'Ah, Friend, 'tis true--this truth you lovers know-- In vain my structures rise, my gardens grow, In vain fair Thames reflects the double scenes Of hanging mountains, and of sloping greens: Joy lives not here; to happier seats it flies, And only dwells where Wortley casts her eyes. What is the gay parterre, the chequer'd shade, The morning bower, the ev'ning colonnade, But soft recesses of uneasy minds, To sigh unheard in, to the passing winds? So the struck deer in some sequestrate part Lies down to die, the arrow at his heart; There, stretch'd unseen in coverts hid from day, Bleeds drop by drop, and pants his life away.' It may here be remarked that in Epistle VIII of the _Moral Essays_ Pope had a line: "And other beauties envy Wortley's eyes"; but in a reprint of the poem he substituted [Lady] "Worsley" for "Wortley" in order to give the impression that "Wortley" had been a misprint. Pope's quarrel with Lady Mary began in or about 1722. The cause is obscure. Many reasons have been advanced. Lady Mary in her correspondence gives no clue as to the breach. It has been said that it arose out of the fact that Pope lent the Montagus a pair of sheets and that they were returned unwashed, to the great indignation of his mother who lived with him. It is difficult to believe this. Others have it that he was jealous of the favour which Lady Mary accorded to the Duke of Wharton and Lord Hervey. Certainly he lampooned the Duke, and he was never weary of writing insultingly about the other. Most probable is the account given by Lady Louisa Stuart, Lady Mary's grand-daughter, which is to the effect that Pope made a declaration of love, and that Lady Mary received it with shrieks of laughter. If Pope were serious, it must have galled him indeed, though nothing can excuse the malignity with which he pursued her for years and years. And if he were not in earnest, he would probably have been nearly, if not quite, as indignant. Anyhow, it is a sorry story, and a blot on the scutcheon of the poet, who, good-hearted as he usually was, was cursed by the gift, refined to a rare degree, of alienating his friends, more often than not for some fancied slight. Addison he lampooned, and from Dennis and Philips he parted company. "Leave him as soon as you can," Addison had warned Lady Mary. "He will certainly play you some devilish trick else: he has an appetite for satire." Lady Mary presently must have wished that she had followed this sage counsel. When Pope fought, he fought with the gloves off; and not the sex or the age or the standing of the subject of his wrath deterred him a whit. "Have I, in silent wonder, seen such things As pride in slaves, and avarice in kings; And at a peer, or peeress, shall I fret, Who starves a sister, or forswears a debt?"