More Bab Ballads

Part 1

Transcribed from the 1920 Macmillan and Co edition of “The Bab Ballads”, also from “Fifty Bab Ballads” 1884 George Routledge and Sons edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org

MORE BAB BALLADS

CONTENTS

THE BUMBOAT WOMAN’S STORY 214 THE TWO OGRES 221 LITTLE OLIVER 229 MISTER WILLIAM 235 PASHA BAILEY BEN 242 LIEUTENANT-COLONEL FLARE 248 LOST MR. BLAKE 256 THE BABY’S VENGEANCE 265 THE CAPTAIN AND THE MERMAIDS 273 ANNIE PROTHEROE 280 AN UNFORTUNATE LIKENESS 287 GREGORY PARABLE, LL.D. 294 THE KING OF CANOODLE-DUM 301 FIRST LOVE 309 BRAVE ALUM BEY 317 SIR BARNABY BAMPTON BOO 324 THE MODEST COUPLE 330 THE MARTINET 338 THE SAILOR BOY TO HIS LASS 348 THE REVEREND SIMON MAGUS 356 DAMON V. PYTHIAS 363 MY DREAM 368 THE BISHOP OF RUM-TI-FOO AGAIN 376 A WORM WILL TURN 383 THE HAUGHTY ACTOR 391 THE TWO MAJORS 399 EMILY, JOHN, JAMES, AND I 405 THE PERILS OF INVISIBILITY 413 OLD PAUL AND OLD TIM 420 THE MYSTIC SELVAGEE 426 THE CUNNING WOMAN 433 PHRENOLOGY 440 THE FAIRY CURATE 446 THE WAY OF WOOING 454 HONGREE AND MAHRY 460 ETIQUETTE 541

THE BUMBOAT WOMAN’S STORY

I’M old, my dears, and shrivelled with age, and work, and grief, My eyes are gone, and my teeth have been drawn by Time, the Thief! For terrible sights I’ve seen, and dangers great I’ve run— I’m nearly seventy now, and my work is almost done!

Ah! I’ve been young in my time, and I’ve played the deuce with men! I’m speaking of ten years past—I was barely sixty then: My cheeks were mellow and soft, and my eyes were large and sweet, POLL PINEAPPLE’S eyes were the standing toast of the Royal Fleet!

A bumboat woman was I, and I faithfully served the ships With apples and cakes, and fowls, and beer, and halfpenny dips, And beef for the generous mess, where the officers dine at nights, And fine fresh peppermint drops for the rollicking midshipmites.

Of all the kind commanders who anchored in Portsmouth Bay, By far the sweetest of all was kind LIEUTENANT BELAYE.’ LIEUTENANT BELAYE commanded the gunboat Hot Cross Bun, She was seven and thirty feet in length, and she carried a gun.

With a laudable view of enhancing his country’s naval pride, When people inquired her size, LIEUTENANT BELAYE replied, “Oh, my ship, my ship is the first of the Hundred and Seventy-ones!” Which meant her tonnage, but people imagined it meant her guns.

Whenever I went on board he would beckon me down below, “Come down, Little Buttercup, come” (for he loved to call me so), And he’d tell of the fights at sea in which he’d taken a part, And so LIEUTENANT BELAYE won poor POLL PINEAPPLE’S heart!

But at length his orders came, and he said one day, said he, “I’m ordered to sail with the Hot Cross Bun to the German Sea.” And the Portsmouth maidens wept when they learnt the evil day, For every Portsmouth maid loved good LIEUTENANT BELAYE.

And I went to a back back street, with plenty of cheap cheap shops, And I bought an oilskin hat and a second-hand suit of slops, And I went to LIEUTENANT BELAYE (and he never suspected me!) And I entered myself as a chap as wanted to go to sea.

We sailed that afternoon at the mystic hour of one,— Remarkably nice young men were the crew of the Hot Cross Bun, I’m sorry to say that I’ve heard that sailors sometimes swear, But I never yet heard a Bun say anything wrong, I declare.

When Jack Tars meet, they meet with a “Messmate, ho! What cheer?” But here, on the Hot Cross Bun, it was “How do you do, my dear?” When Jack Tars growl, I believe they growl with a big big D— But the strongest oath of the Hot Cross Buns was a mild “Dear me!”

Yet, though they were all well-bred, you could scarcely call them slick: Whenever a sea was on, they were all extremely sick; And whenever the weather was calm, and the wind was light and fair, They spent more time than a sailor should on his back back hair.

They certainly shivered and shook when ordered aloft to run, And they screamed when LIEUTENANT BELAYE discharged his only gun. And as he was proud of his gun—such pride is hardly wrong— The Lieutenant was blazing away at intervals all day long.

They all agreed very well, though at times you heard it said That BILL had a way of his own of making his lips look red— That JOE looked quite his age—or somebody might declare That BARNACLE’S long pig-tail was never his own own hair.

BELAYE would admit that his men were of no great use to him, “But, then,” he would say, “there is little to do on a gunboat trim I can hand, and reef, and steer, and fire my big gun too— And it is such a treat to sail with a gentle well-bred crew.”

I saw him every day. How the happy moments sped! Reef topsails! Make all taut! There’s dirty weather ahead! (I do not mean that tempests threatened the Hot Cross Bun: In that case, I don’t know whatever we should have done!)

After a fortnight’s cruise, we put into port one day, And off on leave for a week went kind LIEUTENANT BELAYE, And after a long long week had passed (and it seemed like a life), LIEUTENANT BELAYE returned to his ship with a fair young wife!

He up, and he says, says he, “O crew of the Hot Cross Bun, Here is the wife of my heart, for the Church has made us one!” And as he uttered the word, the crew went out of their wits, And all fell down in so many separate fainting-fits.

And then their hair came down, or off, as the case might be, And lo! the rest of the crew were simple girls, like me, Who all had fled from their homes in a sailor’s blue array, To follow the shifting fate of kind LIEUTENANT BELAYE.

It’s strange to think that I should ever have loved young men, But I’m speaking of ten years past—I was barely sixty then, And now my cheeks are furrowed with grief and age, I trow! And poor POLL PINEAPPLE’S eyes have lost their lustre now!

THE TWO OGRES

GOOD children, list, if you’re inclined, And wicked children too— This pretty ballad is designed Especially for you.

Two ogres dwelt in Wickham Wold— Each traits distinctive had: The younger was as good as gold, The elder was as bad.

A wicked, disobedient son Was JAMES M’ALPINE, and A contrast to the elder one, Good APPLEBODY BLAND.

Part 2

M’ALPINE—brutes like him are few— In greediness delights, A melancholy victim to Unchastened appetites.

Good, well-bred children every day He ravenously ate,— All boys were fish who found their way Into M’ALPINE’S net:

Boys whose good breeding is innate, Whose sums are always right; And boys who don’t expostulate When sent to bed at night;

And kindly boys who never search The nests of birds of song; And serious boys for whom, in church, No sermon is too long.

Contrast with JAMES’S greedy haste And comprehensive hand, The nice discriminating taste Of APPLEBODY BLAND.

BLAND only eats bad boys, who swear— Who can behave, but don’t— Disgraceful lads who say “don’t care,” And “shan’t,” and “can’t,” and “won’t.”

Who wet their shoes and learn to box, And say what isn’t true, Who bite their nails and jam their frocks, And make long noses too;

Who kick a nurse’s aged shin, And sit in sulky mopes; And boys who twirl poor kittens in Distracting zoëtropes.

But JAMES, when he was quite a youth, Had often been to school, And though so bad, to tell the truth, He wasn’t quite a fool.

At logic few with him could vie; To his peculiar sect He could propose a fallacy With singular effect.

So, when his Mentors said, “Expound— Why eat good children—why?” Upon his Mentors he would round With this absurd reply:

“I have been taught to love the good— The pure—the unalloyed— And wicked boys, I’ve understood, I always should avoid.

“Why do I eat good children—why? Because I love them so!” (But this was empty sophistry, As your Papa can show.)

Now, though the learning of his friends Was truly not immense, They had a way of fitting ends By rule of common sense.

“Away, away!” his Mentors cried, “Thou uncongenial pest! A quirk’s a thing we can’t abide, A quibble we detest!

“A fallacy in your reply Our intellect descries, Although we don’t pretend to spy Exactly where it lies.

“In misery and penal woes Must end a glutton’s joys; And learn how ogres punish those Who dare to eat good boys.

“Secured by fetter, cramp, and chain, And gagged securely—so— You shall be placed in Drury Lane, Where only good lads go.

“Surrounded there by virtuous boys, You’ll suffer torture wus Than that which constantly annoys Disgraceful TANTALUS.

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