A BOAR (interrupting him.)

Does any one accuse her of?

What

PURGANAX.

Why, no one

Makes any positive accusation ;-but

There were hints dropped, and so the privy wizards
Conceived that it became them to advise
His majesty to investigate their truth;-
Not for his own sake; he could be content
To let his wife play any pranks she pleased,
If, by that sufferance, he could please the pigs;
But then he fears the morals of the swine,
The sows especially and what effect
It might produce upon the purity and
Religion of the rising generation

Of sucking pigs, if it could be suspected
That Queen Iona-

FIRST BOAR.

Well, go on; we long

To hear what she can possibly have done.

[A pause.

PURGANAX.

Why, it is hinted, that a certain bull

[feed

Thus much is known:-the milk-white bulls that

Beside Clitumnus and the crystal lakes

Of the Cisalpine mountains, in fresh dews

Of lotus-grass and blossoming asphodel,

Sleeking their silken hair, and with sweet breath
Loading the morning winds until they faint
With living fragrance, are so beautiful!-
Well, I say nothing: but Europa rode
On such a one from Asia into Crete,
And the enamoured sea grew calm beneath
His gliding beauty. And Pasiphae,
Iona's grandmother, but she is innocent!
And that both you and I, and all assert.

FIRST BOAR.

Most innocent!

PURGANAX.

Behold this BAG; a bag

SECOND BOAR.

Oh! no GREEN BAGS!! Jealousy's eyes are green, Scorpions are green, and water-snakes, and efts, And verdigris, and—

PURGANAX.

Honourable swine,

In piggish souls can prepossessions reign?
Allow me to remind you, grass is green-
All flesh is grass ;-no bacon but is flesh-
Ye are but bacon. This divining BAG
(Which is not green, but only bacon colour)
Is filled with liquor, which if sprinkled o'er
A woman guilty of-we all know what-

Makes her so hideous, till she finds one blind,
She never can commit the like again.

If innocent, she will turn into an angel,

And rain down blessings in the shape of comfits As she flies up to heaven. Now, my proposal Is to convert her sacred majesty

Into an angel, (as I am sure we shall do,)
By pouring on her head this mystic water.
[Showing the Bag.

I know that she is innocent; I wish
Only to prove her so to all the world.

FIRST BOAR.

Excellent, just, and noble Purganax!

SECOND BOAR.

How glorious it will be to see her majesty
Flying above our heads, her petticoats
Streaming like-like-like-

THIRD BOAR.

Any thing.

PURGANAX.

Oh, no

But like a standard of an admiral's ship,
Or like the banner of a conquering host,
Or like a cloud dyed in the dying day,
Unravelled on the blast from a white mountain;
Or like a meteor or a war-steed's mane,

Or water-fall from a dizzy precipice
Scattered upon the wind.

FIRST BOAR.

Or a cow's tail,—

SECOND BOAR.

Or any thing, as the learned boar observed.

PURGANAX.

Gentlemen boars, I move a resolution,
That her most sacred majesty should be
Invited to attend the feast of Famine,
And to receive upon her chaste white body
Dews of apotheosis from this bag.

[A great confusion is heard of the Pigs out of Doors, which

communicates itself to those within. During the first Strophe, the doors of the Sty are staved in, and a number of exceedingly lean Pigs and Sows and Boars rush in.

SEMICHORUS I.

No! Yes!

SEMICHORUS II.

Yes! No!

SEMICHORUS I.

A law!

SEMICHORUS 11.

A flaw!

SEMICHORUS 1.

Porkers, we shall lose our wash,
Or must share it with the lean pigs!

FIRST BOAR.

Order! order! be not rash!
Was there ever such a scene, pigs!

AN OLD SOW (rushing in.)

I never saw so fine a dash

Since I first began to wean pigs.

SECOND BOAR (solemnly.)

The Queen will be an angel time enough.
I vote, in form of an amendment, that
Purganax rub a little of that stuff
Upon his face-

PURGANAX.

[His heart is seen to beat through his waistcoat.

Gods! What would ye be at?

SEMICHORUS I.

Purganax has plainly shown a
Cloven foot and jack-daw feather.

VOL. III.

SEMICHORUS II.

I vote Swellfoot and Iona

Try the magic test together:

3