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Shepherd,

Is there no way to moderate her anger?

Shepherd,

Echo, Hang her.

Thanks, gentle echo; right thy answers tell, What woman is, and how to guard her well. Echo, Guard her well.

EPILOGUE to a PLAY

For the benefit of the Weavers in Ireland.

WE

1721.

HO dares affirm this is no pious age,
When charity begins to tread the
stage?

When actors, who at best are hardly favers,
Will give a night of benefit to weavers ?
Stay,--- let me fee, how finely will it found!
Imprimis, from his grace* a hundred pound :
Peers, clergy, gentry, all are benefactors;
And then comes in the item of the actors:
Item, the actors freely give a day,---
The poet had no more who made the play.
But whence this wond'rous charity in
play'rs ?

They learnt it not at fermons, or at pray'rs.

* Dr. William King, archbishop of Dublin.

Under

Under the rofe, fince here are none but

friends,

To own the truth, we have fome private ends:

Since waiting-women, like exacting jades, Hold up the prices of their old brocades, We'll drefs in manufactures made at home, Equip our kings and gen'rals at the Comb * We'll rig in Meath-street Egypt's haughty

queen;

And Anthony fhall court her in ratteen.
In blue fballoon fhall Hannibal be clad,
And Scipio trail an Irish purple plad.
In drugget dreft, of thirteen pence a yard,
See Philip's fon amidft his Perfian guard:
And proud Roxana, fir'd with jealous rage,
With fifty yards of crape fhall fweep the
stage.

In fhort, our kings and princeffes within
Are all refolv'd the project to begin;
And you, our fubjects, when you here resort,
Muft imitate the fashions of the court.

Oh! cou'd I fee this audience clad in stuff, Though money's fcarce, we fhou'd have trade enough:

But chints, brocades, and lace take all away, And scarce a crown is left to see a play.

* A ftreet in Dublin famous for woollen manufactures.

Perhaps

Perhaps you wonder whence this friendship

fprings

Between the weavers, and us play-house kings:

Butwit and weaving had the fame beginning; Pallas firft taught us poetry and spinning. And next obferve how this alliance fits, For weavers now are just as poor as wits: Their brother quill-men, workers for the

ftage,

For forry stuff can get a crown a page ; But weavers will be kinder to the players,. And fell for twenty pence a yard of theirs: And, to your knowledge, there is often less in The poet's wit, than in the player's dreffing.

EPITAPH on a MISER.

BENE

ENEATH this verdant hillock lies
Demar, the wealthy and the wife.
His heirs, that he might safely reft,
Have put his carcass in a cheft;
The very cheft, in which, they say,
His other self, his money lay.
And, if his heirs continue kind
To that dear felf he left behind,
I dare believe, that four in five
Will think his better half alive.

Το

Who collected and tranfcribed his Poems. 1720.

AS, when a lofty pile is rais'd,

We never hear the workmen prais'd, Who bring the lime, or place the ftones; But all admire Inigo Jones:

So, if this pile of scatter'd rhymes
Shou'd be approv'd in after-times,
If it both pleases and endures,
The merit and the praise are yours.

Thou, Stella, wer't no longer young,
When first for thee my harp I ftrung,
Without one word of Cupid's darts,
Of killing eyes, or bleeding hearts :
With friendship and esteem poffest,
I ne'er admitted love a guest.

In all the habitudes of life,

The friend, the mistress, and the wife,
Variety we still pursue,

In pleasure seek, for fomething new;
Or elfe, comparing with the rest,
Take comfort, that our own is beft;
The best we value by the worst,
(As tradesmen fhew their trash at first:)
But his pursuits are at end,

Whom Stella chufes for a friend.

A poet

A poet ftarving in a garret,
Conning old topicks like a parrot,
Invokes his mistress and his muse,
And stays at home for want of shoes:
Shou'd but his muse descending drop
A flice of bread and mutton-chop;
Or kindly, when his credit's out,
Surprize him with a pint of ftout *;
Or patch his broken stocking foals,
Or fend him in a peck of coals;
Exalted in his mighty mind,

He flies, and leaves the stars behind;
Counts all his labours amply paid,
Adores her for the timely aid.

Or, fhou'd a porter make enquiries
For Chloe, Sylvia, Phillis, Iris,
Be told the lodging, lane, and fign,
The bow'rs that hold those nymphs divine;
Fair Chloe would perhaps be found
With footmen tippling under ground;
The charming Sylvia beating flax,
Her shoulders mark'd with bloody tracks ;
Bright Phillis mending ragged fmocks;
And radiant Iris in the pox.

These are the goddesses enroll'd
In Curll's + collection, new and old,

* A cant word for ftrong beer.

See an account of Curll, Vol. IV.

Whofe

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