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Thomas Chandler Haliburton
Nothing to Eat

Mrs. Merdle At Home

 
   She Discourseth of Nothing to Eat and the Cost thereof.
 
 
   Why Merdle—why did you bring Dinewell to-day?
   So very, though welcome, so quite unexpected!
 
 
   For dinner, if any, I’m sure I can’t say,
   Our servants with washing are all so infected.
 
 
   If any’s provided, ‘t is nothing but scraps
   Of pot-luck or pick up of some common fare;
   Or something left over from last week perhaps,
   Which you’ve brought a friend, and an old one, to share.
 
 
   I never, I’m sure now, so much was ashamed,
   To think he’ll discover—what’s true to the letter—
   We’ve nothing, or next to’t that’s fit to be named,
   For one who is used every day to what’s better.
 
 
   But what can you expect if you come on a Monday?
   Our French cook’s away too, I vow and declare—
   But if you would see us with something to spare,
   Let’s know when you’re coming, or come on a Sunday;
   For that of all others, for churchmen or sinners,
   A day is for gorging with extra good dinners.
 
 
   If Merdle had told me a friend would be here,
   A dinner I’d get up in spite of the bills—
   I often tell butcher he’s wonderful dear—
   He says every calf that a butcher now kills,
   Will cost near as much as the price of a steer,
   Before all the banks in their discount expanded
   And flooded the country with ‘lamp-black and rags,’
   Which poor men has ruined and shipwrecked and stranded
   On Poverty’s billows and quick-sands and crags.
 
 
   And that is just what, as our butcher explains,
   The dickens has played with our beef and our mutton;
   But something is gained, for, with all of his pains,
   The poor man won’t make of himself such a glutton.
 
 
   I’m sure if they knew what a sin ‘t is to eat,
   When things are all selling at extravagant prices,
   That poor folks more saving would be of their meat,
   And learn by example how little suffices.
 
 
   I wish they could see for themselves what a table—
   What examples we set to the laboring poor,
   In prudence, and saving, in those who are able
   To live like a king and his court on a tour.
 
 
   I feel, I acknowledge, sometimes quite dejected
   To think, as it happens with you here today,
   To drop in so sudden and quite unexpected,
   How poor we are living some people will say.
 

Mrs. Merdle goes to Market

 
   With prices outrageous they charge now for meat,
   And servants so worthless are every day growing,
   I wonder we get half enough now to eat,
   And shouldn’t if ‘t want for the fact of my going
   To market to cheapen potatoes and beef,
   And talk to the butchers about their abuses,
   And listen to stories beyond our belief,
   They tell while they cheat us, by way of excuses.
 
 
   And grocers—do tell us—is ‘t legal to charge
   Such prices for sugar, and butter, and flour?
 
 
   Oh, why don’t the Mayor in his wisdom enlarge
   Both weight and measure as he does ‘doubtful power?’
 

The Dinner-bell Rings

   Mrs. Merdle Describes the Sufferings of Dyspepsia and its Remedy.

 
   But come, now, I hear by the sound of the ringing
   That dinner is ready; and time none to spare
   To finish our eating in time for the singing
   At Niblo’s; or at Burton’s drop in for a stare.
 
 
   To ‘kill time’ the object, whatever the source is,
   And that is the reason we sit at the table
   And call for our dinner in slow-coming courses,
   To kill, while we eat, all the time we are able.
 
 
   Though little, I told you, that’s worthy your taste
   You’ll find on our table, pray don’t think us mean—
   Your welcome is ample—that’s better than waste—
   Oh! here comes the soup in a silver tureen—
   ‘Tis mock turtle too—so good for digestion:
   That kills me by inches, the wretched complaint
   Dyspepsia—to cure which, I take by suggestion
   Port-wine in the soup, when I feel slightly faint.
 

The Dinner Table Talk

 
   Now soup, if you like made of beef very nice,
   You’ll find this the next thing to the height of perfection;
   And eaten with ketchup, or thickened with rice,
   Will suit you I know, if this is your selection.
 
 
   My own disposition to this one inclines,
   But dreadful dyspepsia destroys all the pleasure
   Of dinner, except it’s well tinctured with wines
   Which plan I adopt as a health-giving measure.
 
 
   A table well ordered, well furnished, and neat,
   No wonder our nature for ever is tempting;
   And I’d like to know if Mahomet could beat
   Its pleasures—dyspepsia for ever exempting—
   With all that he promised in paradise gained,
   With Houris attendant in place of the churls
   With which we are worried, tormented, and pained—
   The colored men servants, or green Irish girls.
 

Mrs. Merdle doubts Paradise’s Uneating Pleasure

 
   Though Houris are handsome, though lovely the place—
   More lovely perhaps than our own country seat—
   I never could see, in the light of free grace
   What pleasure they have there with nothing to eat.
 
 
   With nothing to wear, if the climate is suiting,
   We might get along I am sure pretty well;
   No washing and starching and crimping and fluting,
   No muslin and laces and trouble of dressing, they tell,
   E’er troubles the women, or bothers the men,
   Who soon grow accustomed, as people do here,
   To fashions prevailing, and things that they ken;
   To dresses fore-shortened where bosoms appear;
   To bonnets that show but a rose in the wearing;
   To dresses that sweep like a besom the street;
   To dresses so gauzy the hoops through are seen;
   To shoes quite as gauzy to cover the feet;
   But watch how a man here goes raving and swearing,
   At wife and all hands, if they’ve nothing to eat!