And bids him run. He runneth, To this kind promise listened content, And twisted her legs, sure as eggs is eggs, "Ho! forwards," cries Sophy, "there's no time for The Cossacks are breaking the very last gate in: See the glare of their torches shines red through the grating; We've still the back door, and two minutes or more. Now, boys, now or never, we must make for the river, For we only are safe on the opposite shore. XVIII. Away went the priest through the little back door, The honest old priest was not punished the least, four. Away went the prior, and the monks at his tail And just as the last at the back door had passed, The Tartars so fierce, with their terrible cheers; They pulled the gold crucifix down from the altar; The vestments they burned with their blasphemous fires, And many cried "Curse on them! where are the friars ?" When loaded with plunder, yet seeking for more, One chanced to fling open the little back door, arsons, By crying out lustily, "THERE GO THE PARSONS!" Pursued the poor short-winded men of religion. When the sound of that cheering came to the monks' hearing, O Heaven! how the poor fellows panted and blew! At fighting not cunning, unaccustomed to running, When the Tartars came up, what the deuce should they do? "They'll make us all martyrs, those blood-thirsty Quoth fat Father Peter to fat Father Hugh. nearer; Oh, how the bolts whistled, and how the lights shone! "I cannot get further, this running is murther; Come carry me, some one!" cried big Father John. And even the statue grew frightened, "Od rat you!" And the Tartars after him. How the friar sweated, And the pursuers fixed arrows into their tayls. How, at the last gasp, The friars won, and jumped into Borysthenes fluvius. Appeared the fierce Russians, with sword and with fire. On tugged the good prior at Saint Sophy's desire,- The swift arrows' whizziness causing a dizziness, Father Hyacinth tugged, and the monks they The foemen pursued with a horrible laughter. So true, that next day in the coats of each priest, Now the chace seemed at its worst, When the statue, by Heaven's grace, Of this interesting race, As a saint, sure, only could. For as the jockey who at Epsom rides, When that his steed is spent and punished sore, Diggeth his heels into the courser's sides, And thereby makes him run one or two furlongs Even thus, betwixt the eighth rib and the ninth, XIX. And when the Russians, in a fiery rank, Panting and fierce, drew up along the shore; (For here the vain pursuing they forbore, Nor cared they to surpass the river's bank), Then, looking from the rocks and rushes dank, A sight they witnessed never seen before, And which, with its accompaniments glorious, Is writ i' the golden book, or liber aureus. Plump in the Dnieper flounced the friar and They dangling round his neck, he fit to choke, The venerable Sophy's statue of oak; Each at her bidding sat, and sat at ease; Until they came unto some friendly nation. And when the heathen had at length grown shy of And how the The statue get off Hyacinth his back, and sit down with the friars on Hyacinth his cloak. How in this manner of boat they sayled away. XX. THINK NOT, O READER, THAT WE'RE LAUGHING AT YOU; YOU MAY GO TO KIOFF NOW, AND SEE THE STATUE! Finis, or the end. TITMARSH'S CARMEN LILLIENSE. is gone, My heart is weary, my peace I have no money, I lie in pawn, LILLE, Sept. 2, 1843. I. WITH twenty pounds but three weeks since. I thought myself as rich a prince Confiding in my ample means- I never thought my twenty pounds I gaily passed the Belgic bounds. At Quiévrain, twenty miles from Lille. To Antwerp town I hasten'd post, I felt my pouch,-my purse was lost, O Heaven! Why came I not by Lille? |