A LEFT-HANDED LETTER

SIR,

TO DR. SHERIDAN*, 1718.

DELANY reports it, and he has a shrewd tongue,

That we both act the part of the clown and
cow-dung;

We lye cramming ourselves, and are ready to burst,
Yet ftill are no wiser than we were at first.
Pudet hæc opprobria, I freely must tell ye,
Et dici potuiffe, et non potuiffe refelli.

Though Delany advis'd you to plague me no longer,
You reply and rejoin like Hoadly of Bangor;
I must now, at one fitting, pay: off my old score;
How many to answer? One, two, three, four.
But, because the three former are long ago past,
I fhall, for method fake, begin with the last.
You treat me like a boy that knocks down his foe,
Who, ere t'other gets up, demands the rifing blow.
Yet I know a young rogue, that, thrown flat on
the field,

Would, as he lay under, cry out, Sirrah! yield.
So the French, when our Generals foundly did pay

them :

Went triumphant to church, and fang ftoutly Te Deum.

So the famous Tom Leigh, when quite run aground, Comes off by out-laughing the company round.

The humour of this poem is partly loft, by the impoffibility of printing it left-handed as it was written.

My

My offers of peace you ill understood :
Friend Sheridan, when will you know

good?

your own

'Twas to teach you in modefter language your duty;
For, were you a dog, I could not be rude t'ye:
As a good quiet foul, who no mischief intends
To a quarrelfome fellow, cries, Let us be friends.
But we like Antæus and Hercules fight,

The oftener you fall, the oftener
you write;
And I'll ufe you as he did that overgrown clown,
I'll first take you up, and then take you down:
And, 'tis your own cafe, for you never can wound
The worst dunce in your school, till he's heav'd
from the ground.

I beg your pardon for using my left-hand, but I was in great hafte, and the other hand was employ'd at the fame time in writing some letters of business. I will fend you the reft when I have leifure but pray come to dinner with the company you met here last.

A MOTTO for Mr. JASON HASARD, WOOLLEN-DRAPER in DUBLIN;

Whofe Sign was the GOLDEN-FLEECE.

ASON, the valiant prince of Greece,

JAS

From Colchos brought the Golden Fleece:

We comb the wool, refine the ftuff,

For modern Jafons, that's enough.

Oh! could we tame yon watchful * Dragon,
Old Jafon would have lefs to brag on.

• England.

ΤΟ

TO DR. SHERIDAN, 1718.

WHATE'ER your predeceffors taught us,

I have a great esteem for Plautus;

And think your boys may gather there-hence
More wit and humour than from Terence;
But as to comic Ariftophanes,

The rogue too vicious and too prophane is.
I went in vain to look for Eupolis

Down in the Strand*, juft where the New Pole is ;
For I can tell you one thing, that I can

You will not find it in the Vatican.
He and Cratinus us'd, as Horace fays,
To take his greatest grandees for affes.
Poets, in those days, us'd to venture high;
But these are loft full many a century.
Thus you may fee, dear friend, ex pede hence,
My judgement of the old Comedians.

Proceed to Tragicks: firft, Euripides
(An author where I sometimes dip a-days)
Is rightly cenfur'd by the Stagirite,
Who fays, his numbers do not fadge aright.
A friend of mine that author defpifes
So much, he fwears the very beft piece is,
For aught he knows, as bad as Thespis's;
And that a woman, in these tragedies,
Commonly speaking, but a fad jade is.

At least, I'm well affur'd, that no folk lays
The weight on him they do on Sophocles.

The fact may not be true; but the rhyme coft me fome trouble. SwIFT.

But,

But, above all, I prefer Æfchylus,

Whose moving touches, when they please kill us.
And now I find my Mufe but ill able,
To hold out longer in Triffyllable.

I chose those rhymes out for their difficulty;
Will you return as hard ones if I call t'ye?

DR. SHERIDAN TO DR. SWIFT. 1719.

DEAR Dean, fince in cruxes and puns you and I deal,

Pray why is a woman a fieve and a riddle?

"Tis a thought that came into my noddle this morning,
In bed as I lay, Sir, a-toffing and turning.
You'll find, if you read but a few of your hiftories,
All women, as Eve, all women are mysteries.
To find out this riddle I know you'll be eager,
And make every one of the sex a Belphegor.
But that will not do, for I mean to commend them:
I swear without jest I an honour intend them.
In a fieve, Sir, their antient extraction I quite tell,
In a riddle I give you their power and their title.
This I told you before: do know what I mean

you

Sir? "Not I, by my troth, Sir."-Then read it again, Sir. The reason I send you these lines of rhymes double Is purely through pity, to fave you the trouble Of thinking two hours for a rhyme as you did last ̧ When your Pegasus canter'd in triple, and rid fast.

8

As

As for my little nag, which I keep at Parnaffus, With Phoebus's leave, to run with his affes,

He goes flow and fure, and he never is jaded, While your fiery steed is whipp'd, fpurr'd, bastinaded.

THE DEAN'S ANSWER,

IN reading your letter alone in my hackney,

Your damnable riddle my poor brains did rack nigh. And when with much labour the matter I crackt, I found miftaken in matter of fact.

you

A woman's no fieve (for with that you begin) Because she lets out more than e'er fhe takes in. And that she's a riddle, can never be right, For a riddle is dark, but a woman is light. But, grant her a fieve, I can fay fomething archer; Pray what is a man? he's a fine linen fearcher.

Now tell me a thing that wants interpretation, What name for a* maid, was the firft man's damnation?

If your worship will please to explain me this rebus, I fwear from henceforward

you

fhall be my

From my hackney-coach, Sept. II,

1719, past 12 at noon.

• A damfel, i. e. Adam's hell..

Phœbus.

STELLA'S