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REIGN OF CHARLES II. TO WILLIAM III. 569 |
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eluded that he was the author." I think there are very sufficient reasons for doubting this conclusion. In the first place, the Earl of Dorset laid no claim to it, and it is scarcely to be believed that the author of To all you ladies now at land could have penned such thorough doggrel. Although poetry was not required for the purpose, he would certainly have paid more attention to rhythm than is there exhibited. Secondly, the ballad contains no expression that the King would have used, which might not equally have been employed by any other person. And thirdly, Lord Wharton being alive when the attacks in The True Relation and other pamphlets were made upon him, we may infer that his opponents, who' freely charge him with lying, would not have omitted the falsehood of this claim, if there had been any ground for disputing it.
" In The Examiner, and in several pamphlets of 1712," says Lord Macaulay, " Wharton is mentioned as the author." a
The tune of IAlliburlero was printed before the time at which the words are supposed to have been written. " In February, 1687, Tyrconnel began to rule his native country with the powers and appointments of Lord Lieutenant, but with the humbler title of Lord Deputy." It was against such appointment that the ballad was levelled. The tune will be found in the second edition of The Delightful Companion, or Choice new Lessons for the Recorder or Mute (by Robert Carr), 1686, and in all probability in the first edition of the same book.b It |
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• The writing of lampoons was a favorite amusement during the reigns of the Stuarts, when every courtier was expected to handle a pen in rhyme. Passing by minor personages, how many there are still extant which were written by the Earl of Rochester and others upon Charles II. 1 I quote a few odd stanzas, principally from memory;—
" I am a senseless thing, with a hey, Men call me a king, with a ho,
Fo* ray luxury and ease they brought me o*er the seas, Wilh a hey, tronney, nonney, nonney no." . . , "Chaste, pious, prudent Charles the Second, The miracle of thy restoration May like to that of quails be reckon'd,
Rain'd on the Israelitish nation : The wish'd-for blessing, from heaven sent, Became their curse and punishment." ... " Rowley too late will understand What now he shuns to find, That nothing's quiet in this land, Except his careless mind." . . , 11 Beyond sea he began, where such riot he ran, That ev!ry one there did leave him, And now he's come o'er, ten times worse than before, When none but we fools would receive him." . .. " His dogs would sit at council board, Like judges in their furs j We question much which has more sense, The master or the curs." .. . " His father's foes he doth reward,
Preserving those that cut off's head ; Old Cavaliers, the Crown's best guard,
He lets them starve for want of bread : Never was any king endow'd With so much grace and gratitude.". . . " New upstarts, bastards, pimps, &c, That, locust-like, devour the land, |
By shutting up the Exchequer doors,
Whither our money is trepann'd, Have render'd Charles's restoration But a small blessing to the nation." . . . " Then, Charles, beware thy brother York,
Who to thy government gives law; If once you fall to the old sport,
Both must away again to Breda,— When, 'spite of all that would restore you, Grown wise by wrongs, we shall abhor you.'*
Even to Charles's face, things of this kind were occasionally said, with a good motive, but such as the sterner nature of his brother would not have suffered to be uttered with impunity. Pepys records Tom Killegrew's having told Charles, in the presence of Cowley the poet, that matters were in a very ill state, but yet there was one way to help all. "There is," said he, "a good, honest, able man, that I could name, that if your Majesty would employ, and command to see things well executed, all things would soon be mended: and this is one Charles Stuart, who now spends his time employing his lips about the court, and hath no other employment; he were the fittest man in the world to perform it." To this Pepys adds; "This is most true, but the King do not profit by any of this, but lays all aside, and remembers nothing, but to his pleasures again; which is a sorrowful consideration."—Diary, Dec. 8, 1666.
b I have never seen the first edition of The Delightful Companion, neither can I trace any other copy of the second than the one in my own possession, which came from Gostling's, library. The second edition is professedly "corrected," but not "enlarged;" and, as the work is engraved on plates (not set up in type, like The Dancing Master), the contents of the two editions are probably the same. Lilliburlero is found about the middle of the book, Sig. F. |
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