"Nor to the chatt'ring feather'd race
"Discover Celia's foul disgrace:
"But if you fail, my spectre dread,
“Attending nightly round your bed ;
"And yet I dare confide in you;
"So take my secret, and adieu.

"Nor wonder how I lost my wits; "Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia sh!”

A BEAUTIFUL

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YOUNG NYMPH GOING TO BED *.

Written for the honour of the Fair Sex, in 1731.
CORINNA, pride of Drury-Lane,

For whom no shepherd sighs in vain,
Never did Covent-Garden boast
So bright a batter'd strolling toast!
No drunken rake to pick her up,
No cellar where on tick to sup,
Returning at the midnight-hour,
Four stories climbing to her bow'r,
Then seated on a three-legg'd chair,
Takes off her artificial hair.

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*This Poem, for which some have thought no apology could be offered, deserves, on the contrary, great commendation; as it much more forcibly restrains the thoughtless and the young from the risk of health and life, by picking up a prostitute, than the finest declamation on the sordidness of the appetite. Hawkes.

Now picking out a crystal eye,
She wipes it clean, and lays it by.
Her eyebrows from a mouse's hide,
Stuck on with art on either side,

Pulls off with care, and first displays 'em,
Then in a play-book smoothly lays 'em.
Now dex'trously her plumpers draws,
That serve to fill her hollow jaws.
Untwists a wire, and from her gums
A set of teeth completely comes.
Pulls out the rags contriv'd to prop
Her flabby dugs, and down they drop.
Proceeding on, the lovely goddess
Unlaces next her steel-ribb'd bodice,
Which, by the operator's skill,

Press down the lumps, the hollows fill.
Up goes her hand, and off she slips
The bolsters that supply her hips...
With gentlest touch she next explores
Her chancres, issues, running sores,
Effects of many a sad disaster,
And then to each applies a plaster;
But must, before she goes to bed,
Rub off the daubs of white and red,
And smooth the furrows in her front
With greasy paper stuck upon't.
She takes a bolus ere she sleeps,

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And then between two blankets creeps.
With pains of love tormented lies,

if she chance to close her eyes,

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Of Bridewell and the Compter dreams,
And feels the lash, and faintly screams;
Or, by a faithless bully drawn,
At some hedge-tavern lies in pawn;
Or to Jamaica seems transported,
Alone *, and by no planter courted;
Or, near Fleet-ditch's oozy brinks,
Surrounded with a hundred stinks,
Belated, seems on watch to lie,
And snap some cully passing by;
Or, struck with fear, her fancy runs

On watchmen, constables, and duns,

From whom she meets with frequent rubs,
But never from religious clubs,

Whose favour she is sure to find,

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Because she pays them all in kind.
Corinna wakes. A dreadful sight!
Behold the ruins of the night!
A wicked rat her plaster stole,
Half eat, and dragg'd it to his hole;
The crystal eye, alas! was miss'd,
And puss had on her plumpers p-ss'd;
A pigeon pick'd up her issue-peas;
And Shock her tresses fill'd with fleas.
The Nymph, tho' in this mangled plight,
Must ev'ry morn her limbs unite;

-Et longam incomitata videtur

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65

Ire viam.

Virg.

But how shall I describe her arts
To recollect the scatter'd parts?
Or shew the anguish, toil, and pain,
Of gath'ring up herself again?

The bashful Muse will never bear

In such a scene to interfere.

Corinna in the morning dizen'd

Who sees will spue, who smells be poison'd.

STREPHON AND CHLOE *.

Written in the year 1731.

Or Chloe all the Town has rung,

By ev'ry size of poets sung;

So beautiful a nymph appears
But once in twenty thousand years,
By Nature form'd with nicest care,
And faultless to a single hair.

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*This Poem has, among others, been censured for indelicacy, but with no better reason than a medicine would be rejected for its ill taste. By attending to the marriage of Strephon and Chloe, the reader is necessarily led to consider the effect of that gross familiarity in which it is to be feared many married persons think they have a right to indulge themselves: he who is disgusted at the picture feels the force of the precept, not to disgust another by his practice and let it never be forgotten, that nothing quenches desire like indelicacy; and that when desire has been thus quenched, kindness will inevitably grow cold.

Hawkes.

Her graceful mien, her shape and face,
Confess'd her of no mortal race :
And then so nice, and so genteel!
Such cleanliness from head to heel!
No humours gross or frowzy steams,
No noisome whiffs or sweaty streams,
Before, behind, above, below,
Could from her taintless body flow;
Would so discreetly things dispose,
None ever saw her pluck a rose:

Her dearest comrades never caught her
Squat on her hams to make maid's water:
You'd swear that so divine a creature
Felt no necessities of nature.

In summer had she walk'd the Town,
Her armpits would not stain her gown:
At country-dances not a nose

Could in the Dog-days smell her toes.

Her milk-white hands, both palms and backs, '25 Like iv'ry dry, and soft as wax:

Her hands, the softest ever felt,

Tho' cold would burn, tho' dry would melt.”

Dear Venus! hide this wondrous maid,

Nor let her loose to spoil your trade:

While she engrosses ev'ry swain,
You but o'er half the world can reign.
Think what a case all men are now in,
What ogling, sighing, toasting, vowing!

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What powder'd wigs! what flames and darts! 35 What hampers full of bleeding hearts!