A poem about bodysnatching, of all things

[skygazer]

I'm reading this neat book - kind of a social history of London in 1831. It's centered on a case in which a young boy was killed so his body could be sold to surgeons for anatomy lessons. Social history is so fascinating because it gives you a view of everyday life at a particular period. At that point, surgeons were learning more and more about the human body but there was no legal way to obtain cadavers for dissection and teaching. So bodysnatching was a booming business, so much so that the following poem was found in an anthology of the time. The hospitals and doctors named are actual people and places of the time:

Mary's Ghost

Twas in the middle of the night
To sleep young William tried
When Mary's ghost came stealing in
And stood at his bedside

Oh, William dear! Oh, William dear!
My rest eternal ceases
Alas! my everlasting peace
Is broken into pieces

I thought the last of all my cares
Would end with my last minute
But when I went to my last home
I didn't stay long in it

The bodysnatchers they have come
And made a snatch at me
It's very hard them kind of men
Won't let a body be

You thought that I was buried deep
Quite decent like and chary
But from her grave in Mary-bone
They've come and bon'd your Mary!

The arm that used to take your arm
Is took to Dr. Vyse
And both my legs are gone to walk
The Hospital at Guy's

I vowed that you should have my hand
But Fate gave no denial
You'll find it there at Dr. Bell's
In spirits and a phial

As for my feet - my little feet
You used to call so pretty
There's one, I know, in Bedford Row
The other's in the City

I can't tell where my head has gone
But Dr. Carpue can
As for my trunk, it's all packed up
To go by Pickford's van

I wish you'd go to Mr. P.
And save me such a ride
I don't half like the outside place
They've took for my inside

The cock it crows - I must be gone
My William, we must part
But I'll be yours in death although
Sir Astley has my heart

Don't go to weep upon my grave
And think that there I'll be
They haven't left an atom there
Of my anatomy.

[mark11727]

1. Whoa.

[skygazer]

2. I know

I read some strange stuff - wierd things tickle my fancy. And this seemed just bizarre enough to share.