Blush for ill spelling, for ill lines, And fly with hurry to Rathmines;[1] Thy fame, thy genius, now declines, proud boaster. I hear with some concern your roar And flying think to quit the score, By clapping billets on your door and posts, sir. Thy ruin, Tom, I never meant, I'm grieved to hear your banishment, But pleased to find you do relent and cry on. I maul'd you, when you look'd so bluff, But now I'll secret keep your stuff; For know, prostration is enough to th' lion. [Footnote 1: A village near Dublin.--_F._] SHERIDAN'S SUBMISSION BY THE DEAN Miserae cognosce prooemia rixae, Si rixa est ubi tu pulsas, ego vapulo tantum.[1] Poor Sherry, inglorious, To Dan the victorious, Presents, as 'tis fitting, Petition and greeting. To you, victorious and brave, Your now subdued and suppliant slave Most humbly sues for pardon; Who when I fought still cut me down, And when I vanquish'd, fled the town Pursued and laid me hard on. Now lowly crouch'd, I cry _peccavi_, And prostrate, supplicate _pour ma vie_; Your mercy I rely on; For you my conqueror and my king, In pardoning, as in punishing, Will show yourself a lion. Alas! sir, I had no design, But was unwarily drawn in; For spite I ne'er had any; 'Twas the damn'd squire with the hard name; The de'il too that owed me a shame, The devil and Delany; They tempted me t' attack your highness, And then, with wonted wile and slyness, They left me in the lurch: Unhappy wretch! for now, I ween, I've nothing left to vent my spleen But ferula and birch: And they, alas! yield small relief, Seem rather to renew my grief, My wounds bleed all anew: For every stroke goes to my heart And at each lash I feel the smart Of lash laid on by you. [Footnote 1: Juvenalis, Sat. iii, 288.--_W. E. B._] THE PARDON The suit which humbly you have made Is fully and maturely weigh'd; And as 'tis your petition, I do forgive, for well I know, Since you're so bruised, another blow Would break the head of Priscian.[1] 'Tis not my purpose or intent That you should suffer banishment; I pardon, now you've courted; And yet I fear this clemency Will come too late to profit thee, For you're with grief transported. However, this I do command, That you your birch do take in hand, Read concord and syntax on; The bays, your own, are only mine, Do you then still your nouns decline, Since you've declined Dan Jackson. [Footnote 1: The Roman grammarian, who flourished about A.D. 450, and has left a work entitled "Commentariorum grammaticorum Libri xviii."--_W. E. B._] THE LAST SPEECH AND DYING WORDS OF DANIEL JACKSON MY DEAR COUNTRYMEN, --mediocribus esse poetis Non funes, non gryps, non concessere columnae.[1] To give you a short translation of these two lines from Horace's Art of Poetry, which I have chosen for my neck-verse, before I proceed to my speech, you will find they fall naturally into this sense: