Four o'clock.

Such a sermon!-though not about dancing, my

dear;

'Twas only on the' end of the world being near. Eighteen Hundred and Forty's the year that some

state

As the time for that accident

some Forty Eight*:

And I own, of the two, I'd prefer much the latter, As then I shall be an old maid, and 'two'n't matter. Once more, love, good-bye-I've to make a new

сар;

But am now so dead tired with this horrid mishap Of the end of the world, that I must take a nap.

* With regard to the exact time of this event, there appears to be a difference only of about two or three years among the respective calculators. M. Alphonse Nicole, Docteur en Droit, et Avocat, merely doubts whether it is to be in 1846 or 1847. "A cette époque,” he says, les fidèles peuvent espérer de voir s'effectuer la purification du Sanctuaire."

66

LETTER IV.

FROM PATRICK MAGAN, ESQ. TO THE REV.

RICHARD

He comes from Erin's speechful shore
Like fervid kettle, bubbling o'er

With hot effusions-hot and weak;
Sound, Humbug, all your hollowest drums,
He comes, of Erin's martyrdoms

To Britain's well-fed Church to speak.

Puff him, ye Journals of the Lord*,
Twin prosers, Watchman and Record!
Journals reserv'd for realms of bliss,
Being much too good to sell in this.
Prepare, ye wealthier Saints, your dinners,

Ye Spinsters, spread your tea and crumpets; And you, ye countless Tracts for Sinners,

Blow all your little penny trumpets.

* "Our anxious desire is to be found on the side of the Lord.". - Record Newspaper.

He comes, the reverend man, to tell

To all who still the Church's part take,

Tales of parsonic woe, that well

Might make ev'n grim Dissenter's heart ache:Of ten whole Bishops snatch'd away

For ever from the light of day;

(With God knows, too, how many more, For whom that doom is yet in store)— Of Rectors cruelly compell'd

From Bath and Cheltenham to haste home,

Because the tithes, by Pat withheld,

Will not to Bath or Cheltenham come;

Nor will the flocks consent to pay

Their parsons thus to stay away ;—

Though, with such parsons, one may doubt
If 'tisn't money well laid out ;-

--

Of all, in short, and each degree
Of that once happy Hierarchy,

Which us'd to roll in wealth so pleasantly;

But now, alas, is doom'd to see

Its surplus brought to nonplus presently!

Such are the themes this man of pathos,
Priest of prose and Lord of bathos,

Will preach and preach t'ye, till you're dull again;

Then, hail him, Saints, with joint acclaim,
Shout to the stars his tuneful name,

Which Murtagh was, ere known to fame,
But now is Mortimer O'Mulligan!

All true, Dick, true as you're alive—
I've seen him, some hours since, arrive.
Murtagh is come, the great Itinerant-

And Tuesday, in the market-place,
Intends, to every saint and sinner in't,

To state what he calls Ireland's Case; Meaning thereby the case of his shop,Of curate, vicar, rector, bishop,

And all those other grades seraphic,

That make men's souls their special traffic,
Though caring not a pin which way
The' erratic souls go, so they pay.-

Just as some roguish country nurse,

Who takes a foundling babe to suckle,

First pops the payment in her purse,

Then leaves poor dear to-suck its knuckle :

Ev'n so these reverend rigmaroles

Pocket the money-starve the souls.

Murtagh, however, in his glory,

Will tell, next week, a different story;
Will make out all these men of barter,
As each a saint, a downright martyr,
Brought to the stake—i. e. a beef one,
Of all their martyrdoms the chief one;
Though try them ev'n at this, they'll bear it,
If tender and wash'd down with claret.

Meanwhile Miss Fudge, who loves all lions,
Your saintly, next to great and high 'uns—
(A Viscount, be he what he may,
Would cut a Saint out, any day,)
Has just announc'd a godly rout,
Where Murtagh's to be first brought out,
And shown in his tame, week-day state:
"Pray'rs, half-past seven, tea at eight."
Ev'n so the circular missive orders-

Pink cards, with cherubs round the borders.

Haste, Dick-you're lost, if you lose time;-
Spinsters at forty-five grow giddy,

And Murtagh, with his tropes sublime,
Will surely carry off old Biddy,