'In vain are laws passed,
There's nothing holds you fast,

Though you know, sweet Sovereign, I adore you-
At the smallest hint in life,

You forsake your lawful wife,

As other Sovereigns did before you.

'I flirt with Silver, true-
But what can ladies do,

When disowned by their natural protectors?
And as to falsehood, stuff!

I shall soon be false enough,

When I get among those wicked Bank Directors.'

The Sovereign, smiling on her,
Now swore, upon his honour,
To be henceforth domestic and loyal
But, within an hour or two,
Why-I sold him to a Jew,
And he's now at No. 10, Palais Royal.

AN EXPOSTULATION TO LORD KING.

'Quem das finem, Rex magne, laborum ?'-Virgil.

How can you, my Lord, thus delight to torment all
The Peers of the realm about cheapening their corn,
When you know, if one hasn't a very high rental,

'Tis hardly worth while being very high born!

1 See the proceedings of the Lords, Wednesday, March 1, when Lord King was severely reproved by several of the noble Peers for making so many speeches against the Corn Laws.

Why bore them so rudely, each night of your life,
On a question, my Lord, there's so much to abhor in?
A question-like asking one, 'How is your wife?'-
At once so confounded domestic and foreign.

As to weavers, no matter how poorly they feast,
But Peers and such animals fed up for show,
(Like the well-physicked elephant, lately deceased),
Take a wonderful quantum of cramming, you know.

You might see, my dear Baron, how bored and distrest
Were their high noble hearts by your merciless tale,
When the force of the agony wrung even a jest
From the frugal Scotch wit of my Lord L-d-le !1

Bright Peer! to whom Nature and Berwickshire gave
A humour, endowed with effects so provoking,
That, when the whole House looks unusually grave,
You may always conclude that Lord L-d-le's joking!

And then, those unfortunate weavers of Perth

Not to know the vast difference Providence dooms
Between weavers of Perth and Peers of high birth,

'Twixt those who have heir-looms, and those who've but looms.

To talk now of starving, as great At—1 said2—

(And the nobles all cheered, and the bishops all wondered)

When, some years ago, he and others had fed

Of these same hungry devils about fifteen hundred !

It follows from hence-and the Duke's very words

Should be published wherever poor rogues of this craft are
That weavers, once rescued from starving by Lords,
Are bound to be starved by said Lords ever after.

When Rome was uproarious, her knowing patricians
Made Bread and the Circus' a cure for each row:
But not so the plan of our noble physicians,

'No Bread and the Tread-mill's' the regimen now.

So cease, my dear Baron of Ockham, your prose,
As I shall my poetry-neither convinces ;
And all we have spoken and written but shows,
When you tread on a nobleman's corn,3 how he winces.

MORAL POSITIONS.

A DREAM.

'His Lordship said that it took a long time for a moral position to find its way across the Atlantic. He was sorry that its voyage had been so long,' etc.-Speech of Lord Dudley and Ward on Colonial Slavery, March 8.

T'OTHER night, after hearing Lord Dudley's oration

(A treat that comes once in the year, as May-day does),
I dreamt that I saw-what a strange operation !—
A 'moral position' shipped off for Barbadoes.

The whole Bench of Bishops stood by, in grave attitudes,
Packing the article tidy and neat ;-

As their Reverences know, that in southerly latitudes
'Moral positions' don't keep very sweet.

There was B-th-st arranging the custom-house pass;
And, to guard the frail package from tousing and routing,
There stood my Lord Eld-n, endorsing it 'Glass,'

Though-as to which side should lie uppermost doubting.

The freight was, however, stowed safe in the hold;
The winds were polite, and the moon looked romantic,
While off in the good ship the Truth' we were rolled,
With our ethical cargo, across the Atlantic.

Long, dolefully long, seemed the voyage we made ;-
For the Truth,' at all times but a very slow sailer,
By friends, near as much as by foes, is delayed,

And few come aboard her, though so many hail her.

At length, safe arrived, I went through 'tare and tret'
Delivered my goods in the primest condition-
And next morning read, in the Bridgetown Gazette,

'Just arrived, by "the Truth," a new Moral Position;

The Captain here, startled to find myself named
As 'the Captain' (a thing which, I own it with pain,
I through life have avoided), I woke-looked ashamed-
Found I wasn't a Captain, and dozed off again.

MEMORABILIA OF LAST WEEK.

MONDAY, MARCH 13.

TEE Budget-quite charming and witty-no hearing,
For plaudits and laughs, the good things that were in it ;-
Great comfort to find, though the Speech isn't cheering,
That all its gay auditors were, every minute.

What, still more prosperity !-mercy upon us,

'This boy'll be the death of me'-oft as, already, Such smooth Budgeteers have genteelly undone us, For Ruin made easy there's no one like Freddy.

TUESDAY.

Much grave apprehension expressed by the Peers,
Lest--as in the times of the Peachums and Lockitts-
The large stock of gold we're to have in three years,
Should all find its way into highwaymen's pockets!1

A Petition presented (well timed, after this)

Throwing out a sly hint to Grandees, who are hurled
In their coaches about, that 'twould not be amiss
If they'd just throw a little more light on the world."

A plan for transporting half Ireland to Canada,3
Which (briefly the clever transaction to state) is
Forcing John Bull to pay high for what, any day,
N-rb-ry, bless the old wag, would do gratis.

Keeping always (said Mr. Sub. Horton) in mind,
That while we thus draw off the claims on potatoes,
We make it a point that the Pats left behind

Should get no new claimants to fill the hiatus.*

Sub. Horton then read a long letter, just come

From the Canada Paddies, to say that these elves

Have already grown 'prosp'rous'-as we are, at home-
And have e'en got a surplus,' poor devils, like ourselves!5

WEDNESDAY.

Little doing-for sacred, oh Wednesday, thou art
To the seven o'clock joys of full many a table,—
When the Members all meet, to make much of the part,
With which they so rashly fell out, in the Fable.

It appeared, though, to-night, that-as churchwardens yearly
Eat up a small baby-those cormorant sinners,
The Bankrupt-Commissioners, bolt very nearly

A moderate-sized bankrupt, tout chaud, for their dinners !6

1 'Another objection to a metallic currency was, that it produced a greater number of highway robberies.'-Debate in the Lords.

Mr. Estcourt presented a petition, praying that all persons should be compelled to have lamps in their carriages.

3 Mr. W. Horton's motion on the subject of Emigration.

The money expended in transporting the Irish to Canada would be judiciously laid out, provided measures were taken to prevent the gap

they left in the population from being filled up again. Government had always made that a condition.'-Mr. W. Horton's Speech.

5 The hon. gentleman then read a letter, which mentioned the prosperous condition of the writer; that he had on hand a considerable surplus of corn,' etc.

Mr. Abercromby's statement of the enormous taveru bills of the Commissioners of Bankrupts.

Nota Bene.-A rumour to-day, in the city,

'Mr. R―b-ns-n just has resigned' what a pity!
The Bulls and the Bears all fell a-sobbing,
When they heard of the fate of poor Cock Robin,
While thus, to the nursery-tune, so pretty,
A murmuring Stock-dove breathed her ditty :-

Alas, poor Robin, he crowed as long

And as sweet as a prosperous cock could crow;
But his note was small, and the gold-finch's song
Was a pitch too high for Poor Robin to go.
Who'll make his shroud?

A HYMN OF WELCOME AFTER |That you would e'en have taken tea

Ye Senators of many Shares,

(Had you been asked) with Mr.
Goundry !2

Come, matchless country gentlemen ;
Come, wise Sir Thomas, wisest then

When creeds and corn-laws are
debated!

Come, rival even the Harlot Red,
And show how wholly into bread
A 'Squire is transubstantiated.

Come, L-e, and tell the world,
That-surely as thy scratch is curled,

As never scratch was curled before-
Cheap eating does more harm than good,
And working-people spoiled by food,

The less they eat, will work the more.

Come, G-lb-rn, with thy glib defence (Which thou'dst have made for Peter's Pence)

Of

Church-Rates, worthy of a

Whose dreams of premium knew no Two pipes of port (old port 'twas said By honest Newport) bought and paid By Papists for the Orange Altar !3

bound'ry;

So fond of aught like Company,

1 An item of expense which Mr. Hume in vain endeavoured to get rid of. Trumpeters, like the men of All-Souls, must be bene vestiti.'

The gentleman lately before the public, who kept his Joint-stock Tea Company all to himself, siring Te solum adoro.'

3 This charge of two pipes of port for the sacramental wine is a precious specimen of the sort of rates levied upon their Catholic fellowparishioners by the Irish Protestants.

'The thirst that from the soul doth rise Doth ask a drink divine.'