A running river
    Of harmless merriment. 
      My object all sublime
      I shall achieve in time—­
  To let the punishment fit the crime—­
         The punishment fit the crime;
      And make each prisoner pent
      Unwillingly represent
  A source of innocent merriment,
         Of innocent merriment!

All prosy dull society sinners,
Who chatter and bleat and bore,
Are sent to hear sermons
From mystical Germans
Who preach from ten to four,
The amateur tenor, whose vocal villanies
All desire to shirk,
Shall, during off hours,
Exhibit his powers
To Madame Tussaud’s waxwork. 
The lady who dyes a chemical yellow,
Or stains her grey hair puce,
Or pinches her figger,
Is blacked like a nigger
With permanent walnut juice. 
The idiot who, in railway carriages,
Scribbles on window panes,
We only suffer
To ride on a buffer
In Parliamentary trains. 
My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time—­
To let the punishment fit the crime—­
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment,
Of innocent merriment!

The advertising quack who wearier
With tales of countless cures. 
His teeth, I’ve enacted,
Shall all be extracted
By terrified amateurs. 
The music hall singer attends a series
Of masses and fugues and “ops”
By Bach, interwoven
With Sophr and Beethoven,
At classical Monday Pops. 
The billiard sharp whom any one catches,
His doom’s extremely hard—­
He’s made to dwell
In a dungeon cell
On a spot that’s always barred. 
And there he plays extravagant matches
In fitless finger-stalls,
On a cloth untrue
With a twisted cue,
And elliptical billiard balls!

My object all sublime
I shall achieve in time—­
To let the punishment fit the crime—­
The punishment fit the crime;
And make each prisoner pent
Unwillingly represent
A source of innocent merriment,
Of innocent merriment!

THE HOUSE OF PEERS.

When Britain really ruled the waves—­
(In good Queen Bess’s time)
The House of Peers made no pretence
To intellectual eminence,
Or scholarship sublime;
Yet Britain won her proudest bays
In good Queen Bess’s glorious days!

  When Wellington thrashed Bonaparte,
  As every child can tell,
  The House of Peers, throughout the war,
  Did nothing in particular,
  And did it very well;
  Yet Britain set the world a-blaze
  In good King George’s glorious days!

  And while the House of Peers withholds
  Its legislative hand. 
  And noble statesmen do not itch
  To interfere with matters which
  They do not understand,
  As bright will shine Great Britain’s rays,
  As in King George’s glorious days!