Project Gutenberg "Best Of" CD August 2003 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 48 pages of information about Project Gutenberg "Best Of" CD August 2003.

Project Gutenberg "Best Of" CD August 2003 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 48 pages of information about Project Gutenberg "Best Of" CD August 2003.
of wheat, which, at the time Mr. Cobbett was writing, was selling at 45_s_. the quarter, Mr. Cobbett’s crop would be worth nearly 27_l_. the acre, three times, as he says, that of the average crop of wheat this same year.  But in order to compare the worth of this crop with that of others, there are several considerations to be entered into besides this; these it is needless to say, Mr. Cobbett shows are wholly in favour of Cobbett’s corn.  However this may be, and even making a large allowance for the determination of the writer to see every thing he loves couleur de rose, we think there can be little doubt of this fact, that he has made out a case for experiment, and still more, that they who have not made the experiment, are not entitled either to distrust or to gainsay his assertions.  It should be observed, that there are two branches in Mr. Cobbett’s argument; he maintains that his variety of Indian corn may be grown in this country:  but should this not be confirmed by more general experiments, still his praise of the plant, as a valuable substitute for wheat, and even its superior applicability to domestic purposes, demand the same attention as before; for if it may be grown, it may be imported, as from Canada, without the imposition of a burthensome duty.

* * * * *

THE WATCHMAN’S LAMENT.

  As homeward I hurried, within “The Wen,”
    At midnight, all alone. 
  My knees, like the knees of a drunken man,
  Foreboding shook, and my eyes began
    To see two lamps for one.

  The lights burnt blue, as they’re wont to do
    When Spirits are in the wind. 
  Ho! ho! thought I, that’s an ominous hue,
  And a glance on either side I threw,
    But I fear’d to look behind.

  A smell, as of gas, spread far and wide,
    But sulphur it was, I knew;
  My sight grew dim, and my tongue was tied,
  And I thought of my home, and my sweet fireside,
    And the friends I had left at loo!

  And I took once more a hurried peep
    Along and across the street,
  And then I beheld a figure creep,
  Like a man that is walking in his sleep,
    Or a watchman on his beat.

  A lantern, dangling in the wind,
    He bore, and his shaggy and thick
  Great-coat was one of the dread-nought kind,—­
  What seem’d his right hand trail’d behind
    The likeness of a stick.

  The sky with clouds became o’ercast,
  And it suddenly set to raining,—­
  And the gas-lights flicker’d in the blast,
  As that thing of the lantern and dread-nought past,
  And I heard him thus complaining—­

  “A murrain seize—­a pize upon—­
    Plague take—­the New Police! 
  Why couldn’t they do with the ancient one,
  As ages and ages before have done,
    And let us remain in peace?

  “No more, ah! never more, I fear,
    Will a perquisite, (woe is me!)
  Or profits, or vails, the Charley cheer;
  Then, alas! for his tender consort dear,
    And his infant progeny!

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Project Gutenberg "Best Of" CD August 2003 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.