The goddess then, o'er his anointed head,
With mystic words the sacred opium shed.
And lo her bird (a monster of a fowl,
Something betwixt a Heidegger and owl) 47
Perch'd on his crown. "All hail! and hail again,
My son the promised land expects thy reign.
Know Eusden thirsts no more for sack or praise ;48
He sleeps among the dull of ancient days;
Safe, where no critics damn, no duns molest,
Where wretched Withers, Ward, and Gildon rest,
And high-born Howard, more majestic sire,
With fool of quality completes the quire.49
Thou, Cibber! thou, his laurel shalt support,
Folly, my son, has still a friend at court.
Lift up your gates, ye princes, see him come !
Sound, sound, ye viols, be the cat-call dumb!
Bring, bring the madding bay, the drunken vine;
The creeping, dirty, courtly ivy join.
And thou, his aide-de-camp, lead on my sons,
Light-arm'd with points, antitheses, and puns.
Let Bawdry, Billingsgate, my daughters dear,
Support his front, and oaths bring up the rear:
And under his, and under Archer's wing,
Gaming and Grub-street skulk behind the king.

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295

300

305

310

47 [John James Heidegger. Of him, and other parties here named, see notes.]

48 In the former edition :

Know, Settle, cloy'd with custard and with praise,

Is gather'd to the dull of ancient days,

Safe where no critics damn, no duns molest,

Where Gildon, Banks, and high-born Howard rest.

I see a king! who leads my chosen sons

To lands that flow with clenches and with puns:
Till each famed theatre my empire own;
Till Albion, as Hibernia, bless my throne!

I see! I see! Then rapt she spoke no more.
God save King Tibbald! Grub-street alleys roar.
So when Jove's block," &c.

49 [In edition of 1728, this line stood :

"Impatient waits till * **

Lord Hervey was supposed to be meant.]

joins the quire."

O! when shall rise a monarch all our own,50
And I, a nursing mother, rock the throne;
'Twixt prince and people close the curtain draw,
Shade him from light, and cover him from law;
Fatten the courtier, starve the learned band,
And suckle armies, and dry-nurse the land:
Till senates nod to lullabies divine,
And all be sleep, as at an ode of thine."

COLLEY CIBBER.

50 Boileau, Lutrin, Chant. II.

"Helas! qu'est devenu ce tems, cet heureux tems,

Où les Rois s'honoroient du nom de Fainéans," &c.

320

51 The voices and instruments used in the service of the Chapel-royal being also employed in the performance of the Birth-day and New-year odes.

315

Familiar White's, God save King Colley! cries
God save King Colley! Drury-lane replies:
To Needham's quick the voice triumphal rode,
But pious Needham dropp'd the name of God;
Back to the Devil 52 the last echoes roll,
And Coll! each butcher roars at Hockley-hole.53

;

So when Jove's block descended from on high, (As sings thy great forefather Ogilby,) Loud thunder to its bottom shook the bog,

325

And the hoarse nation croak'd, God save King Log!

330

52 The Devil Tavern, in Fleet street, where these Odes are usually rehearsed before they are performed at Court. Upon which a wit of those times made this epigram:

"When Laureates make Odes, do you ask of what sort?

Do you ask if they 're good, or are evil?

You may judge-from the Devil they come to the Court,
And go from the Court to the Devil."

[The Devil Tavern was Ben Jonson's great place of convivial resort and enjoyment. His leges conviviales, or rules of the club, drawn up in Ben's choice Latin, were placed over the chimney. The house was between Temple Bar and the Middle Temple Gate.]

58 [Hockley-hole was a place near Clerkenwell Green, kept for bear-bait ing, boxing matches, and other coarse amusements and exhibitions.]

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BOOK THE SECOND.

ARGUMENT.

THE king being proclaimed, the solemnity is graced with public games, and sports of various kinds: not instituted by the Hero, as by Æneas in Virgil, but for greater honour by the Goddess in person (in like manner as the games Pythia, Isthmia, &c., were anciently said to be ordained by the gods, and as Thetis herself appearing, according to Homer, Odyss. xxiv. proposed the prizes in honour of her son Achilles). Hither flock the poets and critics, attended, as is but just, with their patrons and booksellers. The goddess is first pleased, for her disport, to propose games to the booksellers, and setteth up the phantom of a poet, which they contend to overtake. The races described, with their divers accidents. Next, the game Then follow the exercises for the poets, of tickling, vociferating, diving: the first holds forth the arts and practices of dedicators, the second of disputants and fustian poets, the third of profound, dark, and dirty party-writers. Lastly, for the critics, the Goddess proposes (with great propriety) an exercise, not of their parts, but their patience, in hearing the works of two voluminous authors, the one in verse and the other in prose, deliberately read, without sleeping: the various effects of which, with the several degrees and manners of their operation, are here set forth; till the whole number, not of critics only, but of spectators, actors, and all present, fall fast asleep; which naturally and necessarily

for a poetess.

ends the game.

IGH on a gorgeous seat,1 that far out-shone

HIGH

Henley's gilt tub,2 or Flecknoe's Irish throne,

1 Parody of Milton, book ii.—

"High on a throne of royal state, that far
Outshone the wealth of Ormuz and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East, with richest hand,
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold,

Satan exalted sate."

He had also

2 The pulpit of a Dissenter is usually called a Tub; but that of Mr. Orator Henley was covered with velvet, and adorned with gold. a fair altar, and over it this extraordinary inscription: "The Primitive Eucharist." See the history of this person, book iii.

5

Or that where on her Curlls3 the public pours,
All-bounteous, fragrant grains and golden showers,
Great Cibber sate: the proud Parnassian sneer,
The conscious simper, and the jealous leer,
Mix on his look: all eyes direct their rays
On him, and crowds turn coxcombs as they gaze.
His peers shine round him with reflected grace,
New edge their dulness, and new bronze their face.
So from the sun's broad beam, in shallow urns
Heaven's twinkling sparks draw light, and point their horns.
Not with more glee, with hands pontific crown'd,
With scarlet hats wide-waving circled round,
Rome in her capitol saw Querno sit,
Throned on seven hills, the antichrist of wit.

And now the Queen, to glad her sons, proclaims
By herald hawkers, high heroic games.
They summon all her race: an endless band
Pours forth, and leaves unpeopled half the land.
A motley mixture in long wigs, in bags,
In silks, in crapes, in garters, and in rags,
From drawing-rooms, from colleges, from garrets,
On horse, on foot, in hacks, and gilded chariots ;
All who true dunces in her cause appear'd,
And all who knew those dunces to reward.
Amid that area wide they took their stand,

Where the tall Maypole once o'erlook'd the Strand,
But now (so Anne and Piety ordain)

A church collects the saints of Drury-lane.
With authors, stationers obey'd the call,
(The field of glory is a field for all).

10

15

20

25

30

3 Edmund Curll stood in the pillory at Charing Cross, in March 1727--8. "This (saith Edmund Curll) is a false assertion-I had indeed the corporal punishment of what the gentlemen of the long robe are pleased jocosely to call 'mounting the rostrum' for one hour; but that scene of action was not in the month of March, but in February." [Carliad, 12mo., p. 19.] And of the history of his being tossed in a blanket, he saith, "Here, Scriblerus! thou leeseth in what thou asserteth concerning the blanket: it was not a blanket, but a rug." p. 25. Much in the same manner, Mr. Cibber remonstrated, that his brothers at Bedlam (mentioned book i.) were not brazen, but blocks; yet our author let it pass unaltered, as a trifle that no way altered

the relationship.