A Humorous History of England by Charles Harrison (books to read in your 30s .TXT) 📕
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- Author: Charles Harrison
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Was always turning different ways;
Barnet 1471
On Barnet Field he met his doom
The Rose of York’s now well abloom.
The Barons, Church and Commons fall,
The King emerges Boss of all.
Benevolences he exacts,
An early form of Super Tax.
Earl of Warwick
‘Kingmaker’ was Earl Warwick styled
With his manner scarcely mild
He set Kings up and bowled them down
Playing at ninepins with the Crown.
Wars of Roses 1485
White and Red Rose warring madly
Bled the country very sadly,
Three-and-thirty years contending;
At Bosworth Field we see the ending.
Printing 1473
First in fourteen-seventy-three
We print from type in this Countree.
Now it is that time’s first measured
By monster watches greatly treasured.
Thomas Parr this centurie
His hundred-fifty years did see;
But Henry Jenkins, so ’tis said,
In age was seventeen years ahead.
Hoary patriarchs were these
Retaining p’raps their faculties;
What a comfort ’tis to mention
Neither drew the old age pension.
PRINTING started through the Nation
A taste for higher education;
Here is a citizen at home;
Note his very brainy Dome.
Richard III. 1483–1485
RICHARD (Crookback) in fateful hour
Smothered his nephews in the Tower,
He murdered them the Crown to gain;
A heavy price for three years’ reign.
The Scutcheon’s blotted terribly
Of this King Richard number Three,
For it seems his recreation
Was ordering decapitation.
1485
On Bosworth Field when sorely pressed
He made a bid th’uncommonest
‘My kingdom for a horse’ he cried;
No offers coming, there he died.
Henry VII. 1485–1509
LANCASTRIAN Richmond wins the fight
And to make his title right
Elizabeth of York espouses,
Thus uniting the two Houses.
This Henry Seven of Tudor line
To misers’ habits did incline;
Twelve millions stated to possess,
A tidy little fortune! Yes!
Star Chamber
Much he managed to extort
By means of a Star Chamber Court
From the rich nobles; A new wile
For adding to the kingly pile.
With cash in hand he could attain
His wish as Autocrat to reign;
As sole possessor of the guns
The King no risk from rebels runs.
Columbus 1498
COLUMBUS, full of travellers’ lore,
By going West sought India’s shore;
But found America’s wondrous land;
His ‘exes’ paid by Ferdinand.
Of voyagers we’ve now a lot
Vasco da Gama and Cabot,
Who sailed from Bristol, whence it grew
Bristolians claim this fine cuckoo.
Henry VIII. 1509–1547
NOW Henry Eight comes on the screen,
A stalwart youth, �tat. eighteen;
With youthful hope the nation’s buoyed;
Only, alas! to be destroyed.
Henry VIII. 1509–1547 (continued)
THIS King Henry number Eight
Six times tried the married state;
And certainly of all the Kings
Spent the most on wedding rings.
But to search through old Archives
For tales of Henry and his wives
And all their little tiffs to trace
We cannot spare the time or space.
Yet there are some who fain would sing
The praises of this rotund King;
But as a husband we’re afraid
His category’s lowest grade.
He wielded harsh the despot’s power,
And packed his wives off to the Tower;
Consigned them to a fate most dreaded;
Two, alas! he had beheaded.
HAIL NOW TO THEE OUR GOOD QUEEN BESS! Henry VIII. (continued)
Reformation 1517
MARTIN Luther, fifteen-one-seven,
Sows his Reformation leaven;
It finds a culture medium here
In the ‘New Learning’s’ atmosphere.
Of this New Learning More’s the chief,
Utopia’s Author, He’s ’mid grief
Beheaded, saying cool and calm,
‘Cut not my beard, that’s done no harm.’
His friend Erasmus, Logic’s Master,
Trimmed his sails and ’scaped disaster.
A third, Dean Colet who St. Paul’s
School London into being calls.
Wolsey 1530
In fifteen-thirty Wolsey great,
A Cardinal and Man of State,
From Butcher’s son had risen high.
Reader! consult your Shakespeare nigh.
Blamed by some; by others praised;
He fell; but still the pile he raised
Most nobly graces Hampton Court.
Give Wolsey then a tender thought.
His main ambition that the King
Should be supreme in everything;
Thomas Cromwell
And Thomas Cromwell followed suit
To make his master absolute
Head of the Church within his realm.
These two most able at the helm;
But not with skill enough endued
To ’scape their King’s ingratitude.
Despotical the King’s power grew.
He’s England’s Pope by Act of Su-
Premacy; as, to gain divorce,
The foreign Pope is banned perforce.
1537
Now Bluff King Harry gives the Monks
A series of most awful funks;
Three thousand odd of their domains
He ‘collars’ for his Courtiers’ gains.
Edward VI. 1547–1553
EDWARD Six to the throne succeeds
A pious youth of goodly deeds;
One, well known in the Capital,
The Blue Coat School (Christ’s Hospital).
Mary 1553–1558
QUEEN Mary One, in Smithfield Square,
At Oxford, Gloucester and elsewhere,
Burned poor Martyrs by the score;
The Romish faith she would restore.
Elizabeth 1558–1603
HAIL now to thee our good Queen Bess,
Garbed in the puffed and padded dress,
Farthingale and starched up frills,
Meaning heavy laundry bills.
Od’s Bodikins; what monstrous ruffs,
What gowns of rich embroidered stuffs
Piped and scolloped, trimmed with furs,
And shaped like huge gasometers.
Now we’ve warfare of the Creeds,
For their thoughts all Europe bleeds;
Each party seeks by force to make
The other side its faith forsake.
Spain the Great Power of those days
In these contentions first part plays.
Drake
Drake at bowls on Plymouth Hoe
Left his game to meet this foe
And came home laden we are told
With seachests full of Spanish gold.
Armada 1588
In fifteen-eight-eight Armada strong
From Spain to squash us comes along;
Which Howard, Frobisher and Drake
And stormy weather overtake.
Shakespeare 1564–1616
AND in these epoch making days
Shakespeare wrote and staged his plays;
Weaving a thread whose magic strands
Entwine all English-speaking lands.
Fifteen-eight-seven Scots’ Queen Mary
Lost her head through fate contrary.
When Henry Eight had robbed the Church
’Twas found the poor were in the lurch;
Poor Law
A law was passed about this date
To place the poor upon the rate.
Sir Walter Raleigh 1552–1618
SIR Walter Raleigh, best of Knights,
The first to taste the keen delights
Of the enchantress so serene,
The Ryghte Goode Ladye Nicotine.
No information’s yet to hand
Concerning Raleigh’s favourite brand;
Tobacco
Was it coarse-cut shag which burns
The tongue, or birdseye or returns?
Queen Elizabeth
Good Queen Bess we understand
Had crowds of suitors for her hand;
And here we beg to give a view
Of suitors waiting in a queue.
Queen Elizabeth (continued)
AS time rolled on this Good Queen Bess
Lost somewhat of her sprightliness;
She got into a nervous state
Was mopish and disconsolate.
Now, as everyone will own,
Had ‘Iron Jelloids’ been but known
In Bess’s time; why, it’s conceded
’Twas just the Tonic that she needed.
East India Company 1600
The great ‘John Comp’ny’ now began
Its fine career without a plan.
Great! The Elizabethan Age.
In History’s book a glorious page.
Somewhere or other we’ve heard snuff
Came in the days of frill and ruff;
And here’s a noble ill at ease
Giving the first recorded sneeze.
James I. 1603–1625
JAMES Six of Scotland, miscalled a ‘fule’
As James One of England comes to rule.
Gramercy! ’tis a canny thing
To be a ‘double-barrelled’ King.
The son of Mary Queen of Scots
Of learning he had lots and lots,
Writing sundry ponderous books
’Gainst ’bacca, witches and their spooks.
James thought his kingly power divine
And, loathing Puritanic ‘whine,’
He vowed to make them all comply
Or else he’d ‘know the reason why.’
Pilgrim Fathers 1620
His persecution to escape
Some Zealots in the ‘Mayflower’ shape
Their course for an uncharted world
Where Freedom’s Flag could be unfurled.
These ‘Pilgrim Fathers’ found a state
‘New England,’ blessed with happy fate.
Folks have called the first King James
Most uncomplimentary names;
To wit ‘a sloven’ and ‘a glutton’;
Perhaps his weakness was Scotch Mutton.
And as to gluttony, ‘Gadzooks’!
If what we read in History books
Is true, they all were trenchermen;
There were no diet faddists then.
It startles us, one must declare,
To read their breakfast bill of fare;
All ‘Kynes’ of ale, some highly spiced
And divers meats, roast, boiled and sliced.
In James’ reign a man could get
For money down a coronet
And titles with the greatest ease
Like folks to-day buy soap and cheese.
Harvey
Yet a learned time; for Harvey shows
That blood’s not stagnant, but it flows;
Lord Bacon
‘Experiment!’ Lord Bacon cries
‘There is no progress otherwise.’
5th November 1605
OF troubles James had quite a lot,
For instance the Gunpowder Plot.
It fizzled out but left to-day
A liking for Firework display.
So rockets with their sweeping curves,
Crackers which upset the nerves
And squibs with their infernal din
To this date owe their origin.
Charles I. 1625–1649
HIS son Charles One we understand
Ruled England with a grasping hand;
For he was never loth to levy
Taxes burdensome and heavy.
He moved in an expensive set,
Was always
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