628 PUTTING TO RIGHTS. 



chair to rest myself upon not a room fit to go into hunger and ague 

 staring me in the face. Receive a note from the tax-gatherer demanding 

 immediate payment recollected having paid him, and having stuck 

 the mem. behind the chimney glass, look for it, and find it gone ! burnt 

 or blown out of the window ! Boy waiting for article for magazine, 

 faithfully promised by the 10th papers all dusted and carefully " put 

 to rights/' consequently impossible to be found. Wife scolding child 

 screaming servant crying and I swearing in an agony of rage, and 

 mortification, rush out of the house intending to take a passage for 

 the Swan River, or New Zealand! Think better of it, rather starve 

 at home than be eaten up by the savages, so return to my yoke ! 



SHERIDAN'S DEVIL. 













BRINSLEY SHERIDAN once, after sleeping all day, 



Having squandered the night in carousing and play, 



Sallied forth in the evening, that is, 'tween the lights, 



And leisurely hasten'd his way towards White's. 



He his fast had not broken since rising from bed, 



For his stomach was queer, and a pain in his head 



Made him feel a distaste for each viand that thought 



To his fanciful appetite readily brought. 



" The devil take eating !" he cried in a rage, 



" For, in eating, a brute is as great as a sage." 



Then pausing, as he a new fancy had caught, 



" Why, a devil's the thing, and of that I ne'er thought." 



So he journeyed along, and he met at the door, 



The varlet who lorded the eatables o'er. 



" Come here, my good fellow, you always are civil, 



So cut me a beef bone, and make me a devil." 



" We have not one left, sir, we just cut the last, 



For Bedfordshire's Duke, and 'tis devilling fast. 



Will a chicken not do, sir r" " No, no, let it be; 



I'll bone the Duke's bone, or the devil's in me." 



So he entered the coffee-room ; seated his chair 



As close to his Grace as he civilly dare. 



" I wonder how people at this house e'er dine ; 



If it don't turn their stomachs, I'm sure it does mine." 



" What whim has now seized you ?" inquired his Grace ; 



" Methinks I have seen you oft sup at this place." 



" True, you may have oft seen me a devil partaking, 



Before I looked on while the devil was making : 



But just now, as I pass'd by the area, I saw 



The cook's understrapper the nicest bits gnaw 



From a lovely beef bone, and then daub with his sallow 



Foul hands the rest over with pepper and tallow." 



He scarcely had finished, when in came the tray. 



'Twas placed 'fore the Duke " You may take it away!" 



He cried, in a manner that plainly bespoke 



With choler his Grace was just ready to choke. 



The waiter, though thunder-struck, questioned no more, 



But, taking the tray, slowly moved to the door ; 



When Sheridan cried, " Then you hither may bring 



The devil, for I can still stomach the thing." 







