When landlady, with burly mien,
Bids purses gleam with twinklers sheen,*
'Tis nuncle pays for thee,' I ween;

Gold grow'th not in heaven:

Yet, by the laws, we'll lug thee in

For reck'ning even.

Well, blessings on thy shade so laurel'd!
'Mid all thy high words thou ne'er quarrel'd;
Laugh'd loud, and leer'd, when malice snarl'd,
A smiling wizard:

And when renown'd good beer was barrel'd
Grinn'd in thy gizzard.

No thanks to those who long'd to pelt or
Abuse thy poor muse, helter-skelter;

Send thee to solitude for shelter,

To grief and moping,

Her dim lyre (cause enough to melt her)

In darkness groping.

Yes: all must grant thee too a smack
Of genius, and of warmth. Alack!

• Bright money.

Alluding to a well-known story of Shuter, the actor.

Genius and warmth are gone apack

To land unknown;

They'll never come, I fear me, back,

To make us groan.

The merry catch shall greet thy sprite :
And in the dead of list'ning night
We'll drone sincere at thy ill plight,

And sprinkle strong dews:

The hop shall on thy tomb rise light,

Nor yield us wrong juice.

Tobacco tubes, like trumps inverted,
Shall deck thy grave, and smoke thick-darted
Nourish the flow'rs around thee started

With od'rous aid:

Then, mon, be not this once faint-hearted;

Thy fortune's made.

At judgment-day, when strong-lung'd cherub
Shall pipe all hands from silence here up,
He'll know thee, Tom, to be a queer cub,
And give thee quarters;

Wouns! what a sight, to see thy knee rub

'Gainst the saints and martyrs ?

D'ye now remember, youth, the time
Thou'st rattled off sweet chinking rhime,
Till, rapt in doggerel sublime,

Thou staid'st all night out.

While Mumpus* rang'd from clime to clime,

Raising a right rout?

Peace to thy manes, lad of wax!

Free from all venomous attacks,

Thou liest in harbour snug: what lacks

Thy heart on high?

Would that thy friends here could go snacks,,
And mount the sky!

AN ODE TO MYSELF.

THRICE hail, thou prince of jovial fellows,
Tuning so blithe thy lyric bellows,
Of no one's brighter genius jealous;

Whose little span

Is spent 'twixt poetry and alehouse,

'Twixt quill and cann!

One of his associates at John Baynham's.

Reckless howe'er the world may fadge,
Variety thy only badge:

Now courting Susan, Kate, or Madge,

Or black-ey'd Molly;

For living in one sullen lodge

Is downright folly.

hy classics sleeping on the shelf, Thou'rt muse and patron to thyself: Aye* frolic when profuse of pelf;

Grim as the gallows When dunn'd by that obstreperous elf,

False-scoring Alice.

Long may'st thou punch ambrosial swill,
Drinking no water from that hill

By temperate bards recorded still

In tasteless rhime;

For noble punch shall sweetly fill

The thought sublime.

Ever. So Milton:

And hear the Muses in a ring

Aye round about Jove's altar sing.

By many wrong'd, gay bloom of song,
Thou yet art innocent of wrong,
Virtue and truth to thee belong,

Virtue and truth;

Though Pleasure led thy step along,

And trapp'd thy youth.

With Baynham, social spring * of wit,
Thou hadst full many a merry fit;

And whether haply thou shalt sit

With clown or peer,

Never shall lingering honour quit

Thy heart sincere.

So Falstaff: "I am not only witty myself, but the cause of wit in others.