Quaint Gleanings from Ancient Poetry | Page 3

with a
Star and Garter, and made fine
With all those gaudy Trifles once
call'd mine,
Your Hobby-Horses [1] and your Joys of State,
And
now become the Object of your Hate;
But, d------'ee, Sir, I'll be
Legitimate.
I was your Darling, but against your Will,
And know
that I will be the Peoples still;
And when you're dead, I and my
Friends, the Rout,
Will with my Popish Uncle try a Bout,
And to
my Troubles this one Comfort bring,
Next after you, by ------, I will
be King.
[Footnote 1: At the age of sixteen he was made Master of the Horse.]
THE KING'S ANSWER.
Ungrateful Boy! I will not call thee Son,
Thou hast thyself unhappily
undone;
And thy Complaints serve but to show thee more,
How
much thou hast enrag'd thy Father's Whore.
Resent it not, shake not
thy addle Head,
And be no more by Clubs and Rascals led.
Have I
made thee the Darling of my Joys,
The prettiest and the lustiest of my
Boys?
Have I so oft sent thee with cost to France,

To take new

Dresses up, and learn to dance?
Have I giv'n thee a Ribbon and a Star,

And sent thee like a Meteor to the War?
Have I done all that Royal
Dad could do,
And do you threaten now to be untrue?
But say I did
with thy fond Mother sport,
To the same kindness others had resort;

'Twas my good Nature, and I meant her Fame,
To shelter thee
under my Royal Name.
Alas! I never got one Brat alone,
My
Mistresses all are by each Fop well known,
And I still willing all their
Brats to own.
I made thee once,'tis true, the Post of Grace,
And
stuck upon thee every mighty Place,
Each glitt'ring Office, till thy
heavy Brow
Grew dull with Honour, and my Pow'r low.
I spangled
thee with Favours, hung thy Nose
With Rings of Gold and Pearl, till
all grew Foes
By secret Envy at thy growing State:
I lost my safety
when I made thee Great.
There's not the least Injustice to you shewn;

You must be ruin'd to secure my Throne.
Office is but a fickle
Grace, the Badge
Bestow'd by fits, and snatch'd away in Rage;
And
sure that Livery which I give my Slaves
I may take from 'em when
my Portsmouth raves.
Thou art a Creature of my own Creation;

Then swallow this without Capitulation.
If you with feigned Wrongs
still keep a Clutter,
And make the People for your Sake to mutter,

For my own Comfort, but your Trouble, know,
G------fish, I'll send
you to the Shades below.
AN EPITAPH ON DUNDEE.
ENGLISH'D BY MR. DRYDEN.
O Last and Bests of Scots! Who didst maintain
Thy Country's
Freedom from a Foreign Reign,
New People fill the Land now thou
art gone,
New Gods the Temples, and new Kings the Throne.

Scotland and thou did each in other live,
Thou wouldst not her, nor
could she thee, survive.
Farewell! who living didst support the State,

And couldst not fall but with thy Country's Fate.
THE ROBBER ROBB'D.

I.
A certain Priest had hoarded up
A mass of secret Gold.
And where
he might bestow it safe
He knew not to be bold.
II.
At last it came into his Thought
To lock it in a Chest
Within the
Chancel; and he wrote
Thereon, "Hic Deus est."
III.
A merry Grig, whose greedy Mind
Did long for such a Prey,

Respecting not the Sacred Words
That on the Casket lay,
IV.
Took out the Gold, and blotting out
The Priest's Inscript thereon,

Wrote, "Resurrexit, non est hic":
"Your God is rose and gone."
AH! THE SHEPHERD'S MOURNFUL FATE!
Ah! the shepherd's mournful fate!
When doom'd to love, and doom'd
to languish,
To bear the scornful fair one's hate,
Nor dare disclose
his anguish.
Yet eager looks, and dying sighs,
My secret soul
discover,
While rapture trembling thro' my eyes
Reveals how much
I love her.
The tender glance; the redd'ning cheek,
O'erspread with
rising blushes,
A thousand various ways they speak
A thousand
various wishes.
For, oh! that form so heavenly fair,
Those languid
eyes so sweetly smiling,
That artless blush, and modest air,
So
artfully beguiling! [2]
Thy every look and every grace
So charms
whene'er I view thee,
Till death o'ertake me in the chase
Still will
my hopes pursue thee;
Then when my tedious hours are past
Be this
last blessing given,
Low at thy feet to breathe my last,
And die in
sight of heaven.

[Footnote 2: "Ars celare artem."]
SOME VERSES TO A FRIEND WHO TWICE VENTURED ON
MARRIAGE.
BY THOMAS BROWN.
The Husband's the Pilot, the Wife is the Ocean,
He always in danger,
she always in motion;
And he that in Wedlock twice hazards his
Carcase
Twice ventures the Drowning, and, Faith, that's a hard case.
Even at our Weapons the Females defeat us,
And Death, only Death,
can sign our Quietus.
Not to tell you sad stories of Liberty lost,
Our
Mirth is all pall'd, and our Measures all crost;
That Pagan
Confinement, that damnable Station,
Sutes no other States or Degrees
in the Nation.
The Levite it keeps from Parochial Duty,
For who can
at once mind Religion and Beauty?
The Rich it alarms with Expences
and Trouble,
And a poor Beast, you know, can scarce carry double.

'Twas invented, they tell you, to keep