Old Pardon, the Son of Reprieve.
A RACING RHYME.
[For The Bulletin]
You never heard tell of the story?
Well, now, I can hardly believe!
Never heard of the honour and glory
Of Pardon, the son of Reprieve?
But maybe you're only a Johnnie
As don't know a horse from a hoe?
Well, well, don't get angry, my sonny,
But, really, a young 'un should know.
I'll tell you the story of Pardon—
I've got the old horse by me yet,
And I give him the run of the garden,
Though the missus does grumble and fret
When he chaws up the roses an' daisies
Or rolls on the beds when they're new;
But some slight amusement, I say, is
No more than is justly his due.
They bred him out back on "the Never,"
His mother was Mameluke breed.
To the front—and then stay there—was ever
The root of the Mameluke creed.
He seemed to inherit their wiry
Strong frames, and their pluck to receive—
As hard as a flint and as fiery
Was Pardon, the son of Reprieve.
We ran him at many a meeting
At crossing and gully and town,
And nothing could give him a beating—
At least when our money was down.
For weight wouldn't stop him, nor distance;
Nor odds, though the others were fast,
He'd race with a dogged persistence,
And wear them all down at the last.
At the Turon the Yattendon filly
Led by lengths at the mile and-a-half,
And we all began to look silly
While her crowd were starting to laugh;
But the old horse came faster and faster,
His pluck told its tale, and his strength,
He gained on her, caught her, and passed her,
And won it, hands-down, by a length.
And then we swooped down on Menindie
To run for the President's Cup—
That's a sweet little township—a shindy
To them is board, lodging, and sup.
Eye-openers they are, and their system
Is never to suffer defeat;
It's "win, tie, or wrangle"—to best 'em,
You must lose 'em, or else it's "dead heat."
We strolled down the township and found 'em
At drinking and gaming and play,
If they had any sorrows they drowned 'em,
And betting was soon under way.
Their horses were good 'uns and fit 'uns,
There was plenty of cash in the town;
They backed their own horses like Britons,
And Lord! how we rattled it down!
With gladness we thought of the morrow,
We counted our wagers with glee,
A simile homely to borrow—
"There was plenty of milk in our tea."
You see we were green; and we never
Had even a thought of foul play,
Though we well might have known that the clever
Division would "put us away."
Experience "docet," they tell us,
At least, so I've frequently heard,
But, "dosing" or "stuffing," those fellows
Were up to each move on the board;
They got to his stall—it is sinful
To think what such villains would do—
And they gave him a regular skinful
Of barley—green barley—to chew.
He munched it all night, and we found him
Next morning as full as a hog—
The girths wouldn't nearly meet round him,
He looked like Jim Smiley his frog;
We saw we were done like a dinner—
The odds were a thousand to one
Against Pardon turning up winner,
'Twas cruel to ask him to run.
We got to the course with our troubles,
A crestfallen couple were we;
And we heard the books calling the doubles—
A roar like the surf of the sea;
And over the tumult and louder
Rang "Any price Pardon, I lay!"
Says Jimmy, "The children of Judah
Are out on the warpath to day."
Three miles in three heats:—Ah, my sonny,
The horses in those days were stout,
They had to run well to earn money,
I don't see such horses about.
Your six-furlong vermin that scamper
Half-a-mile with their feather-weight up,
They wouldn't earn much of their damper
In a race like the President's Cup.
The first heat was soon set a-going,
The Dancer went off to the front;
The Don on his quarters was showing,
With Pardon right out of the hunt,
He rolled and he weltered and wallowed,
You'd kick your hat faster, I'll bet.
They finished all bunched and he followed
All lathered and dripping with sweat.
But troubles came thicker upon us,
For while we were rubbing him dry
The stewards came over to warn us—
"We hear you are running a bye!
If Pardon don't spiel like damnation
And win the next heat—if he can,
He'll earn a disqualification,
Just think over that, now, me mahn!"
Oar money all gone and our credit,
Our horse couldn't gallop a yard,
And then people thought that we did it!
It really was terribly hard.
We were objects of mirth and derision
To the folk in the lawn and the stand,
And the yells of the clever division
Of "Any price, Pardon!" were grand.
We still had a chance for the money,
Two heats still remained to be won,
If both fell to us—why, my sonny,
The clever division were done
And Pardon was better, we reckoned,
His sickness was passing a way,
So he went to the post for the second
And principal heat of the day.
They're off! and away with a rattle,
Like dogs from the leashes let slip,
And right at the back of the battle
He hung to them under the whip.
They led him ten lengths at the bushes,
The jockey sat down for a call,
And then while the multitude hushes
I think you'd have heard a pin fall.
We saw the blue jacket was gaining,
We saw his old mouth open wide,
At the bit he was reefing and straining,
And crawling up close every stride.
The field were at sixes and sevens,
The pace at the first had been fast,
And hope seemed to drop from the heavens,
For Pardon was coming at last.
And how did he come! It was splendid;
He gained on them yards every bound,
Stretching out like a greyhound extended,
His girth laid right down on the ground.
A shimmer of silk in the cedars
As into the running they wheeled,
And out flashed the whips on the leaders,
For Pardon had collared the field.
Then right through the ruck he came sailing,
I knew that the battle was won—
The son of Haphazard was failing,
The Yattendon filly was done;
He cub down the Don and the Dancer,
He raced clean away from the mare—
He's in front! Catch him now if you can, sir!
And up went my hat in the air!
Then loud from the lawn and the garden
Rose offers of "Ten to one on!"
"Who'll bet on the field? I back Pardon!"
No use, all the money was gone.
He came for the third heat light-hearted,
A-jumping and dancing about,
While the others were done ere they started,
Crestfallen, and tired, and worn out.
He won it, and ran it much faster
Than even the first, I believe—
Oh, he was the daddy, the master!
Was Pardon, the son of Reprieve.
He showed 'em the method to travel—
The boy sat as still as a stone—
They never could see him for gravel;
He came in hard-held, and alone.
••••••
But he's old, and his eyes are grown hollow,
Like me with my thatch of the snow;
When he dies, then I hope I may follow,
And go where the racehorses go.
I don't want no harping nor singing,
Such things with my style don't agree;
Where the hoofs of the horses are ringing
There's music sufficient for me.
And I feel that the thoroughbred horses
After death rise again and begin
Fresh racing on far-away courses,
And p'raps they might let me slip in.
It would look rather well the race-card on
'Mongst Cherubs, and Seraphs, and things,
"Angel Harrison's black gelding Pardon,
Blue halo, white body and wings."
And if they have racing hereafter
(And who is to say they will not?),
When the cheers and the shouting and laughter
Proclaim that the battle grows hot;
As they come down the racecourse a-steering,
He'll rush to the front, I believe;
And you'll hear the white angels a-cheering
For Pardon, the son of Reprieve.
Nasty Remarks.
(Many Original and some True.)
Nothing comes of those who wet.
To the clergy—"The rich ye have always with ye."
"Any man can make money." Any woman can spend money.
Banqueting the successful man is like re-gilding a pawnbroker's sign.
Blessed are the poor, for they shall inherit the earth. Yes, six feet of the earth.
In obtaining divorces always employ the same lawyer. There's a reduction on a quantity.
Purgatory is the place where you will meet the middle-classes. Then purgatory must be hell.
A "lady-help" is a single woman who helps herself to her mistress's shoes. This needs thinking over.
"The kiss is a prolific means of spreading disease." Yes, there are more widows than widowers about.
Men who buy women with diamonds get them cheapest in the long run. Diamonds are cheaper than pieces of your heart.
Women are of two kinds, angelically good or infernally bad. There is no medium sort. When they are good they are too good for this world, and when they are bad they ought to be sent out of it.
"Long after palæolithic man had passed away, a Chinese junk burst into these silent seas, with youth at the prow and pleasure at the helm, to the sound of the inspiring tom-tom. Old legends tell how the grisly apparition of these adventurous children of the Sun affrighted our peaceful Southern Ocean as it passed on its mysterious way. . . . The enterprising navigator of that pre-historic junk, scanning the future with dim prophetic eye, saw that Australia had better be left for some other active persons to do the rough work of colonisation; and after that his bland and patient Celestial descendents might come along without ruffling an eyelash, and scoop the whole institution like the merest fan-tan pool."—Vide Bulletin "History of Botany Bay":—
Touch the melancholy tom-tom
To a wild and weird refrain—
Let the brazen gongs and conches
Swell the bold historic strain.
Tell the legend, marrow-curdling,
Of that dim, phantasmal skunk
Who burst through the Silent Ocean
Jubilating!—in a junk!
How that cheerful apparition,
With his pig-tail on his head,
Scared the sleeping Austral Beauty
Till the girl got up and fled.
Nob with odour-wafts of Araby,
Clinging to his silken sails,
Did he fool round in his cruises,
As we read in other tales.
Swooped he not about the planet
In a picturesque galleon,
Or a shell-like shallop, guided
By the echo of a tune.
Not much! No! That navigator
Knew no tommy-rob like this—
This disgusting Chinese person
Smelt far otherwise, we wis.
Sloops there were not, neither shallops—
As we said before, this skunk
(Dim, phantasmal, we described him)
Jubilated in a junk.
With a hideous crash of cymbals,
Tom-tom music, wild and weird,
This grey pre-historic horror
Came, and saw, and—disappeared.
Like an Afreet, or a nightmare
Born of fell back-blocks champagne,
lie just came and raised the devil,
Turned—and sailed away again.
Sped into the purple distance
With his sails of dungaree—
With his tom-toms and his fragrant
Odours, not of Araby.
As regards the Austral Beauty,
We may mention that the girl,
When the spectre burst upon her,
Rose, and lit out with a skirl.
Lit out o'er the dim horizon
Where the wattle-blossom waves
[Bard who couldn't work that line in
Might as well be digging graves.—Ed. B.]
Skipped right out!—indeed, this spectre
Might make stronger people wince.
[We may remark the Austral Beauty
Has been missing ever since.—Ed. B.]
So he came and so he vanished—
So the misty legends run—
Up the red track of the sunrise
To the Offspring of the Sun.
Why he came, and why departed,
Why he ever lived or died,
Why he wasn't changed in childhood,
We could not tell if we tried.
Who his father was, or mother—
If he was an orphan boy—
If some swivel-eyed young person
Viewed him as her pride and joy—
If he proudly scorned the poll-tax
This we know nob, neither care—
Not to be deceitful persons
We admit we weren't there.
It may be some Joss, pot-bellied,
Yanked him to the Golden Shore
By his pig-tail—all we know is
He came back here never more.
Years have passed, and now we scoop him
In the scuppers of our rhyme,
And we send him fumigated
Down the corridors of Time.
With a dainty touch we spit him
In the forceps of our verse—
[Whatsoever fate his crimes brought
Couldn't possibly be worse.—Ed. B.]
In the coming time, when slant eyed,
Pig-tailed heathens populate
This the region he discovered
Holding high posts in the State,
Then some yellow Dan. O'Connor,
Or some slant-eyed Burdett Smith,
Will remember him with honour
And resuscitate this myth.
Build a statue—or a tombstone
To perpetuate his fame,
With an epitaph regretting
That they didn't know his name.
And a carven bas-relievo
Whereon the phantasmal skunk
Will be pictured jubilating
In his joy—likewise the junk.
