Dadd wrote a commentary on his painting called 'Elimination of a picture and its subject - called the feller's master stroke'. It is from that the characters mentioned in the song are taken - for examples: 'To assist This gandy long legged trumpeter A tatterdemalion & a junketer', 'In soldier and Sailor, tinker or tailor ploughboy Apothecary, thief', 'The Politician next, with senatorial pipe', 'Some fairy dandy. Making a break As sweet as candy. To faery nymph Like him so quaint', 'You’ll not inform that fay, that under the leg Of one of those maids, behind his Back. A satyr peeps', 'The ostler from the fairy inn Knowing his air, the curate of the trim Hands to his knees and body bent' etc.
And yes the purpose of cracking the nut is to make a new carriage for Mab - 'Left to its time & how to do To split for Mab perchance a chariot new'.
And there is no double meaning in the lyrics - Freddie was very keen on art.
Dadd wrote a commentary on his painting called 'Elimination of a picture and its subject - called the feller's master stroke'. It is from that the characters mentioned in the song are taken - for examples: 'To assist This gandy long legged trumpeter A tatterdemalion & a junketer', 'In soldier and Sailor, tinker or tailor ploughboy Apothecary, thief', 'The Politician next, with senatorial pipe', 'Some fairy dandy. Making a break As sweet as candy. To faery nymph Like him so quaint', 'You’ll not inform that fay, that under the leg Of one of those maids, behind his Back. A satyr peeps', 'The ostler from the fairy inn Knowing his air, the curate of the trim Hands to his knees and body bent' etc. And yes the purpose of cracking the nut is to make a new carriage for Mab - 'Left to its time & how to do To split for Mab perchance a chariot new'. And there is no double meaning in the lyrics - Freddie was very keen on art.