Carefully now he approaches the shrine,

In which, as I've mentioned before, about nine,
They had placed in such state the lamented Divine !
But not to worship-No!-No such thing!—

His aim is-TO "PRIG THE PASTORAL RING!!

Fancy his fright,

When, with all his might

Having forced up the lid, which they'd not fasten'd quite,
Of the marble sarcophagus-" All in white"
The dead Bishop started up, bolt upright
On his hinder end,-and grasp'd him so tight,
That the clutch of a kite,

Or a bull-dog's bite

When he's most provoked and in bitterest spite,
May well be conceived in comparison slight,
And having thus "tackled " him-blew out his light!!

Oh, dear !—Oh, dear !—

The fright and the fear !

No one to hear!-nobody near !

In the dead of the night!-at a bad time of year!—
A defunct Bishop squatting upright on his bier,

And shouting so loud, that the drum of his ear

He thought would have split as these awful words met it"AH, HA! MY GOOD FRIEND!—DON'T YOU WISH YOU MAY GET IT?"

Oh, dear! Oh, dear!

'Twas a night of fear!

I should just like to know if the boldest man here,
In his situation, would not have felt queer?

The wretched man bawls,

And he yells, and he squalls,

But there's nothing responds to his shrieks, save the walls,
And the desk, and the pulpit, the pews, and the stalls.
Held firmly at bay,

Kick and plunge as he may,

His struggles are fruitless-he can't get away,
He really can't tell what to do or to say,
And being a Pagan, don't know how to pray;
Till through the east window a few streaks of grey
Announce the approach of the dawn of the day!

Oh, a welcome sight.

Is the rosy light,

Which lovelily heralds a morning bright,
Above all to a wretch kept in durance all night
By a horrid dead gentleman holding him tight,-
Of all sorts of gins that a trespasser can trap,
The most disagreeable kind of a man-trap!
Oh! welcome that bell's

Matin chime, which tells

To one caught in this worst of all possible snares,
That the hour is arrived to begin Morning Prayers,
And the monks and the friars are coming down stairs!
Conceive the surprise

Of the Choir-how their eyes

Are distended to twice their original size,-
How some begin bless,-some anathematize,—
And all look on the thief as Old Nick in disguise.
While the mystified Abbot cries, "Well!-I declare!-
-This is really a very mysterious affair!—
Bid the bandy-legg'd Sexton go run for the May'r!"
The May'r and his suite

Are soon on their feet,—

(His worship kept house in the very same street,-) At once he awakes,

"His compliments" makes,

"He'll be up at the Church in a couple of shakes!' Meanwhile the whole Convent is pulling and hauling, And bawling, and squalling,

And terribly mauling

The thief, whose endeavour to follow his calling
Had thus brought him into a grasp so enthralling.-
Now high, now low,

They drag "to and fro,"

Now this way, now that way they twist him-but, No!—
The glazed eye of St. Aloys distinctly says "Poh!
"You may pull as you please, I shall not let him !"-
go
Nay, more;-when his Worship at length came to say
He was perfectly ready to take him away,
And fat him to grace the next Auto-da-fé,
Still closer he prest

The poor wretch to his breast,

While a voice though his jaws still together were jamm'd-
Was heard from his chest, "If you do, I'll—" Then slamm'd
The great door of the Church,-with so awful a sound
That the close of the good Bishop's sentence was drown'd!

Has clearly exprest

He has pardon'd the culprit-and as for the rest,
Before you shall burn him—he'll see you all blest!
The Monks, and the Abbot, the Sexton, and Clerk
Were exceedingly struck with the Friar's remark,

And the Judge, who himself was by no means a shark
Of a Lawyer, and did not do things in the dark,
But still leaned, (having once been himself a gay spark,)
To the merciful side, like the late Alan Park.
Agreed that, indeed,

The best way to succeed,

And by which this poor caitiff alone could be freed,
Would be to absolve him, and grant a free pardon,
On a certain condition, and that not a hard one,
Viz." That he, the said Infidel, straightway should ope
His mind to conviction, and worship the Pope,
And ev'ry man Jack' in an amice or cope;—
And that, to do so,

He should forthwith go

To Rome, and salute there his Holiness's toe ;—
And never again

Read Voltaire, or Tom Paine,

Or Percy Byshe Shelley, or Lord Byron's Cain ;-
His pilgrimage o'er, take St. Francis's habit;-

If anything lay about, never to 'nab' it ;—

Or, at worst, if he should light on articles gone astray, To be sure and deposit them safe in the Monast'ry!"

The oath he took

As he kiss'd the book,

Nave, transept, and aisle with a thunder-clap shook!
The Bishop sank down with a satisfied look,
And the Thief, releas'd

The transmogrified Pagan perform'd his vow;

How he quitted his home,

Travell'd to Rome,

And went to St. Peter's and look'd at the Dome,
And obtain'd from the Pope an assurance of bliss,
And kiss'd whatever he gave him to kiss,
Toe, relic, embroidery, nought came amiss;
And how Pope Urban

Had his turban

Hung up in the Sistine chapel, by way

Of a relic and how it hangs there to this day.
Suffice it to tell,

Which will do quite as well,

That the whole of the Convent the miracle saw,
And the Abbot's report was sufficient to draw
Ev'ry bon Catholique in la belle France to Blois,
Among others, the Monarch himself, François,
The Archbishop of Rheims, and his "Pious Jack-daw,"

VOL. VIII.

See Golden Legend, No. I. Bent. Mis. vol. i. p. 529.

2 T

And there was not a man in Church, Chapel, or Meeting-house,
Still less in Cabaret, Hotel, or Eating-house,
But made an oration,

And said, "In the nation

If ever a man deserved canonization,
It was the kind, pitiful, pious Aloys."-
So the Pope says,―says he,

"Then a Saint he shall be !"—

So he made him a Saint, and remitted the fee.

What became of the Pagan I really can't say;
But I think I've been told,

When he'd enter'd their fold,

And was now a Franciscan some twenty days old,
He got up one fine morning before break of day,
Put the Pyx in his pocket-and then ran away.

MORAL.

I think we may coax out a moral or two

From the facts which have lately come under our view.
First-Don't meddle with Saints !-for you'll find if you do,
They're, what Scotch people call, "kittle cattle to shoe!"
And when once they have managed to take you in tow,
It's a deuced hard matter to make them let go!

Now to you, wicked Pagans !-who wander about,
Up and down Regent Street every night, " on the scout,"-
Recollect the Police keep a sharpish look-out,

And if once your suspected your skirts they will stick to,
Till they catch you at last in flagrante delicto!
Don't the inference draw

That because he of Blois

Suffer'd one to bilk "Old father Antic the Law,"

That our May'rs, and our Aldermen-and we've a City full-
Show themselves, at our Guildhall, quite so pitiful!

Lastly, as to the Pagan who play'd such a trick,
First assuming the tonsure, then cutting his stick,
There's but one thing which occurs to me-that

Is,-Don't give too much credit to people who "rat!"

Never forget

Early habit's a net

Which entangles us all, more or less, in its mesh,

And “What's bred in the bone won't come out of the flesh!"
We must all be aware Nature's prone to rebel, as
Old Juvenal tells us, Naturam expellas,

Tamen usque recurrat !—

There's no making her rat!

So that all that I have on this head to advance

Is,-whatever they think of these matters in France,

There's a proverb, the truth of which each one allows here, “YOU NEVER CAN MAKE A SILK PURSE OF A SOW'S EAR!"

Tappington Everard.

T. I.

A DISINTERESTED REVIEW.

WE have much pleasure in announcing to our readers the publication of a new and interesting work, entitled "THE COMIC ENGLISH GRAMMAR;" and we feel that we should neither be doing justice to ourselves nor to the public if we did not recommend every one to be provided with a copy of it at the very earliest opportunity. The author is well known to the world by the facetious introduction to the Latin tongue, with which he has provided the youth of these kingdoms; indeed, it might have been said that he is personally known to everybody by means of the portrait prefixed as a frontispiece to that work, had that same portrait been at all like him which it is not. But, let it not be supposed from this assertion that we are ourselves acquainted with him,- such a supposition would materially invalidate our credit for impartiality; we certainly have seen him, however, and therefore can speak with some confidence. We are the more earnest upon this point, inasmuch as we know, from good authority, that more than one young lady has already declined an introduction to him, declaring herself certain that he must be a horrid fright. We hear that he is yet a bachelor, and we strongly recommend him to consider what may be the consequences of allowing wrong impressions respecting his personal appearance to get about. Verb. sat. Before we quit this topic we will just observe, that our author, in allowing this portrait to be exhibited to the world, has not by any means laid himself open, like some people whom we could name, to the charge of vanity: he having merely followed the example of Vyse, Dilworth, and even Dr. Johnson, with various other writers on different branches of education, whose miniatures, most of them presenting, like his own, a slightly comic character, have accompanied their respective publications.

The principal reason assigned in the Preface to the "Comic English Grammar," for the production of that work, is the very proper one that all previous grammars have proved inadequate to the attainment of their object, -i. e. the promotion of conversational elegance. This assertion is substantiated by a passing reference to the language commonly employed by the "useful" members of society; and we must admit that the language of the Sovereign people has no pretension to be called the King's English. We do not wish to forestal the author in his exemplifications of this great truth, but will simply take the liberty of calling the attention of our readers to the singularly infelicitous mode in which certain itinerant venders of green-grocery, drivers and conductors of public vehicles, and benevolent individuals, who amuse themselves by removing superfluities from our public streets, are in the habit of communicating their ideas to each other. We would, also, direct their notice to the dialects prevalent in Whitechapel, Spitalfields, and St. Giles's, and would put it to them, as enlightened persons, whether all of these are not appalling. Then, too, there are the countless vulgarisms which infest our provinces. The comparatively minor, but positively shocking improprieties of Pentonville, Islington, Woolwich, Peckham-Rye, and Camberwell, must also be taken into account. These facts having been duly digested, let it be considered