“But I’m all over wonder. Surely the kitchen must be somewhere under? But where’s _the_ room?—the matchless little chamber, With its dark ceiling, and its light of amber— That fairy den, by Price’s pencil drawn, Enchantment’s dwelling-place? ’Tis gone—’Tis gone! The times are changed, I said, and men grown frantic, Some cross in steamboats o’er the vast Atlantic; Some whirl on railroads, and some fools there are Who book their places in the pendant car Of the great Nassau—monstrous, big balloon! Poor lunatics! they think they’ll reach the moon! All onward rush in one perpetual ferment, No rest for mortals till they find interment; Old England is not what it once has been, Dogs have their days, and we’ve had ours, I ween. The country’s gone! cut up by cruel railroads, They’ll prove to many nothing short of jail-roads. The spirit vile of restless innovation At Fulham e’en has taken up his station. I landed here, on Father Thames’s banks, To seek repose, and rest my wearied shanks; Here, on the grass, where once I could recline, Like a huge mushroom springs this mansion fine. Astounding work! but yesterday ’twas building; And now what armour, carving, painting, gilding! Vexed as I am, yet loth to be uncivil, I only wish the owner at the ---!” Father Thames (Mr. Giffard), who had been slumbering between two painted boards, respectively inscribed “MIDDLESEX COUNTY BANK” and “SURREY BANK,” and surrounded by flower-pots filled with bulrushes and sedge, roused by the intended imprecation upon their host, here interrupted Egomet, and entered into a long dialogue with him, in which he detailed all his grievances so far as gas and steam were concerned. At length he feels the influence of Hook as “the Great Frost,” who turns “The old blackguard to solid ice.” Upon which Egomet’s remark was, that— “The scene to Oxford shifted in a trice is, This river-god—no longer Thames, but Isis.” Father Christmas (Mr. Crofton Croker) then appeared with a long speech about eating, drinking, and making merry, and the wondrous power that a good fire and a cheerful glass have upon the heart. Beholding “poor Thames a-cold”—“an icy, heartless river”—the question follows, what “Do I the matter see? I’ll thaw you soon—begone to Battersea, There let thy icebergs float in Chelsea Reach.” The Great Frost, too, after much buffoonery, turns himself into “A pleasant fall of fleecy snow,” which he effected by the vigorous use of the kitchen dredging-box, and an ample supply of flour, therewith bepowdering Jolly Christmas, Father Thames, and Egomet, so plentifully as to leave no doubt upon the minds of the audience respecting the transformation.