PASSING FOR A CORNET.

(See Alloa Advertiser.)

THERE was a young gallant, of strong martial bent,
A juvenile hero, on glory intent;

The blood of a warrior ran hot in his veins;

A full heart was his, but he bore empty brains.

This hero that would be, since now some twelve moons,

A Cornetcy sought in a troop of dragoons;
But he first had an examination to pass.

For now a horse-regiment can't let in an ass.

So what did our hero in such a hard strait,
Impassable quite with his ill-furnished pate?
He just went and borrowed another man's head,
A substitute hiring to pass in his stead.

The substitute stood the ordeal at once,

And passed in the name of our valiant young dunce,
Who obtained thus by proxy a first class degree;
His commission he bought, and gazetted was he.

The knave he had been fool enough to suborn
Soon fixed in the young dragoon's saddle a thorn;
The threat of exposure hard bought off, and then
Renewed, and bought off, and repeated again.
Ten months of this life the bold stupid youth bore,
Until he could buy off the rascal no more,
Who, his avarice now sopped no longer with pay,
Peached forthwith on the dupe that had ceased to yield prey.

From head-quarters down word of question prompt speeds;
Fact can't be denied, and dismissal succeeds.

The price of Commission escheats to the Crown,
And the red coat is doffed, and the wearer done brown.

Oh, gallants, whose valour your wit doth excel,
There's no longer a chance for a dense dashing swell;

You must now learn and labour to furnish your brains,
Before you can have them blown out for your pains.

In the eating's the proof of the pudding, 'tis said;
Some think fighting the proof of your good pudding head;
The head that reflects like the pudding, when hot,
And is fit to supply food for powder and shot.
But trust we that boobies do not fight the best,
And scholars won't fail when they come to the test;
And though, ere in war they can venture their luck,
They must take a degree, will show no want of pluck.

They talked about with reckless minds;
Reformers thick and thin:

All old-world caution laughed to scorn,
Called moderation sin:

Bade folks kick British notions out,
And Yankee ones take in.

Such gen'ral shying ne'er was seen
Since knock-me-downs began;

They turned to mirth rank, wealth, and worth,
As but mob-flatterers can:

But the leader sat apart from all,

A melancholy man!

His broad-brim off: his vest apart :

No tie his neck to squeeze:

In négligé unquakerlike,

And with spirit ill at ease,

As a tar who finds he's raised a gale
By whistling for a breeze.

Tired of distorting facts, to fig-
-ures tired of playing cook,

He fumed, he fretted: springing up,
Some moody turns he took.
When lo! he saw a small M.P.,
That pored upon a book!

"In what book read you, thus intent?
Progress's Tale, by PHILP in ?*
-Progress! Oh, happy they, their faith
Who on the word can still pin!—"
The small M.P. looked up, and said,
“I'm reading Johnny Gilpin.”

The leader took six hasty strides-
(To such strides he was prone:)
Six hasty strides beyond the place,
Six hastier back anon:

And down he sat by the small M.P.,
And talked to him of JOHN.

And how the tale that CowPER wrote,
And all the world doth know,
Deep allegoric meaning veils,

It's mask of mirth below;
How few that start to ride can tell
How far they'll have to go.

And how JOHN GILPIN is a type
Of Agitator kind;

The calender's hot, hard-mouth'd horse,
A hobby of the mind;

Whereon who mounts by no means can,
Pull up when so inclined.

And he told of Revolutions wild,
And things that then befall;

How there are times, when public men
Turn JOHNNY GILPINS all:

To whom, at speed, mobs shout "well done,
As loud as they can bawl."

*See "PHILP's History of Progress," very nice reading for M.P.s of an inquiring turn of mind.-ED.

While they have much ado to hold
The saddles they bestride,
Nor more control the steed they sit,
Than vessels do the tide :

It is the team has bolted: they
Are
passengers inside.

-

"And well," quoth he, "I know for truth
Their pangs must be extreme;-
Stokers, who find they 've stopped the valves,
When they wish to shut off steam-
For why-methought I was such an one
But last night-in a dream.

"A Brummagem CROMWELL I would be,
And to the Speaker's face

As a fool's-cap treat his reverend wig,
As a bauble mock his mace.

Yes:

: now, said I, the old House shall die,
And a new House take its place.
"Two monster meetings at Birmingham,
At Manchester but one;
A talk at Glasgow and Edinburgh,
And then the deed was done:
There lay the old Parliament defunct,
And I was the great gun!

"There lay the old Parliament defunct,
And I had drawn the bill!

But, oh! the pricks and qualms I felt
When I had wrought my will:
There seemed a life in the Old House,
Not even I could kill.

"I thought of all my triumphs there,
In Corn-Law fights of fame;
Ten thousand thousand memories
Seemed to be crying 'Shame!'
I took my COCKER in my hand,
But the figures went and came.

"And now for my new Commons' House
The writs went through the land;
Which I had parcelled out in squares,
Symmetrically planned:

With household suffrage and ballot-box,
That numbers might command.

"The new House met: a motley set:
The place I hardly knew:
What with COXES multiplied by ten,

And the POPE's brass band by two.
The old House had few working men,
But none at all had the new!

"Yet where the old House passed one bill,
The new one, it passed three:
For as all were of one way of thinking,
They didn't disagree.

And the know-nothings and the have-nothings
Worked well in companie.

"And first they voted each Member

Should have his pound a-day;
And then they voted the National Debt
Should be sponged clean away;
And they organised labour on the plan
Of no work and good pay.'

Why should not the rich, they asked, pay up
A shilling in the crown?

I quoted M'CULLOCH and ADAM SMITH,
But was instantly coughed down.

"The old Trade-Combinations

Next reared their heads and thrived;
The statutes against Forestallers
And Regraters' were revived:

I saw Protection's old flag brought out,
And for shame 'neath the benches dived!
"O Lord! to think of their wild schemes,
And mine so right and fair;-
Retrenchment, non-intervention,

Free-Trade, and Laissez faire! Where were my hopes from the House I had made P

And Echo answered, 'Where?'

"I had raised a power I could not guide; Like GILPIN, of whom you read;

I meant to stop at Birmingham,

And got Lord knows where instead.
And the more I pulled at my horse's reins,
The straighter he kept his head.

"I couldn't appeal to Knowledge;
Household suffrage drown'd her cry:
I couldn't appeal to Wealth or Worth,
Or Rank their power to try;
The ballot to all such influences
Had given the go-by.

"Then down I cast me on my face,

And did my best to weep:
And I wished the Old House alive again,
And the New One fathoms deep-
But 'tis easier to lose the road,
Than back to it to creep!

Oh, me-that frothy, fussy House
Besets me now awake-
COXES and WILLIAMSES by scores,
With each a speech to make;
And ERNEST JONESES at intervals,
The monotone to break!

"And still no peace to my tortured soul
Will night or day allow;

That dreadful New House haunts my life-
I'm sitting in it Now!"
The scared M.P. looked up and saw
Huge drops upon his brow.

That very night while his platitudes
That M.P.'s audience hissed,

A stout Quaker took train for Rochdale
And resumed the spinning of twist.
And if JOHN BRIGHT bring in no bill,
I can't say 'twill be miss'd.