Boy! bring an ounce of Freeman’s best, And bid the vicar be my guest: Let all be placed in manner due, A pot wherein to spit or spue, And _London Journal_ and _Free Briton_, Of use to light a pipe―――― * * * * * This village, unmolested yet By troopers, shall be my retreat: Who cannot flatter, bribe, betray; Who cannot write or vote for pay. Far from the vermin of the town, Here let me rather live, my own, Doze o’er a pipe, whose vapour bland In sweet oblivion lulls the land; Of all which at Vienna passes, As ignorant as ―――― Brass is: And scorning rascals to caress, Extoll the days of good Queen Bess, When first TOBACCO blest our isle, Then think of other Queens――and smile. Come jovial pipe, and bring along Midnight revelry and song; The merry catch, the madrigal, That echoes sweet in City Hall; The parson’s pun, the smutty tale Of country justice o’er his ale. I ask not what the French are doing, Or Spain to compass Britain’s ruin: Britons, if undone, can go, Where TOBACCO loves to grow. [Illustration] ――――:o:―――― HORACE. _In imitation of Epode III._ AN ODE AGAINST TOBACCO. For parricide, that worst of crimes, Hemlock’s cold draught, in ancient times, Scarce taught the rogue repentance: But had tobacco then been known, Its burning juices swallow’d down, Had prov’d a fitter sentence. How callous are the lab’rers jaws, Who this dire weed both smokes and chaws, And feasts upon the venom! While I by chance a taste once got, That so inflam’d my mouth and throat, I thought all hell was in ’em. Sure, this vile drug, that serv’d me thus, The deadly viper’s poisonous juice Infus’d must have great share in; Or else some hag, with midnight wish, Procur’d it as a special dish Of Satan’s own preparing. This was the charm Medea taught Her dear advent’rous Argonaut, To steal the Golden Fleece with; Down bulls and dragons gaping throat A quid he threw, which, quick as thought, The brutes were laid at peace with. Ting’d in tobacco’s baleful oil, Her presents made her rival broil Past Jason’s art of quenching: And when he swore revenge, the witch Mounted aloft astride her switch, Pleas’d she had spoil’d his wenching. Under the blue I’d rather live, And the sun’s fiercest rays receive, How apt soe’er to burn us: Nay, Hercules’s shirt I’d wear, Or any flame much sooner bear, Than a pipe’s fiery furnace. My merry lord, if quid or whiff You ever taste of this damn’d leaf, May you meet with what you dread most, May Chloe, when with her you lie, And press to kiss her, put you by, And rather hug the bed post! From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. May, 1744. ――――:o:―――― Elegy. WRITTEN OVER AN OLD PIPE-BOX.