MAMMON: 
A high connexion, Purganax.  The bridegroom 205
Is of a very ancient family,
Of Hounslow Heath, Tyburn, and the New Drop,
And has great influence in both Houses;—­oh! 
He makes the fondest husband; nay, TOO fond,—­
New-married people should not kiss in public; 210
But the poor souls love one another so! 
And then my little grandchildren, the gibbets,
Promising children as you ever saw,—­
The young playing at hanging, the elder learning
How to hold radicals.  They are well taught too, 215
For every gibbet says its catechism
And reads a select chapter in the Bible
Before it goes to play.

[A MOST TREMENDOUS HUMMING IS HEARD.]

PURGANAX: 
Ha! what do I hear?

[ENTER THE GADFLY.]

MAMMON: 
Your Gadfly, as it seems, is tired of gadding.

GADFLY: 
Hum! hum! hum! 220
From the lakes of the Alps, and the cold gray scalps
Of the mountains, I come! 
Hum! hum! hum! 
From Morocco and Fez, and the high palaces
Of golden Byzantium; 225
From the temples divine of old Palestine,
From Athens and Rome,
With a ha! and a hum! 
I come!  I come!

All inn-doors and windows 230
Were open to me: 
I saw all that sin does,
Which lamps hardly see
That burn in the night by the curtained bed,—­
The impudent lamps! for they blushed not red, 235
Dinging and singing,
From slumber I rung her,
Loud as the clank of an ironmonger;
Hum! hum! hum!

Far, far, far! 240
With the trump of my lips, and the sting at my hips,
I drove her—­afar! 
Far, far, far! 
From city to city, abandoned of pity,
A ship without needle or star;—­ 245
Homeless she passed, like a cloud on the blast,
Seeking peace, finding war;—­
She is here in her car,
From afar, and afar;—­
Hum! hum! 250

I have stung her and wrung her,
The venom is working;—­
And if you had hung her
With canting and quirking,
She could not be deader than she will be soon;—­ 255
I have driven her close to you, under the moon,
Night and day, hum! hum! ha! 
I have hummed her and drummed her
From place to place, till at last I have dumbed her,
Hum! hum! hum! 260

NOTE: 
260 Edd. 1820, 1839 have no stage direction after this line.

[ENTER THE LEECH AND THE RAT.]

LEECH: 
I will suck
Blood or muck! 
The disease of the state is a plethory,
Who so fit to reduce it as I?