Now spent tallow-candle-grease fatten'd the soil, When "one" struck the clock-and instead of the bird Then the jack fell a-going as if one should sup, Then the hearth rock'd as though it would swallow one up; With fuel from hell, a strange coal-scuttle came, And a self-handled poker made fearful the flame. A cinder shot from it, of size to amaze, (With a bounce, such as Betty ne'er heard in her days,) "Come Betty!"-quoth croaking that non-descript thing, "Come bless the fond arms of your true Cinder-King! Three more Kings, my brothers, are waiting to greet ye, Who-don't take it ill!-must at four o'clock eat ye. "My darling, it must be! do make up your mind; Have a feast and a wedding, each night of our lives, In vain squall'd the cook-maid, and pray'd not to wed; LODGINGS FOR SINGLE GENTLEMEN. GEORGE COLMAN THE YOUNGER. HO has e'er been in London, that overgrown place, Will Waddle, whose temper was studious and lonely, He enter'd his rooms, and to bed he retreated; Next night 'twas the same. And the next. And the next: He perspired like an ox; he was nervous and vex'd; In six months, his acquaintance began much to doubt him : He sent for a doctor; and cried, like a ninny, "I have lost many pounds. Make me well. There's a guinea." The doctor look'd wise :-" A slow fever," he said: Prescribed sudorifics,-and going to bed. "Sudorifics in bed," exclaim'd Will, “ are humbugs! I've enough of them there, without paying for drugs!" Will kick'd out the doctor :-but, when ill indeed, 66 "Look'e, landlord, I think," argued Will, with a grin, I have been so damn'd hot, that I'm sure I caught cold." Quoth the landlord-" Till now, I ne'er had a dispute; "The oven!" says Will. Says the host, "Why this passion? In that excellent bed died three people of fashion. Why so crusty, good Sir ?”—“ Zounds!" cries Will, in a taking, "Who wouldn't be crusty, with half a year's baking?" Will paid for his rooms:-cried the host, with a sneer, "Well, I see you've been going away half a year." "Friend, we can't well agree,—yet no quarrel❞—Will said ;— "But I'd rather not perish, while you make your bread." MAN, in many a country town, we know, Professes openly with death to wrestle; Ent'ring the field against the grimly foe, Arm'd with a mortar and a pestle. Yet, some affirm, no enemies they are; A member of this Esculapian line Or mix a draught, or bleed, or blister, Of occupations these were quantum suff. : A few score mortals from the world, He made amends by bringing others into't. His fame full six miles round the country ran; Benjamin Bolus, though in trade, (Which oftentimes will genius fetter) Read works of fancy, it is said, And cultivated the Belles Lettres. And why should this be thought so odd? Can't men have taste who cure a phthisic; Of poetry though patron-god, Apollo patronises physic. Bolus loved verse ;-and took so much delight in't, That his prescriptions he resolved to write in't. No opportunity he e'er let pass Of writing the directions, on his labels, Or, rather, like the lines in Hudibras. |