Maggots :: :: University of Virginia Library

What Hang'd Hero wilt thou sing?
What lowsy Rogue to equal Glories bring?
Ah! what could man do more? I strove
To teach my Strings of Thundring Jove;
Of long-nail'd Juno, Scold Divine,
Of Cerberus and Proserpine;
But all in vain, for in a Trice
My mighty Hero's dwindled down to Lice:
Go Charioteer! the Coach prepare!
(Or call a Coach if any's there!)
My Muse forsooth must take the Air;
And we intend to rove
Beyond the narrow Bounds of Nature, and of Jove.
We'll take a race
Where light-cloath'd Nothings, and thin fantoms dwell,
Beyond the narrow Bounds of time and place,
Beyond the out-strecht Line of Earth, of Heaven, and Hell.

2.

Pindaric Pegasus! advance
Now with the lofty Barbary proudly waving prance,
And amble now
Like a Galloping Cow!
But if thy Cross-grain'd Ladies will not lend
Their winged Saddle-nag to 'blige a friend,

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If they lock up their Cellar all-divine,
And will not spare one soop of Aganippe-Wine,
Tell 'em I'll get assistance nigher
That soon shall mount me higher;
In Bedstaffs-twinkling I'll be gone

The New Waters discover'd there the last Summer.

To better Streams at Islington,
Inspir'd from Sadlers Pump I'le do, and dare
As much as any motly drunken Doctor there,
There boles of Helicon my Horse and I'll carouse,
And for the founder'd Jade mount my curretting Lowse.

3.

So rides the great Mogul in State

Agra is one of the Great Moguls Royal Cities; he uses to ride on a white Elephant.

When at proud Agra's trembling Gate,
Met by each humble, as a Potentate;
VVith Flow'rs the Roads are pav'd, with Flow'rs the houses crown'd,
And bruitish Mirth, and barb'rous joy runs all-along,
Whilst he uplifted high
Like a New Tit-an, scales the Sky.
From that wild Mount of Flesh, whose Shoulders bear,
Better than Æsops Eagles, Castles in the air.
So a tall Ant in days of yore

Read the story, thus ingeniously describ'd in Mr. Crashaw.—

“High mounted on an Ant, Nanus the Tall,
“Was thrown alas! and got a deadly fall:
“Under the unruly Beasts proud feet he lies,
“All torn; with much ado before he dyes,
“Yet strains these Words—Base envy do! laugh on,
“Thus did I fall, and thus fell Phaeton.

A Bold adventurous Pigme bore.
So, on my fair-neckt Louse securely set

A couple of expeditious Gentlemen (as well mounted as the Witch in Paudæmonium) Astolfo in Orlando Furioso on a Griffith: Pacolet in the famous and renowned Chronicle of Valentine and Orfon, on a Wooden Horse.

Like great Astolfo, or little Pacolet,
With Spur and Switch I make my Steed curvet.

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Hold, hold! I'me gone! I'me gone! that leap has lost us:
So Old-Nick sored away with Doctor Faustus.

4.

Beyond th' attraction of dull Earth we're born,
Near the purple chambers of the Morn;
Now less, and less the lengthen'd Species grow;
Now, credit me,
We hardly see
Athos and Tenariff, and Michaels Mount below,

You see Reader, other folks have had their Maggots as well as your Humble Servant. Two Bishops have wrote expressly of this new Plantation, and the way to sayl thither. One by making a Globe of Glass, or Brass lighter than the Atmosphere, which must therefore naturally ascend: The other by a way perhaps as practicable as the former, by harnessing a certain number of Fowl, called by the Spaniards [Ganza's] on which he makes Signior Domingo hoisted thither.

In Glass or brazen Chariot scarce so soon,

Nor with Domingo's Ganza's had we reach'd the Moon.
There we discover
Over and over

Two famous Astronomers, one in France, the other in Denmark.

VVhat e're quick Azant or Hevelius saw;
VVithout their Glasses
Her Lunatick Faces,
Ætna's, and Land, and Sea, we in a Map could draw.
But my poor Lowse more of its kind
Above could find,

Vid. Where you can find it, this account. When any of the Woodcocks remain behind, the main body returning at Summer to the Land of the Moon, they are reported to be all lowsy.

For all the Lowsie Woodcocks still were left behind,
And therefore calmly dives to Earth again;
So Angels think themselves down thro' the airy Main.

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5.

O'er Hedge and Ditch, a Scholars, or a Hunters pace
VVe run our hare-brain'd Race.
From Post to Pillar I'm like Epicurus hurl'd
By all the Flaming Limits of the VVorld.
VVhere e're we go
By Friend, or Foe,
We my Majestic Lowses Subjects found;
Armies of Beggars gay
In Endless Sun-shine play,
And Lice, as blithe as they
In jolly Squadrons dance around.
Thus did the Sprightly Youth, but those whom hoary age
Had form'd more wise and sage
Upon a Captive Comb plac'd round in State
Declaim among the unexperienc'd Fry
The Nitty Auditory listning by;
And all their Great Forefathers Deeds in greater Verse relate.

6.

Then to my Lowses Pallace we draw nigh,
(For sure by all this it may with ease be understood,
Mine was a Lowse of princely blood)
Where he in tryumph still remains
Dragging Pilgarlick Death in Chains,
And even in Church-yards obtains the Victory.

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When pale Death with harpy claws
(And huge unconscionable Jaws)
To the Sick the Curtain draws.
And the Nurses softly tell
Sad enquiring Friends-He's well,
They to the Church-yard follow him, and there
With him they bury all their Love, and all their Care.
My kind Lowse more kind and bold
Hectors Death, and keeps his Hold,
Keeps his Hold, or what's as fair,
Comes agen, and finds him there.
Drives Sir Rawbones from the Stone,
Claims the Marble all his own;

A vulgar observation—that dead Bodies in time turn all to perfect Lumps of Lice.

In his own Substance quickens mouldring Men,
And makes 'em live, at least an Animals Life agen.

7.

Now Heaven and Earth survey'd a dreadful leap we take
Over the Sooty Stygian Lake;
My Lowse my Sybill was, and all as well
I know not how

Both which are necessary to one that intends a visit to the Infernal Regions—ask Virgil else.

Without a half-penny, or a Golden bough,
I like Æneas travell'd Hell.
We lookt, and lookt again,
And lookt, and lookt with Care,
But lookt, and lookt in vain,

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Nor could we find one House of Purgatory there:
Those old descriptions fail
Whose realms are chang'd
And in another Method rang'd;
We Mountains find where we expect a flowry vale.

8.

Into the Gulph at last my Palfray plung'd, t'explore
Secrets to none but great Quevedo known before.
So brave Empedocles at Ætna's flaming Hole
(The sight enough to melt a common Soul)
Leapt smiling in, with this undaunted Cry,
To be a God 'tis worth the while to die.
So when the hungry Earth gap't wide
And let in hateful Light,
The trembling Ghost to fright
In their own Realm of Night;
Curtius all arm'd to the black breach did ride;
He saw, and smiled with an unbroken mind
Where all the quaking City fled, and scarce durst look behind:
In sprung the noble Youth with this undaunted Cry,
So Rome but live, and flourish,—Thus let Curtius dy.

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9.

Where am I now? Bugbears, and sprights are there:

See Dr. Casauban's account of those Spirits with whom Dr. Dee and Kelly had contracted so intimate a Correspondence. Very good natur'd Devils it seems, for they perswaded the Conjurers to swop Wives, as a necessary Ceremony in their Magical operations.

Here Kelly's Devils buz round me,
Here Doctor Dees dumfound me;

A Thundering Devil that, Dr: Faustus's familiar. See his Life.

Here's Mephistophilus with Tail, and Horns, and Hair,
And each foul Fiend in Bartlomew Fair;
Sights which a stouter man than me might scare,
But worse, far worse than Devils at the Gate,

Scarce any body but has read Quevedo's Visions of Hell, nor can any that have read 'em sure forget how over-stockt he makes the sooty regions with that kind of Cattle.

Bands of Quevedo's hungry Taylors wait;
From Atropos each stole a pair of Sheers,
And gladly now to ensure his Head I'd give my Louses Ears:
Horridly gay their Teeth, and Nails were painted ore
With flesh confus'd, and Skin, and Brains, and mingling Gore.
Hunger, as well as Anger weapons makes;
His Bodkin this, and this his pond'rous yard, and this his Thimble takes:
The Cannibals in dreadful order stood
To murder and devour even their own Flesh and Blood;
To murder and devour my Louse, so wise, so great, so good:
So conqu'ring Indians feed, and hope to find
In their brave enemyes broil'd Corps the Vertues of his Mind.

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10.

Yet my undaunted Louse can scorn 'em all,
He rears his strong Proboscis high,
And does the unmanly rage defie
Of each unequal enemy,
And like himself intends to fall.

No Creature in the world so testy as a Lowse. In a Microscope, one drop of Blood is seen passing up and down very nimbly in the nature of a pulse.

His Martial Soul peeps thro' his Alablaster Skin,
The bloody drop moves quick, and beats a point of War within.
Their tedious trembling Troops he do's to Combat call,
Waits for each mortal blow, contemns each fatal pass,

I would entreat any that know that hard-named Gentleman's right Name to keep silence, for 'twould spoyl the Rhyme sadly if this should be blotted out, and that inserted.

And cryes, Pound on! 'tis but the husk of Anaxagoras.
Whilst quaking Hell do's with concern the event attend,
Least the sharp Conqu'rors should too rav'nous be,
And in the Carrage swallow me,
I durst not stay the fight—but waked—and there's an end.