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Martin: A Bon Gaultier Ballad
There, methinks, would be enjoyment, where no envious
rule prevents;
Sink the steamboats! cuss the railways! rot, O rot the
Three per Cents!
There the passions, cramped no longer, shall have space
to breathe, my cousin!
I will wed some savage woman—nay, I'll wed at least a
dozen.
There I'll rear my young mulattoes, as no Bond Street
brats are reared:
They shall dive for alligators, catch the wild goats by
the beard—
Whistle to the cockatoos, and mock the hairy faced
baboon,
Worship mighty Mumbo Jumbo in the mountains of
the Moon.
I myself, in far Timbuctoo, leopard's blood will daily
quaff,
Ride a tiger-hunting, mounted on a thorough-bred
giraffe.
Fiercely shall I shout the war-whoop, as some sullen
stream he crosses,
Startling from their noonday slumbers iron-bound
rhinoceroses.
Fool! again the dream, the fancy! But I know my words
are mad,
For I hold the grey barbarian lower than the Christian
cad.
I the swell—the city dandy! I to seek such horrid
places,—
I to haunt with squalid negroes, blubber-lips, and
monkey-faces!
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