Little tube of mighty pow’r, Charmer of an idle hour, Object of my warm desire, Lip of wax, and eye of fire: And thy snowy taper waist, With my finger gently brac’d; And thy pretty swelling crest, With my little stopper prest, And the sweetest bliss of blisses, Breathing from thy balmy kisses. Happy thrice, and thrice agen, Happiest he of happy men; Who when agen the night returns, When agen the taper burns; When agen the cricket’s gay, (Little cricket, full of play) Can afford his tube to feed With the fragrant Indian weed: Pleasure for a nose divine, Incense of the god of wine. Happy thrice, and thrice agen, Happiest he of happy men. ―――― IMITATION III. _――――Prorumpit ad æthera nubem Turbine fumantem piceo._ VIRG. O thou, matur’d by glad Hesperian suns, Tobacco, fountain pure of _limpid[16] truth_, _That looks the very soul_; whence pouring thought _Swarms all the mind_; absorpt is yellow care, _And[17] at each puff imagination burns_. Flash on thy bard, and with exalting fires Touch the mysterious lip, that chaunts thy praise In strains to mortal sons of earth unknown. Behold an engine, wrought from tawny mines Of ductile clay, with _plastic[18] virtue_ form’d, And glaz’d magnifick o’er, I grasp, I fill. From _Pætotheke_[19] with pungent pow’rs perfum’d, _Itself[20] one tortoise all, where shines imbib’d Each parent ray_; then rudely ram’d illume, With the red touch of zeal-enkindling sheet, _Mark’d[21] with Gibsonian lore_; forth issue clouds, Thought-thrilling, thirst-inciting clouds around, And many-mining fires: I all the while, Lolling at ease, _inhale_[22] the breezy balm. But chief, when _Bacchus wont with thee to join In genial strife_ and orthodoxal ale, _Stream[23] life and joy into the Muses’ bowl_. Oh be thou still _my great inspirer_, thou _My Muse_; oh fan me with thy zephyrs boon, While I, in clouded tabernacle shrin’d, Burst forth all oracle and mystick song. ―――― IMITATION IV. _――――Bullatis mihi nugis, Pagina turgescat, dare pondus idonea fumo._ PERS.