'You know a certain lady, Dick,
Who saw me when I last was sick;
She kindly talk'd, at least three hours,
Of plastic forms, and mental pow'rs;
Describ'd our pre-existing station,
Before this vile terrene creation;
And, lest I should be wearied, Madam,
To cut things short, came down to Adam;
From whence, as fast as she was able,
She drowns the world, and builds up Babel:
Through Syria, Persia, Greece, she goes,
And takes the Romans in the close.
'But we'll descant on general nature;
This is a system, not a satire.

"Turn we this globe, and let us see
How different nations disagree
In what we wear, or eat, and drink;
Nay, Dick, perhaps in what we think.
In water as you smell and taste

The soils through which it rose and past,
In Alma's manners you may read
The place where she was born and bred.

'One people from their swaddling-bands
Releas'd their infants' feet and hands:
Here Alma to these limbs was brought,
And Sparta's offspring kick'd and fought.
Another taught their babes to talk,
Ere they could yet in go-carts walk:
There Alma settled in the tongue,
And orators from Athens sprung.

'Observe but in these neighbouring lands The different use of mouths and hands; As men repos'd their various hopes, In battles these, and those in tropes.

'In Britain's isles, as Heylin notes, The ladies trip in petticoats,

Which, for the honour of their nation,
They quit but on some great occasion:
Men there in breeches clad you view;
They claim that garment as their due.
In Turkey the reverse appears;
Long coats the haughty husband wears,
And greets his wife with angry speeches,
If she be seen without her breeches.
'In our fantastic climes, the fair
With cleanly powder dry their hair,
And round their lovely breast and head
Fresh flowers their mingled odours shed:
Your nicer Hottentots think meet
With guts and tripe to deck their feet!
With downcast looks on Totta's legs
The ogling youth most humbly begs
She would not from his hopes remove
At once his breakfast and his love;
And if the skittish nymph should fly,
He in a double sense must die.

'We simple toasters take delight
To see our women's teeth look white,
And every saucy ill-bred fellow
Sneers at a mouth profoundly yellow.
In China none hold women sweet
Except their snags are black as jet:
King Chihu put nine queens to death,
Convict on statute, ivory teeth.

'At Tonquin if a prince should die, (As Jesuits write, who never lie) The wife, and counsellor, and priest, Who serv'd him most and lov'd him best.

Prepare and light his funeral fire,
And cheerful on the pile expire.
In Europe 'twould be hard to find
In each degree one half so kind.

'Now turn we to the farthest East,
And there observe the gentry dress'd.
Prince Giolo and his royal sisters,
Scar'd with ten thousand comely blisters,
The marks remaining on the skin,
To tell the quality within:
Distinguish'd flashes deck the great,
As each excels in birth or state;
His eyelet-holes are more and ampler;
The king's own body was a sampler.
Happy the climate where the beau
Wears the same suit for use and show;
And at a small expense your wife,
If once well pink'd, is cloth'd for life.
'Westward again, the Indian fair
Is nicely smear'd with fat of bear:
Before you see, you smell your toast,
And sweetest she who stinks the most.
The finest sparks and cleanest beaux
Drip from the shoulders to the toes.
How sleek their skins! their joints how easy!
There slovens only are not greasy.

'I mention'd different ways of breeding:
Begin we in our children's reading.
To Master John the English maid
A horn-book gives of gingerbread,
And that the child may learn the better,
As he can name, he eats the letter;
Proceeding thus with vast delight,
He spells and gnaws from left to right.

But show a Hebrew's hopeful son

Where we suppose the book begun,

The child would thank you for your kindness, And read quite backward from our finis:

Devour he learning ne'er so fast,

Great A would be reserv'd the last.

'An equal instance of this matter
Is in the manners of a daughter.
In Europe if a harmless maid,
By Nature and by Love betray'd,
Should, ere a wife, become a nurse,
Her friends would look on her the worse.
In China, Dampier's Travels tell ye,
(Look in his index for Pagelli)
Soon as the British ships unmoor,
And jolly longboat rows to shore,
Down come the nobles of the land,
Each brings his daughter in his hand,
Beseeching the imperious tar

To make her but one hour his care;
The tender mother stands affrighted,
Lest her dear daughter should be slighted;
And
poor Miss Yaya dreads the shame
Of going back the maid she came.
'Observe how custom, Dick, compels
The lady that in Europe dwells:
After her tea she slips away,

And what to do, one need not say.
Now see how great Pomonque's queen
Behav'd herself amongst the men;
Pleas'd with her punch, the gallant soul
First drank, then water'd in the bowl,
And sprinkled in the captain's face
The marks of her peculiar grace-

'To close this point, we need not roam For instances so far from home.

What parts gay France from sober Spain?
A little rising rocky chain.

Of men born south or north o' the hill,
Those seldom move, these ne'er stand still.
Dick, you love maps, and may perceive
Rome not far distant from Geneve.
If the good Pope remains at home,
He's the first prince in Christendom.
Choose then, good Pope, at home to stay,
Nor westward, curious, take thy way;
Thy way, unhappy, shouldst thou take
From Tiber's bank to Leman-lake,
Thou art an aged priest no more,
But a young flaring painted whore :
Thy sex is lost; thy town is gone;
No longer Rome, but Babylon.

That some few leagues should make this change, To men unlearn'd seems mighty strange.

'But need we, friend, insist on this?

Since in the very Cantons Swiss,

All your philosophers agree,

And prove it plain, that one may be
A heretic or true believer,

On this or t'other side a river.'

Here with an artful smile, quoth Dick,
'Your proofs come mighty full and thick-
The bard, on this extensive chapter
Wound up into poetic rapture,
Continued: Richard, cast your eye
By night upon a winter-sky;
Cast it by day-light on the strand
Which compasses fair Albion's land;