The Court of Cupid :: :: University of Virginia Library

The Court of Cupid

By the Author of the Meretriciad [i.e. Edward Thompson]. Containing the Eighth Edition of the Meretriciad, with great Additions. In Two Volumes

Thompson, Edward (1738?-1786)

[epigraph]

I, II.

[VOL. I., II.]

TO That amiable, virtuous, gallant Wight, F--- B--- D. Knight.

MERETRICIOUS MISCELLANIES.

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I, II. [VOL. I., II.]

TO That amiable, virtuous, gallant Wight,
F--- B--- D. Knight.

When I consider gallant Sir,
The prowess, and the mighty stir,
You make among our little jades,
Dread Prince of Plackets Knave of Spades:
Liege of all Loiterers at Whites,
Deserter of the Bill of Rights:
Anointed King of groans and sighs,
Sovereign of rhimes to Harlot's eyes:
Lac'd Beadle to the winged God,
Flog'd nightly with his roguish rod:
Knight of false smiles, and folded arms,
With blood, which Venus never warms.
Say gentle Knight what could compel,
Your heart to keep a beautious Belle!
And with this gentle Belle to ride,
And only daudle side, by side!
And ne'er to take insipid genus,
One little ride on little Venus!

But let her tumble, toss, and roll,
Whole nights, and fret her little soul,
Her little heart, and little hole.
Why this parade my tall Sir B.
Wanting that thing which makes a rake!
O! leave such things to abler folk,
Kissing with you is quite a joke.
Take this advice good Knight from me,
I'm much your friend if you can see:
Take you th'expence! and being a neighbour,
To credit you I'll take the labour,
All will be pleas'd, when this is done,
You'll have the honour; I, the fun.
It is not Sir a bad expedient,
And I remain your most Obedient.

Et cætera.

THE MERETRICIAD.

Meretricem ego item esse reor, Mare ut est; quod des, devorat, Plaut. Truc.

Give to a whore the whole within your power,
And like the ocean she'll that whole devour.

Immortal Denham in far earlier times,
Tun'd this soft maxim in melodious rhymes:
That mild Parnassus, nor her milder streams,
E'er made some poets, or the poet's themes;
For many sure there are, who've sung, and sing,
Yet never sip'd at the Castalian spring;
Which plainly proves the Muse the poet made,
And since invok'd to ev'ry Dunce's aid.

Now to avoid the beaten path of old,
I'll make a Muse,—if not as good,—as bold:
And since she's modern, to protect her name,
I've stole her out the Drawing Rooms of Fame.
She's no Castalian water-drinking Muse,
Champaigne, and Burgundy, she quaffs profuse:
Nor does she naked rake about the groves,
With hair dishevell'd to bemoan her Loves,
Nor does she like a vulgar Latin Muse,
Tramp through the woods without her silken shoes;
Far softer carpets grace her steps, and seat,
Softer than Sylvan moss to savage feet.
And if she chuses to indulge an hour,
'Tis not in th'umbrage of the darkling Bow'r,
But on a couch of regal feather'd down,
Where foolish thought ne'er introduc'd a frown.
Ch---'s the Muse, she dare aspire to rise,
And pluck the di'monds from the starry skies.
O had the Poet half her amorous fire,
He'd raise her triumph, and his note the high'r:
But he'll invoke, while invocation's just,
To spur his pen, as Venus spurs her lust.

Then deign dear Matron, (Widow, Miss, or Dame,
Two, all, or either, or which is thy name,
For thou'rt in life a mystery, not in trade,
Yet if approv'd the better,—honour'd Maid!)
To aid an infant poet—lately sprung,
From royal lewdness,—not Plebeian dung,
To chant the triumphs, and exploits of A---
Who is not quite so fat, yet quite as rash.
Say, must she sing the most minute affairs,
Done and transacted in the realm of hairs?
But hold my Muse,—won't that be rather nice
With her, whose only passion's carnal dice,
Where little good is link'd to so much vice;
It is—so in a whisper wrap it clean,
More of a whore, or less, she'd better been.

How durst you soar so high, kind honour'd Maid,
Without invoking Wilmot's lathy shade,
Whose gen'rous soul pursu'd this theme in death,
And rail'd at lewdness with his parting breath;
At last declar'd his ev'ry art in vain,
To scour this lewd Augean stable clean:
Presumptuous Muse, t'attempt so hard a theme,
To make a limpid of a mudded stream;
When ev'ry wench, who bears but common charms,
Condemns the traitor, while the treason warms.
But since my Ch* won't her aid refuse,
Who knows what fortune with so lewd a Muse?
Suppose we but the nobler vermin rout,
One poison's best to drive another out!

O lovely H*, whose lovelier name,
Stood first, and foremost, in the rolls of fame;
Such fame, as Venus bore with Pagan Gods,
When public stews she made of their abodes;
Fair Cytherea's Queen despis'd her Lord,
In that, Earth's Goddess too has kept her word;
Although the Blacksmith-God detected Mars,
In the soft conflict of their am'rous wars,

And brought the whole Pantheon to behold,
How his wife gave him horns, and rais'd her gold;
He, gentle Blacksmith, blest the wanton dame,
And (like the moderns) pocketted his shame:
But since old age has wrinkled her decoy,
She vows a virtuous life's the only joy;
Teaches chaste maxims to her lovelier Girls,
To bird-lime Monarchs, and to marry Earls.
Not that she don't desire with equal gust,
But who'd imbody such a piece of lust?
Not G---'s self with all his breadth and length,
With all his prowess, and his martial strength.

Thy sister, Goddess, who has long been known,
For carnal acts in the politer town,
Now gravely sits, as gravely takes the air,
And vows her spouse, her only love and care;
What moving miracles, these times afford,
Lo Lady V--- sleeps constant with her Lord!
Happy it is, when Females turn in time,
And, like this beauty, ever keep their Prime.
Rouge we put on, to vamp a batter'd face,
As crooked Fops set off their corps with lace:

What don't our Ladies owe to Pompadore,
She gives the ugly charms, the beauty more,
Blanches the rural, rosy British cheek,
And if too pale, crimsons the dimple sleek?
With witty Su---er , have you lately been,
Was it at tea, before she'd time to clean?
Did you not stare to see her pebbl'd face,
Observe it now! with ev'ry blooming grace.
Ladies wear vizards now throughout the Town,
You rarely meet a female with her own;
Down from the Dutchess to the Wench in place,
All have their morning, and their evening face.
What things has France exported to this isle,
To spoil our beauties, and corrupt our stile;
Return 'em genuine, and take back Belleisle!

Thee, Lucy thee, whose meagre smutty charms,
Diverted first the Soldier under arms,
Or if he wanted when his guard was out,
A little nonsense on the silent flute,

Then you supinely laid your matches by,
And to the music join'd the melting sigh;
Say, was it there Orlando heard thy hymns,
There did he grow enamour'd of thy limbs?
O happy Knight, whose judgment could draw out,
Such shining beauties, from a lousy clout;
Yet matchless Lucy do not think I blame,
Thy great ambition of a Lady's name,
Nor do I care, how, when, or where the Knight
Disturb'd thy oceans in the shades of night:
Let the world talk, for scandal's never dumb,
What beats a lady's finger and a thumb.
How shall my Muse, my Lucy now approach,
Exalted from a basket to a Coach?
Nothing emboldens but her not being prude,
And kind indeed, if only kind as lewd;
Then say, soft Lucy, when you rode in state,
Why would you drive at Phaëtonick rate?
Suppose your keeper was a bit decay'd?
He was no less a man than you a maid;

Why fly your Sire, with those new whiten'd charms,
To loll and wallow in a turnkey's arms?
And when you'd quite exhausted Newgate's lust,
You seiz'd poor Palmer with as great a gust:
Inhuman thirst, thou very vital drain,
Lewder than all the whores in Charles's reign.
But that, and more, thee Lucy, she'd excus'd,
Had you Ben Johnson's tippling head refus'd;
Where Usher, you and Bewly oft got drunk,
And then pull'd caps with some less dirty Punk,
When Bridgman made his last dear will and groan,
A good annuity was then thy own;
With this proviso—that you'd rake no more,
Nor play the vagrant, mercenary whore.
Alas! thy many actions since hath shown,
Thou could'st not quit the bottle and the town.
Oft has the Muse beheld thy tott'ring feet,
And pray'd that instant for the widest street;
But then 'twas night, and little to be seen,
So no great matter whether foul or clean.

At fam'd Bob Derry's where the Harlots throng,
My Muse has listen'd to thy luscious song;
And heard thee swear like worser Drury's Punk,
The man should have thee, who could make thee drunk;
Cit, Soldier, Sailor, or some bearded Jew,
In triumph reeling, bore thee to some stew.
At other times more riotous than lewd,
Then nought but swords, blood, tears, and oaths ensu'd:
So dire a conflict surely ne'er was known,
A worse sedition Hellen has not sown.

Men in all ranks, all characters of life,
Promiscuous mingle in the doubtful strife,
Broomsticks, swords, poakers, stools, chairs, fists, and tongs
Together class, for Lucy's drunken wrongs,
Bowls, glasses, bottles whiz about the ears,
And wound regardless, Citizens and Peers:
The females blubber, kneel, shriek, pray and swear,
Tearing caps, laces, sattins, silks and hair:
Now, now the city, now the army beat,
Till the loud clamours reach the public street,

Chairmen, Links, Coachmen, Waiters, Nightmen, Pimps,
Crowd to see fair play—to the Culls and Nymps:
The noise at last, the drowsy watchmen catch,
And twirl their rattles, for their brother watch;
Away they hobble, with their lights and clubs,
A little conscious they'll receive the drubs:
Join the confusion, hoping to subdue
This bloody, ever fighting Motley crew;
But all in vain—they only serve to raise
The fire, as fuel to create more blaze.
Heard you that rush of woe,—those horrid cracks,
Ten lanthorns broke, ten watchmen on their backs!
A greater ruin Derry's never saw;
Two Jews were kill'd, a Bobwig and a Beau:
At last the Constables with numbers beat,
And crown the Warriors with a Round-house treat,
By them in triumph Lucy's bore away,
A captive Queen, to wait the blushing day;
She in her arms embrac'd a drunken Beau,
And with him snor'd upon a truss of straw,

Rose the next morning with her batter'd corps,
And march'd in matchless bronze to Fielding's door;
O let the rigid sentence be forgot,
For Bridewell never was my Lucy's lot.

Debates being done, with Bewly she return'd,
And with dear Usher, for fresh riots burn'd;
The Shakespear's Head, the Rose, and Bedford Arms,
Each alike profit from my Cooper's charms.
But oh! alas! how fully can we weep,
Fat Weatherby sunk in eternal sleep:
She rests, large Quean, from kitchen's greasy storms,
And's wheel'd in solemn dirge for hungry worms.
Weep, weep, my Lucy, Weatherby's no more,
A loss like this you never knew before;
Usher, Orlando, Weatherby are gone;
In dismal sackcloth all the worthies moan!

The greatest deeds a nine days wonder are,
But Lucy laugh'd between each falling tear;
Sought a new seat for Bacchanalian chat,
And fix'd her standard at the Golden Cat;

Where she enjoys whatever's great or low,
The brawny Chairman, or the lathy Beau.
This I'll assert—for it's her real due;
Witty with candour, in her friendships true;
Moves with good-nature, dignity and ease,
Form'd to torment the soul, and yet to please:
Erase thy vices with the sliding day,
The Muse invites thee to attempt to pray:
Nor let thy wit immerge thy reason too,
Tho' thine is pleasing, as it's ever new.

Fisher thou'rt young,—but in the rolls of fame,
Who can, or dare eclipse a Kitty's name.
Let antique poets sing romantic loves,
Of Ladies visited by Bulls, or Doves,
Or to their arms secrete—the dearest Man,
A vig'rous Stallion, or a diving Swan:
These trivial stratagems perplex no more,
'Tis deem'd an honour to be call'd a Whore.

The fairest, sweetest Debauchee below,
A timber'd Son of Liffey, and a Beau,
My Muse maintains it, and she'll prove it too,
Kitty, ne'er harm'd so many maids as you.

Each flirting slut, on whom's bestow'd some charms,
When e'er she sees thee, thrills with lewd alarms,
Swings to the glass, finds beauties she ne'er had,
And, fill'd with vanity, runs chariot mad.
“View Kitty Fisher, who the other day
“In grogram drudg'd—now ravishingly gay,
“Nay wore check'd aprons—that, I've oft' been told,
“Now she wears none—but drags a train of gold;
“Nor is she handsome, that, we all allow;
“But peacock's feathers beautify the daw.
“Then why mayn't I as well as Fisher pass?
“The men all tell me, I'm a pouting lass.”

Thus has thy grandeur, and ill-gotten fame,
Debauch'd the Virgin—and the darling name.
Kitty, my Muse will not pretend to say,
Who first deflower'd or brought thee into play:
So many make pretensions to the fact;
Since you've forgot they cannot be exact.
Some say an Ensign, some an am'rous Knight,
A Suburb 'prentice,—some a Serjeant Kite;

Many have paid for't, who could well afford,
A gay Sea Captain, and an old Sea Lord;
Who of all these can we the Hero dub?
It may be one, or all of Arthur's Club.

Ye Gods! when future ages read this o'er,
Will they believe, to keep a painted Whore,
A thousand Nobles of the British Line,
Of different ages, could promiscuous join?
Peruse the Antients, nothing could employ
So many tails, unless the siege of Troy,
An Eastern Fair, to consecrate her dust,
At Memphis rais'd a Pyramid of lust:
And lovely Lais of Trinacria's Isle,
Who all the youth of Corinth did defile,
Whose greedy, thirsty, mercenary soul,
The greatest presents only cou'd controul.
Our Lords, like sage Demosthenes, ne'er said:
But buy repentance, at the harlot's bed.
Nor Philip's mad, enthusiastic son,
When thro' the East, his arms victorious run.

In his debauches ne'er exceeded this,
Tho' grand Persep'lis flam'd, to please his Miss .
One man may err, like Alexander drunk:
But who would club, to feed a craving punk!

But tell me, Kitty, where was all thy art,
Amongst these numbers not to steal one heart;
When sep'rate you enjoy'd the wining man,
What could resist a well-laid bedded plan?
Then where were all thy mercenary schemes,
To lose the settlement, the best of themes!
It was thy dullness, and thy snowy touch,
Or man had never thought he lov'd too much.
Who besides thee, pray would not sweat and toy,
T'imbibe at once some profit and some joy,
Nay bear one Heir to all—a lovely boy?
A nurse who's skill'd in all the Gossip's clack,
To ev'ry Cully can a likeness tack,
Will swear he is a Bishop's, or a Lord's,
And with a striking feature, prove her words.

O Kitty think, had you but mov'd in tune,
What mighty things your son, and you had done;
E'en Cleopatra, with her orient grace,
Was but a Gypsy to thy lov'lier face;
You might have shone, he out-whipp'd Phaeton,
And drove the Chariots of the Stars and Sun.
Oh! shame and scandal to thy charms and birth,
To hobble in a vis a vis on Earth.
The only thing amongst that mighty club,
Entitles thee a monumental dub,
Was, when a noble Lord had cause to rue,
The paying twice for what he cou'd not do;
The deed by Matrons will recorded stand,
A Lord in bed with Venus,—and unman'd!
This was a merry, and a witty deed,
Surpassing all the beauties of thy steed;
Say, did that mincing, spotted Palfrey run,
To lay thee down in earnest, or in fun?
Unpolish'd Horse to be so nobly rid,
And flirt, and gambol, like a wanton kid.
Suppose thy Rider really made thee proud,
Why little Pye-ball'd,—why so very rude?
Saint George himself, ne'er rode a softer pace,
Nor like thee, Kitty, mov'd with such a grace.

My Muse she weeps, O had it been a mare!
My own dear Pegasus had got an heir.
But this is worse—O this—e'en makes her bleed:
Lo! Hermitage upon the pye-ball'd Steed.
Some doubts she has, and may they prove no worse:
Take care you fall no lower than your horse!
Remember this, and from a Muse who's just,
Thy man's a bankrupt, both in purse, and lust;
And tho' the Sun shines, yet may fortune frown,
And quite reduce, both him, and Mrs. Brown .
Mankind's deceitful, you have had your swing,
Remember Lockheart wore a brilliant ring.
Kitty repent, a settlement procure,
Retire, and keep the Bailiffs from the door.
Too well thou'rt known, too long you've play'd the whore,
Put up with wrinkles, and pray paint no more:

No more thou'rt thought a subject for the town,
Reject Miss Kitty, for plain Mrs. Brown.

Equestrian Hermitage, an answer deign,
Why for a Moor, quit genteel De---l---n?
The fault (like all thy sex) is not in you,
You did your best, he wanted something new:
Women by use, increase their love and joy,
But men more variable, disgust and cloy:
Thus like a crab-louse clings the haggard scold,
The more you scratch, its keeps the firmer hold.
Is it thy amorous disposition say?
That lulls thee with the black Arabian Bey,
Their nature's hotter, and their colour's rare,
And that's sufficient to allure a Fair.
But tell me Hermitage, amongst the sons
Of Butchers, Draymen, Brewers, Chairmen, Duns,
Could you not find a sturdy youth to please,
And give thy meretricious passions ease?
Is such thy conscience, appetite, and want,
That Tripoli can give what Britain can't?
Pursue the scheme, enjoy the swarthy race,
Till they perceive the vizard on thy face.

But here observe the Juliet of her days,
Fall'n from the pinnacle of public praise,
Oft' with encomiums has the playhouse rung,
Enraptur'd with the music of thy tongue,
Oft' has the Virgin sympathiz'd thy doom,
And wept for Juliet in the silent tomb:
Nor griev'd we less when Bellamy withdrew,
Yet we forgave thee for the golden view.
How did the Town applaud thy happy choice,
Altho' in thee she lost the sweetest voice?
But if the ties of mother will not bind,
How weak are women, ignorant, and blind!
Not all the rhet'ric of a Courtier's tongue,
Or that of mother from thy tender young,
Were found sufficient to subdue thy lust,
Tho' quite corroded, by corrosive rust,
When Metham had thee, such a deed as this
Was merely modish, and became a Miss;
But yet his tenderness, could not subdue,
That thirst of dear variety in you:
All he could say that itch could not destroy,
To bind the Mother to the loveliest Boy.
Calcraft you left in search of new delight,
And roll'd in wanton joy with gay Dick W.

But since Old Time has worn the dimple sleek,
And furrow'd wrinkles o'er the blushing cheek,
Who would imagine you would play the whore,
And fly in raptures to the Irish shore?
But women crave while man's a drop to give,
Nor cease to lust, until they cease to live.
If e'er these lines should reach thy flinty heart,
Fly to thy babes—and act the mother's part;
But if they'll not induce thee to return,
Disgrace, and shame, must seal a Juliet's urn.

With regal grace H---t fills the fretting Stage,
And would do honour to the Train, and page;
But see she quits the operative plan,
To sleep in peace, with an Endearing man.
The awful Theatre of late's become,
A mere receptacle for ev'ry Strum:
You might as well have spar'd your spouting pains,
And clung with honour, to your honest grains;

If H*t, a Sister Muse, must do thee right,
Thou'rt Envy's self—with all thy Sex's spite;
Of all thy stamp, the most carniv'rous Trull,
Adam's whole race, thou'd grapple as one Cull.
Swear not the Muse's is a partial pen,
Because thou'rt avaritious H*t of men;
She'll give thee all the merits that are fair,
Nay, kindly wish thee to a greater share:
You have been tender o'er a Sister's health,
And sav'd the Fair-one by your care and Wealth;
For Charity in Harlot, King, or Cowl,
The world must own denotes a noble Soul.

Behold, what's here! a lovely Form of joy,
A fairer Hellen, for a greater Troy;
How could pollution such a Genius wed,
A genius worthy of the chastest bed.
How came she lost in ignorance and rust,
A common prostitute to common lust?
Mur---y if e'er thy deeds, or Summer plays,
Deserv'd encomiums, or the publick's praise,
'Tis now, for introducing to the light,
The peerless Elliot, for the Town's delight.

Let Poet's wrangle, and be-rhyme thy Muse,
Contemn the papers, and the two Reviews:
Let them for barren Pindus' Hill contend,
Decline the low pretension Naiad friend;
Let witlings snarl, let George's Coffee-house sneer,
Let Midwife Bogmaids, drop the muddy tear,
Let all the Scrubs of bare Parnassus bawl,
Let Lloyd prepare the coffin and the pall;
Exert thy talents to their highest pitch,
Then with thy Naiads flounder in Fleet-Ditch.

Thou'st nurst and rais'd a Genius for the stage,
At once to lash, and please a frantic age:

Pritchard, Yates, Cibber, now are all undone,
Clive, Hart, and Pope, must either hide or run:
These are thy triumphs, thy exploits O Poll,
What pretty things you've done, with toll—de—roll.
Let Garrick sheath his Shakespear's tragick knife,
Bind up the antient plays, and Jealous Wife,
Play on my Sons the Citizen, and Maid,
But dread the Rosciad, and implore his aid;
Let Managers anonimously sue,
And beg my Lord to grant the Wishes too,
The King protects you, let the play perplex,
And with pay'd Bentley halloo,—Vivat Rex.
Yet still my Summer Sons the vict'ry's great,
See Rich and Garrick, bow beneath your feet!
And may my Hooper still appear as new,
To all the Town, as she appear'd to you.

What's tripping here more lively than the rest,
If mirth is bliss, then she's supremely blest:
'Tis Nancy Dawson, at a nearer ken,
Fam'd to delight the Fair, and please the men;
Thy motions Nancy are beyond dispute,
Nor does the fame they've got thee S---h---r doubt.
Only for house-rent has that Jockey rode?
Or does he ride, as in Love à la mode?
If so, Iv'e done; it proves you really kind:
I think he rides too heavy, tho' behind:
Tho' you cant bear the whip, you like the spur,
You're game egad—too much for such a cur.
Well, dance on Nancy , keep the beaten rout,
And burn your Rider, as you was burnt out;
Kennedy leave not in the flames to fry,
Poll by the whip and spur will run and die;
Steel to the bottom, only rather hot;
But time and rust the fairest things will rot;
In trot and gallop, you so please these days;
Sure you must amble sweetly in a chaise;

But since it's fashion, and if we agree,
I'd rather drive you Nancy Vis à vis.
Forgive a chatt'ring, simple, wanton Muse,
She cannot mean you for the Livery's use:
How quick the changes of the Harlot's bed,
Shuter has Kennedy, and Dawson's dead.
Incline thine ear, and Madam Marriot weep,
Who ruin'd all, by an extatick leap.
What can have harm'd our gay Italian Belles,
To make sweet Petit dance at Sadler's Wells!

Have courage Muse, for Courage you address,
Aspire like her, but ne'er diminish less,
Say, Female Banker, will you condescend
To spare a trifle, to a Muse, your friend?
'Tis true she's old, but common never known,
And yet no stranger to a sensual town;
She slept with men of ev'ry rank and age,
Down from his Highness to his humble Page;
But want will visit oft' the Noble's door,
And when the outside's rich, the inside's poor;
Grant a few scores at what per Cent you will,
Nor doubt my honour, on a trivial bill.
Thus in your nets, as preying Spiders lie,
You seize the harlot, as they seize the fly;

Grant a few pounds, at double premium full,
Then 'rrest the hussy with some dying Cull.
The worst I wish, is, really to thyself,
Only to starve on such ill-gotten pelf.
What could a Knight see in thy ugly face,
To be hum-bug'd of fifty pounds of lace?
But that's not rare, for thousand have before,
Paid for a maiden-head, and bought a whore.

Of all the daughters Venus ever had,
So fair as Fordyce none, or half so mad;
The greatest pleasure that she ever chose,
Was, to set friends together by the nose;
Not stand for trifles to create a pother,
To leave one Brother, and enjoy another:
Or riot at the Rose, or Bedford Arms,
And fire the Bob-wigs, to dispute her charms;
Her passion riot, she had none for drink,
Her taste and will, deliver'd in a wink;
Few men she chose, but fewer still admir'd,
Chinese and carnal arts, but little fir'd:
Yet where she lov'd, no barriers could prevent,
To give a mutual joy, was all she meant;
Two things she bore, amongst her sex but rare,
Contempt of money, and a foe to care,

Friend to a Mercer, and a scarlet coat,
Ever receiving, but without a groat,
Ne'er build, ye fair, upon her hated plan,
To fly from room to room, from man to man;
Pause here my Muse, nor scrawl an harsher word,
She did live chastely, with the chastest Lord.
Him, she resign'd to finish nature's work,
And chose a prison with her dearest Burk.

If female softness, and endearing grace,
May, in the Muse's records, claim a place,
Dunn must not pass unsung,—there are I know
Some snarling few, the Muse's wrath below,
Some wretches dead to nature and to sense,
Who love to find out faults in excellence.
Faults she hath some, and all with justice rue,
That one so fair should ever prove untrue:
But still it's prudent to resign her Bags,
What beauty now can live on love and rags!
'Tis strange the Ladies, to set off their youth
Will ever deviate from the paths of truth:
Mistaken notion to pretend to raise
A reputation, on so weak a base;

Somewhat too vain, in fabled notes she sings,
An antient lineage drawn from Gods and Kings;
But leave such arts to those, whose form requires
Helps weak as these, to fan love's dying fires.
Blest in thyself despise the thoughts of race,
We ask no parents for so fair a face:
The rigid judge must bring thy faults to veiw;
But candour triumphs, finding them so few;
Scarce would she wish those blemishes forgot,
Was ever Venus yet without a spot?
That thou art Woman, we have known before,
I never thought thee less, nor wish'd thee more.

Behold a face, as fair as great in fame,
A very Venus, with an Hervey's name;
High in the known venereal list she stands,
Fam'd for the loveliest legs, the fairest hands:
She bears one fault, as such, we must impeach,
If with Adonis—she would eat her peach;
She is the Cytherea of the land,
And built her Temple, but it would not stand.

Indust'rious Fair, she spar'd no corp'ral pains,
Nor Stretfield neither, to encrease their gains;
What could declare so soon, the Bankrupt Pair,
But want of cattle, fasting, fresh, and fair?
Causes sufficient, to bring in the Bums,
So stop'd,—as City Kings, for greater sums.
If a stagnation proves in all the trades
Of corn, oil, tea, tobacco, harlots, maids,
Business in course immediately must drop,
And, like Miss Hervey, each must shut up shot.
The coronation causes want of fish,
And flesh, nay ev'ry other common dish;
The torn down hussies some sev'n years ago,
Trim up once more, to flash, and make a show;
They will not vend as erst they did their ware,
But all keep brac'd, for coronation fair;
Wait for the Company's return to town,
And even twist their noses at a crown:
The only place to find what's nice and rare,
Is in the Abbey, or the scaffold fair:
Prebends, Deans, Deacons, now torment no more
Their dog'd-ear'd Bibles, to the blue-coat poor;
Their holy charge, with rev'rence is resign'd,
To things more modern, worldly, and refin'd;

Sermons, Psalms, Lessons, never waft a care;
No priest's so happy, as when free from pray'r;
As for the reliques of the brave, and just,
Peace they must keep, they've had their dust to dust.
If ought would wish to shed the pious tear,
'Tis marble busts, for want of mattin pray'r;
(In which the genius of Roubiliac's seen,
Surpassing all that are, or e'er have been.)
But these will never toll the morning bell,
A long vacation, makes the cassock swell.
Why grieve the loss of trade Herveyan fair?
When the same cause effects our daily pray'r.
Reside in peace till pageant times are o'er,
You'll never be a bit th'inferior whore.

But how has wedlock murder'd that sweet form,
Too weak to bear the buffets of a storm:
You shou'd have scorn'd e'en Jove as swan, or bull,
To cross the seas, much more a modern cull:
The very ship was watch'd by scools of fish,
To have the taste of such a high made dish:
Thrice happy fish that could at last devour,
That body, which I've fed upon before!

It is a bliss upon this whisking land,
To have, what pagan gods must take at second hand.

What's here! a doubtful, visionary fair,
That, like a juggler's ball, is here, and there;
Stole from the confines of the old Welsh Queen,
But for the universe, would not be seen;
Why gentle Charlotte did you not repair,
At the appointed time to drown my care?
I wrote, I sent five porters up and down,
Tore down the bells, and tore this Bagnio gown,
But heard no tidings of my joy and wish,
Abus'd the waiters,—raving oh! my Fish!
“My Maid was out, I rav'd and tore my hair,
“Your billet kiss'd, return'd it back with care;
“But why not break the wafer, gentle Belle?
“My tears declare—I cannot read or spell.”
The honest speech, so pleas'd the rapturous youth,
He clasp'd dear Charlotte, as a country truth.
Will you forgive me, this unhallowed wit,
For Welch declares that Fish can read a-bit!

The Muse is pleas'd to find you thus improve,
There must be genius—where there's so much, love:
Perfection, it is none, to write, or read,
The greater Dunce, the greater mark of breed:
Therefore sweet Charlotte must by face, and head,
Rank high in dignity, being highly bred.

See Charlotte Hays, as modest as a saint,
And fair as ten years past, with little paint;
Blest in a taste which few below enjoy,
Preferr'd a prison to a world of joy:
With borrow'd charms, she culls th'unwary spark,
And by th'Insolvent Act parades the Park.

So great a saint is heavenly Charlotte grown,
She's th'first lady abbess of the town;
In a snug entry leading out Pell-Mell,
Which by the urine a bad nose may smell;
Between th'Hotel, and Tory Almack's house,
The nunn'ry stands for each religious use:

There, there repair, you'll find some wicked whight,
Upon his knees both morning, noon, and night.

Close at her heels, trips fairer Nancy Vane,
Entomb'd sev'n years, and lo! she rose again!
Refraught with goods, displays a Deardian shop,
And hums by turns, the Vet'ran, and the Fop.
Thus art and stratagem encreaseth trade,
And Welch, on letchers, palms her for a maid.

There without art, dame nature will appear
In matchless Massey, little worse for wear:
Bend here, ye harlots, with unfeigned grace!
And own cosmetics, never touch'd that face,
She never vended goods unduty paid,
Nor gave one daub, to mend a batter'd trade;
Just as she bedded, rose the peerless lass,
She never turn'd to use the pocket glass;
A venal trick, trump'd up by batter'd jades,
And practis'd now by all the twirl-mop maids:
Unmatch'd shall peerless Massey grace my lay,
Nor want a guinea, while a Bard can pay.

O giddy Muse—indelible reproach,
To pass Miss Davis, tho' she lost her coach:
Say pretty Polly, will you deign a nod?
She humbly kisses thy posterior rod;
But if you'll not, the tickler you must use,
And as you flog the Vet'rans, flog the Muse.
Hold! hold! thy hand, my fair incensed Fair,
Commit not sacrilege thro' dire despair?
Observe the form, that thou'rt intent to harm,
A sister beauty, blest with ev'ry charm!
O pretty Poll! will nought thy ire restrain;
Must a poor Muse for Kitty plead in vain?
Won't all the powers of Ranelagh withstand,
The little ruin of thy little hand?
O shame, Miss Polly, to thy worshipp'd face,
Not to regard the grandeur of the place!
But rush to battle without fear or care,
Nor spare my Lord—nor spare his Lady's hair;
O what a body! with a soul so big!
To beat the powder from a Noble's wig:
To beat Miss Fisher in that giddy place,
Became Miss Davis' fury, form, and face.
The world must stare, two Heroines to see,
Fighting for peeping Tom of Coventry.

Thee, of all harlots, joy portray'd to please,
To cool the mind, and give the body ease:
Granted an art, peculiar to thy bed,
To lay the living, and to raise the dead;
Since flesh is frail, and subject to mishaps,
Luck, from the blackest rhyme, protect Miss Caps.

But lo! what's here, that interrupts the song;
Something rough painted, ugly, bold, and long,
The Proteus, S---p---ns, fam'd for legs and shape,
Sly as a fox, and antick as an ape:
She has this prudence, to retain her cull,
And like the Cretan dame, conceals her Bull.

Muse drop the curtain, nor behold this act,
Two sisters glorying in a carnal fact:
Shrink at these times, like darker days of yore,
Two sisters playing with one man the whore.
Repent O Gar---ks, quit the Bolton Queen,
Nor e'er together in the Row be seen.
Next lend your ears,—and list the grave intreat,
O spare a Sister, spare St. James's-Street:

Learn her to hate a sensual wicked town,
And chuse a place more virtuous than the Crown!

View a continuance of th'incestuous scene,
O would some guardian virtue intervene!
And lead the Igmires with a conscious shame,
To weep their greatest loss, their virgin fame.
O royal Hampton, thy belov'd retreat,
Is fam'd for all that's elegant, and sweet;
Thy Sylvan shades the chastest beauties throng,
The noblest subject of the poet's song:
Say, what could cause a Noble to destroy,
Two lovely Virgins, chastity and joy?
What cou'd provoke the dire incestuous gust,
To murder Virtue, for the sake of lust!
And then ignobly to deny support,
Stood cast, and censur'd, in a public court;
Like a Lord Mayor who for some marriage feat,
Did, at St. Martin's, penance in a sheet.
But th'eldest I---g---m---e like a knowing wife,
Obtain'd a weighty settlement for life.

Learn then of her, ye fair, who's fair and kind,
To grant no favours, 'till the parchment's sign'd!

What's pregnant here, so very big and rare,
The strong resemblance of a country fair?
Blest she's in that, and blest with vig'rous youth,
But Clemens never deviates into truth.
Above the rest, her genius I prefer,
For who can propagate a lie like her.
She's sick, she faints, she's dead, well, rich, and poor,
All at a breath,—but mostly in an hour.
See at her feet an humble suppliant kneel,
To plead his passion without sense to feel;
In scraps of plays, and many a tortur'd line,
Hums, hah's, and foams, to tell her she's divine;
Starts, pauses, groans, then raves, with clinched fist,
A King, then swain, now Ghost, list, list, oh list!
Gives father, mother, friend, and her this line,
“Let Cæsar have the world, if Sally's mine.”
The youth she kiss'd, and with a Syren's grace,
Declar'd the child was his,—and nam'd the place:

Another comes, another, and two more,
The whole she hums, and would as many score:
Lords, Knights and Captains, Commoners and Scribes,
Each draws the purse—as he the stuff imbibes:
Each claims his right, she proves the child his own;
Yet all the while 'twas got by Mr. Town;
The whole is settl'd, but the infant's name,
Who kindly died the very day it came.
Of all the Nymphs that Venus ever bred,
Of all the living, and of all the dead,
None ever had the cunning, and the art,
To thumb the guineas, and to steal the heart:
She twigs the Vet'ran, wins the youth's regards,
And plays in turns on him the harlot's cards;
The rosy Hebe, has with thousands lain,
And humm'd them all from Faulkenor down to F*.
This is her maxim,—and as good, as true,
Some men for profit, some for pleasure too.

Davis, a second Circe in her wiles,
Who, Syren-like, enchants ye, and beguiles;
You may as well drink of that witch's bowl,
As let this Gipsy captivate your soul:

Sings, swears, She riots o'er the sparkling wine,
Until she makes ye, like Ulyssus'—swine.
The Rose and Shakespear owe a deal to thee;
Begot by lewdness upon infamy;
Which tender name thy genius has retain'd,
And by the title thou hast thousands gain'd.
In younger days, when Prostitution found,
And took thee, grov'ling from thy mother ground,
When thy ambition had no higher rolls,
Than following Carmen, to pick up their coals;
Or raise a laugh, to show thy greater art,
Steal a few handfuls from the loaded cart;
Perhaps, to raise a mob, a sister fight,
Or with a Chairman snore away a Night:
These were thy triumphs, thy exploits before,
The blackest Princess of a common shore;
Where oft' you've grop'd for iron, not in vain,
And sifted cinders high, in Gray's-Inn Lane.
Who wou'd imagine from so mean a thing,
So fair a face, so sweet a Strum cou'd spring:
Shocking it was such eyes as thine should be
Hidden in filth, and viler infamy.

Betsy, delight and ravish with thy tongue,
Nor mind the Cinder-heap from whence you sprung:
Remember this, repent in time and pray,
For mushrooms rise and perish in a day!
Preserve thy beauties, and thy warbling breath,
And eke retain thy Manners to thy death!

Thy deeds, O French! deserve an abler pen,
To paint thy devastations brought on men;
Tho' thou art living, yet they're obsolete,
If ought perpetuates, it's some endless gleet:
You had your hot, nay and your Cold-Well too,
And he that dabbl'd, did his dabble rue;
I know you shone, I know you knew to please,
And pickle some too with the French disease.

Look down my Muse, for thou in all must rule,
And ev'ry praise in store confer on Pool;
A Venus drawn with all Apollo's skill,
To wound in colours, and in life to kill:
As good as fair, in all surpassing kind,
The gentlest manners, with the truest mind.

Stand Hero's stand! she moves; again O move!
Gay Queen of Beauty, Rapture, Pleasure, Love;
Scarce is it possible, so fair a face,
(Adorn'd with manners dignity and grace,
Replete with all the eloquence of Love,
In fire a sparrow, tenderness a Dove;)
Could sue in vain, or could a mortal be
So very frozen, not to kneel to thee.
Could thy lewd clime Hibernia raise a boy,
To scorn the Queen of Beauty, Love, and Joy;
A clime so fam'd in the venereal wars,
What Venus is there bears not Irish scars?
Thrice happy Sons, to be endow'd with parts,
To pain, to please, and win the dearest hearts—
Thou ne'er produc'd but one that could resist,
The charms of Hebe when a Cambridge kist.
Soon may'st thou find a thaw in heavenly charms,
And melt a soft chaste snow ball in her arms.

How various are our tastes of Woman-kind,
To all we're partial, and in some we're blind:
One loves the brown, others the black, or fair,
Some die for eyes, others for teeth or hair:

Some men you'll find disgusted at a squint,
To have one, others will bestow the Mint:
Some can despise the charms of lovely you,
Yet fall a Martyr to a sattin shoe.
A scarlet cloak, white leg, and linnen gown,
Will win a smile—when card'nals raise a frown:
A clean check'd apron often does more harm,
Than all that Milliners can make to charm:
I've known a man in love with no one thing
About a Beauty, but her apron string:
The close French night caps, or your English mobs,
Oft' rifle hearts—yet oftner rifle fobs:
Great things are done by pattens and a mop,
Or a Miss painted in a Mill'ners shop:
Dappers love women that are wonderous tall,
Maypoles love you because you're wonderous small:
'Tis true you're small, a very Fairy Queen,
A nosegay gather'd on St. James's Green:
Pluck'd on the sweetest Banks, the sweetest flower,
The pride, the bloom, the Beauty of an hour.

So Murray rose, but Lord how long ago?
When Bath was young, and Nash an infant Beau:
Soar'd from her basket, to a Chariot Fame,
And lives this moment with the best good name.
And may you Allen still pursue the roads,
That lead from Bailiffs, Bagnios, Pimps and Bawds:
Beauty fair Allen like the flowers you bore,
Are the sad emblems of a Garden Whore.

I've done my utmost to restrain my pen,
But still your deeds drag Satire from his den.
Was not the caution in another name,
To save yourself, your child, your dearer Fame,
Sufficient Madam, but you'll still persist,
And tho' maintain'd by one, by hundreds Kist.
A giddy Mother to forget her case,
Tho' begg'ry lately star'd you in the face;
And then so meanly prostitute, to down
To ev'ry Suburb 'prentice about Town.
Once more I give the caution to reform,
Accept the hint, nor brave the threat'ning storm,
I'll tell a name, a tale, a Cull will cure,
Unless you drive those puppies from your door:

Satire's a spider, full of venom too,
And keeps a Web to 'tangle such as you.
'Tis pity makes me here omit your name,
Nor die, condemn'd to everlasting shame.

Venus and Hebe both were truly fair,
But which the fairest, Ch* can't declare:
Skill'd in the tender arts of love divine,
As you're below in those of lust, and wine:
Two sweeter souls, in sattin never walk'd,
Two more harmonious tongues, have never talk'd:
Sisters ye are in beauty, wit and Grace,
But grieve that iniquity holds a place:
I wish ye every joy from mighty sums,
And hope you'll think before the winter comes:
China's an emblem of a lovely frame,
How fragil's China? Beauty's quite the same:
Rogers reflect—your Beauty's but a flower,
Rais'd, budded, blown, and wither'd in an hour.
You may reject th'advice, but time will show it:
You had no friend so honest, as your Poet.

What various lies we tell to please the Fair,
To make the Fairies vainer than they are:
Flattery, has ever prey'd on female youth,
A girl of breeding hates the name of truth:
In our first days when Eve was in her bloom,
And goodly Adam was her rigid doom:
That first best Man requir'd no gloss of art,
To win the fairest Woman to his heart;
And tho' the first, sweet perfect female made,
Had the best upright man to be her aid:
Yet she, in spite of all that Heaven cou'd do,
Grew sick of Bliss, and sigh'd for something new:
Gadded abroad, met Flatt'ry in her way,
And made a reck'ning we shall never pay:
Thus with the Women rests the maxim still,
“Have it we must; the risk be what it will.”
Pope I admire, where once the Wit let fall,
That women have no characters at all:
Most truly true, and every day approv'd,
Amongst the Fools a-loving, and belov'd;
Ask but the sex themselves, the maxim's true,
Did ever Polly praise her Sister Sue?

This they allow—which proves th'assertion good,
“That Mrs. King's no better than she shou'd,”
First Mrs. Manly rails at Mrs. Drew,
So scandal gallops up from Hull to Kew:
'Twas madam Eve that put it first about,
And live it must while Scandal forms a rout:
'Tis all in vain, talk, write, do what you will,
Woman's a sad, bad contradiction still.
Was I to court a pretty blooming Queen,
I'd feed her squirrel first, or praise her screen:
If she admires a dog, you're doubly snug,
To her be civil, but adore dear Pug:
Sometimes in love indifference may take,
Not from a Clown, but often from a Rake:
'Twas my misfortune, and the case was thus,
I lost an heiress by lampooning Puss:
She was antique, a morsel for old Nick,
But then the Darbies stung me to the quick:
I ap'd the Captain, strutted up and down,
As bold as any Gambler about town:
But what was worse, and only t'other day,
I lost a beauty by offending Tray:

I swore, and lied as much as Soldier cou'd,
And prov'd her plainly more than flesh and blood;
But all in vain, the ever injur'd Tray,
Bark'd at my visits till I went away.
Betty if this should ever reach thine ear,
Ask for my pardon, Betty do by Dear?
I swear in print, if e'er I come to tea,
I'll double thee, the elemental fee:
Try, and erase, the little injury done
That cursed, dirty little Bitches Son:
Is there no kind reversion in the eye,
To make me live, or must I bravely die!
Will you believe me when I swear, and say,
I did not know him, when I kick'd poor Tray:
Have pity Wilmot do not look askew,
On one who'll ever love, your dog and you:
Be cautious Lovers how your heels you trust,
You very rarely find a lap-dog just,
Witness my fate, once thought prodigious snug,
The loveliest Woman, with the prettiest Pug.

Things are so chang'd, e'en C---h---y wou'd not squall,
To see St. Paul's deck'd for a city hall:

This mighty town is so devour'd with lust,
There's barely lodging for the chaste, and just:
Who in the name of wonder would conceit,
A stew, a Fruiterers in St. James's street:
'Tis very true, and you may daily deal
For Fruit, or Ladies, with good Mrs. N---
The sweetest Belle, here meets her stinking spark,
After a morning's stroll about the Park:
Buys a few pippins, then retires to please
Himself, in all the elegance of ease:
Pippins have ever fatal prov'd before,
From Eve in Eden down to Pompadore:
But don't mistake all Fruiterers from this,
Are modish Channels now to modern bliss:
That is not always Friend, a general case;
Mark at the Milliners a painted Face:
That's a true mark of infamy, and sin,
The shop shut up, Sir, “you may venture in.”
Think you it's possible the ribband trade,
Without some different stitchings to its aid,
Could keep so many pretty gilded Queens?
No, no, they have far better ways and means.
There is a rank superior in the air,
Call'd Chamber Milliners where Qual repair;

These keep their Blacks, here Chariots too are driv'n,
And Bank-bills fly like eagles towards heaven.
'Twas here they search'd, when Kitty Hunter fled,
And found a Nymph and Baronet in bed:
The Knight he swore, Miss blush'd, the scandal flew,
And dearer V** is no longer new.
To tell the whole, old Homer would employ,
And beat the Fools he march'd to conquer Troy.

So have I seen a brilliant Star retire,
And leave the nighted lover in the mire:
Such was thy influence o'er this mighty Town,
Then Ross withdrew e'en Pleasure learnt to frown.
O happy man, I do not know his name,
Tho' bless'd so long with thy seraphic frame;
We'll call it generous, when he resign'd,
So sweet a creature to divert mankind:
Return'd what mighty London griev'd in you;
Surpass'd by none, and parallel'd by few.
Tho' earthly born, the rival of the skies,
In form a Goddess, with an Angel's eyes:

Rise, Beauty rise, where Angels only soar,
'Tis yours to rule, and mortals to adore.
May you when weary here, cœlestial shine,
And soar from more than mortal to divine:
Assume your seat amongst your native Stars,
And conquer Venus, by subduing Mars:
Prove the whole mixture of the Muses dross,
And dull the Graces with the charms of Ross.

We've sung the living.—Now let's drop a tear
Upon the first, and fairest, Harlot's bier:
Who living mov'd superlatively fair,
In Wit Minerva, with Idalia's air.
So young a Muse, can never dare to raise
Her little note, on such a form of praise;
Yet still a wretch in these Saturnian times,
Could teaze her Ghost in the most wretched rhymes:
The worst, sad outcast of the fools of verse,
Not fit to drive a Garreteer's hearse;

Base grease of rhyme, with less than mongrel's tongue,
A mere vile mushroom of a Scribbler's dung:
If ought would move her injur'd Ghost to rise,
Thy jargon would, to tare thy Muse's eyes:
Read this, and fly, sad base-born abject slave,
And pilgrim like, do penance at her grave:
Inscribe these lines to Fame, and Beauty writ,
(And transcribe on till I allow thee wit.)
Here lies the pride of Beauty, sense, and shame;
Who dare to Woffington refuse this fame!

How in the first edition cou'd we pass
Amongst the fam'd, the fam'd itinerant lass?
Who by her motions in the wriggling trade,
Two sterling thousands, fairly, cleanly made;
What must be done, when grown so very rich!
Travel in whoredom's a peculiar itch;
Yet that was hers, and mighty odd—forsooth!
She skim'd from Dover, to the milder South:
Swung from Versailles, up to the Paisbàs:
Then down in raptures to the banks of Po:
Thro' gay Ausonia wore the regal smile,
And ap'd a Princess of Britannia's Isle;

Maintain'd the circle of affected grace,
A very Steuart in the very face.
When cash grew low, with dignity she swung,
From the soft warb'lings of the Eunuch's tongue,
Plan'd out a rout according to her purse,
And reach'd sad Calais just two thousands worse;
Roll'd o'er the turgid billows of the sea,
And read new fortune in the dregs of tea;
Review'd the cliffs from whence enrich'd she sail'd,
But 'spite of ev'ry effort—tears prevail'd;
To town return'd, resum'd the Harlot's chair,
No bird's back-side so poor, or half so bare.
Thus Steuart liv'd, but now grown rather stale,
We kindly pay her—just to hear her tale.

Did e'er a quality possess the man,
That sought a fame upon the baseless plan
Of Woman's ruin.—Does not the Soul recoil?
To see Man study to seduce, and spoil:
Man, he is none—a monster's far too great
For him, who means to hurt the Virgin's state.
What cou'd produce, or rear that manly shape;
And grant one passion—to commit a rape:

Bestow'd a form, without one good beside!
A compound, made of ignorance, and pride,
Swell'd with all evils that Pandora nam'd,
And ev'ry other vice the world since fram'd;
Can earth produce a character like this?
Yes! and he wounds when e'er he stoops to kiss:
Behold those Forms, on whom he whilom smil'd,
Thrice wise, and lovely—now alas! defil'd;
Yet still the Fair, are so intent to please,
They'll love the Serpent if he bends his knees;
Nay curse his heart, and dread a Sister's fall,
And prove the pleasure, tho' they dread the gall.
Could such a form so lovely—so divine,
So sweet, so wise, so innocent—as thine?
Be so regardless of a C*t's fame,
To blast thyself, thy family, thy name:
Soft, gentle Fair, whom Heav'n design'd to please,
Not fall a prey to scandal and disease;
How could the purest mind be so betray'd!
To yield a wretch the honours of a Maid.
Too well you knew the character he bore,
Too well you knew a Female's fate before,

And yet so ravish'd with a manly form,
To board the bark—and brave the coming storm,
O C*t, C*t, had I known thee then,
Thy wrongs had never mov'd the Muse's pen;
The noble honour'd Sisterhood had strove,
To hide the wretch from memory, and love:
Think, when he'd gather'd all the bloom of May,
He rose, and smelt, and cast the sweets away,
Inform'd the parent of a Daughter's fate,
Smil'd on her folly—and unhappy state.
Would ye, ye Fair, be cautious whom ye prove,
Ye rarely meet a true return in Love:
The Man of Courage, and the Man of Sense,
Never betray the lovely innocence;
By Heav'n they're sent to save and guard the Fair,
And make your Virtue their peculiar care;
The fool alone disturbs your bless'd repose,
The Men of Sense were never Virtue's foes.

I love a widow that repairs to town
To jigg, and flirt, her bumpkin up and town;
Brings up a babe to prove her virtuous life;
And would persuade you that she was a wife:

A worn-out cant trump'd up so long before,
It only proves her a far greater whore.
We've eyes, and see—nay ears, and hear thee too,
And tongues, sweet Madam—which, must censure you.

If on a Chariot—e'er a boy you find,
Or when Mam walks, he, twenty steps behind;
Or in the Park, or some less public walk,
A child in hand, the maid a scarlet cloak,
You in your mental memorandum place,
Both babe and Lady of the spurious race.

Murray and Corbet thus came up to town,
Club for a Carriage, tho' they need a gown:
Try all they can, to pass for something great,
The very method that betrays their state.
So men in liquor (like a tawdry punk)
Aim to speak plain, by which they prove they're drunk.

With these, how fam'd that northern part's become
Of Tyburn road—for Foreigner and Strum.

Here all Embassadors, prodigious snug,
Preserve their fair ones from the City Bug:
Many around the Abbey choose to fleet,
But Doctors vow no air's like Marg'ret-Street.
Here from the morning to the midnight hour,
Rap, rap, rap, rap, my Lord is at the door.
When gone—anon—you hear the Templer's strut,
He, like my Lord too—loves a game at put.
A Captain next pops in too, wond'rous sly,
He thinks unseen, because he winks an eye;
Presents the King most sweetly set in gold,
Then marches off to quarters, stout and bold.
An essenced Beau, the last attacks the Dame,
And sighs all night, the pureness of his flame:
Five times the golden picture smartly gives,
She vows, he is the sweetest man that lives:
Early away the dear Sir Umbra trips,
Vowing no coral can excel such lips.
Next day at noon, my Lord makes his approach:
But at the corner leaves the motto'd Coach;
He hopes she's well, and free from ev'ry care,
She vows, she's ever sad but when he's there.
Thus Ladies pick our pockets, and our brains,
And we, still blinded—rest their dying Swains:

It's quite the same with horses, Lord, or you,
The whole they drive alike—Je up—je hu.

Now stare the world—now, prodigies begin!
Behold, a learned Banker's Clerk ta'en in.
By what, by whom; how, say? now, when or where,
At th'Coronation, or the Smithfield Fair:
Neither, yet both, and that may too surprize,
A ging'bread bargain—and a market Prize.
But how was this dear harmless youth to blame!
She bore a Burford's dignity and name:
Prov'd five and twenty thousand pounds debt clear,
And good eight thousands sterling too per year.
Egad dull reader, you'll excuse this whim,
It might have humm'd wise you, as well as him.
Suppose it had?—well then suppose it had?
In course the world must surely call thee mad.
Think with what dignity and Love she mov'd,
Who durst refuse, when by an Angel lov'd:
She spoke the living languages as pat,
As old tea gossips gabble out their chat:

All things she knew—whilst I was green and young,
I'm not the first undone by woman's tongue:
Think what a genius, if but chaste as smart,
The clearest head, with sure the vilest heart:
Her wit and genius she would hardly use,
Unless to bilk her lodgings, or the stews;
Her only aim was pageantry and stuff,
The dear duration, trivial as her snuff:
The boy Adonis had he seen the Jay,
Had hated Venus to this very day:
In shape so lovely there ne'er was another,
Cupid might even hugg'd her for his Mother.
These names she bore, as need and profit drew,
Merchant, Barnes, Errington, and Morgan too:
In each she mov'd with well affected ease,
And tho' fictitious, never fail'd to please.
Her false connubial cant would stagger truth,
Her maiden stratagems betray'd my youth;
A Widow, Miss, or Wife perhaps to day,
In France her husband, or alas! at sea;
When she address'd, a pleasing Maid she mov'd,
I gaz'd, I wonder'd, and alas! I lov'd.
She show'd the virtues of the sweetest mind,
By genius nourish'd, and by time refin'd;

I only weep, a wit like her's should raise,
So vile a fabrick on so firm a base.
Forgive me reader, for I cannot rail,
Tho' e'en her deeds have merited a jail.
Yet let us hope she may repent the crime,
And find forgiveness in a transport clime.

O what a name! rever'd in days of yore,
As Maid, Queen, Princess, Dutchess, Countess—Whore,
When e'er the round O dignifies a name,
So surely blown from out the Trump of Fame:
These names in verse run smooth as apple-barrows,
O' Connillo's, O' Brien's, and O' Harra's,
'Kelly's, O' Lochlin's, and O' Courcy's too,
Have been great men and waded Liffey thro';
From them fair Nelly you derive your name,
And genuine beauties must establish fame:
Such soft endearing symmetry of parts,
Must soften Hermits down to Lover's hearts:
Why should Hibernia let her daughters roam,
Why not confin'd to conquer hearts at home?
Dublin should stop these beauties with her tolls,
And not export them to torment our souls;

Will not, O'Brien Dublin then suffice?
But Britain too must suffer from your Eyes:
Have mercy beauty—and pray learn to feel,
And clasp the Suppliant when he aims to kneel.

Now turn my Muse, behold, this pomp of woe!
The dull procession, and the dirge how slow.
Whores, Bawds, and Pimps, make up the grateful train,
To mourn the bodies which old Nick has ta'en.
An hundred watchmen, with their lights and polls
Proceed, but now omit their midnight calls;
Ten ragged green girls, for the garden's praise,
With tops of leeks, and nettles strew the ways;
Then big in flesh see mother Eastsmith stride,
With Gould and Gaudby, waddling by her side;
To bear their trains, behind three pages creep,
Hill, Yews, and Doddington, almost asleep:
Then two, by two, a dozen Bagnio pimps,
Behind them move, as many torn down nymps:

Next from each playhouse, with the salt-box come
A Snuffer, Sweeper, Trumpeter, and Drum;
Then solus, hops a dull Orchestran flute,
Behind him waddles a theatric Mute:
Now, of each House, five under-strappers came,
Behind, as many Guinea Tits of fame,
Dress'd in a flimsy, unbecoming woe,
Pumping for tears, but not a tear will flow:
The chief of these, for tongue and scandal known,
Miss Innis she, no gliber upon town;
Behind her four of less ignoble fames,
Rhymer, Moor, Mitchell, Droheda their names,
Jenkins, and pretty Biddy Wingfield bore
The tatter'd ensigns of the tatter'd Corps:
Behind them Brabsant, Benson, Cook, and Bland,
Then Carey, solus, with a nightman's wand;
Next mov'd six Bailiffs, hung with horrid writs,
Which almost frighted Gardner into fits,
Who behind them, assum'd her awful stand,
With a memento mori in her hand:

In solemn cloaks, just hir'd for the time,
Ten Bagnio Chairmen, hobble on in rhyme,
Follow'd by Steward, Hambleton, and Trail,
Who, for the night, had just obtain'd a bail;
With Whips revers'd, twelve Hackney coachmen mov'd,
Then Sagroe fair, and Buckley the belov'd,
Spencer, Gore, Monday, Kingsborough and Gold,
March'd on as solemn as St. Paul's is toll'd;
Above the rest, majestic Elliot's seen,
Deck'd in a modern mantle of pea-green;
Her right-hand fill'd with things unfit to tell,
The left, the bloody knife that slew Miss Bell;
Stamford and Loudon walk'd in flaming red,
And Gifford with a jordan on her head,
In which the incense for the sacred rite,
Was neatly cover'd from the vulgar's sight.
Solus, advanc'd a garden claret blade,
Crown'd with a paper Cap, of bills unpaid,
Silent and sad as any Rogue cou'd be,
That halter'd rode, to dreaded Tyburn tree;
Behind, in snowy sattin, Holmes advanc'd,
In spite of ev'ry pious effort danc'd:

High on a wand the will of Douglas hung,
And Bet the praises of the Donor sung;
Round her five infants, fam'd for shrillest sounds,
Alternate echo'd,—Holmes five hundred pounds.
High above all, was fam'd Sall Parker seen,
Dress'd in a sooty, dismal bumbasin;
Drawn by three horses in a muddy wain,
Hired at the George in antient Drury-Lane;
Her hands alternate o'er each mourner's head,
Ordure, with opium mixt, profusely spread;
Three Negro boys, of curst Antigua's clime,
Deputed Cupid's, for the dismal time;
Wain rumbl'd, wheels groan'd, with the weighty charge,
As muddy Thames does with my Lord Mayor's barge:
Two Gambian Virgins fan'd the painted Doll,
And two more bore an Indian par-asol:
Next, to make up the Motley, howling pack,
A Steed bore Bence and Harden back to back;
Walkers, full eighty, from the Strand appear,
As many Garden shoe-blacks, grace the rear;

A thousand links on either side for grief
Weep as they burn,—and Buckhurst lo! their chief.
Thus, from the realms of honour'd Drury-Lane
Came this procession to the Garden Fane;
Of which fam'd Derry was appointed priest;
And tho' in function greatest, yet was least!
When all were gather'd in the hallow'd rails,
Bob, from a topsy-turvy basket hails!
“We're here assembl'd on the noblest themes,
“To mourn great Douglas, Wheatherby, and Whemes;
“To lay the ghost of Devenpot that stalks,
“And frights the watchmen in their midnight walks;
“To bind Miss Cassel's ever restless soul,
“Which shocks the Hum—hums with her cloister'd howl;
“And to exhort each godly pious whore,
“To live, and die, as they have done before:”
This said, he took the pot from Gifford's head,
And o'er a crazy stall the incense spread;
Which Buckhurst fir'd by order with his link,
And thro' the mob, the wind diffus'd the stink;

When lo! again the priest, dread silence broke,
And thus renew'd his grating, dismal croak:
“Earth lightly lay;—thou world revere their names,
“And justice do their morals, and their fames.”
Whores, Bawds, and Bunters, Panders, Boys, and Men,
In cadence hoarse, re-bellow out—Amen.
When in confusion the procession broke,
And ev'ry mourner march'd, eclips'd in smoak;
All diff'rent ways, on diff'rent errands run,
Men to undo! and girls to be undone.

Who are the parents of this lady is a doubt with many; yet it is allowed by most that she is nobly descended. She was ever admired by the circle of the Beau monde for her beauty, great abilities, and her wit and taste in the politer arts:—however, that passion for intrigue, which is implanted in us by the God of Love—allured her so much astray, as to make lady H--- say—“the little creature is grown so infamous, that I cannot countenance her any longer.”—She quitted baron H--- to marry captain F--- of the navy, a man as boisterous in his manners as she was delicate.

This Lady was by this satire, and a celebrated preacher, converted to the ways of Magdalenes, and married by him; to shew the efficacy of his new Doctrine.

Sir Orlando B---.

The late Comedian.

Anson.

Cheop's daughter.

A Courtesan of Corinth, who asked so great a price for a night's lodging, that made Demosthenes say, “He would not buy repentance so dear.”

Sicily.

Thais.

Such was the extravagance of this Nymph, that a subscription club was formed at White's to support her—and the Dupes possessed the Girl alternately.

The late Mr. Chetwynd, who died of a decline at Montpelier. After his death she married Mr. N. but falling into a consumption, expired in his arms at the three tons in the city of Bath; by whom she was loved and lamented, and in the latter part of her life proved a religious penitent.

Her name as House-keeper.

After this most accomplished woman had quitted Mr. Thrale, she went into keeping to Sir E. D---g--- where she did not continue long, before she returned to Drury Lane Theatre.

Mr. Robert Lloyd, who died with grief in the Fleet-prison, upon the death of his much loved friend Mr. Churchill—was the greatest classical scholar of his time, and author of many prosaic and poetical pieces of much merit: and a severe satirist against Mr. Murphy.—What Ascanius says to Euryalus in Virgil—may with truth be applied to them.

One fame, one faith, one fate, shall both attend,
My Life's companion, and my bosom friend.

She went by this name before that of Elliot. She was a handsome woman, descended of humble parents—but amassed near 8,000 l from the bounties of her two last keepers, Augustus H. and his H. the D. of C. in whose services she was not quite so steady as prudence could wish—she died soon after her discharge from the last personage.

These Ladies houses were burnt in Manchester buildings.

Pasiphæ.

The sign where she's 'prentice.

One of the names of Venus.

A paultry Performance, intitled, Woffington's Ghost.

Quite weary'd of my part I quit the stage,
And curse the Cringers of a lying age:
How can an honest Muse expect to live,
When Rogues, Thieves, Pimps, and Sons of Sodom thrive:
Whoredom's to these, an honourable trade,
You ne'er meet Honour,—but you may a Maid:
I never held my tongue, or told a lye,
Int'rest I've none,—and Int'rest I defy;

Unhappy now is honest England's lot,
For all but Scotchmen are by G---d, forgot:
O'er the rough seas I'll traverse with my rhime,
And search for virtue in a Savage clime.

YE whores repent, put on your deepest weeds,
See half the world maintains young Ganymedes!
Go to the Magdalene, there pious bawl,
And Charley Dingley will accept ye all:
The sons of Sodom now escape a jail,
Easy as Peter did, when Angels gave him bail.

Adieu, ye fair,—adieu voluptuous time;
All Fools adieu—adieu ye Fools of rhime.

THE COURTESAN.

Hoc quoque composui, Pelignis natus aquosis,
Ille ego nequitiœ Naso Poëta meæ.
Hoc quoque jussit Amor—procul hinc—procul est severæ:
Non estis teneris apta theatra modis.
Me legat in sponsi facie non frigida virgo:
Et rudis ignoto tactus amore puer.
Virg.

I am the Man, the Naso of my time,
Born on the Humber,—fam'd for luscious rime:
I writ the first,—Love bids me write again.
Away—ye cold, ye rigid, ye profane:
Begone—lest I offend with genial joys:
Come melting Maids and read,—Come longing Boys!

Have you not seen, upon a market day,
A butcher's shop, the meat in bright array?
Have you not seen amidst the tempting treat,
The butcher's daughter, tidy, fair, and neat?

Her beefy cheeks, her skin of mutton fat,
Have they not made your heart go pit-a-pat?
Have you not wish'd yourself a fly, to skip
From leg to loin, and riot on her lip?
For such a Muse who wou'd not risk his life,
When she stabs deeper than the butcher's knife?

Hail! Harriot Lamb, who makes her daily food
Of that, which passion rears to shed her blood.
Thrice happy woman, who with joy can feed,
Can kiss with rapture that, which makes her bleed:
The Lamb, the maid, from diff'rent causes feel,
From diff'rent feelings lick the butcher's steel:
Kind Charlotte Hays who entertains the ram,
With such delicious, tender, nice house-Lamb.

Be thou my Muse; in spite of pedant fools
Who walk, eat, drink, and sleep by college rules:
Pindus I pass—call mistress Clio—brim,
Thalia bilk—but knock at Jenny's whim:
I'm for no airy, visionary slut,
With whom so many wits have play'd at put;

Give me an English muse, she'll make me speak,
Beyond a jilt—in ballads prais'd in Greek:
This is my whim—I'm fond of all things new,
I go to Goadby's—not Apollo's stew:
In all I'm odd—I'm mark'd where'er I pass,
Pegasus threw me—so I ride an ass:
Have I your pity? when you cry—poor fool!
He neither lives, nor writes, nor rides by rule.

Hence with your rules—I'll have them not—begone,
They're musty saws, fit for a parson's tongue.
Why should I mention Mother Method's school,
When all my pupils err, and err by rule:
There is not one but hath been tripping caught,
And not one guilty found of one chaste thought:
Then cease this mighty stir, thou mighty fool,
Muse, theme, and words, are aliens born to rule.

Thousands there are upon this whisking ball,
Who sin by rule, who never pray at all:
Many at meals are punctual—some at stool,
All cheat by chance, and all get rich by rule:

Kings rule by rules; Queens try by rules to smile,
Scots fawn by rules, by fawning rule this isle:
Statesmen deceive by rule, and gamblers play,
Harlots by rule delight, and bishops pray:
In all but good we act by drowsy rule,
The whore, the priest, the minister, the fool.
The muse her stings to sons of folly sends,
She censures not by rule—nor yet commends;
To prudes of silken vice she dares to speak,
She draws no tear down Virtue's rural cheek.
Curst be the lines if smooth so'er they run,
That stab unjustly, or detract in fun,
That shun a statesman, when the star should feel
The poet's pen, beyond a Felton's steel:
And doubly curst those rimes, tho' smooth they scan,
That wound the bosom of a patriot man.
Or swerve from truth and call a S--- brave,
Or force a lie and call my Wilkes a slave.

My Wilkes is fled, and must my Ch* too
Fly, weep away her widowhood with you:
O! must we lose the music of her tongue,
For kings have listen'd when a Ch* sung:
Must she withdraw who made so great a stir,
And leave her kitchen to a Milliner!
Forbid it Venus, pray relent my lord,
Have pity, do not send the maid abroad!
O! what a conquest will that friar make,
Who makes a convert of so old a rake:
We've things more strange recorded still in paint,
Ch* may make a mighty jolly Saint:
Better than Agnes she may surely prove,
Not in the feats of arms, but feats of love:
But can he bear to let you cross the seas,
A mistress bless'd with so much corp'ral ease?
My lord remember in the youth of life,
When burnt in wood and for a banker's wife:
Thou wert the man made mighty Orleans frown,
And vied in splendor with the Gallic crown:
Ne'er mind the world, by scandal be it said,
It is no crime my lord to keep a maid:

Be it a crime—'twill not disturb her bliss,
The very worst is gallant P*t's miss;
A Miss the wonder of a courteous age,
A Miss the pleasure of the dull, and sage,
A Miss who'll toy an hundred summer days,
And with her earnings make an evening's blaze,
A Miss so bless'd in the more noble parts,
A Miss so just a judge of English hearts,
A Miss so skill'd in politicks, and plots,
To make a union of the Whigs and Scots:
A Miss so truly chaste, so truly just,
To hold a vestal's place of sacred trust:
A Miss, to end her qualities, and life,
A Miss, a maid, a widow, and a wife.
Hail! Miss, hail! maid, who first inspir'd my lays,
Can I forget thee in this ebb of praise?
Can I—oh! can I ask? cease babbling muse,
Wilt thou ne'er quit this scandal, this abuse?
Never.—Thou shalt. By Love's plump bum I swear,
His Mother's bubbies, and the grace's hair,
I never will.—Suppose with all her state,
Beyond e'en that of rich Corinthian date,

When wanton Lais so luxurious thought,
Or that which Thais Alexander taught,
When high Persepolis by that fair punk
Was burnt; and godlike Alexander drunk,
Reel'd with his torch where that fair Gypsy led,
And by the royal light retir'd to bed:
If in a state, superior to all this,
She should invite thee to her throne of bliss,
Woud'st thou refuse?—No. I would make my peace
With her, on some rich couch of downy ease:
Appoint the congress, nor believe me vain,
When manhood swears, the Maid shall not complain.
If you reject the challenge, mark behind
The power of rime, the bard how very kind.

Of all the females nature ever made
For pleasure, business, gay'ty, or parade;
None can at once those four great passions prove
Like thou, great mistress of the art of love;
Whether the lean, lank soldier, or the cit,
The sturdy parson, or the drunken wit;
The frothy player, or the chalkstone sage,
The college stripling, more lascivious age,

The scurvy noble, or the tawny tar,
All, one and all enjoy thy soft guittar,
All feast with appetite, confess with glee,
Nothing can move in tune but Kennedee.
By most I'm thought a dabler in the trade,
And from experience, this observance made;
It is a Coffee-house, the entrance small,
Once fairly in, there's room enough for all:
Or like the Hellespont, on whose high strand;
The lov'd fam'd Sestos, and Abydos stand;
The deepest stream pent with the straitest lea,
For all within's Propontis, and the sea:
Nay could you cross this sea, you'd find again,
Another Bosp'rus, and another main.

The clock struck six—when ev'ry tea-cup turn'd,
With love and with hot water Kitty burn'd;
Each would at times upon the surface play,
Yet both conspir'd to melt the maid away.
So have I seen across the rolling tide,
A youth attempt to reach the adverse side;
In vain he strove, with art and strength to gain,
And thus deluded roll'd into the main.

Such is the girl, love nestling in her eye,
In vain she strives, love gives her tongue the lye;
Melting like dripping at the Bedford fire,
She seeks the Park to quench the fierce desire:
Chooses the shadiest part, grows sick of light,
And every moment seems an age to night:
By passions torn, by prudence check'd she roves,
Now firm to yield, and now she flies the groves:
Resolv'd to speak, she stops, shame warms her cheek,
She won't, she will, she can, she cannot speak:
Amidst these conflicts Me---d---t appears,
The smoothest, greyest villain of his years;
With sugar'd speeches moves the doubtful part,
And conquer'd Kitty, sighs beneath the smart.
Passions, and snow balls each by motion swell,
And Kitty finds her little heart rebel;
Full of desires she sighs for this, and that,
Her heart for ev'ry man goes pit-a-pat;
Thus by degrees she steps upon the Town,
And what's so common pray, as Kitty Brown?

Laugh, I must laugh to hear such fumblers swear
That thou'rt a maid—and on the town a year.
Hail wanton Amazon! well done's thy part,
When none could find the conduit to thy heart:
Laugh!—I shall burst my sides, to think our Guards
Declar'd thee chaste, so well thou play'dst thy cards,
Although they charg'd thy fortlet foot and horse,
You rose next morning not one pin the worse.
Thus wanton Amazon of keen delight,
By day you heal'd, what they had broke by night;
Not in Penelope's (thy name sake's) way,
By night undoing what she did by day;
Cleanly revers'd by you, dear am'rous Pen,
A ten years maidenhead to ten score men.
Hail pretty Pen! thy size, thy colours prove,
Thou art descended from the queen of Love:
Who may we thank for such a curious maid,
But thy long sister?—Whose long thriving trade,
Has made her long the wonder of this town,
Till thou a wond'rous wonder here was shown.

But Harriot, like all human things must fall,
In spite of brick and mortar, paint and ball:
Take heed you split not on a sister's rocks;
Joy to sweet Stephens with her golden locks!

Lust, the most social passion of the soul,
Sweet to indulge, but stubborn to controul;
A passion, which the god of nature gave
The free enjoyment of to king, to slave:
Which the polite, through strainers more refin'd,
Call gentle love, the joy of womankind.
Then love, or lust, (for call it which ye please)
Leads to one end—the happy road to ease:
Softest amusement which we all profess,
As constitution dictates, more, or less:
Unless it is the chaste Platonic mind,
Which courts without emotion womankind;
If such dull souls possess our duller youth,
It may be impotence, it can't be truth.
We've some of hotter, some of colder make,
And some whose drowsy passions never wake,
Some ripe at fifteen, some at twenty two,
Nay, some at twelve are ripe and rotten too.

That maid I most admire, whose keener loves
Stir'd by some youth, whom best her heart approves,
Longs to enjoy, or the desires in time
Wear her fair beauties out, before their prime:
If disappointment sinks her brilliant eyes,
She pines in thought, smiles sickly green, and dies.
In David's days, in that most pious time,
Ere Priests pronounc'd polygamy a crime;
When Kings on many cast the luscious eye,
And kept that law—encrease and multiply;
There 'twas no sin, there Nature they obey'd,
Great as a pleasure, vulgar as a trade.
Her I despise, whose prostituted mind
Is more to money, than her joy inclin'd:
Who like old Cheop's daughter works in shame,
To make a pyramid to damn her fame.
Our Lady V--- amidst her youthful heats,
Never perform'd such mercenary feats;
The Ptolemaick system wond'rous wide,
And the large Israelitish she has try'd;
Try'd on a happy plan to please herself,
Without one venal thought of gaining pelf:

And in her very joys has done more good,
Than those who boast an apathy of blood:
O could my pen such frozen bedlams move!
To Hell I'd sweep them, where they'd find no love.

Parents there are, too many so we're told,
By age made callous, and the thirst of gold;
Who lose their fire as they approach the tomb;
Who wonder, how their daughters in their bloom
On man can ruminate, can pine, can weep;
Because their hearts retain so cold a sleep:
If ye your children love—avoid these shelves,
Nor once forget—when young, ye lov'd yourselves.

Weep for that pretty creature barr'd, lock'd up,
Bread but to eat, and water but to sup;
Denied the gen'ral air, the noon-tide walk,
Lo! how she bites her nails, and pines on chalk,
For some soft assignation in the Park,
With some delightful meteor of a spark:

But Betty there unbars the parent's plan,
And Scotland joins her to the happy man.—
Such rigid acts but prompt a stronger lust,
For man with woman's something more than dust.
Great Cæsar conquer'd, when e'er Cæsar fought,
Yet Cæsar's arm ne'er kill'd like Cæsar's coat.
Such girls I love, such parents I condemn,
All daughters must—I'll answer for all men.
Is it not most unnatural to move
What nature first implanted, genial love?
Say, can the Leopard change his spots?—or can
The Maid tear from her heart the dear lov'd man.—
From obstacles like these our passions rise,
And one rash moment blasts our future joys:
In this Miss Hunter play'd the Roman part,
The man possessing, who possess'd her heart.
Great is the soul which fears no vulgar awe,
But proves with pride that love's her first, great law.

Some men there are who seek a kind of name,
And think it great to wound a woman's fame:

Curs'd be that man, whose base degen'rate breast
Allures the maid to ruin, when possest
Leaves her on seas of grief, promiscuous hurl'd,
The scorn of kindred, and a scornful world;
For C* wrongs, such, should by Heav'n be curst,
And of such cowards M* the first.
Sweet injur'd innocence, whom savage man,
By various wiles has studied to trepan;
Who dead to ev'ry tender virtue, boasts
Your fall, once queen of all the neighb'ring toasts.
But hear ye fair an absolution giv'n,
An absolution surely meant by Heav'n:
Love, the most gen'rous passion of the mind,
Softest asylum innocence can find;
Love is not sin, but where 'tis sinful love,
And when a crime, first pardon'd too above.
'Tis not the woman—'Tis the man who swore
Honour to you, and made the crime the more:
Is there a sin? (if women sin at all)
So very light, so very trivial;

The first command God issu'd from the sky,
Was to each pair—“encrease and multiply.”
In pious days, amongst the chosen seed,
The act of propagation was a meed:
Then why should these more luscious days decree
The female damn'd, and not the debauchee?
Is this our pious, great religion too,
O! shame upon't! so old, so bad, so new:
A neighbour's fame traduc'd o'er dregs of tea,
Is capital, is downright infamy.
Is this religion?—where's that parent's heart
Who damns his child?—yet never weighs the art,
The lures, the ways, the specious means combin'd
To win her tender heart, her soul, her mind:
Is there no pity for the babe we bred,
“Nurs'd on our knees, and at our bosoms fed?”
Say, can we from ourselves so soon depart,
“So soon forget the darling of our heart?”
Shall she, because her virgin honour's torn
By him she lov'd—become the public scorn?

Shall she for want to prostitution bend,
And 'mongst the brutes of lewdness search a friend.
Shall she find even pity in a bawd,
Or at a Dinlgey's feet lay down her load!
Shall she become a Magdalene, and find
A way to Heaven shut against her kind?
Or shall her virtue (for 'tis virtue sure)
Make her for want of character, endure
The night's bleak air, the flinty street her bed,
Starving her babe, and dying, begging bread!
Or shall she let it tease the wither'd breast;
Till sinking in her wearied arms to rest,
Death closes up the clinging baby's eyes,
And the poor mother bursts with grief—and dies?

Ye wedded dames, when no allurements drew
To drink such bitter draughts, who never knew
A base, vile man, have pity on your sex,
Nor leave your sisters to become such wrecks?
Hail wedded love! and hail thrice happy they!
Who live to love, and living love t'obey.
Think not by such digressions, that I mean
To praise the prostitute, or save that queen,

Whose stinking actions, whose incestuous gust,
Whose lustful appetites, carniv'rous lust,
Made her commit such endless blots of shame,
That even Rome proscrib'd a Julia's name:
Nor think I mean to stimulate the soul,
That like a beast, the man inflam'd should prowl
The streets, and secret dens, where whoredom squat
On her broad-tail, from mingl'd lusts grows fat.
No;—I shall mark the acts of those who swerve
From truth and honour, those men who deserve
From deeds of public shame to feel
The poet's pen, beyond th'assassin's steel.
Dark, bloody things like these I dare to tell,
When such a wretch as S---n--- stab'd Miss Bell:
When money choak'd up justice, stop'd the breath
Of truth, and made her die a nat'ral death:
Such things we've seen—O may they all appear!
Not pass like this which putrified the air.

Come Jemmy Twitcher, whose adult'rate fame,
Makes thee distinguish'd 'mongst the sons of shame;

Come Jemmy Twitcher, whose creative brain,
Ne'er serv'd the poor, or brought the master gain;
Come Jemmy Twitcher smallest 'mongst the small,
And first begin thy little bunter's ball:
Most pious peer, whose piety is shown,
By giving dances to the whores in town,
Rais'd for his virtues to a place of state,
Tho' in the knack of sinning only great:
He 'mongst his fiends a second Satan stands,
And when he swears, his devils clap their hands.
This is the man who first impeach'd his friend,
And on his ruin rose, yet could not lend
One cobweb virtue from his scurvy soul,
Which sins by study, and without controul:
This is that Jemmy Twitcher, whose pretence
Is pure religion, and state innocence:
Yet midst these royal virtues, he defil'd
The mother, and seduc'd her only child:
O! gentle M---e, repent e'er night,
Must Twitcher rule, and must not T---n write?
Forbid it Heaven it should e'er be said,
He smiles at you, because that Churchill's dead.

Homer and Sappho, tun'd their ditties long,
And Catley charm'd Tower-hill in ballad song,
Poor Homer's lays when living had no force,
And Sappho lov'd a fool, and died of course:
But lovely Catley—soar'd above the two,
Sold all her ballads, and her wigwam too;
Seiz'd like a Panym fierce, a red-cross knight,
And for his money slept alone at night.
Weary of fumbling out, a fumbling year,
Spread out her wings for more substantial cheer!
Eager to taste a long'd-for joy—turn'd rake,
And for a gimlet left the small Sir B---:
No Lord Lieutenant ever did such good,
For Catley has refin'd the Irish blood:
She in their gloomy souls breath'd music too,
And softly humaniz'd the salvage crew:
Such is our Catley, whose angelic shape,
Might fire an hermit to commit a rape;
Speaks like an angel—like a Syren sings—
Moves like a Cherub upon silken wings:
No more of Venus and her golden locks,
View but the two divested of their smocks:
Or place her with the three, which Paris view'd,
The very wise, the lovely, and the lewd.

And let this very night the umpire be,
Tho' he ne'er lov'd her—yet he will agree,
That she as much excells th'excelling slut,
As she excell'd him at the game of put.
Hibernia sends us many beauties, true,
Those we return are matchless—tho' they're few:
This is the case, for joy ours cross the main,
Theirs ferry here for elegance and gain.

Great is thy price—Lais could not ask more,
When she to Corinth came, to play the whore:
And old Demosthenes refus'd the bait,
To buy repentance at so dear a rate:
The lewd old fellows of these lewder times,
In their old age keep adding to their crimes;
Although the gout has eat up ev'ry power,
Still they will hobble to the harlot's door:
Chuckle, and shake at all venereal feats,
Envying the very dogs about the streets:
A cock a treading of his fav'rite hen,
Brings spittle from the mouths of our old men:
The wanton sparrows on their walls and trees,
Will make them bite their lips, and knock their knees:
Nature's most common acts create a fire,
And still denies that vigour they require;

Which makes these lewd old fools the common sport
Of ev'ry Lais, in young Cupid's court:
Where most profusely they are made to pay
For stirring passions, which they cannot lay:
'Tis fit they should—why must a fine young tit,
Be touz'd about by each old frosty cit?
No labour Hercules could ever prove,
Like obligation, in the act of love:
What is so nauseous, hateful, heavy, dull,
As beauty truckling to a cold, old cull?
From Old White-Chappel-Bars to Bolton-Row,
Take but a strole, ask pertly as you go
The various strumpets on their stands, or stop
With those poor toads, whose rags won't make a mop;
And if the meanest 'mongst the mean won't say,
They've dealt with Fz*; I'll be bound to pay
What all those questions cost; nay, I will treat
Too, with the smartest milliner you meet.
The col'nel sure's the lewdest upright cull,
That ever stroll'd the streets, or bilk'd a trull.

For things like Fz*, you should be well paid,
Such old commodities do well in trade,

A woman of your elegance and fame,
Should keep a menag'rie of such old game;
Vigour and youth you'll find in every stew,
So make them pay for what they cannot do:
These means will keep thee from all duns secure,
And make thee rich, when half thy trade are poor:
I need not whisper how to act, or move,
Thou'rt quite a mistress of the cheats of love:
For this is truth, and Venus hears me swear,
Henley's—the object of my heart and care.

If Fisher's beauty ever fail'd to please,
Or Cooper's wit, with Nancy Garrick's ease,
How must the form excell where these combine:
Earthly she is,—I wish her not divine.
Divine,—is mere imaginary bliss,
Give me an earthly goddess that can kiss?
Give me substantial joys, substantial food,
No airy goddess sailing on a cloud:
Put me to no dull shifts unworthy man,
To woo a goddess in the form of swan:
Here I could wish the Pagan tale might hold,
To win some tinsel hearts—by showers of gold:

But grant me Heaven—it's all I wish to have,
Woman, dear lovely woman to my grave;
Things known by halves, of a mysterious date,
The explanation be reserv'd for fate.
O! could the muse bestow thee equal praise,
The muse would make it equal to the blaze
Of those fair houses, which fair Dawson made,
By way of burn-fire to enliven trade:
May you enjoy each mighty mark of fame,
As bright—but still more lasting than that flame;
May wit, and elegance encrease with time,
And your fair beauty never know its prime!
Yours to your sex, be a superior case,
Love without end, and without measure grace;
May Mamma Venus every pleasure pour,
And make the fabric lasting as the door!
Stamp thee the matchless Newton of the fair,
As he was rare in learning, be thou rare.

Born in a clime where pity never stray'd
To spare the infant, or delight the maid:
Where stony parents steal for sing-song mirth,
Those means, with which Deucalion peopl'd earth:

A clime which once the bravest men might boast,
Some eunuchs rears, or sodomites at most,
A clime distinguish'd for the wisest schools,
Now only known to fiddlers, and to fools.
From such a clime did our Tenduci come,
Once fam'd, once honour'd, with the name of Rome:
From thence he came, to tantalize our fair,
And tickle with a soft Italian air:
O! What a conscience must that woman have
To loll, to riot with that sapless slave!
To dwell, to hope; to hope, to dwell one hour
For one poor drop, poor one not in his power:
Cruel duration, to emit no joy,
But stimulate without the power to cloy;
Cruel, thrice cruel, beyond all reply,
To pump the sucker when the fountain's dry.

His song is nervous, nay, he takes a pride
To show, what decency would wish to hide,
Runs warbling, dangling, round and round the town,
To brag how much he brought the matron down:

Shakes his loose limbs like death at Hell's wide gate,
And grins a ghastly grin, a grin of hate.—
Is it excusable one woman shou'd
Destroy her beauty, body, soul and blood,
Out of the numbers which adorn this shore?
Or use this thing to shun the name of whore!
Art thou of English breed, and yet so dead
To real pleasure, to defile thy bed
With a poor thing, whom cruelty has robb'd
Of means, with which all Englishmen are sob'd?
It must be ignorance; then be advis'd,
Choose, dainty dame, from men stout, strong, well siz'd,
If one won't do, take two, and two, and two,
And multiply, 'till multiplying's true:
If the encreasing number cannot please,
To give thy meretricious passions ease,
Call upon Jove, as Sem'le did of yore,
And be consum'd like that abandon'd whore.

The ship paid off—the harlot takes her due,
The colours struck, she strikes her colours too;
In riot rolls, while Jack's poor pockets stand,
The pocket empty—shakes her lilly hand;
Shifts every time the scene each ship comes in,
Serves all their turns, and drinks of all their gin:
The last poor Tar triumphant hugs the jilt,
Feeds on her charms, without one thought of guilt.
But time, which brings new ills upon his back,
Proves her a fire-ship to unlucky Jack.—
Discharg'd by every ship, by ev'ry Tar,
She goes to dock, like some foul ship of war:
Gets a clean bottom, ballasts well with lies,
And gayly rigg'd, assures herself a prize;
Re-hoists her colours, shows her painted pride,
And lewdly rolls adown a lustful tide:
To cruize she goes with all her brav'ry on,
And drops an anchor in this mighty town.
London, tho' serv'd with all daintiest cates,
Is caught like fish with artificial baits,
Hugs this new piece—alas! tho' sev'n years since,
The fleet possess'd Peg Storry, and Peg Prince.

'Twas at that time when early lamps appear,
E're day is gone, declaring night is near:
When empty cits with full stuff'd bellies trot—
To spend at night, what in the day they got:
When Qual with fresh lit flamboys bob about,
To plays, to bagnios, or to church devout.

'Twas at that time when Dod, Romaine repair,
And with their yells torment the darkling air:
'Twas at that time when letchers seek the Park,
Dreading the light because their deeds are dark;
I went to Mortimer—poor girl!—so high,
I found her parlour nearest to the sky;
Oh! what a wretched falling off is here,
From her the brilliant, her the debonair:
She, whom a monarch might have wish'd to court,
Tho' living, dead; alive without support:
On whom a levee once of lovers hung,
Sipping like bees the honey of her tongue.
Alas! here pinch'd with all the pains of need,
Cast from the Garden like a noxious weed!
The crimson cov'ring, and the downy bed,
Where oft thy lovely limbs were lewdly spread,

Are chang'd to wretched straw upon the floor;
The casement broke, the room without a door;
Dead flies, dead spiders fill the wretched haunt,
Sad, sorry emblems of the house of want.
No brilliant equipage, no tea-cups charm;
A tin-pot full, without a fire to warm:
A broken jordan, and a three leg'd chair,
A bottle shew'd a candle had burnt there;
The broken bellows like their mistress kind,
By time and use had almost lost their wind:
Thus sat the fallen fair, with comely mien
Amidst her penury,—her raiment clean:
Shock'd at a visit from a friend, she tries
To hide the melting rhet'ric of her eyes,
Which stole a-down her cheeks, still smooth, still fair,
And wip'd them with the tresses of her hair;
(The first repenting sign in Eve of grace,)
Which tho' disorder'd deck'd her pretty face.—
She gaily bred, compleated to the joy
Of am'rous appetence, to play, to toy;
To sing, to lisp, to troll the tongue, to dress,
And roll the eye of love with sure success.

O lovely Mortimer, ignobly lost!
Once 'midst the fairer fair, the fairest toast.
O! woman, lovely woman, hard's thy fate,
If plain, thou liv'st a most neglected state;
If fair, like frontier towns besieg'd by all,
And like Quebec by force of arms must fall;
If ye capitulate, the virtuous form
Is gone;—resist,—you're plunder'd in the storm.
Base man, base wretch, to forfeit all thy fame,
To court the gen'rous maid to endless shame:
By oaths, wiles, lies deceive her easy truth,
And to the jaws of lust consign her youth.
Here I your sex's persecution blame,
Who rather glory in a sister's shame,
Than pity; on a sister frown distrest,
Altho' one bore you, and you suck'd one breast:
Allow'd susceptible—unfeeling here,
A sister starve! without a sister's tear.
That muckworm man, abandon'd half his life,
Sleeps in the arms of some chaste, lovely wife:
What charity to man! when proverbs prove
The batter'd rake the best domestic dove.
But woman's reputation once defac'd,
Alas! can't be by penitence replac'd:

Curs'd be the maxim, doubly curs'd the heart
That turns, nor feels the injur'd woman's smart.
Are these good Christians?—how must Heathens blush,
When daughters perish by the parents crush:
O lift! repentance never comes too late,
Altho' the crime should stink to Heav'n's high gate:
The contrite heart will ever be forgiv'n,
Since God is truth, since mercy lives in Heav'n.
And why not make as true, as good a wife,
As that good man who rak'd the youth of life?
Blush, and let Mortimer have pity then,
Women may sure repent, as well as men.

From small beginnings rose almighty Rome,
From dirty corners lovely beauties bloom:
The nightman's baby, tho' its rear'd in dung,
Excels the child which from an Empress sprung,
This Rutland proves, in dirt, in beauty bred,
Got on a soot bag—Mamma had no bed.
Musick, and beauty in the sound of Bow,
Are all outdone by her—and sweep soot O!

Signs which are well adapted draw the guest,
From which we oft' conceit the liquor best:

100

Reduc'd in cash—still mode allures the beau,
Who chalk'd at Dolly's will to Wildman's go:
The kitchen fire at th'Bedford speaks the cook;
Under the Rose for something snug we look:
Wit at the Shakespear's head has ta'en a lease,
Where if you miss the wit, you hit the piece.
The Castle Tavern, and the Bedford head,
Have all strong tables—tho' they have no bed:
The Fountain too, with Humphrey on the sign,
Yields you good meat, a couch, good girls, good wine:
Tho' Harris out pimps Hermes with the gods,
I'll bet they beat him, and I'll lay the odds:
I'll not bet this, its more than Hermes cou'd,
That this same Fountain's always pure, and good.
If you're a Tory, dance at Almack's ball,
If you've much money, White's will take it all:
The Cardigan and Cannon, if you've gust,
Will clear your pockets, and indulge your lust:
But what are these?—or all that I have seen,
To fierce Bohemia's head on Turnham green:
Not as it stands in Master Gibson's time,
But as it stood—and Johnston in her prime:

101

Indulgent Johnston own'd by all so fair,
That not a coach, a buggey, or a chair
Could pass, but all must stop to give thee praise,
And horses too would quit their corn to gaze:
Such was thy influence on the Western road,
Thyself a goddess, worthy of a god:
Such matchless dignity appears in thee,
To worship cannot be idolatry:
Worship—O! Venus would but that suffice,
I'd kneel, I'd pray, I'd gaze away my eyes:
Yet still I fear—I should possess this dread,
If Cupid bungl'd you wou'd break his head:
Johnston forgive the humour of my stile,
And if I come to Chiswick deign to smile?

The ship when shatter'd in a storm, repairs
To port, where all her crew unfixt from cares,
Forget the recent horrors of the deep,
And in oblivion let misfortunes sleep.
Colebrook's not so—she shows the storms she bore,
Wreck'd like a vessel on a ruthless shore;
Mock'd by the waves, strip'd of her garish gear,
The spoil of ev'ry legal buccaneer.

102

Oft' have I seen thee with thy sails a-trip,
The wish, the envy of the Adm'ral's ship;
Thy streamers courted by the winds which blew,
Their pride abroad, and long'd for by the crew;
Who sigh'd to kiss thee, like the bawdy air,
Which wanton grew, and rambl'd you know where.
O! Nancy, Nancy had'st thou kept the spoils,
The various victors brought thee from their toils,
To this thou had'st been rich, thou had'st been gay,
Follow'd at Vauxhall, courted at the play:
Unthinking wench, now destitute of friends,
Tho' all the Navy paid thee dividends:
Had'st thou the gin in which they drank thy name,
Thou might'st have died in state, and stunk in fame.
Unthinking wench,—Can'st thou remember, when
Captains, Lieutenants, Pursers, Midshipmen,
Laid all their hearts, their warrants at thy feet,
And to indulge thy lust forsook the Fleet?

103

Thy case was never like a close kept whore,
Depriv'd of liberty to pass the door;
For ev'ry wind took pity on thy charms,
And brought new culls, new plunder to thy arms:
But still thy damn'd extravagance was such,
Cleveland could not bestow—thou spend too much:
Alas! how chang'd the scene—how hard thy fate,
Once known so high, in so reduc'd a state:
On Women of the Town there seems a spell,
Now up, now down, like buckets in a well.

By being so artful it must sure be her,
To live, to die, revive and make a stir:
Portsmouth and Plymouth liv'd within her arms,
And long were rul'd by her o'er-ruling charms:
When gay adult'rate Jemmy G* rose,
He gave new charms, by giving Miss new cloaths:
Nothing is now so smart, so fair, so trim,
As the soft, peerless, pretty, chaste Miss P*;
At Richmond oft' I've look'd with longing eyes,
And sighing saw a Duke possess the prize:

104

Granby, like Saul, who mighty thousands slew,
Could stoop, could kiss the buckle of thy shoe.
I love that Hero, who when free from arms,
Can pitch his camp with such a Queen of charms:
This stands a truth, and held as fair as light,
The man who loves not woman will not fight:
It glar'd at Minden, like the noon-day sun,
When Granby stood and fought, when S--- run.
The gallant Cock, when pitted first to shew,
Stands in suspence a-while, and eyes his foe;
But when he sees the Hen he flies to blows,
Obtains the vict'ry—flaps his wings, and crows.
Hear me fair form, the favour grant to me,
I'll risk a thousand lives, to die with thee;
But if I fail in this substantial part,
My pen shall find the channel to thy heart.

Orlando dead!—and Cowper too in tears!
Orlando, my good Sir, you've kill'd some years:
No!—you mistake, I rather help'd to save:
Himself he early buried in the grave:
Dead e'en when living—hardly known by name,
Till my good-nature brought him into fame:

105

But since he's truly dead, I'll give that due
To him—which Lucy he bestow'd on you:
And may those various sums he gave, or lent,
Be multiplied by others cent per cent.
Forbid it Fortune—charms and wit like thine,
Should want the needs of life, in life's decline:
The world now rather think you've sav'd than spent,
That you'll erect an endless monument;
A monument of praise like her of old
Who built a pyramid—by well earn'd gold:
Our great Republick overwhelm'd in debt,
Hopes her condition you will not forget,
But kindly give her that which Flora gave;
Like Rome she'll deify both name and grave;
Command an endless epitaph to thee,
Written by Bishop Warburton or me:
O me! alas poor me! the last of men,
Can you forget the service of my pen!
Will you forget?—dare you presume it Sir!
May the Divinity within you stir,
That usual grace, that usual joy, and love,
I'll have my wishes then below, above.
Let these the grand preliminaries be
Of future friendship, between you and me;

106

And let the world believe what I declare;
Those lines are false, are foul as tainted air,
Written in youthful spite and false abuse,
Because above the pocket of my muse:
All other codicils but this be rent,
This is my last just will and testament,
To Lucy leaving all just praise—(sad trash,)
If she dies first—she gives me all her cash:
A great return: it is I own for praise,
Surprising charity in such poor days:
By age to babes it will be chuckling told,
She ask'd for praise, and he receiv'd her gold.
But O! my luscious, dissipated wench,
How came ye lately in the close Kings-bench!
Was it the mercer for a load of silks,
Or a desire to live with honest Wilkes!
But now thou'rt out, I cannot call thee fool,
To put so great a value on thy tool:
Thou art the tennis-ball of Drury-lane,
For ev'ry stroke you get, you rise again:
Yet, don't rebound so very strong, to rise
Next to that parlour nearest to the skies.

107

Birch for the bum, ye floggers here resort:
Here Birch and Venus hold their switching court;
All kinds of instruments, all kinds of ware,
To raise your passions, and encrease your care;
Here ye may have it from her own soft hand,
Birch how extensive is thy birch command:
The martial Truncheon which the hero bore,
Is made a rod; Ability's no more:
Thou hag old Impotence—tormenting bitch,
At Cytherean halberts thus to switch
Our hardy vet'rans o'er the tawny bum,
And little Cupid too the flogging drum:
It's horrid cruel we should live to see,
Our passions grow and lose ability;
But such is nature, man is not divine,
I wish 'twas chang'd, the case may once be mine.

Women, like post-boys on a turnpike run
In an eternal heat, from sun, to sun:
And nothing stops the passion of the sex,
But broken winds, and often broken necks:
I never knew œconomy in lust,
The fire continues, until dust to dust

108

Consigns the breathless body to the grave,
And ends the follies, and the petty slave.
Would ye ye fair be cautious in your youth,
Hear all mankind, and hearing doubt their truth;
Save from those rolling sums a little gold;
Friends you might have, and even live when old;
See Talbot now,—who drank in pomp of sin,
Thro' wretched want, a sad, bad Magdalene.
Kindling new passions in her Nun's attire,
Till Dod and Dingley are themselves on fire.
Health to great Dingley, Muse, I charge commend
The orphan's, and the harlot's gen'rous friend:
He who can let the orphan want its bread,
And cloath, and feed the strumpet for his bed:
He who could labour to strike out a plan,
A godly plan, t'appear a godly man;
Who would imagine him so much a Monk,
To cheat the Nun—and canonize the punk.
But should these poor unhappy girls be plac'd
At Church in public view,—to be disgrac'd,
And pointed at below by demi-reps,
Whose fly adulterate deeds, and sinful steps,

109

Are ten-fold more! say is it decent? they
Should thus be 'rang'd, whilst Dod's eternal bray,
Is hell, damnation, bombast, thunder, rant,
And ev'ry where below in pious cant,
Wonder they cannot blush, they do not feel,
They must be harden'd like an heart of steel.

No—you are wrong proprietors, and priest.
Let them be veil'd like Nuns—or else at least
Secreted so, that no intruders may
Disturb their worship, when they mean to pray!
Let no mean dame of quality repair
Hot from her nest—saunt'ring with uncomb'd hair,
To buy applause; but not decrease her sin,
By giving card debts to the Magdalene:
Shame on such actions in the house of God,
Forbid it Dingley, and forbid it Dod.

Thou who now drag'st a peacock's tail along,
Too soon may court the crowd in dismal song:

110

Too soon may you bear some poor babe about,
Starving for food—and hardly left one clout
To hide its naked limbs—puling aloud
(By stripes so taught) to draw the busy crowd:
Thy fate I dread—I've ever had some care,
Since the sad falling of thy lovely hair;
A web so fine no spider ever spun,
But oh! alas those ringlets all are gone!
Oft' have I stood behind thy easy chair,
And envy'd her who comb'd thy lovely hair:
Oft' have I seen thee on a Bagnio bed,
And o'er thy breasts those lovely tresses spread;
Oft' when subdued by Love—thy beauties bare,
I've tied thy floating ringlets—you know where,
With such soft dalliance—I have sprung to arms,
To fall again a victim to your charms.—
But why should I torment thee with this strain,
That hair is dropt—and ne'er may grow again:
The fatal cause I would not, dare not guess,
It was not poison—and it was not less;
I will not say—I'm sure you're full of care,
The omen's bad—the falling of the hair:
Be this a warning—time will speed'ly show,
Whether dear Cambrige—those dear locks will grow.

111

Well swept good Mother, sure thy sweeping's just,
To sweep together so much precious dust.
Health to such sweepers,—when the sweeping trade,
Makes trade a pleasure, and sweeps up a Maid,
Which all the dames of fashion had not shown,
Tho' kist by all the Sweepers in the Town,
In such soft sweeping who won't take a pride,
When from one ev'ning's sweeping—starts Miss Bride:
C---t thou blackest sweeper left alive,
But if in sweeping gold a man don't thrive,
How will he thrive! for that has so much force,
Women, and Ortolans repair of course:
Besides it gives a man prodigious weight
To make conditions, and to mark the state
Of life, the pretty melting Maid must tread,
With all the soft menouvres of the bed.
Such are the articles the mother sign'd;
Knowing her child of a complying mind:
Our women Agents thus indentures draw,
And bind their Misses by the common law:
A snug, good method, sure to keep them civil,
And yet the worst to make them study evil:

112

A girl thus 'prentic'd must detest the slop,
She shows a spirit when she leaves the shop:
A spirit worthy such a soul as thine,
But more so if Dick W--- should deign to pine;
He was the man bore two before—away,
Thou art the girl by Venus form'd to stray:
Mankind must follow—when you take your leave,
We'll give up Paradise to follow Eve.

Like fools we travel, and by fools we are
Cheated, of that which we the least can spare:
But what's still worse, these foreign fools pursue
Us to our very homes—and cheat us too:
What a strange animal's an Englishman,
Form'd from the fools 'tween London and Japan;
And tho' the creature has a spice of all,
Yet still he's cheated by the great and small:
He goes abroad—they find his want of sense,
So where he fails in wit—makes up in pence:
But still he boasts of lineage from the flood,
Tho' got by Ruffians on a savage brood.
The foreign fop whose finances are low,
Upon his arts depends to make a show;

113

Boasts of his honour tho' without one jot,
On whom begotten, and by whom begot:
Like oil on water, still his meanness flows,
And all his merit's in a suit of cloaths:
He roves about—forgetting where he sprung,
And like a bird of passage drops his dung:
Can even be so very dirty too,
To cheat his very mistress of her due:
Can give her cloaths—can grow prodigious vain,
Can go to law—to have 'em back again.
There are such kind of commissaries now;
Who'd thought 'em born so high,—so very low:
Great, here an Englishman appears alone;
A wretch—to injure smiling, Sucky Stone.

Sprung from the line of Irish Kings behold,
Sweet Kitty Connoly, of whom we're told
Such pretty am'rous tricks, that all must sigh
Who hear, with Kitty Connoly to die:
A death so pleasing Saints would wish to know,
Martyrs would choose with such a fire to glow:
If in some manage the sweet creature had
Been broke to frisk, to kick, to prance, to pad,
Nothing can move with so much grace, and ease,
Nothing like Kitty Connoly can please;

114

Her Lord declares she jigs so very bonnily,
His rank he'd lose before his Kitty Connoly.

Health to young Elliot—by her sister's care
Bought, brought, and sold at Covent-Garden Fair:
Few shops you'll find, search all the Fruit'rers round,
That have a cherry half so round and sound:
Sound did I say?—But how will that pray suit
With this wet season? fatal to fine fruit:
Rotten or sound—pray did you never buy
A golden pippin lovely to the eye?
And when you'd enter'd once the tempting skin,
Found it quite rotten to the core within?
It's thus with women, and it's thus with fruit,
Hundreds I've known, the simile might suit:
Elliot, excelling foremost, in this place
Stands an exception to the gen'ral case.
What don't thy kindred owe to Murphy's wit,
One for the Stage he broke,—and in the bit
And martingal, he has thy pretty mouth;
Which with thy memory and lively youth,
Will make thee soon the darling of the Stage,
The wit, the wonder, genius of the age.

115

The stones which Pyrrha and Deucalion cast,
Ne'er form'd a form, which hath thy form surpast,
Tho' the old Square-toe's stones repeopl'd earth,
Gave wit, gave elegance, gave beauty birth;
Yet all the graces in one form ne'er shone,
'Till you he form'd, and christen'd lovely Stone.
How must thy Sire lament, when yon was ta'en
From Bath, and like a flower in heavy rain
In one short evening blasted, and forgot:
O! manly, wretched Spoiler M**t.
Bath since ber Bladud's time, ne'er felt a blow,
A blow like this, when all confess'd the woe:
Nash with the power of divination burn'd,
And show'd that Bladud's magic was return'd;
Took wings and to his empire bid adieu,
The corner stone he sigh'd was mov'd with you.
Alas! such charms, such qualities to fall
To one without one quality at all:
Studious to bring dear Woman to disgrace;
In heart a Hebe, with Narcissus' face.
That Girl I praise who chooses, and is kind,
That man I curse whom honour cannot bind:
Give me the Maid, who in her plan of life
Feels something more in Mistress, than in Wife;

116

Who scorns the dog-like ties the married wear,
True in her love, and yet as free as air;
Selects the Youth with whom she'll pass her life,
Constant by choice, not constant 'cause a Wife:
In some neat flow'ry, rural, social spot,
And to the noise of town, prefers her cot:
Serenely eats her independent bread,
And even virtuous too without being wed.
Such may he prove to Stone whose charms may raise,
The coldest stones to life, to pity, praise.

Thin,—rather thick I think about the head,
Battersea's near, but we are so well bred,
Altho' we have the greatest need of brains,
And cutting's cheap, we will not take that pains.
Some are as curious in their paying debts,
As Jemmy Twitcher is in making bets:
Give for an equipage a monstrous sum,
And the first night it's tip'd by some old Bum
For soap, and candles; or perhaps, small beer:
Such is the noble course our Gentry steer
To pay their creditors. Others abuse
Some honest man, by screening in their house

117

A fine, mean Rascal, truly base enough,
To never pay the tradesman's bill for snuff.
So very high was fed old Rufo's nose,
That without lodging, washing, meat, or cloaths,
Or even those two needs, a miss, or wife,
It would have laid him snug in jail for life.
But Rufo's honest, when we name the knave,
Who like a villain thus protects a slave.
O ye Ambassadors repent! repent,
Remember ye are chosen seed, and sent
To be your Country's honour—nay, to bear
More virtues, than e'er prov'd your Country's share;
How do ye marr that delegated trust,
In acting opposite to all that's just!
To all that's even decent too beside,
O! what a baseness—when we make it pride.
Come Thin, come Thick—come dash thro' thick and thin,
But pay Miss Rogers—or I'll blow the sin
To Churchill's ear, who, from the heavenly sphere
Shall bow, (if injur'd woman drops one tear;)
And give thee such a peal of nervous verse,
Shall send thee ten years sooner to thy hearse:

118

Injure Miss Rogers—and all earth shall shake,
And pray what would not for a Roger's sake!
Rogers, the sweetest Rogers that can move,
O! sister Rogers, Rogers all for Love.

When health and vigour swell'd my youthful veins,
Lust drew my carriage, Folly held the reins,
A thousand times I wish'd the wench to meet,
Blest with a generous heart, and power to treat:
If I had had such luck, I had been vain,
Vain of my person, and my parts; when gain
Flow'd in from deeds of heavenly pleasure too,
My manhood had not bore a thing so new;
It wou'd have turn'd my head, t'have been in pay,
With the dear sex I kneel to, night and day:
But Venus knew the folly of her son,
Intending always he shou'd be undone,
But not at once;—for had it been my fate,
Ye gods to've had a beauty of that Rate,
Like giddy Phaeton I'd broke my bones,
In driving such a gen'rous Queen as Jones.

119

Lovely in paint, but still in life more fair,
An angel dress'd, but more an angel bare;
No more of Elöisa's mossy cell,
Where Youth and Abelard were known to dwell:
Where that was dark, and awful, this is gay,
This is the cell of Nuns where Priests shou'd pray;
Here heavenly, pensive meditation reigns,
Here Love beats time to tumults in the veins:
Here roves a heart which never will retreat,
Here flows a blood, which ne'er will lose its heat:
Yes, yes I love, and will with equal flame,
And rapt'rous kiss the Cell, and Lucy's name.
Dear name, dear part, dear Creature hear that knell!
'Tis for the grave where you must ever dwell!
An awful summons but when Death compels,
Heroes and Poets fall like Lucy Sells.

When at the masquerade gay C--- rose
An Iphigenia, and her vestment gauze;
When all to stimulate was quite reveal'd;
E'en that, which even Indians keep conceal'd,

120

Peep'd lovely thro' its little gauzy state,
Like some sweet Nun thro' some monastic grate:
Rais'd mighty passions never known before,
Because forbid to pass the little door:
But Iphigenia's are quite common grown,
Women go now half naked thro' the town;
I find no fault—they show the whole they have,
I wish they'd show no more than nature gave:
But such japaning, such cosmetic arts,
Make Women's faces false, as Women's hearts:
Observe how pretty Richards is at night,
The eye-brow arch'd—the sweetest red and white:
Her dress as loose as Iphigenia wore,
Tho' little less than angel must be more:
Now view her snoring on her greasy pillow,
For such a Witch who'd dangle on a willow!
The black arch'd eye-brows now alas! are fled,
And mix promiscuous with the white and red;
Walcote who hung upon her charms at night,
Fled the next morning naked in a fright:
Swore some strange metamorphosis had been,
To make a thing so black, before so clean;

121

She stamp'd, she star'd, abus'd her Maid, and said,
O! Molly, Molly how these paints have spread:
Here have I lost five guineas and my swain,
Curse on all paints, I'll never paint again:
Some hours before her glass she sat, and cry'd,
Made some attempts, which fail'd, as soon as tried;
Till want of money conquers all disgrace,
And Miss collects the ruins of her face:
Begins again, with every touch revives,
Blooms in an hour—and thus for ever thrives:
Her culls forget her, and each night embrace,
The moving picture, for some fine new face:
For here she's happy, and supports her fame,
By skill, in never painting twice the same.

If jumping life, if jumping manners please,
Eternal talking, with uncommon ease,
An oath well turn'd, a well tun'd bawdy catch,
An eye that swims in love, sweet Smith I'll match
With all the pretty bunters on my roll,
Or even those who ride, or those who strole:

122

Below the blanket she is quite the same,
As she's above—I do not mean in flame,
Venus forbid inflammatory fun!
Nothing so hot attend your darling son!
If she is hot—O! Venus hear my strain,
And make thy graceless daughter cool again?

One little caution Girls, and then I've done:
Long bills with Milliners beware, and shun!
This is the gen'ral maxim of that Race,
To give ye credit as they like your face:
Yours like some other trades may not succeed;
Perhaps, you find no easy youth to bleed:
No rich old doating Man, that can bestow
With much quick feeling, all those sums you owe:
If so, the mere dull, guinea, Bagnio trade,
Will barely fill an Irish hungry Maid:
Out of this guinea, Jervis, don't forget
That poundage must be paid, a decent debt
To ev'ry rascal of a waiter due,
For giving Miss the preference to you.
These things consider'd, you will find a want
Of Cash, to stop each greedy Cormorant:

123

The Milliner arrests—alas poor wench!
The Bailiff has you—and anon King's Bench.
To keep yourselves in vogue, and from the Fleet,
Buy not a rag, in high St. James's-street:
O! she's a bitter one—and will confine:
You know the house, altho' she chang'd the sign!

When vicious Julia gloried in the shame
Of lust, and whoredom blew the trump of Fame:
When each new mode of venery was held
In high esteem, and he who most excell'd
Had royal thanks, yet in that vicious time
Poor Ovid fell,—as I may fall—for rhime.
But if I fall, I'll not be doubly curst,
By Heav'ns I'll lie with some high beauty first:
Something observe that is not common meat,
Something that never deign'd to tread a street;
Something that's higher born, and higher bred,
Something that's fitted for a Monarch's bed;
Something that's luscious, and that's virgin fair,
Something divine when dress'd, diviner bare;
Nothing suspicious shall displume my wing,
No filthy daughter, nor no filthier King;

124

No vicious Julia shall destroy my fame,
No Cæsar banish me to hide his shame:
No,—what I do shall gaze the noon-day Sun,
And when I do't—it shall be nobly done:
I do not boast of elegance of stile,
But where I fail to charm, I'll make ye smile;
And tho' my language is not quite so rich
As Rochester's, yet I will give an itch,
An itch to read these lines when I am gone:
Lines beyond brass, or monuments of stone;
Lines which shall last, while Hampstead Hill remains,
Or Highgate's level with the nether plains,
Last! they shall never die while Woman's fair,
Or be unprais'd, while woman prov'd my care:
But what gives still more immortality,
I liv'd when Churchill sung,—tho' not of Me:
I liv'd with him in friendship, and esteem,
Churchill, the noblest jewel of my theme!
The fairest not—Polly let that be yours,
Which shall be read with mine, while verse endures.

125

Drive me to Tomos now imperious slave:
E'en there the seat of Love shall be my grave:
E'en there some Fair one o'er my tomb shall cry,
And pitying read,—“Thus did he live and die.”

“Conveniens vitæ mors fuit ista suæ.”

This Hero, by a great stroke of Generalship, saved his Majesty's Horse at Minden.

Pucelle D'Orleans.

This unhappy Fair-one is since dead of a consumption; and the Eunuch married to a Lady of Ireland.

Duke of M**.

Since the first publication of this Poem, the situation of the Magdelene's at church has been altered, as recommended.

A City on the Euxine sea, and was the metropolis of Lower Mæsia—where Ovid was drove by Augustus, for seeing some lewd, scandalous actions of that prince.

He was banished to this inhospitable climate in his fiftieth year, and died of a broken heart, in the eighth year of his exile—and buried near that city which is now call'd Kiow.

Mantua Virgilio gaudet, Verona Catullo.
Pelignæ dicar gloria gentis Ego.
Of Virgil Mantua sings, Verona boasts
Thy am'rous fame Catullus round her Coasts.
But NASO OVID swears with conscious grace,
I AM the First of the Pelignæan Race.

129

THE TEMPLE OF VENUS.

I. PART I.

Fiers Vainqueurs de la Terre,
Cedez à votre tour:
Le vrai Dieu de la guerre
Est le Dieu de l'amour,
Rousseau.

Ye Heroes of Earth,
Whether Soldier or Tar,
Must acknowledge in turn that 'twas Love gave you birth:
That the soft God of Love is the monarch of mirth,
And the only true, great God of War.

Love, and the Dame I sing, who first inspires
The thrilling Virgin with unhallow'd fires.

130

Say, lovely Goddess, why mankind so curst,
That Cull the second, pays like Cull the first?
Venus, declare, for you alone can tell,
Why lust drives Virtue from her hallow'd cell?
Say, by what rule the eldest Son's a cull,
Or why the fairest Daughter turns a trull?
How came we lull'd in ignorance, and rust,
Undone by gaming, and devour'd by lust?
Did education in the days of yore,
Consist in judgment of a Matadore?
Did Roman Virtue rise from games of Whist,
Or Grecian Orators from list! Oh! list!
Or Cincinnatus build that godlike name,
Like empty Britons on a Table's fame;
Vaunt, the whole globe contributes to his treats,
Whilst hundreds perish in the public streets?
Or Rome's œconomy distress the souls,
That bore her Eagles to the distant Poles?
Or do you think Camillus learnt like you,
His great experience from the game of Lue?
Was e'er a Noble like Manilius drove
From Court, for public cooing with a Dove!

131

No, nor a Father hurt, (the tale how true)
'Tho' he debauch'd his very Daughter too.
There see extended in ignoble dust,
A weak, sad Sister, thro' a Brother's lust:
At White's behold, those filial, kind regards,
The Father starving, and the Son at cards.
These are the acts of Britons, shame to say,
Ruin'd by whoredom, or undone by play.
Rise I intreat thee Goddess from the main,
Diffuse thy influence o'er a Poet's brain,
To give to Beauty, what is Beauty's right,
Or weak's the pinion, and the Muse's flight;
For surely Virtue never dwelt with thee,
For Virtue Venus never went to sea:
Why should she in her first loose essay err,
When thy 'Beaux Monde concubinage prefer:
Smile sweet consent, a batter'd Vot'ry sings,
And bid thy Urchin flap his rosy wings!

O! thou whom titles never yet made vain,
Knight, Baron, Member, Patriot, Acquitain,

132

Whether you choose at Renelagh to shine,
Or more luxuriously at Almacks dine;
Or court at Tomkins more mysterious rites,
Or shake with joy, the wining chair at White's:
Or if some dying female blest in thee,
Sighs for Vauxhall, and elemental tea:
Hear and relieve them with a Play, or Ball,
Who wont capitulate at Beauty's call:
Here smile, and prove the Patron of a page,
That flogs the follies of a dirty age.

Love's lovely Goddess from the Ocean sprung,
So greater fools than Hesiod whilom sung:
But where no matter, she a wanton girl,
Was found by Zeph'rus floating in a pearl;
The winds took pity on the little whore,
And kindly puff'd her to the Cyprian shore:
The circling Horæ saw the floating car,
And kindly sav'd her for the God of War:
Eunomia , Dica, and Irene fair,
Made the sweet baby their peculiar care:

133

Taught her the deepest mysteries of love,
Then bore the Beauty to the powers above.
To win the wanton every Hero prest,
And yet a Blacksmith stole her from the rest:
From that, dear Venus, ever deign'd to smile
Upon her Paphos, and the Cyprian Isle:
Abroad the Horæ wing their Daughter's fame,
And every fool burnt incense to her name:
In every place, a different name she bore,
In every place, was reverenc'd a Whore:
Rome, Athens, Sparta, Sicily, and Troy,
Fall to the Dutchess, and her poor blind Boy;
From thence it spread to Turkey and Delly,
Pass'd thro' Pegu, and crost the Chinese sea;
Rose at Canton, took Pekin in the way,
And penetrated to cold Zagathay :
The clime had no effect upon his wings,
So up to Petersburgh the puppy swings;
Perform'd strange wonders on an Empress Queen,
And poison'd Europe's hopes in poor Holstein:
To Sweden, Norway, and the frozen Isles,
Nay skin clad Lapland, felt the genial smiles:

134

Roll'd thro' an hundred Circles up to Prague,
And swam through Holland, for the Yatcht at Hague.
The purple sails belly'd with amorous airs,
Till Love met Mirth and Charles at Whitehall-stairs:
Then Temples grew like mushrooms to the Queen,
And the first Priestess nam'd, was Madam Gwyn:
Unthinking Monarch, whose prodigious lust,
Could raise up stock from Flounders, Sprats and dust:
Whose studies were, to raise venereal fame,
And hand to us the Cytherean game.
Is it a wonder, why the venom spread,
When Charles himself defil'd his Subject's bed?
From bad examples mighty evils spring,
Virtue's the brightest jewel in a King.
A thousand proofs the Poet might advance,
From Troy and Hellen, to the Whore of France:
Start! at the Scene upon the Baltic shore;
An Empress wading in her husband's gore;

135

What's Tullia's murder, or Lucretia's rape,
To Russia's Devil, in a female shape;
The want of Virtue in th'ambitious breast,
Is want of all, to make a Kingdom blest.
Thrice happy Monarch, when so justly nice,
That dare love Virtue, in the midst of vice;
O would thy moral arm extend abroad;
And move that wanton from a thoughtless Lord:
Reduce the Temples rais'd to lust and wine,
And lead sweet Virtue from her hallow'd shrine.
Go where you will, Impiety you meet,
And altars smoke to lust in every street;
Near to Hyde Park, is rear'd a stately Fane,
By giddy Mortals, impotent and vain.

Here debauchees, and Harlots later born,
Or martial youth, whom arms, and vice adorn;
Or wealthy Cits, whom riches rais'd to note,
Nay Justice too creeps here in thread-bare coat;
Men of all ranks, all characters attend,
And each before all powerful Beauty bend;
Law, War, Divinity, the Rich, the Sage,
Impetuous Youth, and cold lascivious Age:

136

Except the very wise, and very good,
But all the Nobles of the purest blood:
Both sexes here encrease, or lose their cares;
Miss in her teens, and Madam in white hairs.
The wearied husband, or the craving wife,
Oft' get a Bastard, or a p---x for life:
Ladies debauch themselves; while Southern shores,
First make them Nuns, for Priests to make them Whores.

O what a conscience has the Queen of joy!
To hold all Nature in her soft employ:
Temples on Temples; to lust Altars blaze
From th'holy Abbey down to Wapping ways:
A thousand more in Covent-Garden stand,
Two thousand more, in Ludgate and the Strand:
To palliate all, behold upon a Horse
The moral Monarch ride at Charing-Cross:
Where, when Night's sooty mantle hides the just,
Circle the Brutes, of Sodomy and lust.
Nor are thy shades less chaste St. James's Park,
When Men, like Owls, and Bats embrace the dark:

137

Where Dames of easy Virtue stray to please,
The foulest passions 'mongst the fairest Trees:
O would some virtuous soul aspire to move,
The acts of lewdness, from the shades of Love;
Not sit like Justice upon Drury's throne,
Grow rich from bribes, from all the Whores in Town.

'Twas when the lamps a solemn glim'ring spread,
And every Noise but Hackney-coaches dead;
The Poet glow'd with most unhallow'd fire,
Wore nature's frailty, in a gay attire:
Sir Umbra's self ne'er made a lovelier show,
He bloom'd, and scented like a birth-day Beau:
An harmless sword his heel submissive kist,
A clouded cane hung o'er the lilly wrist:
A tortoise box the neatest fingers grace,
And in the lid appear'd the sweetest face:
A very tulip in the mode of cloaths,
A standing pattern to St. James's Beaux:
In a sedan he took his formal seat,
And dingle dangle rode thro' Bury-street:

138

To virtuous Fish, whom half the Bucks in Town
Had pay'd long visits, from her high renown:
If ever Venus left her natives skies
'Twas now, to bless the Hero with her eyes;
Who fell supinely, like the vernal dews,
Or fair Apollo, on the fairest Muse:
But violent passions ne'er continue long,
He sunk in metaphor, and died in song:
Reclin'd his head upon the dear one's lap,
And soar'd to vision in the luscious nap.

Soft invocations now are out of use,
And all the stuff of Pindus, and the Muse:
'Tis Love I sing, 'tis Love my soul inspires,
I seek no aid from Heliconian fires.

In that soft time, when Youth with vigour crown'd,
Wades in the seas of love till drunk, and drown'd;
I sought a Paphos of the greatest fame,
Assum'd a title, to obtain a Dame:

139

So high no Poet ever meant to soar,
Excepting Pope at Button's once before;
She mov'd a Venus—and receiv'd th'attack,
Equal to her with Ilium on her back;
So Trojan like, when wearied under arms,
In sleep, and vision, re-attack'd her charms.
Methought I lay in all that downy ease,
That Courtiers do, when Wives have learnt to please;
Lo! on a sudden all the roof expands,
And smiling Venus in her Chariot stands,
As soft, as sweet, as fair, as gay, as young,
As painters fancied, or as Poets sung:
She drew the reins, and gently stay'd the Doves,
Adonis blush'd—and Cupid kiss'd the Loves:
When Hebe fairer than the morning star,
Skimm'd through the air, and led me to the car.
The Doves obedient to their Charioteer,
Flutter their silver wings, and quicken their career.

140

Towns, Temples, Cities, lessen as we soar,
And quick as thought we lost this bawdy shore:
When Venus spoke—“Dear Naso pray attend,
“Believe that Venus is the poet's friend:
“'Tis Beauty fills the heart with soft desire,
“Stirs up the passions, sets the soul on fire,
“Deceives the sight, defaces Virtue's plan,
“Fixes her chains, and vassals all the man;
“Victorious always when she takes the field,
“The young, the aged, only gaze and yield:
“Silence in her is thunder to your hearts,
“Her eyes are lightnings, when Love's fire she darts;
“Her voice is weak, yet who'll refuse her call?
“Monarchs and bishops must promiscuous fall.
“Wander no more, an honest woman's rare,
“Nor seek new Beauties in the brown or fair:
“In a small village upon Barham Down,
“Remov'd from all the vices of the Town,
“Where rural Beauty in a russet guise
“Of homely truth, excels the pomp of lies:
“There Love, and Beauty live unknown to fame,
“Pollia she's call'd—and Phœbus gave the name;

141

“The decent Graces lent their aid divine,
“Then nam'd the happy composition thine:
“Fly to her arms, her every worth adore,
“Love her till you, and the belov'd's no more.”
This said, a dull confused sound a-far
Stole on th'attentive ear, like distant war
Of ships, when muttering heavy cannon roar,
Or southern seas, upon a rocky shore:
I turn'd, when lo! a noble fabrick stood,
Of Gothic form, amidst a raging flood
On a tremendous rock, where giddy crowds
Were falling higher than the fleeting clouds:
When Beauty smil'd, e'en rocks forgot to frown,
The turgid sea was in a moment down;
The silver Doves shot like the Evening star,
And Hebe took me from the silver car.
When Beauty's Queen forsook her airy seat,
What humble suppliants wait her silken feet.
Around her snowy neck and shoulders flew,
A flock of little Loves of rosy hue;
The Sports, the Joys on golden pinions move,
And Rapture, bursting hail'd her Queen of Love.

Wives with petitions 'gainst a sluggard Spouse,
Husbands declaiming 'gainst the marriage noose:

142

Widows in health imploring secret grants,
Virgins in sighs, confessing half their wants:
Stout roaring Batchelors demand her aid,
Old age for vigour to seduce the maid:
Dames whom experience long had rendered sage,
Bark at the Goddess to annul old age:
“Complaining round her altar many lay,
“Some of their loss some of their Love's delay;
“Some of their pride, some ardent suits disdaining,
“Some fearing fraud, some fraudulently feigning.”
Not Steuart's Levee ever half so full,
Tho' Scotland spares him to her poor and dull.
Amongst the crowd a blooming creature stood:
Lovely amidst her grief, and wept a flood:
And thus to Venus she preferr'd her prayer:
“Oh! will you lovely Goddess deign to hear
“The sad petition of an injur'd Maid,
“By man and Medlicot alas! betray'd.
“'Twas May O Goddess, and your Daughter young,
“I lent my ear to his alluring tongue:
“What could alas! an amorous Virgin do?
“He swore he lov'd me, I believ'd him too:

143

“He call'd on you to prove the flame how true,
“Intreated Hymen to unite the two:
“Declar'd he meant to bless me for my life,
“His view was honour, wou'd I be his Wife?
“Things were preparing for the gordion knot,
“Beg'd me to yield,—Oh! Goddess, had I not?
“A very vagrant thro' the World I rove,
“The scorn of Kindred, and the Man I love.
“The Goddess pity'd, wept, sigh'd, turn'd away;
“Ye beauteous maids, beware the ides of May!

This said; a Youth as meagre, and as thin,
As a bad carcass quite devour'd by Sin:
Fell on his knees, (as erst a gallant Wight,
When other's merits made the thing a Knight .)
Hear, Venus hear, an humble vot'ry's prayer,
Then paus'd, or else the rest was lost in air:
She sigh'd, the Warrior sunk into the dust,
Then smil'd and rear'd him next a strumpet's Bust.

144

In rage a furious, ever greedy Dame
Flew to the Goddess, Obloquy her Name,
Rail'd at the sluggard she had got for life,
And curs'd the narrow circle of a wife:
Wish'd that her goodness would remove the man,
Or quite invert the matrimonial plan,
Begg'd she would send a philtrum to her aid,
And curs'd all Laws, but those, that lust had made:
The Goddess stagger'd by the Matron's voice,
Dismiss'd her happy, and condemn'd her choice.

This Quean withdrawn, a Quaker in belief,
Appear'd in horns, the signet of his grief;
Declar'd his Wife a carnal act had done,
As never yet appear'd before the Sun:
By common law he try'd the horrid cause,
And cast the sturdy Author of his woes:
Begg'd that the Goddess would remove the Two,
And plant him where no horns, or Cuckolds grew;
The queen of love consented with a smile,
And Obadiah rested from his toil.

145

An amorous Lady next, supply'd the place,
With Wit, and Beauty, but she wanted grace:
Close at her heels attends her injur'd mate,
The greatest Cuckold, in the greatest state:
In turns the two before the Goddess spoke,
Who sat attentive, and enjoy'd the joke;
My Lady Lucy once was nearly winning,
Until her maid produc'd her own fair linnen:
This was so plain, Venus began to stare,
Blush'd for her sex, and then divorc'd the Pair.

To these, succeed four characters well known,
To all the Men, and Matrons of the Town:
Two injur'd husbands, and as many wives,
The plague, and torment of each other's lives:
The first a Lady, most politely true,
The second, never even true to two:
The Men as various in their different wars
As Boys of Venus, and the Sons of Mars:
Each plead their cause with energy and strife,
The injur'd Husband, and the wanton Wife:
Enrag'd the Goddess stop'd the vile defence,
And branded two, to shame, and Impotence.

146

The last that came was Virtue's lovely Child,
Chaste, noble, handsome, eloquent, and mild:
Soon as the Beauty dignify'd the place,
A secret gladness blush'd in every face;
Her name was eccho'd with unfeign'd applause,
And the bad wept with better men her cause:
When Venus first beheld the peerless Queen,
She broke the ring, and met her on the green,
Declar'd such charms were only made to rule,
Not fall a prey to such a frantic fool.
High in the air was tender Virtue seen,
To guard her daughter to the Paphian Queen:
As quick as thought she cut the yielding air,
And P* hail'd her Darling, and her care:
Honour and Truth support a brilliant crown,
And justice nam'd it—Lady P---'s own:
'Twas Virtue plac'd it on her lovely brow,
And Fame and Envy own, she wears it now.
The Maiden Chastity concludes the verse,
And with her voice the Sons of lust disperse,
All different ways, on different errands fly,
Many to Styx, not many to the sky:
Maids cross'd in Love attempt the rocky steep,
And fiery Widows plunge into the deep:

147

Old Age, and Youth, both foolishly inclin'd,
Are blown, and baffl'd by the baffling wind;
Some discontented with the Queen's decree,
Fly to the rocks, and plunge into the sea.
Unhappy Man, on whom the gifts of Fate,
Are thought bestow'd too early, or too late:
Search every page of life, you'll find a blot,
Was ever Man contented with his lot?

End of the First Volume.

Manilius, struck from the list of Roman Senators, for saluting his wife before his daughters.

The late L---d D**.

Mr. C**, once a Lord of the A---y, died for want in a garret in the Strand.

The hours.

Their Names.

Vulcan.

Independent Tartary.

The Second.

Miss H--- and Lord P---m---e.

Mrs. Walche's.

Mr. Cibber (in the frontispiece of his letter to Mr. Pope) is depicted, tearing the English Homer at Button's from a naked Venus.

A Scot's Captain of the Navy knighted for bringing home an Express from Quebec in the reign of George the Second.

Lady Lucy Mo*'s, and Lord Augustus Fitzroy were tried in a publick Court.

TO VENUS.

Venus, 'twas thou inspired'st my strains,
Sent love full gallop through my veins:
'Twas thou my Verses first didst speed;
And fill'd them with Lucretian seed;
That seed prolifick I proclaim,
That rais'd Lucretius' Roman name
To glorious, and immortal Fame.

O! Venus hear your darling Son,
Smile, or your gallant Boy's undone!
Unless you aid,—he sinks in shame,
Who only rose to raise your fame.

'Tis thou O! Goddess that inspires,
All Nature through with fond desires;
'Tis thou that warms the Dove to coo,
And stirs the sturdy Bull to woo;
'Tis thou that stimulates the Wren,
And whips the Cock upon the Hen;
'Tis thou that makes the boar to sigh,
To grunt, and court within the Sty.
To quit the straw, or leave the wood,
And raise his passion in the mud;
'Tis thou provok'st the lazy pig,
To frisk in the venereal jigg:
'Tis thou that mak'st the Stallion snort,
And gives him vigour for the sport:
Nature, without thine aid wou'd rust,
Thou spur'st them all to love, to lust.
'Tis thou O! Goddess warms each part,
And trills about the virgin heart:
'Twas you sent Paris once Pell-Mell in,
'To Menelaus' lovely Helen.
'Twas you kick'd up the Trojan dust,
And got Miss Bab Briseis bust:

iii

'Twas you that form'd th'Egyptian jade
Cleopatra, for the frisking trade;
'Twas you that made poor Tony spend,
Unto a loving fatal end;
And made the wanton Gypsy grasp
The pois'nous, slipp'ry, wriggling asp.
'Twas you that made Lucretia lewd,
And at the same time made her prude;
'Twas you which made the happy hit,
To whip her slave upon the spit;
She'd no objections to the prince,
That her enjoyment must convince;
But when found out, she went a Barking
Unto her Spouse against young Tarquin:
Let you alone dear gentle Venus,
You always can reveal or screen us.

With us indeed you have been civil,
And with the great have play'd the Devil:
'Twas you turn'd Lady Sarah's head,
And put Lord William in her bed:

Cupid and you your flames still waft on,
And burnt young O---y up for G*.
Passion and lust puft up the gale,
And kindled Kitty H.'s tail:
Then quick again as brimstone match,
My Lady B* did catch:
No Engines cou'd prevent or hinder;
V*t too she took like tinder:
Nothing in short could burn so quick,
Out of the Kingdoms of old Nick:
No Thames-street fire had half the merit,
Tho' made of sugar, oil, and spirit,
Nor did they blaze or make such flames,
As burnt in these unquenched Dames.
However Venus keep it up,
Still reign the toast of Bacchus' cup!
To Love, pray smooth the Turnpike road,
Let kissing still remain the mode;
In me provoke the Darling passion,
And flirting ever keep in fashion:
'Tis what you like, 'tis what we love,
We're taught to rev'rence folks above:

It is a homage I shall pay,
To your sweet Daughters ev'ry day;
And when I'm past all worship here,
Transport me to your heavenly sphere,
With seeing you, O! make me blest,
Lull me upon your velvet breast;
No earthly Babby e'er shall tipple,
As I will Venus of your nipple:
And if such sucking won't create,
And fit me for th'Elysian state;
Let me drink nectar, still be jolly,
And spend Eternity with Polly.

II. PART II.

Under how hard a fate are Women born,
Prais'd to their ruin or expos'd to scorn.
If they want Beauty, they of love despair,
And are besieged like frontier Towns if fair.

Have you not seen an awkward Country Clown,
Grin at the Wax-work, and the signs in Town?
With Sister Mall, a buxom rosy lass,
Who came forsooth to see the Queen's fine Ass:
Or gape an hour, at finding out the Black
At Temple-Bar, that grins, and winds a Jack:

Or at a Monkey, Lord, Lord, John behold!
What wonderous things these people make for gold:
Next See St Paul's, Guildhall, the Bridge, and Tower,
And wait till Gog and Magog dine at four:
The Meuse, Tall Woman, Palace, Charing Cross,
And the Life-guards-man stuck upon his horse:
But last the Abbey, where a gabling Cull,
Relates what air puffs in his empty skull;
He praises ev'ry Bust, and ev'ry grave,
As Milton learned, and as Marlborough brave;
Thus gold to every Blockhead rears a bust,
Where Fame should crown, the Wise, the Brave, and Just.

Thus fill'd with wonder to their farm repair,
Make Father, Mother, and the Children stare,
How that they saw the King, nay heard him speak,
And wou'd have din'd wi'em but 'twas washing week;
Thus did I gaze in Love's Pantheon lost,
Or Fools in London at a Cock-Lane Ghost.

Four faces had the Fane of different dates,
To each were five and twenty brasen gates,
Open to both the poor, and regal call,
For love is general, and receiv'd at all.
Here amorous Sons, who fell at Beauty's shrine,
Here female Honour, truly drawn divine:
Here mighty Chiefs who fought in Virtue's cause,
Here Beauties blush, that follies were their foes:
Here horrid lusts sit trembling o'er their rapes,
Here injur'd Virgins wear angelic shapes:
Here wanton age stoops ridicul'd in brass,
While Impotency points—the lovely Lass:
Here Monks recluse on living pass-times frown,
And Nuns half dare to meditate in stone.

Soft breathe the flutes—the massy doors unfold,
Stupendous vault! the roof of fretted gold,
Rais'd on an orient granite collonade,
Where foliage twin'd, and naked Cupids play'd;
Two lovely forms the spacious entrance grace,
And each a beauty of Idalian race;
High above all, and exquisitely done,
Appear'd th'amours of Venus, and her son:

From th'Ocean rising to cœlestial bliss,
And as she rose the waters clung to kiss,
What she with wining female coyness try'd
To vail, what none wou'd ever wish to hide.

There on a cloud, with every beauty grac'd
She loll'd, and with her gay Adonis plac'd
In a soft attitude of love, and joy,
And fine the contrast of the nut-brown Boy:
Their arms, and legs irregularly twine,
Their looks declaring more than joys divine.

The next the warmest conflict of her wars:
Where the dear Creature conquers sturdy Mars,
The dull procuress snoring fast asleep,
The Blacksmith calls the Gods to have a peep;
Poor Venus blush'd, who wou'dn't at the shock?
Catch'd with a Man, and she without a smock.

Will not our times as plain a case afford,
A Goddess married to a vulgar Lord:
What would you have the pretty creature do?
When married A*n to a fish like you:
Can you, if nothing's good at home, my Lord,
Blame a wise wife, who gets it cheap abroad?

Ladies suppose you're guilty of the crime?
(I love the Fair, as Poets love their rhime)
In spite of all the panders you procure,
Some will surprise in the most secret hour:
Night, and a Bagnio may conceal a while,
But time, and day at last will tell the guile.
David, that chaste good man in days of yore
Uriah slew, and made his wife a whore:
Heav'n saw the damn'd adul'try he had done,
And made the crime as public as the Sun.

A living wou'd not save a Parson's life,
When a lewd Lord debauch'd a dear lov'd wife;
A broken heart destroy'd the holy man,
He lives a knave, and she an Harridan.

What dire effects from regal secrets rise,
See Scarborough curses God, and madly dies!
He told to Love, what woman could not hold,
So man's betray'd thro' vanity, or gold:
But what could prompt that Dutchess to relate
A thing, which kill'd her friend, and hurt the state?

The Fair must own, and men with pity grieve,
The Salique maxim, “Woman's but a sieve.”
'Tis plain they kill, “But yet I can't define”,
How it's as easy as they use carmine?
'Tis hell, 'tis horror, it is all that's bad,
And no excuse if all the sex are mad.
God made a Devil, and portray'd it Fair,
Then call'd it Woman to encrease our care.

Who would believe this after years of love,
As loving, cooing as a turtle Dove:
Nought was so good, so constant to his bed,
But when he broke his leg, it turn'd her head;
She could not bear to nurse, so stretch'd her scope,
And tugging broke the matrimonial rope:
Pick'd Paddy up, well clad in all but cloaths,
Who beat her husband's goodness, by the nose:
But it's the mode, for Ladies to elope,
From pretty Kitty, down to madam P*.
Yet if a busband's either lame, or brown,
Are you to kiss with all the Fops in Town?
Oh! Virtue come, thou jewel of the Fair,
'Tis Virtue only makes a happy pair;
A handsome Woman is a joy, agreed,
A virtuous Woman is a bliss indeed.

On either hand a thousand forms appear'd,
To Virtue, Beauty, Lust and Folly rear'd;
Here old amours thought buried with their slaves,
Rise true from noble, or ignoble graves:
High above all the fatal youth I view'd,
Who every female, not himself subdu'd;
Th'unhappy Umpire of a tender cause,
Founder of Grecian, and the Trojan woes:
Whom Venus lov'd, altho' he ruin'd Troy,
And for adult'ry canoniz'd the Boy .
Such were the favours of the Cyprian Fair,
And now the mode of pure St. James's air:
Or why should wanton C---h rise in fame,
A maid of honour dub'd for deeds of shame?
Or why applaud his Grace's virtuous life;
Because his goodness keeps another's wife:
Blush grandeur blush! at such adult'rous deeds,
And act the god-like part when Virtue bleeds.
Not rear to Infamy the marble Bust,
Or with libations quench the Harlot's Lust:
Blush grandeur blush! on your incestuous beds,
Ye wicked Stars hide your diminish'd heads!

How droll was miss Europa in her cull,
O! what a Gothic taste! a God, a Bull:
Between her thighs the Beast declares his pride,
And she in rapture hugs his hairy side:
Thus rav'd a Brother, when a noble Lord
A Hunter stole, and gallop'd her abroad:
The best bred Filly ever prest a course,
Steel to the bottom, run against a-horse:
No man knows better how to break, or bit,
And seven to two, he backs the pretty Tit:
O! damme, bottom, bottom Boy indeed,
He knows a Wag, to cross, or mend a Breed:
Pray in a Pembrook have you seen her ride,
Champing the bit in all Equestrian pride:
A sweeter creature never wagg'd a tail,
And push her starting—hang me if she fail.
If e'er my Lord should sell the little Mare,
I'll try for Pegasus to get an heir.
His Grace, or Shaftow, gallop, walk, or trot 'em,
We have it hollow, Boy, the Filly's bottom.
Would not an Heiress in these 'lopeing days,
Straddle an Ox if she could get no chaise?
Rather than sigh away nights, days, and morns,
They'll ride the Bull, or hang upon his horns:
What won't the Girl do full of flesh and blood,
To have the thing she doats on; bad or good?

Where lies the diff'rence between Kitty's cull,
And fair Europa and her milking Bull?
I'll tell you friend;—but then, 'tis inter nos,
One, took O'Kelly—t'other Sampson Bos.

Here gathering flowers stood sweet Sicilia's Miss,
Herself the sweetest, pluck'd by gloomy Dis ;
So Fanny fell, whose charms e'en worlds adore,
Surpassing art, and all the Flowers she bore:
I wish the Angel had not such a rod,
A man so very like the grimy god:
Pluto one day may ease her of her load,
And Angels place her in a calm abode.

Semele next receives the Thunderer's fires,
And in extatic joys beneath expires:
The times are chang'd—the Men may try their skill,
But Women now, are plaguey hard to kill:
Men have expir'd in the connubial deed,
But, Puppy like, the Ladies suck and feed.

Next sigh'd Narcissus to himself a slave;
And pretty Echo pining in a Cave.

God knows we've plenty sigh, and plenty pine,
From hoary ninety, down to verdant nine;
See dear Sir Jessy for himself expires,
And prettier Biddy faints with strange desires;
There old Sir Fumble toys a long, long hour,
And Betty swears—it's out of woman's power;
These things are common in this dirty Town,
From Mother Goadbey up to Mrs. Brown.
Scandal with all's a very favourite dish,
From Maid's of honour, up to Charlottee Fish;
On such a trifle, why should much be said?
“She only took a Gentleman to bed;”
And every day the Quality do more,
Making her tender one a Baker's score:
Few Echos pine, they hardly wait to hope,
For if Pappa denies—“Egad elope;”
It's in the City now so plain a truth,
You'll hardly see a Footman that's a youth,
Many not quite so nice the Coachmen take,
Smack of the whip they love for driving sake:
Scotland, and Scots are all poor England's care,
Her Men they trammel, and debauch her Fair:
But how could Ovid tell such monstrous lies,
How a stout youth rejected Echo's sighs!
Such silly stuff might do in times of yore,
But baulk a City Miss—“She turns a whore:”

Nothing persuades me that the Tale is right,
But still the Huzzy holds her sex's spite:
Say what you will, and let the Gypsy hear,
She tells it far and near, like Miss Poitier.

Here smooth Alpheus thro' a secret sluice
Sub terra steals, to kiss his Aretheuse:
And after various turns of adverse woe,
The thrilling streams of Love united flow:
How phrensy rages in the Poet's themes,
Comparing bliss in Love to river's streams;
Was that our case, what deluges would flow,
And headlong bear us to the Thames below:
Say, who wou'd walk Pall-mall, or Drury-lane?
When doors and windows gush'd like spouts of rain:
The tide of Lust was never very low,
The ebb is trifling to the constant flow:
Our Ladies won't admit the secret plan,
But where they like, in publick show the Man;
Attend Vauxhall, the Glasses, or the Play,
You'll find O'Kelly hugg'd about like Tray;
Why close about what's trivial as a pin,
“To use what Nature gave, is sure no sin!”

Thus modern Matron's palliate modern ill,
As Doctors cheat them with a gilded Pill:
Should they commit a sin, (can Ladies sin?)
They with their alms drive to the Magdalene:
There with repenting few join Sunday's pray'r,
And go twice more to make the Parson stare.

Next Erythibolus appear'd in flames,
Where blind Sesostris burnt adulterate Dames.
How many Dames would burn to one blind Knight,
Before chaste Urine would restore his sight?
'Tis hard to say, so many you'd destroy,
Smithfield for years must blaze a feu de joy:
I don't approve the trial of our wives,
That one man's sight should risk a million's lives:
But where's Sir John's great right, I can't devise?
For, like old Argus, Merc'ry sealed his eyes.

Here Cheop's Daughter breathes once more in stone,
And lust declares the Pyramid her own.
A droll conceit, a monument to raise,
And may surprise in these more virtuous days;
One stone she levy'd on each am'rous Cull,
Mod'rate enough, considering such a Trull:
But don't you think we've Ladies now alive,
To her one pyramid would build ye five?
Whether St. James's-street, or Seathing-lane,
I will not say—It is not Lady V*.
Guess on my Friend, perhaps you may come nigher,
I say, she'd build ten more, and ten times higher.

There Capuan Virgins conquer with their charms,
What Rome confess'd superior to her arms:

The Whores of Capua rais'd the Hero's tomb,
A heavier blow than Cannæ prov'd to Rome.
Is not our Garden now a viler womb
To us, than damn'd Seplasia was to Rome:
Blush Britons, blush, nor glory in a fame,
That Virtue cannot tell, nor Honour name.

And lastly, see! Apollodorus brings
A coarse matrass, fill'd with the sweetest things:
Like the lewd Monk in print, who seems to crack,
Hot for the fair provision on his back;
At the device, see vigorous Cæsar stare!
And so should I—if brought me in a chair.
Why so surpriz'd because the Hero kneel'd,
Had he not buss'd her—“Lord, the Monster's steel'd!

Yes, doubtless, steel'd—but still he show'd a heart,
As soft, as Cleopatra's softest part:
Pagans reflect—could flesh, could blood withstand,
Fair Cleopatra, with the softest hand:
This whirling egg—(our world) forgot to move,
Nature stood silent—swallow'd up in Love:
More eyes by Myriads on the Beauty wait,
Than when the fools of Venice jolt in state:
What modern Lord could ward the darts she hurl'd,
To conquer him, who conquer'd all the world.

Beneath this Queen, and exquisitely done,
Lay poor Actæon, by his Hounds out-run:
Was naked Dian now to try the force
Of Beauty's charms, upon New-Market-Course;
What pretty tricks amongst the Great she'd play;
Change to a horse his Grace—my Lord to Tray;
One hundred Squires, would make one hundred hounds,
And Shaftow in a Stag, might maze the grounds;
A good fat Countess too might prove a Mare,
And Black and all Black cover for an Heir:

Sir James might shine a Stallion on the Course,
And prove the pleasures of a leaping Horse:
I dare not say, the things that would be done,
In earnest many—and a few in fun.
Actæon's case, was like St. A---l---n's fate,
Hounds, Dice, and Women, got his whole Estate.

Here Sappho sings, who living sung in vain,
To bind th'affections of the Lesbian Swain.
This is not Cattlee's case—tho' Tower-hill rung
With Newgate's ditties, from her lisping tongue:
Her voice prevail'd, and pierc'd Sir Francis' ears,
And now alike kills Citizens and Peers;
Fortune's a Whore—and tho' the Brimstone's blind,
Yet shoeless Merit has known Fortune kind;
As you have seen the soft melodious Lark,
She left the ground to charm a noon-tide Park;
You've heard her sing, perhaps you've seen her walk;
But have you heard the pretty Angel talk?
Lord how she talks! her words are fair as milk,
And when she moves, it's on the wings of silk.

But why such trappings when ye take the air?
Is it, good Sir, to make the vulgar stare?
Why keep a concubine my gay Sir Bl*,
When even robb'd of that which makes a rake!
Let Cattlee go, pass all your time at White's,
Desert the Women, and the Bill of Rights.

Here Cephalus fatigu'd begs Aura's aid,
And curious Procris bleeds beneath the shade:
A pretty moral to the City Dames,
Who ape being jealous to indulge their flames:
Persuade their husbands 'tis their wonderous Love;
Inkle believes—“Don't cry? come kiss my Dove?”
The better bred, have better ways by far,
My Lady Betty weds a brilliant Star:
But that's for Rank—they hardly speak for life,
It is enough she's call'd my Lady Strife:
My Lord comes down, my Lady saunters up,
He calls for dinner, she desires to sup;
To White's he hobbles, and she swings to prayers,
He snores with Fisher—And John gets his heirs:

Thus live the very Gay, and very Great,
The happiest Mortals in the marriage state:
There's no deception, all's above the board,
He hates my Lady—and she hates my Lord:
If they should meet be certain it's by chance,
At Drum, Ring, Rout, Court, Concert, Play, or Dance:
“My Lord, your Lordship, here's a charming Sun;”
“Madam, your Ladyship”—Ah! Charles,—who won?
No jealous cares corrode the noble's breast,
Where e'er the magnet draws they sleep the best.
But City Wives deceive with jealous flames,
And cram the Bagnio's under borrow'd names:
Find features like the Dad each rising day,
Tho' got by him who drove the husband's dray:
No wonder Cits are brawney without brains,
When the dull composition's mixt with grains.
Ladies suppose, we breathe the morning air,
To tickle Trouts, or hunt the timid Hare?
Why should ye grieve, or pray why should ye stir?
The curious woman must for ever err:

'Twas that gave Procris an untimely fall,
Damn'd curiosity undoes ye all.
If inclination leads to drop the strife,
You must improve from “Coleman's jealous Wife.”

Here chaster Caunus tender of his fame;
His Sister flies—for an unnatural flame.
It shocks my soul—yet, oft' these things have been,
And are, oh! horror, daily to be seen:
It gives me strange unnatural alarms,
When Brothers hang upon a Sister's charms:
I love my Sister, as I love my blood,
I love her strictly—as a Brother shou'd:
Shun, Brothers, shun, the foul incestuous flame,
Curst let him be, who wounds a Sister's fame!

When sweet Ophelia breathes the morning air,
The sullen wrinkle quits the brow of care:
In love, as manners rude the Mob must see her,
And mealy Bakers pressing mark the Peer:

The Play or Park are free for me as Burk,
Or how dare Blacksmith's shove a Duke of York?
'Tis honest ease peculiar to our Isles,
And on the glorious freedom, Edward smiles.
All love Ophelia—till her Brother's seen
To handle, dandle, you know what I mean.
'Tis British freedom checks the blackest crimes,
And Wilkes's freedom purifies the times:
Noble exertion in a noble cause,
Thou Pyramid of worth 'gainst boreal laws.
How eloquence in godlike PRAT prevails,
“I dare like him commit a Prince of Wales. ”
The tongues of Britons are as free as air,
In praise or censure of her Court, or Fair:
O! Caunus fly, and save Ophelia's fame,
Nor blast a sister with eternal shame:
At incest shudder! unpolluted fly!
A Byblis rather let Ophelia die.

Unconquer'd Daphne grac'd the grand abode,
She, who so scornful scorn'd the Delphic god.

Great was the scorn, a god too did you say?
Miss turn'd her tail upon—“ah! lack-a-day?”
Lord, what a tramp 'twould be to find another?
That would deny a handsome Man, a Lover.
What wild conceits that puppy Ovid had,
But duller folks swear every Poet's mad:
Should Ch* die, I hope she'll be forgiven,
If of a Rape, she'll surely go to Heav'n:
A thing of that kind—if the Man was rash,
Might kill indeed, the tender small miss A*;
For such another pretty fairy Queen,
Has never totter'd o'er St. James's Green:
Their pretty noses now are out of joint,
'Tis said V***t twists his Lordship's point:
Such in's and out's, such various up's and down's,
Are grown quite modish in our country towns:
Keep kissing on, the game is in and out,
These are thy triumphs, thy exploits, O Bute.
But why such spite against these Ladies eke?
Their greatest sin I'm sure's a painted cheek:
If against them the gates are shut above,
It is a crime below to paint and love;
Age may cure love, but why abolish paint?
What's half so frightful as a pale fac'd Saint?

I like to see a handsome Corpse in bed,
Blushing on those who weep about the dead;
Your smaller sins, great alms, and Doctor Rock
May move; if not, the Magdalene, and Lock.
Fisher may yet repent, tho' deep the taint,
And little Davies die a little Saint;
If Lucy err'd—still that's no reason, why
Cooper must not reform before she die:
Tho' Mother Douglass fed on flesh all Lent,
Yet Foot and Whitfield made the Bawd repent:
I'm not a Cit, in condemnation rank,
That Rice is damn'd because he robb'd their Bank:
I hope the very worst may be forgiv'n,
And even M---l---n too may go to heav'n;
The greatest merit which the Son hath bore,
Amongst his Creditors, he bilk'd his Whore.
Retir'd a while from Bailiffs—not from care,
And made an Av'ry of a house of Prayer:
Domitien like he drew the bow—in lies,
And kill'd his younger days, in killing flies:
At length th'insolvent act reliev'd the soul,
Like a poor crawling tortoise from his hole.
A youth to practise on so base a plan,
What must he prove, ye Devils, when a Man?

Should he send bread to Hunger in a cave,
Honour must spurn the morsel that he gave:
Let him repent to ease a breast of care,
And with these juster Sisters hope in prayer.

Near virtuous Daphne, sat the Roman Maid,
Philotis she, in lilly white array'd;
Like to the morn, when first her blushing face,
Sheds o'er the gloomy world her heavenly grace,
What can't a Virgin do, in Beauty's bloom?
As much in England as she did in Rome:
Only suppose the Maids in this great Town,
(For great, or small, they'll bring a Cæsar down)
Should France attack us in voluptuous ease,
Like Men they could but act—and botch a Peace.
They must succeed on this unconquer'd plan;
Tell me the Maid, that can not beat her Man?
Many there are I know will vanquish ten,
Is not that monstrous odds against the Men?

Sampson was mortal strong; yes, so I've read,
But how much stouter Dalila in bed?
She was a wife, or if you will a Whore,
Allow her both, we've maids would beat a score.
That's needless, friend, for Wives are plaguey tough,
At least I'm sure their Husbands groul enough:
Yes, but our kinds are various as our meat,
Try from Whitechapel-Bars—to Audley-Street:
Maids you'll meet myriads—but the Virgin rare,
And less at Court, perhaps, than in Rag-Fair:
If from their parts such streams of goodness gush,
Grant public portions to the Well, and Bush:
Is there a slip-shod Dotard lives this day,
That does not kneel more times to whore, than pray?
Then what's the good man's adoration, Friend?
Beauty—and will be to the world's long end:
Beauty in all has rul'd this whirling egg,
By shape, face, tongue, et cætera, or leg;
And will command, when these chaste lines are gone,
And their chaste Poet dead—without a stone.

Come, sacred sleep, and happily profound,
When no Scotch Thistle dare profane the ground.
Thrice happy thought—thou'lt fold more happy death,
Him, who curst Scotland with his dying breath.
I can love Scotsmen—when they're good, and brave,
But why Scots love a Scot—when known a Knave?
There must be some damn'd curse upon the Crew,
For Heaven mark'd ye, when she black'd the Jew:
You'll call me bitter,—yes, I am as gall,
Whene'er I meet a Scot without a Saul:
Yes, special soles, I've heard the Cobler swear,
But when made upper-leathers gall in wear:
O! wretched times, when such a wretched Crew,
Fill ev'ry place from Wapping—down to Kew:
Hold—no, I'll speak my mind tho' Hell's wide jaws
Should gape, it is my King and Country's cause;

Why flinch, why fear? I'm honest English born,
I neither dread the Mon, his leer, or scorn:
Hope better times, for sure they can't be worse:
And on her bitter foes, I breathe my bitter curse.

Who don't adore the virtue of that wife ,
Who dar'd to spare an honour'd husband's life?
And who don't shudder for that Royal Lord?
Presented with a parchment, or a sword:
A cursed choice—and by the Woman giv'n,
He thought a Sister to the Saints in Heav'n:
Priests caus'd the Crocodile to murder here,
Blush holy Rogues!—blush Queen, thou Russ, thou Bear!
Run o'er the Hist'ries of the states of yore,
And all have moulder'd in the Priest, and Whore:
Strange fascination!—that the gown, and cowl,
Should bear about a more enlighten'd soul:
Thanks to our stars—we take our prayers in ease,
We hear the Parson, and we pay his fees:

They learn at present Peace in every School,
And like the City fools address by rule:
In body fat, in form, and manners full,
Prolix in words, and technically dull;
That they're but men, we always knew before,
And if they're never less—we ask no more.

Standing alone, an exquisitely fair,
Virtue in youth, blush'd innocently bare,
Damocles he, who bore a spotless name,
Who nobly perish'd, to preserve his fame.
O! would a spark of thy dear fame revive!
In this vile City where such scoundrels thrive!
Where man with man, O! monstrous to unfold,
Basely debase themselves thro' lust, or gold:
And when condemn'd to die dare name the Lord,
Will save these Villains from their right—a cord:
Does not this truth too daily wound the ear?
Thieves hang'd at Tyburn—Sons of Sodom—where?

Blush, Justice blush, nor let a purse prevail,
If men of rank disgrace a British Jail:
The man who asks five guineas on the road,
Does he offend mankind so much, or God?
Think you Paul Lewis had so base a vice?
Tho' dying justly with a Whore and Rice.
O! venal age—when men are not afraid,
By breeches buckles to declare their trade:
Feeding to-day, Cameleon like, on air,
To-morrow shining like a Miser's heir:
Behold e'en virtue in a common whore!
Expiring, smiling, glorying in her gore!
Peace injur'd shade!—thy bleeding wounds I'll tell,
Nor spare that wretch, that would not spare Miss Bell.
Haunt him dear Ghost in the remotest climes,
I'll rack him living with unnatural crimes:
Thou more than beast—so foul a deed to dare,
And when deny'd—to wound a form so Fair.
Where rose that trivial meteor of a Spark?
That fleeting phantom of a noon-day Park?

Where rose, where lives, this dainty fine drawn thing?
This strutting nothing on the cob-web wing?
This mighty pretty form in boots, or hose?
This form distinguish'd by the length of nose?
Where sprung, where feeds this insect of a day?
Is he a moving mistery of clay?
Or does he pray subsist?—“Hush, do not name;”
—On the excrescence of some courtly Dame?
Or does he?—no, enough, pray hold your tongue!
“He is a man of fashion, and he's young:”
Better and better still—suppose we try,
Will he at Haddock's—a Damocles die?
Why burn? that cannot answer any end,
No, no—unless to try his virtue Friend:
Pshaw, a romantick joke, a mad desire,
To try the virtue of a man in fire;
But then, if virtuous, is he to survive?
Yes, with the Gods above he'll surely live.
If Rogues will try for that precarious boon,
Fielding, and you will scald them all in Town.

Here Atalanta show'd her pretty face,
Undone like many Girls at Epsom race;
Ye Bow-Street Hags, why prostitute the charms,
Of injur'd beauty, in a Gambler's arms?
A sett of cursed thieves, and more than Jew,
Who'll bilk a needy harlot of her due;
Ye Youths, who glory in the name of Rake,
Avoid a Gambler as you wou'd a Snake;
In words they're tempting as the summer seas,
And all their studies are the arts to please;
They'll stile you Colonel, Captain, Squire, or Lord,
But doubt their honour—and they wear a Sword.
Have you not seen a wanton, giddy fly,
Catch'd as he careless pass'd the cobweb by,
Flutter in vain his little gauzy wings,
And fall a martyr to the spider's stings?
Whores may have honour, but a Gambler can't,
They're thieves in chariots, and they're thieves in want:
It is a thousand pities Fielding's blind,
Or else such pests could never marr mankind:

In Russel-Street , there's held a cursed Court,
Where these card Cannibals in herds resort:
Where Templers game for more than they can pay,
And wisely sink like Ghosts at dawn of day:
The City Fool here struts to show his sword,
Loses one hundred—and he's sent abroad:
The flashy Heir, perhaps more hot than wise,
Fights with a Scoundrel, and a Scoundrel dies.
Thus Atalanta, fair deluded Maid,
By gold was tempted, and by Man betray'd:
Gold changes natures, makes the Black a White,
The Coward brave; foul, fair; and error right:
It will do every thing in these poor days,
But make a Churchill give a Scotsman praise:
No, that it cannot do, give what you will,
Tho' Audley-street should march to Shuter's-hill:
Curse on the power of gold, and curse its slaves,
Great is the curse—for I have curs'd all Knaves;
What havock does is make in this huge town,
It raises Rogues, and tumbles Merit down;
Thousands it ruins, and as many makes,
Filth drives his coach, and Wotley cleans the jakes;

For debts at Play, my Lady pawns her plate,
New-Market mortgages my Lord's estate;
To-day Change-Alley makes an hundred Jews,
To-morrow Moses cleaneth Aaron's shoes:
Touchit himself has made an awful stop,
The books examin'd W---h displays his shop:
So men in trade like boys on planks appear,
One on the ground, the other high in air.
A Woman once refus'd great Jove's address,
Yet, in a shower of gold he gain'd access:
Well, so he might—and I with wings the same,
Would reach a beauty of the greatest fame:
Had I the purse of Clive, I'd try the scheme,
And 'kiss from Plymouth, up to Humber's stream.
Money, alas! will purchase all their charms,
Or how can L---g---r defile their arms?
'Tis very rare, yet some there are resist;
And nobly pay to be more nobly kist:
Happy's the man on whom such favours fall,
And if she's handsome, it is more than all.

Descend, O gold! and in a heavy show'r,
And let me try thy more than mighty pow'r!
Walking, farewel; proud chariot roll my pride;
And let me jostle with the rogues that ride:
My crest a Thistle—(who with scorn dare treat it?)
Asses supporters, and the motto—Eat it.
Bett at New-market—and at Arthur's play:
And drive o'er ev'ry villain in my way:
A knight I must be—not without a Post,
Treat Whigs with claret—and the King my toast.
For such a plate, what jockey will not start?
In hope of gaining Lady W**'s heart.

These, and a thousand more appear'd in stone,
Themselves forgotten, and their deaths unknown:
Many perhaps expir'd thro' lust, or shame,
And some when dead to bear a tinkling name:
Romantick Lovers crowd the outward wall,
Doubtless undone by love and folly all:
Thousands above to madness near allied,
Liv'd in Romance, and in a duel died:

Numbers unfinish'd fill'd the nether place,
Of various Kingdoms, but of modern Race:
And might we judge too from the mighty store,
Our fools in love, surpass the fools of yore.

Lord H---n.

A remarkable occurrence in the reign of George II.

Paris

Pluto ravish'd Proserpine in the Garden of Enna.

Under-ground.

Sesostris the second being blind, the oracle of Brutus declared, he would recover his sight by using the Urine of a woman, who had known no man but her husband—He tried his own wife, and many more to no effect; and lastly, found the remedy in a Gardener's wife, whom he made his Queen—burning the adultresses in Erythibolus.

Cheops, king of Egypt, had a Daughter, who requiring a stone of each gallant, with them built a pyramid.

Hannibal, says Valerius Maximus, had now got such a relish for pleasures, that he was more frequently seen in a place of debauchery, call'd Seplasia, than in the camp; a place, where it was a crime for a Roman to appear in.

Covent.

Apollodorus bore Cleopatra on his back through the streets of Alexandria, folded in a matrass, and laid the beautiful burden at Cæsar's feet—The Roman Hero, out of true military compassion, took care of her all night.

The Venetian Ambassadors made a public entry into London, in the year 1765.

Byblis fell in love with her Brother Caunus, which he avoided by flight, and she hang'd herself.

Harry the Fifth.

A Maid Servant at Rome, who, when the State was weak, was given to the Fidenates, whom she betrayed, when drunk, by a signal; for which service the Maid Servants were free, and had portions out of the public treasury.

Hypermnestra sav'd her husband Lynceus, when her forty-nine Sisters murdered theirs by agreement.

“An instance of the greatest private Virtue.”—Damocles, a beautiful Athenian youth, was pursued by Demetrius—the latter surprising him naked in a private Bath, the youth threw off the cover of the Cauldron where the water was boiling, leap'd in, and was stifled.

Hang'd for a robbery, with a woman for the same, and Rice for forgery, in 1763.

Mr. Haynes has judiciously altered the plan of his Coffee-house.

Danae.

THE DEMI-REP.

Conjugium vocat, hoc prætexit nomine culpam. Virg.

Where Matrimony veils th'incestuous Life,
And Whore is shelter'd in the name of Wife.

The Times are such, I cannot kindly speak;
Since mere appearances are all we seek:
One may be hang'd for looking o'er the gate,
A second steal the horse and ride in state.

Vices of ev'ry kind so much prevail,
That were the virtues in the adverse scale;
And just Astræa pois'd the beam with care,
The bad would sink—the good would mount in air.

There's not a single crime beneath the sun,
But what in this great City's hourly done:
There's not one vice, peculiar to one clime,
But we have transplanted here from time to time:
Transplanted so that they have proudly grown,
As proudly we adopted them our own.
We Holland's avarice and thirst of gain,
The filth of Portugal, the pride of Spain;
The insincerity of France assume,
And practise all the turpitudes of Rome;
Nor damn'd enough, we more exoticks sue,
Importing plagues from Turkey and Peru:
Here foreign crimes and ills take deeper stains,
And roll in torrents through our English veins.
Vice in a thousand horrid forms appears,
In strength increasing with increasing years:
A virtuous Court, is no attracting charm,
To vicious Courtiers who like vermin swarm;
From complicated filths engender'd first,
They by the genial sun from matter burst
To life: then in a thousand frightful forms
They rise, and blast mankind with deadly storms.

Heavens! such impositions now appear,
Man can't be even said to see, or hear!

Such cursed impositions rise to view,
Though vice was thought at top; still, they are new.
Who can with temper see that haggard quean,
Playing through life the most adult'rate scene!
With feelings who can see, and not complain,
Of the lewd actions of a Lady V---?
Pity that other little Lord, poor dupe!
Hen-peck'd, confin'd within his Lady's hoop.
Now pray you pity, the poor simple man,
Bully'd through life by such a harridan!
Who quite compos'd can warmly coo at court,
And make this little lord her little sport!
Hell and confusion what a life is here,
When men thus truckle, women domineer!
Immortal Dorset, Rochester arise,
And wipe the film from such poor Cuckold's eyes!
Convince the Noble, and the plodding Man,
Footmen will end the work they first began:
Or give me rhime to lash each vicious step,
And check the conduct of the Demi-rep!

Behold that house!—prodigious grand indeed;
Behold her company!—all noble breed;
Behold her Footmen, what a brawny crew!
Pamper'd to do what Nobles cannot do.
Their liv'ries, how superbe! themselves how trim!
As if lewd Venus had fram'd ev'ry limb:
They're not intended now for menial use,
As cleaning plate, or knives, or blacking shoes;
When they are hired, whether white or black,
The Mistress takes them by the breadth of back;
For search this City round, and round about,
You'll find no class so handsome or so stout:
It is a maxim in which Dames are clear,
A strapping Footman to a tiny Peer.
Behold her dress, her table and her house!
Nothing can be more grand, more rich, profuse.
Pray does she play Sir?—play! ay well, and wins,
Or else her income would not buy her pins.
Pray is she married? Yes, her Spouse in France,
The tame good creature let's her take her dance.

Pray is she modest?—As Lucretia known;
But forc'd by all the Tarquins in the town.
Yes, the good Lady chaste Lucretia apes,
To save her fame she pays for daily rapes.—
Yet, there's a way to gain her with great ease,
Which is a never-failing rule to please:
To lose your cash exert your play, and art,
And you may ride the turnpike to her heart:
Or if you can, win all she has at play,
Return the sum,—and take it out her way:
If you are lucky, stick to't hand and foot,
Get her in debt, then play it out at put.
For there she's happy, whether out or in,
Play as you please, she's always sure to win.
But if you're handsome, sturdy, fair, and sound,
Please but her whim—she'll tip a thousand pound:
This is the way, a way nor strange, nor new,
And ask of C---f---d if it is not true!

Maidens of forty-five of virtue boast,
Pure as the virgin snow,—seal'd up as frost:
Affect the icy chastity of Nuns,
Despise the thaw of Love, and genial suns:
Talk of temptation with a hermit's pride,
How they've resisted, and how men have tried.

Such is Miss Macer, whose eternal boast,
Is, what man offers, and what virtue lost.
“O my dear virtue! would I forfeit thee,
“I might enjoy the top of pageantry!
“But I and virtue, cannot, will not part.”—
Thus Macer talks, but talks not from the heart:
Talks of her neighbours with a venom'd tooth,
Yet Macer never deviates into truth:
She by abusing those who're free from shame,
Builds upon infamy a cobweb fame;
Rails at young Masterman's lascivious sin,
And yet in private ev'ry year lies in;
In those convenient places of the town,
Where Maiden Ladies lay their bantlings down:
It's thus with Macer and the Maids well bred,
When thought at Bath, they're only brought to bed.
O! lovely Masterman, unconquer'd Rake,
Passions, once screw'd so high, must crack, must break.

As mills are turn'd by each capricious gust,
So Woman's turn'd by money, mode, or lust.
Thro' life a pattern of domestic love;
Loving, and constant as the turtle dove:
The sweetest temper with the fairest face,
When education adds to native grace:
Loving her children, of her children lov'd,
And married to the Man her heart approv'd:
The halcyon state all wish'd which Pritta shar'd,
And when they talk'd of love with her compar'd:
“O could my spouse and I enjoy such bliss!
“Ye Gods did Pritta ever do amiss!”
Hang Heav'n with black;—ye rivers stream with blood!
Reign vice triumphant over all that's good!
Fork'd lightnings dart,—ye mutt'ring thunders roar!
Seas burst your bounds, and deluge ev'ry shore!
Yield up your dead ye graves,—earth's centre shake!
Chaos is come,—and Pritta's turn'd a rake.
Twenty years married, and at last to fall!
Is more than man can bear that feels at all.

Would it not make one curse the sex, to see
An Angel end her life in infamy!
Oh! I could curse while ink my oaths could black,
To see so fair a fabrick—fall to wrack.
Have you no pity for the babes you bore,
Must they survive, nor own a Mother more?
Have you no feelings for their infant years,
No anxious moments—or no Mother's fears?
Relent! nor be absorb'd in sin, and mirth,
To make them curse the womb that gave 'em birth.

Lord, what a delicate delightful creature!
Love in her eyes, and grace in ev'ry feature:
So young, so tender, and so modest too,
She'd tempt a very Sweedish Charles to woo.

Ye Gods!—ye little Gods of house, or fane,
Or rather Venus dear to Drury-Lane,
Assist my tongue to lisp her praises o'er,
And draw a picture never drawn before!

Pygmalion's statue not more chaste in death,
Sweet as the pouting rose, ere Zephyr's breath
The Maiden bellows of his lungs hath blown,
To make those maiden beauties all his own.
Touch her, she faints—court her you're mighty rude;
Praise her, she'll blush,—and vow you make her proud:
Name genial joys she'll freeze at ev'ry pore,
Force but one kiss,—she's lost for evermore.
Her reading's Langhorne, and platonick love,
Which every day her feelings disapprove.
Her Church the Magdelene, her Preacher Dodd,
By following whom, she's sure to lose her God.
Her pity those, created first from dust,
Undone by that unnat'ral passion lust.
Thus ** lives, and to the world appears
A virgin saint throughout a train of years.
The curtain's drawn.—Now view her virgin plan!
Melting with joy, beneath her Father's man.

This Town's infested by a pack of Dames,
Burnt with the hotest meretricious flames.

Chaste as unfired coals they seem, but sin
Has to a cinder burnt them up within:
Their skins are parch'd with use, and yet they rail
At whoredom, tho' they're whores from head to tail.
Behold old Phoebe, tott'ring on a staff,
Tho' call'd alive, her own dead epitaph:
Double with age, her eyes with rheum o'er-flown,
Lip drop'd, cheek shrunk, and drivel driv'ling down,
Toothless by coughing, from long munching grim,
An aspin palsy shaking ev'ry limb:
Grey as a badger, wrinkl'd as an ape,
And worn by time and ven'ry out of shape.
Yet Phoebe lusts, and wonders men are cold,
And grieves to think she's courted for her gold:
Chuckles for ev'ry sturdy youth she sees,
Although she keeps a stud in liveries:
At eighty Phoebe dies.—The world all stare,
To find an Irish Chairman Phoebe's heir:

To whom these moving words, she moving cried,
O spare me Patrick!—spare me more!—and died.

Would you imagine me at once to find
A man so base, so venal, to resign
The Woman that his heart approv'd, to wear
A dirty feather in a higher sphere!
Would one imagine that ambition cou'd
Possess a Man to prostitute his blood!
To prostitute to other's lusts his wife,
To stink in gilded infamy through life!
Would one imagine such a Wretch to be,
A wretch so mean to boast his infamy!
Can the same vital fire possess such dust,
To give up virtue to adult'rate lust?
To give a wife up with the sweetest charms
For lucre to Boscawen's nautick arms?
'Tis but too true. I wish it was forgot,
Since Mrs. L---n was Mrs. S---t.

The greatest curse in this inconstant life,
Is, to be curst with an inconstant wife:

But double still's the curse, when all we know
Will not amount to proof; when she shall go
From man to man with fresh carniv'rous lust,
And take the greatest with the greatest gust.
Deception is the dress which Women wear,
They paint, yet foolish Man believes 'em fair:
Each has a Janus' face,—here war,—there peace,
Which artful Woman changes at her ease:
So very false in all, that ev'ry part
They act, is seldom acted from the heart.
By art, by stratagem they brazen truth,
And murder thousands in the bloom of youth.
The Spoiler thus upon the publick way,
Draws the unwary trav'ller astray;
But soon shakes off the cheat, and to the heart
Stabs the good Man that meant the gen'rous part.
Woman, why form'd so shallow, false, and blind,
At once the curse, and blessing of Mankind!
Why made so soft, so elegant, so fair,
At once to please, and pleasing to ensnare!

But why surpris'd that Woman should deceive,
When ev'ry Woman is the type of Eve?
To day an angel, tender, kind, and civil;
To-morrow, thunder, lightning, rain, and Devil:
In Eden with one Man she prov'd a brim,
And found some happy means to cuckold him.
Unhappy E**l, how we lament thy case,
To try in public thus a wife's disgrace!
A cunning dame that could contrive her sport,
To save her Gallant from the costs of Court:
A Gallant whom the fairest Matron, might
To wanton in her snowy arms invite:
A Gallant whom a thousand women love,
And whom, let's hope, the better half approve.
Such various cheats in various life appear,
It seems domestick harmony, where Dear,
And Love, and Duck, and Joy's the mutual song:
Kissing and ever cooing in a throng:
But tongs and poker ere you're out o'door,
Accord in concert to “you rogue—you whore!”

Such are the various cheats in various life,
With a chaste, mighty good kind of a wife.

Women have various schemes in being Wives,
Some to enjoy their Man,—some freer lives:
But marriage, like all earthly things possest,
Falls short in that, we wish'd to make us blest.—
In marriage, this, a trifle you'll allow,
Tom broke his leg;—and Madam broke her vow:
Hating to nurse—away to France she flies,
And in the int'rim the poor cripple dies:
The world all star'd,—to find a wife elope,
But drop'd their wonder—when 'twas Mrs. P---e,
Fair she was made, and shone with native grace,
Catching applauses from the Gallic Race;
Display'd those talents Nature made her own,
And took a Knight in—easy as a Clown:
Married,—return'd, she proves a torn down Hack,
And labours now to break her second's back.—

If this is marriage let me shun the wreck,
For fear I get a Dame may break my neck:
Maids when they're courted are our bliss in love,
The question is, what wives those maids will prove?

Cruel injunction by a husband laid
Upon a wife,—who makes her cards her trade:
Cruel injunction, from the man we wed,
To force a wife from cards at five, to bed:
Cruel injunction, all the world must say,
A Duke, to force a Dutchess from her play:
If others copy from these great men's rules,
What times will Ladies have from doating fools!
Marriage!—my stars! who'll ever be a wife,
When Maids are free with all,—and Maids for life!
Marriage! avaunt—your chains I now disown;
First,—make me Demi-rep to half the town.
Husband no more, that thus my love rewards!
Take Husband Heav'n—and give me love and cards.
Thus G---n spoke,—and smiling slipt away
From him for ever—to her tea, and play:

She felt no nuptial ties—nor dreaded ill,
Her cares were Ombre—and her joy Quadrille:
Children, House, Husband sunk without a sigh:
—What live, and quit my cards! I'd rather die,
With gallant, gentle, upper O---y.

That blessing Love, the God of Nature gave
To cheer us from the cradle to the grave;
But yet alas! what perils wait the Spark;
That blindly puts to sea in Cupid's bark:
The waves of scandal roar—and ev'ry gust
Is stir'd by passion, jealousy, or lust:
Beauty, should have a skillful pilot's care,
Through envious rocks and shoals to steer her clear;
Beauty the eyes of Argus too requires,
To save her cargo from the pirate's fires;
Beauty's th'Hesperian tree,—and ev'ry brute
Will risk his life to pluck the golden fruit:
Beauty alas! hath not one friend below
But virtue, which can vanquish ev'ry foe:

She that hath virtue is compleatly arm'd
But Beauty without virtue may be charm'd.

A beauteous woman, reputation gone,
Is like a half-pay officer in town;
In virtue she is courted, and desir'd,
In war he's honour'd, and by all admir'd:
Her virgin flow'r once pluck'd—her credit's gone:
And he in peace is credited by none:
Such is the Soldier's, such the Virgin's lot,
Alike unpitied, and alike forgot.—
Is there no pity 'mongst the rich, and great,
For those poor girls who roam the public street?
Have you no pity for the sons of Mars,
Who bought your peace at the expence of scars?
Shall one sad fate each hapless kind attend,
Alike unpitied, and without a friend?
Curs'd be that Man, who will not stoop to save
The injur'd Maid, or Soldier from the grave!
Alive, may conscience be his earthly Hell,
As dead, he will the damndest Fiends out yell!

List! list ye Sinners! I'll a tale unfold,
A tale, shall shock the Man tho' savage bold:
If you have feelings—here you shall deplore,
And bleed, and agonize at every pore:
If injur'd Woman ever drew a tear,
Shower down a torrent on a sister here!
If perjur'd perfidy e'er curs'd our race,
If Heaven marks the virtuous, from the base,
If incest, upon incest, can incense
The wrath of Heaven, Heaven thy wrath dispense!

In a small village vice could never find,
Nor garish dress corrupt the female mind:
Where courtly luxury had never stray'd,
To cram the glutton,—to seduce the Maid;—
Here Virtue, taught her virtue in her youth,
And pure Religion mark'd the ways of truth;
Heav'n in her birth shew'd ev'ry darling care,
And made her beauteous as her angels are:
All these, and more the sweet Carrelia shar'd,
A spotless angel to the town repair'd:

All prais'd her charms, for none could look, but lov'd:
The sigh, the wish, the joy of all she prov'd
All prais'd to please, without one thought to truth,
All try'd by flatt'ry to corrupt her youth;
Dukes, Lords, and Princes could admire, could swear,
“Heaven never made an angel half so fair;”
(For common words with Nobles have a force,
Which other men may use till they are hoarse)
Flatt'ry alas! the bane of womankind,
Pour'd by degrees its poison in her mind;
Flatt'ry the curse of all the lovely sex,
The rock where Women make their fatal wrecks,
Smooth, pleasing poison which the mind receives,
Tho' conscious of the endless wound it gives.
Ye undeluded shun the flow'ry shore,
Nor split, where thousands have been wreck'd before!
Flatt'ry alas! her sugar'd poison pours,
Like venom'd snakes beneath the fairest flowers.

O! shun the lure, and mark Carrelia's end,
In youth a weeping Nun, without one friend,
To a thatch'd cot retir'd to end her days;
Searching with broken contrite heart the ways
Of Heav'n for happy Penitents reserv'd,
(For more or less in life we all have swerv'd.)
But Heav'n attentive hears the Sinner's pray'r,
And from the drooping soul—removes the care:
Gives that reviving Hope to all below,
That, bliss succeeds this temporary woe.

Hence Charity! and Indignation rush
With all ethereal fire and rage, to crush
The Wretch, that gather'd first this flow'ret gay,
Then cast it like a “loathsome weed away.”
Curs'd be the Wretch that can seduce the Fair,
Then, drive 'em forth to all the stings of care!
For all the riches of the golden West,
I would not have the Hell in L---w---th---r's breast!
Heav'n keep me poor, and steady to my trust,
Firm tho' unhappy, and tho' tempted just.

Nay, might I choose—I would be stak'd in flames,
Rather than damn'd like Twitcher and Sir James.

That first great Demi-rep, first Queen of hearts,
Whose wanton love reduc'd all hero's parts;
She who brought mighty Cæsar on his knees,
To pay the turnpike to the seat of ease:
That flowry seat on Ida's mid-land shore,
Where none e'er enter'd but did first adore:
A worship follow'd by the Prince and Slave;
At once our cradle, and at once our grave;
A truth fulfill'd by Men of each degree,
From love-sick Anthony to love-sick Me.
Hail Cleopatra of the shining East!
Who first made lust a dish at ev'ry feast;
Fair Demi-rep from whom profusion rose
In lust, in lux'ry, pageantry, and cloaths:
Who will not fire at that lascivious thought,
When on his back Apollodorus brought
A rich Mattress, fill'd with a richer treat,
And laid the jewel down at Cæsar's feet:
O how the Blood trills at the luscious scene,
A Cæsar bleeding with a maiden queen!

From Cleopatra's wanton, giddy steps,
Arose the wanton race of Demi-reps:
Such are the changes of our state below,
The scene of joy becomes a scene of woe;
Anthony falling shuns Octavius' grasp,
And Cleopatra courts the fatal asp!

Fortune, whose favours are promiscuous hurl'd,
The giddy Mistress of a giddy world;
To thee, vain goddess, still our altars blaze,
Still swell to thee the various notes of praise:
To thee the labour of each head and hand,
To thee our travels both by sea and land;
The Poet's lay, the Statesman's subtle scheme,
The air-built castle, and the golden dream.
Neptune's rough sons who e'er his surges sweep,
And tempt with swelling sails the awful deep,
In many an oath thy changing power revere,
As through the storm or lengthen'd calm they steer.
For thee the hardy Veterans sustain,
The heats of summer, and the winter's rain:

E'en Priests themselves to thee have learnt to pray,
And mitred heads confess thy sacred sway:
Physick's grave tribe, and Law's rapacious crew,
And traffick's Sons, all toil alike for you:
By thee the Arts and Sciences avail,
And tardy Justice lifts her equal scale.
Say then, blind Goddess, while we have in view
Thy various gifts, and variously pursue!
Say, shall the hungry Poet by his lay,
Exulting eat the dinner of the day?
Shall some dull Lord deep smit with love of verse,
For panegyrick give the needed purse?
Or is he doom'd by thy unkinder pow'r,
Fasting to write in thrice exalted floor?
Where unmolested spiders spread the snare,
Where stand the sheetless bed, the broken chair;
Where to defend the bard from blasts of night,
Rags in the casement keep out wind and light.

Some few, thus struggle still in virtue's cause,
Nor find protection in their Country's Laws.

They who first painted Fortune drew her blind,
A giddy Strumpet giving alms to wind:
She has been partial since this world began,
And ever steady to the worthless man;
Call these not chance!—Let these inspire your hate!
See B--- possessing M---ue's estate!
See learned M---ue unpitied roam,
And friendless begging both abroad and home!
Here Angel-Pity turn thy tender eye,
See Lloyd and Genius in one prison die!
Are these the proofs of fortune's general care,
O! damn her—damn her here and ev'ry where!
O! let me, Churchill, offer at thy shrine,
One line of friendship, one warm, honest line!
Let me with truth defend thee from the rage
Of him, who blasted thine like Shakespear's page !
One, who with ranc'rous envy, could sit down,
Conceive a lie, and spread it round the town:

Could try the Prince of Poets to dethrone,
Whose name shall out-live Envy, brass a stone:
Faults he had some, but the superior weight
Of all his sterling virtues was so great,
To poise them both, if Envy should prevail,
While equal-handed Justice held the scale,
Virtue would sink to earth, and the rebound
Would shake the adverse vices to the ground

Hail gentle York the patron of the fair,
Who make the sex your study and your care!
In all so humble, and in all so good,
To mix in vulgar veins your noble blood!
Husbands, whose wives you honour, own with truth,
How much they owe to your more vig'rous youth!
How much you ease the labour of their reins,
By the effusions of your gen'rous veins!

You have the thanks of our more aged sires,
Teaching their daughters more unhallow'd fires!
Your noble acts to all the Dames are known,
Who raise the seed you scatter up and down.
To give due praise kind Spouses can't forbear,
Cuckolds to D---l brown, and M---t fair.
Does a Peer die?—behold your gen'rous deeds,
Your comforts to the Widow in her weeds!
The sweetest Widow Venus e'er design'd
Had died for grief, had G---r not been kind;
Had he not cheer'd with cordial drops her heart,
Transfix'd by Death's, his own, and Love's keen dart.
Should your kind influence e'er affect my Dame,
To feel the warmth of a right noble flame,
Let the sad secret never come from you,
And I shall think her quite as fair and true:
Let my sweet Mistress kiss with whom she will,
Let me not know it I am easy still!
I do not care if I'm deceiv'd if pleas'd;
Which way it is,—tho' of my money eas'd.
I ne'er am studious jealous facts t'obtain,
Without to feel the horns within the brain:

The cuckold's cares I give to Master Ford,
Or some old impotent deluded Lord:
Or him who thought his artifices sage,
By cooping up his Lady in a cage!
I have not jealousy to swell my woes,
And wish my Dame may never give me cause!
God keep her true, or keep the news from me,
Nor damn me 'mongst the sons of Jealousy!
Make me not studious to find out my shame,
Like one suspicious of his gentle Dame!
When sickness had reduc'd the body low,
He with a face of penitence and woe,
Declar'd a fatal poison he had giv'n,
Soon she wou'd stand before the judge of Heav'n:
Confess, nor thus retire my dear lov'd wife,
Top full of sin from this adult'rous life!
Have you not cuckol'd me my gentle Fair,
Speak, and your bosom will be freed from care!
But should you bear a lie to that high world,
That body must be to the Devil hurl'd!

Confess sweet soul before you reach the grave,
Have you not cuckol'd me?—“Yes, once, I have.”
But once!—“yes twice”—only dear Wife but twice!
“Forgive dear Spouse, indeed, indeed but thrice.”
Now all the good he gets of this good wife:
She wears the breeches, he the horns for life.

Life is a state of trial upon earth,
And virtue only gives immortal worth:
Woman is frail, and Man's apostate born,
Whom she should treat with all her sex's scorn;
Base are the deeds of Man to womankind,
But ills should not pervert the virtuous mind:
In spite of stratagem, allurement, need,
She that is virtuous still, is great indeed:
She that has virtue wears a coat of mail,
Which all the wiles of Vice cannot assail.
Whether 'tis ease in Man or thirst of gain,
Or vice in Woman, I will not maintain!
But be it which it may in both 'tis bad,
And feeble the excuse to call them mad!

If lustful passions lead the Dame astray,
Or a vile Husband drive her out for pay!
If vanity or dress allure her mind,
To forfeit fame and letcher with Mankind!
Or if to add a feather to his head,
Spouse make her truckle to some Noble's bed!
If one small spice of these is found in each,
It needs no Jemmy Twitcher to impeach:
Curs'd is their state, nor should such base born slaves
Be earth'd, with common rogues in common graves.
A stinking Cuckold he, and she a Punk,
In spite of Fl---r---, Dn---ln--- and D---.

Virtue in Woman's like the virgin snow;
Which while it keeps it's purity and show,
Maintains it's beauty: but one viscious flaw
Fouls and destroys it like a sudden thaw.
Woman will hold long sieges for a name,
And like Lucretia bleed to raise a fame:
No whining Preacher, nor no Courtiers lies,
Tho' e'er so cunning, politick, or wise,
No Soldier's glory, nor no miser's purse;
Nor can the Pope with his eternal curse,

Frighten a Woman to bestow her charms,
Unmov'd she'll stand and Virtue all her arms.
Her truth, her honour shall the world convince
She's chaste;—and yet she'll truckle to a Prince.
But that is loyalty: you'll ne'er persuade
Women that Kings can make them less a maid.
Man they'll withstand—yet long for untast'd joy,
And then resign their bauble for a toy:
All have their prices, Yarmouth prov'd the thing,
She stood the world, but could not stand a King.
Some Men are happy with a handsome wife,
And many doubly wretched drag through life:
Handsome and good, indeed are handsome things,
But how few these attend! Beauty has wings,
And in a breath is gone, and all her charms,
When we think safe and virtuous in our arms
'Tis very strange the sudden flights she'll take,
A Saint this moment, and the next a Rake.
Oh I could say such things would make ye weep,
With Daughters Sires; Brothers with Sisters sleep!

Many by incest thus to ruin fall,
And growing Sodomy will damn us all.

Enough of Women! Gods, it stabs my heart,
When I'm to prove they've play'd th'adult'rous part!
Oh, can you, after this flagitious rhime,
Hail me the gentle Naso of my time!
Venus attend thy am'rous Poet's pray'r,
If e'er my pen unjustly wounds the Fair,
Nine fold return the stab, I'll own it just,
From thee fair Queen of Beauty, Joy and Lust!

Enough of Woman!—H*n stand forth,
The smallest, greatest Cuckold in the North.
With little F---th, and less C---y,
That ye a lewd Triumverate may be,
Like Cæsar, Lepidus, and Anthony;
In lewdness only, not in truth or sense,
To which you must allow you've no pretence;
Ye know not even the soft art of love,
As ev'ry strumpet upon town can prove!
Shame on such Senators, such green old Peers,
Old in debauchery, tho' young in years?

Have ye not Wifes and Mistresses?—yet still,
Go we to Ranelagh, or where we will
We find you there; for ye like jackalls prowl
About for prey, and smell at ev'ry hole.
At noon you're on the hunt, and in the dark
We find you fumbling in the streets or Park,
Sober; for it would be a praise if drunk,
And some excuse for hugging of a punk.
Turn and observe the lux'ry of the times,
From high to low do we not study crimes?
What are our statesmen, but a venal crew,
Voting this day for me, the next for you?

When Rome at length, by various tempests tost,
Her antient fame and liberty had lost,
A horse in Se---te sat; here let him sit,
He'll have more votes than Honesty or Pitt!
Walpole, like old Caligula cou'd buy
You all if he had cash,—I cannot lie,
And call these golden days; I swear they're worse
Than those, which did the sons of Sodom curse.

Such Leaders never Country had before,
Our very convicts blush on yonder shore;
Defy their palsied Mother, and dispute
The acts of Twitcher, H---, and B---.
There was a time when honest Members came
To this great Town, to raise their Country's fame:
Their souls all free, not venally profuse,
With twice sol'd shoes they stump'd it to the House.
Wives staid at home, but now the turnpikes bring,
All to learn vice, buy pins, and see the King;
'Tis on the turnpikes that we ought to rail,
The turnpikes where sin runs upon the nail.
Thus Vice and Luxury in days of yore
Sunk Rome, as Athens it had sunk before;
And England now at a strange je-hu rate,
Seems to be driving down the steep of Fate.
Thus have I seen at some snug Cit's abode,
Full in the dust upon the northern road,
The York post-coach from Highgate's lofty brow,
Whirling and clatt'ring to the plain below.

Lechers, at least be prudent in this state,
Bring in your strumpets at the postern gate!
Nor strut in vice, amidst the day's bright glare,
To show mankind what little things ye are:
Give up these tinsel toys to idle youth,
And let the acts of falsehood, yield to truth.
With you the feats of Venus ill agree,
Leave those to Spencer, Hamilton and Me.

An unfortunate Niece of a late Alderman of York, whose viscious disposition hurried her down the precipice of lust and folly—in spite of education, or the tears of Kindred.

Charles the 12th of Sweden, when 16 years old, marched against Copenhagen, (the capital of Denmark) and made a vow to abstain from women and wine—which Voltaire tells us he most religiously performed: we know that he had resolution—or brutality—or apathy, or whatever you please to call it: to refuse a visit from the Countess of Conismar, a Sweedish Lady of birth and fashion; celebrated through Europe for her wit and beauty. She made many visits and many efforts to see the cold Hero—(which he only called a conquest of his passions, to obviate and avoid those evils which the fair-sex brought upon Caesar and Alexander.) However, she exercised her wit and charms in vain; and the last efforts were these. She took an opportunity of meeting him in a narrow lane on horseback, when he could not pass the coach;—upon which, she alighted—he saluted her, never spoke a word, but turned his horse and rode off: a galling mortification to solliciting beauty. She was a mistress of the living languages, and composed a poem to win the favours of this Hero; wherein she makes all the Gods, but Venus and Bacchus, speak highly of his fame. The piece concludes, thus:

“Enfin chacun des dieux dis courant à sa gloire,
“Le placoit par avance au temple de Memoire:
“Mais Venus, ni Bacchus n'en dire pas un mot.”
When all the Gods did of his glories boast,
And Mem'ry plac'd him in her highest post;
Sweet Venus sigh'd, and Bacchus past the toast.

I believe I may say, that it was the first time those bewitching Sisters, Beauty and Poesy, failed with a youth under 20.

The late Admiral.

Samuel Johnson satirized by Churchill, under the name of Pomposo.

In Dodsley's Annual Register for 1764, you will see the memoirs of Churchill, written by a false, invidious pen, attempting, by the grossest falsities, to prejudice the world, against one of the greatest Poets this kingdom ever produced.

The great Buck Henley, was guilty of this absurdity.

This circumstance passed between the teeth of a Dentist and his wife.

COOPER'S WELL .

A FRAGMENT.

TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE LORD ROCHESTER.

Spissa Te nitidam coma.

Thee Lovely with thy bushy hair.

Sure there are lovers which did never sip
The stream of Venus; nor did taste the lip
Of Cooper's Well; we therefore may suppose
Those made some Lovers, and some Lovers those:

And as Wells make not Springs, but Springs the Well,
So, where the Graces, and the Muses dwell
Flows Cooper's Stream; if I can be to thee
A pleasing Bard, thou'rt Helicon to me.
Nor wonder if (new pinion'd in my wing,
By bathing in thy sliding silver spring)
Through long trac'd ways, and shady paths I flie,
Where Fancy reaches further than the eye:
My wanton eye, with raptures views the space
That lies between; and first salutes the place
Crown'd with the softest moss, sweet shrubs, and flowers;
Where, oft recline the greatest, gayest Powers
Of earth; and near two snowy Mountains stand,
Which may be climb'd by each advent'rous hand:
Below, a lovely, velvet Valley swells,
Where Strength with Beauty, Mars with Venus dwells;
And to the eye it doth itself present,
With such an easy, and unforc'd ascent,
No horrors there appear to hurt the eye,
Nor access to the Fair and Young deny:
But such a gentle slope, as doth invite
A pleasure, rapture, rev'rence for the sight;

Below, the Beauties, and the Graces dwell,
And the clear stream which trills from Cooper's Well.
Oh! happiness of sweet retir'd content,
Where I, my very happiest hours have spent.

Here Nature seems in all intent to please,
In moving up and down varieties;
Here soft delights from two soft causes move,
The cause of Beauty, and the cause of Love.
No unexpected inundations spoil
The Sower's hopes;—or mock the Ploughman's toil;
But Nature's gentle bounties gently run,
First love to do—then love the thing they've done;
Nor are the blessings to the banks confin'd,
But free, and common as the sea, and wind.—
O could I flow like thee, and make my theme,
As strong and lasting as thy purling stream!
Upon thy charms I would for ever dwell,
And only bathe within my Cooper's Well.—

Here all the roughness of the creeping Wood,
Strives with the gentle oozings of the flood.

And tho' the stream's transparent, deep and clear,
Yet had the boy Narcissus gazed here;
He had not met with such a sad disgrace,
Had he the bottom seen, and not his face;
This lovely place, had the Ovidian Youth
Beheld of Yore, how he had stretch'd the mouth
Of Love, with am'rous tales of swains, and Dames,
And Priapus the God of female Flames;
Here had he prais'd young Cupid and his Courts;
For hither all the horned host resorts
To frisk, to wanton, gambol, bathe and graze,
And Nature's master-piece sublimely raise:
Which only proves great things beneath the sun,
When quickly rear'd as quickly are undone.
Thus an imperious Statesman, I could name,
By one deep motion sunk himself in shame:
How blest when both to the same centre move,
When one gives Liberty, the other Love.—

Thus, Sem'le grasping more than she could hold,
Made Jove oppressive, insolent, and bold;
Unthinking Dame! to force a God to give
More, than he made a mortal to receive:
The action prov'd—things carry'd to excess,
Made both, by striving to be greater, less:
Thus Cooper's Well, if swell'd by sudden rains,
May drown the ploughman—ploughing in her Plains,
He on her banks, no longer holds his seat,
Half drown'd—and shrunk, he trusts unto his feet.

This is the place, where Love and Beauty roam
To spend their little matters free at home:
O! Love all eloquent, thy mighty sway,
Maids, Monarchs, Coblers, equally obey;
Thy poignant dart made rapid with a feather,
Pierces alike the sole, the upper leather:
Nought can resist thy sharp, thy gentle touch,
Thee all obey in little, and in much:

Women and men confess thy soft command,
And spread their Sovereign's image thro' the land;
Enraptur'd fall where e'er the arrow's sped,
The daisied Meadow, or the damask'd Bed;
Such is thy sovereign power, thy sovereign sway,
Beauty, fair ruler of the night and day.
Hail! gentle Empress hail! to mortals given;
Beauty thou first, thou fairest work of Heaven.
Of Men and Angels, thou sweet wonder, deign
To aid the Lover, and the Poet's strain:
Inspire my verse, inspire my am'rous tongue,
Till praise, thy due, breathes musical in song!
Inspire the Muse, that she may soar above
All meaner waters, to the spring of Love!
Whether Cythera fam'd, or Ida sing?
The Muse impatient seeks the silver spring.

Bold's the attempt,—but what won't Beauty turn?
If even Illium was again to burn;
If the whole globe itself was Beauty's foe,
The Globe I'd burn; or would aspiring shew;

Like Paris, with dear Venus on my side,
How Hector fought, and how Achilles dy'd.

Bold be th'attempt! yet will I boldly sing,
And with a quill indite from Cupid's wing:
In these chaste days what cause for fears, or frights,
When Charles will run to read what Denham writes!
In these chaste days, when essays please the ears
Of Monarchs, Bishops, Ministers and Peers;
When men, flagitious men, are rais'd to place,
For acts of lewdness, not for acts of grace:
And one because of a more pious soul,
Sets up a chaste High-Steward to the whole:
In such chaste days, must I refuse to tell,
Of all the Beauties round my Cooper's Well.

Then tell my Muse, for thou, or none can'st tell;
The hidden Mystries of that sacred Well,
Where Wilmot sprung, and oft' where Wilmot dy'd?
The Well which swallow'd old Illium's pride:

A Well, as deep as nine times day and night,
A Well, unfathom'd by the sons of light:
A Well, tho' deep and dark, yet smooth and strait,
A Well, frequented by the brave and great:
A Well, where Adam lav'd in days of Yore,
A Well, where Bishops dabble, and adore:
Confess'd by Connoisseurs whom pleasures move,
The bliss of mortals, is the Well of love.

Seated within a Grot of make divine,
Built without mortar, chisel, rule, or line:
Soft moss without; of lively crimson hue
The canopy, the architect, more true
Than ever Michael Angelo or Wren
Design'd, or finish'd for the proudest Men.
Such seems the lovely place, made only proud,
To be the bearer of a royal load;
Than which, a nobler weight no mountain bears,
But Juno who supports the king of spheres.
When nature's hand this spot did thus advance,
'Twas guided by a wiser Pow'r than chance;

Mark'd out for softest use, as if 'twere meant
That man and fortunes here, should both be spent.
Nor can we call it choice; when what we chuse,
The coldest apathy cou'd not refuse.

High on two alabaster pillars rear'd
(Which Popes have kiss'd, and Infidels rever'd)
The grotto was; where men of all degrees
Present their largest off'rings on their knees;
But gen'rous Love returns a little loth
Layers, in hopes of a luxuriant growth.
So tradesmen wishing to encrease their store,
Give you good weight to have your custom more.

Soft, Mossy Grotto, exquisitely fair,
The work of Jove himself, and man's chief care:
O! how thou tempting smiles, t'attempt the small
Ascent, accessible to one: but all
Alternate climb the little snowy Hill,
And when obtain'd, enjoy it to their fill.

Mid-way one Entrance leads, that Entrance small,
Which all mankind have pass'd to gain this Ball:
And tho' the Entrance won't admit the day,
Still in obscurity it's truly gay:
The end unknown:—altho' the strict employ
Of men of Courage, and of men of Joy:
Thousands have toil'd to reach the endless goal,
And all in striving spent their mighty all;
Returning faint, without their former might;
Praising the joys of darkness more than light.
Around grew wanton shrubs, of various hue,
In wanton tufts, seem'd wanton as they grew:
Luxuriant creeping as they dangl'd o'er
To kiss the borders of the flowery shore:
In this neat Grotto, thro' a dark Alcove,
Rises the spring of Cooper's Well, and Love;
(Where the blind, purpled pinion'd Prince of hearts,
Hangs up his armory, shields, quivers, darts:)
Which in a gentle rill, runs gently through
The nether tufts, and wets each pendent bough;

Oft on these boughs a thousand airy things,
When tir'd with bathing, dry their little wings:
Prolifick stream! which can at once give Breath
To various Creatures, and eternal death:
Thrice powerful stream, which can destroy and save,
And prove at once the cradle and the grave:
No wonder why ye so desirous cling,
To hold a Manor near so fair a spring:
O! could I change my state, and with ye dwell
Within the borders of my Cooper's Well;
All my possessions in this world I'd give,
To only die, where you are known to live.
Prolifick stream, and more prolifick fry,
Where myriads quicken, and where myriads die.
O! could I flow like thee, and make thy stream
My only pass-time, as it is my theme;
Tho' deep, yet clear; tho' gentle, yet not dull;
And like the Thames too pleases most when full.

Heaven, shall no more her Via lactis boast,
Her Fame in thy more milky current lost:
Thy gentle stream shall visit Jove's abodes,
Shine with the stars, and bathe the Heathen Gods.
O! it shall flow to th'world's extreamest ends,
Endless itself, its azure stream extends.
Yes, shalt thou flow tho' sword, or time, or fire,
Or lust and zeal more fierce than they, conspire,
Secure, whilst thee the best of Poets sings,
Enjoy'd and nourish'd by the best of Kings.

Here, the thick roughness of the mossy wood,
Yields to the gentle thrillings of the flood:
Such wide extremes, here, Nature doth unite,
That none can view them but must feel delight.
The stream's so milky, silky, strong and clear,
That, Charles himself bathes here the silken year.

Oft' have I known the King, when great affairs
Call'd him to Council; here, unfix'd from cares,
Enraptur'd bathe his sturdy limbs, and dwell
Supinely, kindly, within Cooper's Well.
The shrubs which grew around the brim, he made
His soft retreat, where no man durst invade
His soft repose, so freed from all alarms
By turns he lives, and dies in Beauty's arms.
Love, and Enjoyment, thus, like war and peace,
Are each the others ruin, and encrease.

Cooper, thy Well long fam'd, long known the best,
Between the civil East, and savage West:
The mighty pow'r it has, the stream it makes,
Reduces other streams, to common jakes;
A stream superior to all min'ral streams,
If streams are priz'd by matter like our themes:
If min'ral tincts give Beauties to a rill,
What rill can tinct like thine, what current trill?

Iris, herself in all her wat'ry pride,
Falls short of thy more variegated tide:
Can Wilmot paint, or less renowned Gage,
(The great map-jobber of the present age)
A map of various dyes, with all this skill,
As the smart stream which runs from Cooper's-Rill.
No more shall he those various colours boast,
Their fame in thy metallic stream is lost:
Thine shall mæander, and like Arethuse,
Receive Alpheus at a secret sluice:
Thine shall surpass the muddy stygian pool,
Where Mother Thetis dip'd her Hero Fool:
Nay, that fair stream, when he could passion's feel,
Where he, more wanton bath'd his mortal heel.
Thine too shall raise more wonder in the land,
Than that which bubbled o'er a golden sand:

More golden thine with more attractive power,
When gently trilling in the darling hour.
Be not inquisitive the depth t'explore,
Search not the bottom, but survey the shore.
Nor shall Scamander's stream, which Homer sings,
Surpass the power of thy relaxing springs;
But what a pause hath old Scamander made;
Like City Wells dry'd up by too much trade.
Thus thirsty time insatiate drinks, and dries
The streams we love, the flood-gates to our joys.
But when these currents (where the Great have div'd,
The stoutest fainted, tho' they bravely striv'd,
Emollient Baths where mighty Gods and Kings,
Have bath'd their members, and ador'd the springs)
Are dry'd of all, but heavy casual rains:
O! what a yawning chasm alas! remains!

100

A chasm more dark, a chasm more deep, and streight,
Something like that, when, Satan's hellish weight,
Bore him with such velocity from light,
“Nine times the space which measures day and night.”
An hideous place where hoary weeds are found,
Where, no kind dews revive the unplough'd ground.
Where, Nature's choicest seeds will never grow,
Where, Beauty fades, and Flowers have ceas'd to blow:
'Tis thus with Beauty—not with Cooper's Well,
When age appears, the Graces bid farewell:
Smiles then are vain, when ev'ry dimple sleek,
In wrinkles lengthen down the wither'd cheek;
When age has giv'n the rose the winter nip,
And all the cherry quits the pouting lip;
When Cupid steals his Quiver from the eye,
To youth belong the little feats of joy:
Age must resign, nor Lovers ever prove;
When Youth, and Beauty, quit thy Grotto Love.

101

Let more religious pastimes court your ease,
For with these travel all the arts to please!

But dire mishaps like these can never dwell
Within the circle of my Cooper's Well;
Where blushing flowers are timely seen to blow,
And seeds prolific most luxuriant grow;
Where streams mæander, and where Fountains play,
And smiles and sun-shine sport the live-long day:
Where am'rous sighs steal gently o'er the calm,
And softly whisper, whence they stole their balm:
Where softest motions, softest musick suit,
Beyond the German, or the Dorian Flute:
Musick which gives emotion to the heart,
A fainting flutter, and a pleasing smart.
And in the mixture of all these appears
Variety, which all the rest endears.

No more of past'rals, and Elysian Bow'rs,
No more of Enna, or of Enna's Flow'rs:
No more of spreading roots, or thriving seeds,
Of weeping Willows, or of whistling reeds;

102

No more of gentle Arethusa's streams,
The Poet's fancies, or the Lover's dreams!
Those roots, those seeds, those streams, and blushing flow'rs,
Those weeping Willows, and those roseate Bow'rs;
Are now excell'd by Cooper's Flow'rs, and Streams,
By Cooper's Fancies, and by Cooper's Dreams.
O! Love triumphant, could I but recount,
The thousands which have lav'd in Beauty's fount!
Vain is th'attempt:—suffice it then to sing,
That Adam bath'd in the attractive spring;
That first good man the first example gave,
And we with joy, and filial rev'rence have
In soft gradation swam with life and limb,
And still progressive, and obedient swim.

No more of Woodstock or of Hampton's Bow'rs,
Where Harry Tudor rank'd the first of flow'rs:

103

Where amorous Charles sows out imperial seeds,
And then transplants them forth to run to weeds;
No more of Jets, Ah Ahs, and rough Cascades,
Of tinkling Rills, and aromatic Shades;
No more of grottos, or sequester'd cells,
Of conic arches, or unfathom'd Wells;
Here Priests in happy contemplations dwell,
It is religion, and religion's cell;
No more of ruin's nodding in the air,
Compos'd of stones that ever want repair;
No more of breathing Statues cut in stone,
Or speaking Pictures by a Raphael drawn.
Above all Bowers, Cooper's Bowers rise,
And ev'ry Ah Ah, this Ah Ah outvies;
The rill more tinckles, and the shade's more sweet,
The Grot's more cool, and deeper's the retreat:
The Arch more conic, and the Well more deep,
(If we may credit those who've try'd the steep:)
The strongest stones this Well reduces too,
And like Amphion raises them anew:

104

Statues, nor Pictures, can such charms excell,
For all who see it sigh for Cooper's Well.

Cætera Desiderantur.

Dictus et Amphion, Thebanæ conditor urbis,
Saxa movere sono testudinis, et prece blandæ
Ducere quò vellet.

—Hor: De Arte Poet.

Amphion play'd so well the Theban riggle,
He made their stones to skip, their Girls to giggle:
His pipe and tabor touch'd so much the blood,
The merry Piper did what e're he wou'd.

I am greatly divided whether this composition is really Sir John Denham's, altho' the manuscript strictly declares it such. I should rather conceive it to be some of the salacious Geniuses of that time, who wanted to vex the chaste Knight, by a parody on his Cooper's-Hill: but tho' the thought and words have or have not, an obscene tendency, nevertheless they are so neatly rolled up, as to avoid offence to the chastest eye and ear.

The milky way.

Achilles, filius ex Thetide.

Ab Ulysse in aula Regis Lycomedis detectus.

Il fait telliment aime de la Princess Deidamie,
Fille du Roi, qu'elle lui avoit permis de l'engrosser.—

Pactolus, a river of Lydia, rising out of the hill Tmolus, where Midas washed off his foolish wish.

A river of Troas, rising out of mount Ida; and enters the Archipelago opposite the isle of Tenedos.

Amphion played so well on the harp, and moved so regularly the stones, that, they composed the City of Thebes.

105

MERETRICIOUS MISCELLANIES.

107

AN EPITHALAMIUM On the Marriage of SUDLEY and BEERPINT.
March, 1769.

Ye little Gods and Goddesses attend,
From Pimlico, May Fair, and gay Mile-End!
From foul Mount Pleasant pray resort in pairs,
And eke from Billingsgate to Whitehall stairs!
From Cold Bath fields, from Hockley in the hole,
From every gin'bread, apple, oyster stall!
Who knows the fortune of a lousy calf,
The fate of greasy Deborah and Ralph:

108

Whores now are maids, and maids are common whores,
They stink like dead dogs on the common shores,
Hold up your heads my girls, the manner such-is,
There is no knowing who will be a Dutchess!
Or who will not be one, for in one moon
Marriage is sugar sweet and melts as soon.
For Dukes obtain from Dutchess' divorce,
Sooner than I can mount upon my horse:
But here attend ye little sooty jades,
And reeling bring your ragged, rough-spun blades,
Here with your breaths of anniseed and gin,
Suck in this bridal song and thus begin.
Sudley and Beerpint now together dream,
Catch it, ye alleys, and ye bunters scream!

Think what encouragement is this to sport,
All play at push-pin who attend at C---
Put and All-fours, and ape my Lady's hole,
Is followed tightly by each able soul.
And where's the myst'ry Moll of such a plan,
You've beat Ned oftner than e'er Ned beat Nan;
Upon an oyster barrel have I seen,
You, and he play—as black as the club Queen,

109

An inch of candle stuck upon the side,
Hugging with rapture you his amorous bride;
Have I not seen these freaks in alleys dire,
Where coals n'er wander'd to afford a fire;
And yet the fire of Love in dirt and rags,
Beats Sudley's virtue and her Beerpint's bags;
Catch it ye Dustmen, spread abroad the theme,
Ye gutters roll it down your shallow inky stream.

A whiten'd barber from the lengthen'd Strand,
Lead forth a Chimney-sweeper in each hand!
And let them bear within their sooty paws,
Sheets of white paper with the marriage laws!
Let ev'ry ballad woman next be found,
Between old Jews-place and St. Giles's Pound!
Concordant and discordant let them scream,
Thro' every street the happy bridal theme!
The chorus form'd of Covent Garden breed,
By various fathers of the Bagnio seed,
Ye mob devour it like a Gossip's dream,
Ye kennels catch the sound, and roll it down the stream!

110

Let Buckhorse hold in St. Pulchre's porch,
A candle in a stick, as Hymen's torch;
Conjugal precepts let our Langhorne preach,
And work a wonder; such, to Courtiers teach!
And as he's full of prodigies and wonder,
Sighs, groans, effusions, ditties, throes, and thunder,
Let him take gentle Hymen by the fist,
And gabble marriage o'er to those who list,
He may perhaps renew miss Fanny's ghost,
Or move old Newgate to a clearer coast,
Such things by priests have oft been done before,
Witness old Thebes, old Jericho of yore:
If Doctor Langhorne doth in these succeed,
He will deserve a mitre for a meed.
Attempt, dear Doctor do, the bridal theme,
Your own dear dull Review will roll it ream by ream.

In Leister-Fields, before great Saville house,
Where beggars tune a stave, and crack a louse;

111

Where many a mucky brat is pinch'd to cry,
And draw the charity of passers by!
Where, “black your Honour, buy pomatum” sound,
And twenty different songs at once abound:
Where Quack Doctors in gold and silver shine,
And Harlots court ye for a glass of wine:
Where clowns stand gaping often 'till they're lick'd,
And listening wenches have their pockets pick'd:
Where our good Dowager did once resort,
Until she found it was too far from Court:
Where thousands pass for business, pleasure, fun,
Some to undo because they are undone:
Here stop awhile, and hear my bridal theme,
And spread it gen'ral round, adown my Thames's stream.

Ye Hackney Coachmen, who take ev'ry pride,
To Blackguard those who do not chuse to ride;
And ye who ply for Wilkes and Brentford Town,
Where seeds of Liberty are only sown;

112

Who like mad phaetons more furious drive,
If you're inspired and chalk'd with XLV.
Sing the soft theme as through the dust you roll,
And Siren like you'll bilk the greedy toll!
Warble the gentle strains as you advance,
And quite through Knightsbridge make your Cattle dance;
A word ye snotty sons of Knight'sbridge hear!
Move from Hyde park those emblematic Deer!
Their branching horns are Dignity's disgrace,
They run their antlers full into our face:
For ever blot it from the bridal theme,
And may she ebb with joys like Thames's moving stream.

Ye nosegay Girls who bother all ye meet,
Unbind your flow'rs and spread them at her feet.
She cannot tread as Goddesses have trod,
Upon the common, vulgar, verdant sod;
Roses and myrtles strew before her steps,
And hail her mighty Queen of Demi-reps;

113

She'll add new fragrance to the herbs ye strew,
So bright a yellow, Sun-flowers never blew:
Tho' she's a blossom 'tis not colly-flow'r,
Her charms have stood the patt'ring of the show'r;
They're worse for rain and time, and time and rain,
Yet each cosmetick summer blow again:
Thy vi'lets Flora ne'er were half so sweet,
Thy deeds in Rome my Sudley's never beat:
Thou art a Goddess and an empty dream,
She is the world's great talk, the poet's theme.
Thy treasure bought thee footing in the skies,
She means to spend her all before she dies:
Thy spendings Flora in the days of Rome,
Made thee a star—which cannot be her doom;
She shines below too much, to shine above,
She's quite a bankrupt in the trade of Love,
So long she used it—she has worn it out,
As erst she cannot bear it now about—
To please the Gods indeed she'll be too stale,
The long drawn bottom of a draught of ale.

114

'Twill not go down—tho' e'er so thirsty grown,
We seek a fresher tap around the town.
But yet this wedding does deserve esteem,
Carrol Bawds, Harlots, Nose-gay Girls the bridal theme!

A publication to a Lady on her marriage.

Cock Lane.

115

An Imitation of the 10th Elegy of the second book of the Amours of that meretricious, polite, Roman Gentleman, PUBLIUS NASO OVID.

Remember George, with warmth 'twas said by you,
No Man at once could be in love with Two.
Deceived by you: unarm'd—I had no fears;
But now, in love with two o'er head and ears.
They both are handsome; and, they both dress well;
But which I cannot say doth most excell.
My heart for this, then that, alternate burns,
By Heav'n I love these Angels in their turns.
Thus like a ship the sport of wind and tide,
My heart divided beats from side to side.
Why would you Love redouble thus my smart,
One pretty Girl's enough to tease one heart?
Love brought to Me—is bringing leaves to trees,
Stars to the skies, and waters to the seas;

116

I'm full; 'tis better than to've none at all;
Let that damn'd curse my Enemies befal.
This curse attend my foe (if I have one)
To deeply love, and yet to lie alone.
Love from my senses every slumber move,
O! make me active on the bed of Love?
If one sweet Girl my manhood can subdue,
Let her—if not—then bring me sweeter two.
Fine slender limbs with me and love suffice,
I want no vigour, but I may want size.
Desire still fans the flame, if strength does fade,
No Beauty slept with me and rose a maid.
Oft' have I spent in Love a luscious night,
And rose next morning eager for the fight:
Blest are those lives which mutual raptures spend,
Give me, ye Gods! so wish'd, so sweet an end!
Let the tough Soldier glory in his scars,
And search for Honour in the fields of Mars;
Let him who thirsts for riches cruize the main,
Let him, when ship-wreck'd sink and drink his gain.

117

Let me in Love's soft battles fall a slave,
And dig with rapture there my own soft grave.
Some feeling Fair, shall at my Exit cry,
“Thus did he live, thus did my Naso die.”

The BEE and POLLY. 1764.

Pretty Polly ran to see,
Pretty Chicks the hen had hatch'd;
As she went a saucy Bee,
Polly's honey'd beauties watch'd.

“Gracious heart! see where it flies?
Down poor pretty Polly drop'd,
Screaming! it has stung my thighs,
But where has the villain hop'd?”

She call'd catch it, sob'd and wept;
I shall never this survive!
I look'd, but found the Bee had crept,
Into little Cupid's hive.

118

The WARMING PAN.

The Coach arriv'd, impatient all
For diff'rent things begin to call!
But I, who have no trade
But Love, for sweeter morsels try;
I search, and fix an am'rous eye,
Upon the Chamber Maid.

I wait, and catch her as she flies
From Room to Room, with eager eyes:
“My Dear permit my aid!”
I seize her and she cries a-done,
I kiss her quick, and let her run;
The pretty Chambermaid.

The supper comes, and Betty Grove,
'Tis Hebe waiting upon Jove;
The reck'ning next is paid.
Yawning the Passengers retire,
I, burning like the kitchen fire,
For Betty Chambermaid.

119

Kneeling, my bed the Beauty warms,
When furious I attack her charms:
“Get out you naughty Man!”
The port is gain'd by quick surprise,
I kiss, she kicks, and faintly cries,
“O! move the warming-pan!”

There—there, again—the bed—it burns,
I move,—she moves—we move by turns,
“What are you at dear Man?”
Hush! there's a noise—the bed—the joy,
Hark!—hark! how sweet my amorous Boy,
Hold there—the warming-pan.

When e'er I pass the high North road,
I knock at Betty's soft abode,
Where happy I am laid:
The neatest Inn, the softest thatch,
And tell me, where a place can match,
My Pretty Chambermaid.

120

An Epigram written by the celebrated Mons. Voltaire, on Madam Pompadour being made Mistress to Lewis the Fifteenth.

IMITATED.

In early youth this lovely maid,
By art and nature form'd to please,
In Brothel, Cot, or Masquerade,
And captivate each heart with ease.
Whom, her Mama discreet and wise,
Intended for a Farmer's bed;
But Love, a better judge of eyes,
Gave to a King her Maidenhead.

121

EPIGRAM. The Marriage of Margaret and Moses.

Marg'ret to Moses wed, and pray'd to God,
Her spouse might have both Aaron's beard and rod.

122

The following Epitaph was pin'd to a Lady's bed curtains upon her Wedding Night.

ENGLISHED.

123

Here lieth Stella,
In the joyful hope of the resurrection of the flesh;
A virgin of surpassing beauty,
No charm was wanting to compleat her mind,
No ornament her body;
The fire of love she stir'd in ev'ry breast:
Yet to herself was all this worth unknown.
Folded at last within the arms of him
She most desir'd,
Nature she joyfully repaid,
And,
Pleasing sunk to rest.

[The following Epitaph was pin'd to a Lady's bed curtains upon her Wedding Night.]

AGAIN [ENGLISHED].

Beneath these stones sweet Stella lies,
Fill'd with the hope the flesh will rise:
By beauty fashion'd, knowledge led,
In manners elegantly bred.
To heav'n no girl look'd with such grace,
So perfect in her mind, and face,
She, love in every breast inspir'd,
Nor knew it tho' the world admir'd.

124

Folded at last within the arms
Of him, she pray'd might have her charms.
That nature, Nature gave she paid,
Sigh'd with a smile and pleasing laid.

ROGER and MOLLY.

Beneath a weeping willow's shade,
Melting with love fair Molly laid,
Her cows were feeding by:
By turns she knit, by turns she sung,
While ever flow'd from Molly's tongue:
“How deep in love am I.”

Young Roger chanc'd to stroll along,
And hearing Molly's am'rous song,
And now and then a sigh:
Straight o'er the hedge he made his way,
And join'd with Molly in her lay;
“How deep in love am I!”

The quick surprize made Molly blush,
“How rude, she cried;—now pray be hush?

125

“Yet show'd a yielding eye:
“My needle's bent,—my worsted's broke,
“Roger, I only meant in joke,
“How deep in love am I.”

“You're rude—get out—I won't be kist,
“Pray don't—yes do?—begone—persist!
“Roger, I vow I'll cry!
“What are you at?—you rogueish swain?
“He answer'd in a dying strain:
“How deep in love am I.”

The DISAPPOINTMENT.

With all the rapture which can fire love's breast,
I kept the hour design'd to make me blest:
Courtier ne'er watch'd so much the monarch's nod,
Pilgrim ne'er sought with greater zeal his God:
Each petticoat that rustled by, my heart
Bounded as if 'twould from its centre start!
To ev'ry form spied by the glimm'ring lamp
I ran, which seen, but caus'd a greater damp:

126

Wearied at length, sore vex'd, and chill'd my flame,
I turn'd,—for damn the Jilt she never came.

A PARODY.

[In infancy I knew a spot]

In infancy I knew a spot,
Where flowers ne'er had blown;
Where creeping moss had never got,
Where seed was never sown.
But when to years maturer grown,
The spot was deck'd with flowers,
Seed flourish'd whensoever sown,
And lik'd reviving showers.

Within this little snug retreat,
A cooling fountain plays:
Here, Venus did Narcissus treat,
And spent their youthful days.
The stream, they nam'd the milky way,
Cause of its cooling pow'r,
Here Titus sigh'd to lose a day!
And I to lose an hour.

127

Around this fount a shady grove,
To lovely Venus dear:
Where all the loves and graces rove,
And wanton all the year.
The only grove where Ida's dove,
Is known to build her nest:
Wherein the little God of love,
Creeps, from his mother's breast.

A smoother plain, beyond the fount
Extends than Tempe sweet,
Whereon appears a little mount,
Which Cupid makes his seat.
Two snowy mountains rise above,
Fairest beneath the skies:
Which Venus nam'd the hills of love,
Because, when prest they rise.

LYDY—Cherning.

Brim full of love fat Lydy sat,
Cheeks like a blooming plumb;
Sweating with all a maiden's strength,
To make the butter come.

128

In vain she chern'd, in vain she try'd;
O would our Roger come!
For nothing but a Roger's strength,
Can make my butter come.

Within the pantry Roger skulk'd,
And heard this am'rous hum;
Then fixing fast on Lydy's chern,
He made her butter come.

Lydy cried out—O Roger,—on—
That day may I be dumb;
If once I toil—when you so soon,
Can make my butter come.

129

AN EPITAPH, Written in the year 1766, Upon the Death and Burial of a MAID.

Beneath these stones a lovely Maid's repos'd,
Who, while alive a secret ne'er disclos'd:
She on her back is still supinely laid,
The pious posture of a dying Maid.

130

On the Death of KITTY FISHER.

Of St. Peter 'twas said in the days of the Jews,
In Judea no Fisher could stand in his shoes:
But this I'll affirm, and I'm sure with no drift:
That he, ne'er like St. Kitty, was put to the shift!
Nay, I'll bett Bishop Warburton fifty to ten,
He, never like her, was the Fisher of Men.

131

A Translation of some Part of the first Book of Voltaire's Pucelle d'Orleans.

Of Saints you bid me sing—'tis all in vain,
My voice is feeble, and withal prophane.
Sing, then O! sing of Joan the fair, the fine,
Who did, 'tis said, such prodigies divine!
She first establish'd with her virgin hands,
The Flow'r-de-luce, the pride of Gallia's lands;
The branch she stole, left England in the lurch,
And canoniz'd it in the Rheimean church.
She shew'd in all a pious, lovely face,
Was known to be the Rowland of her Race.
For vig'rous courage she surpass'd all praise,
Beneath the placket and within the stays.
O grant an ev'ning for a wanton feat,
The Wench as fair as mutton, and as sweet.
Great Joan of Arc a lyon's heart possest,
You'll see it plainly, do but read the rest!

132

You'll tremble at such acts, such mighty feats,
Rare 'mongst the rarests: but, amidst her heats
This was the lab'ring work, the grand affair,
To keep her little maidenhead a year.

133

A SMOCK in the TEETH.

The magick charms which smile beneath the smock,
Have Romans brought to the Tarpeian rock:
Wisdom's white hairs have into exile drove,
And the world's Conquerors dissolv'd in Love.
The first great quarrel was for Helen's charms,
And her white smock drew all the Greeks in arms:
Ten bloody years Troy stood the adverse shock,
And ow'd at last her ruin to a smock.
To save this smock was all the Trojan's pride,
The Greeks fought with it in their teeth, and died.

When smock inspir'd, the Bard he sung the best,
Without it Ovid's works had had no zest:
Give Bays to Bards, to Kings the laurel wreath,
But let me have the smock within my teeth!

134

WILKES'S RIGGLE.

A New Country Dance,

As danc'd by all the Folks of Fashion, at the fashionable end of the Town, in the year 1769.

The set was select, for the Dancers were chose,
For their beauties, their passions, and not for their cloaths;
Some small altercation the Belles did advance,
Who should stand at the top and lead down the new Dance;
But that was remov'd, when young Oss---y came
With a Dutchess, divorc'd for the strength of her flame.
Lady Sarah the sweet, and lord William stood next,
But Sir Charles kept his seat and look'd damnably vext.

135

Kitty Hunter, Lord Pem---e supplied the next places,
Tho' third of the Fair—had the fairest of faces;
She will out-dance old Venus—the Muses—and Graces.
Sweet B---l---ke looked both kind and askance,
My Lord, he kept teazing my Lady to dance;
With raptures he star'd, and with raptures he swore,
Since, he lost her he lov'd her by Heavens the more.
Pretty P---t, 'twas a pity look'd down with some shame,
Two gabbering Plenipos laid in their claim;
And she was too kind to refuse or to blame.
Mrs. G---r stood up, but they all 'gan to pout,
A woman like her, to attend such a rout,
When Panton bawl'd out he'd lay fifty to ten,
That she out-danc'd the women, and tir'd all the men:
O! let her they cried with a sneer and a giggle,
Who knows but she'll shine in the new fashion riggle.

136

M---t and D---l were both fairer than milk,
The one in white sattin, the other black silk:
One coo'd like a pidgeon, one look'd like a rook,
Together they danc'd, as they out danc'd the Duke.
Lady W---e appear'd very low in the sett,
Enough faith to put e'en a Queen in a pet;
She pouted, and thought she had right to rebuke,
I will be at top as I jigg with a Duke.
The Dutchess of K---n appear'd very low,
For one who had made such a bustle and show;
But, 'twas time to grow cool since she put on the wife,
'Tis the Devil to dance in the autumn of life:
Beneath this fair covey stood dame H---n,
Like St. George and a Soldier my Lord B---n:
Lady V--- made an effort to dance the first sett,
Tho' ready to faint at the thoughts of a sweat.
Like Flora my Lady Ann H---n stood,
A fine luscious armfull of beauty and blood:

137

She danc'd with a Scot, but his name is no matter,
As handsome as Arne faith, and not a deal fatter.
Lady A---r, and S---t---e were brighten'd with red,
But were grave that young Billy and Neddy were dead.
The musick well tun'd, and the sett quite compleat,
Each drew on his gloves, and then chalk'd o'er his feet;
The whisper went round, and the girls 'gan to giggle,
When Oss'-y bawl'd out—come, come give us the riggle?
He led her down as light as cork,
When she began to giggle;
And said at ev'ry step and jerk,
Play up Wilkes's riggle.
Lead two couple down my Lord!
“Very well upon my word,
Now cross over figure in!
“To have lost it were a sin,

138

To the top lead up again!
“Charming, charming, gallant swain.
Hands around my pretty troop!
“Lady Sarah mind your hoop;
“Who in one can dance with ease?
Hands across pray if you please!
“Lord! that is a charming sack;
Now my Lord pay back to back!
“We've no need, you find of guides;
Open,—and lead out at sides!
“O! we've done it in a trice;
“Can you dance the figure twice?
“Ask not beauty how or why,
“I will jigg it 'till I die.
Feet unto the fiddle run,
Wilkes's riggle's all the fun:
On the light fantastic toe,
Trip it softly as you go!
O! it is a heav'nly dance,
Quite the fashion too in France.
Is your Lordship out of breath?
“I could dance it to my death.
Pray dear Oss'---y do not wonder,
Pleas'd I am or up or under:

139

For to dance my passion such is,
I resign the name of Dutchess:
Thus continue all your life,
And I'll prove a faithful wife.
Lady Sarah with your fan,
Gently tap your fav'rite man!
Now begin, and jigg it thro',
Beat my Lord, my Lady do!

The END.

University of Virginia Library

I, II. [VOL. I., II.]

TO That amiable, virtuous, gallant Wight, F--- B--- D. Knight.

THE MERETRICIAD.

THE COURTESAN.

THE TEMPLE OF VENUS.

I. PART I.

TO VENUS.

II. PART II.

THE DEMI-REP.

COOPER'S WELL .

A FRAGMENT.

MERETRICIOUS MISCELLANIES.

AN EPITHALAMIUM On the Marriage of SUDLEY and BEERPINT. March, 1769.

An Imitation of the 10th Elegy of the second book of the Amours of that meretricious, polite, Roman Gentleman, PUBLIUS NASO OVID.

The BEE and POLLY. 1764.

The WARMING PAN.

An Epigram written by the celebrated Mons. Voltaire, on Madam Pompadour being made Mistress to Lewis the Fifteenth.

IMITATED.

EPIGRAM. The Marriage of Margaret and Moses.

The following Epitaph was pin'd to a Lady's bed curtains upon her Wedding Night.

ENGLISHED.

[The following Epitaph was pin'd to a Lady's bed curtains upon her Wedding Night.]

AGAIN [ENGLISHED].

ROGER and MOLLY.

The DISAPPOINTMENT.

A PARODY.

[In infancy I knew a spot]

LYDY—Cherning.

AN EPITAPH, Written in the year 1766, Upon the Death and Burial of a MAID.

On the Death of KITTY FISHER.

A Translation of some Part of the first Book of Voltaire's Pucelle d'Orleans.

A SMOCK in the TEETH.

WILKES'S RIGGLE.

A New Country Dance,

As danc'd by all the Folks of Fashion, at the fashionable end of the Town, in the year 1769.

TO That amiable, virtuous, gallant Wight,
F--- B--- D. Knight.

AN EPITHALAMIUM On the Marriage of SUDLEY and BEERPINT.
March, 1769.