Kirkby Lonsdale | Nov. 25th 1842
My dear Tyndall
Enclosed I send you the ‘continuation’.1 I hope it may please you – but I ween2 not – for it does not please me. Jack3 took a notion last week to scheme Friday and Saturday4 and go to the Fair of Ingleton5 to enjoy the fun with Dick Hunter. They both came over here on Sunday morning Jack went home on that evening Dick the evening after. I’ve spun this preface merely to tell you that I had a note from Jack on Tuesday saying that Baker6 had reported him absent from his quarters on Saturday morning, and that Sinnett had written back for ‘all the particulars as the charge was a serious one and should go before Lt. Hamley’. Jack’s excuse was that his work lay nearer Kirkby than Hornby7 and so he came in here on Friday night (I of course will swear to that) I hope it wont injure him in getting the two shillings. I think he will get over it with a slight reprimand, if his S–r8 has not been seen by Baker. I’ve opened a score9 for that monkey sapper to be rubbed off10 when opportunity offers. I hope I may be always kept away from them as I am at present. I just worked 2 hours this week and that within ¼ mile of the town – no sign of compulsion there boy’o. 5 days last week done my fortnight’s work. I had a letter from Jim11 on yesterday. That paragon of cads! for want of other matter he gave me
A taste of ould times – when ‘discussions’ were
in vogue – oh that I was near him just for
two or 3 hours. I’d make my fist ‘acquainted’
with the softest part of his head.
– Tell me Tyndall – did Bessie12 answer his letter. I guess not for if she did he would be proud to boast of it. But ‘I’ll talk of this anon’ ‘Does Miss Edwards squint?’ No! miscreant – dare you trifle so with perfection! Does Claris13 squint? Does Ellen14 squint? did Miss Ronayne15 squint? did the spalpeen16 Sapper squint? did – did, but enough – Do you recollect when you were ‘hailing the last resort’ you surely squinted then! do you recollect when you were embracing the lamp post and crying
‘Here’s the post “she loved so much”
Where I was often planted’
Did you squint then? I (you well know to your grief) could give you enough in this strain. Tell Geo Willm17 got his letter
I will expect a scrap from you shortly.
Yours &c. | Ginty
NB | Tell Fin Malone I will ‘touch him on the raw’ next week See Cuddys vocabulary of witticisms.
P.S. | As you have all the ‘copy rights’ of my productions18 you may as well have this among the rest. Tho’ I cant exactly call it such for it graced the last page of Mary’s19 album a fortnight ago you take care and dont turn Albemarle St. Murray20 on me one of these days!
_______________________
‘Sweet it is to gaze upon’
This Album’s bright and lovely pages
To turn them over one by one
And view the muses in their rages
Here one will sigh – there one will cry
My Mary dear how can I leave thee
Bereft of thee
Where shall I flee
Oh woe is me – nought can relieve me!
________
Another there will sigh and moan
And say his heart is nearly broken
Then leaves when he sets off to roam
A sweet ‘forget-me-not’ – a token –
The token of his lasting love
Which ne’er shall die which nought shall relieve
But still remain
A heavenly flame
To light his soul to lovely Mary!
________
And gazing thus those pages oer
A thought has struck me quite perplexing
Oh! all ye skilled in woman’s core
Unravel this? – for me tis vexing!
Pray tell me how – those lovesuits all
So sadly here within reflected
Of love the elite
Long loud and sweet
Where all – aye every one – rejected?
________
Ye do not know! Ye cannot tell!
No more can I – so let’s try guessing!
The blockheads knew not how to seal
Their loves with kisses and caresses
But sighed and loved and madly roved
In search of pens and ‘midnight taper’
What’s in the name?
Without the game?
Where’s all this love? Why on the paper
________
This paper love I do not like
It’s like the paper easily blasted
Like it tis easily kindled bright
And just as easily quenched and wasted!
It should be written somewhere else
Where it would be more secret – safer
Deep buried in
The breast within
The soul the pen – the heart the paper
________
Then lovely Mary tell me this
Suppose one thought of such a writing
Could you deny his soul the bliss
So heavenly pure so sweet – delighting
Say would’st thou give – suppose he found
The Pen the words, the seal, the taper
Could you refuse
To such a muse
The one thing wanting then – the Paper!
________
I have written another piece in it in Don Juan style,21 in answer to a most bitter piece called ‘man’s love’ you will probably have that in my next
RI MS JT 1/11/3586
LT Transcript Only
the ‘continuation’: see letter 0174, in which the enclosed poem ended ‘To be continued (?)’.
ween: think or suppose (OED).
Jack: John Tidmarsh.
Friday and Saturday: 18 and 19 November 1842.
the Fair of Ingleton: The Yorkshire village of Ingleton held an annual fair, originally for the trading of leather and oatmeal, starting every 17 November (E. Hargrove, The Yorkshire Gazetteer (Knaresborough: Hargrove & Sons, 1806), n.p.).
Baker: see letter 0132, n. 5.
nearer Kirkby than Hornby: Kirkby Lonsdale is a town in Westmoreland (now Cumbria), Hornby a village 7 miles further south in Lancashire. Both are situated close to the River Lune.
S–r: Sapper.
score: a notch or groove made in a piece of timber or metal to allow another piece to be neatly fitted into it (OED).
that monkey sapper to be rubbed off: Ginty may be referring to the brass Royal Engineer Grenade which, since 1825, was worn by Royal Sappers and Miners on the tail of their full dress coatee (Royal Engineers Museum http://www.re-museum.co.uk/research/corps_history/symbols_and_songs/), and may also have been worn by civil assistants working for them. The distinctive insignia of a nine-flame grenade might be rubbed off using a score in a piece of metal (see n. 9).
Jim: Phillip Evans.
Bessie: see letter 0115, n. 17.
Claris: not identified.
Ellen: from Kinsale.
Miss Ronayne: possibly the daughter of Dominick P. Ronayne; see letter 0099, n. 7.
spalpeen: a low or mean fellow; a scamp, a rascal (OED).
Geo Willm: George and William Latimer.
‘copy rights’ of my productions: Ginty is using an earlier meaning of the word, indicating the original manuscripts from which printed copies could be taken (OED).
Mary: Mary Edwards.
Albemarle St. Murray: the publisher John Murray (1778–1843), whose home and office were at 50 Albemarle Street in London’s Mayfair. Ginty may be alluding to Murray’s notorious decision, following the death of Lord Byron in 1824, to burn the manuscript of the poet’s personal memoirs, which he had sent to the publisher several years earlier.
Don Juan style: in the style of Byron’s Don Juan (1819–24), a long satirical and sometimes scandalous poem in seventeen cantos.
Please cite as “Tyndall0176,” in Ɛpsilon: The John Tyndall Collection accessed on 24 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/tyndall/letters/Tyndall0176