WOOD-PARK. 57 Thus for a week the farce went on; When all her country-favings gone, She fell into her former scene, Small beer, a herring, and the dean, Thus far in jeft: though now I fear, You think my jefting too fevere; But poets, when a hint is new, Regard not whether false or true: Yet raillery gives no offence, Where truth has not the least pretence; Nor can be more fecurely plac'd Than on a nymph of Stella's tafte. I must confefs, your vine and vittle I was too hard upon a little : Your table neat, your linen fine; And, though in miniature, you shine: Yet when you figh to leave Wood-park, The scene, the welcome, and the spark, To languish in this odious town, And pull your haughty ftomach down; We think you quite mistake the cafe, The virtue lies not in the place: For though my raillery were true, A cottage is Wood-park with you, . A quibbling ELEGY on the worshipful Judge BOAT. Written in the Year 1723. T° O mournful ditties, Clio, change thy note, Since cruel fate hath funk our justice Boat. Why should he fink, where nothing feem'd to prefs? His lading little, and his ballaft lefs. Toft in the waves of this tempeftuous world, At length, his anchor fixt and canvas furl'd, To* Lazy-bill retiring from his court, At his * Ring's-end he founders in the port. Wish water fill'd he could no longer float, The common death of many a ftronger boat. A poft fo fill'd on nature's laws entrenches: Benches on boats are plac'd, not boats on benches. And yet our Boat, how shall I reconcile it? Was both a Boat, and in one fenfe a pilot. *Two villages near the fea, where boatmen and feamen live. It was faid he died of a dropfy. With ev'ry wind he fail'd, and well could tack: Had many pendents, but abhorr'd a* Jack. He's gone, although his friends began to hope, That he might yet be lifted by a rope. Behold the awful bench, on which he fat; He was as hard and pond'rous wood as that: Yet, when his fand was out, we find at laft, That death has overfet him with a blast. Our Boat is now fail'd to the Stygian ferry, There to fupply old Charon's leaky wherry : Charon in him will ferry fouls to hell; A trade our + Boat hath practis'd here fo well: And Cerberus hath ready in his paws Both pitch and brimflone to fill up his flaws. Yet fpite of death and fate, I here maintain We may place Boat in his old post again. The way is thus; and well deferves your thanks: Take the three ftrongeftof his brokenplanks, Fix them on high, confpicuous to be seen, Form'd like the triple-tree near ‡ Stephen's green; * A cant word for a Facobite. judge. + In hanging people as a And, Where the Dublin gallows ftands. And, when we view it thus with thief at end on't, We'll cry; look, here's our Boat, and there's the pendant. The EPITAPH. HERE lies judge Boat within a coffin; A Receipt to reftore STELLA's Youth, Written in the Year 1724-5. T HE Scottish hinds, too poor to house In frosty nights their starving cows, While not a blade of grafs or hay Appears from Michaelmas to May, Muft let their cattle range in vain For food along the barren plain. * Query, Whether the author meant scholar, and wilfully mistook. Meagre Meagre and lank with fafting grown, Why, Stella, fhould you knit your brow, Jupiter is fabled to have ftolen Europa in the fhape of a bull. t Dr. Sheridan's houfe, feven or eight miles from Dublin. |