See, the course throng’d with gazers, the sports are begun, What confusion, but hear!――“I’ll bet you, Sir!”――“Done, done!” A thousand strange murmurs resound far and near, Lords, hawkers, and jockeys, assail the tired ear; While, with neck like a rainbow, erecting his crest, Pamper’d, prancing, and pleased, his head touching his breast, Scarcely snuffing the air, he’s so proud and elate, The high-mettled racer first starts for the plate. Next Reynard’s turn’d out, and o’er hedge and ditch rush Hounds, horses, and huntsmen, all hard at his brush; They run him at length, and they have him at bay, And by scent or by view, cheat a long tedious day; While alike born for sports in the field or the course, Always sure to come through――a staunch and fleet horse; And when fairly run down, the fox yields up his breath, The high-mettled racer is in at the death. Grown aged, used up, and turn’d out of the stud, Lame, spavin’d, and wind-gall’d, but yet with some blood; While knowing postilions his pedigree trace, Tell his dam won that sweepstakes, his sire won that race; And what matches he’d won too the ostlers count o’er, As they loiter their time by some hedge-alehouse door; Whilst the harness sore galls, and the spurs his sides goad, The high-mettled racer’s a hack on the road. At length, old and feeble, trudging early and late, Bow’d down by diseases, he bends to his fate; Blind, old, lean, and feeble, he tugs round a mill, Or draws sand, till the sand of his hour-glass stands still; And now, cold and lifeless, exposed to the view In the very same cart which he yesterday drew; Whilst a pitying crowd his sad relics surrounds The high-mettled racer is sold to the hounds. CHARLES DIBDIN. This, being a sporting song, would be quite out of place here, but that Dibdin followed it up, by writing an imitation of it, on a naval topic. This is one of the somewhat rare cases of an author composing a parody on one of his own poems:―― THE PRIDE OF THE OCEAN. See the shore lined with gazers, the tide comes in fast, The confusion, but hear! bear a hand there, avast! The blocks and the wedges the mallets obey, And the shores and the stanchions are all cut away: While with head like a lion, built tight fore and aft, Broad amidships, lean bows, and taper abaft In contempt of all danger from quicksands and rocks, The pride of the ocean is launched from the stocks.