Ballads: Molony's Lament

Molony's Lament

O TIM, did you hear of thim Saxons,
  And read what the peepers report?
They're goan to recal the Liftinant,
  And shut up the Castle and Coort!
Our desolate counthry of Oireland,
  They're bint, the blagyards, to desthroy,
And now having murdthered our counthry,
  They're goin to kill the Viceroy, Dear boy;
  'Twas he was our proide and our joy!
And will we no longer behould him,
  Surrounding his carriage in throngs,
As he weaves his cocked-hat from the windies,
  And smiles to his bould aid-de-congs?
I liked for to see the young haroes,
  All shoining with sthripes and with stars,
A horsing about in the Phaynix,
  And winking the girls in the cyars,
           Like Mars,
  A smokin' their poipes and cigyars.
Dear Mitchell exoiled to Bermudies,
  Your beautiful oilids you'll ope,
And there'll be an abondance of croyin'
 From O'Brine at the Keep of Good Hope,
When they read of this news in the peepers,
  Acrass the Atlantical wave,
That the last of the Oirish Liftinints
  Of the oisland of Seents has tuck lave.  God save
  The Queen--she should betther behave.
And what's to become of poor Dame Sthreet,
  And who'll ait the puffs and the tarts,
Whin the Coort of imparial splindor
From Doblin's sad city departs?
And who'll have the fiddlers and pipers,
  When the deuce of a Coort there remains?
And where'll be the bucks and the ladies,
  To hire the Coort-shuits and the thrains?
           In sthrains,
  It's thus that ould Erin complains!
There's Counsellor Flanagan's leedy
   'Twas she in the Coort didn't fail,
And she wanted a plinty of popplin,
  For her dthress, and her flounce, and her tail;
She bought it of Misthress O'Grady,
  Eight shillings a yard tabinet,
But now that the Coort is concluded,
  The divvle a yard will she get; I bet,
  Bedad, that she wears the old set.
There's Surgeon O'Toole and Miss Leary,
  They'd daylings at Madam O'Riggs';
Each year at the dthrawing-room sayson,
  They mounted the neatest of wigs.
When Spring, with its buds and its dasies,
  Comes out in her beauty and bloom,
Thim tu'll never think of new jasies,
  Becase there is no dthrawing-room,
           For whom
  They'd choose the expense to ashume.
There's Alderman Toad and his lady,
  'Twas they gave the Clart and the Poort,
And the poine-apples, turbots, and lobsters,
  To feast the Lord Liftinint's Coort.
But now that the quality's goin,
  I warnt that the aiting will stop,
And you'll get at the Alderman's teeble
  The devil a bite or a dthrop,
           Or chop;
  And the butcher may shut up his shop.
Yes, the grooms and the ushers are goin,
  And his Lordship, the dear honest man,
And the Duchess, his eemiable leedy,
  And Corry, the bould Connellan,
And little Lord Hyde and the childthren,
  And the Chewter and Governess tu;
And the servants are packing their boxes,--
  Oh, murther, but what shall I due
           Without you?
  O Meery, with ois of the blue!

MR. MOLONY'S ACCOUNT OF THE BALL.

GIVEN TO THE NEPAULESE AMBASSADOR BY THE PENINSULAR AND ORIENTAL COMPANY.

O will ye choose to hear the news,
  Bedad I cannot pass it o'er:
I'll tell you all about the Ball
  To the Naypaulase Ambassador.
Begor! this f�te all balls does bate
  At which I've worn a pump, and I
Must here relate the splendthor great
  Of th' Oriental Company.
These men of sinse dispoised expinse,
  To f�te these black Achilleses.
"We'll show the blacks," says they, "Almack's,
  And take the rooms at Willis's."
With flags and shawls, for these Nepauls,
  They hung the rooms of Willis up,
And decked the walls, and stairs, and halls,
  With roses and with lilies up.
And Jullien's band it tuck its stand,
  So sweetly in the middle there,
And soft bassoons played heavenly chunes,
  And violins did fiddle there.
And when the Coort was tired of spoort,
  I'd lave you, boys, to think there was
A nate buffet before them set,
  Where lashins of good dhrink there was.
At ten before the ball-room door,
  His moighty Excellincy was,
He smoiled and bowed to all the crowd,
  So gorgeous and immense he was.
His dusky shuit, sublime and mute,
  Into the door-way followed him;
And O the noise of the blackguard boys,
  As they hurrood and hollowed him!
The noble Chair* stud at the stair,
  And bade the dthrums to thump; and he
Did thus evince, to that Black Prince,
  The welcome of his Company.
O fair the girls, and rich the curls,
  And bright the oys you saw there, was;
And fixed each oye, ye there could spoi,
  On Gineral Jung Bahawther, was!
This Gineral great then tuck his sate,
  With all the other ginerals,
(Bedad his troat, his belt, his coat,
  All bleezed with precious minerals;)
And as he there, with princely air,
  Recloinin on his cushion was,
All round about his royal chair
  The squeezin and the pushin was.
O Pat, such girls, such Jukes, and Earls,
  Such fashion and nobilitee!
Just think of Tim, and fancy him
  Amidst the hoigh gentilitee!
There was Lord De L'Huys, and the Portygeese
  Ministher and his lady there,
And I reckonized, with much surprise,
 Our messmate, Bob O'Grady, there;
There was Baroness Brunow, that looked like Juno,
  And Baroness Rehausen there,
And Countess Roullier, that looked peculiar
  Well, in her robes of gauze in there.
There was Lord Crowhurst (I knew him first,
  When only Mr. Pips he was),
And Mick O'Toole, the great big fool,
  That after supper tipsy was.
There was Lord Fingall, and his ladies all,
  And Lords Killeen and Dufferin,
And Paddy Fife, with his fat wife:
  I wondther how he could stuff her in.
There was Lord Belfast, that by me past,
  And seemed to ask how should I go there?
And the Widow Macrae, and Lord A Hay,
  And the Marchioness of Sligo there.
Yes, Jukes, and Earls, and diamonds, and pearls,
  And pretty girls, was sporting there;
And some beside (the rogues!) I spied,
  Behind the windies, coorting there.
O there's one I know, bedad would show
  As beautiful as any there,
And I'd like to hear the pipers blow,
  And shake a fut with Fanny there!

* James Matheson, Esq., to whom, and the Board of Directors of the Peninsular and Oriental Company,
I, Timotheus Molony, late stoker on board the "Iberia," the "Lady Mary Wood," the "Tagus," and the
Oriental steamships, humbly dedicate this production of my grateful muse.

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