The bluftering bully in our neighbouring streets
Scorns to attack the female that he meets :
Fearless the petticoat contemns his frowns :
The hoop secures whatever it surrounds.
The many-colour'd gentry there above,
By turns are ruld by tumult and by love:
And, while their sweethearts their attention fix,
Suspend the din of their damn'd clattering sticks.
Now, Sirs-
To you our author makes her soft request,
Who speak the kindest, and who write the best,
Your sympathetic hearts she hopes to move,
From tender friendship, and endearing love.
If Petrarch's Mufe did Laura's wit rehearse ; .
And Cowley flatter'd dear Orinda's verse ;
She hopes from you-Pox take her hopes and fears ;
I plead her sex's claim ; what matters hers?
By our full power of beauty we think fit
To damn the Salique law impos’d on wit :
We'll try the empire who so long have boasted ;
And, if we are not prais’d, we'll not be toasted.
Approve what one of us presents to-night,
Or every mortal woman here shall write :
Rural, pathetic, narrative, fublime,
We'll write to you, and make you write in rhyme ;
Female remarks shall take up all your time.
Your time, poor souls ! we'll take your very money;
Female third-days shall come so thick upon ye,
As long as we have eyes, or hands, or breath,
We'll look, or write, or talk you all to death.
Unless
Unless you yield for better and for worse:
Then the She-Pegasus shall gain the course ;
And the grey mare will prove the better horse.
W H O has e'er been at Paris, must needs know
the Greve,
The fatal retreat of th' unfortunate brave;
Where Honour and Justice moft oddly contribute
To ease heroes' pains by a halter and gibbet.
Derry down, down, hey derry down.
There Death breaks the shackles which Force had
put on, And the Hangman completes what the Judge but
begun; There the Squire of the Pad, and the Knight of the
Post, Find their pains no more balkd, and their hopes no.
more croft. Derry down, &c.
Great
Great claims are there made, and great secrets are
known ;
And the king, and the law, and the thief, has his own:
But my hearers cry out, What a duce dost thou ail ?
Cut off thy reflections, and give us thy tale.
Derry down, &c.
'Twas there then, in civil respect to harsh laws,
And for want of false witness to back a bad cause,
A Norman, though late, was oblig'd to appear :
And who to assist, but a grave Cordelier ?
Derry down, &c.
The Squire, whose good grace was to open the scene,
Seem'd not in great haste that the show should begin :
Now fitted the halter, now travers'd the cart ;
And often took leave, but was loth to depart.
Derry down, &c.
What frightens you thus, my good son? says the
Priest :
You murder'd, are sorry, and have been confeft.
O father! my sorrow will scarce save my bacon ;
For 'twas not that I murder'd, but that I was taken.
Derry down, &c.
Pough! pr’ythee ne'er trouble thy head with such
fancies:
os Rely' on the aid you shall have from Saint Francis :
If the money you promis'd be brought to the chest, 1 You have only to die : let the church do the rest.
Derry down, &c.
Vol. XXXIII. - H
And what will folks fay, if they see you afraid? It reflects upon me, as I knew not my trade : Courage, friend; for to-day is your period of sorrow; And things will go better, believe me, to-morrow.
Derry down, &c. To-morrow! our Hero replied in a fright: He that's hang'd before noon, ought to think of to
night. Tell your beads, quoth the Priest, and be fairly truss’d
For you surely to-night shall in Paradise fup.
Derry down, &c. Alas ! quoth the Squire, howe'er fumptuous the , treat, Parbleu! I shall have little stomach to eat; I should therefore esteem it great favour and grace, Would you be so kind as to go in my place.
Derry down, &c. That I would, quoth the Father, and thank you to
boot;
But our actions, you know, with our duty must fuit.
The feast I propos’d to you, I cannot taste;
For this night, by our order, is mark'd for a fast.
Derry down, &c.
Then, turning about to the hangman, he said,
Dispatch me, I pr’ythee, this troublesome blade ;
For thy cord and my cord both equally tie,
And we live by the gold for which other men die.
Derry down, &c.
VHILST I am scorch'd with hot desire,
In vain cold friendship you return;
Your drops of pity on my fire,
Alas! but make it fiercer burn.
Ah! would you have the fame supprest,
That kills the heart it heats too fast,
Take half my passion to your breast :
The rest in mine shall ever last.
TNTERR’D beneath this marble stone
Lię fauntering Jack and idle Joan.
While rolling threescore years and one
Did round this globe their courses run ;*
If human things went ill or well,
If changing empires rose or fell,
The morning past, the evening came,
And found this couple still the fame.
H 2
|