Beware of Latin authors all!

Nor think your verses sterling, Though with a golden pen you scrawl, And scribble in a Berlin.

For not the desk with silver nails,
Nor bureau of expense,

Nor standish well japanned avails
To writing of good sense.

Hear how a ghost in dead of night,
With saucer eyes of fire,
In woeful wise did sore affright
A wit and courtly squire.

Rare Imp of Phoebus, hopeful youth,
Like puppy tame that uses
To fetch and carry, in his mouth,
The works of all the muses.

Ah! why did he write poetry,
That hereto was so civil;
And sell his soul for vanity,
To rhyming and the devil?

A desk he had of curious work,
With glittering studs about;
Within the same did Sandys lurk,
Though Ovid lay without.

Now as he scrached to fetch up thought,
Forth popped the sprite so thin;
And from the key-hole bolted out,

All upright as a pin.

With whiskers, band, and pantaloon,
And ruff composed most duly;
This squire he dropped his pen full soon,
While as the light burned bluely.

"Ho! Master Sam," quoth Sandys's sprite, "Write on, nor let me scare ye; Forsooth, if rhymes fall in not right, To Budgell seek, or Carey.

"I hear the beat of Jacob's drums, Poor Ovid finds no quarter!

See first the merry P

comes1

In haste, without his garter.

"Then lords and lordlings, squires and knights,
Wits, witlings, prigs, and peers!
Garth at St. James's and at White's,
Beats up for volunteers.

"What Fenton will not do, nor Gay,
Nor Congreve, Rowe, nor Stanyan,
Tom Burnett or Tom D'Urfey may,
John Dunton, Steele, or any one.

"If Justice Philips' costive head
Some frigid rhymes disburses;
They shall like Persian tales be read,
And glad both babes and nurses.

"Let Warwick's muse with Ashurst join,
And Ozell's with Lord Hervey's:
Tickell and Addison combine,
And Pope translate with Jervas.

"L

2

himself, that lively lord, Who bows to every lady,

Shall join with F

3

in one accord,

And be like Tate and Brady.

"Ye ladies too draw forth your pen,

I

pray where can the hurt lie?

Since you have brains as well as men,
As witness lady Wortley,

"Now, Tonson, 'list thy forces all,
Review them, and tell noses;
For to poor Ovid shall befall
A strange metamorphosis.

"A metamorphosis more strange
Than all his books can vapour;

"To what" (quoth squire) "shall Ovid change?" Quoth Sandys: "To waste paper."

1 Supposed to be Lord Pembroke.

3 Frowde.

Supposed to be Lord Lansdowne,

EPITAPHS ON JOHN HUGHES AND
SARAH DREW.'

WHEN eastern lovers feed the fun'ral fire,
On the same pile the faithful fair expire:
Here pitying heav'n that virtue mutual found,
And blasted both, that it might neither wound.
Hearts so sincere th' Almighty saw well pleased,
Sent His own lightning, and the victims seized.

I.

Think not, by rig'rous judgment seized,
A pair so faithful could expire;
Victims so pure Heav'n saw well pleased,
And snatched them in celestial fire.

II.

Live well, and fear no sudden fate;
When God calls virtue to the grave,
Alike 'tis justice, soon or late,

Mercy alike to kill or save.

Virtue unmoved can hear the call,
And face the flash that melts the ball.

EPIGRAM.

YES! 'tis the time (I cried,) impose the chain,
Destined and due to wretches self-enslaved;
But when I saw such charity remain,

I half could wish this people should be saved.

Faith lost, and hope, our charity begins;
And 'tis a wise design in pitying heaven,

If this can cover multitude of sins,

To take the only way to be forgiven.

1 These were two rustic lovers who were simultaneously strnck by lightning beneath a hay-stack on the last day of July 1718. Pope rs. lates their story in a letter to Lady M. W. Montagu.

ON THE COUNTESS OF BURLINGTON
CUTTING PAPER.

PALLAS grew vapourish once, and odd,
She would not do the least right thing,
Either for goddess, or for god,

Nor work, nor play, nor paint, nor sing.

Jove frowned, and, "Use," he cried, "those eyes So skilful, and those hands so taper;

Do something exquisite and wise"

She bowed, obeyed him, and cut paper.

This vexing him who gave her birth,
Thought by all heaven a burning shame;
What does she next, but bids, on earth,
Her Burlington do just the same.

Pallas, you give yourself strange airs;
But sure you'll find it hard to spoil
The sense and taste of one that bears
The name of Saville and of Boyle.

Alas! one bad example shown;
How quickly all the sex pursue!
See, madam, see the arts o'erthrown,
Between John Overton and you!

ON A PICTURE OF QUEEN CAROLINE,

DRAWN BY LADY BURLINGTON.

PEACE, flattering Bishop! lying Dean!1
This portrait only paints the Queen!

1 Alured, Dean of Carlisle, is the dean alluded to; he wrote a panegyric on Queen Caroline.

SONG,1

BY A PERSON OF QUALITY. WRITTEN IN THE YEAR 1733
FLUTT'RING Spread thy purple pinions,
Gentle Cupid, o'er my heart,

I a slave in thy dominions;
Nature must give way to art.

Mild Arcadians, ever blooming,
Nightly nodding o'er your flocks,
See my weary days consuming,
All beneath yon flow'ry rocks.

Thus the Cyprian goddess weeping,
Mourn'd Adonis, darling youth:
Him the boar, in silence creeping,
Gored with unrelenting tooth.

Cynthia, tune harmonious numbers;
Fair Discretion, string the lyre;
Sooth my ever-waking slumbers;
Bright Apollo, lend thy choir."

Gloomy Pluto, king of terrors,
Arm❜d in adamantine chains,
Lead me to the crystal mirrors,
Wat'ring soft Elysian plains.

Mournful cypress, verdant willow,
Gilding my Aurelia's brows,
Morpheus hovering o'er my pillow,
Hear me pay my dying vows.

Melancholy smooth Mæander,
Swiftly purling in a round,
On thy margin lovers wander,

With thy flow'ry chaplets crown'd.

Thus when Philomela, drooping,
Softly seeks her silent mate,
See the bird of Juno stooping;
Melody resigns to fate.

A pleasant burlesque on the style of certain descriptive poets.