To t'other ear I felt it coming on:
And thus I folve this hard phenomenon.

'Tis true, a glass will bring supplies To weak, or old, or clouded eyes: Your arms, though both your eyes were lost, Would guard your nose against a post: Without your legs two legs of wood Are stronger and almost as good: And as for hands, there have been those, Who wanting both have us'd their toes But no contrivance yet appears To furnish artificial ears.

*

A quiet LIFE and a good NAME.

To a friend who married a fhrew.

Written in the Year 1724.

NEL

ELL fcolded in fo loud a din, 'That Will durft hardly venture in : He markt the conjugal difpute; Nell roar'd inceffant, Dick fat mute; But, when he saw his friend appear, Cry'd bravely, Patience, good my dear.

There was about this time a man fhewed, who wrote with his foot.

At fight of Will, fhe bawl'd no more,
But hurry'd out and clapt the door.

Why Dick! the devil's in thy Nell, (Quoth Will) thy house is worse than hell : Why what a peal the jade has rung! D-n her, why don't you flit her tongue? For nothing else will make it cease. Dear Will, I fuffer this for peace: I never quarrel with my wife; I bear it for a quiet life. Scripture you know exhorts us to it; Bids us to feek peace, and enfue it.

Will went again to vifit Dick; And ent'ring in the very nick, He faw virago Nell belabour, With Dick's own ftaff, his peaceful neigh

bour:

Poor Will, who needs muft interpofe,
Receiv'd a brace or two of blows.

But now, to make my story short Will drew out Dick to take a quart. Why, Dick, thy wife has dev'lifh whims; Ods-buds, why don't you break her limbs? If he were mine, and had fuch tricks, I'd teach her how to handle flicks :

Z-ds,

Z―ds, I would fhip her to Jamaica,
Or truck the carrion for tobacco:
I'd fend her far enough away-
Dear Will; but what would people fay?
Lord! I fhould get fo ill a name,
The neighbours round would cry out fhame.
Dick fuffer'd for his peace and credit;
But who believ'd him, when he faid it?
Can he, who makes himself a flave,
Confult his peace, or credit fave?
Dick found it by his ill fuccefs,
His quiet fmall, his credit lefs.
She ferv'd him at the ufual rate;
She stunn'd and then the broke, his pate.
And, what he thought the hardeft cafe,
The parish jeer'd him to his face;
Those men, who wore the breeches leaft,
Call'd him a cuckold, fool and beast.
At home he was purfu'd with noife;
Abroad was pefter'd by the boys :
Within, his wife would break his bones;
Without, they pelted him with ftones :
The 'prentices procur'd a riding *,
To act his patience, and her chiding.

A riding, a humorous cavalcade ftill practifed in fome parts of England to ridicule a fcolding wife and henpecked husband: : a woman bestrides

the horfe, and with a ladle chaftifes a man, who fits on a pillion behind her with his face to the horfe's tail.

Falle

F 3

False patience and mistaken pride! There are ten thousand Dicks befide; Slaves to their quiet and good name, Are us'd like Dick, and bear the blame.

Some ingenious gentlemen, friends to the author, ufed to entertain themselves with writing riddles, and fending them to him and their other acquaintance; copies of which ran about, and fome of them were printed both in England and Ireland. The author at his leisure hours fell into the fame amufement; although it be faid, that he thought them of no great merit, entertainment, or ufe. However, by the advice of fome perfons, for whom the author had a great efteem, and who were pleafed to fend the copies, the few followlowing have been published (which are allowed to be genuine): because we are informed that feveral good judges have a taste for fuch kind of compofitions.

A

RIDDLE.

Written in the Year 1724.

I.

N youth exalted high in air,
Or bathing in the waters fair,

Nature

Nature to form me took delight,
And clad my body all in white,
My perfon tall, and flender wafte,
On either fide with fringes grac'd;
'Till me that tyrant man espy'd,
And dragg'd me from my mother's fide:
No wonder now I look fo thin;
The tyrant ftript me to the skin :
My skin he flay'd, my hair he cropt;
At head and foot my body lopt:
And then, with heart more hard than stone,
He pick'd my marrow from the bone.
To vex me more, he took a freak
To flit my tongue and make me speak :
But that which wonderful appears,

I speak to eyes, and not to ears.
He oft employs me in disguise,

And makes me tell a thoufand lies:
To me he chiefly gives in trust
To please his malice or his luft.
From me no fecret he can hide;
I fee his vanity and pride :
And my delight is to expofe
His follies to his greatest foes.

All languages I can command, Yet not a word I underftand.

F4

Without