The board on which we fet our a-s
Is not fo smooth as are thy verses;
Compar'd with which (and that's enough)
A fmoothing-iron itself is rough.
Nor praise I lefs that circumcifion,
By modern poets call'd elifion,

With which, in proper ftation plac'd,
Thy polish'd lines are firmly brac'd.
Thus a wife taylor is not pinching,
But turns at every feam an inch in;
Or elfe, be fure, your broad-cloth breeches
Will ne'er be fimooth, nor hold their ftitches.
Thy verfe, like bricks, defy the weather,
When smooth'd by rubbing them together;
Thy words fo clofely wedg'd and short are
Like walls, more lafting without mortar;
By leaving out the needlefs vowels,

You fave the charge of lime and trowels.
One letter fill another locks,

Each groov'd and dove-tail'd like a box;
Thy Mufe is tuckt-up and fuccinct;
In chains thy fyllables are linkt;

Thy words together ty'd in small hanks,
Close as the Macedonian phalanx;

Or like the umbo of the Romans,

Which fierceft foes could break by no means.
The critick to his grief will find,
How firmly these indentures bind.
So, in the kindred painter's art,
The shortening is the nicest part.
Philologers of future ages,
How will they pore upon thy pages!

P 2

Nor

Nor will they dare to break the joints,
But help thee to be read with points :
Or elfe, to fhew their learned labour, you.
May backward be perus'd like Hebrew,
In which they need not lofe a bit
Or of thy harmony or wit.
To make a work completely fine,
Number and weight and measure join;
Then all muft grant your lines are weighty,
Where thirty weigh as much as eighty;
All must allow your numbers more,
Where twenty lines exceed fourscore ;
Nor can we think your measure short,
Where lefs than forty fill a quart,
With Alexandrian in the close,

Long, long, long, long, like Dan's long nofe.

GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN'S INVITATION TO THOMAS SHERIDAN.

Gaulftoun, Aug. 2, 1721.

DEAR Tom, this verse, which however the beginning may appear, yet in the end's good

metre.

Is fent to defire that, when your Auguft vacation comes, your friends you'd meet here.

For why should you ftay in the filthy hole, I mean the city fo fmoaky,

When you have not one friend left in town, or at leaft not one that's witty, to joke w'ye?

For,

For as for honeft John *, though I am not sure on 't, yet I'll be hang'd, left he

Be gone down to the county of Wexford with that - great peer the lord Anglesey.

Oh! but I forgot; perhaps, by this time, you may

have one come to town, but I don't know whether he be friend or foe, Delany:

But, however, if he be come, bring him down, and you fhall go back in a fortnight, for I know there's no delaying ye.

Oh! I forgot too; I believe there may be one more, I mean that great fat joker, friend Helfham, he. That wrote the prologue †, and if you stay with him, depend on't, in the end, he'll sham ye. Bring down Long Shanks Jim too; but, now I think on't, he's not yet come from Courtown, I fancy;

For I heard, a month ago, that he was down there a courting fly Nancy.

However, bring down yourself, and you bring down all; for, to fay it we may venture,

In thee Delany's fpleen, John's mirth, Helfham's jokes, and the foft foul of amorous Jemmy,

centre.

Supposed to mean Dr. Walmfeyr

+ One spoken by young Putland, in 1720, before Hippolytus; in which Dr. Sheridan (who had written in a prologue for the occa fion) was most unexpectedly and egregioufly laughed at.

POSTSCRIPT.

I had forgot to defire you to bring down what I fay you have, and you'll believe me as fure as a gun, and own it;

I mean, what no other mortal in the univerfe can boaft of, your own fpirit of pun, and own wit. And now I hope you'll excufe this rhyming, which I muft fay is (though written fomewhat at large) trim and clean;

And fo I conclude, with humble refpects as ufual, Your moft dutiful and obedient

GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN.

TO GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN, Efq,

Upon his incomparable VER SE S, &c.

By Dr. DELANY, in SHERIDAN'S Name *

HAIL, human compound quadrifarious,
Invincible as Wight Briareus!

Hail! doubly-doubled mighty merry one,
Stronger than triple-body'd Geryon !
O may your vaftness deign t' excufe
The praises of a puny Mufe.

Unable, in her utmost flight,

To reach thy huge Coloffian height.
T' attempt to write like thee were frantic,
Whose lines are, like thyself, gigantic.

• These were written all in circles.

Yet

Yet let me blefs, in humbler ftrain,
Thy vaft, thy bold Cambyfian vein,
Pour'd out t'enrich thy native ifle,
As Egypt wont to be with Nile.
Oh, how I joy to fee thee wander,
In many a winding loofe meander,
In circling mazes, fmooth and fupple,
And ending in a clink quadruple;
Loud, yet agreeable withal,

Like rivers rattling in their fall!
Thine, fure, is poetry divine,
Where wit and majefty combine;
Where every line, as huge as feven,
If ftretch'd in length, would reach to Heaven:
Here all comparing would be flandering,
The leaft is more than Alexandrine.

Against thy verse Time fees with pain,
He whets his envious fcythe in vain ;
For, though from thee he much may pare,
Yet much thou ftill wilt have to spare.
Thou haft alone the fkill to feaft

With Roman elegance of tafte,
Who haft of rhymes as vaft resources
As Pompey's caterer of courfes.

Oh thou, of all the Nine infpir'd!
My languid foul, with teaching tir'd,
How is it raptur'd, when it thinks
On thy harmonious fet of clinks;
Each answering each in various rhymes,
Like Echo to St. Patrick's chimes!

Thy Mufe, majestic in her rage,
Moves like Statira on the stage;