From Josiah Singleton¹

My dear son John

full many a day Has come, rolled on, and passed away To swell the tides of that dread sea Which mortals call eternity (To which not only days but all Who tread this dark terrestrial ball Are floating, down life’s ceaseless stream And fading like the hurried dream That melts before the glowing beam Of mornings earliest ray)

Yes many a day has come and gone Rolling its silent moments on Loaded for some with bitter care Or hope deferred, or dark despair Or, chance, amid life’s changing scene Those fleeting moments may have been

Alas how short their stay!

Full freighted with earth’s small delights

As when some loving heart unites

With heart of kindred passions

In bonds, how transient, but as bright

As nature ever fashions

Full swiftly by these days have fled

Numbering their thousands with the dead

I hope, friend, you’re not tired

For I have not as yet begun

What has and what has not been done

How many have been fired

With schemes as baseless as the air

Or castles that one builds up there

Pretty while building one may swear

But which, confound them will not bear

A moment’s retrospection

I’ve yet said nothing ‘true enough’

I hear you say a pack of stuff

Almost without connexion

I’m much afraid if truth be told

My father’s² brains are growing old

Or something very like it

His harp I know in former days

Resounded to far nobler lays

With bolder hand to strike it

It may be so my son but still

What mortal with the noblest will

To climb the steep Parnassian hill³

Such labour could endure –

As to supply a craving pen

With language, ideas and then

Drink only aqua pura!!!

Please to remember you took care

With steaks and chops and such like fare

To feast the inner man

With brandy too on coach’s top

The ravages of cold to stop

But here’s a different plan

No, brandy, no, nor wine nor beer

Nor porter nor such vulgar cheer

But water pure and bright and clear

Although I must not say I fear

No better ever ran

But to return, full many a day

Has come, rolled on and passed away

Since your epistle came to hand⁴

Posted in Cork ‘Ould Ireland’

And many a time and oft I thought

Of paying as I knew I ought

All that to you was due John

But then ‘tis rather hard to send

Your letter to a distant friend

This you’ll allow is true, John

When all the while you do not know

Where it has pleased that friend to go

I could not send, could you John?

But now your whereabouts is clear

I’ll shortly send you never fear

Half dozen for your six

And if you’re careful to reply

It seems to me that you and I

Will correspond like bricks.

_____________

You’ve seen a mummy ‘praps, my son

At any rate a sketch of one

But those have all been dead

But if you’ll come to my bed side

In Dr Weeding’s⁵ house in Ryde⁶

You’ll have a chance each other day

In spite of what the sceptics say

To see one there in bed.

For first they strip me to the skin

Then wrap a sheet from foot to chin

Quite wet and cold around me

And then with blankets five or six

They wrap me round and in that fix

They leave me where they’ve bound me

Thus hands and arms and legs all fast

This durance has an hour to last

And sometimes two or near it

And if your nose should itch and want

A scratch, your hands are fast you cant

There’s nothing but to bear it

Then I’ve a splash bath very nice

Get well rubbed down and in a trice

Am dressed and off and walking

Then, breakfast, till eleven I sit

And read or write or chat a bit

Tho’ seldom I’ve much talking

Then comes the man with cold wet sheets

To clothe my naked shoulder

At first it brought a sobbing fit

But now I’m grown much bolder

And then I walk and then I dine

And then I labour at the line

A writing here or writing there

Wishing to write nigh everywhere

Till four o’clock when James⁷ again

Comes with the sheet and stops my pen

Then finish letters, then to post

For fear a single day be lost

And then I walk and tea and read

Or write till time to go to bed

And now farewell – ‘tis time I’d done

I am | Your friend | J. Singleton.⁸

RI MS JT/2/13a/292-294

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