Tim Turpin
A Pathetic Ballad
Tim Turpin he was gravel blind,
And ne’er had seen the skies:
For Mature, when his head was made,
Forgot to dot his eyes.
So, like a Christmas pedagogue,
Poor Tim was forc’d to do—
Look out for pupils, for he had
A vacancy for two.
There’s some have specs to help their sight
Of objects dim and small:
But Tim had specks within his eyes,
And could not see at all.
Now Tim he woo’d a servant-maid,
And took her to his arms;
For he, like Pyramus, had cast
A wall-eye on her charms.
By day she led him up and down
Where’er he wished to jog,
A happy wife, altho’ she led
The life of any dog.
But just when Tim had liv’d a month
In honey with his wife,
A surgeon ope’d his Milton eyes,
Like oysters, with a knife.
But when his eyes were open’d thus,
He wish’d them dark again:
For when he look’d upon his wife,
He saw her very plain.
Her face was bad, her figure worse,
He couldn’t bear to eat:
For she was any thing but like
A Grace before his meat.
Tim he was a feeling man:
For when his sight was thick,
It made him feel for every thing—
But that was with a stick.
So with a cudgel in his hand—
It was not light or slim—
He knocked at his wife’s head until
It open’d unto him.
And when the corpse was stiff and cold,
He took his slaughter’d spouse,
And laid her in a heap with all
The ashes of her house.
But like a wicked murderer,
He lived in constant fear
From day to day, and so he cut
His throat from ear to ear.
The neighbors fetch’d a doctor in:
Said he, this wound I dread
Can hardly be sew’d up—his life
Is hanging on a thread.
But when another week was gone,
He gave him stronger hope—
Instead of hanging on a thread,
Of hanging on a rope.
Ah! when he hid his bloody work
In ashes round about,
How little he supposed the truth
Would soon be sifted out.
But when the parish dustman came,
His rubbish to withdraw,
He found more dust within the heap
Than he contracted for!
A dozen men to try the fact,
Were sworn that very day;
But tho’ they all were jurors, yet
No conjurors were they.
Said Tim unto those jurymen,
You need not waste your breath,
For I confess myself at once
The author of her death.
And, oh! when I reflect upon
The blood that I have spilt,
Just like a button is my soul,
Inscrib’d with double guilt!
Then turning round his head again,
He saw before his eyes
A great judge, and a little judge,
The judges of a-size!
The great judge took his judgment cap,
And put it on his head,
And sentenc’d Tim by law to hang,
’Till he was three times dead.
So he was tried, and he was hung
(Fit punishment for such)
On Horsham-drop, and none can say
It was a drop too much.
DEATH’S RAMBLE.27
One day the dreary old King of Death
Inclined for some sport with the carnal,
So he tied a pack of darts on his back,
And quietly stole from his charnel.
His head was bald of flesh and of hair,
His body was lean and lank,
His joints at each stir made a crack, and the cur
Took a gnaw, by the way, at his shank.
And what did he do with his deadly darts,
This goblin of grisly bone?
He dabbled and spill’d man’s blood, and he kill’d
Like a butcher that kills his own.
The first he slaughter’d, it made him laugh,
(For the man was a coffin-maker,)
To think how the mutes, and men in black suits,
Would mourn for an undertaker.
Death saw two Quakers sitting at church,
Quoth he, “We shall not differ.”
And he let them alone, like figures of stone,
For he could not make them stiffer.
He saw two duellists going to fight,
In fear they could not smother;
And he shot one through at once—for he knew
They never would shoot each other.
He saw a watchman fast in his box,
And he gave a snore infernal;
Said Death, “He may keep his breath, for his sleep
Can never be more eternal.”
He met a coachman driving his coach
So slow, that his fare grew sick;
But he let him stray on his tedious way,
For Death only wars on the quick.
Death saw a toll-man taking a toll,
In the spirit of his fraternity;
But he knew that sort of man would extort,
Though summon’d to all eternity.
He found an author writing his life,
But he let him write no further;
For Death, who strikes whenever he likes,
Is jealous of all self-murther!
Death saw a patient that pull’d out his purse,
And a doctor that took the sum;
But he let them be—for he knew that the “fee”
Was a prelude to “faw” and “fum.”
He met a dustman ringing a bell,
And he gave him a mortal thrust;
For himself, by law, since Adam’s flaw,
Is contractor for all our dust.
He saw a sailor mixing his grog,
And he marked him out for slaughter;
For on water he scarcely had cared for Death,
And never on rum-and-water.
Death saw two players playing at cards,
But the game wasn’t worth a dump,
For he quickly laid them flat with a spade,
To wait for the final trump!