Fragment Of A Character.

Here lies Factotum Ned at last;
Long as he breathed the vital air,
Nothing throughout all Europe past
In which Ned hadn't some small share.
Whoe'er was in, whoe'er was out,
Whatever statesmen did or said,
If not exactly brought about,
'Twas all, at least, contrived by Ned.
With Nap, if Russia went to war,
'Twas owing, under Providence,
To certain hints Ned gave the Tsar--
(Vide his pamphlet--price, sixpence.)
If France was beat at Waterloo--
As all but Frenchmen think she was--
To Ned, as Wellington well knew,
Was owing half that day's applause.
Then for his news--no envoy's bag
E'er past so many secrets thro' it;
Scarcely a telegraph could wag
Its wooden finger, but Ned knew it.
Such tales he had of foreign plots,
With foreign names, one's ear to buzz in!
From Russia, shefs and ofs in lots,
From Poland, owskis by the dozen.
When George, alarmed for England's creed,
Turned out the last Whig ministry,
And men asked--who advised the deed?
Ned modestly confest 'twas he.
For tho', by some unlucky miss,
He had not downright seen the King,
He sent such hints thro' Viscount This,
To Marquis That, as clenched the thing.
The same it was in science, arts,
The Drama, Books, MS. and printed--
Kean learned from Ned his cleverest parts,
And Scott's last work by him was hinted.
Childe Harold in the proofs he read,
And, here and there infused some soul in't--
Nay, Davy's Lamp, till seen by Ned,
Had--odd enough--an awkward hole in't.
'Twas thus, all-doing and all-knowing,
Wit, statesman, boxer, chymist, singer,
Whatever was the best pie going,
In that Ned--trust him--had his finger.