The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1833-04-26 00:00:00

Vain),

ON DEATH.

-Wa come from nothing into life, a time
We measure with a short breath, and that often
Made tedious too, with our own cares that fill it,
Which, like so many atoms in a sunbeam,
But crowd and jostle one another. All,
From the adored purple to the hairclotb,
Must centre in a shade, and they that have
Their virtues to wait on them, bravely mock
The ru.,,ed storms that so much fright them here,
When their soul's launched by death into a sea
That's ever calm.

Hark ! how chimes the passing bell
There's no music to a knell
All the other sounds we hear ,
-Flatter, and but cheat the ear.
This doth put us still in mind
That our flesh must be resign'd,
And, a general silence made,
The world be muffled in a shade.
Orpheus' lute, as poets tell,
V'as but moral to this bell,
And the captive soul was she
Which they call Euridice,
Rescued by our holy groan,
A loud echo"to this tone.
Ile that on his pillow lies.
Fear embalmed, before he dies,
Carries, like a sheep, his life
To the sacrificer's knife.

Why come ye to the place of prayer
With jewels in your braided hair ?
And wherefore is the house of God
By glittering feet profanely trod ;
As if. vain things, ye came to keep
Some festival, and not to weep 7
Oh ! prostrate weep before that Lord
Of earth and heaven, of life and death,
'Who blights the fairest with a word,
And blasts the mightiest with a breath !

Go 'tis not thus in proud array
Such sinful souls should dare to pray.
Vainly to anger'd Heaven ye raise
Luxurious hands where diamonds blaze ;
And she, who comes in broidered veil
To weep her frailty, still is frail.

VARIETIES.

In the gray of the Sunday morning, at the sound of the
tatitin-bell, the gin temples open wide their portals to all corners.
'lime was when yin was to be found only in bye-lanes and blind
alleys—in dirty obscure holes, y'clep'd dram-shops; but now,
thanks to an enlightened and paternal government, gin is be-
come a giant denn-god—a mighty spirit dwelling in gaudy gold-
beplastered temples, erected to his honour in every street, and
worshipped by countless thousands, who daily sacrifice at his
shrine their health, their strength, their money, their minds,
their bodies, wives, children, sacred home, and liberty. Jag-
ger'naut is but a fool to him !—for the devotees of Jaggernaut
.do but put themselves in the way of being crushed to death
beneath his chariot-wheels, and are put out of their misery at
once ;—but the devotees of the Great Spirit Gin devote them-
selves to lingering misery ;--for his sake they are contented to
drag on a degraded, nasty existence—to see their children pine,
dwindle, and famish; to steep themselves in poverty to the
very lips, and die at last poor, sneaking, beadle-kicked, gruel-
swollen paupers! Sunday is especially devoted to the worship
of this great spirit; and when the early Sabbath bells announce
the arrival of that day, then do the lower orders' begin to
shake off the beery slumbers of the midnight pay-table, and
wander forth in.maudlin unwashed multitudes to the temples of
the Great Spirit Gin; and there, Sir, you may see them, the
ancient and the infant of a span long—old men and maidens,
.gransires and grandams, fathers anu mothers, husbands, wives,
and children, crowding and ,jostling like so many maggots
in a grease-pot,' and sucking in the portions of the spirit which
the haunting priestesses of the temple dole out to them in re-
turn for their copper offerings. * * * * There has
been much carping at the barbers fur opening their shops on a
Sunday ; against which carping we hereby enter our protest ;
for what a cruel thing it would be to debar the barber from
shaving a poor man on a Sunday, when it is a well-known fact
that pour men are too stupid to shave themselves ! And even
if a poor man had wit to shave himself, the purchase of a razor
would take out of his hard earnings at least ten pence!—and
perhaps, the razor would not last him longer than ten years, or
thereabout; whereas the barber only charges him a penny a
share—which, at twice a-week for the whole ten years, would
not amount to more than four pounds she shillings and eight-
pence ! Besides, whilst one rich man in a hundred is too lazy
to shave himself, and prefers having his nose pulled about by a
barber, there can he no reason given why all the poor men
should not indulge in the same cheap luxury. * * * * *
• The raw,' cockneycally so called, is a sore place on horse or
ass—an opening iu the hide which leaves the bare flesh and
nerves exposed as a mark for the whip of the driver. Take
•the following commentary thereon from the lips of a learned
omnibus-driver on the Paddington-road:— You may take
your oath there's nothing like a raw for getting the go out of a
boss as long as there's any in him. You calla cruel ; but I'll
just take and tell you how it is now—and I'll leave you to
guess. Your buggy gentlemen and sich, they takes and uses all
the high courage out of a hoss—very good. Then they sells
him to us, and we flogs the work out of him ; but after a bit he
gets whip-hardened, and worked down as it were, though its
like there's plenty of go in him still, if we could only get it out.
Well, then conies the use of the raw; and if the raw don't
come natural, by the rubbing of the traces and sich like, why
some folks will make a raw, with a bit of blister-plaster, or
what not, (but I don't hold with that ere, for we shouldn't like
it ourselves,) and its a mortal to see how you may get all the rest
of the work out of a hoss quite sprightly, by whipping into
the raw, till he hasn't a leg left to stand upon, and is good for
nothing but the knackers' shambles. It may be cruelish, per-
haps; but its all fair in the way of trade. We buy the hosses
for the work what's in 'em • and we've a right to get the work
out of 'em of course—or else what's the use ?* * * * *
Lest you, gentle leader, should not be one of the initiated, we
will, for your edification and future government, describe what
a Torting paper is. A sporting paper is published only on Sun-
day, and very appropriately it deprecates all 'religious observ-
g.!lce of the Sunday; as cant and humbug; and it denounces
all police officers as public nuisances and raw lobsters; but it
patronizes the ' fancy, and flash houses, and propogates
slang; it registers the genealogy of prize fighters and bull-
does; it publishes the challenges of these worthies, and gives
full, true, and particular accounts of the grand slap-up fights'
consequent thereon; and the state of the odds, as first blood'
was drawn; also it keeps a register of the extraordinary
feats' which celebrated horses' have by wet whip and bloody
spur been encouraged to perform,- the number of shots fired
and birds killed by the valiant Tomtit and Sparrow Clubs at
the Red House in Battersea Fields—and whether the said
birds were killed in bounds' or out of bounds;' and it
gives notice of all the coining bull-baitings, badgerbaitings,
and duck-hustings, and when they arc to ' come off,' and the
state of the odds thereon: Finally, it resolves and determines
all disputed gambling debts, ancrexpatiateth on every other
matter and thing which can interest • sporting characters'—that
is to say, bullies, bruisers, and black-legs. And, perhaps,
gentle reader, you would stare if you were told that the pro-
prietor of the most police-defying, Sabbath'-decrying, betting,
and bullying Sunday newspaper, is a worshipful magistrate of
the city of London. But, nevertheless, such is the fact. In-
deed, there are but two of these sporting Sunday papers; and
.the only one which constantly decryeth the observance of the
Sabbath,' and denonneeth the police as raw lobsters,' is pre-
cisely that one which is the property of his worshiip the magic-
trate.---Cruikshank's Illustrations of a Sunday
in London.
CHARACTER. OF CaRRETT.—After speaking of Cobbett's
"intimate familiarity with the father of lies," Mr. Hall adds
—" •Ihese and such like extrava,gancies will be quite sufficient
to satisfy the reader that he (Cobbett) is a popular declaimer,
nova philosopher; a firebrand, not a luminary. lie emits fire
and smoke in abundance, like a volcano; but the whole effect
is to desolate, not to enlighten. His piincipal artifice consists
is the exhibition of a few speciaas generalities, which he illus-
trates and -confirms by a few prominent facts, culled for his
purpose, with,eit the slightest attempt at that patipt induction
anlinquiry, which alone can lead to solid and useful results.
Shrewd, intemperate, presumptuous, careless of the truth of his
representatiims,and indijArent to their consequences, provided
they make an impression, he is we'll qualified, it must be con-
fessed, by his faults no less than his talents, by his inflammatory
style and incendiary spirit, for the office he assumes—to scatter
delusion, to excite Insurrection—the Polyphemus of the mob,
the one-eyed monarch of the blind."--:.Robot Hall's tract on
the Frame-work Knitters' Fund.