HELEN was juft flipt into bed:
Her eye-brows on the toilet lay Away the kitten with them fled, As fees belonging to her prey.
For this misfortune careless Jane, Affure yourself, was loudly rated : And madam, getting up again,
With her own hand the mouse-trap baited..
On little things, as fages write,. Depends our human joy or forrow: If we don't catch a mouse to-night, Alas! no eye-brows for to-morrow.
HOW old may Phyllis be, you afk,
Whose beauty thus all hearts engages ?
To answer is no easy task:
For fhe has really two ages.
Stiff in brocade, and pinch'd in stays,
Her patches, paint, and jewels on;
All day let Envy view her face,
And Phyllis is but twenty-one.
Paint, patches, jewels laid afide,
At night Aftronomers agree,
The evening has the day bely'd;
And Phyllis is fome forty-three.
HAT a frail thing is Beauty, fays baron Le Cras,
Perceiving his Mistress had one eye of glass :
And fcarcely had he spoke it;
When the more confus'd, as more angry fhe grew,
By a negligent rage prov'd the maxim too true :
She dropt the eye, and broke it.
EPIGRAM,
Written to the Duke de NOAILLES.
VAIN the concern which you express,
That uncall'd Alard will poffefs
Your house and coach, both day and night,
And that Macbeth was haunted lefs
By Banquo's reftlefs fpright.
With fifteen thousand pounds a year,
Do you complain, you cannot bear
An ill, you may fo foon retrieve?
Good Alard, faith, is modester
By much than you believe.
Lend him but fifty Louis-d'or;
And you fhall never fee him more :
Take the advice; probatum eft.
Why do the Gods indulge our store,
But to fecure our reft?
EPILOGUE to SMITH'S PHEDRA and HIPPOLYTUS, Spoken by Mrs. OLDFIELD, who acted ISMENA,
LADIES, to-night your pity I implore
For one, who never troubled you before :
An Oxford-man, extremely read in Greek,
Who from Euripides makes Phædra speak ;
And comes to town to let us Moderns know,
How women lov'd two thousand years ago.
If that be all, faid I, e'en burn your play
Egad! we know all that as well as they :
Shew us the youthful, handsome charioteer,
Firm in his feat, and running his career;
Our fouls would kindle with as generous flames,
As e'er infpir'd the antient Grecian dames :
Every Ifmena would resign her breast;
And every dear Hippolytus be blest.
But, as it is, fix flouncing Flanders mares
Are e'en as good as any two of theirs:
And, if Hippolytus can but contrive
To buy the gilded chariot, John can drive.
Now of the buftle you have seen to-day,
And Phædra's morals in this scholar's play,
Something at least in justice should be faid;
But this Hippolytus fo fills one's head—
Well! Phædra liv'd as chastely as the cou'd;
For fhe was Father Jove's own flesh and blood.
Her aukward love indeed was oddly fated;
She and her Poly were too near related;
And yet that fcruple had been laid afide,
If honeft Thefeus had but fairly dy'd:
But when he came, what needed he to know,
But that all matters ftood in ftatu quo?
There was no harm, you fee; or, grant
She might want conduct; but he wanted care.
"Twas in a husband little less than rude,
Upon his wife's retirement to intrude-
He should have sent a night or two before,
That he would come exact at fuch an hour;
Then he had turn'd all tragedy to jest;
Found every thing contribute to his rest;
The picquet-friend dismiss'd, the coast all clear,
And spouse alone impatient for her dear.
But, if these gay reflections come too late,
To keep the guilty Phædra from her fate;
If your more ferious judgement must condemn
The dire effects of her unhappy flame :
Yet, ye chafte matrons, and ye tender fair,
Let Love and Innocence engage your care:
My fpotlefs flames to your protection take;
And fpare poor Phædra for Ifmena's fake.
She was painting her cheeks at the time her nofe fell.
EPILOGUE to Mrs. MANLEY'S LUCIUS.
HE Female Author who recites to-day,
Trufts to her sex the merit of her play.
Like Father Bayes fecurely fhe fits down:
Pit, box, and gallery, 'gad! all's our own.
In ancient Greece, fhe fays, when Sappho writ,
By their applause the critics fhew'd their wit,
They tun'd their voices to her Lyric string;
Though they could all do something more than fing.
But one exception to this fact we find ;
That booby Phaon only was unkind,
An ill-bred boat-man, rough as waves and wind.
From Sappho down through all fucceeding ages,
And now on French or on Italian stages,
Rough fatyrs, fly remarks, ill-natur'd fpeeches,
Are always aim'd at Poets that wear breeches.
Arm'd with Longinus, or with Rapin, no man
Drew a fharp pen upon a naked woman.
The bluftering bully in our neighbouring streets
Scorns to attack the female that he meets :
Fearless the petticoat contemns his frowns:
The hoop fecures whatever it furrounds.
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