Beer Analysis

1In those old days which poets say were golden --

2(Perhaps they laid the gilding on themselves:

3And, if they did, I'm all the more beholden

4To those brown dwellers in my dusty shelves,

5Who talk to me "in language quaint and olden"

6Of gods and demigods and fauns and elves,

7Pan with his pipes, and Bacchus with his leopards,

8And staid young goddesses who flirt with shepherds:)



9In those old days, the Nymph called Etiquette

10(Appalling thought to dwell on) was not born.

11They had their May, but no Mayfair as yet,

12No fashions varying as the hues of morn.

13Just as they pleased they dressed and drank and ate,

14Sang hymns to Ceres (their John Barleycorn)

15And danced unchaperoned, and laughed unchecked,

16And were no doubt extremely incorrect.



17Yet do I think their theory was pleasant:

18And oft, I own, my "wayward fancy roams"

19Back to those times, so different from the present;

20When no one smoked cigars, nor gave At-homes,

21Nor smote a billiard-ball, nor winged a pheasant,

22Nor "did" her hair by means of long-tailed combs,

23Nor migrated to Brighton once a year,

24Nor -- most astonishing of all -- drank Beer.



25No, they did not drink Beer, "which brings me to"

26(As Gilpin said) "the middle of my song."

27Not that "the middle" is precisely true,

28Or else I should not tax your patience long:

29If I had said "beginning," it might do;

30But I have a dislike to quoting wrong:

31I was unlucky -- sinned against, not sinning --

32When Cowper wrote down "middle" for "beginning."



33So to proceed. That abstinence from Malt

34Has always struck me as extremely curious.

35The Greek mind must have had some vital fault,

36That they should stick to liquors so injurious --

37(Wine, water, tempered p'raps with Attic salt) --

38And not at once invent that mild, luxurious,

39And artful beverage, Beer. How the digestion

40Got on without it, is a startling question.



41Had they digestions? and an actual body

42Such as dyspepsia might make attacks on?

43Were they abstract ideas -- (like Tom Noddy

44And Mr. Briggs) -- or men, like Jones and Jackson?

45Then nectar -- was that beer, or whisky-toddy?

46Some say the Gaelic mixture, I the Saxon:

47I think a strict adherence to the latter

48Might make some Scots less pigheaded, and fatter.



49Besides, Bon Gaultier definitely shows

50That the real beverage for feasting gods on

51Is a soft compound, grateful to the nose

52And also to the palate, known as "Hidgson."

53I know a man -- a tailor's son -- who rose

54To be a peer: and this I would lay odds on,

55(Though in his Memoirs it may not appear,)

56That that man owed his rise to copious Beer.



57O Beer! O Hodgson, Guinness, Allsopp, Bass!

58Names that should be on every infant's tongue!

59Shall days and months and years and centuries pass,

60And still your merits be unrecked, unsung?

61Oh! I have gazed into my foaming glass,

62And wished that lyre could yet again be strung

63Which once rang prophet-like through Greece, and taught her

64Misguided sons that the best drink was water.



65How would he now recant that wild opinion,

66And sing -- as would that I could sing -- of you!

67I was not born (alas!) the "Muses' minion,"

68I'm not poetical, not even blue:

69And he, we know, but strives with waxen pinion,

70Whoe'er he is that entertains the view

71Of emulating Pindar, and will be

72Sponsor at last to some now nameless sea.



73Oh! when the green slopes of Arcadia burned

74With all the lustre of the dying day,

75And on Cithæron's brow the reaper turned,

76(Humming, of course, in his delightful way,

77How Lycidas was dead, and how concerned

78The Nymphs were when they saw his lifeless clay;

79And how rock told to rock the dreadful story

80That poor young Lycidas was gone to glory:)



81What would that lone and labouring soul have given,

82At that soft moment for a pewter pot!

83How had the mists that dimmed his eye been riven,

84And Lycidas and sorrow all forgot!

85If his own grandmother had died unshriven,

86In two short seconds he'd have recked it not;

87Such power hath Beer. The heart which Grief hath cankered

88Hath one unfailing remedy -- the Tankard.



89Coffee is good, and so no doubt is cocoa;

90Tea did for Johnson and the Chinamen:

91When "Dulce est desipere in loco"

92Was written, real Falernian winged the pen.

93When a rapt audience has encored "Fra Poco"

94Or "Casta Diva," I have heard that then

95The Prima Donna, smiling herself out,

96Recruits her flagging powers with bottled stout.



97But what is coffee, but a noxious berry,

98Born to keep used-up Londoners awake?

99What is Falernian, what is Port or Sherry,

100But vile concoctions to make dull heads ache?

101Nay stout itself -- (though good with oysters, very) --

102Is not a thing your reading man should take.

103He that would shine, and petrify his tutor,

104Should drink draught Allsopp in its "native pewter."



105But hark! a sound is stealing on my ear --

106A soft and silvery sound -- I know it well.

107Its tinkling tells me that a time is near

108Precious to me -- it is the Dinner Bell.

109O blessed Bell! Thou bringest beef and beer,

110Thou bringest good things more than tongue may tell:

111Seared is, of course, my heart -- but unsubdued

112Is, and shall be, my appetite for food.



113I go. Untaught and feeble is my pen:

114But on one statement I may safely venture:

115That few of our most highly gifted men

116Have more appreciation of their trencher.

117I go. One pound of British beef, and then

118What Mr. Swiveller called a "modest quencher";

119That home-returning, I may "soothly say,"

120"Fate cannot touch me: I have dined to-day."

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