That creamy glove, and supercilious shoe,
That glossy garment of imperial blue,—
Those taper fingers, and unwholesome skin,
Betray patrician spirit shrin'd within.'-
O, that's a tailor, kneaded to a fop,
Obliged Sir T. with loans, and left his shop!
Forth stalks the coxcomb, flimsy-frothy-vain,
In step a Brummell, and in look a Hayne;
'From head to toe,' perfum'd like Rowland shops,
He's every inch the paragon of fops!
A porkish whiteness pales his plastic skin,
And muslin halters prop the pimpled chin;
A gleaming spy-glass dangles from his neck,
Speckless his frill and fame, tho' prone to speck!
A goatish thing-he lives on ogling eyes,
On scented handkerchiefs, and maiden sighs!
Next mark the red-nosed Jehu awe the street,
With file-thinn'd teeth, and benjamin' complete;
His balanc'd hat, and far equestrian gaze,
The val'rous spume that round his muzzle plays;
That cock-pit air, and fine Herculean fist,
Where Belcher science turns the flexile wrist;
The look from Tattersall's-the snorted hail,'-
All show him tallied for the horse's tail:
Had heaven, in pity, doom'd the vulgar fool
In fitter rank the whip and wheel to rule,
How would his stable mien adorn the place,
And add new dignity to coachee's grace!
A MILITARY EXQUISITE.
The foppish soldier, victor in the ball,
Comes clinking next, the cynosure of all:
For him will titled Harriets melt and frown,
And rank him darling puppy of the town:
Big lips and clanking chains, and polish'd spurs,
And sword that rarely from its scabbard stirs,
The warlike foot-fall, and the hairy glue,
All fit him for another Waterloo!
Fashion is all in all,-that creed of fools
Whose flighty doctrine half the empire rules.
Queen of the rich,—Minerva of the vain,
Begot by folly,-cleav'd from falsehood's brain,
'Tis Fashion dies the beldame's blister'd cheek,
Lives in her errant gaze, and kitten squeak.
To scribble, leave the card's diurnal lie,—
Watch Christie's grin, or pinch a noon-tide pie,—
Create importance in a matin call,
Unpack a tradesman's shop-nor buy at all,—
Crawl forth each morn, and so yawn out the day,
Growl, smile, and guzzle,—sorrowing to be gay ;-
Thus, Fashion dupes her addle-headed slaves,
Until, like dogs, they shrivel to their graves!
Deals with the gambler, pilfers with the rogue,
And gives to Wealth a NEW MAde Decalogue.
Space and time warn me now to drop the curtain on this amiable tragi-comedy, from the Age Reviewed. The next passages will bear advantageous comparison with similar passages, on nearly the same subjects, in English Bards.
All serve the myst'ries of this dread conclave
While Willis toils, their sneakup and their slave:
O peerless senate!-ye who here decree,
And trace beyond the flood, a pedigree,
Illumined rulers of a wax-lit stye,
Where passion twirls the leg, and rolls the eye,—
Let your mean pride ascend to decent aim,
Outlaw the bosom's lust-creating shame.
The ball commences-rich the music flows,
Melts on the heart, and vivifies the toes;
Wide o'er the room, behold the chalky round,
Where light the foot-beat floor begins to bound;
Awak'ning pleasure each flush'd face illumes,
And flirting misses toss their crested plumes ;-
Warm streams the blood within each thrilling vein,
Tints the bright cheek, and rushes on the brain.
Now anxious idiots in their pumps appear,
From red-gill'd banker up to lean-jaw'd peer;
Here a huge beldame swells within her stays,
Smirks at each beau-and flaps him for his praise;
Here Bond Street puppies, rank with eau Cologne,
Limp round the room, and whimper to the ton;
While peevish beldames by their daughters watch,
Glance in their eyes, and pray- God send a match!'
Now to the Opera turn, where ballets please,
And foppish fashion fumes away its ease;
There, what fine ear can list the lewd-breathed sounds, What decent eye survey the wanton bounds,
Each warm lascivious twirl of panting lust,
Nor feel the burning fever of disgust?
Bedaub'd with paint, here jewell'd herds compose
Their pustuled persons in the steamy rows;
Pile luscious fancies on transparent limbs,
Move with each form, and languish as it swims.
Patrons of vice from dunghill or from court,
In mercy, cease such operatic sport!
Caress no Bochsas in your costly home,
No whisker'd knave, no eunuch scamp'd from Rome;
O! let the lavish'd millions feed the poor,
The wan-eyed paupers fainting at your door.
Now from the Op'ra's widened portals stream
A shiv'ring concourse,-wide the torches gleam,-
And fling cadav'rous hues upon each face,
Where pall'd Delight has left her pale-worn trace,
Perturbed, mark, the blinking chap'rons guard,
Wrapt in her gather'd silks, their dainty ward;
While flutt'ring near, gallants obtrusive try
To read the twinkling promise of her eye:
Within the crush-room fretful throngs parade,
And lisping puppies quizz each well-laced maid;
Some round the fire-place chafe their chilly hands,
Smooth their wild locks, and fold their silken bands:
While, borne with crutches to the creaking door,
The snarling cuckolds for their cars implore.
The following extracts from the Age Reviewed are of appalling force. The phrase 'synonyme of all depravity,' and the passages, Heaven sweep,' &c., and 'Come, godless,' &c., have a terrific vehemence of vituperation, modulated like Pope, but flashing with the fiery intensity and withering brevity of Juvenal. Byron, has nothing superior to this first passage in the sublime of satirical description :
A DUEL BETWEEN TITLED GAMBLERS.
For such a bandit famed Chalk Farm uprears
Its battle-field, where base or brutish peers,
And touchy boobies, fire away their dread,
And thick skulls blunt the disappointed lead:
Lo! there the heroes stand,—the pistols roar!—
Heaven sweep from Britain's isle one villain more!
A FASHIONABLE HELL.
Within St. James's Hells what bilks resort,
Both young and hoary, to pursue their sport!
'Tis mis'ry revels here!-the haggard mien
And lips that quiver with the curse obscene,
The hollow cheeks that faintly fall and rise,
While silent madness flashes from the eyes,
Those fever'd hands, the darkly-knitting brow,
Where mingling passions delve their traces now-
Denote the ruined,-whose bewilder'd air,
Is one wild vengeful throbbing of despair!
Deserted homes, and mothers' broken hearts,
Forsaken offspring,-crime's unfathom'd arts,
The suicide, and ev'ry sad farewell,-
These are the triumphs of a London Hell!
Nor can the English Bards produce such a burst of sublimely indignant and withering vituperation as this
Now for the apex of polluted souls,
No shame subdues, no reverence controls;
Come, godless, blushless-England's vilest pair,
Blots to the land, and plague-spots to the air;
The base we've had, of ev'ry kind and hue,
The bloody, lech'rous, and unnatʼral too—
But never, yet, the wretch that equall'd thee,
Thou synonyme of all depravity!
The last line has terrific force.
Oh stand not forth to Britain's public eye,
The monster-fiend of painted blasphemy;
But go!-and quickly end thy course perverse,
Hung on the gibbet of a nation's curse !!!
In the midst of this scathing lava-torrent of poetical vituperation, the author discovers the manly feeling of his humane nature by the following pathetic sketch. Like the revelling joy with which he turns. from the horrors of crime, on all occasions, to sympathize with the innocent sportfulness of childhood; and
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