Page:Devonshire Characters and Strange Events.djvu/874

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DEVONSHIRE CHARACTERS

Wanting to drink—one of the men
Dipp'd from the bowl the drunken host,
And drank—then taking care that none were lost,
He put in ev'ry mother's son agen.
Up jump'd the bacchanalian crew on this,
Taking it very much amiss—
Swearing, and in the attitude to smite:
"Lord!" cry'd the man with gravely lifted eyes,
"Though I don't like to swallow flies,
I did not know but others might."

The Queen had removed the cartoons of Raphael from Hampton Court to St. James's, and had them cut down so as to fit the place which she designed them to occupy. This exasperated Peter to the last degree: it reminded him of a cutting story. In the last war the French prisoners died by scores, and the Mayor of Plymouth to accommodate a first cousin, a carpenter, gave him a contract for their coffins. The carpenter, thinking to save some pence on each coffin, made every one too short; and so as to accommodate the dead to the receptacles made for them, cut off the heads of the deceased prisoners and tucked them en chapeau bas under their arms.

To a Devonshire man one of the most amusing compositions of Peter Pindar is an account of the royal visit to Exeter in 1788, supposed to be written by a farmer of Moreton Hampstead to his sister Nan:—

Now meend me, Nan! all Ex'ter town
Was gapin', rennin' up and down,
     Vath, just leek vokes bewitch'd!
Lord! how they laugh'd to zee the King;
To hear un zay zum marv'lous thing!
     Leek mangy dogs they itch'd.

Leek bullocks sting'd by appledranes (wasps),
Currantin' it about the lanes,
     Vokes theese way dreav'd and that;
Zum hootin', swearin', scraimin', bawlin'!
Zum in the muck, and pellum (dust) sprawlin';
     Leek pancakes all zo flat.