by
John Wilmot
At five this morn, when Phoebus raised his head
From Thetis' lap, I raised myself from bed,
And mounting steed, I trotted to the waters
The rendesvous of fools, buffoons, and praters,
Cuckolds, whores, citizens, their wives and daughters.
My squeamish stomach I with wine had bribed
To undertake the dose that was prescribed;
But turning head, a sudden curséd view
That innocent provision overthrew,
And without drinking, made me purge and spew.
From coach and six a thing unweildy rolled,
Whose lumber, card more decently would hold.
As wise as calf it looked, as big as bully,
But handled, proves a mere Sir Nicholas Cully;
A bawling fop, a natural Nokes, and yet
He dares to censure as if he had wit.
To make him more ridiculous, in spite
Nature contrived the fool should be a knight.
Though he alone were dismal signet enough,
His train contributed to set him off,
All of his shape, all of the selfsame stuff.
No spleen or malice need on them be thrown:
Nature has done the business of lampoon,
And in their looks their characters has shown.
Endeavoring this irksome sight to balk,
And a more irksome noise, their silly talk,
I silently slunk down t' th' Lower Walk,
But often when one would Charybdis shun,
Down upon Scilla 'tis one's fate to run,
For here it was my curséd luck to find
As great a fop, though of another kind,
A tall stiff fool that walked in Spanish guise:
The buckram puppet never stirred its eyes,
But grave as owl it looked, as woodcock wise.
He scorns the empty talking of this mad age,
And speaks all proverbs, sentences, and adage;
Can with as much solemnity buy eggs
As a cabal can talk of their intrigues;
Master o' th' Ceremonies, yet can dispense
With the formality of talking sense.
From hence unto the upper walk I ran,
Where a new scene of foppery began.
A tribe of curates, priests, canonical elves,
Fit company for none besides themselves,
Were got together. Each his distemper told,
Scurvy, stone, strangury; some were so bold
To charge the spleen to be their misery,
And on that wise disease brought infamy.
But none had modesty enough t' complain
Their want of learning, honesty, and brain,
The general diseases of that train.
These call themselves ambassadors of heaven,
And saucily pretend commissions given;
But should an Indian king, whose small command
Seldom extends beyond ten miles of land,
Send forth such wretched tools in an ambassage,
He'd find but small effects of such a message.
Listening, I found the cob of all this rabble
Pert Bays, with his importance comfortable.
He, being raised to an archdeaconry
By trampling on religion, liberty,
Was grown to great, and looked too fat and jolly,
To be disturbed with care and melancholy,
Though Marvell has enough exposed his folly.
He drank to carry off some old remains
His lazy dull distemper left in 's veins.
Let him drink on, but 'tis not a whole flood
Can give sufficient sweetness to his blood
To make his nature of his manners good.
Next after these, a fulsome Irish crew
Of silly Macs were offered to my view.
The things did talk, but th' hearing what they said
I did myself the kindness to evade.
Nature has placed these wretches beneath scorn:
They can't be called so vile as they are born.
Amidst the crowd next I myself conveyed,
For now were come, whitewash and paint being laid,
Mother and daughter, mistress and the maid,
And squire with wig and pantaloon displayed.
But ne'er could conventicle, play, or fair
For a true medley, with this herd compare.
Here lords, knights, squires, ladies and countesses,
Chandlers, mum-bacon women, sempstresses
Were mixed together, nor did they agree
More in their humors than their quality.
Here waiting for gallant, young damsel stood,
Leaning on cane, and muffled up in hood.
The would-be wit, whose business was to woo,
With hat removed and solemn scrape of shoe
Advanceth bowing, then genteelly shrugs,
And ruffled foretop into order tugs,
And thus accosts her: "Madam, methinks the weather
Is grown much more serene since you came hither.
You influence the heavens; but should the sun
Withdraw himself to see his rays outdone
By your bright eyes, they would supply the morn,
And make a day before the day be born."
With mouth screwed up, conceited winking eyes,
And breasts thrust forward, "Lord, sir!" she replies.
"It is your goodness, and not my deserts,
Which makes you show this learning, wit, and parts."
He, puzzled, butes his nail, both to display
The sparkling ring, and think what next to say,
And thus breaks forth afresh: "Madam, egad!
Your luck at cards last night was very bad:
At cribbage fifty-nine, and the next show
To make the game, and yet to want those two.
God damn me, madam, I'm the son of a whore
If in my life I saw the like before!"
To peddler's stall he drags her, and her breast
With hearts and such-like foolish toys he dressed;
And then, more smartly to expound the riddle
Of all his prattle, gives her a Scotch fiddle.
Tired with this dismal stuff, away I ran
Where were two wives, with girl just fit for man -
Short-breathed, with pallid lips and visage wan.
Some curtsies past, and the old compliment
Of being glad to see each other, spent,
With hand in hand they lovingly did walk,
And one began thus to renew the talk:
"I pray, good madam, if it may be thought
No rudeness, what cause was it hither brought
Your ladyship?" She soon replying, smiled,
"We have a good estate, but have no child,
And I'm informed these wells will make a barren
Woman as fruitful as a cony warren."
The first returned, "For this cause I am come,
For I can have no quietness at home.
My husband grumbles though we have got one,
This poor young girl, and mutters for a son.
And this is grieved with headache, pangs, and throes;
Is full sixteen, and never yet had those."
She soon replied, "Get her a husband, madam:
I married at that age, and ne'er had 'em;
Was just like her. Steel waters let alone:
A back of steel will bring 'em better down."
And ten to one but they themselves will try
The same means to increase their family.
Poor foolish fribble, who by subtlety
Of midwife, truest friend to lechery,
Persuaded art to be at pains and charge
To give thy wife occasion to enlarge
Thy silly head! For here walk Cuff and Kick,
With brawny back and legs and potent prick,
Who more substantially will cure thy wife,
And on her half-dead womb bestow new life.
From these the waters got the reputation
Of good assistants unto generation.
Some warlike men were now got into th' throng,
With hair tied back, singing a bawdy song.
Not much afraid, I got a nearer view,
And 'twas my chance to know the dreadful crew.
They were cadets, that seldom can appear:
Damned to the stint of thirty pounds a year.
With hawk on fist, or greyhound led in hand,
The dogs and footboys sometimes they command.
But now, having trimmed a cast-off spavined horse,
With three hard-pinched-for guineas in their purse,
Two rusty pistols, scarf about the ****,
Coat lined with red, they here presume to swell:
This goes for captain, that for colonel.
So the Bear Garden ape, on his steed mounted,
No longer is a jackanapes accounted,
But is, by virtue of his trumpery, then
Called by the name of "the young gentleman."
Bless me! thought I, what thing is man, that thus
In all his shapes, he is ridiculous?
Ourselves with noise of reason we do please
In vain: humanity's our worst disease.
Thrice happy beasts are, who, because they be
Of reason void, and so of foppery.
Faith, I was so ashamed that with remorse
I used the insolence to mount my horse;
For he, doing only things fit for his nature,
Did seem to me by much the wiser creature.
|
by
Amy Lowell
The little boy pressed his face against the window-pane
and looked out
at the bright sunshiny morning. The cobble-stones of
the square
glistened like mica. In the trees, a breeze danced and
pranced,
and shook drops of sunlight like falling golden coins into the brown
water
of the canal. Down stream slowly drifted a long string
of galliots
piled with crimson cheeses. The little boy thought they
looked as if
they were roc's eggs, blocks of big ruby eggs. He said,
"Oh!" with delight,
and pressed against the window with all his might.
The golden cock on the top of the `Stadhuis' gleamed. His
beak was open
like a pair of scissors and a narrow piece of blue sky was wedged
in it.
"Cock-a-doodle-do," cried the little boy. "Can't you
hear me
through the window, Gold Cocky? Cock-a-doodle-do! You
should crow
when you see the eggs of your cousin, the great roc." But
the golden cock
stood stock still, with his fine tail blowing in the wind.
He could not understand the little boy, for he said "Cocorico"
when he said anything. But he was hung in the air to
swing, not to sing.
His eyes glittered to the bright West wind, and the crimson cheeses
drifted away down the canal.
It was very dull there in the big room. Outside in the
square, the wind
was playing tag with some fallen leaves. A man passed,
with a dogcart
beside him full of smart, new milkcans. They rattled
out a gay tune:
"Tiddity-tum-ti-ti. Have some milk for your tea. Cream
for your coffee
to drink to-night, thick, and smooth, and sweet, and white,"
and the man's sabots beat an accompaniment: "Plop! trop!
milk for your tea.
Plop! trop! drink it to-night." It was very pleasant
out there,
but it was lonely here in the big room. The little boy
gulped at a tear.
It was ***** how dull all his toys were. They were so
still.
Nothing was still in the square. If he took his eyes
away a moment
it had changed. The milkman had disappeared round the
corner,
there was only an old woman with a basket of green stuff on her
head,
picking her way over the shiny stones. But the wind pulled
the leaves
in the basket this way and that, and displayed them to beautiful
advantage.
The sun patted them condescendingly on their flat surfaces, and
they seemed
sprinkled with silver. The little boy sighed as he looked
at his disordered
toys on the floor. They were motionless, and their colours
were dull.
The dark wainscoting absorbed the sun. There was none
left for toys.
The square was quite empty now. Only the wind ran round
and round it,
spinning. Away over in the corner where a street opened
into the square,
the wind had stopped. Stopped running, that is, for it
never
stopped spinning. It whirred, and whirled, and gyrated,
and turned.
It burned like a great coloured sun. It hummed, and buzzed,
and sparked,
and darted. There were flashes of blue, and long smearing
lines of saffron,
and quick jabs of green. And over it all was a sheen
like a myriad
cut diamonds. Round and round it went, the huge wind-wheel,
and the little boy's head reeled with watching it. The
whole square
was filled with its rays, blazing and leaping round after one another,
faster and faster. The little boy could not speak, he
could only gaze,
staring in amaze.
The wind-wheel was coming down the square. Nearer and
nearer it came,
a great disk of spinning flame. It was opposite the window
now,
and the little boy could see it plainly, but it was something more
than the wind which he saw. A man was carrying a huge
fan-shaped frame
on his shoulder, and stuck in it were many little painted paper
windmills,
each one scurrying round in the breeze. They were bright
and beautiful,
and the sight was one to please anybody, and how much more a little
boy
who had only stupid, motionless toys to enjoy.
The little boy clapped his hands, and his eyes danced and whizzed,
for the circling windmills made him dizzy. Closer and
closer
came the windmill man, and held up his big fan to the little boy
in the window of the Ambassador's house. Only a pane
of glass
between the boy and the windmills. They slid round before
his eyes
in rapidly revolving splendour. There were wheels and
wheels of colours --
big, little, thick, thin -- all one clear, perfect spin. The
windmill vendor
dipped and raised them again, and the little boy's face was glued
to the window-pane. Oh! What a glorious, wonderful
plaything!
Rings and rings of windy colour always moving! How had
any one ever preferred
those other toys which never stirred. "Nursie, come quickly. Look!
I want a windmill. See! It is never still. You
will buy me one, won't you?
I want that silver one, with the big ring of blue."
So a servant was sent to buy that one: silver, ringed
with blue,
and smartly it twirled about in the servant's hands as he stood
a moment
to pay the vendor. Then he entered the house, and in
another minute
he was standing in the nursery door, with some crumpled paper on
the end
of a stick which he held out to the little boy. "But
I wanted a windmill
which went round," cried the little boy. "That is the
one you asked for,
Master Charles," Nursie was a bit impatient, she had mending to
do.
"See, it is silver, and here is the blue." "But it is
only a blue streak,"
sobbed the little boy. "I wanted a blue ring, and this
silver
doesn't sparkle." "Well, Master Charles, that is what
you wanted,
now run away and play with it, for I am very busy."
The little boy hid his tears against the friendly window-pane. On
the floor
lay the motionless, crumpled bit of paper on the end of its stick.
But far away across the square was the windmill vendor, with his
big wheel
of whirring splendour. It spun round in a blaze like
a whirling rainbow,
and the sun gleamed upon it, and the wind whipped it, until it seemed
a maze of spattering diamonds. "Cocorico!" crowed the
golden cock
on the top of the `Stadhuis'. "That is something worth
crowing for."
But the little boy did not hear him, he was sobbing over the crumpled
bit of paper on the floor.
|