Let old charmers yield to new; In arms, in arts, be still more shining; All your tastes be still refining; All your jars for ever ceasing: But let old charmers yield to new. WHAT IS PRUDERY? ["A prude would never have had any charms for Mr. Pope, to whom Mrs. Howe said one day, 'You men call us strange names; some of them I don't understand. Coquetry, indeed, I guess at; but prudery,-for heaven's sake, make me know thoroughly what that prudery is.' Mr. Pope wrote her an answer in the leaf of an ivory book."-Ayre's Life of Pope.] Lean and fretful, would seem wise; That rails at dear Lepell, and you. [Miss Sophia Howe was one of the Maids of Honour to the Princess Caroline. She was a daughter of General Howe, brother of the first Viscount of that name. An unfortunate acquaintance with Mr. A. Lowther, brother of Lord Lonsdale, lost this young lady her reputation. According to Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, "Her breaking looks foretold a breaking heart;" and she died in 1726.] I ON A CERTAIN LADY AT COURT.1 KNOW the thing that's most uncommon; I know a reasonable woman, Handsome and witty, yet a friend. Not warp'd by passion, awed by rumour, Not grave through pride, or gay through folly; An equal mixture of good humour And sensible soft melancholy. "Has she no faults, then, (Envy says) sir?" When all the world conspires to praise her, 1 [Mrs. Howard, Countess of Suffolk.] DEAR, A FAREWELL TO LONDON. IN THE YEAR 1715. EAR, damn'd, distracting town, farewell! This year in peace, ye critics, dwell, Ye harlots, sleep at ease! Soft B --s and rough C- ――s adieu,1 The lively H-—k and you May knock up whores alone. To drink and droll be Rowe allow'd Farewell, Arbuthnot's raillery On every learned sot; And Garth, the best good Christian he, Lintot, farewell! thy bard must go; Heaven gives thee for thy loss of Rowe,3 1 [There was one Brocas-" Beau Brocas "-whom Pope mentions in an epistle to H. Cromwell. Ayre also mentions a Mr. Fettiplace Bellers, of Crown Allins, Gloucestershire, an intimate acquaintance of Mr. Pope's, and much esteemed by him."] 66 2 [See poem, Sandys' Ghost, in which Frowde is alluded to.] 3 [Rowe had the year before, on the accession of George I., been made Poet-laureate, one of the land-surveyors of the port of London, Clerk of the Closet to the Prince of Wales, and Secretary of Presentations under the Lord Chancellor. Such an accumulation of offices might well suspend for a season the poetical and publishing pursuits of Rowe. But he did not enjoy his good fortune long. His death took place in 1718, when he was only forty-five years of age.] 4 [The "Johnson" coupled with Ambrose Philips, was Charles Johnson, the dramatist, who died in 1748.] Why should I stay? Both parties rage; And Homer (damn him!) calls. The love of arts lies cold and dead And not one Muse of all he fed Has yet the grace to mourn.5 My friends, by turns, my friends confound, Poor Y--rs sold for fifty pounds, Why make I friendships with the great, Or follow girls, seven hours in eight, Still idle, with a busy air, Deep whimsies to contrive; The gayest valetudinaire, Most thinking rake, alive. Solicitous for other ends, Though fond of dear repose; Careless or drowsy with my friends, Luxurious lobster-nights, farewell, Adieu to all, but Gay alone, Whose soul, sincere and free, 5 [The date of Halifax's death was May 19, 1715.] 6 [Miss Younger an actress, one of the performers in "What d'ye call it?"] 7 [Mrs. Bicknell, who was also an actress, and another of the performers in "What d'ye call it?" Steele recommended this lady in the Tatler.] |