Madrigal And Trulletta :: :: University of Virginia Library

Mad.
Thanks, gentle Sculliona—for this kindness,
And all thy other curtesies, e'er long
I will fulfil my promise—thy bright charms
Shall be the subject of my tuneful song.
For thee I'll strain each faculty of thought,
Till my brain burst with thinking—every tongue
Shall chaunt the beauteous Sculliona's name.
In verse immortal I'll record thy charms;
And when dear Ally Crocar is forgot,
Thou shalt be humm'd, or warbled thro' each street,
From Hyde Park Corner to Limehousian Hole .

Scul.
That will be pure!—but come; Trulletta waits.

To all judges of nature, how beautiful must the unaffected simplicity of this line appear! some of our modern wholesale dealers in fustian, would have express'd this image in the following words,

O bard sublime! thy coming glads my soul.

but how far the simplicity of our image excels the force of such rant, I leave the learned to determine.

Dr. Humbug.

Here's room for meditation, even to madness,
Till the mind burst with thinking.

Fair Penitent.

A little poem, or sonnet, which was sung by all Britons, who had the faculty of humming, or chanting. The sublimity of this little piece was so great, that the connoissieurs affirm'd it to be equal, if not superior to any of the odes, or sonnets, antiquity can boast. Dr. Humbug.

In plain prose, Limehouse-hole.

Our author, in this scene, hath given us a second proof of his knowledge of human nature, in preferring simplicity of expression to a chain of pompous words. In most of our modern tragedies, the chamber maid; or, to speak more politely, the confident, is drawn a person of better sense than the mistress (which is indeed sometimes the case) and her diction is generally more elevated; but our author shews his dislike of such practice, by making a chamber maid speak like a chamber maid. Dr. Humbug.