Sleep had swept him o'er the seas, To the drear antipodes; There he saw a felon band, Chains on neck, and spade in hand, Orators, all sworn to die In "Old Ireland's" cause--or fly! Now, divorced from pike and pen, Digging ditch, and draining fen, Sky their ceiling, sand their bed, Fed and flogged, and flogged and fed. "Operatives!" he harangued; "Ere I'm banished--I'll be hanged." Now, he strove to strike a light, But, a form of giant height Through the crashing casement sprang; Shattered stanchions round him rang, From his eyes a light within Showed the blackness of his skin; In his lips a huge cigar Smouldered, like a dying star; Holding to the culprit's eyes, Writ in flame, a scroll of lies, Champing jaws with iron fanged, "Friend," cried he, "you _shall_ be hanged." 'Twixt the tempter and the rogue, Then began the dialogue: --"Master--shall I rob the state?" "Not, unless you'd dine off plate." --"Shall I try my hand at law?" "You'll be sure to make a flaw." --"Shall I job in Parliament?" "You'll be richer, cent per cent." --"Shall I truckle, or talk big?" "You'll but get a judge's wig, Blockheads may be conscience-panged, Knaves are pensioned, but, _not_ hanged!" --"Master, _must_ I then escape?" "No," exclaimed the knowing shape, "You shall perish by Lynch-Law." Through his skull he struck a claw, On the tempest burst a wail, Through the bars a serpent-tail, Flashing like a lightning spire, Seemed to set the cell on fire; Far and wide was heard the clang, Through the whirlwind as they sprang. Many a year the sulphurous fume Stung the nostril in that room. The river widens, and we sweep along by the rich slopes and deep wooded vales of the Kentish shore. From time to time little pastoral villages emerge, from plantations of willows and poplars, and all water-loving trees. Before coming to Purfleet, we had passed a noble hill, looking over a vast expanse of country, on which stands a princely mansion,--Belvedere, with its battlements glittering above groves as thick as the depths of the Black Forest. This was once the mansion of Lord Eardley, one of the greatest humorists of the age,--the companion of George the Fourth, before he ceased to be a wit and became a king.