Mapping Keats’s Progress: A Critical Chronology

Mapping Keats’s Progress
A Critical Chronology

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References to this poem

All gentle folks who owe a grudge

All gentle folks who owe a grudge
To any living thing,
Open your ears and stay your trudge
Whilst I in dudgeon sing.

The gadfly he hath stung me sore —
O may he ne’er sting you!
But we have many a horrid bore
He may sting black and blue.

Has any here an old grey mare
With three legs all her store?
O put it to her buttocks bare
And straight she’ll run on four.

Has any here a lawyer suit
Of 1743?
Take lawyer’s nose and put it to’t
And you the end will see.

Is there a man in Parliament
Dumbfounder’d in his speech?
O let his neighbour make a rent
And put one in his breech.

O Lowther, how much better thou
Hadst figur’d t’ other day,
When to the folks thou mad’st a bow
And hadst no more to say,

If lucky gadfly had but ta’en
His seat upon thine a — e
And put thee to a little pain
To save thee from a worse.

Better than Southey it had been,
Better than Mr. D — ,
Better than Wordsworth too, I ween,
Better than Mr. V — .

Forgive me pray, good people all,
For deviating so;
In spirit sure I had a call —
And now I on will go.

Has any here a daughter fair
Too fond of reading novels,
Too apt to fall in love with care
And charming Mister Lovels?

O put a gadfly to that thing
She keeps so white and pert —
I mean the finger for the ring —
And it will breed a wert.

Has any here a pious spouse
Who seven times a day
Scolds as King David pray’d, to chouse
And have her holy way?

O let a gadfly’s little sting
Persuade her sacred tongue
That noises are a common thing
But that her bell has rung.

And as this is the summum bo-
Num of all conquering,
I leave withouten wordes mo
The gadfly’s little sting.

× Cite this page:

MLA Style: Works Cited

Keats, John. “All gentle folks who owe a grudge.” Mapping Keats’s Progress: A Critical Chronology, by G. Kim Blank. Edition 3.25 , University of Victoria, 29 May 2023. https://johnkeats.uvic.ca/poem_all_gentle_folks_who_owe_a.html.

Chicago Style: Note

John Keats, “All gentle folks who owe a grudge,” Mapping Keats’s Progress: A Critical Chronology, Edition 3.25 , last modified 29th May 2023. https://johnkeats.uvic.ca/poem_all_gentle_folks_who_owe_a.html.

Chicago Style: Bibliography

Keats, John. “All gentle folks who owe a grudge.” Mapping Keats’s Progress: A Critical Chronology, Edition 3.25 , last modified 29th May 2023. https://johnkeats.uvic.ca/poem_all_gentle_folks_who_owe_a.html.