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Since we both have play'd the truant,
As to both is too well known,

I will rove no more if you won't,*
But be ever your's alone.

SIMON.

Yonder hoary sky-capp'd mountain
Shall be seated in the lake,
Battenkiln shall seek its fountain,

Ere my Sophy I forsake.

SOPHY.

Trouts shall browse on highest spruces,

Otter-Creekt shall turn to wine,

Nettles spring up flower-de-luces,

If I am not ever thine.t

* Quid si prisca redit Venus, &c.

† Name of a river in Vermont.

In other words, "Tecum vivere amem, tecum obeam libens."

SIMON SPUNKEY'S

POLITICAL PEPPER-POT.

WRITTEN IN 1798.

Simon attunes his harp, more pleasant
Than reed of bland Arcadia's peasant,
And chaunteth poetry, more prettily
Than bard of ancient Greece or Italy.
Then seeth sights, sublime and dreadful,
Which fill with horrour every head full ;
Sees sansculottes, arm'd cap-a-pe,
To force the nations to be free,

Who do ten times more mischief, latterly,
Than erst did Alarick, or Attila.

Now, having found his former track,

The poet, nimbly, trips it back

Over the Union courses rapid,
And squibs each jacobinick saphead.
Such flights poetick few can equal,
As is apparent in the sequel.

OLD Time, a persevering codger,

Like debtor dunn'd a nimble dodger,
Who, having scamper'd one inch by you,
Will never afterwards come nigh you-
Whose foretop one might hide a cat in,
Though bald behind as school-boy's latin-
Who never bates his usual jog,

Nor stops his steed, for oats nor grog

Who never yet, by saint, nor sinner,
Was brib'd to stay till after dinner,

But Jehu-like, drives all this world round
More swift than top by truant twirl'd round-
Who lowers at love-sick poetaster,

But puffs productions of a master;
Before whom Grandeur's gorgeous palaces
Melt like a dream's fantastick fallacies,
Now jogs the bard, with shag-bark* elbow,
And aims, with lifted scythe, a fell blow
To level Simon's reputation,
Unless the poet scrawl narration,
A kind of Hudibrastick summary
Of politicks, and other flummery,
Of matters tragical and queer,
Which mark the annals of last year,
And with a congée, low and pleasant,
Wish people happy through the present.

Now, gentle reader, take the trouble To mount my nag, he carries double,

* There is a species of the walnut tree, which, from the roughness of its bark, is called “shag-bark.”

I mean my Pegasus, so antick,

And bid him canter cross th' Atlantick;

While we, more close than bride and groom stick,

And ride like witches on a broomstick!

And first mad Gallia's coast we light on,
And then to Paris travel right on,
Where Discord makes infernal rout,
To see what Frenchmen are about.

Five tyrants, chosen from the mob,
Well known in every dirty job,
By nature meant to bore and hector ye,
Compose th' immaculate Directory :
What cruel wars these fellows carry on,
While Até blows the blasting clarion.
Behold their Corsican commander,
The modern would-be Alexander;
Like Death he marches in terrorem,
And almost drives. the Alps before him!

Mantua surrenders, Wurmser's taken, The German empire sadly shaken; Striving to manage such a chap,

E'en mighty Charles meets dire mishap!

The emperour trembles on his throne,
And scarcely thinks his head his own;
But ruminates on sad affairs,

And makes his will, and says his prayers!

Now Frenchmen rob the Virgin Mary,
Stand not in awe of pope's tiara,
But bid Italia's peasants learn

The art to "turn and overturn;"
Excite, with vigour most surprising,
A rage for revolutionizing.

In numerous lying proclamations,
Now promise freedom to all nations;
Persuade the mob, by vast exertion,
True liberty is French coercion !
Now rob and plunder where they can,
To put in force the "rights of man.”
Build commonwealths, in twenty places
Founded on such substantial bases,
That I dare venture you a sous
They'll last, at least a month or two!

Of many battles might we tell

On Rhine, on Sambre, and Moselle ;

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