T

A DOG AT COURT.

'O thee, fweet Fop, these lines I fend,
Who, though no fpaniel, am a friend.
Though once my tail in wanton play,
Now frifking this and then that way,
Chanc'd, with a touch of just the tip,
To hurt your lady-lap-dog-fhip;
Yet thence to think I'd bite your head off;
Sure Bounce is one you never read of.

Fop! you can dance, and make a leg,
Can fetch and carry, cringe and beg;
And (what's the top of all your tricks)
Can ftoop to pick up strings and sticks.
We country dogs love nobler fport,
And fcorn the pranks of dogs at court.
Fie, naughty Fop! where'er you come
To fart and pifs about the room,

To lay your head in every lap,

And when they think not of you-snap :
The worst that envy, or that spite,
E'er faid of me is, I can bite;
That sturdy vagrants, rogues in rags,
Who poke at me, can make no brags;
And that to touze fuch things as flutter,
To honest Bounce is bread and butter.
While you and every courtly fop
Fawn on the devil for a chop;
I've the humanity to hate

A butcher, though he brings me meat :
And, let me tell you, have a nose
(Whatever stinking fops suppose)
That, under cloth of gold or tiffue,
Can fiell a plaster, or an issue.
Your pilfering lord, with fimple pride,
May wear a pick-lock at his fide:
My mafter wants no key of state,
For Bounce can keep his house and gate.
When all fuch dogs have had their days,
As knavish Pams, and fawning Trays:
When pamper'd Cupids, beastly Veni's,
And motley, fquinting Harlequini's *,
Shall lick no more their lady's breech,
But die of loosenefs, claps, or itch;
Fair Thames from either echoing shore
Shall hear and dread my manly roar.

See Bounce, like Berecynthia crown'd
With thundering offspring all around,
Beneath, befide me, and at top,
A hundred fons! and not one Fop.
Before my children fet your beef,
Not one true Bounce will be a thief;
Not one without permiffion feed
(Though fome of J's hungry breed);
But whatfoe'er the father's race,
From me they fuck a little grace:

While your fine whelps learn all to steal,
Bred up by hand on chick and veal.
My eldeft-born refides not far

Where fhines great Strafford's glittering star;
My fecond (child of fortune!) waits
At Burlington's Palladian gates;
A third majestically stalks

(Happieft of dogs) in Cobham's walks!
One ufhers friends to Bathurst's door,
One fawns at Oxford's on the poor.
Nobles, whom arms or arts adorn,

Wait for my infants yet unborn.
None but a peer of wit and grace
Can hope a puppy of my race,
And, oh! would fate the blifs decree
To mine (a blifs too great for me),
That two my talleft fons might grace
Attending each with stately pace

Iülus' fide, as erft Evander's *,

To keep off flatterers, fpies, and panders; *Virg. Æn. viii.

ΤΟ

Through your Perfpective we can plainly fee,
The new-difcover'd road of Poetry;

To fteep Parnaffus you direct the way

So fmooth, that venturous travellers cannot ftray,
But with unerring fteps rough ways difdain,
And, by you led, the beauteous fummit gain,
Where polifh'd lays fhall raise their growing fames,
And with their tuneful guide enrol their honour'd names.

EPISTLE XI.

DR. GARTH ΤΟ MR. GAY.

WHE

ANACREONTIC.

HEN Fame did o'er the fpacious plains
The lays the once had learn'd, repeat;

And liften'd to the tuneful strains,

And wonder'd who could fing so sweet : "Twas thus. The Graces held the lyre,

Th' harmonious frame the Mufes ftrung, The Loves and Smiles compos'd the choir;

And Gay tranfcrib'd what Phoebus fung.

EPISTLE

EPISTLE X.

TO MY INGENIOUS AND WORTHY FRIEND

WILLIAM LOWNDS, ESQ

AUTHOR OF THAT CELEBRATED
TREATISE IN FOLIO, CALLED
THE LAND-TAX BILL.

WHEN Poets print their works, the fcribbling crew

Stick the bard o'er with bays, like Christmas-pew:

Can meagre poetry fuch fame deferve?

Can poetry, that only writes to starve ?
And shall no laurel deck that famous head,
In which the Senate's annual law is bred?

That hoary head, which greater glory fires,
By nobler ways and means true fame acquires.
O had I Virgil's force, to fing the man,
Whofe learned lines can millions raise per ann.
Great Lownds's praife fhould fwell the trump of fame,
And rapes and wapentakes refound his name!

If the blind Poet gain'd a long renown

By finging every Grecian chief and town;
Sure Lownds's profe much greater fame requires,
Which fweetly counts five thousand knights and
fquires,

Their feats, their cities, parishes, and fhires.

VOL. I.

P

Thy