These are to certify good Men and True,
That I have conveyed the white Heifer to you,
To have and to hold for ever and ye,
On condition of finding her good Grass and Hay.
Go gentle Rocket serve that faithful friend,
Who saved your Master from the spotted fiend—
Go milk-white messenger to “Walworth” go,
And be the generous Harry’s own milch Cow.
When Godfrey doffs his hat with low’ring brow,
And hacks out, Sir, I’ve lost the Rocket Cow;
I’ll ease his heart by telling him a tale,
And make him swicker as with harvest ale—
The Heifer, Godfrey, is to London gone,
To serve my friend–my friend, I had but one:
For know my boy there was a dismal day,
When I your Master trav’ling lost my way,
Forth from a thicket where I dream’t no ill,
A Tiger sprung—I think I see him still,
Fast in his horrid fangs he clasp’d me round,
And foaming laid me sprawling on the ground;
O Godfrey, had you heard your Master cry,
(We heard you, Sir, but none of us were nigh)
Well one was nigh and he a humane man,
Kind and intrepid out the Hero ran,
Touchd to the quick to see my piteous case,
The tear of friendship trickling down his face,
He stamp’d his foot and gave one deadly blow,
The Tiger struggled and his hold let go,
I sprang and fell at my deliverer’s feet,
And vow’d an offering should his Mansion greet.
Godfrey, observe, some hundred years ago,
Before mankind did God the true God know,
They daily offer’d to the unknown good,
A cup of milk, or wine, or salt, or blood,
And when in trouble tried to bribe his power
By promising to make the offering more.
But when the God who lives and reigns above,
Unfolded to his creatures heavenly love—
Magnificent he shone, and thus he said,
I’ll take no bull, no goat, no wine, no blood;
Yet call on me in all your darksome days,
I’ll set you free and you shall give me praise.
Ah! Godfrey, gratitude’s a painful thing—
High heaves my heart, some offering I must bring,
What can I do, God will not have it, then
To ease myself I’ll force that best of men,
That actor of my God in that sad scene,
The great, the good, the generous Henry Keene.
Go favourite heifer, browse beneath his eye,
Crop his rich herbage, near his garden lie:
Lie full in sight the live-long summer’s day,
And round him when he walks my homage pay.
See where he comes, his consort by his side,
The best of wives, his virtue, and his pride—
Twice every day your udder fill nor fail,
Gently to low for Molly and the pail—
She’ll milk you softly don’t you kick her down,
Nor whisk your tail about her Sunday gown.
Methinks I see the full froth’d pail go in.
I see that thirsty heathen Griffiths grin,
O hang the Cow, why don’t she porter give,
By beer and not by milk mankind must live.
Not so, the good old father Winch replies,
His face a cherubs and a dove’s his eyes,
Mistress, I’ll have some milk, Oh! I could live,
Tho’ Heaven had nothing else but milk to give.
I knew a widow who with one milch Cow
Brought up six sons, there’s no such woman now—
Milk was the beverage of Paradise,
Milk harmless milk, that never gender’d vice.
Run, Judith run, your Mistress rings for cream,
See there the circle sits that I esteem,
There sits the Governor like ancient jove,
The man made up of all that mortals love—
There sits the Queen of all domestic peace
And there the man of God with looks of grace;
There Isaac simpers and there Stavely stares,
And there perchance some stranger unawares.
But all are wise and every one loves cream,
E’en tea insipid without that they deem—
But what thy milk and what thy luscious cream,
Delightful Cow, there’s magic in the theme:
Thy silver-fluid Manufacturers know,
Simple and mixed in many channels flow—
With milk the Baker shortens his hot roll,
With milk and rum the Vinter fills the bowl,
With milk the Plasterer silvers o’er the wall,
With milk are Poultry whiten’d for the stall,
With milk the Farmer fats both pork and calf,
And of a pudding milk’s the better half—
With milk the wench stirs up the Ploughman’s froise,
And fries nice shrove-tide Pancakes for good boys,
Cheese-cakes and custards from the milk pail flow,
And thence comes syllabubs and trifles too –
Thence curds-and-whey, posset and white pot come,
Thence many a nick-nack at the Farmer’s home.
See how the flummery on the table shakes,
And how the broad flat hasty pudding quakes,
The gay peas pottage and the gooseberry fool,
The soft milk broth, light food for boys at school.
When Dr. Trindle has spent all his brains,
And could not cure his patient’s racking pains,
A poultice and a glister milk became,
Performed the cure and stole poor Trindle’s fame.
Yet what are these and what ten thousand more!
Thy staple traffick who can e’er explore,
Thy weekly butter and thy daily cheese,
Employ and keep some thousands at their ease—
Thine annual calf, thy rich manure, thine all
Demands a tribute both from great and small.
Go universal blessing, Rocket go,
Long live and preach, and let your Master know
God gave a noble present when he gave—the Cow.