The Dandies, a poem (1824)

• Posted by mgr on March 30th, 2008 filed in Zeitdokumente
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THE DANDIES.

BLESS me—what two nondescripts together!
The SHE…a pile of ribband, straw, and feather,
Her back, a pillion—all above, and on it,
A church bell? cradle? tower?—no, faith, a bonnet;
Aye, and an actual woman in it— able,
Rouse but her tongue, to make that tower a Babel.

Now for the He, the fellow nondescript —
Whence has that mockery of man been ship’t ?
Have Ross or Parry brought him to console
The Quidnuncs for the passage to the Pole ?
While on her iceberg howls some Greenland squaw,
Robb’d of her pretty monster— till next thaw ?

No, Paris has the honour, ” ah que oui. ”
” Voila,” — the air, grace, shrug, smell of Paris!
France gave his step trip, his tongue its phrase,
His head his peruke, and his waist its stays!

The thing is contraband — let’s crush the trade ;
Ladies insist on’t — all is best home-made!
All British — from your shoe-tie or your fan,
Down to that necessary brute, call’d — man !

Now for the compound creature— first the wig,
With every frizzle straggling to look big !
On the rough cheek the fresh-dyed whisker spread,
The thousandth way of dressing a calf’s head !

The neckcloth neat— where starch and whalebone vie,
To make the slave a walking pillory !
The bolster’d bosom— ah, ye envying fair,
How little dream ye of the stuff that’s there !
What straps, ropes, steel, the aching ribs compress,
To make the Dandy beautifully less.

Thus fools, their final stake of folly cast,
By instinct, to straight waistcoats come at last !
Misjudging Shakspeare — this escap’d thine eye,
For though the brains are out, the thing won’t die !

Source: The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. February 28th, 1824

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