Jacob Homnium’s Hoss

written by


« Reload image

One sees in Viteall Yard,
 Vere pleacemen do resort,
A wenerable hinstitute,
 'Tis call'd the Pallis Court.
A gent as got his i on it,
 I think 'twill make some sport.

The natur of this Court
 My hindignation riles:
A few fat legal spiders
 Here set spin their viles;
To rob the town theyr privlege is,
 In a hayrea of twelve miles.

The Judge of this year Court
 Is a mellitary beak,
He knows no more of Lor
 Than praps he does of Greek,
And prowides hisself a deputy
 Because he cannot speak.

Four counsel in this Court—
 Misnamed of Justice—sits;
These lawyers owes their places to
 Their money, not their wits;
And there's six attornies under them,
 As here their living gits.

These lawyers, six and four,
 Was a livin at their ease,
A sendin of their writs abowt,
 And droring in the fees,
When their erose a cirkimstance
 As is like to make a breeze.

It now is some monce since,
 A gent both good and trew
Possest an ansum oss vith vich
 He didn know what to do:
Peraps he did not like the oss;
 Peraps he was a scru.

This gentleman his oss
 At Tattersall's did lodge;
There came a wulgar oss-dealer,
 This gentleman's name did fodge,
And took the oss from Tattersall's
 Wasn that a artful dodge?

One day this gentleman's groom
 This willain did spy out,
A mounted on this oss
 A ridin him about;
"Get out of that there oss, you rogue,"
 Speaks up the groom so stout.

The thief was cruel whex'd
 To find himself so pinn'd;
The oss began to whinny,
 The honest gloom he grinn'd;
And the raskle thief got off the oss
 And cut avay like vind.

And phansy with what joy
 The master did regard
His dearly bluvd lost oss again
 Trot in the stable yard!

Who was this master good
 Of whomb I makes these rhymes?
His name is Jacob Homnium, Exquire;
 And if I'd committed crimes,
Good Lord I wouldn't ave that mann
 Attack me in the Times!

Now shortly after the groomb
 His master's oss did take up,
There came a livery-man
 This gentleman to wake up;
And he handed in a little bill,
 Which hangered Mr. Jacob.

For two pound seventeen
 This livery-man eplied,
For the keep of Mr. Jacob's oss,
 Which the thief had took to ride.
"Do you see anythink green in me?"
 Mr. Jacob Homnium cried.

"Because a raskle chews
 My oss away to robb,
And goes tick at your Mews
 For seven-and-fifty bobb,
Shall I be call'd to pay?—It is
 A iniquitious Jobb."

Thus Mr. Jacob cut
 The conwasation short;
The livery-man went ome,
 Detummingd to ave sport,
And summingsd Jacob Homnium, Exquire,
 Into the Pallis Court.

Pore Jacob went to Court,
 A Counsel for to fix,
And choose a barrister out of the four,
 An attorney of the six:
And there he sor these men of Lor,
 And watch'd 'em at their tricks.

The dreadful day of trile
 In the Pallis Court did come;
The lawyers said their say,
 The Judge look'd wery glum,
And then the British Jury cast
 Pore Jacob Hom-ni-um.

O a weary day was that
 For Jacob to go through;
The debt was two seventeen
 (Which he no mor owed than you),
And then there was the plaintives costs,
 Eleven pound six and two.

And then there was his own,
 Which the lawyers they did fix
At the wery moderit figgar
 Of ten pound one and six.
Now Evins bless the Pallis Court,
 And all its bold ver-dicks!

I cannot settingly tell
 If Jacob swaw and cust,
At aving for to pay this sumb;
 But I should think he must,
And av drawn a cheque for L24 4s. 8d.
 With most igstreme disgust.

O Pallis Court, you move
 My pitty most profound.
A most emusing sport
 You thought it, I'll be bound,
To saddle hup a three-pound debt,
 With two-and-twenty pound.

Good sport it is to you
 To grind the honest pore,
To pay their just or unjust debts
 With eight hundred per cent. for Lor;
Make haste and get your costes in,
 They will not last much mor!

Come down from that tribewn,
 Thou shameless and Unjust;
Thou Swindle, picking pockets in
 The name of Truth august:
Come down, thou hoary blasphemy,
 For die thou shalt and must.

And go it, Jacob Homnium,
 And ply your iron pen,
And rise up, Sir John Jervis,
 And shut me up that den;
That sty for fattening lawyers in,
 On the bones of honest men.

© William Makepeace Thackeray