Now all his hopes are in the Czar: "Why, Muscovy is not fo far:

105

"Down the Black Sea, and up The Streights,

"And in a month he's at your gates;
"Perhaps, from what the packet brings,
" By Christmas we shall fee strange things."

Why should I tell of ponds and drains,

What carps we met with for our pains;

Of sparrows tam'd, and nuts innumerable
To choak the girls, and to confume a rabble ?

How tranfient all things are below,
How prone to change is human life !
Last night arriv'd Clem * and his wife-
This grand event hath broke our meafures;
Their reign began with cruel feizures :
The Dean muft with his quilt fupply
The bed in which those tyrants lie:

120

Nim loft his wig-block, Dan his jordan (My lady fays, she can't afford one);

George is half-fcar'd out of his wits,
For Clem gets all the dainty bits.

125

Henceforth expect a different furvey,
This house will foon turn topfy-turvey:

They talk of further alterations,
Which causes many fpeculations.

130

* Mr. Clement Barry.

THOMAS

A

THOMAS SHERIDAN, CLERK,

TO GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN, ESQ.

July 15, 1721, at night.

I'D have you t' know, George*, Dant, Deant, and

Nim §,

That I've learned how verse t' compose trim.
Much better b' half th'n you, n'r you, n'r him,
And th't I'd rid'cule their 'nd your flam-flim,
Ay' b't then, p'rhaps, fays you, t's a m'rry whim
With 'bundance of mark'd notes i' th' rim,
So th't I ought n't for t' be morofe 'nd t' look grim,
Think n't your 'p'stle put m' in a meagrim;
Though 'n rep't't'on day, I 'ppear ver' flim,
Th' last bowl 't Helsham's did m' head t' fwim,
Sơ th't I h'd man' aches n' 'v'ry scrubb'd limb,
Cause th' top of th' bowl I'h'd oft us'd t' skim;
And b'fides D'lan' swears th't I'h'd fwall'w'd f'v'r'l brim-
mers, 'nd that my vis'ge's cov'r'd o'er with r'd pim-
ples: m'r'o'er though m' scull were (s' tis n't) 's
strong's tim-

ber, 't must have ak'd. Th' clans of th' c'lledge Sanh'drim,

Pres'nt the'r humbl' and 'fect'nate respects; that 's t'say, D'lan', 'chlin, P. Ludl', Dic' St'wart, H'lsham, capt'n P'rr' Walınfl', 'nd Longsh'nks Timm [[.

* Geo. Rochfort.

‡ Mr. Jackson.

+ J. Rochfort.

§ Dr. Swift.

|| Dr. James Stopford, afterwards bishop of Cloyne.

GEORGE

GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN'S ANSWER.

DEAR Sheridan! a gentle pair

Of Gaulstown lads (for fuch they are),

Befides a brace of grave divines,
Adore the smoothness of thy lines;
Smooth as our bason's filver flood,
Ere George had robb'd it of its mud;
Smoother than Pegasus' old shoe,
Ere Vulcan comes to make him new.
The board on which we set our a-s
Is not so smooth as are thy verses,
Compar'd with which (and that's enough)
A fmoothing-iron itself is rough.
Nor praise I less that circumcifion,
By modern poets call'd'elifion,
With which, in proper station 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 fmooth, nor hold their stitches.
Thy verse, like bricks, defy the weather,
When smooth'd by rubbing them together;
Thy words fo closely wedg'd and short are
Like walls, more lafting without mortar;
By leaving out the needless vowels,

You fave the charge of lime and trowels.
VOL. I.

One

One letter ftill another locks,

Each groov'd and dove-tail'd like a box;
Thy Muse 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 fiercest 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!
Nor will they dare to break the joints,
But help thee to be read with points:
Or elfe, to shew their learned labour, you
May backward be perus'd like Hebrew,
Where they need not lose a bit
Or of thy harmony or wit.
To make a work compleatly fine,
Number and weight and measure join;
Then all must 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 less than forty fill a quart,

With Alexandrian in the clofe,

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

GEORGE

GEORGE-NIM-DAN-DEAN'S INVITATION

D

TO THOMAS SHERIDAN.

Gaulstown, Aug. 2d, 1721.

EAR Tom, this verse, which however the beginning may appear, yet in the end's good metre, Is fent to defire that, when your August vacation comes, your friends you 'd meet here.

For why should you stay in that filthy hole, I mean the city so smoaky,

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

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

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

Oh! but 1 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 shall 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 Helsham, be That wrote the prologue †, and if you stay with him, depend on 't, in the end, he'll ham ye.

* Supposed to mean Dr. Walmfley.

Bring

+ One spoken by young Putland, in 1720, before

Hippolytus; in which Dr. Sheridan (who had written

Q2