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After all you have writ, it cannot be wit;
Which plainly does follow, since it flies from Apollo.
Its cowardice such it cries at a touch;
'Tis a perfect milksop, grows drunk with a drop,
Another great fault, it cannot bear salt:
And a hair can disarm it of every charm.
TO LADY CARTERET
BY DR. SWIFT
FROM India's burning clime I'm brought,
With cooling gales like zephyrs fraught.
Not Iris, when she paints the sky,
Can show more different hues than I;
Nor can she change her form so fast,
I'm now a sail, and now a mast.
I here am red, and there am green,
A beggar there, and here a queen.
I sometimes live in house of hair,
ANSWERED BY DR. SWIFT 77
Poems (Volume II.)
And oft in hand of lady fair.
I please the young, I grace the old,
And am at once both hot and cold.
Say what I am then, if you can,
And find the rhyme, and you're the man.
ANSWERED BY DR. SHERIDAN
Your house of hair, and lady's hand,
At first did put me to a stand.
I have it now 'tis plain enough
Your hairy business is a muff.
Your engine fraught with cooling gales,
At once so like your masts and sails;
Your thing of various shape and hue
Must be some painted toy, I knew;
And for the rhyme to you're the man,
What fits it better than a fan?
A RIDDLE
I'm wealthy and poor,
I'm empty and full,
I'm humble and proud,
I'm witty and dull.
I'm foul and yet fair:
I'm old, and yet young;
I lie with Moll Kerr,
And toast Mrs. Long.
ANSWER, BY MR. F R
In rigging he's rich, though in pocket he's poor,
He cringes to courtiers, and cocks to the cits;
Like twenty he dresses, but looks like threescore;
He's a wit to the fools, and a fool to the wits.
Of wisdom he's empty, but full of conceit;
He paints and perfumes while he rots with the scab;
'Tis a beau you may swear by his sense and his gait;
He boasts of a beauty and lies with a drab.
ANSWERED BY DR. SHERIDAN 78
Poems (Volume II.)
A LETTER TO DR. HELSHAM
SIR,
Pray discruciate what follows.
The dullest beast, and gentleman's liquor,
When young is often due to the vicar,[1]
The dullest of beasts, and swine's delight,
Make up a bird very swift of flight.[2]
The dullest beast, when high in stature,
And another of royal nature,
For breeding is a useful creature.[3]
The dullest beast, and a party distress'd,
When too long, is bad at best.[4]
The dullest beast, and the saddle it wears,
Is good for partridge, not for hares.[5]
The dullest beast, and kind voice of a cat,
Will make a horse go, though he be not fat.[6]
The dullest of beasts and of birds in the air,
Is that by which all Irishmen swear.[7]
The dullest beast, and famed college for Teagues,
Is a person very unfit for intrigues.[8]
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The dullest beast, and a cobbler's tool,
With a boy that is only fit for school,
In summer is very pleasant and cool.[9]
The dullest beast, and that which you kiss,
May break a limb of master or miss.[10]
Of serpent kind, and what at distance kills,
Poor mistress Dingley oft hath felt its bills.[11]
The dullest beast, and eggs unsound,
Without it I rather would walk on the ground.[12]
The dullest beast, and what covers a house,
Without it a writer is not worth a louse.[13]
The dullest beast, and scandalous vermin,
Of roast or boil'd, to the hungry is charming.[14]
The dullest beast, and what's cover'd with crust,
There's nobody but a fool that would trust.[15]
The dullest beast, and mending highways,
Is to a horse an evil disease.[16]
The dullest beast, and a hole in the ground,
Will dress a dinner worth five pound.[17]
The dullest beast, and what doctors pretend,
The cook-maid often has by the end.[18]
A LETTER TO DR. HELSHAM 80
Poems (Volume II.)
The dullest beast, and fish for lent,
May give you a blow you'll for ever repent.[19]
The dullest beast, and a shameful jeer,
Without it a lady should never appear.[20]
Wednesday Night.
I writ all these before I went to bed. Pray explain them for me, because
I cannot do it.
[Footnote 1: A swine.]
[Footnote 2: A swallow.]
[Footnote 3: A stallion.]
[Footnote 4: A sail.]
[Footnote 5: A spaniel.]
[Footnote 6: A spur.]
[Footnote 7: A soul.]
[Footnote 8: A sloven.]
[Footnote 9: A sallad.]
[Footnote 10: A slip.]
[Footnote 11: A sparrow.]
[Footnote 12: A saddle.]
[Footnote 13: A style.]
[Footnote 14: A slice.]
[Footnote 15: A spy.]
[Footnote 16: A spavin.]
[Footnote 17: A spit.]
[Footnote 18: A skewer.]
[Footnote 19: Assault.]
[Footnote 20: A smock.]
PROBATUR ALITER
A long-ear'd beast, and a field-house for cattle,
Among the coals doth often rattle.[1]
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A long-ear'd beast, a bird that prates,
The bridegrooms' first gift to their mates,
Is by all pious Christians thought,
In clergymen the greatest fault.[2]
A long-ear'd beast, and woman of Endor,
If your wife be a scold, that will mend her.[3]
With a long-ear'd beast, and medicine's use,
Cooks make their fowl look tight and spruce.[4]
A long-ear'd beast, and holy fable,
Strengthens the shoes of half the rabble.[5]
A long-ear'd beast, and Rhenish wine,
Lies in the lap of ladies fine.[6]
A long-ear'd beast, and Flanders College,
Is Dr. T l, to my knowledge.[7]
A long-ear'd beast, and building knight,
Censorious people do in spite.[8]
A long-ear'd beast, and bird of night,
We sinners art too apt to slight.[9]
A long-ear'd beast, and shameful vermin,
A judge will eat, though clad in ermine.[10]
A long-ear'd beast, and Irish cart,
Can leave a mark, and give a smart.[11]
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A long-ear'd beast, in mud to lie,
No bird in air so swift can fly.[12]
A long-ear'd beast, and a sputt'ring old Whig,
I wish he were in it, and dancing a jig.[13]
A long-ear'd beast, and liquor to write,
Is a damnable smell both morning and night.[14]
A long-ear'd beast, and the child of a sheep,
At Whist they will make a desperate sweep.[15]
A beast long-ear'd, and till midnight you stay,
Will cover a house much better than clay.[16]
A long-ear'd beast, and the drink you love best,
You call him a sloven in earnest for jest.[17]
A long-ear'd beast, and the sixteenth letter,
I'd not look at all unless I look'd better.[18]
A long-ear'd beast give me, and eggs unsound,
Or else I will not ride one inch of ground.[19]
A long-ear'd beast, another name for jeer,
To ladies' skins there nothing comes so near.[20]
A long-ear'd beast, and kind noise of a cat,
Is useful in journeys, take notice of that.[21]
PROBATUR ALITER 83
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A long-ear'd beast, and what seasons your beef,
On such an occasion the law gives relief.[22]
A long-ear'd beast, a thing that force must drive in,
Bears up his house, that's of his own contriving.[23]
[Footnote 1: A shovel.]
[Footnote 2: Aspiring.]
[Footnote 3: A switch.]
[Footnote 4: A skewer.]
[Footnote 5: A sparable; a small nail in a shoe.]
[Footnote 6: A shock.]
[Footnote 7: A sloven.]
[Footnote 8: Asperse. (Pearce was an architect, who built the
Parliament-House, Dublin.)]
[Footnote 9: A soul.]
[Footnote 10: A slice.]
[Footnote 11: A scar.]
[Footnote 12: A swallow.]
[Footnote 13: A sty.]
[Footnote 14: A sink.]
[Footnote 15: A slam.]
[Footnote 16: A slate.]
[Footnote 17: A swine.]
[Footnote 18: Askew.]
[Footnote 19: A saddle.]
[Footnote 20: A smock.]
[Footnote 21: A spur.]
[Footnote 22: Assault.]
[Footnote 23: A snail.]
POEMS COMPOSED AT MARKET HILL
ON CUTTING DOWN THE THORN AT MARKET-HILL.[1] 1727
At Market-Hill, as well appears
By chronicle of ancient date,
There stood for many hundred years
A spacious thorn before the gate.
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Hither came every village maid,
And on the boughs her garland hung,
And here, beneath the spreading shade,
Secure from satyrs sat and sung.
Sir Archibald,[2] that valorous knight.
The lord of all the fruitful plain,
Would come to listen with delight,
For he was fond of rural strain.
(Sir Archibald, whose favourite name
Shall stand for ages on record,
By Scottish bards of highest fame,
Wise Hawthornden and Stirling's lord.[3])
But time with iron teeth, I ween,
Has canker'd all its branches round;
No fruit or blossom to be seen,
Its head reclining toward the ground. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]