Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, ODE TO THE LATE LORD MAYOR, ON PUBLICATION OF HIS 'VISIT TO OXFORD', by THOMAS HOOD


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

ODE TO THE LATE LORD MAYOR, ON PUBLICATION OF HIS 'VISIT TO OXFORD', by                 Poet Analysis     Poet's Biography
First Line: O worthy mayor! - I mean to say ex-mayor
Last Line: And every lord mayor his own recorder!
Subject(s): Oxford, England; Politics & Government


O WORTHY MAYOR! -- I mean to say Ex-Mayor!
Chief Luddite of the ancient town of Lud!
Incumbent of the City's easy chair! --
Conservator of Thames from mud to mud!
Great river-bank director!
And dam-inspector!
Great guardian of small sprats that swim the flood!
Lord of the scarlet gown and furry cap!
King of Mogg's map!
Keeper of Gates that long have "gone their gait!"
Warder of London stone and London Log!
Thou first and greatest of the civic great,
Magog or Gog! --

O Honourable Ven --
(Forgive this little liberty between us),
Augusta's first Augustus! -- Friend of men
Who wield the pen! --
Dillon's Maecenas!
Patron of leaning where she ne'er did dwell,
Where literature seldom finds abettors,
Where few -- except the postman and his bell --
Encourage the bell-lettres! --
Well hast thou done, Right Honourable Sir --
Seeing that years are such devouring ogresses,
And thou hast made some little journeying stir, --
To get a Nichols to record thy Progresses!

Wordsworth once wrote a trifle of the sort;
But for diversion,
For truth -- for nature -- everything in short --
I own I do prefer thy own "Excursion."
The stately story
Of Oxford glory --
The Thames romance -- yet nothing of a fiction --
Like thine own stream it flows along the page --
"Strong, without rage,"
In diction worthy of thy jurisdiction!
To future ages thou wilt seem to be
A second Parry;
For thou didst carry
Thy navigation to a fellow crisis.
He penetrated to a Frozen Sea,
And thou -- to where the Thames is turned to Isis!

I like thy setting out!
Thy coachman and thy coachmaid boxed together!
I like thy Jarvey's serious face -- in doubt
Of "four fine animals" -- no Cobbetts either!
I like the slow state pace -- the pace allowed
The best for dignity -- and for a crowd,
And very July weather,
So hot that it let off the Hounslow powder!
I like the She-Mayor's proffer of a seat
To poor Miss Magnay, fried to a white heat;
'Tis well it didn't chance to be Miss Crowder!

I like the steeples with their weathercocks on,
Discerned about the hour of three, P.M.
I like thy party's entrance into Oxon,
For oxen soon to enter into them!
I like the ensuing banquet better far,
Although an act of cruelty began it; --
For why -- before the dinner at the Star --
Why was the poor Town-clerk sent off to plan it?

I like your learned rambles not amiss,
Especially at Bodley's, where ye tarried
The longest -- doubtless because Atkins carried
Letters (of course from Ignorance) to Bliss!
The other Halls were scrambled through more hastily;
But I like this --
I like the Aldermen who stopped to drink
Of Maudlin's "classic water" very tastily,
Although I think -- what I am loth to think --
Except to Dillon, it has proved no Castaly!

I like to find thee finally afloat;
I like thy being barged and Water-Bailiff'd,
Who gave thee a lift
To thy state-galley in his own state-boat.
I like thy small sixpennyworths of largess
Thrown to the urchins at the City's charges;
I like the sun upon thy breezy fanners,
Ten splendid scarlet silken stately banners!
Thy gilded bark shines out quite transcendental!
I like dear Dillon still,
Who quotes from "Cooper's Hill,"
And Birch, the cookly Birch, grown sentimental;
I like to note his civic mind expanding
And quoting Denham, in the watery dock
Of Iffley lock --
Plainly on Locke upon the Understanding!
I like thy civic deed
At Runnymede,
Where ancient Britons came in arms to barter
Their lives for right -- Ah, did not Waithman grow
Half mad to show
Where his renowned forefathers came to bleed --
And freeborn Magnay triumph at his Charter?
I like full well thy ceremonious setting
The justice-sword (no doubt it wanted whetting!)
On London Stone; but I don't like the waving
Thy banner over it, for I must own
Flag over stone
Reads like a most superfluous piece of paving!

I like thy Cliefden treat; but I'm not going
To run the civic story through and through,
But leave thy barge to Pater Noster Row-ing,
My plaudit to renew. --
Well hast thou done, Right Honourable rover,
To leave this lasting record of thy reign,
A reign, alas! that very soon is "over
And gone," according to the Rydal strain!
'Tis piteous how a mayor
Slips through his chair.
I say it with a meaning reverential,
But let him be rich, lordly, wise, sentential,
Still he must seem a thing inconsequential --
A melancholy truth one cannot smother;
For why? 'tis very clear
He comes in at one year,
To go out by the other!
This is their Lordships' universal order! --
But thou shalt teach them to preserve a name --
Make future Chaplains chroniclers of fame!
And every Lord Mayor his own Recorder!





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