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Bab Ballads (version 2)

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<h2>A DISCONTENTED SUGAR BROKER</h2> A Gentleman of City fame    Now claims your kind attention; East India broking was his game,    His name I shall not mention:       No one of finely-pointed sense       Would violate a confidence,             And shall I go             And do it?  No!    His name I shall not mention. He had a trusty wife and true,    And very cosy quarters, A manager, a boy or two,    Six clerks, and seven porters.       A broker must be doing well       (As any lunatic can tell)             Who can employ             An active boy,    Six clerks, and seven porters. His knocker advertised no dun,    No losses made him sulky, He had one sorrow—only one—    He was extremely bulky.       A man must be, I beg to state,       Exceptionally fortunate             Who owns his chief             And only grief    Is—being very bulky. “This load,” he’d say, “I cannot bear;    I’m nineteen stone or twenty! Henceforward I’ll go in for air    And exercise in plenty.”       Most people think that, should it come,       They can reduce a bulging tum             To measures fair             By taking air    And exercise in plenty. In every weather, every day,    Dry, muddy, wet, or gritty, He took to dancing all the way    From Brompton to the City.       You do not often get the chance       Of seeing sugar brokers dance             From their abode             In Fulham Road    Through Brompton to the City. He braved the gay and guileless laugh    Of children with their nusses, The loud uneducated chaff    Of clerks on omnibuses.       Against all minor things that rack       A nicely-balanced mind, I’ll back             The noisy chaff             And ill-bred laugh    Of clerks on omnibuses. His friends, who heard his money chink,    And saw the house he rented, And knew his wife, could never think    What made him discontented.       It never entered their pure minds       That fads are of eccentric kinds,             Nor would they own             That fat alone    Could make one discontented. “Your riches know no kind of pause,    Your trade is fast advancing; You dance—but not for joy, because    You weep as you are dancing.       To dance implies that man is glad,       To weep implies that man is sad;             But here are you             Who do the two—    You weep as you are dancing!” His mania soon got noised about    And into all the papers; His size increased beyond a doubt    For all his reckless capers:       It may seem singular to you,       But all his friends admit it true—             The more he found             His figure round,    The more he cut his capers. His bulk increased—no matter that—    He tried the more to toss it— He never spoke of it as “fat,”    But “adipose deposit.”       Upon my word, it seems to me       Unpardonable vanity             (And worse than that)             To call your fat    An “adipose deposit.” At length his brawny knees gave way,    And on the carpet sinking, Upon his shapeless back he lay    And kicked away like winking.       Instead of seeing in his state       The finger of unswerving Fate,             He laboured still             To work his will,    And kicked away like winking. His friends, disgusted with him now,    Away in silence wended— I hardly like to tell you how    This dreadful story ended.       The shocking sequel to impart,       I must employ the limner’s art—             If you would know,             This sketch will show    How his exertions ended. MORAL. I hate to preach—I hate to prate—    I’m no fanatic croaker, But learn contentment from the fate    Of this East India broker.       He’d everything a man of taste       Could ever want, except a waist;             And discontent             His size anent,    And bootless perseverance blind, Completely wrecked the peace of mind Of this East India broker. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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