The Poetry Corner

The Sinking Fund Cried.

By Thomas Moore

"Now what, we ask, is become of this Sinking Fund--these eight millions of surplus above expenditure, which were to reduce the interest of the national debt by the amount of four hundred thousand pounds annually? Where, indeed, is the Sinking Fund itself?" --The Times. Take your bell, take your bell, Good Crier, and tell To the Bulls and the Bears, till their ears are stunned, That, lost or stolen, Or fallen thro' a hole in The Treasury floor, is the Sinking Fund! O yes! O yes! Can anybody guess What the deuce has become of this Treasury wonder? It has Pitt's name on't, All brass, in the front, And Robinson's scrawled with a goose-quill under. Folks well knew what Would soon be its lot, When Frederick and Jenky set hob-nobbing,[1] And said to each other, "Suppose, dear brother, "We make this funny old Fund worth robbing." We are come, alas! To a very pretty pass-- Eight Hundred Millions of score, to pay, With but Five in the till, To discharge the bill, And even that Five, too, whipt away! Stop thief! stop thief!-- From the Sub to the Chief, These Gemmen of Finance are plundering cattle-- Call the watch--call Brougham, Tell Joseph Hume, That best of Charleys, to spring his rattle. Whoever will bring This aforesaid thing To the well-known House of Robinson and Jenkin, Shall be paid, with thanks, In the notes of banks, Whose Funds have all learned "the Art of Sinking." O yes! O yes! Can anybody guess What the devil has become of this Treasury wonder? It has Pitt's name on't, All brass, in the front, And Robinson's, scrawled with a goose-quill under.