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For, entre nous, we hellish sprites
Love more the fresco of the nights;
And oftener our receipts convey
In dreams, than any other way.
I tell you therefore as a friend,

Ere morning dawns, your fears shall end.
Go then this evening, master Carvel,

Lay down your fowls, and broach your barrel;
Let friends and wine dissolve your care;

Whilst I the great receipt prepare :

To-night I'll bring it, by my faith;

Believe for once what Satan saith.

Away went Hans: glad? not a little;

Obeyed the devil to a tittle;

Invited friends some half a dozen,

The colonel and my lady's cousin.

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100

The meat was served, the bowls were crowned, Catches were sung, and healths went round; Barbadoes waters for the close;

Till Hans had fairly got his dose.

The colonel toasted to the best;

The dame moved off to be undressed;

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The chimes went twelve; the guests withdrew:

But when, or how, Hans hardly knew.

Some modern anecdotes aver,

He nodded in his elbow chair;

From thence was carried off to bed:
John held his heels, and Nan his head.
My lady was disturbed, new sorrow!
Which Hans must answer for to-morrow.

In bed then view this happy pair;
And think how Hymen triumphed there.
Hans fast asleep as soon as laid,

The duty of the night unpaid;

120

The waking dame, with thoughts oppressed, 125
That made her hate both him and rest;
By such a husband, such a wife!
'Twas Acme's and Septimius' life:
The lady sighed: the lover snored:
The punctual devil kept his word;
Appeared to honest Hans again,
But not at all by madam seen;
And giving him a magic ring,
Fit for the finger of a king,

Dear Hans, said he, this jewel take,
And wear it long for Satan's sake;
"Twill do your business to a hair;
For, long as you this ring shall wear,
As sure as I look over Lincoln,

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That ne'er shall happen which you think on. 140 Hans took the ring with joy extreme;

(All this was only in a dream)

And, thrusting it beyond his joint,

"Tis done, he cried, I've gained my point. What point, said she, you ugly beast? You neither give me joy nor rest:

'Tis done.-What's done, you drunken bear; You've thrust your finger G-d knows where!

A DUTCH PROVERB.

FIRE, water, woman, are man's ruin:
Says wise professor Vander Brüin.
By flames a house I hired was lost
Last year, and I must pay the cost.
This spring the rains o'erflowed my ground;
And my best Flanders mare was drowned.

A slave I am to Clara's eyes:

The gipsy knows her power, and flies.
Fire, water, woman, are my ruin:
And great thy wisdom, Vander Brüin.

PAULO PURGANTI AND HIS WIFE:

AN HONEST, BUT A SIMPLE PAIR.

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Est enim quiddam, idque intelligitur in omni virtute, quod deceat: quod cogitatione magis à virtute potest quàm re separari. Cic. de Off. L. 2.

BEYOND the fixed and settled rules
Of vice and virtue in the schools,
Beyond the letter of the law,

Which keeps our men and maids in awe,
The better sort should set before 'em
A grace, a manner, a decorum;
Something, that gives their acts a light;
Makes them not only just, but bright;
And sets them in that open fame,
Which witty malice cannot blame.

For 'tis in life, as 'tis in painting,
Much may be right, yet much be wanting;
From lines drawn true, our eye may trace
A foot, a knee, a hand, a face;

May justly own the picture wrought
Exact to rule, exempt from fault:
Yet, if the colouring be not there,
The Titian stroke, the Guido air;
To nicest judgment show the piece;
At best 'twill only not displease:
It would not gain on Jersey's eye;
Bradford would frown, and set it by.

Thus in the picture of our mind
The action may be well designed;

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20

Guided by law, and bound by duty;
Yet want this Je ne sçai quoi of beauty;
And though its error may be such,
As 1 Knags and Burgess cannot hit;
It yet may feel the nicer touch
Of Wycherley's or Congreve's wit.

What is this talk, replies a friend,
And where will this dry moral end?
The truth of what you here lay down
By some example should be shown.-
With all my heart, for once; read on!
An honest, but a simple pair

(And twenty other I forbear)
May serve to make this thesis clear.
A doctor of great skill and fame,
Paulo Purganti was his name,
Had a good, comely, virtuous wife;
No woman led a better life;

She to intrigues was even hard-hearted:
She chuckled when a bawd was carted;
And thought the nation ne'er would thrive,
Till all the whores were burned alive.

On married men, that dared be bad,

She thought no mercy should be had;

They should be hanged, or starved, or fleaed,
Or served like Romish priests in Swede.

In short, all lewdness she defied:

And stiff was her parochial pride.

Yet, in an honest way, the dame

Was a great lover of that same;

And could from scripture take her cue,

That husbands should give wives their due.

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1 Two divines. Knags was Lecturer of St Giles in the Fields; Burgess was a Dissenter.

Her prudence did so justly steer
Between the gay and the severe,
That if in some regards she chose
To curb poor Paulo in too close;
In others she relaxed again,
And governed with a looser rein.
Thus though she strictly did confine
The doctor from excess of wine;
With oysters, eggs, and vermicelli,
She let him almost burst his belly;
Thus drying coffee was denied;
But chocolate that loss supplied:
And for tobacco (who could bear it),
Filthy concomitant of claret!
(Blest revolution!) one might see
Eringo roots, and bohea tea.

She often set the doctor's band,

And stroked his beard, and squeezed his hand: Kindly complained, that after noon

He went to pore on books too soon.

She held it wholesomer by much,
To rest a little on the couch;
About his waist in bed a-nights
She clung so close-for fear of sprites.

The doctor understood the call,
But had not always wherewithal.

The lion's skin too short, you know
(As Plutarch's Morals finely show),
Was lengthened by the fox's tail;
And art supplies, where strength may fail.
Unwilling then, in arms to meet
The enemy he could not beat,
He strove to lengthen the campaign,
And save his forces by chicane.

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