194 VARIOUS REMARKS ON THE 



speculation of our own, we proceed at once to quote the 

 poems thus introduced : 



" THOUGHTS OF AN OYSTER SEATED ON A GRIDIRON. 



They 've borne me afar from my native bed, 



Where " such a beauty I did grow," 

 And from dredger to dealer, in bustle and dread, 

 I 've been tumbled about till I wish'd myself dead ; 

 And now, by my beard, I am pretty well sped, 



For my frame's in the devil's own glow ! 



So ho ! what the plague is this piercing my shell ? 



Sure 'tis flame rising hotter and hotter ! 

 Why, an oyster of quality might just as well 



Take kitchen-floor lodgings in fire-eating h , 



Or make up his mind, like a mumchance, to dwell 



In the mullock-stowed maw of an otter! 



Accurst is my fate ! I'm all shrivelled up ! 



Never more shall I rest on the banks 

 Where, before love was crost, I oft tasted the nup- 

 Tial delight to be drawn from the conjugal cup ; 

 Now I'm doomed to be dished that some boobies may sup, 



And fatten their indolent flanks. 



O, Neptune ! oh, Venus ! release a poor oyster, 



Who swears in the heat of devotion, 

 For the rest of his life, like a monk in a cloister, 

 He '11 shrink in his shell from the touch of the Roister, 

 And never (if once he get back) heed the hoister 



Who'd tempt him to leave the green ocean. 



