Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs Part 7

A third adorer had the girl, A man of lowly station-- A miserable grov'ling earl Besought her approbation.

This humble cad she did refuse With much contempt and loathing; He wore a pair of leather shoes And cambric underclothing!

"Ha! ha!" she cried, "Upon my word!

Well, really--come, I never!

Oh, go along, it's too absurd!

My goodness! Did you ever?

"Two dukes would make their Bowles a bride, And from her foes defend her"-- "Well, not exactly that," they cried, "We offer guilty splendor.

"We do not offer marriage rite, So please dismiss the notion!"

"Oh, dear," said she, "that alters quite The state of my emotion."

The earl he up and says, says he, "Dismiss them to their orgies, For I am game to marry thee Quite reg'lar at St. George's."

He'd had, it happily befell, A decent education; His views would have befitted well A far superior station.

His sterling worth had worked a cure, She never heard him grumble; She saw his soul was good and pure Although his rank was humble.

Her views of earldoms and their lot, All underwent expansion; Come, Virtue in an earldom's cot!

Go, Vice in ducal mansion!

BOB POLTER.

Bob Polter was a navvy, and His hands were coa.r.s.e, and dirty too, His homely face was rough and tanned, His time of life was thirty-two.

He lived among a working clan (A wife he hadn't got at all), A decent, steady, sober man-- No saint, however--not at all.

He smoked, but in a modest way, Because he thought he needed it; He drank a pot of beer a day, And sometimes he exceeded it.

At times he'd pa.s.s with other men A loud convivial night or two, With, very likely, now and then, On Sat.u.r.days, a fight or two.

But still he was a sober soul, A labor-never-s.h.i.+rking man, Who paid his way--upon the whole A decent English working man.

One day, when at the Nelson's Head, (For which he may be blamed of you) A holy man appeared and said, "Oh, Robert, I'm ashamed of you."

He laid his hand on Robert's beer Before he could drink up any, And on the floor, with sigh and tear, He poured the pot of "thruppenny."

"Oh, Robert, at this very bar, A truth you'll be discovering, A good and evil genius are Around your noddle hovering.

"They both are here to bid you shun The other one's society, For Total Abstinence is one, The other Inebriety."

He waved his hand--a vapor came-- A wizard, Polter reckoned him: A bogy rose and called his name, And with his finger beckoned him.

The monster's salient points to sum, His heavy breath was portery; His glowing nose suggested rum; His eyes were gin-and-wortery.

His dress was torn--for dregs of ale And slops of gin had rusted it; His pimpled face was wan and pale, Where filth had not encrusted it.

"Come, Polter," said the fiend, "begin, And keep the bowl a-flowing on-- A working-man needs pints of gin To keep his clockwork going on."

Bob shuddered: "Ah, you've made a miss, If you take me for one of you-- You filthy beast, get out of this-- Bob Polter don't want none of you."

The demon gave a drunken shriek And crept away in stealthiness, And lo, instead, a person sleek Who seemed to burst with healthiness.

"In me, as your advisor hints, Of Abstinence you have got a type-- Of Mr. Tweedle's pretty prints I am the happy prototype.

"If you abjure the social toast, And pipes, and such frivolities, You possibly some day may boast My prepossessing qualities!"

Bob rubbed his eyes, and made 'em blink, "You almost make me tremble, you!

If I abjure fermented drink, Shall I, indeed, resemble you?

"And will my whiskers curl so tight?

My cheeks grow smug and muttony?

My face become so red and white?

My coat so blue and b.u.t.tony?

"Will trousers, such as yours, array Extremities inferior?

Will chubbiness a.s.sert its sway All over my exterior?

"In this, my unenlightened state, To work in heavy boots I comes, Will pumps henceforward decorate My tiddle toddle tootsic.u.ms?

"And shall I get so plump and fresh, And look no longer seedily?

My skin will henceforth fit my flesh So tightly and so Tweedie-ly?"

The phantom said, "You'll have all this, You'll know no kind of huffiness, Your life will be one chubby bliss, One long unruffled puffiness!"

"Be off!" said irritated Bob.

"Why come you here to bother one?

You pharisaical old sn.o.b, You're wuss almost than t'other one!

"I takes my pipe--I takes my pot, And drunk I'm never seen to be: I'm no teetotaller or sot, And as I am I mean to be!"

[Ill.u.s.tration]

GENTLE ALICE BROWN.

It was a robber's daughter, and her name was Alice Brown; Her father was the terror of a small Italian town; Her mother was a foolish, weak, but amiable old thing; But it isn't of her parents that I'm going for to sing.