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8 1 19 20120206 19 SONG 57. On the Buck Hunt in the county of Limerick, abovementioned. Tune: LAURY GROGAN. 1 By your leave, LAURY GROGAN, / Enough has been spoken, It’s time to give over your sonnet, your sonnet; Come listen to mine, sir, / Much truer than thine, sir, For these very eyes were upon it, upon it. It is of a Buck slain / This very campaign, To let him live longer, were pity, were pity; For head and for branches, / For fat and for haunches, Exceeding the mayor of a city, a city. A council assembled, / (Who’d think but he trembled) Of lads of good spirit, well mounted, well mounted; Each his whip and cap on, / And spurs made at Rippon 2 , The number full twenty, well counted, well counted. But in legs he confiding, / All efforts deriding; He thought himself safe as in bed, sir, in bed, sir; With a bounce off he goes, / And toss’d up his nose; But Ringwood cry’d lord help your head, sir, your head, sir. Off scores we went bounding, / Sweet horns were a sounding, Each youth fill’d the grove with a whoop and a halloo; DUBOURG were he then there, / Such sweet music to hear, Would leave his Cremona 3 and follow, and follow. Knockdiscan, knockainy, / And hills twice as many; We scamper’d o’er stone walls, o’er hedges, o’er ditches; He skimm’d o’er the grounds, / But to baffle our hounds, Was ne’er yet in any Buck’s breeches, Buck’s breeches. Four hours he held out, / Most surprizingly stout, ’Till at length to his fate he submitted, submitted; His throat being cut up, / And poor culprit put up, To the place whence he came was remitted, remitted. 4 A place most enchanting, / Where nothing was wanting, The poor hungry huntsman could wish for, could wish for; Of delicate fare, / (Tho’ numbers were there) Yet every man was a dish for, a dish for. We fell to with fury, / Like a long-famish’d jury, Nor stay’d we for grace to our dinner, our dinner; The butler a sweating, / The knives all a whetting, The edge of each stomach was keener, was keener; The bumper went round / With a beautiful sound, Clink, clink, like the sweet bells, went the glasses, the glasses; We dispatch’d queen and king, / And each other fine thing, To bumper the beautiful lasses, sweet lasses. There was sweet SALLY CURRY, / And SINGLETON CHERRY, Miss CROKER, miss BLIGH, and miss PRITTY, miss PRITTY; With lovely miss PIERCE, / That subject of verse, Who shall ne’er be forgot in my ditty, my ditty. With numberless more, / From fifteen to a score, 5 Oh had you but seen them together, together; Such charms you’d discover, / You’d pity Louvre, 6 And offer St. James 6 as a feather, a feather. The man of the house, / And his beautiful spouse, May they live to give claret and venison, venison; And may honest NED, / There’s no more to be said, Ne’er want the beggar’s old benison, benison. Long prosper that county, / The store house of bounty, Where thus we indulge, and make merry, make merry For jovial as we are, / We puff away all care, To POOR ROBIN and FLEURY, and FLEURY. 7 1 An old favourite song. – We should acknowledge our- selves under an obligation to any gentleman or lady who would favour use with a copy of that song, di- rected to J. Hoey, junior. 2 A town famous for making spurs. 3 A place in Italy where the best fiddles are made: here put for the fiddle of the famous MR. DUBOURG. 4 The park of the mansion house, where he was let out. 5 Alluding to the ages of the ladies. 6 The beauties at the courts of France and England. 7 SIR ROBERT WALPOLE and CARDINAL FLEURY, one the prime minister of the court of England the other of that of France, at the time the ballad was wrote. ‘Euphrosyne’, one of the Three Graces, was the Greek goddess of mirth and enjoyment. Also in The Chaplet of Chearfulness … is a further song to the tune ‘Larry Grogan’ (p. 84) and one to ‘Jack Lattin’ (pp. 92–3), both from Kane O’Hara’s burlesque opera Midas (1759). The collection was republished under the far more louche title, The Coal-Hole of Cupid: a collection of songs: now published for the en- tertainment of all those bucks, who would ren- der themselves agreeable to the fair, when in midnight conversation (London, 1768). The only substantial difference to the song itself (pp. 56–60) is the omission of Hoey’s footnote seeking the text of ‘Larry Grogan’, and the conversion of the references numbers to sym- bols. This version of the ‘Limerick Buck-Hunt’ was also republished, without the introduction but still with the tune direction ‘Laury Gro- gan’, in George Alexander Stevens (ed.), The Choice Spirit’s Chaplet: or a Poesy from Par- nassus. Being a select collection of songs, from the most approved authors … (Whitehaven, 1771), pp. 45–8. Further changes creep into later editions, and with the dropping of the tune direction the significance of the opening line was lost. 13

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2012-02-01T00:00:00

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