ELEGY WRITTEN IN A BALL-ROOM.
The beaux are jogging on the pictured floor,
The belles responsive trip with lightsome heels;
While I, deserted, the cold pangs deplore,
Or breathe the wrath which slighted beauty feels.
When first I entered glad, with glad mamma,
The girls were ranged and clustered round us then;
Few beaux were there, those few with scorn I saw,
Unknowing Dandies that could come at ten.
My buoyant heart beat high with promised pleasure,
My dancing garland moved with airy grace;
Quick beat my active toe to Gow's gay measure,
And undissembled triumph wreathed my face.
Fancy prospective took a proud survey
Of all the coming glories of the night;
Even where I stood my legs began to play—
So racers paw the turf e'er jockeys smite.
And “who shall be my partner first?” I said,
As my thoughts glided o'er the coming beaux;
“Not Tom, nor Ned, nor Jack,”—I tossed my head,
Nice grew my taste, and high my scorn arose.
“If Dicky asks me, I shall spit and sprain;
When Sam approaches, headaches I will mention;
I'll freeze the colonel's heart with cold disdain;”
Thus cruelly ran on my glib invention.
While yet my fancy revelled in her dreams,
The sets are forming, and the fiddles scraping;
Gow's wakening chord a stirring prelude screams,
The beaux are quizzing, and the misses gaping.
Beau after beau approaches, bows, and smiles,
Quick to the dangler's arm springs glad ma'amselle;
Pair after pair augments the sparkling files,
And full upon my ear “the triumph” swells.
I flirt my fan in time with the mad fiddle,
My eye pursues the dancers' motions flying;
Cross hands! Balancez! down and up the middle!
To join the revel how my heart is dying.
One miss sits down all glowing from the dance,
Another rises, and another yet;
Beaux upon belles, and belles on beaux advance,
The tune unending, ever full the set.
At last a pause there comes—to Gow's keen hand
The hurrying lackey hands the enlivening port;
The misses sip the ices where they stand,
And gather vigor to renew the sport.
I round the room dispense a wistful glance,
Wish Ned, or Dick, or Tom, would crave the honor;
I hear Sam whisper to Miss B., “Do—dance,”
And launch a withering scowl of envy on her.
Sir Billy capers up to Lady Di;
In vain I cough as gay Sir Billy passes;
The Major asks my sister—faint I sigh,
“Well after this—the men are grown such asses!”
In vain! in vain! again the dancers mingle,
With lazy eye I watch the busy scene,
Far on the pillowed sofa sad and single,
Languid the attitude—but sharp the spleen.
“La! ma'am, how hot!”—“You're quite fatigued, I see;”
“What a long dance!”—“And so you're come to town!”
Such casual whispers are addressed to me,
But not one hint to lead the next set down.
The third, the fourth, the fifth, the sixth, are gone,
And now the seventh—and yet I'm asked not once
When supper comes must I descend alone?
Does Fate deny me my last prayer—a dunce?
Mamma supports me to the room for munching,
There turkey's breast she crams, and wing of pullet;
I slobbering jelly, and hard nuts am crunching,
And pouring tuns of trifle down my gullet.
No beau invites me to a glass of sherry;
Above me stops the salver of champaign;
While all the rest are tossing brimmers merry,
I with cold water comfort my disdain.
Ye bucks of Edinburgh! ye tasteless creatures!
Ye vapid Dandies! how I scorn you all!—
Green slender slips, with pale cheese-pairing features,
And awkward, lumb'ring, red-faced boobies tall.
Strange compounds of the beau and the attorney!
Raw lairds! and school-boys for a whisker shaving!
May injured beauty's glance of fury burn ye!
I hate you—clowns and fools!—but hah!—I'm raving!
