The barmaid of the Crown he loved, From whom he never ranged, For tho’ he changed his horses there, His love he never changed. He thought her fairest of all fares, So fondly love prefers; And often, among twelve outsides, Deemed no outside like hers. One day as she was sitting down Beside the porter-pump-- He came, and knelt with all his fat, And made an offer plump. Said she, my taste will never learn To like so huge a man, So I must beg you will come here As little as you can. But still he stoutly urged his suit, With vows, and sighs, and tears, Yet could not pierce her heart, altho’ He drove the Dart for years. In vain he wooed, in vain he sued; The maid was cold and proud, And sent him off to Coventry, While on his way to Stroud. He fretted all the way to Stroud, And thence all back to town; The course of love was never smooth, So his went up and down. At last her coldness made him pine To merely bones and skin; But still he loved like one resolved To love through thick and thin. Oh, Mary, view my wasted back, And see my dwindled calf; Tho’ I have never had a wife, I’ve lost my better half. Alas, in vain he still assail’d Her heart withstood the dint; Though he had carried sixteen stone He could not move a flint. Worn out, at last he made a vow To break his being’s link; For he was so reduced in size At nothing he could shrink. Now some will talk in water’s praise And waste a deal of breath, But John, tho’ he drank nothing else-- He drank himself to death. The cruel maid that caused his love, Found out the fatal close, For, looking in the butt, she saw The butt-end of his woes. Some say his spirit haunts the Crown, But that is only talk-- For after riding all his life, His ghost objects to walk. NUMBER ONE. VERSIFIED FROM THE PROSE OF A YOUNG LADY. It’s very hard!--and so it is, To live in such a row, And witness this that every Miss But me, has got a Beau. For Love goes calling up and down, But here he seems to shun; I’m sure he has been asked enough To call at Number One! I’m sick of all the double knocks That come to Number Four! At Number Three, I often see A Lover at the door: And one in blue, at Number Two, Calls daily like a dun,-- It’s very hard they come so near, And not to Number One! Miss Bell I hear has got a dear Exactly to her mind, By sitting at the window pane Without a bit of blind; But I go in the balcony, Which she has never done, Yet arts that thrive at Number Five Don’t take at Number One!