University of Virginia Library

Of Kings Renown'd and Mighty Bards I write,
Some kill'd by Whores, and others slain in Fight;
Some starving liv'd, whilst others were prefer'd;
But all, when dead, are in one place inter'd.
A Fabrick stands by Antient Heroes built,
Design'd for Holy Use t'atone their Guilt;
Here Sacred Urns of Majesty they keep,
Here Kings and Poets most profoundly sleep;
Here Choristers in Hymns their Voices raise,
And charm the dreadful Goblins from the Place.
Tho throng'd with Tombs, no Specter here is found,
They sing the very Devil off the ground:
No Night-mare dances 'mongst the antient Tombs,
Nor sulphurous Incubus dispenses Fumes;
Nor let no subterranean Hag affright
My Muse, whilst of the FUNERAL I write.

A Bard there was, who whilome did command,
And held the Laurel in his potent Hand;
He o'er Parnassus bore Imperial Sway,
Him all the little Tribes of Bards obey:
But Bards and Kings, howe'er approv'd and great,
Must stoop at last to the Decrees of Fate.
Fate bid him for the Stroke of Death prepare,
And then remov'd him to the Lord knows where.
If to the Living we such Tributes owe,
We on the Dead must pious Rites bestow;
To our Assistance all the Wits must call,
To grace the Glory of the Funeral.

Who is the first appears unto our View,
But haughty, proud, imperious M---ue?
Who cocks his Chin, and scarce affords a Word,
But looks as big as any Belgick Lord;
In the best Dairies fed, grown sleek and fat,
The creeping Mouse is turn'd into a Rat:
Of others Brows he licks the toilsom Sweat,
And by our Sins grows impudently great:
As chief of Wits he does himself prefer,
And with our Gold bribes ev'ry Flatterer;
But Men of Sense and Honour does despise,
And crushes such as would by Virtue rise,
Whilst each leud Rakehel of the nauseous Town
He fills with Coin, and does with Honours crown.
The Nation's Wealth he most profusely spends,
But not on such as are the Nation's Friends;
But such as wrote our Country to inslave,
His Kindness follows even to the Grave.
He the great Bard at his own Charge inters,
And dying Vice to living Worth prefers.
Some others too in the Affair are join'd,
Alike in Morals, and alike in Mind;
But these my Muse must here forbear to name,
Scarce worthy Honour or deserving Fame.

The Day is come, and all the Wits must meet
From Covent-Garden down to Watling-street;
They all repair to the Physicians Dome,
There lies the Corps, and there the Eagles come:
No Corps an Entrance has within this Gate,
None are admitted here to lie in State,
But such as Fate a noted Death has carv'd,
A Cutpurse hang'd, or a poor Poet starv'd;
One is anatomiz'd when he is dead,
The other in his Life for want of Bread.

A Troop of Stationers at first appear'd,
And Jacob T---n Captain of the Guard;
Jacob the Muses Midwife, who well knows
To ease a lab'ring Muse of Pangs and Throws;
He oft has kept the Infant-Poet warm,
Oft lick'd th'unweildy Monster into Form;
Oft do they in high Flights and Raptures swell,
Drunk with the Waters of our Jacob's Well.

Next these the Playhouse Sparks do take their turn,
With such as under Mercury are born,
As Poets, Fidlers, Cut-purses, and Whores,
Drabs of the Play-house, and of Common-shores;
Pimps, Panders, Bullies, and Eternal Beaux,
Fam'd for short Wits, long Wigs, and gaudy Clothes;
All Sons of Meter tune the Voice in praise,
From lofty Strains, to humble Ekes and Ayes:
The Singing-men and Clerks who charm the Soul,
And all the Traders in fa la fa sol:
All these the Funeral Obsequies do aid,
As younger Brothers of the Rhyming Trade.

The tuneful Rabble now together come,
They fill with dolesome Sighs the sable Room
Some groan'd, some sob'd, and some I think there wept,
And some got drunk, loll'd down, and snor'd and slept.
Around the Corps in State they wildly press;
In Notes unequal, like Pindarick Verse,
Each one does his sad Sentiments express.
The Player says, My Friends we are undone,
See here, the Muses best and darling Son
Is from us to the blest Elyzium gone:
What other Poet for us will engage
To be the Prop of the declining Stage?
All other Poets are not worth a Louse,
There fell the Prop of our once glorious House:
But now from us by Fate untimely torn,
Leaves the dull Stage a Desert and forlorn.
A dismal Sadness in each Face appears;
And such as could not speak, burst out in Tears;
His Death, alas! affected ev'ry body,
And fetch'd deep Sighs and Tears from ev'ry Noddy:
It much affected every tuneful Ringer,
But most of all the jolly Ballad-singer,
Who now at a Street's Corner must no more
A Play-house Song in equal Numbers roar.
Nay, I am told, when he his last Gasp groan'd,
The Bell-rope trembled, and the Organ ton'd:
And as great things affect a little thing,
This was the Death of many a Fiddle-string.
No Chronicles I read of do relate
Such a sad Hurricane in Church and State.
The charming Songsters at our great St. Paul's
Cou'd scarce sing Pray'rs to save their very Souls;
The Boys were dumb, the Singingmen were wounded,
All the whole Choir disabled and confounded:
And when the Prayers were ended, alas then
The Clerk could hardly sob out an Amen.
Not a Crowdero at a Bawdy-house,
Who us'd in racy Liquors to carouse,
But with sad haste unto the Burial ran,
Forgets his Tipple, and neglects his Can.
With Tag-rag, Bob-tail was the Room full fill'd,
You'd think another Babel to be built;
Not more Confusion at St. Bat's fam'd Fair,
Or at Guildhall for choice of a Lord Mayor.

But stay my Muse, the learned G---th appears,
He sighing comes, and is half drown'd in Tears;
The famous G---th, whom learned Poets call
Knight of the Order of the Urinal.
He of Apollo learnt his wondrous Skill,
He taught him how to sing and how to kill;
For all he sends unto the darksome Grave,
He honours also with an Epitaph.
He entertain'd the Audience with Oration,
Tho very new, yet something out of fashion:
But 'cause the Hearers were with Learning blest,
He said it in the Language of the Beast:
But so pronounc'd, the Sound and Sense agrees,
A Country-mouse talks better in a Cheese,
Or Jack-at-a-pinch, when reeling he repairs
To neighb'ring Church to mumble o'er his Prayers.
The Sense and Wit they say was very good,
Tho neither seen, felt, heard, nor understood.
Thus we must all, as common Rumour saith,
Believe the Doctor by implicit Faith.

Next him the Sons of Musick pass along,
And murder Horace in confounded Song;
Whose Monument more durable than Brass,
Is now defac'd by every chanting Ass.
No Man at Tyburn doom'd to take a swinging,
Would stay to hear such miserable singing,
Where all the Beasts of Musick try their Throats,
And different Species use their different Notes:
Here the Ox bellows, there the Satyr howls;
The Puppies whine, and the bold Mastiff growls;
The Magpys chatter, and the Night-Owls screek;
The old Pigs grunt, and all the young ones squeek:
Yet all together make melodious Songs,
As Bumpkin Trols to rusty pair of Tongs.

Now, now the time is come, the Parson says,
And for their Exeunt to the Grave he prays:
The Way is long, and Folk the Streets are clogging,
Therefore my Friends away, come let's be jogging.

Assist me Thou, who, clad in Sun-beam Weeds,
Driv'st round the Orb each day with fiery Steeds;
Who neither art with Heat nor Cold opprest,
Art never weary, tho thou tak'st no rest:
Assist me to describe the Cavalcade,
What mighty Figure thro the Streets they made.

Before the Herse the mourning Hautboys go,
And screech a dismal sound of Grief and Wo;
More dismal Notes from Bogtrotters may fall,
More dismal Plaints at Irish Funeral.
But no such Flood of Tears e'er stopt our Tide
Since Charles the Martyr and the Monarch dy'd.
The Decency and Order first describe,
Without regard to either Sex or Tribe.
The sable Coaches lead the dismal Van,
But by their sides I think few Footmen ran:
Nor needed these, the Rable fill the Streets,
And Mob with Mob in great Disorder meets.
See next the Coaches how they are accouter'd
Both in the Inside, eke and on the Outward:
One pocky Spark, one sound as any Roach,
One Poet and two Fidlers in a Coach;
The Play-house Drab, that beats the Beggars Bush,
And Bawdy talks would make an old Whore blush,
By every Bully kiss'd, good Truth, but such is
Now her good Fate to ride with Mrs. Dutchess.
Was e'er Immortal Poet thus buffoon'd?
In a long Line of Coaches thus lampoon'd?
A Man with Gout and Stone quite wearied,
Would rather live than thus be buried.
What greater Plague can Heaven on Man bestow,
Who must with Knaves on Life's dull Journy go?
And when on t'other Shoar he's landed safe,
A Crowd of Fools attend him to the Grave,
A Crowd so nauseous, so profusely leud,
With all the Vices of the Times endu'd,
That Cowley's Marble wept to see the Throng,
Old Chaucer laugh'd at their unpolish'd Song,
And Spencer thought he once again had seen
The Imps attending on his Fairy Queen.
Her little Tib, and Tom, and Mib, and Mab,
Come to lament the Death of Poet Squab.

But Burying is not all the Rites we owe,
Some other Obsequies we must bestow:
Must so Religious, so profound a Wit,
Be toss'd like common Dust into the Pit?
The Fates forbid! We'll surely fill the Plains
And neighb'ring Woods with Elegiack Strains:
E'en Newgate's Chaplain, who in's Office fell,
Instructing Villains in the way to Hell;
He had the Muses Pass-port on his Herse,
His Praises sung in everlasting Verse.
Nay, a Dutch Mastiff late in state did lie;
My Lady's Lap-dog had an Elegy;
And shall not Dryden have one O Fy, Fy!
Yes, say the Oxford and the Cambridg Sparks,
We'll sing his Death as sweet as any Larks;
Oxford and Cambridg, the renowned Schools,
Fam'd for a Breed of wise Men and of Fools,
Where Infant Wits with Water-gruel fed,
And little puny sucking Priests are bred;
Where Conjurers employ their Time in Vision,
Whence many a Learned Saffold has his Mission?
These always march in Verse in rank and file,
In Company pursue Poetick Toil;
Here a Battalion does in English lead,
While one in Latin does the Troopers head:
But such the Wit and Sense, you'd think the Elves
Did only write but just to please themselves:
Playford laments that he their Lines bespoke,
And swears the Bookseller is almost broke.