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TO MRS MARTHA BLOUNT.

SENT ON HER BIRTH-DAY, JUNE 15TH.

O, BE thou blest with all that Heaven can send,
Long health, long youth, long pleasure, and a friend!
Not with those toys the female race admire,
Riches that vex, and vanities that tire;
*Not as the World its petty slaves rewards,
A youth of frolics, an old age of cards;
Fair to no purpose, artful to no end;
Young without lovers, old without a friend;
A fop their passion, but their prize a sot;
Alive, ridiculous; and dead, forgot!

Let joy or ease, let affluence or content,
And the gay conscience of a life well spent,
Calm ev'ry thought, inspirit ev'ry grace,
Glow in thy heart, and smile upon thy face:
Let day improve on day, and year on year,
Without a pain, a trouble, or a fear;
Till Death unfelt that tender frame destroy,
In some soft dream, or ecstasy of joy;
Peaceful sleep out the sabbath of the tomb,
And wake to raptures in a life to come!

*The six following lines are thus varied in Pope's Works: With added years of life bring nothing new, But like a sieve let every blessing thro'; Some joy still lost, as each vain year runs o'er, And all we gain, some sad reflection more: Is that a Birth-day? 'tis alas! too clear, "Tis but the funeral of the former year.

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I SAID to my heart between sleeping and waking, Thou wild thing, that always art leaping or aching, What black, brown, or fair, in what clime, in what nation,

By turns has not taught thee a pit-a-pat-ation?

Thus accus'd, the wild thing gave this sober reply: See the heart without motion, tho' Celia pass by! Not the beauty she has, or the wit that she borrows, Gives the eye any joys, or the heart any sorrows.

When our Sappho appears, she whose wit's so refin'd,

I am forc'd to applaud with the rest of mankind;
Whatever she says, is with spirit and fire;
Ev'ry word I attend; but I only admire.

Prudentia as vainly would put in her claim,
Ever gazing on Heaven, tho' man is her aim:
'Tis love, not devotion, that turns up her eyes:
Those stars of this world are too good for the skies..

But Cloe so lively, so easy, so fair,

Her wit so genteel, without art, without care; When she comes in my way, the motion, the pain, The leapings, the achings, return all again.

The Earl of Peterborow.-H.

O wonderful creature! a woman of reason!

Never grave out of pride, never gay out of season! When so easy to guess who this angel should be, Would one think Mrs Howard ne'er dreamt it was she?

BALLAD.

[This song was written on Miss Nelly Bennet, a celebrated beauty, who went under the escort of Dr Arbuthnot, in 1718, to reside with an uncle in France. On the 14th October in that year, Dr Arbuthnot writes to the Dean an account of his Paris journey. "Among other things, I had the honour to carry an Irish lady to Court, that was admired beyond all the ladies in France for her beauty. She had great honours done her; the hussar himself was ordered to bring her the King's cat to kiss. Her name is Bennet." On December 11th, he renews the subject. "You say you are ready to resent it as an affront, if I thought a beautiful lady a curiosity in Ireland; but pray, is it an affront to say that a lady hardly known or observed for her beauty in Ireland, is a curiosity in France?" The song may be safely ascribed to Dr Arbuthnot.]

Of all the girls that e'er were seen,
There's none so fine as Nelly,*
For charming face and shape and mien,
And what's not fit to tell ye:

* Miss Nelly Bennet, a celebrated beauty.-N.

Oh! the turn'd neck, and smooth white skin

Of lovely dearest Nelly!

For many a swain it well had been,
Had she ne'er pass'd by Calai.

For when, as Nelly came to France
(Invited by her cousins)
Across the Tuilleries each glance
Kill'd Frenchmen by whole dozens;
The king, as he at dinner sate,
Did beckon to his hussar,

And bid him bring his tabby cat,
For charming Nell to buss her.

The ladies were with rage provok'd
To see her so respected:
The men look'd arch, as Nelly strok'd,
And puss her tail erected.

But not a man did look employ,

Except on pretty Nelly,

Then said the Duke de Villeroy,
Ah! qu'elle est bien jolie!

But who's that grave philosopher,
That carefully looks a'ter?
By his concern it should appear,
The fair one is his daughter.
Ma foy! (quoth then a courtier sly)
He on his child does leer too;
I wish he has no mind to try
What some papas will here do.

The courtiers all with one accord
Broke out in Nelly's praises,
Admir'd her rose, and lys sans farde
(Which are your termes Françoises.)

Then might you see a painted ring
Of dames that stood by Nelly:
She, like the pride of all the spring,
And they like fleurs de palais.

In Marli's gardens, and St Clou,
I saw this charming Nelly,
Where shameless nymphs, expos'd to view,
Stand naked in each alley:

But Venus had a brazen face,
Both at Versailles and Meudon,
Or else she had resign'd her place,
And left the stone she stood on.

Were Nelly's figure mounted there,
'Twould put down all th' Italian:
Lord! how those foreigners would stare!
But I should turn Pygmalion:
For, spite of lips, and eyes, and mien,
Me nothing can delight so,

As does that part that lies between

Her left toe and her right toe.

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