cly,29
No slour'd hoxter30 my snipes31 could stay,
None knap a reader32 like me in the lay.
Soon then I mounted in swell-street high.
Soon then I mounted in swell-street high,
And sported my flashiest toggery,33
Firmly resolved I would make my hay,
While Mercury's star shed a single ray;
And ne'er was there seen such a dashing prig,34
And ne'er was there seen such a dashing prig,
With my strummel faked in the newest twig.35
With my fawnies famms,36 and my onions gay,37
My thimble of ridge,38 and my driz kemesa;39
All my togs were so niblike40 and splash,
All my togs were so niblike and splash,
Readily the queer screens I then could smash;41
But my nuttiest blowen,42 one fine day,
To the beaks43 did her fancy man betray,
And thus was I bowled out at last.44
And thus was I bowled out at last,
And into the jug for a lag was cast;45
But I slipped my darbies46 one morn in May,
And gave to the dubsman47 a holiday.
And here I am, pals, merry and free,
A regular rollocking romany.48
Much laughter and applause rewarded Jerry's attempt to please; and though the meaning of his chant, even with the aid of the numerous notes appended to it, may not be quite obvious to our readers, we can assure them that it was perfectly intelligible to the canting crew. Jerry was now entitled to a call; and happening, at the moment, to meet the fine dark eyes of a sentimental gipsy, one of that better class of mendicants who wandered about the country with a guitar at his back, his election fell upon him. The youth, without prelude, struck up a
GIPSY SERENADE49
Merry maid, merry maid, wilt thou wander with me?
We will roam through the forest, the meadow, and lea;
We will haunt the sunny bowers, and when day begins to flee,
Our couch shall be the ferny brake, our canopy the tree.
Merry maid, merry maid, though a roving life be ours,
We will laugh away the laughing and quickly fleeting hours;
Our hearts are free, as is the free and open sky above,
And we know what tamer souls know not, how lovers
Zoroaster now removed the pipe from his upright lips to intimate his intention of proposing a toast.
An universal knocking of knuckles by the knucklers50 was followed by profound silence. The sage spoke:
'The city of Canterbury, pals,' said he; 'and may it never want a knight of Malta.'
The toast was pledged with much laughter, and in many bumpers.
The knight, upon whom all eyes were turned, rose, 'with stately bearing and majestic motion,' to return thanks.
'I return you an infinitude of thanks, brother pals,' said he, glancing round the assemblage; and bowing to the president, 'and to you, most upright Zory, for the honour you have done me in associating my name with that city. Believe me, I sincerely appreciate the compliment, and echo the sentiment from the bottom of my soul, I trust it never
THE KNIGHT OF MALTA
Come list to me, and you shall have, without a hem or haw, sirs,
A Canterbury pilgrimage, much better than old Chaucer's.
'Tis of a hoax I once played off, upon that city clever,
The memory of which, I hope, will stick to it for ever.
To execute my purpose, in the first place, you must know, sirs,
My locks I let hang down my neck—my beard and whiskers grow, sirs;
A purple cloak I next clapped on, a sword tagged to my side, sirs,
And mounted on a charger black, I to the town did ride, sirs,
Two pages were there by my side, upon two little ponies,
Decked out in scarlet uniform, as spruce as maccaronis;
Caparisoned my charger was, as grandly as his master,
And o'er my long and curly locks I wore a broad-brimmed castor.
The people all flocked forth, amazed to see a man so hairy,
Oh! such a sight had ne'er before been seen in Canterbury!
My flowing robe, my flowing beard, my horse with flowing mane, sirs!
They stared—the days of chivalry, they thought, were come again, sirs.
I told them a long rigmarole romance, that did not halt a
Jot, that they beheld in me a real knight of Malta!
Tom a Becket had I sworn I was, that saint and martyr hallowed,
I doubt not just as readily the bait they would have swallowed.
