And scarce so cheerily.
You boast the pure knight-errantry so vaunted,
Some two years since,
Eh? You unfeigned Crusading zeal evince?
Whence, then, that rival banner
Which you coquet with in so cautious manner?
Hoisting it? Humph! Say, rather, just inspecting it.
But whether with intention of rejecting it,
Or temporising with the sly temptation
And making Proclamation
Of views a trifle modified, and ardour
A little cooled by thoughts of purse and larder.
Why, that's the question.
Reynard will probably resent suggestion
Of playing renegade, in the cause of Trade,
To that same Holy, Noble, New Crusade.
"Only," he pleads, "don't fume, and fuss, and worry,
The New Crusade is not a thing _to hurry_;
I never meant hot zealotry or haste--
Things hardly to the solid Teuton taste!"

And Leo? Well, he always had his doubts,
Yet to indulge in fierce precipitate flouts
Is not his fashion.
The Anti-Slavery zeal, with him a passion,
He knows less warmly shared by other traders;
But _soi-disant_ Crusaders
Caught paltering with the Infidels, like traitors,
And hot enthusiast Emancipators
Who the grim Slavery-demon gently tackle,