THIS day, dear Bec! is thy nativity,
Had Fate a luckier one she'd give it ye:
She chose a thread of greatest length,
And doubly twisted it for strength,
Nor will be able with her shears
To cut it off these forty years.
Then who says care will kill a cat?
Rebecca shows they're out in that;
For she, though overrun with care,
Continues healthy, fat, and fair.
As, if the gout should seize the head,
Doctors pronounce the patient dead;
But if they can by all their arts
Eject it to the' extremest parts,
They give the sick man joy, and praise
The gout that will prolong his days;
Rebecca thus I gladly greet,
Who drives her cares to hands and feet;
For though philosophers maintain
The limbs are guided by the brain,
Quite contrary Rebecca's led,
Her hands and feet conduct her head,
By arbitrary power convey her,
She ne'er considers why, or where :
Her hands may meddle, feet may wander,
Her head is but a mere by-stander;
And all her bustling but supplies
The part of wholesome exercise.
Thus Nature hath resolved to pay her
The cat's nine lives, and eke the care.
Long may she live and help her friends
Whene'er it suits her private ends;
Domestic business never mind,
Till coffee has her stomach lined;
But when her breakfast gives her courage,
Then think on Stella's chicken porridge;
I mean when Tiger' has been served,
Or else poor Stella may
be starved.
May Bec have many an evening nap,
With Tiger slabbering in her lap;
But always take a special care
She does not overset the chair;
Still be she curious, never hearken
To any speech but Tiger's barking.
And when she's in another scene,
Stella long dead, but first the Dean,
May Fortune and her coffee get her
Companions that will please her better;
Whole afternoons will sit beside her,
Nor for neglects or blunders chide her;
A goodly set as can be found
Of hearty gossips prating round;
Fresh from a wedding or a christening,
To teach her ears the art of listening,
And please her more to hear them tattle
Than the Dean storm, or Stella rattle.
Late be her death, one gentle nod, When Hermes, waiting with his rod, Shall to Elysian fields invite her, Where there will be no cares to fright her.
1 Mrs. Dingley's favourite lap-dog.
WRITTEN AT CHESTER, 1726.
YOUR mouldering walls are mending still,
Your churches in neglect lie;
But yet the Scripture you fulfil
By walking circumspectly 1.
The church and clergy here, no doubt,
Are very much a-kin;
Both weather-beaten are without,
Both empty are within.
OCCASIONED BY THE SUDDEN DRYING UP OF ST. PATRICK'S
WELL, NEAR TRINITY-COLLEGE, DUBLIN, IN 1726.
By holy zeal inspired, and led by fame
To thee, once favourite isle! with joy I came,
What time the Goth, the Vandal, and the Hun,
Had my own native Italy o'errun ;
Ierne! to the world's remotest parts
Renown'd for valour, policy, and arts.
Hither from Colchos, with thy fleecy ore,
Jason arrived two thousand years before.
Thee, happy island! Pallas call'd her own,
When haughty Britain was a land unknown.
From thee, with pride, the Caledonians trace
The glorious founder of their kingly race.
Thy martial sons, whom now they dare despise,
Did once their land subdue and civilize:
Their dress, their language, and the Scotish name,
Confess the soil from whence the victors came.
Well may they boast that ancient blood which runs
Within their veins, who are thy younger sons;
A conquest and a colony from thee,
The mother-kingdom left her children free:
From thee no mark of slavery they felt,
Not so with thee thy base invaders dealt;
Invited here to vengeful Morrough's aid,
Those whom they could not conquer, they betray'd
Britain! by thee we fell, ungrateful isle!
Not by thy valour, but superior guile.
Britain! with shame confess this land of mine
First taught thee human knowledge and divine;
My prelates and my students, sent from hence,
Made your sons converts both to God and sense;
Not like the pastors of thy ravenous breed,
Who come to fleece the flocks, and not to feed.
Wretched Ierne! with what grief I see
The fatal changes time hath made in thee!
The Christian rites I introduced in vain ;
Lo! Infidelity return'd again.
Freedom and virtue in thy sons-I found,
Who now in vice and slavery are drown'd.
By faith and prayer, this crosier in my hand,
I drove the venom'd serpent from thy land;
The shepherd in his bower might sleep or sing,
Nor dread the adder's tooth nor scorpion's sting1.
There are no snakes, vipers, or toads, in Ireland; and even frogs were not known until about the year 1700. The magpies came a short time before, and the Norway rats since.
With omens oft I strove to warn thy swains,
Omens, the types of thy impending chains:
I sent the magpie from the British soil,
With restless beak thy blooming fruit to spoil;
To din thine ears with unharmonious clack,
And haunt thy holy walls in white and black.
What else are those thou seest in bishop's geer,
Who crop the nurseries of learning here?
Aspiring, greedy, full of senseless prate,
Devour the church, and chatter to the state.
As you grew more degenerate and base,
I sent you millions of the croaking race;
Emblems of insects vile, who spread their spawn
Through all thy land, in armour, fur, and lawn;
A nauseous brood, that fills your senate walls,
And in the chambers of your viceroy crawls.
See where the new-devouring vermin runs,
Sent in my anger from the land of Huns!
With harpy claws it undermines the ground,
And sudden spreads a numerous offspring round.
The' amphibious tyrant, with his ravenous band,
Drains all thy lakes of fish, of fruits thy land.
Where is the Holy Well that bore my name?-
Fled to the fountain back from whence it came!
Fair Freedom's emblem once, which smoothly
flows,
And blessings equally on all bestows.
Here from the neighbouring nursery of arts,
The students drinking raised their wit and parts ;
Here, for an age and more, improved their vein,
Their Phoebus I, my spring their Hippocrene.
Discouraged youths! now all their hopes must fail,
Condemn'd to country cottages and ale;
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