Thomas Hood- Collected Poetical Works Read online

  But John, tho’ he drank nothing else —

  He drank himself to death.

  The cruel maid that caused his love,

  Found out the fatal close,

  For looking in the butt, she saw,

  The butt-end of his woes.

  Some say his spirit haunts the Crown,

  But that is only talk —

  For after riding all his life,

  His ghost objects to walk.

  NUMBER ONE

  VERSIFIED FROM THE PROSE OF A YOUNG LADY

  It’s very hard! — and so it is,

  To live in such a row, —

  And witness this that every Miss

  But me, has got a Beau. —

  For Love goes calling up and down,

  But here he seems to shun;

  I’m sure he has been asked enough

  To call at Number One!

  I’m sick of all the double knocks

  That come to Number Four!

  At Number Three, I often see

  A Lover at the door; —

  And one in blue, at Number Two,

  Calls daily like a dun, —

  It’s very hard they come so near

  And not to Number One!

  Miss Bell I hear has got a dear

  Exactly to her mind, —

  By sitting at the window pane

  Without a bit of blind; —

  But I go in the balcony,

  Which she has never done,

  Yet arts that thrive at Number Five

  Don’t take at Number One!

  ’Tis hard with plenty in the street,

  And plenty passing by, —

  There’s nice young men at Number Ten,

  But only rather shy; —

  And Mrs. Smith across the way

  Has got a grown-up son, —

  But la! he hardly seems to know

  There is a Number One!

  There’s Mr. Wick at Number Nine,

  But he’s intent on pelf,

  And though he’s pious will not love

  His neighbour as himself. —

  At Number Seven there was a sale —

  The goods had quite a run!

  And here I’ve got my single lot

  On hand at Number One! —

  My mother often sits at work

  And talks of props and stays,

  And what a comfort I shall be

  In her declining days: —

  The very maids about the house

  Have set me down a nun,

  The sweethearts all belong to them

  That call at Number One.

  Once only when the flue took fire,

  One Friday afternoon, —

  Young Mr. Long came kindly in

  And told me not to swoon: —

  Why can’t he come again without

  The Phoenix and the Sun! —

  We cannot always have a flue

  On fire at Number One!

  I am not old! I am not plain!

  Nor awkward in my gait —

  I am not crooked like the bride

  That went from Number Eight: —

  I’m sure white satin made her look

  As brown as any bun —

  But even beauty has no chance,

  I think, at Number One!

  At Number Six they say Miss Rose

  Has slain a score of hearts,

  And Cupid, for her sake, has been

  Quite prodigal of darts.

  The Imp they show with bended bow,

  I wish he had a gun!

  But if he had, he’d never deign

  To shoot with Number One!

  It’s very hard, and so it is

  To live in such a row!

  And here’s a ballad singer come

  To aggravate my woe; —

  O take away your foolish song,

  And tones enough to stun —

  There is ‘Nae luck about the house,’

  I know, at Number One! —

  THE DROWNING DUCKS

  Amongst the sights that Mrs. Bond

  Enjoy’d yet grieved at more than others,

  Were little ducklings in a pond,

  Swimming about beside their mothers —

  Small things like living waterlilies,

  But yellow as the daffo-dillies.

  ‘It’s very hard,’ she used to moan,

  ‘That other people have their ducklings

  To grace their waters — mine alone

  Have never any pretty chucklings.’ —

  For why! — each little yellow navy

  Went down — all downy — to old Davy!

  She had a lake — a pond I mean —

  Its wave was rather thick than pearly —

  She had two ducks, their napes were green —

  She had a drake, his tail was curly, —

  Yet spite of drake, and ducks, and pond,

  No little ducks had Mrs. Bond!

  The birds were both the best of mothers —

  The nest had eggs — the eggs had luck

  The infant D.’s came forth like others —

  But there, alas! the matter stuck!

  They might as well have all died addle,

  As die when they began to paddle!

  For when, as native instinct taught her,

  The mother set her brood afloat,

  They sank ere long right under water,

  Like any over-loaded boat;

  They were web-footed too to see,

  As ducks and spiders ought to be!

  No peccant humour in a gander

  Brought havoc on her little folks, —

  No poaching cook — a frying pander

  To appetite, — destroyed their yolks, —

  Beneath her very eyes, Od rot ‘em!

  They went, like plummets, to the bottom.

  The thing was strange — a contradiction

  It seem’d of nature and her works!

  For little ducks, beyond conviction,

  Should float without the help of corks: —

  Great Johnson it bewildered him!

  To hear of ducks that could not swim.

  Poor Mrs. Bond! what could she do

  But change the breed — and she tried divers

  Which dived as all seemed born to do;

  No little ones were e’er survivors —

  Like those that copy gems, I’m thinking,

  They all were given to die-sinking!

  In vain their downy coats were shorn;

  They flounder’d still! — Batch after batch went!

  The little fools seem’d only born

  And hatch’d for nothing but a hatchment!

  Whene’er they launched — O sight of wonder!

  Like fires the water ‘got them under!’

  No woman ever gave their lucks

  A better chance than Mrs. Bond did;

  At last quite out of heart and ducks,

  She gave her pond up, and desponded;

  For Death among the water-lilies,

  Cried ‘Duc ad me’ to all her dillies!

  But though resolved to breed no more,

  She brooded often on this riddle —

  Alas! ’twas darker than before!

  At last about the summer’s middle,

  What Johnson, Mrs. Bond, or none did,

  To clear the matter up the Sun did!

  The thirsty Sirius, dog-like drank

  So deep, his furious tongue to cool,

  The shallow waters sank and sank,

  And lo, from out the wasted pool,

  Too hot to hold them any longer,

  There crawl’d some eels as big as conger!

  I wish all folks would look a bit,

  In such a case below the surface;

  But when the eels were caught and split

  By Mrs. Bond, just think of her face,

  In each inside at once to spy

  A duckling turn’d to giblet-pie!
>
  The sight at once explained the case,

  Making the Dame look rather silly,

  The tenants of that Eely Place

  Had found the way to Pick a dilly.

  And so by under-water suction,

  Had wrought the little ducks’ abduction.

  SALLY SIMPKIN’S LAMENT

  OR, JOHN JONES’S KIT-CAT-ASTROPHE

  ‘He left his body to the sea,

  And made a shark his legatee.’

  Bryan and Perenne.

  ‘Oh! what is that comes gliding in,

  And quite in middling haste?

  It is the picture of my Jones,

  And painted to the waist.

  ‘It is not painted to the life,

  For where’s the trowsers blue?

  Oh Jones, my dear! — Oh dear! my Jones,

  What is become of you?’

  ‘Oh! Sally dear, it is too true, —

  The half that you remark —

  Is come to say my other half

  Is bit off by a shark!

  ‘Oh! Sally, sharks do things by halves,

  Yet most completely do!

  A bite in one place seems enough,

  But I’ve been bit in two.

  ‘You know I once was all your own,

  But now a shark must share!

  But let that pass — for now to you

  I’m neither here nor there.

  ‘Alas! death has a strange divorce

  Effected in the sea,

  It has divided me from you,

  And even me from me!

  ‘Don’t fear my ghost will walk o’ nights

  To haunt as people say;

  My ghost can’t walk, for, oh! my legs

  Are many leagues away!

  ‘Lord! think when I am swimming round,

  And looking where the boat is,

  A shark just snaps away a half,

  Without ‘a quarter’s notice.’

  ‘One half is here, the other half

  Is near Columbia placed;

  Oh! Sally, I have got the whole

  Atlantic for my waist.

  ‘But now, adieu — a long adieu!

  I’ve solved death’s awful riddle,

  And would saymore, but I am doomed

  To break off in the middle.’

  THE FALL

  ‘Down, down, down, ten thousand fathoms deep.’ — Count Fathom.

  Who does not know that dreadful gulf, where Niagara falls,

  Where eagle unto eagle screams, to vulture vulture calls;

  Where down beneath, Despair and Death in liquid darkness grope,

  And upward, on the foam there shines a rainbow without Hope;

  While, hung with clouds of Fear and Doubt, the unreturning wave

  Suddenly gives an awful plunge, like life into the grave;

  And many a hapless mortal there hath dived to bale or bliss;

  One — only one — hath ever lived to rise from that abyss!

  Oh, Heav’n it turns me now to ice, with chill of fear extreme,

  To think of my frail bark adrift on that tumultuous stream!

  In vain with desperate sinews, strung by love of life and light,

  I urged that coffin, my canoe, against the current’s might:

  On — on — still on — direct for doom, the river rush’d in force,

  And fearfully the stream of Time raced with it in its course.

  My eyes I closed — I dared not look the way towards the goal;

  But still I view’d the horrid close, and dreamt it in my soul.

  Plainly, as through transparent lids, I saw the fleeting shore,

  And lofty trees, like winged things, flit by for evermore;

  Plainly, — but with no prophet sense — I heard the sullen sound,

  The torrent’s voice — and felt the mist, like death-sweat gathering round.

  O agony! O life! My home! and those that made it sweet:

  Ere I could pray, the torrent lay beneath my very feet.

  With frightful whirl, more swift than thought, I passed the dizzy edge,

  Bound after bound, with hideous bruise, I dashed from ledge to ledge,

  From crag to crag, — in speechless pain, — from midnight deep to deep;

  I did not die, — but anguish stunn’d my senses into sleep.

  How long entranced, or whither dived, no clue I have to find:

  At last the gradual light of life came dawning o’er my mind;

  And through my brain there thrill’d a cry, — a cry as shrill as birds’

  Of vulture or of eagle kind, but this was set to words:

  ‘It’s Edgar Huntley in his cap and nightgown, I declares!

  He’s been a walking in his sleep, and pitch’d all down the stairs!’

  SONNET: ALONG THE WOODFORD ROAD THERE COMES A NOISE

  Along the Woodford road there comes a noise

  Of wheels, and Mr. Rounding’s neat postchaise

  Struggles along, drawn by a pair of bays,

  With Rev. Mr. Crow and six small Boys;

  Who ever and anon declare their joys,

  With trumping horns and juvenile huzzas,

  At going home to spend their Christmas days,

  And changing Learning’s pains for Pleasure’s toys.

  Six weeks elapse, and down the Woodford way,

  A heavy coach drags six more heavy souls,

  But no glad urchins shout, no trumpets bray;

  The carriage makes a halt, the gate-bell tolls,

  And little Boys walk in as dull and mum

  As six new scholars to the Deaf and Dumb.

  THE STEAM SERVICE

  ‘Life is but a kittle cast’ — Burns.

  I

  I steamed from the Downs in the Nancy,

  My jib how she smoked through the breeze;

  She’s a vessel as tight to my fancy

  As ever boil’d through the salt seas.

  * * * * *

  When up the flue the sailor goes

  And ventures on the pot,

  The landsman, he no better knows,

  But thinks hard is his lot.

  Bold Jack with smiles each danger meets,

  Weighs anchor, lights the log; —

  Trims up the fire, picks out the slates,

  And drinks his can of grog.

  * * * * *

  Go patter to lubbers and swabs do you see,

  ‘Bout danger, and fear, and the like;

  But a Boulton and Watt and good

  Wall’s-end give me;

  And it an’t to a little I’ll strike.

  Though the tempest our chimney

  smack smooth shall down smite,

  And shiver each bundle of wood;

  Clear the wreck, stir the fire, and stow every thing tight,

  And boiling a gallop we’ll scud.

  II

  Hark, the boatswain hoarsely bawling,

  By shovel, tongs, and poker, stand;

  Down the scuttle quick be hauling,

  Down your bellows, hand, boys, hand.

  Now it freshens, — blow like blazes;

  Now unto the coal-hole go;

  Stir, boys, stir, don’t mind black faces,

  Up your ashes nimbly throw.

  Ply your bellows, raise the wind, boys;

  See the valve is clear of course;

  Let the paddles spin, don’t mind, boys,

  Though the weather should be worse.

  Fore and aft a proper draft get,

  Oil the engines, see all clear;

  Hands up, each a sack of coal get,

  Man the boiler, cheer, lads, cheer.

  Now the dreadful thunder s roaring,

  Peal on peal contending clash;

  On our heads fierce rain falls pouring,

  In our eyes the paddles splash.

  One wide water all around us,

  All above one smoke-black sky:

  Different deaths at once surround us;

>   Hark! what means that dreadful cry.

  The funnel’s gone! cries ev’ry tongue out;

  The engineer’s washed off the deck;

  A leak beneath the coal-hole’s sprung out,

  Call all hands to clear the wreck.

  Quick, some coal, some nubbly pieces;

  Come, my hearts, be stout and bold;

  Plumb the boiler, speed decreases,

  Four feet water getting cold.

  While o’er the ship wild waves are beating,

  We for wives or children mourn;

  Alas! from hence there’s no retreating;

  Alas! to them there’s no return.

  The fire is out — we’ve burst the bellows,

  The tinder-box is swamped below;

  Heaven have mercy on poor fellows,

  For only that can serve us now!

  A LAY OF REAL LIFE

  ‘Some are born with a wooden spoon in their mouths, and some with a golden ladle.’ — GOLDSMITH.

  ‘Some are born with tin rings in their noses, and some with silver ones.’ — SILVERSMITH.

  Who ruined me ere I was born,

  Sold every acre, grass or corn,

  And left the next heir all forlorn?

  My Grandfather.

  Who said my mother was no nurse,

  And physicked me and made me worse,

  Till infancy became a curse?

  My Grandmother.

  Who left me in my seventh year,

  A comfort to my mother dear,

  And Mr. Pope, the overseer?

  My Father.

  Who let me starve, to buy her gin,

  Till all my bones came through my skin,

  Then called me ‘ugly little sin?’

  My Mother.

  Who said my mother was a Turk,

  And took me home — and made me work,

  But managed half my meals to shirk?