The Poems of Jonathan Swift, D.D Volume I Part 29

She stretches, gapes, unglues her eyes, And asks if it be time to rise; Of headache and the spleen complains; And then, to cool her heated brains, Her night-gown and her slippers brought her, Takes a large dram of citron water.

Then to her gla.s.s; and, "Betty, pray, Don't I look frightfully to-day?

But was it not confounded hard?

Well, if I ever touch a card!

Four matadores, and lose codille!

Depend upon't, I never will.

But run to Tom, and bid him fix The ladies here to-night by six."

"Madam, the goldsmith waits below; He says, his business is to know If you'll redeem the silver cup He keeps in p.a.w.n?"--"Why, show him up."

"Your dressing-plate he'll be content To take, for interest _cent. per cent._ And, madam, there's my Lady Spade Has sent this letter by her maid."

"Well, I remember what she won; And has she sent so soon to dun?

Here, carry down these ten pistoles My husband left to pay for coals: I thank my stars they all are light, And I may have revenge to-night."

Now, loitering o'er her tea and cream, She enters on her usual theme; Her last night's ill success repeats, Calls Lady Spade a hundred cheats: "She slipt spadillo in her breast, Then thought to turn it to a jest: There's Mrs. Cut and she combine, And to each other give the sign."

Through every game pursues her tale, Like hunters o'er their evening ale.

Now to another scene give place: Enter the folks with silks and lace: Fresh matter for a world of chat, Right Indian this, right Mechlin that: "Observe this pattern--there's a stuff; I can have customers enough.

Dear madam, you are grown so hard-- This lace is worth twelve pounds a-yard: Madam, if there be truth in man, I never sold so cheap a fan."

This business of importance o'er, And madam almost dress'd by four; The footman, in his usual phrase, Comes up with, "Madam, dinner stays."

She answers, in her usual style, "The cook must keep it back a while; I never can have time to dress, No woman breathing takes up less; I'm hurried so, it makes me sick; I wish the dinner at Old Nick."

At table now she acts her part, Has all the dinner cant by heart: "I thought we were to dine alone, My dear; for sure, if I had known This company would come to-day-- But really 'tis my spouse's way!

He's so unkind, he never sends To tell when he invites his friends: I wish ye may but have enough!"

And while with all this paltry stuff She sits tormenting every guest, Nor gives her tongue one moment's rest, In phrases batter'd, stale, and trite, Which modern ladies call polite; You see the b.o.o.by husband sit In admiration at her wit!

But let me now a while survey Our madam o'er her evening tea; Surrounded with her noisy clans Of prudes, coquettes, and harridans, When, frighted at the clamorous crew, Away the G.o.d of Silence flew, And fair Discretion left the place, And modesty with blus.h.i.+ng face; Now enters overweening Pride, And Scandal, ever gaping wide, Hypocrisy with frown severe, Scurrility with gibing air; Rude laughter seeming like to burst, And Malice always judging worst; And Vanity with pocket gla.s.s, And Impudence with front of bra.s.s; And studied Affectation came, Each limb and feature out of frame; While Ignorance, with brain of lead, Flew hovering o'er each female head.

Why should I ask of thee, my Muse, A hundred tongues, as poets use, When, to give every dame her due, A hundred thousand were too few?

Or how should I, alas! relate The sum of all their senseless prate, Their innuendoes, hints, and slanders, Their meanings lewd, and double entendres?

Now comes the general scandal charge; What some invent, the rest enlarge; And, "Madam, if it be a lie, You have the tale as cheap as I; I must conceal my author's name: But now 'tis known to common fame."

Say, foolish females, bold and blind, Say, by what fatal turn of mind, Are you on vices most severe, Wherein yourselves have greatest share?

Thus every fool herself deludes; The prude condemns the absent prudes: Mopsa, who stinks her spouse to death, Accuses Chloe's tainted breath; Hircina, rank with sweat, presumes To censure Phyllis for perfumes; While crooked Cynthia, sneering, says, That Florimel wears iron stays; Chloe, of every c.o.xcomb jealous, Admires how girls can talk with fellows; And, full of indignation, frets, That women should be such coquettes: Iris, for scandal most notorious, Cries, "Lord, the world is so censorious!"

And Rufa, with her combs of lead, Whispers that Sappho's hair is red: Aura, whose tongue you hear a mile hence, Talks half a day in praise of silence; And Sylvia, full of inward guilt, Calls Amoret an arrant jilt.

Now voices over voices rise, While each to be the loudest vies: They contradict, affirm, dispute, No single tongue one moment mute; All mad to speak, and none to hearken, They set the very lap-dog barking; Their chattering makes a louder din Than fishwives o'er a cup of gin; Not schoolboys at a barring out Raised ever such incessant rout; The jumbling particles of matter In chaos made not such a clatter; Far less the rabble roar and rail, When drunk with sour election ale.

Nor do they trust their tongues alone, But speak a language of their own; Can read a nod, a shrug, a look, Far better than a printed book; Convey a libel in a frown, And wink a reputation down; Or by the tossing of the fan, Describe the lady and the man.

But see, the female club disbands, Each twenty visits on her hands.

Now all alone poor madam sits In vapours and hysteric fits; "And was not Tom this morning sent?

I'd lay my life he never went; Past six, and not a living soul!

I might by this have won a vole."

A dreadful interval of spleen!

How shall we pa.s.s the time between?

"Here, Betty, let me take my drops; And feel my pulse, I know it stops; This head of mine, lord, how it swims!

And such a pain in all my limbs!"

"Dear madam, try to take a nap"-- But now they hear a footman's rap: "Go, run, and light the ladies up: It must be one before we sup."

The table, cards, and counters, set, And all the gamester ladies met, Her spleen and fits recover'd quite, Our madam can sit up all night; "Whoever comes, I'm not within."

Quadrille's the word, and so begin.

How can the Muse her aid impart, Unskill'd in all the terms of art?

Or in harmonious numbers put The deal, the shuffle, and the cut?

The superst.i.tious whims relate, That fill a female gamester's pate?

What agony of soul she feels To see a knave's inverted heels!

She draws up card by card, to find Good fortune peeping from behind; With panting heart, and earnest eyes, In hope to see spadillo rise; In vain, alas! her hope is fed; She draws an ace, and sees it red; In ready counters never pays, But p.a.w.ns her snuff-box, rings, and keys; Ever with some new fancy struck, Tries twenty charms to mend her luck.

"This morning, when the parson came, I said I should not win a game.

This odious chair, how came I stuck in't?

I think I never had good luck in't.

I'm so uneasy in my stays: Your fan, a moment, if you please.

Stand farther, girl, or get you gone; I always lose when you look on."

"Lord! madam, you have lost codille: I never saw you play so ill."

"Nay, madam, give me leave to say, 'Twas you that threw the game away: When Lady Tricksey play'd a four, You took it with a matadore; I saw you touch your wedding ring Before my lady call'd a king; You spoke a word began with H, And I know whom you meant to teach, Because you held the king of hearts; Fie, madam, leave these little arts."

"That's not so bad as one that rubs Her chair to call the king of clubs; And makes her partner understand A matadore is in her hand."

"Madam, you have no cause to flounce, I swear I saw you thrice renounce."

"And truly, madam, I know when Instead of five you scored me ten.

Spadillo here has got a mark; A child may know it in the dark: I guess'd the hand: it seldom fails: I wish some folks would pare their nails."

While thus they rail, and scold, and storm, It pa.s.ses but for common form: But, conscious that they all speak true, And give each other but their due, It never interrupts the game, Or makes them sensible of shame.

The time too precious now to waste, The supper gobbled up in haste; Again afresh to cards they run, As if they had but just begun.

But I shall not again repeat, How oft they squabble, snarl, and cheat.

At last they hear the watchman knock, "A frosty morn--past four o'clock."

The chairmen are not to be found, "Come, let us play the other round."

Now all in haste they huddle on Their hoods, their cloaks, and get them gone; But, first, the winner must invite The company to-morrow night.

Unlucky madam, left in tears, (Who now again quadrille forswears,) With empty purse, and aching head, Steals to her sleeping spouse to bed.

THE LOGICIANS REFUTED

Logicians have but ill defined As rational, the human kind; Reason, they say, belongs to man, But let them prove it if they can.

Wise Aristotle and Smiglesius, By ratiocinations specious, Have strove to prove, with great precision, With definition and division, _h.o.m.o est ratione praeditum;_ But for my soul I cannot credit 'em, And must, in spite of them, maintain, That man and all his ways are vain; And that this boasted lord of nature Is both a weak and erring creature; That instinct is a surer guide Than reason, boasting mortals' pride; And that brute beasts are far before 'em.

_Deus est anima brutorum._ Whoever knew an honest brute At law his neighbour prosecute, Bring action for a.s.sault or battery, Or friend beguile with lies and flattery?

O'er plains they ramble unconfined, No politics disturb their mind; They eat their meals, and take their sport Nor know who's in or out at court.

They never to the levee go To treat, as dearest friend, a foe: They never importune his grace, Nor ever cringe to men in place: Nor undertake a dirty job, Nor draw the quill to write for Bob.[1]

Fraught with invective, they ne'er go To folks at Paternoster Row.

No judges, fiddlers, dancing-masters, No pickpockets, or poetasters, Are known to honest quadrupeds; No single brute his fellow leads.

Brutes never meet in b.l.o.o.d.y fray, Nor cut each other's throats for pay.

Of beasts, it is confess'd, the ape Comes nearest us in human shape; Like man, he imitates each fas.h.i.+on, And malice is his lurking pa.s.sion: But, both in malice and grimaces, A courtier any ape surpa.s.ses.

Behold him, humbly cringing, wait Upon the minister of state; View him soon after to inferiors Aping the conduct of superiors; He promises with equal air, And to perform takes equal care.

He in his turn finds imitators, At court, the porters, lacqueys, waiters, Their masters' manner still contract, And footmen, lords and dukes can act.

Thus, at the court, both great and small Behave alike, for all ape all.

[Footnote 1: Sir Robert Walpole, and his employment of party-writers.--_W. E. B._]

THE ELEPHANT; OR, THE PARLIAMENT MAN

WRITTEN MANY YEARS SINCE; AND TAKEN FROM c.o.kE'S FOURTH INSt.i.tUTE THE HIGH COURT OF PARLIAMENT, CAP. I

Sir E. c.o.ke says: "Every member of the house being a counsellor should have three properties of the elephant; first that he hath no gall; secondly, that he is inflexible and cannot bow; thirdly, that he is of a most ripe and perfect memory ... first, to be without gall, that is, without malice, rancor, heat, and envy: ... secondly, that he be constant, inflexible, and not be bowed, or turned from the right either for fear, reward, or favour, nor in judgement respect any person: ...

thirdly, of a ripe memory, that they remembering perils past, might prevent dangers to come."--_W. E. B._

Ere bribes convince you whom to choose, The precepts of Lord c.o.ke peruse.

Observe an elephant, says he, And let him like your member be: First take a man that's free from _Gaul_, For elephants have none at all; In flocks or parties he must keep; For elephants live just like sheep.

Stubborn in honour he must be; For elephants ne'er bend the knee.