William Makepeace Thackeray: Verses about Sorrow

Returning from the cruel fight
How pale and faint appears my knight!
He sees me anxious at his side;
'Why seek, my love, your wounds to hide?
Or deem your English girl afraid
To emulate the Indian maid?'

Be mine my husband's grief to cheer
In peril to be ever near;
Whate'er of ill or woe betide,
To bear it clinging at his side;
The poisoned stroke of fate to ward,
His bosom with my own to guard:
Ah! could it spare a pang to his,
It could not know a purer bliss!
'Twould gladden as it felt the smart,
And thank the hand that flung the dart!

When moonlike ore the hazure seas
In soft effulgence swells,
When silver jews and balmy breaze
Bend down the Lily's bells;
When calm and deap, the rosy sleep
Has lapt your soal in dreems,
R Hangeline! R lady mine!
Dost thou remember Jeames?

I mark thee in the Marble All,
Where England's loveliest shine—
I say the fairest of them hall
Is Lady Hangeline.
My soul, in desolate eclipse,
With recollection teems—
And then I hask, with weeping lips,
Dost thou remember Jeames?

Away! I may not tell thee hall
This soughring heart endures—
There is a lonely sperrit-call
That Sorrow never cures;
There is a little, little Star,
That still above me beams;
It is the Star of Hope—but ar!
Dost thou remember Jeames?

How spake of old the Royal Seer?
(His text is one I love to treat on.)
This life of ours he said is sheer
Mataiotes Mataioteton.

O Student of this gilded Book,
Declare, while musing on its pages,
If truer words were ever spoke
By ancient, or by modern sages!

The various authors' names but note,*
French, Spanish, English, Russians, Germans:
And in the volume polyglot,
Sure you may read a hundred sermons!

What histories of life are here,
More wild than all romancers' stories;
What wondrous transformations queer,
What homilies on human glories!

What theme for sorrow or for scorn!
What chronicle of Fate's surprises—
Of adverse fortune nobly borne,
Of chances, changes, ruins, rises!

Of thrones upset, and sceptres broke,
How strange a record here is written!
Of honors, dealt as if in joke;
Of brave desert unkindly smitten.

How low men were, and how they rise!
How high they were, and how they tumble!
O vanity of vanities!
O laughable, pathetic jumble!

Here between honest Janin's joke
And his Turk Excellency's firman,
I write my name upon the book:
I write my name—and end my sermon.

—————

O Vanity of vanities!
How wayward the decrees of Fate are;
How very weak the very wise,
How very small the very great are!

What mean these stale moralities,
Sir Preacher, from your desk you mumble?
Why rail against the great and wise,
And tire us with your ceaseless grumble?

Pray choose us out another text,
O man morose and narrow-minded!
Come turn the page—I read the next,
And then the next, and still I find it.

Read here how Wealth aside was thrust,
And Folly set in place exalted;
How Princes footed in the dust,
While lackeys in the saddle vaulted.

Though thrice a thousand years are past,
Since David's son, the sad and splendid,
The weary King Ecclesiast,
Upon his awful tablets penned it,—

Methinks the text is never stale,
And life is every day renewing
Fresh comments on the old old tale
Of Folly, Fortune, Glory, Ruin.

Hark to the Preacher, preaching still
He lifts his voice and cries his sermon,
Here at St. Peter's of Cornhill,
As yonder on the Mount of Hermon;

For you and me to heart to take
(O dear beloved brother readers)
To-day as when the good King spake
Beneath the solemn Syrian cedars.

O TIM, did you hear of thim Saxons,
And read what the peepers report?
They're goan to recal the Liftinant,
And shut up the Castle and Coort!

Our desolate counthry of Oireland,
They're bint, the blagyards, to desthroy,
And now having murdthered our counthry,
They're goin to kill the Viceroy, Dear boy;
'Twas he was our proide and our joy!

And will we no longer behould him,
Surrounding his carriage in throngs,
As he weaves his cocked-hat from the windies,
And smiles to his bould aid-de-congs?
I liked for to see the young haroes,
All shoining with sthripes and with stars,
A horsing about in the Phaynix,
And winking the girls in the cyars,
Like Mars,
A smokin' their poipes and cigyars.

Dear Mitchell exoiled to Bermudies,
Your beautiful oilids you'll ope,
And there'll be an abondance of croyin'
From O'Brine at the Keep of Good Hope,
When they read of this news in the peepers,
Acrass the Atlantical wave,
That the last of the Oirish Liftinints
Of the oisland of Seents has tuck lave. God save
The Queen—she should betther behave.

And what's to become of poor Dame Sthreet,
And who'll ait the puffs and the tarts,
Whin the Coort of imparial splindor
From Doblin's sad city departs?
And who'll have the fiddlers and pipers,
When the deuce of a Coort there remains?
And where'll be the bucks and the ladies,
To hire the Coort-shuits and the thrains?
In sthrains,
It's thus that ould Erin complains!

There's Counsellor Flanagan's leedy
'Twas she in the Coort didn't fail,
And she wanted a plinty of popplin,
For her dthress, and her flounce, and her tail;
She bought it of Misthress O'Grady,
Eight shillings a yard tabinet,
But now that the Coort is concluded,
The divvle a yard will she get; I bet,
Bedad, that she wears the old set.

There's Surgeon O'Toole and Miss Leary,
They'd daylings at Madam O'Riggs';
Each year at the dthrawing-room sayson,
They mounted the neatest of wigs.
When Spring, with its buds and its dasies,
Comes out in her beauty and bloom,
Thim tu'll never think of new jasies,
Becase there is no dthrawing-room,
For whom
They'd choose the expense to ashume.

There's Alderman Toad and his lady,
'Twas they gave the Clart and the Poort,
And the poine-apples, turbots, and lobsters,
To feast the Lord Liftinint's Coort.
But now that the quality's goin,
I warnt that the aiting will stop,
And you'll get at the Alderman's teeble
The devil a bite or a dthrop,
Or chop;
And the butcher may shut up his shop.

Yes, the grooms and the ushers are goin,
And his Lordship, the dear honest man,
And the Duchess, his eemiable leedy,
And Corry, the bould Connellan,
And little Lord Hyde and the childthren,
And the Chewter and Governess tu;
And the servants are packing their boxes,—
Oh, murther, but what shall I due
Without you?
O Meery, with ois of the blue!

'I am Miss Catherine's book,' the album speaks;
'I've lain among your tomes these many weeks;
I'm tired of their old coats and yellow cheeks.

'Quick, Pen! and write a line with a good grace:
Come! draw me off a funny little face;
And, prithee, send me back to Chesham Place.'

PEN.

'I am my master's faithful old Gold Pen;
I've served him three long years, and drawn since then
Thousands of funny women and droll men.

'O Album! could I tell you all his ways
And thoughts, since I am his, these thousand days,
Lord, how your pretty pages I'd amaze!'

ALBUM.

'His ways? his thoughts? Just whisper me a few;
Tell me a curious anecdote or two,
And write 'em quickly off, good Mordan, do!'

PEN.

'Since he my faithful service did engage
To follow him through his queer pilgrimage,
I've drawn and written many a line and page.

'Caricatures I scribbled have, and rhymes,
And dinner-cards, and picture pantomimes;
And merry little children's books at times.

'I've writ the foolish fancy of his brain;
The aimless jest that, striking, hath caused pain;
The idle word that he'd wish back again.

. . . . . .

'I've help'd him to pen many a line for bread;
To joke with sorrow aching in his head;
And make your laughter when his own heart bled.

'I've spoke with men of all degree and sort—
Peers of the land, and ladies of the Court;
Oh, but I've chronicled a deal of sport!

'Feasts that were ate a thousand days ago,
Biddings to wine that long hath ceased to flow,
Gay meetings with good fellows long laid low;

'Summons to bridal, banquet, burial, ball,
Tradesman's polite reminders of his small
Account due Christmas last—I've answered all.

'Poor Diddler's tenth petition for a half-
Guinea; Miss Bunyan's for an autograph;
So I refuse, accept, lament, or laugh,

'Condole, congratulate, invite, praise, scoff.
Day after day still dipping in my trough,
And scribbling pages after pages off.

'Day after day the labor's to be done,
And sure as comes the postman and the sun,
The indefatigable ink must run.

. . . . .

'Go back, my pretty little gilded tome,
To a fair mistress and a pleasant home,
Where soft hearts greet us whensoe'er we come!

'Dear, friendly eyes, with constant kindness lit,
However rude my verse, or poor my wit,
Or sad or gay my mood, you welcome it.

'Kind lady! till my last of lines is penn'd,
My master's love, grief, laughter, at an end,
Whene'er I write your name, may I write friend!

'Not all are so that were so in past years;
Voices, familiar once, no more he hears;
Names, often writ, are blotted out in tears.

'So be it:—joys will end and tears will dry—
Album! my master bids me wish good-by,
He'll send you to your mistress presently.

'And thus with thankful heart he closes you;
Blessing the happy hour when a friend he knew
So gentle, and so generous, and so true.

'Nor pass the words as idle phrases by;
Stranger! I never writ a flattery,
Nor sign'd the page that register'd a lie.'

The play is done; the curtain drops,
Slow falling to the prompter's bell:
A moment yet the actor stops,
And looks around, to say farewell.
It is an irksome word and task;
And, when he's laughed and said his say,
He shows, as he removes the mask,
A face that's anything but gay.

One word, ere yet the evening ends,
Let's close it with a parting rhyme,
And pledge a hand to all young friends,
As fits the merry Christmas time.

On life's wide scene you, too, have parts,
That Fate ere long shall bid you play;
Good night! with honest gentle hearts
A kindly greeting go alway!

Goodnight—I'd say, the griefs, the joys,
Just hinted in this mimic page,
The triumphs and defeats of boys,
Are but repeated in our age.
I'd say, your woes were not less keen,
Your hopes more vain than those of men;
Your pangs or pleasures of fifteen
At forty-five played o'er again.

I'd say, we suffer and we strive,
Not less nor more as men, than boys;
With grizzled beards at forty-five,
As erst at twelve in corduroys.
And if, in time of sacred youth,
We learned at home to love and pray,
Pray Heaven that early Love and Truth
May never wholly pass away.

And in the world, as in the school,
I'd say, how fate may change and shift;
The prize be sometimes with the fool,
The race not always to the swift.
The strong may yield, the good may fall,
The great man be a vulgar clown,
The knave be lifted over all,
The kind cast pitilessly down.

Who knows the inscrutable design?
Blessed be He who took and gave!
Why should your mother, Charles, not mine,
Be weeping at her darling's grave?
*
We bow to Heaven that will'd it so,
That darkly rules the fate of all,
That sends the respite or the blow,
That's free to give, or to recall.

This crowns his feast with wine and wit:
Who brought him to that mirth and state?
His betters, see, below him sit,
Or hunger hopeless at the gate.
Who bade the mud from Dives' wheel
To spurn the rags of Lazarus?
Come, brother, in that dust we'll kneel,
Confessing Heaven that ruled it thus.

So each shall mourn, in life's advance,
Dear hopes, dear friends, untimely killed;
Shall grieve for many a forfeit chance,
And longing passion unfulfilled.
Amen! whatever fate be sent,
Pray God the heart may kindly glow,
Although the head with cares be bent,
And whitened with the winter snow.

Come wealth or want, come good or ill,
Let young and old accept their part,
And bow before the Awful Will,
And bear it with an honest heart,
Who misses or who wins the prize.
Go, lose or conquer as you can;
But if you fail, or if you rise,
Be each, pray God, a gentleman.

A gentleman, or old or young!
(Bear kindly with my humble lays);
The sacred chorus first was sung
Upon the first of Christmas days:
The shepherds heard it overhead—
The joyful angels raised it then:
Glory to Heaven on high, it said,
And peace on earth to gentle men.

My song, save this, is little worth;
I lay the weary pen aside,
And wish you health, and love, and mirth,
As fits the solemn Christmas-tide.
As fits the holy Christmas birth,
Be this, good friends, our carol still—
Be peace on earth, be peace on earth,
To men of gentle will.

The noble King of Brentford
Was old and very sick,
He summon'd his physicians
To wait upon him quick;
They stepp'd into their coaches
And brought their best physick.

They cramm'd their gracious master
With potion and with pill;
They drench'd him and they bled him;
They could not cure his ill.
'Go fetch,' says he, 'my lawyer,
I'd better make my will.'

The monarch's royal mandate
The lawyer did obey;
The thought of six-and-eightpence
Did make his heart full gay.
'What is't,' says he, 'your Majesty
Would wish of me to-day?'

'The doctors have belabor'd me
With potion and with pill:
My hours of life are counted,
O man of tape and quill!
Sit down and mend a pen or two,
I want to make my will.

'O'er all the land of Brentford
I'm lord, and eke of Kew:
I've three-per-cents and five-per-cents;
My debts are but a few;
And to inherit after me
I have but children two.

Prince Thomas is my eldest son,
A sober Prince is he,
And from the day we breech'd him
Till now, he's twenty-three,
He never caused disquiet
To his poor Mamma or me.

'At school they never flogg'd him,
At college, though not fast,
Yet his little-go and great-go
He creditably pass'd,
And made his year's allowance
For eighteen months to last.

'He never owed a shilling.
Went never drunk to bed,
He has not two ideas
Within his honest head—
In all respects he differs
From my second son, Prince Ned.

'When Tom has half his income
Laid by at the year's end,
Poor Ned has ne'er a stiver
That rightly he may spend,
But sponges on a tradesman,
Or borrows from a friend.

'While Tom his legal studies
Most soberly pursues,
Poor Ned most pass his mornings
A-dawdling with the Muse:
While Tom frequents his banker,
Young Ned frequents the Jews.

'Ned drives about in buggies,
Tom sometimes takes a 'bus;
Ah, cruel fate, why made you
My children differ thus?
Why make of Tom a DULLARD,
And Ned a GENIUS?'

'You'll cut him with a shilling,'
Exclaimed the man of wits:
'I'll leave my wealth,' said Brentford,
'Sir Lawyer, as befits;
And portion both their fortunes
Unto their several wits.'

'Your Grace knows best,' the lawyer said
'On your commands I wait.'
'Be silent, Sir,' says Brentford,
'A plague upon your prate!
Come take your pen and paper,
And write as I dictate.'

The will as Brentford spoke it
Was writ and signed and closed;
He bade the lawyer leave him,
And turn'd him round and dozed;
And next week in the churchyard
The good old King reposed.

Tom, dressed in crape and hatband,
Of mourners was the chief;
In bitter self-upbraidings
Poor Edward showed his grief:
Tom hid his fat white countenance
In his pocket-handkerchief.

Ned's eyes were full of weeping,
He falter'd in his walk;
Tom never shed a tear,
But onwards he did stalk,
As pompous, black, and solemn,
As any catafalque.

And when the bones of Brentford—
That gentle king and just—
With bell and book and candle
Were duly laid in dust,
'Now, gentleman,' says Thomas,
'Let business be discussed.

'When late our sire beloved
Was taken deadly ill,
Sir Lawyer, you attended him
(I mean to tax your bill);
And, as you signed and wrote it,
I prithee read the will.'

The lawyer wiped his spectacles,
And drew the parchment out;
And all the Brentford family
Sat eager round about:
Poor Ned was somewhat anxious,
But Tom had ne'er a doubt.

'My son, as I make ready
To seek my last long home,
Some cares I had for Neddy,
But none for thee, my Tom:
Sobriety and order
You ne'er departed from.

'Ned hath a brilliant genius,
And thou a plodding brain;
On thee I think with pleasure,
On him with doubt and pain.'
('You see, good Ned,' says Thomas,
'What he thought about us twain.'

'Though small was your allowance,
You saved a little store;
And those who save a little
Shall get a plenty more.'
As the lawyer read this compliment,
Tom's eyes were running o'er.

'The tortoise and the hare, Tom,
Set out, at each his pace;
The hare it was the fleeter,
The tortoise won the race;
And since the world's beginning
This ever was the case.

'Ned's genius, blithe and singing,
Steps gayly o'er the ground;
As steadily you trudge it
He clears it with a bound;
But dulness has stout legs, Tom,
And wind that's wondrous sound.

'O'er fruits and flowers alike, Tom,
You pass with plodding feet;
You heed not one nor t'other
But onwards go your beat,
While genius stops to loiter
With all that he may meet;

'And ever as he wanders,
Will have a pretext fine
For sleeping in the morning,
Or loitering to dine,
Or dozing in the shade,
Or basking in the shine.

'Your little steady eyes, Tom,
Though not so bright as those
That restless round about him
His flashing genius throws,
Are excellently suited
To look before your nose.

'Thank heaven, then, for the blinkers
It placed before your eyes;
The stupidest are weakest,
The witty are not wise;
Oh, bless your good stupidity,
It is your dearest prize!

'And though my lands are wide,
And plenty is my gold,
Still better gifts from Nature,
My Thomas, do you hold—
A brain that's thick and heavy,
A heart that's dull and cold.

'Too dull to feel depression,
Too hard to heed distress,
Too cold to yield to passion
Or silly tenderness.
March on—your road is open
To wealth, Tom, and success.

'Ned sinneth in extravagance,
And you in greedy lust.'
('I' faith,' says Ned, 'our father
Is less polite than just.')
'In you, son Tom, I've confidence,
But Ned I cannot trust.

'Wherefore my lease and copyholds,
My lands and tenements,
My parks, my farms, and orchards,
My houses and my rents,
My Dutch stock and my Spanish stock,
My five and three per cents,

'I leave to you, my Thomas'—
('What, all?' poor Edward said.
'Well, well, I should have spent them,
And Tom's a prudent head')—
'I leave to you, my Thomas,—
To you in TRUST for Ned.'

The wrath and consternation
What poet e'er could trace
That at this fatal passage
Came o'er Prince Tom his face;
The wonder of the company,
And honest Ned's amaze!

''Tis surely some mistake,'
Good-naturedly cries Ned;
The lawyer answered gravely,
''Tis even as I said;
'Twas thus his gracious Majesty
Ordain'd on his death-bed.

'See, here the will is witness'd,
And here's his autograph.'
'In truth, our father's writing,'
Says Edward, with a laugh;
'But thou shalt not be a loser, Tom,
We'll share it half and half.'

'Alas! my kind young gentleman,
This sharing cannot be;
'Tis written in the testament
That Brentford spoke to me,
'I do forbid Prince Ned to give
Prince Tom a halfpenny.

''He hath a store of money,
But ne'er was known to lend it;
He never help'd his brother;
The poor he ne'er befriended;
He hath no need of property
Who knows not how to spend it.

''Poor Edward knows but how to spend,
And thrifty Tom to hoard;
Let Thomas be the steward then,
And Edward be the lord;
And as the honest laborer
Is worthy his reward,

''I pray Prince Ned, my second son,
And my successor dear,
To pay to his intendant
Five hundred pounds a year;
And to think of his old father,
And live and make good cheer.''

Such was old Brentford's honest testament,
He did devise his moneys for the best,
And lies in Brentford church in peaceful rest.
Prince Edward lived, and money made and spent;
But his good sire was wrong, it is confess'd
To say his son, young Thomas, never lent.
He did. Young Thomas lent at interest,
And nobly took his twenty-five per cent.

Long time the famous reign of Ned endured
O'er Chiswick, Fulham, Brentford, Putney, Kew,
But of extravagance he ne'er was cured.
And when both died, as mortal men will do,
'Twas commonly reported that the steward
Was very much the richer of the two.