Often aiding to impart
All the fecrets of her heart.
Various is my bulk and hue;
Big like Befs, and fmall like Sue;
Now brown and burnish'd as a nut,
At other times a very flut;
Often fair, and foft, and tender,
Taper, tall, and smooth, and flender;
Like Flora deck'd with various flowers;
Like Phoebus, guardian of the hours:
But, whatever be my drefs,
Greater be my fize or lefs,
Swelling be my fhape or fmall,
Like thyfelf I fhine in all.
Clouded if my face is feen,
My complexion wan and green,
Languid like a love-fick maid,
Steel affords me prefent aid.
Soon or late, my date is done,
As my thread of life is fpun;
Yet to cut the fatal thread
Oft' revives my drooping head:
Yet I perifn in my prime,
Seldom by the death of time;
Die like lovers as they gaze,
Die for those I live to pleafe;
Pine unpitied to my urn,

Nor warm the fair for whom I burn;
Unpitied, unlamented too,
Die like all that look on you.

ANSWERED BY DR. SWIFT.
WITH half an eye your riddle I spy.
I obferve your wicket hemm'd in by a thicket,
And whatever paffes is ftrained through glafles.
You fay it is quict: I flatly deny it.

It wanders about, without firring out;
No paffion fo weak but gives it a tweak;
Love, joy, and devotion, fet it always in motion.
And as for the tragic effects of its magick,
Which you fay it can kill or revive at its will,
The dead are all found, and revive above ground,
After all you have writ, it cannot be wit;
Which plainly does follow, fince it flies from
Apollo.

Its cowardice fuch, it cries at a touch:
'Tis a perfect milkfop, grows drunk with a drop.
Another great fault, it cannot bear falt :
And a hair can difarm it of every charm.

A RECEIPT

TO RESTORE STELLA'S YOUTH. 1724-5 HE Scottish hinds, too poor to house

THE

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 rood along the barren plain.
Meagre and lank with fafting grown,
And nothing left but skin and bone;
Expos'd to want, and wind, and weather,
They juft keep life and foul together,
Tili fummer-fhowers and evening's dew
Again the verdant glebe renew;
And, as the vegetables rise,

The famifh'd cow her want fupplies:
Without an ounce of laft year's tiefh,
Whate'er the gains is young and fresh;
Grows plump and round, and full of mettle,
As rifing from Medea's kettle,
With youth and beauty to inchant
Europa's counterteit gallant.

Why, Stella, fhould you knit your brow,
If I compare you to the cow?
'Tis just the cafe; for you have fafted
So long, till all your flesh is wafted,
And muft against the warmer days
Be fent to Quilca down to graze;
Where mirth, and exercife, and air,
Will foon your appetite repair:
The nutriment will from within,
Round all your body, plump your skin,
Will agitate the lazy flood,

And fill your veins with fprightly blood;
Nor fleth nor blood will be the fame,
Nor aught of Stella but the name;
For what was ever understood,
By human kind, but flesh and blood?
And if your flesh and blood be new,
You'll be no more the former you;
But for a blooming nymph will pafs,
Just fifteen, coming fummer's grafs

Your jetty locks with garlands crown'd : While all the 'fquires for nine miles round, ttended by a brace of curs, Vith jocky boots and filver fpurs, o lefs than justices 'quorum,

Their cow-boys bearing cloaks before 'em, all leave deciding broken pates, o kifs your fteps at Quilca gates. ut, left you should my skill disgrace, one back before you 're out of cafe: or if to Michaelmas you ftay, he new-born flesh wil! melt away; he 'squire in scorn will fly the house ›r better game, and look for groufe; ut here, before the froft can mar it, 'e'll make it firm with beef and claret.

STELLA'S BIRTH-DAY. 1724-5.

1S, when a beauteous nymph decays,

We fay, fhe's past her dancing-days;
poets lofe their feet by time,
ad can no longer dance in rhyme.
our annual bard had rather chose

> celebrate your birth in profe:
t merry folks, who want by chance
pair to make a country-dance,
il the old houfe-keeper, and get her
fill a place, for want of better:
hile Sheridan is off the hooks,
d friend Delany at his books,
aat Stella may avoid difgrace,

ce more the Dear fupplies their place.
Beauty and wit, too fad a truth!
we always been confin'd to youth;
w god of wit, and beauty's queen,
e twenty-one, and the fifteen.
poet ever fweetly fung,

lefs he were, like Phoebus, young; or ever nymph inspir❜d to rhyme, lefs, like Venus, in her prime. fifty-fix, if this be true,

a poet fit for you?

, at the age of forty-three, e you a fubje&t fit for me?

ieu! bright wit, and radiant eyes! ou must be grave, and I be wife, ar fate in vain we would oppofe : at I be fill your friend in profe: them and friendship to express, ill not require poetic drefs; d, if the Mufe deny her aid have them ung, they may be faid. But, Stella, fay, what evil tongue -ports you are no longer young; at Time fits, with his fcythe, to mow ere erft fat Cupid with his bow; at half your locks are turn'd to grey? l ne'er believe a word they fay. s true, but let it not be known, eyes are fomewhat dinmifh grown ; nature, always in the right,

- your decays adapts my fight;

A SIMILE,

ON OUR WANT OF SILVER:

And the only WAY to REMEDY it. 1725.

S when of old fome forcerefs threw

Aset of mofos face a fable hue,

To drive unfeen her magic chair,
At midnight, through the darken'd air;
Wife people, who believ'd with reason
That this eclipfe was out of feason,
Affirm'd the moon was fick, and fel!
To cure her by a counter-spell.
Ten thoufand cymbals now begin
To read the fkies with brazen din;
The cymbals' rattling founds difpel
The cloud, and drive the hug to hell.
The moon, deliver'd from her pain,
Difplays her filver face again
(Note here, that in the chemic ftyle,
The moon is filver all this while).

So (if my fimile you minded,
Which I confefs is too long-winded)
When late a feminine magician,
Join'd with a brazen politician,
Expos'd, to blind the nation's eyes,
A parchment of prodigious ze;
Conceal'd behind that ample fereen,
There was no filver lo be fear.
But to this parchment let the Drapier
Oppofe his counter-charm of paper,
And ring Wood's copper in our ears
So loud till all the nation hears;
That found will make the parchment fhrivel,
And drive the conjurers to the devil :

A great lady was faid to have been bribed by
Wood.
The patent for ceining half-pence.

And, when the fky is grown ferene, Our filver will appear again.

B

WOOD AN INSECT. 1725.

Y long obfervation I have underfood,

That two little vermin are kin to Will Wood.
The first is an infect they call a wood-loufe,
That folds up itself in itself for a house,

As round as a ball, without head, without tail,
Inclos'd cat-a-te in a strong coat of mail.
And thus Willian Wood to my fancy appears
In fillets of brafs roll'd up to his ears:
And over thefe fillets he wifely has thrown,
To keep out of danger, a doublet of ftone*.
The loufe of the cod for a medicine is us'd,
Or fwallow'd alive, or fkilfully bruis'd,
And, let but our mother Hibernia contrive
To fwallow Will Wood either bruis'd or alive,
* She need be no more with the jaundice poffeft,
Or fick of ebfruiens, and pains in her chet.

The next is an infect we call a weed-worm, That lies in old weed like a hare in her form; With teeth or with claws it will bite or will fcratch;

And chambermaids chriften this worm a deadwatch,

Becaufe like a watch it always cries click.

Then woe be to thofe in the houfe who are fick; For, as fure as a gun, they will give up the ghoft,

If the maggot cries click when it fcratches the poft.

But a kettle of fcalding hot water injected
Infallibly cures the timber affected:

The omen is broken, the danger is over;

The maggot will die, and the fick will recover. Such a worm was Will Wood, when he fcratch'd at the door

Of a governing ftatefman or favourite whore : The death of our nation he feem'd to foretell, And the found of his brafs we took for our knell. But now, fince the Drapier hath heartily maul'd him,

I think the best thing we can do is to feald him. For which operation there's nothing more proper Than the liquor he deals in, his own melted

Up at his forge by morning-peep,
Nor creature in the lane could feep;
Among a crew of roystering fellows
Would fit whole evenings at the alcheuse:
His wife and children wanted bread,
While he went always drunk to bed.
This vapouring feab muft needs devife
To ape the thunder of the fkies :
With brass two fiery steeds he shod,
Ta make a clattering as they trod.
Of polifh'd brafs his faming car
Like lightning dazzled from afar ;
And up he mounts into the box,
And he muft thunder, with a pox.
Then furious he begins his march,
Drives rattling o'er a brazen arch;
With fquibs and crackers arm'd, to throw
Among the trembling croud below.
All ran to prayers, both priests and laity,
To pacify this angry deity:

When Jove, pity to the town,
With real thunder knock'd him down.
Then what a huge delight were all in,
To fee the wicked varlet fprawling;
They fearch'd his pockets on the place,
And found his copper all was bafe;
They laugh'd at fuch an Irish blunder,
To take the noife of brafs for thunder.
The moral of this tale is proper,
Apply'd to Wood's adulter'd copper;
Which, as he fcatter'd, we like dolts,
Miftook at first for thunder-bolts;
Before the Drapier fhot a letter,
(Nor Jove himself could do it better)
Whsch, lighting on th' impoftor's crown,
Like real thunder knock'd him down.

Come hither, and try;
I'll teach you to buy

pot of good ale for a farthing: Come; three-pence a score,

I ask you no more,

nd a fig for the Drapier and Hardinge*. When tradesmen have gold, The thief will be bold,

night and by day for to rob him: My copper is fuch,

No robber will touch,

d fo you may daintily bob him.

The little blackguard,
Who gets very hard

s half-pence for cleaning your fhoes;
When his pockets are cramm'd
With mine and be d―'d,

may wear he has nothing to lofe.

Here's half-pence in plenty,
For one you'll have twenty,

ough thousands are not worth a pudden :
Your neighbours will think,
When your pocket cries chink,
u are grown plaguy rich on a fudden,
You will be my thankers,
I'll make you my bankers,
good as Ben Burton or Fadet;
For nothing fhall pafs
But my pretty brass,

d then you'll be all of a trade.

I'm a fon of a whore

If I have a word more

fay in this wretched condition. If my coin will not pafs,

I muft die like an afs; d fo i conclude my petition.

E people of Ireland, both country and city, Come liften with patience, and hear out my ditty:

this time I'll choose to be wifer than witty. Which nobody can deny. Half-pence are coming, the nation's undoing.

ere's an end of your ploughing, and baking, and brewing:

fort, you must all go to rack and to ruin. Which, &c th high men and low men, and thick men and tall men,

ad rich men and poor men, and free men and thrall men,

fuffer; and this man, and that man, and all

The Soldier is ruin'd, poor man ! by his pay; His five-pence will prove but a farthing a day, For meat, or for drink; or he must run away. Which, &c.

When he pulls out his two-pence, the Tapfter fays not,

That ten times as much he must pay for his fhot;
And thus the poor Soldier muft foon go to pot.
Which, &c.
If he goes to the Baker, the Baker will huff,
And twenty-pence have for a two-penny loaf,
Then, dog, rogue, and rafcal, and fo kick and
cuff,
Which, &c.

Again, to the market whenever he goes,
The Butcher and Soldier must be mortal foes;
One cuts off an ear, and the other a nofe.

Which, &c.
The Butcher is ftout, and he values no fwagger.
A cleaver's a match any time for a dagger,
And a blue fleeve may give fuch a cuff as may
ftagger.

Which, &c.

The Beggars themfelves will be broke in a trice, When thus their poor farthings are funk in their price;

When nothing is left, they muft live on their lice.
Which, &c.

The Squire poffefs'd of twelve thousand a year,
O Lord! what a mountain his rents would appear!
Should be tave them, he would not have houfe-
roon, I fear.

Which, &c.

Though at prefent he lives in a very large houfe, There would then not be room in it left for a

mouse;

But the Squire 's too wife, he will not take a foufe. Which, &c.

The Farmer, who comes with his rent in this cafh,

For taking thefe counters, and being fo rafh, Will be kick'd out of doors, both himfelf and his traíh.

And I think, after all, it would be very strange
To give current money for bafe in exchange,
Like a fine lady fwapping her moles for they
mange.