Hyde Park from Domesday-book to Date. Ashton John
his emptied pockets,
And much of ships he muttered, and of rockets;
Of silly Fêtes – and Jubilees unthrifty —
And babies overgrown, of two and fifty;32
I guess’d the train of thought which then possess’d him,
And deem’d th’ occasion fit, and thus address’d him:
“ ‘Be generous to a fallen foe,
With gratulations meet,
On Elba’s Emperor bestow
Thy Liliputian fleet:
“ ‘For, with his Island’s narrow bounds,
That Navy might agree,
Which, laugh’d at daily here – redounds
In ridicule to thee.’
“Says John, ‘Right readily I’ll part
With these, and all the gay things,
But it would break the R – ’s heart
To take away his play things.’ ”
Or take the two following distiches: —
“A simple Angler, throwing flies for trout,
Hauled the main mast, and lugg’d a First Rate out.
“A crow in his fright, flying over the Fleet,
Dropped something, that covered it all, like a sheet.”
In contemporary accounts, the “Naumachia” was generally very summarily dismissed, and the following is, perhaps, one of the best of them.
“Between eight and nine o’clock, the Grand Sea Fight took place on the Serpentine River, where ships of the line, in miniature, manœuvred and engaged, and the Battle of the Nile was represented in little. Of this mock naval engagement on the great Serpentine Ocean, it would be extremely difficult to give any adequate description. It is, perhaps, sufficient to observe that it was about on a par with spectacles of a similar nature, which have been frequently exhibited at the Theatres… We were as heartily glad when the cockle-shell fight was over, as we had been tired of waiting for it. We were afraid, at one time, whether it would have neither beginning nor end. Indeed, there had been a wretched skirmish between four and five in the afternoon, between an American and an English frigate,33 at the conclusion of which, the English colours were triumphantly hoisted on the rebel Yankee… At a signal given, the fireworks in the Green Park were let off, and four of the little fleet in the Serpentine were set on fire. The Swans screamed, and fluttered round the affrighted lake.”
Such an opportunity for his satirical pen could not be missed by C. F. Lawler, the then pseudo Peter Pindar, and he wrote thereon: “Liliputian Navy!!! The R – t’s Fleet, or John Bull at the Serpentine.” – “The P – e’s Jubilee.” “The R – l Showman.” “The R – l Fair, or Grande Galante Show.” And, on the sale of the Temple of Concord, which had been erected in the Green Park: “The Temple knock’d down: or R – l Auction. The last lay of the Jubilee.” They are mostly scurrilous and spiteful, but from the first of them I take the following: —
“Now to Hyde Park the crowds repair,
To mark the wonders of the fair;
To view the long extended line,
The glory of the Serpentine.
“Now sounds the Cannon, near and far,
The signal for the naval war,
The cockle fleet their flounder sails
Now spread to catch the whisp’ring gales.
“Now meet the rival ships; now rave
The echoing thunders o’er the wave;
Within the banks the eels retire,
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