Freed the captive, and succoured the damsel distrest
              Till Jack would exclaim—
     "If I don't do the same,
     An' I live to become a man,—I'm blest!"

     Jack lightly recked of sport or play
              Wherein young gentlemen delight,
     But he would wrestle any day,
     Box, or at backsword fight.

     He was a lad of special "pluck,"
     And strength beyond his years,
          Or science, gave him aye the luck
          To drub his young compeers.

     His task assigned, like Giles or Hodge,
     The woolly flocks to tend,
          His wits to warlike fray or "dodge"
          Wool-gathering oft would wend.

     And then he'd wink his sparkling eye,
     And nod his head right knowingly,
         And sometimes "Won't I just!" would cry,
         Or "At him, Bill, again!"

          Now this behaviour did evince
          A longing for a foe to mince;
          An instinct fitter for a Prince
          Than for a shepherd swain.

     I.

          Where good Saint Michael's craggy mount
          Rose Venus-like from out the sea,
          A giant dwelt; a mighty- Count
          In his own view, forsooth, was he;
          And not unlike one, verily,

          (A foreign Count, like those we meet
          In Leicester Square, or Regent Street),
          I mean with respect to his style of hair,
          Mustachios, and beard, and ferocious air,—
          His figure was quite another affair.

         This odd-looking "bird"
         Was a Richard the Third,
         Four times taller and five as wide;
         Or a clumsy Punch,
         With his cudgel and hunch,
              Into a monster magnified!

     In quest of prey across the sea
     He'd wade, with ponderous club;
              For not the slightest "bones" made he
              Of "boning" people's "grub."
     There was screaming and crying "Oh dear!" and "Oh law
     When the terrified maids the monster saw;

                 As he stalked—tramp!