The Bab Ballads

PART I.. At a Pleasant Evening Party I Had Taken Down to Supper

AT a pleasant evening party I had taken down to supper One whom I will call ELVIRA, and we talked of love and TUPPER,

MR. TUPPER and the Poets, very lightly with them dealing, For I’ve always been distinguished for a strong poetic feeling.

Then we let off paper crackers, each of which contained a motto, And she listened while I read them, till her mother told her not to.

Then she whispered, “To the ball-room we had better, dear, be walking; If we stop down here much longer, really people will be talking.”

There were noblemen in coronets, and military cousins, There were captains by the hundred, there were baronets by dozens.

Yet she heeded not their offers, but dismissed them with a blessing, Then she let down all her back hair, which had taken long in dressing.

Then she had convulsive sobbings in her agitated throttle, Then she wiped her pretty eyes and smelt her pretty smelling-bottle.

So I whispered, “Dear ELVIRA, say,—what can the matter be with you? Does anything you’ve eaten, darling POPSY, disagree with you?”

But spite of all I said, her sobs grew more and more distressing, And she tore her pretty back hair, which had taken long in dressing.

Then she gazed upon the carpet, at the ceiling, then above me, And she whispered, “FERDINANDO, do you really, really love me?”

“Love you?” said I, then I sighed, and then I gazed upon her sweetly— For I think I do this sort of thing particularly neatly.

“Send me to the Arctic regions, or illimitable azure, On a scientific goose-chase, with my COXWELL or my GLAISHER!

“Tell me whither I may hie me—tell me, dear one, that I may know— Is it up the highest Andes? down a horrible volcano?”

But she said, “It isn’t polar bears, or hot volcanic grottoes: Only find out who it is that writes those lovely cracker mottoes!”

PART II.. “tell Me, Henry Wadsworth, Alfred Poet Close, or Mister Tupper,

“Tell me, HENRY WADSWORTH, ALFRED POET CLOSE, or MISTER TUPPER, Do you write the bon bon mottoes my ELVIRA pulls at supper?”

But HENRY WADSWORTH smiled, and said he had not had that honour; And ALFRED, too, disclaimed the words that told so much upon her.

“MISTER MARTIN TUPPER, POET CLOSE, I beg of you inform us;” But my question seemed to throw them both into a rage enormous.

MISTER CLOSE expressed a wish that he could only get anigh to me; And MISTER MARTIN TUPPER sent the following reply to me:

“A fool is bent upon a twig, but wise men dread a bandit,”— Which I know was very clever; but I didn’t understand it.

Seven weary years I wandered—Patagonia, China, Norway, Till at last I sank exhausted at a pastrycook his doorway.

There were fuchsias and geraniums, and daffodils and myrtle, So I entered, and I ordered half a basin of mock turtle.

He was plump and he was chubby, he was smooth and he was rosy, And his little wife was pretty and particularly cosy.

And he chirped and sang, and skipped about, and laughed with laughter hearty— He was wonderfully active for so very stout a party.

And I said, “O gentle pieman, why so very, very merry? Is it purity of conscience, or your one-and-seven sherry?”

But he answered, “I’m so happy—no profession could be dearer— If I am not humming ‘Tra! la! la!’ I’m singing ‘Tirer, lirer!’

“First I go and make the patties, and the puddings, and the jellies, Then I make a sugar bird-cage, which upon a table swell is;

“Then I polish all the silver, which a supper-table lacquers; Then I write the pretty mottoes which you find inside the crackers.”—

“Found at last!” I madly shouted. “Gentle pieman, you astound me!” Then I waved the turtle soup enthusiastically round me.

And I shouted and I danced until he’d quite a crowd around him— And I rushed away exclaiming, “I have found him! I have found him!”

And I heard the gentle pieman in the road behind me trilling, “‘Tira, lira!’ stop him, stop him! ‘Tra! la! la!’ the soup’s a shilling!”

But until I reached ELVIRA’S home, I never, never waited, And ELVIRA to her FERDINAND’S irrevocably mated!

LORENZO DE LARDY

DALILAH DE DARDY adored The very correctest of cards, LORENZO DE LARDY, a lord— He was one of Her Majesty’s Guards.

DALILAH DE DARDY was fat, DALILAH DE DARDY was old— (No doubt in the world about that) But DALILAH DE DARDY had gold.

LORENZO DE LARDY was tall, The flower of maidenly pets, Young ladies would love at his call, But LORENZO DE LARDY had debts.

His money-position was queer, And one of his favourite freaks Was to hide himself three times a year, In Paris, for several weeks.

Many days didn’t pass him before He fanned himself into a flame, For a beautiful “DAM DU COMPTWORE,” And this was her singular name:

ALICE EULALIE CORALINE EUPHROSINE COLOMBINA THÉRÈSE JULIETTE STEPHANIE CELESTINE CHARLOTTE RUSSE DE LA SAUCE MAYONNAISE.

She booked all the orders and tin, Accoutred in showy fal-lal, At a two-fifty Restaurant, in The glittering Palais Royal.

He’d gaze in her orbit of blue, Her hand he would tenderly squeeze, But the words of her tongue that he knew Were limited strictly to these:

“CORALINE CELESTINE EULALIE, Houp là! Je vous aime, oui, mossoo, Combien donnez moi aujourd’hui Bonjour, Mademoiselle, parlez voo.”

MADEMOISELLE DE LA SAUCE MAYONNAISE Was a witty and beautiful miss, Extremely correct in her ways, But her English consisted of this:

“Oh my! pretty man, if you please, Blom boodin, biftek, currie lamb, Bouldogue, two franc half, quite ze cheese, Rosbif, me spik Angleesh, godam.”

A waiter, for seasons before, Had basked in her beautiful gaze, And burnt to dismember MILOR, He loved DE LA SAUCE MAYONNAISE.

He said to her, “Méchante THÉRÈSE, Avec désespoir tu m’accables. Penses-tu, DE LA SAUCE MAYONNAISE, Ses intentions sont honorables?

“Flirtez toujours, ma belle, si tu ôses— Je me vengerai ainsi, ma chère, Je lui dirai de quoi l’on compose Vol au vent à la Financière!”

LORD LARDY knew nothing of this— The waiter’s devotion ignored, But he gazed on the beautiful miss, And never seemed weary or bored.

The waiter would screw up his nerve, His fingers he’d snap and he’d dance— And LORD LARDY would smile and observe, “How strange are the customs of France!”

Well, after delaying a space, His tradesmen no longer would wait: Returning to England apace, He yielded himself to his fate.

LORD LARDY espoused, with a groan, MISS DARDY’S developing charms, And agreed to tag on to his own, Her name and her newly-found arms.

The waiter he knelt at the toes Of an ugly and thin coryphée, Who danced in the hindermost rows At the Théatre des Variétés.

MADEMOISELLE DE LA SAUCE MAYONNAISE Didn’t yield to a gnawing despair But married a soldier, and plays As a pretty and pert Vivandière.

DISILLUSIONED BY AN EX-ENTHUSIAST

OH, that my soul its gods could see As years ago they seemed to me When first I painted them; Invested with the circumstance Of old conventional romance: Exploded theorem!

The bard who could, all men above, Inflame my soul with songs of love, And, with his verse, inspire The craven soul who feared to die With all the glow of chivalry And old heroic fire;

I found him in a beerhouse tap Awaking from a gin-born nap, With pipe and sloven dress; Amusing chums, who fooled his bent, With muddy, maudlin sentiment, And tipsy foolishness!

The novelist, whose painting pen To legions of fictitious men A real existence lends, Brain-people whom we rarely fail, Whene’er we hear their names, to hail As old and welcome friends;

I found in clumsy snuffy suit, In seedy glove, and blucher boot, Uncomfortably big. Particularly commonplace, With vulgar, coarse, stockbroking face, And spectacles and wig.

My favourite actor who, at will, With mimic woe my eyes could fill With unaccustomed brine: A being who appeared to me (Before I knew him well) to be A song incarnadine;

I found a coarse unpleasant man With speckled chin—unhealthy, wan— Of self-importance full: Existing in an atmosphere That reeked of gin and pipes and beer— Conceited, fractious, dull.

The warrior whose ennobled name Is woven with his country’s fame, Triumphant over all, I found weak, palsied, bloated, blear; His province seemed to be, to leer At bonnets in Pall Mall.

Would that ye always shone, who write, Bathed in your own innate limelight, And ye who battles wage, Or that in darkness I had died Before my soul had ever sighed To see you off the stage!

BABETTE’S LOVE

BABETTE she was a fisher gal, With jupon striped and cap in crimps. She passed her days inside the Halle, Or catching little nimble shrimps. Yet she was sweet as flowers in May, With no professional bouquet.

JACOT was, of the Customs bold, An officer, at gay Boulogne, He loved BABETTE—his love he told, And sighed, “Oh, soyez vous my own!” But “Non!” said she, “JACOT, my pet, Vous êtes trop scraggy pour BABETTE.

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