No More Learning

THE TWO ROUND SPACES ON THE TOMBSTONE


The Devil believes that the Lord will come,
Stealing a march without beat of drum,
About the same time that he came last
On an old Christmas-day in a snowy blast:
Till he bids the trump sound neither body nor soul stirs
For the dead men's heads have slipt under their bolsters.

Ho! ho! brother Bard, in our churchyard
Both beds and bolsters are soft and green;
Save one alone, and that's of stone,
And under it lies a Counsellor keen.
This tomb would be square, if it were not too long;
And 'tis rail'd round with iron, tall, spear-like, and strong.

This fellow from Aberdeen hither did skip
With a waxy face and a blubber lip,
And a black tooth in front to show in part
What was the colour of his whole heart.
This Counsellor sweet,
This Scotchman complete
(The Devil scotch him for a snake! ),
I trust he lies in his grave awake.
On the sixth of January,
When all around is white with snow
As a Cheshire yeoman's dairy,
Brother Bard, ho! ho! believe it, or no,
On that stone tomb to you I'll show
After sunset, and before cock-crow,
Two round spaces clear of snow.
I swear by our Knight and his forefathers' souls,
That in size and shape they are just like the holes
In the large house of privity
Of that ancient family.
On those two places clear of snow
There have sat in the night for an hour or so,
Before sunrise, and after cock-crow
(He hicking his heels, she cursing her corns,
All to the tune of the wind in their horns),
The Devil and his Grannam,
With the snow-drift to fan 'em;
Expecting and hoping the trumpet to blow;
For they are cock-sure of the fellow below!

180O.




THE DEVIL'S THOUGHTS


From his brimstone bed at break of day
A walking the DEVIL is gone,
To visit his little snug farm of the earth
And see how his stock went on.
Over the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain,
And backward and forward he swished his long tail
As a gentleman swishes his cane.

And how then was the Devil drest?
Oh! he was in his Sunday's best:
His jacket was red and his breeches were blue,
And there was a hole where the tail came through.

He saw a LAWYER killing a Viper
On a dung heap beside his stable,
And the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind
Of Cain and _his_ brother, Abel.

A POTHECARY on a white horse
Rode by on his vocations,
And the Devil thought of his old Friend
DEATH in the Revelations.

He saw a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility!
And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride that apes humility.

He went into a rich bookseller's shop,
Quoth he! we are both of one college,
For I myself sate like a cormorant once
Fast by the tree of knowledge.

Down the river there plied, with wind and tide,
A pig with vast celerity;
And the Devil look'd wise as he saw how the while,
It cut its own throat. "There! " quoth he with a smile,
"Goes 'England's commercial prosperity. '"

As he went through Cold-Bath Fields he saw
A solitary cell;
And the Devil was pleased, for it gave him a hint
For improving his prisons in Hell.

* * * * * *

General ----------- burning face
He saw with consternation,
And back to hell his way did he take,
For the Devil thought by a slight mistake
It was general conflagration.

1799.