University of Virginia Library

Search this document 
A Metrical History of England

Or, Recollections, in Rhyme, Of some of the most prominent Features in our National Chronology, from the Landing of Julius Caesar to the Commencement of the Regency, in 1812. In Two Volumes ... By Thomas Dibdin

collapse sectionI. 
  
  
expand section1. 
 2. 
expand section3. 
expand section4. 
 5. 
expand section6. 
expand sectionII. 

A joyous nation hail the royal pair!
He, brave as merciful, she, good as fair;
From ev'ry slavish apprehension freed,
No more Opinion fears in chains to bleed:
Nor, at the mercy of a legal brute,
Endure the thumbscrew or tormenting boot;
To honest joys each patriot's harp is strung,
And thus some bard convivial might have sung,
Had he, like me, the inspiring air to chuse,
Which echoes the Anacreontic Muse
Of Morris, fittest wight on social earth,
With classic wreath to crown the hour of mirth;

161

Had Morris wrote the song instead of me,
How devilish glad my bookseller would be!
 

The Boot was an instrument of torture borrowed from the Continent.