The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D., Volume 2

     If Noisy Tom[1] should in the senate prate,
     "That he would answer both for church and state;
     And, farther, to demonstrate his affection,
     Would take the kingdom into his protection;"
     All mortals must be curious to inquire,
     Who could this coxcomb be, and who his sire?
     "What! thou, the spawn of him[2] who shamed our isle,
     Traitor, assassin, and informer vile!
     Though by the female side,[3] you proudly bring,
     To mend your breed, the murderer of a king:
     What was thy grandsire,[4] but a mountaineer,
     Who held a cabin for ten groats a-year:
     Whose master Moore[5] preserved him from the halter,
     For stealing cows! nor could he read the Psalter!
     Durst thou, ungrateful, from the senate chase
     Thy founder's grandson,[6] and usurp his place?
     Just Heaven! to see the dunghill bastard brood
     Survive in thee, and make the proverb good?[7]
     Then vote a worthy citizen to jail,[8]
     In spite of justice, and refuse his bail!"[9]

     [Footnote 1: Sir Thomas Prendergast. See post, p. 266.]

     [Footnote 2: The father of Sir Thomas Prendergast, who engaged in a plot
     to murder King William III; but, to avoid being hanged, turned informer
     against his associates, for which he was rewarded with a good estate, and
     made a baronet.—F.]

     [Footnote 3: Cadogan's family.—F.]

     [Footnote 4: A poor thieving cottager under Mr. Moore, condemned at
     Clonmel assizes to be hanged for stealing cows.—F.]

     [Footnote 5: The grandfather of Guy Moore, Esq., who procured him a
     pardon.—F.]

     [Footnote 6: Guy Moore was fairly elected member of Parliament for
     Clonmel; but Sir Thomas, depending upon his interest with a certain party
     then prevailing, and since known by the title of parson-hunters,
     petitioned the House against him; out of which he was turned upon
     pretence of bribery, which the paying of his lawful debts was then voted
     to be.—F.]

     [Footnote 7: "Save a thief from the gallows, and he will cut your
     throat."—F.]

     [Footnote 8: Mr. George Faulkner. Mr. Sergeant Bettesworth, a member of
     the Irish Parliament, having made a complaint to the House of Commons
     against the "Satire on Quadrille," they voted Faulkner the printer into
     custody (who was confined closely in prison three days, when he was in a
     very bad state of health, and his life in much danger) for not
     discovering the author.—F.]

     [Footnote 9: Among the poems, etc., preserved by Mr. Smith are verses on
     the same subject and person with these in the text. The verses are given
     in Swift's works, edit. Scott, xii, 448.—W. E. B.]

     Make Rundle bishop! fie for shame!
     An Arian to usurp the name!
     A bishop in the isle of saints!
     How will his brethren make complaints!
     Dare any of the mitred host
     Confer on him the Holy Ghost:
     In mother church to breed a variance,
     By coupling orthodox with Arians?
       Yet, were he Heathen, Turk, or Jew:
     What is there in it strange or new?
     For, let us hear the weak pretence,
     His brethren find to take offence;
     Of whom there are but four at most,
     Who know there is a Holy Ghost;
     The rest, who boast they have conferr'd it,
     Like Paul's Ephesians, never-heard it;
     And, when they gave it, well 'tis known
     They gave what never was their own.
       Rundle a bishop! well he may;
     He's still a Christian more than they.
       We know the subject of their quarrels;
     The man has learning, sense, and morals.
       There is a reason still more weighty;
     'Tis granted he believes a Deity.
     Has every circumstance to please us,
     Though fools may doubt his faith in Jesus.
     But why should he with that be loaded,
     Now twenty years from court exploded?
     And is not this objection odd
     From rogues who ne'er believed a God?
     For liberty a champion stout,
     Though not so Gospel-ward devout.
     While others, hither sent to save us
     Come but to plunder and enslave us;
     Nor ever own'd a power divine,
     But Mammon, and the German line.
       Say, how did Rundle undermine 'em?
     Who shew'd a better jus divinum?
     From ancient canons would not vary,
     But thrice refused episcopari.
       Our bishop's predecessor, Magus,
     Would offer all the sands of Tagus;
     Or sell his children, house, and lands,
     For that one gift, to lay on hands:
     But all his gold could not avail
     To have the spirit set to sale.
     Said surly Peter, "Magus, prithee,
     Be gone: thy money perish with thee."
     Were Peter now alive, perhaps,
     He might have found a score of chaps,
     Could he but make his gift appear
     In rents three thousand pounds a-year.
       Some fancy this promotion odd,
     As not the handiwork of God;
     Though e'en the bishops disappointed
     Must own it made by God's anointed,
     And well we know, the congi regal
     Is more secure as well as legal;
     Because our lawyers all agree,
     That bishoprics are held in fee.
       Dear Baldwin[1] chaste, and witty Crosse,[2]
     How sorely I lament your loss!
     That such a pair of wealthy ninnies
     Should slip your time of dropping guineas;
     For, had you made the king your debtor,
     Your title had been so much better.

     [Footnote 1: Richard Baldwin, Provost of Trinity College in 1717. He left
     behind him many natural children.—Scott.]

     [Footnote 2: Rector of St. Mary's Dublin, in 1722; before which time he
     had been chaplain to the Smyrna Company. See the Epistolary
     Correspondence, May 26, 1720.—Scott.]

     Friend Rundle fell, with grievous bump,
     Upon his reverential rump.
     Poor rump! thou hadst been better sped,
     Hadst thou been join'd to Boulter's head;
     A head, so weighty and profound,
     Would needs have kept thee from the ground.

     The immediate provocation to this fierce satire upon the Irish Parliament
     was the introduction of a Bill to put an end to the tithe on pasturage,
     called agistment, and thus to free the landlords from a legal payment,
     with severe loss to the Church.

     As I stroll the city, oft I
     See a building large and lofty,
     Not a bow-shot from the college;
     Half the globe from sense and knowledge
     By the prudent architect,
     Placed against the church direct,[1]
     Making good my grandam's jest,
     "Near the church"—you know the rest.[2]
       Tell us what the pile contains?
     Many a head that has no brains.
     These demoniacs let me dub
     With the name of Legion[3] Club.
     Such assemblies, you might swear,
     Meet when butchers bait a bear:
     Such a noise, and such haranguing,
     When a brother thief's a hanging:
     Such a rout and such a rabble
     Run to hear Jackpudding gabble:
     Such a crowd their ordure throws
     On a far less villain's nose.
       Could I from the building's top
     Hear the rattling thunder drop,
     While the devil upon the roof
     (If the devil be thunder proof)
     Should with poker fiery red
     Crack the stones, and melt the lead;
     Drive them down on every skull,
     When the den of thieves is full;
     Quite destroy that harpies' nest;
     How might then our isle be blest!
     For divines allow, that God
     Sometimes makes the devil his rod;
     And the gospel will inform us,
     He can punish sins enormous.
       Yet should Swift endow the schools,
     For his lunatics and fools,
     With a rood or two of land,
     I allow the pile may stand.
     You perhaps will ask me, Why so?
     But it is with this proviso:
     Since the house is like to last,
     Let the royal grant be pass'd,
     That the club have right to dwell
     Each within his proper cell,
     With a passage left to creep in
     And a hole above for peeping.
       Let them, when they once get in,
     Sell the nation for a pin;
     While they sit a-picking straws,
     Let them rave of making laws;
     While they never hold their tongue,
     Let them dabble in their dung:
     Let them form a grand committee,
     How to plague and starve the city;
     Let them stare, and storm, and frown,
     When they see a clergy gown;
     Let them, ere they crack a louse,
     Call for th'orders of the house;
     Let them, with their gosling quills,
     Scribble senseless heads of bills;
     We may, while they strain their throats,
     Wipe our a—s with their votes.
       Let Sir Tom,[4] that rampant ass,
     Stuff his guts with flax and grass;
     But before the priest he fleeces,
     Tear the Bible all to pieces:
     At the parsons, Tom, halloo, boy,
     Worthy offspring of a shoeboy,
     Footman, traitor, vile seducer,
     Perjured rebel, bribed accuser,
     Lay thy privilege aside,
     From Papist sprung, and regicide;
     Fall a-working like a mole,
     Raise the dirt about thy hole.
       Come, assist me, Muse obedient!
     Let us try some new expedient;
     Shift the scene for half an hour,
     Time and place are in thy power.
     Thither, gentle Muse, conduct me;
     I shall ask, and you instruct me.
       See, the Muse unbars the gate;
     Hark, the monkeys, how they prate!
       All ye gods who rule the soul:[5]
     Styx, through Hell whose waters roll!
     Let me be allow'd to tell
     What I heard in yonder Hell.
       Near the door an entrance gapes,[6]
     Crowded round with antic shapes,
     Poverty, and Grief, and Care,
     Causeless Joy, and true Despair;
     Discord periwigg'd with snakes,'[7]
     See the dreadful strides she takes!
       By this odious crew beset,[8]
     I began to rage and fret,
     And resolved to break their pates,
     Ere we enter'd at the gates;
     Had not Clio in the nick[9]
     Whisper'd me, "Lay down your stick."
     What! said I, is this a mad-house?
     These, she answer'd, are but shadows,
     Phantoms bodiless and vain,
     Empty visions of the brain.
       In the porch Briareus stands,[10]
     Shows a bribe in all his hands;
     Briareus the secretary,
     But we mortals call him Carey.[11]
     When the rogues their country fleece,
     They may hope for pence a-piece.
       Clio, who had been so wise
     To put on a fool's disguise,
     To bespeak some approbation,
     And be thought a near relation,
     When she saw three hundred[12] brutes
     All involved in wild disputes,
     Roaring till their lungs were spent,

     Now a new misfortune feels,
     Dreading to be laid by th' heels.
     Never durst a Muse before
     Enter that infernal door;
     Clio, stifled with the smell,
     Into spleen and vapours fell,
     By the Stygian steams that flew
     From the dire infectious crew.
     Not the stench of Lake Avernus
     Could have more offended her nose;
     Had she flown but o'er the top,
     She had felt her pinions drop.
     And by exhalations dire,
     Though a goddess, must expire.
     In a fright she crept away,
     Bravely I resolved to stay.
     When I saw the keeper frown,
     Tipping him with half-a-crown,
     Now, said I, we are alone,
     Name your heroes one by one.
       Who is that hell-featured brawler?
     Is it Satan? No; 'tis Waller.[13]
     In what figure can a bard dress
     Jack the grandson of Sir Hardress?
     Honest keeper, drive him further,
     In his looks are Hell and murther;
     See the scowling visage drop,
     Just as when he murder'd Throp.[14]
       Keeper, show me where to fix
     On the puppy pair of Dicks:
     By their lantern jaws and leathern,
     You might swear they both are brethren:
     Dick Fitzbaker,[15] Dick the player,[15]
     Old acquaintance, are you there?
     Dear companions, hug and kiss,
     Toast Old Glorious in your piss;
     Tie them, keeper, in a tether,
     Let them starve and stink together;
     Both are apt to be unruly,
     Lash them daily, lash them duly;
     Though 'tis hopeless to reclaim them,
     Scorpion's rods, perhaps, may tame them.
       Keeper, yon old dotard smoke,
     Sweetly snoring in his cloak:
     Who is he? 'Tis humdrum Wynne,[16]
     Half encompass'd by his kin:
     There observe the tribe of Bingham,[17]
     For he never fails to bring 'em;
     And that base apostate Vesey
     With Bishop's scraps grown fat and greasy,
     While Wynne sleeps the whole debate,
     They submissive round him wait;
     (Yet would gladly see the hunks,
     In his grave, and search his trunks,)
     See, they gently twitch his coat,
     Just to yawn and give his vote,
     Always firm in his vocation,
     For the court against the nation.
       Those are Allens Jack and Bob,[18]
     First in every wicked job,
     Son and brother to a queer
     Brain-sick brute, they call a peer.
     We must give them better quarter,
     For their ancestor trod mortar,
     And at Hoath, to boast his fame,
     On a chimney cut his name.
       There sit Clements, Dilks, and Carter;[19]
     Who for Hell would die a martyr.
     Such a triplet could you tell
     Where to find on this side Hell?
     Gallows Carter, Dilks, and Clements,
     Souse them in their own excrements.
     Every mischief's in their hearts;
     If they fail, 'tis want of parts.
       Bless us! Morgan,[20] art thou there, man?
     Bless mine eyes! art thou the chairman?
     Chairman to yon damn'd committee!
     Yet I look on thee with pity.
     Dreadful sight! what, learned Morgan
     Metamorphosed to a Gorgon![21]
     For thy horrid looks, I own,
     Half convert me to a stone.
     Hast thou been so long at school,
     Now to turn a factious tool?
     Alma Mater was thy mother,
     Every young divine thy brother.
     Thou, a disobedient varlet,
     Treat thy mother like a harlot!
     Thou ungrateful to thy teachers,
     Who are all grown reverend preachers!
     Morgan, would it not surprise one!
     To turn thy nourishment to poison!
     When you walk among your books,
     They reproach you with their looks;
     Bind them fast, or from their shelves
     They'll come down to right themselves:
     Homer, Plutarch, Virgil, Flaccus,
     All in arms, prepare to back us:
     Soon repent, or put to slaughter
     Every Greek and Roman author.
     Will you, in your faction's phrase,
     Send the clergy all to graze;[22]
     And to make your project pass,
     Leave them not a blade of grass?
     How I want thee, humorous Hogarth!
     Thou, I hear, a pleasant rogue art.
     Were but you and I acquainted,
     Every monster should be painted:
     You should try your graving tools
     On this odious group of fools;
     Draw the beasts as I describe them:
     Form their features while I gibe them;
     Draw them like; for I assure you,
     You will need no car'catura;     Draw them so that we may trace
     All the soul in every face.
       Keeper, I must now retire,
     You have done what I desire:
     But I feel my spirits spent
     With the noise, the sight, the scent.
     "Pray, be patient; you shall find
     Half the best are still behind!
     You have hardly seen a score;
     I can show two hundred more."
     Keeper, I have seen enough.
     Taking then a pinch of snuff,
     I concluded, looking round them,
     "May their god, the devil, confound them!"[23]

     [Footnote 1: St. Andrew's Church, close to the site of the Parliament
     House.]

     [Footnote 2: On a scrap of paper, containing the memorials respecting the
     Dean's family, there occur the following lines, apparently the rough
     draught of the passage in the text:
       "Making good that proverb odd,
       Near the church and far from God,
       Against the church direct is placed,
       Like it both in head and waist."—Scott.]

     [Footnote 3: From the answer of the demoniac that the devils which
     possessed him were Legion.—St. Mark, v, 9.—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 4: Sir Thomas Prendergast, a prominent opponent of the clergy,
     and a servile supporter of the government. See the verses on "Noisy Tom,"
     ante, p. 260.]

     [Footnote 5: "Di quibus imperium est animarum umbraeque silentes
     Sit mihi fas audita loqui."—VIRG., Aen., vi, 264.]

     [Footnote 6: "Vestibulum ante ipsum primisque in faucibus Orci
     Luctus et ultrices posuere cubilia Curae;"—273.]

     [Footnote 7:"——Discordia demens
     Vipereum crinem vittis innexa cruentis."—281.]

     [Footnote 8: "Corripit his subita trepidus,
     ——strictamque aciem venientibus offert."—290.]

     [Footnote 9: "Et ni docta comes tenues sine corpore vitas."—VIRG.,
     Aen., vi, 291.]

     [Footnote 10: "Et centumgeminus Briareus."—287.]

     [Footnote 11: The Right Honourable Walter Carey. He was secretary to the
     Duke of Dorset when lord-lieutenant of Ireland. The Duke of Dorset
     came to Ireland in 1731.]

     [Footnote 12: "Two hundred" written by Swift in the margin.—Forster.]

     [Footnote 13: John Waller, Esq., member for the borough of Dongaile. He
     was grandson to Sir Hardress Waller, one of the regicide judges, and who
     concurred with them in passing sentence on Charles I. This Sir
     Hardressmarried the daughter and co-heir of John Dowdal of Limerick, in
     Ireland,
     by which alliance he became so connected with the country, that after the
     rebellion was over, the family made it their residence.—Scott.]

     [Footnote 14: Rev. Roger Throp, whose death was said to have been
     occasioned by the persecution which he suffered from Waller. His case was
     published by his brother, and never answered, containing such a scene of
     petty vexatious persecutions as is almost incredible; the cause being the
     refusal of Mr. Throp to compound, for a compensation totally inadequate,
     some of the rights of his living which affected Waller's estate. In 1739,
     a petition was presented to the House of Commons by his brother, Robert
     Throp, gentleman, complaining of this persecution, and applying to
     parliament for redress, relative to the number of attachments granted by
     the King's Bench, in favour of his deceased brother, and which could not
     be executed against the said Waller, on account of the privilege of
     Parliament, etc. But this petition was rejected by the House, nem. con.     The Dean seems to have employed his pen against Waller. See a letter from
     Mrs. Whiteway to Swift, Nov. 15, 1735, edit. Scott, xviii, p.
     414.—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 15: Richard Tighe, so called because descended from a baker who
     supplied Cromwell's army with bread. Bettesworth is termed the player,
     from his pompous enunciation.]

     [Footnote 16: "Right Honourable Owen Wynne, county of Sligo.-Owen Wynne,
     Esq., borough of Sligo.—John Wynne, Esq., borough of Castlebar."]

     [Footnote 17: "Sir John Bingham, Bart., county of Mayo.—His brother,
     Henry Bingham, sat in parliament for some time for Castlebar."]

     [Footnote 18: John Allen represented the borough of Carysfort; Robert
     Allen the county of Wicklow. The former was son, and the latter brother
     to Joshua, the second Viscount Allen, hated and satirized by Swift, under
     the name of Traulus. The ancestor of the Allens, as has been elsewhere
     noticed, was an architect in the latter end of Queen Elizabeth's reign;
     and was employed as such by many of the nobility, particularly Lord
     Howth. He settled in Ireland, and was afterwards consulted by Lord
     Stafford in some of his architectural plans.—Scott.]

     [Footnote 19: There were then two Clements in parliament, brothers,
     Nathaniel and Henry. Michael Obrien Dilks represented the borough of
     Castlemartye. He was barrack-master-general.]

     [Footnote 20: Doctor Marcus Antonius (which Swift calls his "heathenish
     Christian name") Morgan, chairman to that committee to whom was referred
     the petition of the farmers, graziers, etc. against tithe agistment. On
     this petition the House reported, and agreed that it deserved the
     strongest support.]

     [Footnote 21: Whose hair consisted of snakes, and who turned all she
     looked upon to stone.—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 22: A suggestion that if the tithe of agistment were
     abolished, the clergy might be sent to graze.—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 23: On the margin of a Broadside containing this poem is
     written by Swift:
       "Except the righteous Fifty Two
       To whom immortal honour's due,
       Take them, Satan, as your due
       All except the Fifty Two."—Forster.     probably the number of those who opposed the Bill.—W. E. B.]

     Better we all were in our graves,
     Than live in slavery to slaves;
     Worse than the anarchy at sea,
     Where fishes on each other prey;
     Where every trout can make as high rants
     O'er his inferiors, as our tyrants;
     And swagger while the coast is clear:
     But should a lordly pike appear,
     Away you see the varlet scud,
     Or hide his coward snout in mud.
     Thus, if a gudgeon meet a roach,
     He dares not venture to approach;
     Yet still has impudence to rise,
     And, like Domitian,[2] leap at flies.

     [Footnote 1: Mr. Faulkner, for printing the "Proposal for the better
     Regulation and Improvement of Quadrille."]

     [Footnote 2: "Inter initia principatus cotidie secretum sibi horarum
     sumere solebat, nec quicquam amplius quam muscas captare ac stilo
     praeacuto configere; ut cuidam interroganti, essetne quis intus cum
     Caesare, non absurde responsum sit a Vibio Crispo, ne muscam quidem"
     (Suet. 3).—W. E. B.]

     "Qui color ater erat, nunc est contrarius atro."[1]

     WITH singing of ballads, and crying of news,
     With whitening of buckles, and blacking of shoes,
     Did Hartley set out, both shoeless and shirtless,
     And moneyless too, but not very dirtless;
     Two pence he had gotten by begging, that's all;
     One bought him a brush, and one a black ball;
     For clouts at a loss he could not be much,
     The clothes on his back as being but such;
     Thus vamp'd and accoutred, with clouts, ball, and brush,
     He gallantly ventured his fortune to push:
     Vespasian[2] thus, being bespatter'd with dirt,
     Was omen'd to be Rome's emperor for't.
     But as a wise fiddler is noted, you know,
     To have a good couple of strings to one bow;
     So Hartley[3] judiciously thought it too little,
     To live by the sweat of his hands and his spittle:
     He finds out another profession as fit,
     And straight he becomes a retailer of wit.
     One day he cried—"Murders, and songs, and great news!"
     Another as loudly—"Here blacken your shoes!"
     At Domvile's[4] full often he fed upon bits,
     For winding of jacks up, and turning of spits;
     Lick'd all the plates round, had many a grubbing,
     And now and then got from the cook-maid a drubbing;
     Such bastings effect upon him could have none:
     The dog will be patient that's struck with a bone.
     Sir Thomas, observing this Hartley withal
     So expert and so active at brushes and ball,
     Was moved with compassion, and thought it a pity
     A youth should be lost, that had been so witty:
     Without more ado, he vamps up my spark,
     And now we'll suppose him an eminent clerk!
     Suppose him an adept in all the degrees
     Of scribbling cum dasho, and hooking of fees;
     Suppose him a miser, attorney, per bill,
     Suppose him a courtier—suppose what you will—
     Yet, would you believe, though I swore by the Bible,
     That he took up two news-boys for crying the libel?

     [Footnote 1: Variation from Ovid, "Met.," ii, 541:
     "Qui color albus erat, nunc est contrarius albo."—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 2: So in Hudibras, Pt. II, Canto II:
       "Vespasian being dawb'd with Durt,
       Was destin'd to the Empire for't
       And from a Scavinger did come
       To be a mighty Prince in Rome."]

     [Footnote 3: Squire Hartley Hutcheson, "that zealous prosecutor of
     hawkers and libels," who signed Faulkner's committal to prison. See
     "Prose Works," vii, 234.—W. E. B.]

     [Footnote 4: Sir T. Domvile, patentee of the Hanaper office.—F.]

       But he by bawling news about,
       And aptly using brush and clout,
       A justice of the peace became,
       To punish rogues who do the same.

     I sing the man of courage tried,
     O'errun with ignorance and pride,
     Who boldly hunted out disgrace
     With canker'd mind, and hideous face;
     The first who made (let none deny it)
     The libel-vending rogues be quiet.
       The fact was glorious, we must own,
     For Hartley was before unknown,
     Contemn'd I mean;—for who would chuse
     So vile a subject for the Muse?
       'Twas once the noblest of his wishes
     To fill his paunch with scraps from dishes,
     For which he'd parch before the grate,
     Or wind the jack's slow-rising weight,
     (Such toils as best his talents fit,)
     Or polish shoes, or turn the spit;
     But, unexpectedly grown rich in
     Squire Domvile's family and kitchen,
     He pants to eternize his name,
     And takes the dirty road to fame;
     Believes that persecuting wit
     Will prove the surest way to it;
     So with a colonel[1] at his back,
     The Libel feels his first attack;
     He calls it a seditious paper,
     Writ by another patriot Drapier;
     Then raves and blunders nonsense thicker
     Than alderman o'ercharged with liquor:
     And all this with design, no doubt,
     To hear his praises hawk'd about;
     To send his name through every street,
     Which erst he roam'd with dirty feet;
     Well pleased to live in future times,
     Though but in keen satiric rhymes.
       So, Ajax, who, for aught we know,
     Was justice many years ago,
     And minding then no earthly things,
     But killing libellers of kings;
     Or if he wanted work to do,
     To run a bawling news-boy through;
     Yet he, when wrapp'd up in a cloud,
     Entreated father Jove aloud,
     Only in light to show his face,
     Though it might tend to his disgrace.
       And so the Ephesian villain [2] fired
     The temple which the world admired,
     Contemning death, despising shame,
     To gain an ever-odious name.

     [Footnote 1: Colonel Ker, a Scotchman, lieutenant-colonel to Lord
     Harrington's regiment of dragoons, who made a news-boy evidence against
     The printer.—F.]

     [Footnote 2: Herostratus, who set fire to the Temple of Artemis at
     Ephesus, 356 B.C.—W. E. B.]

     At Dublin's high feast sat Primate and Dean,
     Both dress'd like divines, with band and face clean:
     Quoth Hugh of Armagh, "The mob is grown bold."
     "Ay, ay," quoth the Dean, "the cause is old gold."
     "No, no," quoth the Primate, "if causes we sift,
     This mischief arises from witty Dean Swift."
     The smart one replied, "There's no wit in the case;
     And nothing of that ever troubled your grace.
     Though with your state sieve your own notions you split,
     A Boulter by name is no bolter of wit.
     It's matter of weight, and a mere money job;
     But the lower the coin the higher the mob.
     Go tell your friend Bob and the other great folk,
     That sinking the coin is a dangerous joke.
     The Irish dear joys have enough common sense,
     To treat gold reduced like Wood's copper pence.
     It is a pity a prelate should die without law;
     But if I say the word—take care of Armagh!"

     [Footnote 1: In 1737, the gold coin had sunk in current value to the
     amount of 6d. in each guinea, which made it the interest of the Irish
     dealers to send over their balances in silver. To bring the value of the
     precious metals nearer to a par, the Primate, Boulter, who was chiefly
     trusted by the British Government in the administration of Ireland,
     published a proclamation reducing the value of the gold coin threepence
     in each guinea. This scheme was keenly opposed by Swift; and such was the
     clamour excited against the archbishop, that his house was obliged to be
     guarded by soldiers. The two following poems relate to this controversy,
     which was, for the time it lasted, nearly as warm as that about Wood's
     halfpence. The first is said to be the paraphrase of a conversation which
     actually passed between Swift and the archbishop. The latter charged the
     Dean with inflaming the mob, "I inflame them?" retorted Swift, "were I to
     lift but a finger, they would tear you to pieces."—Scott.]

     Patrick astore,[1] what news upon the town?
     By my soul there's bad news, for the gold she was pull'd down,
     The gold she was pull'd down, of that I'm very sure,
     For I saw'd them reading upon the towlsel[2] doore.
           Sing, och, och, hoh, hoh.[3]

     Arrah! who was him reading? 'twas jauntleman in ruffles,
     And Patrick's bell she was ringing all in muffles;
     She was ringing very sorry, her tongue tied up with rag,
     Lorsha! and out of her shteeple there was hung a black flag.[4]
           Sing, och, &c.

     Patrick astore, who was him made this law?
     Some they do say, 'twas the big man of straw;[5]
     But others they do say, that it was Jug-Joulter,[6]
     The devil he may take her into hell and Boult-her!           Sing, och, &c.

     Musha! Why Parliament wouldn't you maul,
     Those carters, and paviours, and footmen, and all;[7]
     Those rascally paviours who did us undermine,
     Och ma ceade millia mollighart[8] on the feeders of swine!
           Sing, och, &c.

     [Footnote 1: Astore, means my dear, my heart.]

     [Footnote 2: The Tholsel, where criminals for the city were tried, and
     where proclamations, etc., were posted. It was invariably called the
     Touls'el by the lower class.]

     [Footnote 3: It would appear that the chorus here introduced, was
     intended to chime with the howl, the ululatus, or funeral cry, of the
     Irish.]

     [Footnote 4: Swift, it is said, caused a muffled peal to be rung from the
     steeple of St. Patrick's, on the day of the proclamation, and a black
     flag to be displayed from its battlements.—Scott.]

     [Footnote 5: The big man of straw, means the Duke of Dorset,
     Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland; he had only the name of authority, the
     essential power being vested in the primate.]

     [Footnote 6: Jug-Joulter means Primate Boulter, whose name is played
     upon in the succeeding line. In consequence of the public dissatisfaction
     expressed at the lowering the gold coin, the primate became very
     unpopular.]

     [Footnote 7: "Footmen" alludes to a supporter of the measure, said to
     have been the son or grandson of a servant.]

     [Footnote 8: Means "my hundred thousand hearty curses on the feeders of
     swine."]

     While the king and his ministers keep such a pother,
     And all about changing one whore for another,
     Think I to myself, what need all this strife,
     His majesty first had a whore of a wife,
     And surely the difference mounts to no more
     Than, now he has gotten a wife of a whore.
     Now give me your judgment a very nice case on;
     Each queen has a son, say which is the base one?
     Say which of the two is the right Prince of Wales,
     To succeed, when, (God bless him,) his majesty fails;
     Perhaps it may puzzle our loyal divines
     To unite these two Protestant parallel lines,
     From a left-handed wife, and one turn'd out of doors,
     Two reputed king's sons, both true sons of whores;
     No law can determine it, which is first oars.
     But, alas! poor old England, how wilt thou be master'd;
     For, take which you please, it must needs be a bastard.

     [Footnote 1: So the following very remarkable verses are entitled, in a
     copy which exists in the Dean's hand-writing bearing the following
     characteristic memorandum on the back: "A traitorous libel, writ several
     years ago. It is inconsistent with itself. Copied September 9, 1735. I
     wish I knew  the author, that I might hang him." And at the bottom of the
     paper is subjoined this postscript. "I copied out this wicked paper many
     years ago, in hopes to discover the traitor of an author, that I might
     inform against him." For the foundation of the scandals current during
     the reign of George I, to which the lines allude, see Walpole's
     Reminiscences of the Courts of George the first and second, chap, ii, at
     p. cii, Walpole's Letters, edit. Cunningham.—W. E. B.]

     CHARLES CARTHY, a schoolmaster in the city of Dublin, was publisher of a
     translation of Horace, in which the Latin was printed on the one side,
     and the English on the other, whence he acquired the name of Mezentius,
     alluding to the practice of that tyrant, who chained the dead to the
     living.
       Carthy was almost continually involved in satirical skirmishes with
     Dunkin, for whom Swift had a particular friendship, and there is no doubt
     that the Dean himself engaged in the warfare.—Scott.

     Containing, on one side, the original Latin, on the other, his own
     version.

     This I may boast, which few e'er could,
     Half of my book at least is good.

     How monstrous Carthy looks with Flaccus braced,
     For here we see the man and there the beast.

     Once Horace fancied from a man,
     He was transformed to a swan;[1]
     But Carthy, as from him thou learnest,
     Has made the man a goose in earnest.

     [Footnote 1:
       "Jam jam residunt cruribus asperae
       Pelles, et album mutor in alitem
         Superne, nascunturque leves
           Per digitos humerosque plumae."
     Lib. ii, Carm. xx.]

     Talis erat quondam Tithoni splendida conjux,
       Effulsit misero sic Dea juncta viro;
     Hunc tandem imminuit sensim longaeva senectus,
       Te vero extinxit, Carole, prima dies.

     So blush'd Aurora with celestial charms,
     So bloom'd the goddess in a mortal's arms;
     He sunk at length to wasting age a prey,
     But thy book perish'd on its natal day.

     Lectores ridere jubes dum Carthius astat?
     Iste procul depellit olens tibi Maevius omnes:
     Sic triviis veneranda diu, Jovis inclyta proles
     Terruit, assumpto, mortales, Gorgonis ore.

     Could Horace give so sad a monster birth?
     Why then in vain he would excite our mirth;
     His humour well our laughter might command,
     But who can bear the death's head in his hand?