Courtship & marriage

          THE HANDSOME

              WIFE.

MY friends when I was twenty-one
And in every other prime of life,
I did as others might have done.
I took to me a handsome wife.
I went to every fancy ball,
To every play and masquerade,
Till I meet and married Rosa Gall,
A very handsome lady's maid.
So if you wish to married be,
And pass your days in care and strife
Take this lessons, gents, from me,
Have a very handsome wife.

I thought when I had married her,
That I was surley bless'd for life ;
For every gent said to me, " sir,
You've got a very handsome wife,"
I thought so too, until I found
That she used to paint and then
It was well known to all around
That she kept two fancy men.

We had a servant she called " Chalk,"
a man in colour black as ink,
At night they'd out together walk,
And at each other nod and wink,
This man slept up two pair of stair,
Just a flight above my head,
One night, just to complete my cares,
I found him with my wife in bed.

Next day she said that she could get
A better looking man than me ;
And if I put her in a pet,
She'd get her men to chastise me,
Because I said, " I didn't care,"
She took and tore off all my clothes,
Then black'd my eyes—pull'd out my hair,
And bit a piece bang off my nose.

My wife got in a certain way,
And took strange fancies in her head,
Nothing was right that I could say,
Until, at last, she went to bed.
The nurse came knocking at my door,
She said, " Your happiness begins,
Your lady, sir, is in the straw,
And got two lovely colour'd twins.

Next day, while labouring with the gout,
A Bow-street Officer called on me,
Sad he, "Old chap, I've found her out,
If charge her, sir, with bigamy."
So they took away my handsome wife,
And I got lectured by the mayor
For the future I'll lead a single life,
For of beauty I have had my share.

          JOLLY

       NOSE.

Jolly nose, the bright rubies that garnish thy tip,
Are dug from the mines of Canary ;
And to keep up their lusture I moisten my
lip
With hogheads of clarit and sherry.

Jolly nose, he who sees thee across a broad
glass,
Beholds thee in all thy perfection ;
And to the pale snout of a temperate ass,
Entertains the profoundest objection,

For a big belllied glass is the palette I use
And the choicest of wine is my colour,
And I find that my nose takes the mellowest
hues,
The fuller I fill it—the fuller.

Jolly nose, they are fools who say drink
hurts the sight,
Some dullards know nothing about it ;
'Tis better with wine to extinguish the
light,
Than live always in darkness without it.