produce an atmosphere, which may
prevent its heat from so easily escaping, and its water from so easily
evaporating, and thence become fit for the production of vegetables and
animals.

“That the moon possesses little or no atmosphere is deduced from the
undiminished lustre of the stars at the instant when they emerge from
behind her disk. That the ocean of the moon is frozen is confirmed from
there being no appearance of lunar tides,” &c.

2. Bodies on the moon possess much less gravity in proportion to their
quantity of matter than bodies on the surface of the earth; for matter
is attracted by the earth and moon, respectively, in proportion to the
quantity of matter which each contains. It follows that a comparatively
slight impulse, communicated to a body on the moon’s surface, would be
sufficient to counteract its attraction towards the moon, and if it
were propelled towards the earth it might come within its attraction,
and would of course make its way to our planet.

Thus it appears very evident, even to persons of your worships’
ordinary penetration, that these wonderful showers of stones are of
lunar origin.

[121]

    For doctor Tasker to descant on.

I feel a very great solicitude to mould and modify every part and
parcel of this performance according to rules and regulations of the
best master-builders of epic poems, tragedies, and other great things
of that kind. The judicious critic will perceive that all my wounds are
inflicted with anatomical accuracy, and I have no doubt but my friend
Dr Haygarth will do himself the honor to write a treatise upon this
subject, and tell the world with what terrible propriety we have hewed
and hacked our opponents in the field of battle. The reverend William
Tasker, A. B. has furnished a model of this species of criticism in _A
Series of Letters_, respecting “The Anatomical Knowledge of Homer,” &c.
Dr Haygarth I expect will prove that the “death wounds” of Sarpedon,
Hector, Ulysses’ dog, &c. as displayed in the treatise of Dr Tasker,
were mere flea bites compared with these of Dr Caustic.

[122]

    From where the head to where the tail is.

Or more correctly where the tail _was_. Lord Monboddo tells us
that men, as well as monkies, were formerly dignified with long
tails protruding from the place where (according to Butler) honor
is lodged. Philosophers and antiquaries had never been able to
discover how man became divested of this ornament, till my friend,
Dr Anderson, furnished a clue to the mystery. From this discovery I
am led to suppose that your antediluvian bucks began the practice of
CUR-_tail_-ing these excrescences for gentility’s sake, and what was
at first _artificial_ became in due time _natural_, till, at length,
your right _tippies_, as in modern times, were entirely disencumbered
of that monkey-like appendage; but our Bond-street loungers, although
divested of that exterior mark of the monkey, with a laudable desire
to prevent the intentions of Nature from being defeated, have adopted
all the ourang-outang-ical _airs_ which she originally designed should
discriminate that species of _animals_ from man.

[123]

    With burning lapis infernalis.

The use of this _caustic_ and other escharotics on this momentous
occasion reminds me of an important era in my life, a _succinct_
biographical sketch of which I shall _shortly_ publish, in nineteen
volumes folio; a work which, in point of size, erudition, and
interesting anecdote, will be immensely preferable to the voluminous
production of lord Orford.

The event in question was of the greater consequence, as it gave rise
to the present family name of “CAUSTIC.”

Just thirty-two years since, from the fourteenth day of last July,
while I was prosecuting some of my chymical researches, my eldest
son Tom, a burly-faced boy, since killed in a duel with a hot-headed
Irish gentleman, overturned a bench on which were placed seven carboys
full of acids, alkalies, &c. and broke them into inch pieces. The
consequences of this accident may be more easily conceived than
described. The whole neighborhood was alarmed, and many most terribly
_causticized_ in endeavoring to extinguish the conflagration which
ensued. In the consternation, and amid the exertions to subdue it, some
one cried out that Dr Crichton (for such was my former name, being the
lineal descendant from the celebrated “admirable Crichton”) is fairly a
Dr CAUSTIC.

Thus began my _honorary_ name, of which, as it is _scientific_, I
am not a little proud, especially as it was acquired by virtue of
an _explosion_, similar to that which gave the honorary appellation
of _Bronte_ to my friend, viscount Nelson of the Nile. For further
particulars respecting this important event, you will please to inquire
at the Herald’s college, where, I dare say, “garter principal king
at arms,” sir Isaac Heard, knt. has done me the justice to register
the occurrence. Instead of lions, bulls, boars, camels, elephants,
and such insignificant _animalculæ_, my shield is decorated with
insignia more appropriate to my great pretensions. On the left are seen
broken carboys _couchant_, implying that the secrets of science lie
prostrate before me. On the right are fumes _rampant_, indicative of my
discoveries, which _soar_ above those of all other pretenders. In the
centre are nine hedgehogs, with quills, _stickant_, a happy emblem of
my peaceable disposition.

My motto, which I trust sir Isaac has also registered, is worthy of
notice. Dr Darwin was much pleased with it, and, desirous to emulate
my fame in the art of motto making, _made_ “OMNIA E CONCHIS.” But your
worships will perceive that the doctor’s motto bears no comparison
with mine, in point of erudition; as I prove myself versed in three
languages; whereas he can boast of only one. Here it comes.

    Ο ανθρωπος, or η γυνη
    Lacessit never me impune!!

This, my beautiful and appropriate motto, for the sake of accommodating
those among your worships, who are not versed in the lore of Greece and
Rome, and cannot afford to subsidize men of erudition to officiate for
you in that department of science, I shall render into our vernacular
idiom, as follows:

    If I’m attack’d by man or trollop
    I’ll dose the knave with drastic jalap.

Lest the more critical and polite reader should complain, that in order
to _let myself down_ to the level of your worshipful capacities, I
have anglicized my sublime motto in too vulgar and colloquial a style,
I shall take the liberty, politely, to parodize thereon, and, as lord
Bacon says, “to bring it home to men’s business and bosoms;” that is,
to make the application to that particular kind of gentry, against whom
my hedgehog quills, aforesaid, are pointed _in terrorem_.

    Ladies and gentlemen, REVIEWERS!
    You are a set of mischief brewers;
    A gang of scandalous backbiters,
    Who feast on us, poor murder’d writers.
    Now if you dare to throw the gauntlet,
    I tell you honestly I sha’n’t let
    Your impudences, with impunity,
    Impose in future on community.
    If you dare say that greater wit
    Than doctor Caustic ever writ;
    If you dare venture to suggest
    His every word is not the best;
    If you dare hint that Caustic’s noddle
    Is not improved from Homer’s model;
    If you dare _think_ he has not treble
    The inspiration of a Sybil;
    If you don’t seem to take delight
    In puffing him with all your might;
    If you don’t coin for him some proper lies
    To circulate through this metropolis,
    To give eclat to this edition
    Of his Poetical Petition;
    If you don’t sing the same tune o’er
    Which he himself has sung before,
    Ancients and moderns, altogether,
    Are but the shadow of a feather,
    Compared with Caustic, even as
    A puff of hydrogenous gas,
    He’ll hurl ye to old Davy’s grotto,
    As you’ll imagine from his motto.


[124]

    Thus monsieur Satan, was quite merry.

So said Milton, _Paradise Lost_, B. vi. where the hero of the poem
(whom I would propose as a model for your worships’ imitation on all
occasions) and his merry companions “in gamesome mood stand scoffing,”
and “quips cranks,” powder, grape shot, puns, blunderbuss, jokes, and
cannon-balls, flash, roar, and bellow in concert.

But I am sure that every candid critic will be disposed to acknowledge
that neither Homer nor Milton ever described a battle, fraught with
such sublime images and similes, as this in which we are so desperately
engaged.

[125] The above ode was written, set to music, and sung on a public
occasion in Rutland, Vermont, July, 1798. At that time the armament,
which afterwards sailed to Egypt, under Buonaparte, lay at Toulon: its
destination was not known in America, but many supposed that it was
intended to waft the blessings of _French liberty_ to the United States.

[126] This ode was written to the music of an anthem, previously
composed for other words, by Oliver Holden, Esq. Charlestown, Mass.,
a gentleman eminent for his musical talents, and sung during divine
service, at the anniversary of Vermont General Election.

[127] There is an inflated species of simplicity, consisting of
exaggerations of thought expressed by colloquial barbarisms, mixed with
occasional pomposity of diction, which it is the object of the above
to ridicule. The measure is after the model of “THALABA;” but rhyme is
added, as Butler says, merely by way of _rudder_ to the verses.

[128] Killington Peak. The summit of the Green Mountains, in Vermont,
is so called.

[129] Written for the occasion, and sung in New York, July the fourth,
1805.

[130] Mud-pout and sucker are two kinds of fishes of little value,
common enough in muddy streams. The otter pursues these with peculiar
avidity.

[131] Wickapy is the popular name for a shrub, which is remarkably
flexible.

[132] Virgil says “_acquirit_,” which not rhyming we use a substitute;

    “For rhyme the rudder is of verses.”


[133] Sung at the Anniversary of the Mass. Hort. Society, Sept. 10,
1830.

[134] Hon. Elias Phinney.

[135] The lady, to whom these lines were addressed, had been offended
at the insolence of the character who sat as the _original_ for our
picture.

[A] We preferred whales both for the docility and the rhyme’s sake.

[B] “Divine Nonsensia.”

[C] And therefore the writer of the article “_Earth_,” in the
Encyclopedia Britannica, is wrong in attempting to overturn this fine
fabric of philosophy, by making it appear that metals, minerals,
fossils, &c. are continually forming by accretion, &c. on the earth’s
surface. Indeed, that writer has laid a heavy hand on all the theories
of our modern earthmongers.

[D] I am afraid, after all, this would turn out but a bubble.

[E]Now, if it should happen that the comparative levity of air consists
in the repellant powers of its particles, and those bodies which have
the greatest _cohesion_ are most prone to gravitate, there “needs some
conjuror to tell us,” what should hinder bodies of greater specific
gravity from _riddling down between those_ particles of air. No man
but Dr Franklin could have caught the fugitive air under the shell of
the first earth, and pressed it till it became heavier than gold by a
hurly-burly of elements “mixed in confusion.”

[F] The “Monthly Reviewers” of our late edition of Tractoration, would
have it that OURSELF was a Scotchman “frae the north,” &c. Now here’s
a yankee phrase, merely to convince you that they were out in their
conjectures.

[G] See Edinburgh Review of Southey’s Thalaba, October, 1802.


Transcriber’s Notes:

1. Obvious spelling errors have been silently corrected.

2. Where necessary, original spelling has been retained.

3. Some words have been left as either hyphenated or non-hyphenated as
in the original.

4. Italics are shown as _xxx_.




*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "Terrible Tractation and Other Poems" ***

Copyright 2023 LibraryBlog. All rights reserved.