EPISTLE FROM DOCTOR WINTER TO DOCTOR CHEYNE. TELL me from whom, fat-headed Scot, Thou didst thy system learn; Suppose we own that milk is good, Doctor, one new prescription try, ANSWER. My system, Doctor, is my own, My blunders hurt myself alone, But your's your dearest friend. Were you to milk and straw confin'd, I can't your kind prescription try, 'Tis natural you should bid me die, VERSES Written on a retired Cottage built by Powis, Esq. STAY, passenger, and though within Yet enter, and thy ravish'd mind Beneath this humble roof shall find What gold will never buy. Within this solitary cell, Calm thought and sweet contentment dwell, Parents of bliss sincere ; Peace spreads around her balmy wings, And, banish'd from the courts of kings, Has fix'd her mansion here. London Magazine. VERSES WRITTEN AT AN INN, ON A PARTICULAN To thee, fair Freedom! I retire From flattery, feasting, dice, and din; Nor art thou found in domes much higher Than the low cot, or humble Inn. 'Tis here with boundless power I reign, I fly from pomp, I fly from state, And chuse my lodging's, at an Inn. Here, waiter! take my sordid ore, Which lackeys else might hope to win; It buys what courts have not in store, And now once more I shape my way, Through rain or shine, through thick or thin, Secure to meet at close of day, With kind reception—at an Inn. Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round, LET there be ever so great plenty of good things, ever so much grandeur, ever so much elegance, ever so much desire that every one should be easy in a private house, in the nature of things it cannot be: there must always be some degree of care and anxiety. The master of the house is anxious to entertain his guests; the guests are anxious to be agreeable to him : and no man, but a very impudent dog indeed, can as freely command what is in another man's house, as if it were his own. Whereas at a Tavern, there is a general freedom from anxiety. You are sure you are welcome; and the more noise you make, the more trouble you give, the more good things you call for, the welcomer you are. No servants will attend you with the alacrity which waiters do, who are incited by the prospect of an immediate reward in proportion as they please. No, Sir, there is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good Tavern or Inn. Dr. Johnson. THE CAPTIVE QUEEN. WITH radiance rose thy morning sun, But, luckless ere it reach'd its noon, The fiend of darkness dimm'd the ray. What though the brightest gifts are thine, The voice of Joy, for ever mute, The syren, HOPE, who won thy ear, That croak thy doom on yonder tow'r. Yet what is life 'midst HORROR's reign, Where MURDER's triumph cleaves the sky; Where heaves with death the groaning scene, And dungeons loud for vengeance cry? |