“_She!_” in scorn cried the keeper,――Armed Force,――who stood there, With his whip and strait-waistcoat, fair shown, “Don’t think her craze cured, or her turned head set square, Poor L’Espana’s still mad as was ever March hare. It is me you’ve to thank for your throne. “How bonds both a curse and a blessing may be Poor L’Espana is destined to know: In the bonds I put on her salvation you see, Through the bonds she got off bankrupt beggar is she, A world’s warning, a scoff, and a show!” The maniac looked fierce, but her wrath died away To dead calm, that strait-waistcoat displayed, And she crouched and she whined, “’Pon my honour I’ll pay―― And get credit――who knows?――to run more ticks some day, When my ‘_passives_’ once ‘_actives_’ are made. “Then come to my arms――be Alfonso the Brave―― And I’ll be thy fair Imogine.” Here the maniac looked wild, and the keeper looked grave, While Alfonso, poor boy, scarce knew how to behave,―― When a third party stepped on the scene. ’Twas Le Lor Maire of London――that mythical Lord, Who had deigned upon Paris to shine, With herald and trumpeters, sword-bearer, sword, Mace, flags, running footmen――in friendly accord Come England and France to combine! * * * * * Did Alfonso to Stone――Yo El Rey to Lord Mayor―― Give a pledge Spain’s bad debts in to call? And if a pledge――what pledge――and whence when and where Is the money to come, that, betwixt bull and bear, Like a bone of contention will fall? _Punch._ January 16, 1875. ―――― A TERRIBLE TALE. The night it was dark, not a star in the sky, As the Lord Mayor of London passed nervously by A charnel-house crammed with the bodies of those Who had died ’neath grim Radicals’ murderous blows. The wind howled a dirge and the moon hid its face, There were skulls and dry blade-bones all over the place; But the Lord Mayor of London, no tremor had he―― Said his lordship, “It’s here that the thieves will put me.” So he crept past the tombs and the graves of the dead, In spite of grim spectres, with eye-sockets red; And he hid him away in a newly-made grave, Just to see how at midnight the ghosts would behave. Thought he, “I will watch these poor victims arise―― They shall tell me their sorrows, I’ll gather their sighs; And I’ll hie me away at the crow of the cock To give the good people of England a shock. “I shall hear how these noble old corpses were killed―― They’ll describe how their innocent claret was spilled; And I’ll never take breath through my burning harangue Till the world knows the crimes of the Radical gang.” Just then a wild tempest broke over the scene―― The bells clanged out midnight, his lordship turned green; For, with clamour and cry, in their shrouds from their graves, There arose the dead victims of Radical knaves.