Jane Gwilliam

Primrose Hill, a Poem: to which are added, The Queen's Jubilee, and other metrical effusions

Printed for the author, London, 1838.

The book was published anonymously: the copy held by the British Library has 'Jane Gwilliam' added by hand on the title page. The name is not listed anywhere else and may well be a pseudonym of John Gwilliam, who appears as an 'added name' in the catalogue. He published several volumes of verse: one is dedicated to Punch magazine, without which 'the double-faced rogues of society would carry on their schemes of imposture unmolested.' The rogues in this poem would have been clearly identifiable, which may be why he chose anonymity. After a conventional apostrophe to the beauties of Primrose Hill there is a sharp change of tone:

Beauties which, I'm griev'd to say
Seem to lessen day by day,
As thy foes, with head-long speed,
In their guilty plans succeed;
Foes that nature rightly fears,
Builders, lawyers, engineers...
And, though last not least in crime,
Members wanting cash, or time,
By the devil shrewdly sent
Into Melbourne's parliament,
Just to aid their damn'd intent

Conservationists will warm to this, but may feel the later verses a bit excessive:

Primrose Hill! There was a time
When thy scen'ry look'd sublime,
Ere they marr'd thy verdant ridges
With their ugly locks and bridges,
Or the dull canal became
Honor'd with the Regent's name...

The Regent's newly opened park is not spared either:

Where the rosy children play'd,
And their lively nurses stray'd,
Chattering nonsense with their beaux,
We have nought but ugly Rows,
Lines of terraces that make
Contemplation's vision ache,
As the light of Phoebus falls
On their beastly stuccoed walls...

The new landscape, 'plann'd for empty fashion's sake', has swept away the old taverns and farm houses and now excludes the common folk:

Have we not, for many a year,
Seen the Jew's Harp gardens throng'd
With the people Might had wrong'd
Of each green suburban shade...

Primrose Hill! When I survey
The Regent's Park, I sigh and say,
Can this conceit presume to claim
The shadow of improvement's name?