The English Spy: An Original Work Characteristic, Satirical, And Humorous. C. M. Westmacott

Of cit, west-ender, and noblesse,

       Who in Hyde Park crowd like a fair

       To stare, and lounge, and take the air,

       Or ride or drive, or walk, and chat

       On fashions, scandal, and all that.—

       Here, reader, with your leave, will we

       Commence our London history.

       'Twas Sunday, and the park was full

       With Mistress, John, and Master Bull,

       And all their little fry.

       The crowd pour in from all approaches,

       Tilb'ries, dennets, gigs, and coaches;

      The bells rung merrily.

       Old dowagers, their fubsy faces{2}

       Painted to eclipse the Graces,

       Pop their noddles out

       Of some old family affair

       That's neither chariot, coach, or chair,

       Well known at ev'ry rout.

       But bless me, who's that coach and six?

       "That, sir, is Mister Billy Wicks,

       A great light o' the city,

       Tallow-chandler, and lord mayor{3};

       Miss Flambeau Wicks's are the fair,

       Who're drest so very pretty.

       It's only for a year you know

       He keeps up such a flashy show;

       And then he's melted down.

       The man upon that half-starved nag{4}

       Is an Ex-S———ff, a strange wag,

       Half flash, and half a clown.

       But see with artful lures and wiles

       The Paphian goddess, Mrs. G***s,{5}

       2 There are from twenty to thirty of these well known relics

       of antiquity who regularly frequent the park, and attend all

       the fashionable routs—perfumed and painted with the

       utmost extravagance: if the wind sets in your face, they may

       be scented at least a dozen carriages off.

       3 It is really ludicrous to observe the ridiculous pride of

       some of these ephemeral things;—during their mayoralty, the

       gaudy city vehicle with four richly caparisoned horses is

       constantly in the drive, with six or eight persons crammed

       into it like a family waggon, and bedizened out in all the

       colours of the rainbow;—ask for them six months after, and

       you shall find them more suitably employed, packing rags,

       oranges, or red herrings.

       4 This man is such a strange compound of folly and

       eccentricity, that he is eternally in hot water with some

       one or other.

       5 Mrs. Fanny G-1-s, the ci-devant wife of a corn merchant,

       a celebrated courtezan, who sports a splendid equipage, and

       has long figured upon town as a star of the first order in

       the Cyprian hemisphere. She has some excellent qualities,

       as poor M————n can vouch; for when the fickle goddess

       Fortune left him in the lurch, she has a handsome annuity

       from a sporting peer, who was once the favoured swain.