The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore Part 219

[1] These verses were suggested by the result of the Clare election, in the year 1828, when the Right Honorable W. Vesey Fitzgerald was rejected, and Mr. O'Connell returned.

[2] Some expressions to this purport, in a published letter of one of these gentlemen, had then produced a good deal of amus.e.m.e.nt.

THE ANNUAL PILL.

Supposed to be sung by OLD PROSY, the Jew, in the character of Major CARTWRIGHT.

Vill n.o.bodies try my nice _Annual Pill_, Dat's to purify every ting nashty avay?

Pless ma heart, pless ma heart, let ma say vat I vill, Not a Chrishtian or Shentleman minds vat I say.

'Tis so pretty a bolus!--just down let it go, And, at vonce, such a _radical_ shange you vill see, Dat I'd not be surprished, like de horse in de show, If your heads all vere found, vere your tailsh ought to be!

Vill n.o.bodies try my nice _Annual Pill_, etc.

'Twill cure all Electors and purge away clear Dat mighty bad itching dey've got in deir hands-- 'Twill cure too all Statesmen of dulness, ma tear, Tho' the case vas as desperate as poor Mister VAN'S.

Dere is noting at all vat dis Pill vill not reach-- Give the Sinecure Ghentleman van little grain, Pless ma heart, it vill act, like de salt on de leech, And he'll throw de pounds, shillings, and pence, up again!

Vill n.o.bodies try my nice _Annual Pill_, etc.

'Twould be tedious, ma tear, all its peauties to paint-- "But, among oder tings _fundamentally_ wrong, It vill cure de Proad Pottom[1]--a common complaint Among M.P.'s and weavers--from _sitting_ too long.

Should symptoms of _speeching_ preak out on a dunce (Vat is often de case), it vill stop de disease, And pring avay all de long speeches at vonce, Dat else vould, like tape-worms, come by degrees!

Vill n.o.bodies try my nice _Annual Pill_, Dat's to purify every ting nashty avay?

Pless ma heart, pless ma heart, let me say vat I vill, Not a Chrishtian or Shentleman minds vat I say!

[1] Meaning, I presume, _Coalition_ Administrations.

"IF" AND "PERHAPS."[1]

Oh tidings of freedom! oh accents of hope!

Waft, waft them, ye zephyrs, to Erin's blue sea, And refresh with their sounds every son of the Pope, From Dingle-a-cooch to far Donaghadee.

"_If_ mutely the slave will endure and obey, "Nor clanking his fetters nor breathing his pains, "His masters _perhaps_ at some far distant day "May _think_ (tender tyrants!) of loosening his chains."

Wise "if" and "perhaps!"--precious salve for our wounds, If he who would rule thus o'er manacled mutes, Could check the free spring-tide of Mind that resounds, Even now at his feet, like the sea at Canute's.

But, no, 'tis in vain--the grand impulse is given-- Man knows his high Charter, and knowing will claim; And if ruin _must_ follow where fetters are riven, Be theirs who have forged them the guilt and the shame.

"_If_ the slave will be silent!"--vain Soldier, beware-- There _is_ a dead silence the wronged may a.s.sume, When the feeling, sent back from the lips in despair, But clings round the heart with a deadlier gloom;--

When the blush that long burned on the suppliant's cheek, Gives place to the avenger's pale, resolute hue; And the tongue that once threatened, disdaining to _speak_, Consigns to the arm the high office--to _do_.

_If_ men in that silence should think of the hour When proudly their fathers in panoply stood, Presenting alike a bold front-work of power To the despot on land and the foe on the flood:--

That hour when a Voice had come forth from the west, To the slave bringing hopes, to the tyrant alarms; And a lesson long lookt for was taught the opprest, That kings are as dust before freemen in arms!

_If_, awfuller still, the mute slave should recall That dream of his boyhood, when Freedom's sweet day At length seemed to break thro' a long night of thrall, And Union and Hope went abroad in its ray;--

_If_ Fancy should tell him, that Dayspring of Good, Tho' swiftly its light died away from his chain, Tho' darkly it set in a nation's best blood, Now wants but invoking to shine out again;

_If--if_, I say--breathings like these should come o'er The chords of remembrance, and thrill as they come, Then,--_perhaps_--ay, _perhaps_--but I dare not say more; Thou hast willed that thy slaves should be mute--I am dumb.

[1] Written after hearing a celebrated speech in the House of Lords, June 10, 1828, when the motion in favor of Catholic Emanc.i.p.ation, brought forward by the Marquis of Lansdowne, was rejected by the House of Lords.

WRITE ON, WRITE ON.

A BALLAD.

Air.--"_Sleep on, sleep on, my Kathleen dear.

salvete, fratres Asini_. ST. FRANCIS.

Write on, write on, ye Barons dear, Ye Dukes, write hard and fast; The good we've sought for many a year Your quills will bring at last.

One letter more, Newcastle, pen, To match Lord Kenyon's _two_, And more than Ireland's host of men, One brace of Peers will do.

Write on, write on, etc.

Sure never since the precious use Of pen and ink began, Did letters writ by fools produce Such signal good to man.

While intellect, 'mong high and low, Is marching _on_, they say, Give _me_ the Dukes and Lords who go Like crabs, the _other_ way.

Write on, write on, etc.

Even now I feel the coming light-- Even now, could Folly lure My Lord Mountcashel too to write, Emanc.i.p.ation's sure.

By geese (we read in history), Old Rome was saved from ill; And now to _quills_ of geese we see Old Rome indebted still.

Write on, write on, etc.

Write, write, ye Peers, nor stoop to style, Nor beat for sense about-- Things little worth a n.o.ble's while You're better far without.

Oh ne'er, since a.s.ses spoke of yore, Such miracles were done; For, write but four such letters more, And Freedom's cause is won!