Genre:

Poetry, Drollery

Subjects:

Nationalism, Invention, Cultural Geography

    Draws unfavourable comparisons between French and English attitudes towards railway management and invention. Compares the foreign railways, which are 'Check'd and cow'd by Government's power', with the British lines, which are the subject of 'unrestrain'd competition' and which 'Too often result in a smash' for 'travellers' and shareholders' ventures'. Adds that 'John Bull's every town is a centre / Of inventions most useful to man', but laments the fate of 'John's greatest inventor, / Unless he can patent his plan!'. Contrasts the fact that awards such as titles and ribands are for 'rank, or for wealth, or for war', but that 'great ones of science are martyrs / Who have still worn the cross , not the star', and that 'art and science are zeroes' in John Bull's court.