To the pheasants-how well they're preserv'd !—
My sport's not a jot more beholden,
As the birds are so shy,

For my friends I must buy,

And so send "silver pheasants and golden."

I have tried ev'ry form for a hare,

Every patch, every furze that could shroud her, With toil unrelax'd,

Till my patience is tax'd,

But I cannot be tax'd for hare-powder.

I've been roaming for hours in three flats,
In the hope of a snipe for a snap at ;
But still vainly I court

The percussioning sport,

I find nothing for "setting my cap at!"

A woodcock,-this month is the time,—
Right and left I've made ready my lock for,
With well-loaded double,

But 'spite of my trouble,

Neither barrel can I find a cock for !

A rabbit I should not despise,
But they lurk in their burrows so lowly;
This day's the eleventh,

It is not the seventh,

But they seem to be keeping it hole-y.

For a mallard I've waded the marsh,
And haunted each pool, and each lake-oh!
Mine is not the luck,

To obtain thee, O Duck,

Or to doom thee, O Drake, like a Draco!

For a field-fare I've fared far a-field,
Large or small I am never to sack bird,
Not a thrush is so kind

As to fly, and I find

I may whistle myself for a black-bird!

I am angry, I'm hungry, I'm dry,
Disappointed, and sullen, and goaded,
And so weary an elf,

I am sick of myself,

And with Number One seem overloaded.

As well one might beat round St. Paul's,
And look out for a cock or a hen there;
I have search'd round and round,
All the Baronet's ground,

But Sir Christopher hasn't a wren there!

Joyce may talk of his excellent caps,
But for nightcaps they set me desiring,

And it's really too bad,

Not a shot I have had

With Hall's Powder renown'd for "quick firing."

If this is what people call sport,

Oh! of sporting I can't have a high sense;
And there still remains one

More mischance on my gun—

"Fined for shooting without any licence."

JOHN DAY

A PATHETIC BALLAD

"A Day after the Fair."-Old Proverb.

JOHN DAY he was the biggest man
Of all the coachman kind,

With back too broad to be conceived
By any narrow mind.

The very horses knew his weight,
When he was in the rear,

And wished his box a Christmas box,
To come but once a year.

Alas! against the shafts of love,
What armour can avail?
Soon Cupid sent an arrow through
His scarlet coat of mail.

The barmaid of the Crown he loved,
From whom he never ranged,
For though he changed his horses there,
His love he never changed.

He thought her fairest of all fares,
So fondly love prefers;

And often, among twelve outsides,
Deemed no outside like hers!

One day, as she was sitting down
Beside the porter-pump—

He came, and knelt with all his fat,
And made an offer plump.

Said she, my taste will never learn
To like so huge a man,

So I must beg you will come here
As little as you can.

But still he stoutly urged his suit

With vows, and sighs, and tears, Yet could not pierce her heart, altho’ He drove the Dart for years.

In vain he wooed, in vain he sued,
The maid was cold and proud,
And sent him off to Coventry,
While on his way to Stroud.

He fretted all the way to Stroud,
And thence all back to town,
The course of love was never smooth,
So his went up and down.

At last her coldness made him pine
To merely bones and skin,

But still he loved like one resolved
To love through thick and thin.

O Mary! view my wasted back,
And see my dwindled calf;
Tho' I have never had a wife,
I've lost my better half.

Alas, in vain he still assail'd,

Her heart withstood the dint ; Though he had carried sixteen stone He could not move a flint.

Worn out, at last he made a vow
To break his being's link;
For he was so reduced in size,
At nothing he could shrink.

Now some will talk in water's praise,
And waste a deal of breath,

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!

HUGGINS AND DUGGINS

PASTORAL, AFTER POPE

Two swains or clowns-but call them swains
Whilst keeping flocks on Salisbury plains,

For all that tend on sheep as drovers
Are turned to songsters or to lovers,
Each of the lass he call'd his dear,
Began to carol loud and clear.
First Huggins sang, and Duggins then,
In the way of ancient shepherd men ;
Who thus alternate hitched in song,
"All things by turns, and nothing long."

HUGGINS

Of all the girls about our place,

There's one beats all in form and face;

Search through all Great and Little Bumpstead, You'll only find one Peggy Plumstead.