Slangs songs in Dublin.

Chapter VIII.

Slang Songs - Prison Usages - The Night Before Larry Was Stretched - Kilmainham Minit - Executioners - Bull Baiting - Lord Altham’s Bull - The Bush.

Among the popular favourites of the last century, now almost entirely exploded, were slang songs. As compositions their merits were of various degrees; but the taste of the times has so entirely changed, that their literary pretensions would now gain them little attention. Their value chiefly consists in being genuine pictures of uncouth scenes, not to be met with elsewhere.

The favourite subjects of these compositions were life in a gaol and the proceedings of an execution. The interior and discipline of a prison of that date presented a frightful contrast to the same things at the present day. The office of a gaoler was regarded as a place of profit, of which a trade might as fairly be driven as in the keeping of an inn; and so as the prisoners were kept safe, and the gaoler’s fees paid, the entire object of such institutions was supposed to be answered, with a total disregard to the improvement or correction of the unfortunate inmates.

One striking instance of this is the custom introduced in the time of King Henry the Eighth, and which continued to a comparatively recent date, of licensing poor prisoners to beg for their fees. When an unfortunate captive was discharged, for want of prosecution or on acquittal, the gaoler nevertheless would not let him out till his fees were paid; and if he was unable to pay them from his own means, he was allowed a certain time to beg in the neighbourhood of the gaol to procure them.

But the most shocking example of the utter laxity of all discipline and want of decency, was exhibited in the manner in which condemned capital convicts were allowed to pass their last hours. When so many petty offences were punishable with death, and commitment on suspicion was so often but the stepping-stone to the gallows, it was natural that, to the unfortunate felons themselves, an execution should be stripped of all the salutary terrors, in which alone the utility of capital punishment consists, and should be by them regarded as an ordinary misfortune in their course of life. The numerous instances recorded of utter levity and recklessness, exhibited by convicts on the very verge of eternity, clearly show this to have been so, not merely in Ireland, but in the sister kingdom. The practice of prisoners selling their bodies to surgeons, to be dissected after their execution, was common, we believe, to both countries; and the anecdote of the felon who took the money, and then told the surgeon, laughing, that “it was a bite, for he was to be hung in chains,” we believe we can hardly claim as Irish wit.

But there was one trait, evincing a similar careless indifference, which was peculiarly Irish. The coffins of condemned malefactors were usually sent to them, that the sight might suggest the immediate prospect of death, and excite corresponding feelings of solemn reflection and preparation for the awful event. From motives of humanity, the friends of the condemned were also allowed free intercourse with him during the brief space preceding his execution. The result was, that the coffin was converted to a use widely different from that intended. It was employed as a card-table, and the condemned wretch spent his last night in this world gambling on it.

A man named Lambert was an outcast of a respectable family, and was known thus to have spent his last precious moments; and it was on him the celebrated song of “De nite afore Larry was stretched” is supposed to have been written. He was a cripple, paralytic on one side, but of irreclaimable habits. He was at once ferocious and cowardly, and was reported to have always counselled murdering those whom he had robbed. When on his way to execution, he shrieked, and clung with his hands to whatever was near him, and was dragged with revolting violence, by the cord about his neck, to the gallows from which he fell.

The celebrated song composed on him has acquired a lasting fame, not only as a picture of manners, but of phraseology now passed away; and its authorship is a subject of as much controversy as the letters of Junius. Report has conferred the reputation of it on Burrowes, Curran, Lysaght, and others, who have never asserted their claims. We shall mention one more claimant whose pretensions are equal to those of any other. There was at that time, a man named Maher, in Waterford, who kept a cloth shop at the market cross; he had a distorted ancle [stet. KF], and was known by the sobriquet of “Hurlfoot Bill.” He was “a fellow of infinite humour,” and his compositions on various local and temporary subjects were in the mouths of all his acquaintance. [There stood formerly a statue of Strongbow in front of Reginald’s Tower, on the quay of Waterford. One Sunday morning this statue was seen converted into that of a woman, with an inscription, supposed to be Maher’s composition, detailing circumstances which proved that it was not a statue of Strooghow, but of Eva his wife. The metamorphosis was, however, so offensive, that this ancient figure was removed from the conspicuous place is occupied.] There was then a literary society established in Waterford, which received contributions in a letter-box that was periodically opened, and prizes awarded for the compositions. In this was found the *first *copy of this celebrated slang song that had been seen in Waterford. Its merit was immediately acknowledged; inquiry was made for its author, and “Hurlfoot Bill” presented himself, and claimed the prize awarded. We give this anecdote, which must go for *tantum quantum valet; *but we have heard from old members of this society, that no doubt, at the time, existed *among them *that he was the author. His known celebrity in that line of composition rendered it probable, and he continued to the end of his short and eccentric career of life to claim the authorship with confidence, “no man forbidding him.”

Though “De nite afore Larry was stretched” has survived almost all its rivals, many songs of the same style once enjoyed nearly an equal popularity. One very similar was “Luke Caffrey’s Kilmainham Minit.” The subject is also an execution, but turns on a different topic - the hope of being brought to life by a surgical process. This hope was often the last clung to by the dying wretch, and had some foundation in reality, as several well-known instances are recorded in which it was actually effected. The unfortunate Lanigan, [John Lonergan, a Dublin University graduate, and tutor in the family of Thomas O’Flaherly, of Castlefield, Co. Kilkenny, was convicted of murdering that gentleman by poisoning him on the 24th of June, 1778. The indictment was for Petit Treason, as he was in O’Flaherty’s service. The trial was held at bar in Dublin, the jury being brought from Kilkenny. Lonergan was executed at the City Gallows, Baggot-street, on the 24th of November, 1781. There is reason to believe that he was innocent of the murder, as he protested to the last. His body was cut down after 20 minutes, and given to his friend, the Rev. Eugene M’Kenna, of Raheny, at whose house animation was restored as related above.] who was hanged at that time in Dublin for the supposed participation in the murder of O’Flaherty, was known to be alive, and seen by many, after his public execution. When given for dissection, the use of the knife on his body had caused a flow of blood, which, in a little time, restored suspended animation. A general belief therefore existed, that opening a vein after hanging was a certain means of restoring to life - an idea particularly cherished by felons, who seldom failed to try the experiment on their departed friends. We annex specimens of this song, which, though once very popular, is now rarely met with, and, we believe, out of print.

“Luke Caffrey’s Kilmainham Minit”

“When to see Luke’s last *jig *we agreed,

We tipped him our gripes in a tangle,

Den mounted our trotters wid speed,

To squint at de snub as he’d dangle;

For Luke he was ever de chap

To boosle the bulldogs and pinners,

And when dat he milled a fat slap,

He merrily melted de winners,

To snack wid de boys of do pad.

“Along de sweet Coombe den we go,

Slap dash tro de Poddle we lark It,

But when dat we come to de Row,

Oh, dere was no meat in de market;

De boy he had travelled afore,

Like rattlers, we after him pegged it;

To miss him, would grieve us full sore,

Case why, as a favour he begged it -

We’d tip him the fives fore his det.”

They come up with him before he is turned off, and the following dialogue ensues:-

” ‘Your sowl, I’d fight blood to de eyes,

You know it, I would to content ye,

But foul play I always despis -

Dat’s for one for to fall upon twenty.’

Ses he, ”Tis my fate for to die,

I knowd it when I was committed,

But if dat de slang you run sly,

De scrag-boy may yet be outwitted,

And I scout again on de lay.

“‘When I dance twixt de ert and de skyes

Do clargy may bleet for de struggler,

But when on de ground your friend lies,

Oh, tip me a snig in do jugglar;

Ye know dat is all my last hope,

As do surgents of otaamy tell us,

Dat when I’m cut down from de rope,

You’d bring back de puff to my bellows,

And set me once more on my pins.’

“Dese last words were spoke wid a sigh,

We saw de poor fellow was funkin,

De drizzle stole down from his eye,

Do we tought he had got better spunk in;

Wid a tip of de slang we replied,

And a blinker dat nobody noted,

De clergy stept down from his side,

And de dust-cart from under him floated,

And left him to dance on do air.

“Pads foremost he dived, and den round,

He capered do Kilmainham Minit,

But when dat he lay on de ground,

Our bisness we tought to begin it;

Wid de stuff to a shebeen we hied,

But det had shut fast every grinder,

His brain-box hung all a one side,

And no distiller’s pig could he blinder;

But dot’s what we all roust come to.

“His disconsolate widdy came in

From tipping the scrag-boy a dustin’ -”

The poet then records her melancholy situation, in the prospect of being soon a mother, and concludes thus:

“We tipped him a snig, as he said,

In de juggler, oh dere where de mark is,

Bud when dat we found him quite ded,

In de dust-case we bundled his carcase,

For a Protestant lease of the sod.”

We subjoin a glossary of son’s of the unintelligible phrases.

“Tipped our gripes in a tangle.” A strong figurative entpression for an earnest shake of many hands.

“Mounted our trotters,” synonymous with “riding shank’s mare.”

“Chap,” a contraction of chapman, a dealer in small wares - similar to the epithet of “small merchant,” applied to a boy.

“Boozle de bull-dogs,” &c., outwit thief-takers and gaolers.

“Milled a fat slap,” made a rich booty.

“Melted de winners,” spent the booty - winners, by mytonymy for winnings.

“Boys of the Pad,” footpads, robbers. Paddington, a village near London, once infamous, for such means, “the town of robbers.” [Footpad is from pad, a path, a Dutch word, like many other slang terms. Paddington is not derived from this, but means town of the descendants of Peads.]

“Slap dash,” &c. The Poddle was a low street over the stream of that name, always flooded and dirty; the passengers waded through it like “mud larks.”

“Come to de Row,” New-row, where the prison was then.

“Meat,” a human body: “seeing the cold meat home,” was attending a funeral.

“Travelled afore,” set out for Stephen’s-green, where the gallows then was.

“Tip me de fives,” five fingers - shake hands.

“Scrag-boy,” hangman - from scrag, the neck.

“Ottamy,” anatomy.

“Dust-cart,” the flat platform cart provided for the accommodation of the doomed, before *the *invention of prison drops.

“Pads foremost he dived, and den round.” This is horribly graphic, as those who have unfortunately chanced to witness such a scene can testify.

“Sheebeen,” a low public-house.

“‘His disconsolate widdy.” It is a remarkable fact that felons wore generally attended by females in the family way, who had various duties to perform: the first was to *dust, i.e,, *abuse the hangman; the second to beg for the funeral.

“Protestant lease of the sod.” In allusion to the penal laws, which prohibited Roman Catholics from acquiring long titles.

We may mention in passing, that one circumstance which contributed to the strange contradiction exhibited at an Irish execution, turning that awful scene into an opportunity for merriment and jest, was the character and dress of the hangman. That functionary was generally disguised in a fantastic manner, very ill suited to the occasion. On his face he wore a grotesque mask, and on his back an enormous hump, in the whole resembling Punch in the puppet-show. The original design of this apparent levity was, to protect the executioner by the disguise; and it was in some degree necessary. The use he made of the hump was curious. It was formed of a large wooden bowl-dish, laid between his shoulders, and covered with his clothes. When the criminal was turned off, and the “dusting of the scrag-boy” began, the hangman was assailed, not merely with shouts and curses, but often with showers of stones. To escape the latter, he ducked down his head, and opposed his hump as a shield, from which the missiles rebounded with a force that showed how soon his skull would have been fractured if exposed to them. After some antics, the finisher of the law dived among the sheriff’s attendants and disappeared. This grotesque figure, surrounded by two or more human beings, struggling in the awful agonies of a violent and horrible death, was regarded by the mob as presenting a funny and jocular contrast.

Many anecdotes are recorded of the levity of hangmen eminent in their day. The last and most notorious of the craft was “Tom Galvin.” He is not very long dead, and in his old age was often visited at Kilmainham gaol by persons who indulged a morbid curiosity to see him and the rope with which he had hanged most of his own nearest relations. One of his practical facetiae was, to slip the rope slily round a visitor’s neck, and give it a sudden chuck, which would nearly cause the sensation of strangling. He was brutally unfeeling in the discharge of his horrid duty, and when a reprieve would come to some wretch, whose hanging he anticipated, he would almost cry with disappointment at the loss of his fee, and say, “It is a hard thing to be taking the bread out of the mouth of an old man like me!” He was always impatient at any delay made by a convict. When the wretched Jemmy O’Brien was about to be executed, he exhibited the greatest terror, and lingered over his devotions, to protract his life thus for a few moments. Galvin’s address to him is well known. He called out at the door, so as to be heard by all the bystanders, as well as the criminal, “Mr. O’Brien, jewel, long life to you, make haste wid your prayers; de people is getting tired under de swingswong.” [‘The original name of Hammond-lane was Hangman-lane, as Fumbally’s-lane was Bumbailiff’s-lane. Dark-lane, Kimmage, was was called Hangman-lane in the end of the 18th century.]

The history of the last century in Ireland presents instances of unprofessional executioners, whose actions would be even more grotesque, if they were not so revolting that horror supersedes every other feeling respecting them. The best known is the ease of Lieutenant Hepenstal, commemorated by Barrington, who, however, is mistaken in his account of him. He was in the Wicklow militia, and a very tall man. On one occasion, in Westmeath, his corps being in want of a gallows to hang “a croppy,” Hepenstal volunteered to execute him without one, and actually hanged the wretched man by swinging him over his own shoulder with a drum-cord. He owes his name of “Walking Gallows” to the following epigram: -

“This county owes you many thanks,

And will reward your friendly pranks,

But what fresh evils may befal us,

Now that we’ve lost our walking gallows!”

But the brutality of Hepenstal is left in the shade by the contrast presented by a *female *hangman. In August, 1793, a gang of robbers were surrounded and captured near Bruff. One of them was a Margaret Farrell. Among her duties one was to find the cord for the execution of persons who were sacrificed to the vengeance of the gang. On an occasion, when she was at a loss for a cord, she stripped off her clothes, and taking her chemise tore it into stripes, which she twisted, tied round the neck of the wretched man who was doomed to suffer, and, when he was swung up to a neighbouring tree, complacently contemplated the strength of the contrivance till he died.

Another slang song, once in great celebrity, but now nearly forgotten, is “Lord Altham’s Bull.” As it is little known, and, we believe, not to be obtained in print, and is, perhaps, the most graphic of its class, and the best specimen of the slang of 90 years ago, we subjoin a few extracts from it also. We should premise that the subject of the song - a bull bait - though the humanity of modern legislation has now very properly prohibited it - was, at the time of which we speak, not merely a very common and popular sport among the lower orders, but like prize-fighting and the cock-pit, often keenly relished by the better classes of society. This was not merely owing to the grosser tastes of the age, but in a great measure to peculiar circumstances. Ireland was then a pastoral country, with little agriculture and less manufactures. It was the great grazing ground on which were fed all the cattle that supplied the armies of England, in their incessant wars then waged for the balance of power in Europe, the subjugation of revolted colonies in America, or counteracting the revolutionary principles of France. The midland counties of Ireland, particularly Tipperary, 110W waving with corn, were one great bullock walk; and Cork, Waterford and Dublin, were the marts where the beasts were slaughtered and prepared for exportation.

Among the cattle sent in was a large proportion of bulls. The south of Ireland, connected by several ties with Spain, adopted many Spanish usages and sports; among the rest, bull-fighting, which degenerated into bull-baiting. In Waterford and other towns, on the election of every mayor, he was surrounded by a mob, who shouted out, “A rope, a rope, a rope! and the new mayor never failed to grant their demands. A rope two inches in diameter, with a competent leather collar and buckle, had been previously prepared, and was then delivered to the claimants, who bore it away in triumph, and deposited it in the city gaol-yard, to remain there till wanted. We have an extract before us from the old corporation books of Waterford, dated 1714, October, in which month the slaughtering season commenced:- “Ordered, that a bull-rope be provided at the charge of the city revenue.” Under this sanction, the populace assumed the authority of seizing all the bulls, and driving them to the bull-ring to be baited before they were killed. The place for baiting them was an open space outside the city gate, called Ballybricken. It was surrounded with houses, from which spectators looked on, as at a Spanish bull-fight. In the centre was the ring through which the rope was passed. It was surmounted by a pole, bearing a large copper bull on a vane. In 1798, when bullfights were prohibited, this apparatus was removed, and the sport discontinued; but prior to that it was followed with the greatest enthusiasm; and it was not usual to see 18 or 20 of these animals baited during the season.

To enhance and render perfect this sport, a peculiar breed of dogs was cherished; the purity of whose blood is marked by small stature, with enormous, disproportioned heads and jaws, the upper short and snub, and the under projecting beyond it. The savage ferocity and tenacity of those small animals are quite extraordinary. A single one unsupported would seize a fierce bull by the lip or nose, and pin to the ground the comparatively gigantic animal, as if he had been fired with a stake of iron. Even after the fracture of their limbs, they never relaxed their hold; and it was often necessary, at the conclusion of a day’s sport, to cut off broken legs, and in that mutilated state they were seen on three legs rushing at the bull.

When, on rare occasions, a rope was refused by a refractory mayor, or a new one was required, the ball was driven through the streets of the town, and sometimes even into his worship’s shop or hall, as a hint of what was wanted, and the civic authorities were often called out with the military to repress the riots that ensued. Lives were frequently lost, and a Lord Mayor of Dublin was long remembered by the name of “Alderman Levellow,” for his interference on such an occasion. A bull was driven through the lower part of Abbey-street, then open and called the “Lots,” and the mob became so riotous that the military were called out and ordered to fire. They directed their muskets above the heads of the people, but the Lord Mayor laying his rod on them, depressed them to a murderous level, and several persons were killed. This, we believe, was the last bull-bait recorded in Dublin, and the restrictive regulations adopted at the time of the rebellion in ‘98, prohibiting the assemblage of persons, suppressed bull-baiting then, and it was never since revived.

The custom of seizing bulls on their way to market for the purpose of baiting, became so grievous an evil in Dublin in 1779, that it was the subject of a special enactment, making it a peculiar offence to take a bull from the drivers for such a purpose, on its way to or from market. [Statute, 19, 20 George III, c. 36.]

The place for bull-baiting in Dublin was in the Corn-market, where there was an iron ring, to which the butchers fastened the animals they baited. An officer, called the “Mayor of the bull-ring,” had a singular jurisdiction allowed to him. He was the guardian of bachelors, and it was a duty of his office to take cognizance of their conduct. After the marriage ceremony, the bridal party were commonly conducted to the ring by “the mayor” and his attendants, when a kiss from “his worship” to the bride concluded the ceremony, from which they went home with the bridegroom, who entertained them according to his ability.

Having premised so much, we give an example of

Lord Altram’s Bull.

“‘Twas on the fust of sweet Megay,

It being a high holiday

Six and twenty boys of de strawt

Went to take Lord Altham’s bull away.

“Spoktn - I being de fust in the field, who should I see bud de mosey wid his horns sticking in de ground. Well becomes me, I pinked up to him, ketched him by de tail, and rode him dree times round de field, as well as ever de master of de tailors’ corporation rode de fringes; but de mosey being game to de back bone, de first rise he gev me in the elements, he made a smash of me collar-bone. So dere being no blunt in de cly, Madame Steevens was de word, where I lay for seven weeks in lavender on de broad of me back, like Paddy Ward’s pig, be de hekey.

“We drove de bull tro many a gap,

And kep him going many a mile,

But when we came to Kilmainham lands,

We let de mosey rest awhile. *

“Spoken *- Oh! boys, if de mosey was keeper of de ancle-spring warehouse, you could not help pitying him; his hide smoked like Ned Costigas’s brewery, and dere was no more hair on his hoofs den dere’s wool on a goose’s gams, be de hokey.

We drove de bull down sweet Tryck-street,

Widout eider dread or figear,

When out run Mosey Creathorn’s bitch,

Hand cotched de bull be do year. *

“Spoken *- Hye, Jock - dat dog’s my bitch - spit on her nose to keep her in wind - fight fair, boys, and no stones - low, Nettle, low - shift, shift, my beauty, and keep your hoult. Oh! boys, your sowls, I tought de life ud leave Mosey Creathorn’s glimms, when he saw his bitch in de air: ‘Oh! Larry Casey, happy det to you, and glory may you get, stand wide and ketch her in your arms - if her head smacks de pavement, she’s not worth lifting up - dat’s right, yer sowls, now tip hoe a sup a de blood while its warm.’

“We drove de bull down Corn-market,

As all de world might segee,

When brave Tedy Foy trust his nose tro’ de bars,

Crying ‘High for de sweet liberty. *

“Spoken*- Oh! cruel Coffey, glory to you, just knock off my darbies - let me out on padroul of honour - I’ll expel de mob - kill five, skin six, and be de fader of de scity, I’ll return like an innocent lamb to de sheep-walk. ‘Oh! boys, who lost an arm, who lost five fingers and a tumb?’ ‘Oh!’ says Larry Casey, ‘it belongs to Luke Ochy, I know it by de slime on de sleeve.

“De mosey took down Plunket-street,

Where de clothes on de pegs were hanging,

Oh! den he laid about wid his nob,

De shifts around him banging. *

Spoken - *Oh! Mrs. Mulligan, jewel, take in de bits o’ duds from de wall, out o’ de way o’ de mosey’s horns - be de hokey, he’ll fly kites wid dem, and den poor Miss Judy will go to do Lady Mayress’s ball like a spatchcock.

“Lord Altham is a very bad man,

As all de neighbours know;

For driving white Roger from Kilmainham lands,

We all to Virginy must go! *

Spoken* - Well, boys! - suppose we go for seven years, an’t dere six of us! Dat’s just 14 monts a-piece. I can sail in a turf kish; and if over I come back from his Majesty’s tobacco-manufactory, I’ll butter my knife in his tripes, and give him his guts for garters. All de world knows I’ve de blood of de Dempseys in me.”

As the allusions and phraseology of this composition are new nearly obsolete, a few explanatory note, on the text may be necessary.

“Boys of de straw!” - Citizens of the straw market, Smithfield.

“Fringes” - the name by which the triennial procession of the trades was known - a corruption of “franchises.” The masters rode at the head of their corporations, and the tailors were never distinguished as first-rate horsemen. We have already given an account of this extraordinary ceremony. The last we believe, took place on the election of Grattan to the representation of Dublin.

“No blunt in de cly.” - No money in the pocket.

“Madame Steevens was de word.”-Miss Griselda Steevens was left by her brother, an eminent physician in Dubin, an estate in Westmeath and the King’s County, yielding £600 per annum for her life; and after her death to found an hospital. She, however, most benevolently commenced the application of it to the donor’s charitable intentions during her life. She founded, in 1720, the celebrated hospital near Kilmainham, which bears her name, and has over since boon the gratuitous receptacle of the maimed and poor, particularly for sudden accidents, as the inscription on the door decares- “Aegris sauciisque sanandis.” Larry, therefore, means he had to betake himself to the hospital, where he had nothing to pay.

“Paddy ward’s pig” - Who Paddy Word was, we believe, has eluded the inquiries of historians and antiquaries. He was, however, very eminent for his sayings and doings: he measured a griddle, and declared it was “as bread as it was long!” Hence, his “griddle” was as famous an illustration as his pig.

“Ancle-spring warehouse,” an ingenious periphrasis for the stocks.

“Ned Costigan,” - a celebrated Dublin distiller, whose premises were long famous for adumbrating the Liberties with their smoke.

“Gams” - Legs: from the French jambes. Nothing, perhaps, could more forcibly describe the total absence of hair from the poor bull’s legs than the state of a goose’s gam.

“Truck-street,” - afterwards Cuckold’s-row, now Brabazon-street.

“Creathorn.” - A respectable name long appearing among the commons and freemen of the butchers’ guild.

“Dat dog’s my bitch!” - This confusion of gender is not confined to Mosey Creathorn. His late Majesty, George IV., when Prince of Wales, was notoriously fond of bull-baiting. On one occasion, a Smithfield butcher slapped him on the back in ecstacy, crying out, with an imprecation, “D--- your blood, Mr. Prince, the dog that pinned the bull is my bitch!”

“Low, Nettle! - low! - and keep your hoult!” - Taking a bull by the ear, was the mark of a mongrel. The perfection of a bull-dog was, to seize the bull by the nose, and hold fast - so Nettle is ordered to shift, but keep her hold, i.e., move down to the nose without letting go. Limbs were often broken by the tossing of the bull, and amputated, which, however, did not repress the animal’s ardour; and many a “three-legged bitch” acquired great celebrity, after losing her limb.

“Corn-market.” - This old prison stood in this street, and was called “Newgate,” because it had been once a gate of the city. In 1773 the new prison was built and the old taken down. Corn-market lay in the way from Kilmainham to the city market, near Plunket-street, which, therefore, the bull had to pass through; and this causes Teddy Foy’s affecting aspiration after liberty, with his nose through the bars.

“Padroul” - Parole of honour.

“Who lost an arm,” &c. - Larry Casey’s mark of recognition of the owner is not merely graphic, but, coarse as it may appear, is very classical. The father of Horace, it seems, was addicted to Luke Ochy’s habits, which caused his adversaries to say - “Quoties vidi cubito se emungentem.” - See praefat. Hor. Sat. Ed. Delph.

“Plunket-street” long distinguished as the mart in Dublin for the sale of old clothes, whence the proverb, to describe a person dressed in secondhand finery, that be “stripped a peg in Plunket-street.” It is in the immediate vicinity of the scene of action.

“Dat’s just 14 monts a-piece!” - Larry Dempsey’s calculation may appear not according to the rules of arithmetic, however it may be to those of sentiment. Miss Edgeworth, we believe, it is who remarks, that such Irishisms are founded on sociability of temper. The two Irishmen, transported for fourteen years, who comforted themselves because it was but seven years a-piece, were consoled with the reflection, that the enjoyment of each other’s society would make the time appear to each but half its real length.

“His Majesty’s tobacco manufactory.” - This may seem merely a metaphor of Larry’s; but is nevertheless legally correct, and borrowed from parliamentary phraseology. The language of all statutes previous to the 30 George III. was, “transportation to his Majesty’s plantations in North America.”

We shall conclude with specimens from one more song, very popular in its day. We have before noticed the feuds between the Liberty and Ormond boys.

Various objects of petty display presented objects of emulation and strife. Among them was planting a May-bush - one party endeavouring to cut down what the other had set up. A memorable contest of this kind, in which the weavers cut down “the bush” of the butchers, is thus celebrated in song:-

“De night afore de fust of Magay,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

We all did agree without any delay,

To cut a May-bush, so we pegged it away.

Ri rigidi dum doe!”

The leader of the boys was Bill Durham, a familiar corruption of Dermot, his right name, a distinguished man at that time in the Liberty riots. When the tree was cut down, it was borne back in triumph, with Bill astride on it, exhibiting a classical picture still more graphic than the gem of Bacchus astride on his tun:-

“Bill Durham, he sat astride on his bush,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

And dere he kept singin’, as sweet as a trush-

His faulchin in one hand, his pipe in his mush.

Ri rigidi dum dee!”

“The bush” having been planted in Smithfield, contributions were raised to do it honour; and among other contributors were the fishwomen of Pill-lane, who, from contiguity of situation and similarity of dealing, were closely allied to the butchers of Ormond-market. A custom prevailed here, of selling the fish brought for sale, to the women who retailed it, by auction. The auctioneer, who was generally one of themselves, holding a plaice or a haddock by the tail, instead of a hammer, knocked down the lot to the highest bidder. This was an important time to the trade; yet the high-minded poissardes, like their Parisian sisters, “sacrificed everything to their patriotic feelings,” and abandoned the market, *even *at this crisis, to attend “de bush:” -

“From de lane came each lass in her holiday gown,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

Do de haddock was up, and de lot was knocked down,

Dey doused all dere sieves, till dey riz de half-crown.

Ri rigidi dum dee!”

After indulging in the festivities of the occasion round “de bush,” some returned, and some lay about, *vine somnoque sepulti; *and so, not watching with due vigilance, the Liberty boys stole on their security, cut down, and carried off “de bush.” The effect on Bill Durham, when he heard the adversary passing on their way back with the trophy, is thus described:-

“Bill Durham, being up de nite afore,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum de,

Was now in his flea-park, taking a snore,

When he heard de mob pass by his door.

Ri rigidi dum dee!

“Den over his shoulders his flesh-bag he trew,

RI rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

And out of the chimbley his faulchin he drew,

And, mad as a hatter, down May-lane he flew.

Ri rigidi dum dee!

“Wid his hat in his hand, by de way of a shield,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

He kep all along crying out ‘Never yield!’

But he never cried stop till he came to Smithfield,

Ri rigidi dum dee!

“Dere finding no bush, but de watch-boys all flown

Ri rigidi ri ri dum dee,

‘Your sowls,’ says Bill Durham, ‘I’m left all alone;

Be de hokey, de glory of Smithfield is gone!

Ri rigidi dum dee!”

Bill vows revenge in a very characteristic and professional manner, by driving one of the bulls of Ormond market among his adversaries

“For de loss of our bush, revenge we will get,

Ri rigidi, ri ri dum dee,

In de slaughtering season we’ll tip ‘em a sweat,

Rigidi di do dee

We’ll wallop a mosey down Mead-street in tune,

And we won’t leave a weaver alive on de Coombo;

But we’ll rip up his tripe-bag, and burn his loom.

Ri rigidi di do dee!.”

“In his mush” - mouth, from the French louche. Many words are similarly derived - gossoon, a boy, from garcon, &c.

“De lane” Pill-lane, called so, *par excellence, *as the great centre and mart of piscatory dealing.

“Doused all dere sieves.” Laid them down at their uncle’s, the pawnbrokers.

“Riz half a crown” - The neuter verb “rise” is classically used here for the active verb “raised” a common licence with our poets.

“Flea-park” - This appellation of Bill’s bed was no doubt borrowed from the account the Emperor Julian gives of his beard: “I permit little beasts,” said he, “to run about it, like animals in a park.” So that Durham’s “flea-park” was evidently sanctioned by the Emperor’s “-park” The Abbé de Bletterie, who translated Julian’s work, complains that he was accused for not suppressing the image presented by Julian; but adds, very properly La délicatesse Francaise va-t elle jusq’ au falsifier les auteurs. So we say of our AUTHOR.

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