Terrible Tractoration, and Other Poems

By Thomas Green Fessenden

Terrible Tractoration is Fessenden’s collection of poems comments on the human condition. With grandiose allusions to historical Greek and European figures Homer and Joan of Arc, Terrible Tractoration rhymes about various inventions and how they relate to science and religion.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sharp Ink
• Release date: Jun 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9788028205874

Book preview

Thomas Green Fessenden

Terrible Tractoration, and Other Poems

Sharp Ink Publishing

2022

Contact: [e-mail]

ISBN 978-80-282-0587-4

Table of Contents

PREFACE.

CANTO I. OURSELF!

ARGUMENT.

CANTO II. CONJURATIONS!

ARGUMENT.

CANTO III. MANIFESTO.

ARGUMENT.

CANTO IV. GRAND ATTACK!

ARGUMENT.

No. I. Fitted for female education.

No. II. In foreign source of yellow fever.

No. III.

AN ODE. [125]

THE MORNING.

AN ODE. [126]

ON THE DEATH OF WASHINGTON.

DIRECTIONS FOR DOING POETRY. IN THE SIMPLE STYLE OF SOUTHEY, WORDSWORTH, AND OTHER MODERN METRE MONGERS.

HORACE SURPASSED.

SONG. [129]

TABITHA TOWZER.

THE SPLENDORS OF THE SETTING SUN.

THE SLEEP OF THE SLUGGARD.

A SOFT ANSWER TURNETH AWAY WRATH.

HAVING FOOD AND RAIMENT, LET US THEREWITH BE CONTENT.

HARVEST—INTEMPERANCE.

LINES WRITTEN IN A YOUNG LADY’S ALBUM.

THE INDEPENDENT FARMER.

THE CULTIVATOR’S ART.

AN ODE.

THE COURSE OF CULTURE.

A SONG.

THE EVILS OF A MISCHIEVOUS TONGUE.

CHEERFULNESS.

EULOGY ON THE TIMES.

THE ART OF PRINTING.

THE OLD BACHELOR

CALORIC.

THE ILLS OF IDLENESS.

PREFACE.

Table of Contents

---

In submitting the present edition of the following poem, entitled Terrible Tractoration, to the American public, the author complies not only with solicitations of personal friends, but with expressed wishes of many gentlemen to whom he is personally a stranger. They say that by stripping folly of some of its disguises, and plucking the mask of deception from that impudent charlatanry, which encumbers the march of improvement, this burlesque production may be of service to mankind.

The origin of the poem entitled Tractoration, is as follows: In the year 1801 the author, (who is a native of Walpole, New Hampshire,) was in London, on business as an agent for a Company in Vermont. In that Metropolis he became acquainted with Mr Benjamin Douglas Perkins, proprietor of a patent right for making and using certain implements, called Metallic Tractors. These were said to cure diseases in all or nearly all cases of topical inflammation, by conducting from the diseased part the surplus of electric fluid which in such cases, causes or accompanies the morbid affection. At the request of that gentleman, the author undertook to make the Tractors the theme of a satirical effusion in Hudibrastic verse. This was originally intended for the corner of a newspaper, but subsequently in the first edition enlarged to a pamphlet of about fifty pages royal octavo. It was published in the summer of 1803, well received, and a second edition called for in less than two months. A new and enlarged edition was put to press, and met with a favorable reception both from the public and the reviewers. From the success which attended Tractoration, the author was induced to publish in London a small volume of Original Poems, which was well received and favorably reviewed.

The author never would have written a syllable intended to give Metallic Tractors favorable notoriety, had he not believed in their efficacy. As conductors of what is called animal electricity, and in principle allied to Galvanic stimulants, even their modus operandi, he thought, might be in a great measure explained. Respectable English Reviews and other periodicals gave favorable notices of the Tractors, and Mr Perkins exhibited to the author testimonials in favor of those implements from several professors of universities, many regular physicians, surgeons, clergymen, and others, men of as high standing and influence as any in community.

But although the author was willing to aid the proprietor of the tractors, he did not confine himself to topics connected with those implements. He made use of Tractoration as the title, and the tractors as the apology for a poem, in which he essayed to paint

——"every idle thing

Which Fancy finds in her excursive flight."

Although many of the subjects alluded to, or animadverted on were intended to be satirized, others were introduced merely to give them notoriety, or honorable mention in a humorous way; to laugh with rather than to laugh at the inventors, and rather to advertise than to stigmatise their inventions, &c. Persons of this description will perceive our objects, appreciate our motives, and recollect that Dr Caustic, by virtue of a figure in rhetoric, called irony, can speak one thing and mean another, without uttering falsehood.

The author conceives that he was fortunate as regards the plan of Tractoration. Dr Caustic, who may be styled the hero of the poem, is represented as a visionary, eccentric, would-be philosopher, endeavoring to effect grand discoveries and inventions of most immense utility, but had received so little encouragement that he was impelled by necessity to petition the Royal College of Physicians in London, for relief from penury, and assistance in his projects. In pursuance of this plan, every thing novel, singular, relating to any human pursuit, it was competent for Dr Caustic to make the object of discussion or animadversion.

The miscellaneous poems, which, in this little volume succeed Tractoration, are, in part, selected from a volume first published in London, and partly from poems written in this country since the author’s return from Europe. He hopes not to be condemned for unpardonable egotism, if he quotes a passage or two from English and American reviews relative to his poetical productions. If a traveller produces passports, or a candidate for office exhibits recommendations, we do not condemn him for pride, nor chastise him for presumption.

The Gentleman’s Magazine, published in London, Jan. 1804, contains a long notice of Tractoration, from which the following passages are extracted:

In the first Canto the author, in an inimitable strain of irony, ridicules those pretended discoveries and inventions of certain pseudo-philosophers both of the natural and moral class, which have no tendency to meliorate the condition of man. After many extracts from the work, and encomiums on each of the four cantos, the reviewers conclude, Whatever may be the merits of the Metallic Tractors, or the demerits of their opponents, we have no hesitation to pronounce this performance to be far superior to the ephemeral productions of ordinary dealers in rhyme. The notes, which constitute more than half the book, are not behind the verse in spirit. Who the author can be we have not the least conception; but from the intimate acquaintance he discovers with the different branches of medical science, we should imagine him to be some jolly son of Galen, who, not choosing to bestow all his arts upon his PATIENTS, has humanely applied a few ESCHAROTICS for the benefit of his brethren.

The following is extracted from a review written by the Hon. Daniel Webster, while a student at law in Boston.

In commending Christopher Caustic, we are only subscribing to the opinions expressed by the people of another country. To be behind that country in our appreciation of his merits, were a stigma; it is very pardonable to go beyond it. National vanity may be a folly, but national ingratitude is a crime. Terrible Tractoration was successful on its first appearance in England, and as yet seems to have lost none of its popularity. It belongs to that class of productions which have the good fortune to escape what Johnson angrily, but too justly, denominates the general conspiracy of human nature against cotemporary merit.

Monthly Anthology for April, 1805.

The eminence of Mr Webster, whose acquisitions as a scholar are scarcely exceeded by his qualifications as a statesman, is our apology for exhibiting the above testimony of his approbation.

We might add to the above, other extracts from about twenty English and American Reviewers, in which the poems contained in this little volume have been taken notice of with much commendation; but we hope the work may meet a favorable reception without such extraneous assistance.

In the present edition of Tractoration several new subjects are introduced and thrown into the crucible of Dr Caustic. Among these are Phrenology, Abolition, Amalgamation, Temperance, Reformation, &c. &c. These parts were written expressly for this edition of Tractoration, were intended to shoot folly as it flies, and adapt the strictures of satire to the topics of the times.

THOMAS GREEN FESSENDEN.

Boston, March 25, 1836.

---

CANTO I.

OURSELF!

Table of Contents

---

ARGUMENT.

Table of Contents

Great Doctor Caustic is a sage

Whose merit gilds this iron age,

And who deserves, as you’ll discover

When you have conn’d this canto over,

For grand discoveries and inventions,

A dozen peerages and pensions;

But, having met with rubs and breakers,

From Perkins’ metal mischief makers;

With but three halfpence in his pocket,

In verses blazing like sky rocket,

He first sets forth in this petition

His high deserts but low condition.

From garret high, with cobwebs hung,

The poorest wight that ever sung,

Most gentle Sirs, I come before ye,

To tell a lamentable story.

What makes my sorry case the sadder,

I once stood high on Fortune’s ladder;[1]

From whence contrive the fickle jilt did,

That your petitioner should be tilted.

And soon th’ unconscionable flirt,

Will tread me fairly in the dirt,

Unless, perchance, these pithy lays

Procure me pence as well as praise.

Already doom’d to hard quill-driving,

’Gainst spectred poverty still striving,

When e’er I doze, from vigils pale,

Dame Fancy locks me fast in jail.

Necessity, though I am no wit,

Compels me now to turn a poet;

Not born, but made, by transmutation,

And chymick process, call’d—starvation!

Though poet’s trade, of all that I know,

Requires the least of ready rhino,

I find a deficit of cash is

An obstacle to cutting dashes.

For gods and godesses, who traffic

In cantos, odes, and lays seraphic,

Who erst Arcadian whistle blew sharp,

Or now attune Apollo’s jews-harp,

Have sworn they will not loan me, gratis,

Their jingling sing-song apparatus,

Nor teach me how, nor where to chime in

My tintinabulum of rhyming.[2]

What then occurs? A lucky hit—

I’ve found a substitute for wit;

On Homer’s pinions mounting high,

I’ll drink Pierian puddle dry.[3]

Beddoes (bless the good doctor) has

Sent me a bag full of his gas,[4]

Which snuffed the nose up, makes wit brighter,

And eke a dunce an airy writer.

With this a brother bard, inflated,

Was so stupendously elated,

He tower’d, like Garnerin’s balloon,

Nor stopp’d, like half wits, at the moon:

But scarce had breath’d three times before he

Was hous’d in heaven’s high upper story,[5]

Where mortals none but poets enter,

Above where Mah’met’s ass dar’d venture.

Strange things he saw, and those who know him

Have said that, in his Epic Poem,[6]

To be complete within a year hence,

They’ll make a terrible appearance.

And now, to set my verses going,

Like "Joan of Arc," sublimely flowing,

I’ll follow Southey’s bold exemple,

And snuff a sconce full, for a sample.

Good Sir, enough! enough already!

No more, for Heaven’s sake!—steady!—steady!

Confound your stuff!—why how you sweat me!

I’d rather swallow all mount Etna!

How swiftly turns this giddy world round,

Like tortur’d top, by truant twirl’d round;

While Nature’s capers wild amaze me,

The beldam’s crack’d or Caustic crazy![7]

I’m larger grown from head to tail

Than mammoth, elephant, or whale!—

Now feel a tangible extension

Of semi-infinite dimension!—

Inflated with supreme intensity,

I fill three quarters of immensity!

Should Phœbus come this way, no doubt,

But I could blow his candle out!

This earth’s a little dirty planet,

And I’ll no longer help to man it,

But off will flutter, in a tangent,

And make a harum scarum range on’t!

Stand ye appall’d! quake! quiver! quail!

For lo I stride a comet’s tail!

If my deserts you fail t’ acknowledge,

I’ll drive it plump against your college!

But if your Esculapian band

Approach my highness, cap in hand,

And show vast tokens of humility,

I’ll treat your world with due civility.

But now, alas! a wicked wag

Has pull’d away the gaseous bag:

From heaven, where thron’d, like Jove I sat,

I’m fall’n! fall’n! fall’n! down, flat! flat! flat![8]

Thus, as the ancient story goes,

When o’er Avernus flew the crows,

They were so stench’d in half a minute,

They giddy grew and tumbled in it:

And thus a blade, who is too handy

To help himself to wine or brandy,

At first gets higher, then gets lower,

Then tumbles dead drunk on the floor!

Such would have been my sad case, if

I’d taken half another tiff;

And even now, I cannot swear,

I’m not as mad as a March hare!

How these confounded gases serve us!

But Beddoes says that I am nervous,

And that this oxyd gas of nitre

Is bad for such a nervous writer!

Indeed, Sir, Doctor, very odd it is

That you should deal in such commodities,

Which drive a man beside his wits,

And women to hysteric fits![9]

Now, since this wildering gas inflation

Is not the thing for inspiration,

I’ll take a glass of cordial gin,

Ere my sad story I begin;

And then proceed with courage stout,

From hard-bound brains to hammer out

My case forlorn, in doleful ditty,

To melt your worships’ hearts to pity.

Sirs, I have been in high condition,

A right respectable Physician;

And passed, with men of shrewd discerning,

For wight of most prodigious learning;

For I could quote, with flippant ease,

Grave Galen and Hippocrates,

Brown, Cullen, Sydenham and such men,

Besides a shoal of learned Dutchmen.[10]

In all disorders was so clever,

From tooth ache, up to yellow fever,

That I by learned men was reckon’d

Don Esculapius the second!

No case to me was problematic;

Pains topical or symptomatic,

From aching head, to gouty toes,

The hidden cause I could disclose.

Minute examiner of Nature,

And most sagacious operator,

I could descern, prescribe, apply

And cure[11] disease in louse’s eye.

And insects smaller, ten degrees

Than those which float in summer’s breeze,

Drugg’d with cathartics and emetics,

Then doctor’d off with diuretics.

I had a curious little lancet,

Your worship could not help but fancy it,

By which I show’d with skill surprising,

The whole art of flea-botomizing!—

And with it oft inoculated

(At which friend Jenner’ll be elated)

Flies, fleas, and gnats, with cow-pock matter,

And not one soul took small-pox a’ter!—

Could take a microscopic mite,

Invisible to naked sight;

Ad infinitum, could divide it,

For times unnumber’d have I tried it.

With optic glass, of great utility,

Could make the essence of nihility

To cut a most enormous figure,

As big as St Paul’s church, or bigger!

Could tell, and never be mistaken,

What future oaks were in an acorn;

And even calculate, at pleasure,

The cubic inches they would measure.

Scotland could never boast a wight,

Could match OURSELF at second sight.[12]

Nor Wales a wizard, who so well

Could destiny’s decrees foretel.

For we’d a precious knack at seeing,

Not only matters not in being,

But ever and anon would still be

Foreseeing things which never will be—[13]

Great manufacturer of weather

Nine Lapland witches, clubb’d together,

With all the elements a stewing,

Are not our match at tempest brewing.

For many a popular almanac,

Within say half a century back,

We foretold every shine and storm

Which heaven can burnish or deform.

Though no