A Waterloo Ballad.

To Waterloo, with sad ado,     And many a sigh and groan,     Amongst the dead, came Patty Head,     To look for Peter Stone.     "O prithee tell, good sentinel,     If I shall find him here?     I'm come to weep upon his corse,     My Ninety-Second dear!     "Into our town a sergeant came,     With ribands all so fine,     A-flaunting in his cap - alas!     His bow enlisted mine!     "They taught him how to turn his toes,     And stand as stiff as starch;     I thought that it was love and May,     But it was love and March!     "A sorry March indeed to leave     The friends he might have kep', -     No March of Intellect it was,     But quite a foolish step.     "O prithee tell, good sentinel,     If hereabout he lies?     I want a corpse with reddish hair,     And very sweet blue eyes."     Her sorrow on the sentinel     Appear'd to deeply strike: -     "Walk in," he said, "among the dead,     And pick out which you like."     And soon she picked out Peter Stone,     Half turned into a corse;     A cannon was his bolster, and     His mattrass was a horse.     "O Peter Stone, O Peter Stone,     Lord, here has been a skrimmage!     What have they done to your poor breast     That used to hold my image?"     "O Patty Head, O Patty Head,     You're come to my last kissing;     Before I'm set in the Gazette     As wounded, dead, and missing!     "Alas! a splinter of a shell     Right in my stomach sticks;     French mortars don't agree so well     With stomachs as French bricks.     "This very night a merry dance     At Brussels was to be; -     Instead of opening a ball,     A ball has open'd me.     "Its billet every bullet has,     And well it does fulfil it; -     I wish mine hadn't come so straight.     But been a 'crooked billet.'     "And then there came a cuirassier     And cut me on the chest; -     He had no pity in his heart,     For he had steel'd his breast.     "Next thing a lancer, with his lance,     Began to thrust away;     I call'd for quarter, but, alas!     It was not Quarter-day.     "He ran his spear right through my arm,     Just here above the joint; -     O Patty dear, it was no joke,     Although it had a point.     "With loss of blood I fainted off,     As dead as women do -     But soon by charging over me,     The Coldstream brought me to.     "With kicks and cuts, and balls and blows,     I throb and ache all over;     I'm quite convinc'd the field of Mars     Is not a field of clover!     "O why did I a soldier turn     For any royal Guelph?     I might have been a Butcher, and     In business for myself!     "O why did I the bounty take?     (And here he gasp'd for breath)     My shillingsworth of 'list is nail'd     Upon the door of death!     "Without a coffin I shall lie     And sleep my sleep eternal:     Not ev'n a shell - my only chance     Of being made a Kernel!     "O Patty dear, our wedding bells     Will never ring at Chester!     Here I must lie in Honor's bed,     That isn't worth a tester!     "Farewell, my regimental mates,     With whom I used to dress!     My corps is changed, and I am now     In quite another mess.     "Farewell, my Patty dear, I have     No dying consolations,     Except, when I am dead, you'll go     And see th' Illuminations."