So he resolved at once to train, And walked and walked with all his main; For years he paced this mortal earth, To bring himself to decent girth. At night, when all around is still, You’ll find him pounding up a hill; And shrieking peasants whom he meets, Fall down in terror on the peats! Old PETER walks through wind and rain, Resolved to train, and train, and train, Until he weighs twelve stone’ or so— And when he does, I’ll let you know. THE MYSTIC SELVAGEE. Perhaps already you may know SIR BLENNERHASSET PORTICO? A Captain in the Navy, he— A Baronet and K.C.B. You do? I thought so! It was that Captain’s favourite whim (A notion not confined to him) That RODNEY was the greatest tar Who ever wielded capstan-bar. He had been taught so. “BENBOW! CORNWALLIS! HOOD!—Belay! Compared with RODNEY”—he would say— “No other tar is worth a rap! The great LORD RODNEY was the chap The French to polish! Though, mind you, I respect LORD HOOD; CORNWALLIS, too, was rather good; BENBOW could enemies repel, LORD NELSON, too, was pretty well— That is, tol-lol-ish!” SIR BLENNERHASSET spent his days In learning RODNEY’S little ways, And closely imitated, too, His mode of talking to his crew— His port and paces. An ancient tar he tried to catch Who’d served in RODNEY’S famous batch; But since his time long years have fled, And RODNEY’S tars are mostly dead: _Eheu fugaces_! But after searching near and far, At last he found an ancient tar Who served with RODNEY and his crew Against the French in ’Eighty-two, (That gained the peerage). He gave him fifty pounds a year, His rum, his baccy, and his beer; And had a comfortable den Rigged up in what, by merchantmen, Is called the steerage. “Now, JASPER”—’t was that sailor’s name— “Don’t fear that you’ll incur my blame By saying, when it seems to you, That there is anything I do That RODNEY wouldn’t.” The ancient sailor turned his quid, Prepared to do as he was bid: “Ay, ay, yer honour; to begin, You’ve done away with ‘swifting in’— Well, sir, you shouldn’t! “Upon your spars I see you’ve clapped Peak halliard blocks, all iron-capped. I would not christen that a crime, But ’twas not done in RODNEY’S time. It looks half-witted! Upon your maintop-stay, I see, You always clap a selvagee! Your stays, I see, are equalized— No vessel, such as RODNEY prized, Would thus be fitted!