While Shakspeare and Spenser,* with song and with fable, Enchanted King Arthur and all round his table. Now the First of the James'st complained of the heat, And seemed ill at ease on his rickety seat; It proved, when examined (which made them all stare), The First of the Charles's§ was clearing the dishes, When up started Cromwell, and sliced off his head. T Charles the Second,** enraged at the villanous deed, Tried to turn out Old Cromwell, but could not succeed ; But he mastered young Dick, and then cooled his own wrath In syllabub, trifle, and filigree broth.†† James the Second,‡‡ with looks full of anger and gloom, To make all the company eat macaroni ;||||| At which James grew queasy, and fled from the tent. * In her reign lived many eminent authors, particularly Shakspeare and Spenser. James the First. The gunpowder plot, 5th November, 1605. § Charles I. || Overstrained his prerogative; encroached on the liberties of the people, and on the privileges of parliament. The consequence was a civil war and the loss of his head. The commonwealth succeeded, at the head of which was Oliver Cromwell. He was succeeded by his son Richard, who was displaced by the restoration of Charles II. * Charles II. SS A bigoted Roman Catholic. Used violent measures to establish that religion in England. ¶¶ Was obliged to fly the country; and the crown devolved to his daughter Mary, and her husband, William, Prince of Orange. *** William III. + His reign was distinguished by foreign victories and domestic prosperity. Wreath of glory and peace, by young Freedom entwined,* And gave him a key to the lock* of the mind. Now as Arthur continued the party to scan, He did not well know what to make of Queen Anne ;† And he heartily laughed at the jokes of Dean Swift.§ Who closed in his left, and the circle completed; PAPER MONEY LYRICS. [Written in 1825. A few of the Lyrics were published in the Guide newspaper in 1837, and the whole published privately in that year.] Falstaff.-Master Shallow, I owe you a thousand pound. Shallow.-Ay, marry, Sir John, which I beseech you to let me have home with me.-SHAKSPEARE. Perez.-Who's that is cheated? Speak again, thou vision. Cacafogo.-I'll let thee know I am cheated, cheated damnably. BEAUMONT AND FLETCHER. PREFACE. THESE "Lyrics" were written in the winter of 1825-26, during the prevalence of an influenza to which the beautiful fabric of papercredit is periodically subject; which is called commercial panic by citizens, financial crisis by politicians, and day of reckoning by the profane; and which affected all promisers to pay in town and country with one of its most violent epidemic visitations in December, 1825. The "Lyrics" shadow out, in their order, the symptoms of the * By being the origin of the present form of the English constitution, in the glorious revolution of 1688; and by the life and writings of the philosopher Locke. + Anne. Her general, the Duke of Marlborough, gained several great victories in France. § Many eminent literary characters flourished in her time, particularly Swift and Pope. || The House of Hanover: George I., George II., George III. epidemic in its several stages; the infallible nostrums, remedial and preventive, proposed by every variety of that arch class of quacks, who call themselves political economists; the orders, counter-orders, and disorders, at the head of affairs, with respect to joint-stock banks, and the extinction of one-pound notes, inclusive of Scotland, and exclusive of Scotland; till the final patching up of the uncured malady by a series of false palliatives, which only nourished for another eruption the seeds of the original disease. The tabes tacitis concepta medullis has again blazed forth in new varieties of its primitive types-broken promises and bursting bubbles. Persons and things are changed, but the substance is the same; and these little ballads are as applicable now as they were twelve years ago. They will be applicable to every time and place, in which public credulity shall have given temporary support to the safe and economical currency, which consists of a series of paper promises, made with the deliberate purpose, that the promise shall always be a payment, and the payment shall always be a promise. 20 July, 1837. PAN IN TOWN.* (Metrum Ithyphallicum cum anacrusi.) Falstaff.-If any man will caper with me for a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. PAN AND CHORUS OF CITIZENS. TH PAN. HE Country banks are breaking: E'en quakers now are quaking: And promises of payment Are neither food nor raiment; Then, since that, one and all, you Are fellows of no value For genius, learning, spirit, Or any kind of merit *Pan, it may be necessary to tell the citizens, is the author of "Panic Terrors." The Cockney poet, who entitled a poem "The Universal Pan," which began with "Not in the town am I ;" a most original demonstration of his universality; has had a good opportunity, since he wrote that poem, of seeing that Pan can be in town sometimes. Perhaps, according to his Mythology, the Pan in town was the Sylvan Pan; a fashionable arrival for the season. That mortals call substantial, (Which means the art of robbing On the stream of paper money, Look out for squalls are coming, And not worth a maravedi. CHORUS. Our balances, our balances, OBADIAH NINE-EYES.* The mighty men of Gad, yea, Are all upon the pad, yea, : *The Nine-eyes, or Lamprey, is distinguished for its power of suction. Bellowing with lungs all brazen, Of the wrath of their back-sliding; CHORUS. Our balances, our balances, Our balances, our balances. MAC FUNGUS. A weel sirs, what's the matter? Ye seely men. Y'ur fortunes ne'er were batter. Ye'd batter, I conjacture, To hear our braw chiel lacture: His ecoonoomic science Wad silence a' your clanking, An' teach you some reliance, On the preenciples o' banking. |