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Attention seizes every ear;

We pant for the description here:
If ever dulness left thy brow,

"Pindar," we say, "'twill leave thee now."
But oh! old Dulness' son anointed
His mother never disappointed!--
And here we all were left to seek
A dimple in F-rd-ce's cheek!

And could you really discover,
In gazing those sweet beauties over,
No other charm, no winning grace,
Adorning either mind or face,
But one poor dimple, to express
The quintessence of loveliness?

....Mark'd you her cheek of rosy hue?
Mark'd you her eye of sparkling blue?
That eye, in liquid circles moving;
That cheek abash'd at Man's approving;
The one, Love's arrows darting round;
The other, blushing at the wound:
Did she not speak, did she not move,
Now Pallas-now the Queen of Love!

*

We see the Dame, in rustic pride,
A bunch of keys to grace her side,
Stalking across the well-swept entry,
To hold her council in the pantry;
Or, with prophetic soul, foretelling
The peas will boil well by the shelling;
Or, bustling in her private closet,
Prepare her lord his morning posset;
And while the hallow'd mixture thickens,
Signing death-warrants for the chickens:
Else, greatly pensive, poring o'er
Accounts her cook hath thumb'd before;
One eye cast up upon that great book,
Yclep'd The Family Receipt Book ;
By which she's rul'd in all her courses,
From stewing figs to drenching horses.

Then pans and pickling skillets rise,
In dreadful lustre, to our eyes,
With store of sweetmeats, rang'd in order,
And potted nothings on the border;

While salves and caudle-cups between,
With squalling children, close the scene.

O! should your genius ever rise,
And make you Laureate in the skies,
I'd hold my life, in twenty years,
You'd spoil the music of the spheres.
-Nay, should the rapture-breathing Nine
In one celestial concert join,

Their sovereign's power to rehearse,
-Were you to furnish men with verse,
By Jove, I'd fly the heavenly throng,
Tho' Phoebus play'd and Linley sung.

SHERIDAN'S VERS DE SOCIETE.

In what are called Vers de Société, or drawing-room verses, he took great delight; and there remain among his papers several sketches of these trifles. Mr. Moore once heard him repeat, in a ball-room, some verses which he had written on Waltzing, and of which he has given us the following:

"With tranquil step, and timid downcast glance,
Behold the well-pair'd couple now advance.
In such sweet posture our first Parents mov'd,

While, hand in hand, through Eden's bowers they rov'd
Ere yet the Devil, with promise foul and false,

Turn'd their poor heads and taught them how to Walse.
One hand grasps hers, the other holds her hip-

*

*

*

For so the Law's laid down by Baron Trip."*

He had a sort of hereditary fancy for difficult trifling in poetry; particularly for that sort which consists in rhyming to the same word through a long string of couplets, till every rhyme that the language supplies for it is exhausted. The following are specimens from a poem of this kind, which he wrote on the loss of a lady's trunk:

*This gentleman, whose name suits so aptly as a legal authority on the subject of Waltzing, was, at the time these verses were written, well known in the dancing circles.

MY TRUNK !

(To Anne.)

Have you heard, my dear Anne, how my spirits are sunk? Have you heard of the cause? Oh, the loss of my Trunk! For exertion or firmness I've never yet slunk ;

But my fortitude's gune

with the loss of my Trunk! Stout Lucy, my maid, is a damsel of spunk ;

Yet she weeps night and day for the loss of my Trunk!
I'd better turn nun, and coquet with a monk;

For with whom can I flirt without aid from my Trunk?

*

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*

*

Accurs'd be the thief, the old rascally hunks,
Who rifles the fair, and lays hands on their Trunks!
He who robs the King's stores of the least bit of junk,

Is hang'd-while he's safe, who has plunder'd my Trunk!

*

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*

*

*

There's a phrase amongst lawyers, when nunc's put for tunc;
But, tunc and nunc both, must I grieve for my Trunk!
Huge leaves of that great commentator, old Brunck,
Perhaps was the paper that lin'd my poor Trunk !
But my rhymes are all out!-for I dare not use st―k ;*
'Twould shock Sheridan more than the loss of my Trunk!

From another of these trifles, (which, no doubt, produced much gaiety at the breakfast-table,) the following extracts will be sufficient:—

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Lord Petre's house was built by Payne-
No mortal architect made Jane.

If hearts had windows, through the pane
Of mine you'd see sweet Lady Jane.

*

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At breakfast I could scarce refrain
From tears at missing lovely Jane;
Nine rolls I eat, in hopes to gain

The roll that might have fall'n to Jane, &c.

He had a particular horror of this word.

Another, written on a Mr. Bigg, contains some ludicrous

couplets :

I own he's not fam'd for a reel or a jig,

Tom Sheridan there surpasses Tom Bigg.
For, lam'd in one thigh, he is obliged to go zig-

Zag, like a crab-so no dancer is Bigg.

Those who think him a coxcomb, or call him a prig,

How little they know of the mind of my Bigg!

Though he ne'er can be mine, Hope will catch a twig-
Two Deaths-and I yet may become Mrs. Bigg.

Oh give me, with him, but a cottage and pig,

And content I would live on Beans, Bacon, and Bigg.

A few more of these light productions remain among his papers, but their wit is gone with those for whom they were written; the wings of Time "eripuere jocos."

Of a very different description are the following striking and spirited fragments, written by him, apparently, about the year 1794, and addressed to Lord Howe and the other naval heroes of that period, to console them for the neglect they experienced from the Government, while ribands and titles were lavished on the Whig Seceders :

Never mind them, brave black Dick,

Though they've played thee such a trick-
Damn their ribands and their garters,

Get you to your post and quarters.

Look upon the azure sea,

There's a Sailor's Taffety!
Mark the Zodiac's radiant bow,
That's a collar fit for HOWE!—
And, than P-tl-d's brighter far,
The Pole shall furnish you a Star?

Damn their ribands and their garters,

Get you to your post and quarters.

Think, on what things are ribands shower'd

The two Sir Georges-Y

and H

!

Look to what rubbish stars will stick,

To Dicky Hn and Johnny D—k!
Would it be for your country's good,
That you might pass for Alec. Hd,

Or, perhaps and worse by half-
To be mistaken for Sir R- -h!
Would you, like C, pine with spleen,
Because your bit of silk was green ?
Would you, like C, change your side,
To have your silk new dipt and dyed ?-
Like him, exclaim, 'My riband's hue
Was green-and now, by Heay'ns! 'tis blue,
And, like him-stain your honour too!
Damn their ribands and their garters,
Get you to your post and quarters.
On the foes of Britain close,

While B- -k garters his Dutch hose
And cons, with spectacles on nose,
(While to battle you advance,)
His "Honi soit qui mal y pense."

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