...
Now our boatmen quit the mooring,
And all hands must ply the oar:
Baggage from the quay is lowering,
We're impatient, push from shore.
"Have a care that case holds liquor--
Stop the boat--I'm sick--oh Lord!"
"Sick, ma'am, d--me, you'll be sicker,
Ere you've been an hour on board."
Thus are screaming
Men and women,
Gemmen, ladies, servants, tacks;
Here entangling,
All are wrangling,
Stuck together close as wax,
Such the general noise and racket
Ere we reach the Lisbon packet.
Fletcher! Murray! Bob! where are you?
Stretched along the deck like logs--
Bear a hand, you jolly tar, you!
Here's a rope's end for the dogs.
Hobhouse muttering fearful curses
As the hatchway down he rolls,
Now his breakfast, now his verses,
Vomits forth and d--ns our souls.
In Beppo there is much gay carnival merriment and some humour--a style
well suited to Italian revelry. When Laura's husband, Beppo, returns,
and is seen in a new guise at a ball, we read--
"He was a Turk the colour of mahogany
And Laura saw him, and at first was glad,
Because the Turks so much admire philogyny,
Although the usage of their wives is sad,
'Tis said they use no better than a dog any
Poor woman, whom they purchase like a pad;
They have a number though they ne'er exhibits 'em,
Four wives by law and concubines 'ad libitum.
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