Classic Poem

With the best of goodwill, but rough numbers, I raise
To our excellent selves a song-offering of praise:
Away with mock modesty! We are the men
Who love to live now as the Doctor lived then.
For his writings... 'tis true that not all of us read them:
But we walk in his ways, and his precepts, we heed them;
The town and its taverns, the sound of the street,
To the genuine Johnsonian , are merry and sweet.
" The country is sweeter " , you say, sir! Why, no, sir:
A dull misanthropical prig may think so, sir!
Let him babble alone of green fields at a distance:
For us, Charing Cross's " full tide of existence! "
But the place of our pride we love best to remember
Is the Cheshire Cheese, Fleet Street, Thirteenth of December:
When the Brethren , all eager and bright, flock together,
Johnsonianissimi , birds of a feather:
When the Scribe gives the word for beginning the revel,
And everything dismal is sent to the devil:
When the Chaplain has murmured his brief Benedicite ,
And we sit on " the thrones of all human felicity "
(Which is how, you must know, " tavern chairs " were defined
By the Great Lexicographer's accurate mind):
When nobody bothers us, critic or creditor,
Client, constituent, contributor, editor;
When we're done for awhile with all worry and work,
Free and easy as any unspeakable Turk :
When for winter's worst weather we care not a jot,
But the fogs and the winds and the rains are forgot
In the pipe-bowl so ruddy, the punch-bowl so hot:
When the firelight goes dancing around the old wall,
And glows on our glasses and us, one and all,
And our feast is the bravest for miles round Saint Paul !
Then the wits pour the wine of their wit at its best,
And the rafters are ringing with infinite zest:
While the Prior makes it plain to the meanest capacity
That he champions the chair with uncommon tenacity,
Standing no nonsense, nor any audacity.
Oh! then is the height of our pleasure and pride,
As we sit in good fellowship trusty and tried.
If the Doctor himself were to join our festivity
Would the Brethren submit to his tongue with passivity?
(For if the dear Doctor were sharing our punch,
And daring that perilous pudding to munch,
He might call us " you dogs " , and say " he'd have a frisk with us " ,
But he'd " down " us as well, and be mightily brisk with us.)
Certain Brethren , may be, would meet more than their match,
And some would soon talk of the trains they must catch;
Having caught quite enough from the tongue of the Sage ,
Whose ways have not probably altered with age;
For, as Browning has sung, he was " ever a fighter " ,
And I'm sure he fights still, at some heavenly Mitre .
But Brethren there are who would fight to the last,
And be fresh as at first, when the " good talk " was past:
They would soothe the huge Talker, smooth him, disarm him,
Fortiter face him and suaviter charm him;
(Though sundry Whig principles well might alarm him):
And perhaps, if the Great Man were tamed, and all was well,
He'd give us his honest opinion of Boswell .
If only it might be! ... But, long as we may,
We shall ne'er hear that laughter, Gargantuan and gay,
Go pealing down Fleet Street and rolling away.
In silence we drink to the silent, who rests
In the warmth of the love of his true lovers' breasts.