The Ballad Of A.F. Harrold

It's a little known fact that in eighteen thirty-two
I invented the camera to take photographs of you
Just four years later in eighteen thirty-six
I cut your first wax cylinder with Stevie Nicks
It was a song I'd written with a very express view
Of explaining my yearnings and desires to you
But you wrote me a letter which was cold and sincere
Saying you didn't think I was quite right for you that year
So, in eighteen thirty-seven I tried a different style
And I took up mountaineering for just a little while
I climbed Mount Fuji and I climbed K2
Mount Everest, Ben Nevis and Kilimanjaroo
But when I came back to Europe with a frost-bitten thumb
You just said stop being silly and started to hum
Idly a tune I'd never heard before
But I'd orchestrated it by eighteen forty-four
And I had it performed by Sir Thomas Beecham
And although he tried for all the high notes he couldn't quite reach 'em
But you weren't too impressed and you turned your back
So I invented Polyfilla which could fill any crack
Or blemish in a surface or awkward nook or corner
But your sister ran into my study and before I could warn 'er
She'd fallen in the vat and had sunk out of sight
So I solemnly sat by your bedside through the night
But you were at your uncle's house I discovered when the morning
Brought misty wisps of light from the sun's languid dawning
And so eighteen forty-five was fogged with misery
And London stayed much like that till eighteen fifty-three
When I left and visited the Continent on a grand tour
Where I got several ideas though I'm not sure what for
But I built two devices both as useful as a fish is
One a dish-proof oven and some oven-proof dishes
And you didn't think that these, though, were true indicators of love
So I added to the list the fingerless glove
And the gloveless finger which when sold as a set
Could be useful to the working man, I was willing to bet
But you were so unenlightened you deigned not to speak
And you managed this endeavour for, well, almost a week
Less six or seven days, not that I'd counted
For I had gone to Canada and been promptly mounted
And now I live by the Law in the forests of Quebec
In a nice red uniform above my polo-neck
Which I wear when it's cold as it sometimes is
In such a northern and an empty country as this
And my best friends now are elks and beavers and yaks
And I've even spoken softly to several lumberjacks
Who've been so much nicer than you ever were, milady
And they helped me to invent a hat that keeps it shady
Even with the brightest light glinting off the ice
So my life, thanks to you, is now particularly nice