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Thomas Chandler Haliburton
Nothing to Eat

Things That Mortals Eat There

 
   And what do you eat in the mess there compounded?
   For roast beef, the gravy the soap-man should claim—
   The soup some odd things might turn up if sounded,
   And other “made-dishes” might turn up the same.
 
 
   Decoctions that puzzle your chemical skill,
   You get if you call either coffee or tea;
   And milk that is made with and tastes of the swill,
   As like milk, as wine is that often we see
   Is like to the juice of the grape in perfection,
   Or like as the candidate after election
   Is like the fair thing that we hoped or expected
   Before the base thief was exposed or detected;
   As like truth and virtue—and more is the pity—
   The men we elected to rule our own city.
 
 
   In “council” while sitting, though “common” we call them,
   In common opinion, if people at large
   Are’s common in morals, no worse could befal ‘em
   If Satan should take them at once in his charge.
 
 
   If food as their filth was as plenty for diet,
   No lack would they feel of the coveted cash,
   Or power they maintain with the power of a riot,
   When heads of opponents are served up as hash
   By Star-chamber cooks of the club “restoration,”
    That rules now the city and would rule the nation,
   If “Sachems” were willing the “Wigwam” to yield,
   And give the arch-traitor a fair fighting field.
 
 
   But fighting just now is not our intention,
   But dining with Merdle, the banker, in state,
   And only these items like side dishes mention,
   While waiting the coming the main dinner plate.
 

The Invitation

 
   While waiting debating I stated before,
   Jack Merdle drove up in his carriage and bays,
   “Halloo,” said the banker, “I see you’re ashore—
   No wonder—this weather is all in a haze—
   But come in my carriage, and truly confess
   You’re a victim of hunger and dinner down town;
   A case of most common distressing distress;
   When dining in public with Jones, Smith or Brown,
   Or some other practical men of the nation,
   Is worse on the whole than a little starvation.
 
 
   But come home with me for the sake of Lang Syne,
   And see Mrs. Merdle and see how we dine.
 
 
   I must not expect,” he advised in advance,
   “To meet with a dinner got up in perfection,
   But must run the risk of the luck and the chance,
   As candidates do on the day of election.”
 

The Merdle Origin

 
   Now Merdle, en passant, I had known for a score
   Of years, when a dinner with Jones, Brown or Smith
   As good as one gets for a quarter or more,
   Was a thing unthought of, or else but a myth
   In Merde’s day-dreaming of things yet in store,
   When hope painted visions of a painted abode,
   And hope never hoped for anything more—
   I’m sure never dreamed he would dine a la mode.
 
 
   In dreams wildest fancy I doubt if he dreamed,
   That time in its changes that wears rocky shores,
   Should change what so changeless certainly seemed,
   Till Merdle, Jack Merdle, would own twenty stores,
   Much more own a bank, e’en the horse that he rode,
   Or pay half the debts of the wild oats he sowed.
 
 
   I knew when he worked at his old father’s trade,
   And thought he would stick to his wax and the last,
   But Fortune, the fickle, incontinent jade,
   A turn to his fortune has given a cast;
   “A wife with a fortune,” which men hunt in packs,
   To Jack was the fortune that fell to his share;
   A fortune that often is such a hard tax,
   That men hurry through it with “nothing to spare,”
    With “nothing to eat,” or a house “fit to live in,”
    With “nothing half decent” to put on their backs,
   With nothing “exclusive” to have or believe in,
   “Except what is common to common street hacks.”
 
 
   So fortune and comfort, that should be like brothers,
   Though fought for and bled for where fortunes are made,
   Though sought for and failed of by ten thousand others,
   Are not worth the fighting and fuss that is made.
 
 
   But fortune for Merdle by Cupid was cast,
   And bade him look higher than wax and the last,
   That Merdle his father, with good honest trade,
   Had used with the stitches his waxed end had made.
 
 
   I knew when old Merdle lived down by the mill,
   I often went fishing and Jack dug the bait;
   But Jack Merdle then never thought he should fill
   With fish and roast meat such a full dinner plate:
   Nor I, when my line which I threw for a trout
   While Jack watched the bob of the light floating cork,
   Ever thought of the time in a “Merdle turn out”
    To ride, or to dine with a pearl handle fork
   In Jack’s splendid mansion, where taste, waste and style,
   Contend for preemption, as then by the mill,
   Old Merdle contended with fortune the while,
   For bread wherewithal Jack’s belly to fill.
 
 
   I never thought then little Kitty Malone
   As heir to old Gripus would bring him the cash,
   ‘Pon which as a banker Jack Merdle has shone,
   And Kitty in fashion has cut such a dash;
   Nor when as a girl not a shoe to her feet,
   She accepted my offers of coppers or candy,
   She would tell me in satin “we’ve nothing to eat,”
    While eating from silver or sipping her brandy,
   And wond’ring that Merdle, the Jack I have named,
   Should bring home a friend—(‘twas thus she exclaimed—
   The day that I’ve mentioned—a day to remember—
   When Merdle and I in his carriage and bays,
   Through Avenue Five on a day in September,
   Drove up to a mansion with gas-light ablaze.)