[Page 266]

[A thing my dear Lord, that I ne'er should have thought on]

1 A thing my dear Lord, that I ne'er should have thought on
2 Was to hear at Marseilles that you was at Houghton
3 With roast beef and plumb-pudding are treating the Russ
4 While the Austrian Ambassador adds to the fuss,
5 But your looks tell them both you think of your Son
6 Whom here to the Garcons, I say is my own
7 And his wife is so pretty, so sweet a musician,
8 that wants only cramming and not a Physician
9 Turtle Soup — Asses Milk — good porridge all that
10 And much more would I give her to make her quite fat
11 But — I wish you of Blessed years at least have a million,
12 to enjoy all the honours of Brighton's Pavillion
13 Where an order I hear is created for Dames
14 of high Beauty and wit and Poetical Fames
15 I suppose the next order your bosom may cover
16 Will be the most Royal Titche Cross of Hanover
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17 mine got: ser shone is the Thought for 'tis clear
18 A Tedescan order must honour a Peer
19 An Old Peer of England by inheritance too;
20 But unless he is fond of a Bauble that's new —
21 He'll find himself one worth twenty times two
22 of gravens new made, tho like me, saucy Elf,
23 you might claim a Durchlachen from Witikind's self:
24 but before to the land of Sour Crout you are Roving
25 to my own native shore I shall be moving
26 and I hope I shall find you by my wise injunctions
27 having fill'd up Canals and all their vile junctions —
28 for till that is perform'd, as you know I'm no frog
29 Live I cannot where reigns a perpetual fog,
30 and my Rose-color'd mind like Flora's true Rose
31 must droop and be kill'd where the sun never glows;
32 vice-versa, so here as it shines every day
33 my muse she will laugh, dance, sing or play
34 And I thought she might just as well dictate a Letter
35 To make you like mamselle L'asne somewhat better
36 than you did when I shew'd you her name in a box
37 which set you a screaming like Berkeley's game cocks —
38 and so furious you look'd that she ran away
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39 but now has most humbly desired me to say;
40 she only ran away to come and fight another day.
41 if my verse is irregular, you may thank yourself
42 for with me you are an irregular Elf —
43 there are times when all that I do is most charming;
44 at others, the very best jest is alarming.
45 arrangez vous s'il vous plait you never can blame
46 the froth of a cream when the fond is the same
47 for howe'er I may trifle with those I don't know
48 I am always with those that I love, statu quo,
49 and you to this Latin, add, Probatum est
50 for my constant esteem for you is no jest,
51 And tho' you forget me for Ages when near you
52 no time or events from my friendship can tear you.
Elizabeth —12 Jan 1815 Marseilles.

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About this text

Title (in Source Edition): [A thing my dear Lord, that I ne'er should have thought on]
Author: Elizabeth Craven (née Berkeley)
Themes:
Genres: comic verse

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Source edition

Craven, Elizabeth, 1750–1828. The Beautiful Lady Craven: the Original Memoirs of Elizabeth Baroness Craven afterwards Margravine of Anspach and Bayreuth and Princess Berkeley of the Holy Roman Empire (1750-1828). Edited with Notes and a Biographical and Historical Introduction containing much unpublished matter by A. M. Broadley & Lewis Melville. With 48 Illustrations. In Two Vols. London: John Lane The Bodley Head, 1914, pp. 266-267. 

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Typography, spelling, capitalization, and punctuation have been cautiously modernized. The source of the text is given and all significant editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. This ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.