BETA

MSS. No II.

To Marshall ——— on his Return ; or,
Congratulatory Address by Mons. ——.

1.

O welcome home, my marshal, my col-
league true and good,1
When under brave Napoleon we dabbled
long in blood ;2
Who brought you back to Paris in Bour-
bon’s royal days ?3
Was it Madame Bonaparte’s man, our own
Monsieur De Cazes ?*4

2.

With thee I robbed thro’ Prussia, thro’ Por
tugal and Spain ;5
With thee I marched to Russia, and then—
marched back again ;6
With thee I faced the red-coats awhile at
Waterloo ;7
And with thee I raised the war-song of jolly†
sauve qui peut.8
* Hodie Duc de Cazes, olim secretary to Madame Mere, the imperial mother of all
the BonapartesP. F.
† Jolly !  Quoi ?  Jolly !  Ma foi, voila une epithete assez mal appliquè.
Marshal Grouchy.

3.

I took the oaths to Louis, and now with
face of brass,9
I bawl against the royalists all in the Cham-
bre Basse ;10
But you, my lad, were exiled, a mighty cruel
thing,11
For you did nothing surely, but fight against
your king.12

4.

Then drink a health to th’ Emperor, and
curse Sir Hudson Lowe ;*13
And decorate with stolen plate your honest-
earned chateau ;14
And merrily, my marshal, we shall the gob-
let drain,15
’Tis a chalice† that I robbed one day out of
a church in Spain.16

5.

Fill, fill the bumper fairly, ’tis Chambertin,‡
you see17
The Emperor’s favourite liquor, and chant
in pious glee,18
A song of Monsieur Parny’s,§ Miladi Mor-
gan’s bard,19
And curse the tasteless Bourbons who won’t
his muse reward.20

6.

Then, with our wigs all perfumed, and our
beavers cocked so fierce,21
We’ll throw a main together, or troll the
amorous verse ;22
And I’ll get as drunk as Irishmen, as Irish-
men morbleu,23
After six-and-thirty tumblersǁ in drinking
healths to you.24
* Sir Hudson Lowe is a very bad man in not letting the Emperor escape. Las Cases.
He is a man of no soul. The world cannot decide whether Bonaparte or Wellington is
the greater general—I am sure the former is, without a second battle of Waterloo ; and
here we have a simple knight preventing the solution of the question. He is an imbecile.
I am sure he never had the taste to read my Amyntas.Leigh Hunt.
† It was an instrument of superstition ; and I, therefore, although a water-drinker, ap-
prove of its being turned to any other use, just as I approved of the enlightened revolu-
tionists of France turning the superstitious bells of Paris into cannon, although, on prin-
ciplie, a declared enemy of war. Sir R. Phillips.
‡ Bonaparte was fond of Chamertin. Teste Tom Moore. I prefer whisky. P. F.
§ A pet poet of Lady Morgan’s. Vide her France. I wonder what the medical Knight,
her caro sposo, says, when he catches her reading “ La Guerre des Dieux.” P. F.
ǁ On this I must remark, that six and thirty tumblers is rather hard drinking. My
friend, Rice Hussey, swears only to six and twenty, though he owns he has heard he drank
two and thirty, but could not with propriety give his oath to it, as he was somewhat dis-
ordered by the liquor. There is not a Frenchman in France would drink it : I will lay
any wager on that. In fact, I back Ireland against the world. A few years ago, the
Northumberland, a very pretty English militia regiment, commanded by Lord Loraine,
who endeared himself wherever he went in Ireland by his affable and social manners, ar-
rived in the city of Cork. His Lordship gave a dinner to thirty officers of his regiment,
who each drank his bottle. When the bill was called for, he observed to the waiter with a
smile, that the English gentlemen could drink as well as the Irish.  “ Lord help your
head, sir,” said the waiter, “ is that all you know about it ?  Why, there’s five gentle-
men next room who have drank one bottle more than the whole of yees, and don’t you
hear them bawling like five devils for the other cooper,——coming gentlemen !” P.F.
In Horace it is Edoni, not Irishmen ; but that is quite correct. The Irish are of Scythian
descent, so were the Thracians. Thos. Wood, M.D.