“Tobacco, charmer of my mind, When, like the meteor’s transient gleam Thy substance gone to air I find, I think, alas! my life the same. “What else but lighted dust am I? Thou show’st me what my fate will be; And when thy sinking ashes die, I learn that I must end like thee.” ―――― TO A PIPE OF TOBACCO. Come, lovely tube by friendship blest, Belov’d and honour’d by the wise, Come, fill’d with honest _Weekly’s best_, And kindled from the lofty skies. While round me clouds of incense roll, With guiltless joys you charm the sense, And nobler pleasures to the soul, In hints of moral truth, dispense. Soon as you feel th’ inlivening ray, To dust you hasten to return; And teach me that my earliest day, Began to give me to the urn. But tho’ thy grosser substance sink To dust, thy purer part aspires; This when I see, I joy to think That earth but half of me requires. Like thee myself am born to die, Made half to rise and half to fall. O! could I while my moments fly, The bliss you give me, give to all. From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. July, 1746. ―――― CHOOSING A WIFE BY A PIPE OF TOBACCO. Tube, I love thee as my life; By thee I mean to chuse a wife, Tube, thy _colour_ let me find, In her _skin_ and in her _mind_ Let her have a _shape_ as fine; Let her breath be sweet as thine: Let her, when her lips I kiss, _Burn_ like thee, to give me bliss: Let her in some _smoke_ or other, All my failings kindly smother. Often when my thoughts are _low_, Send them where they _ought to go_. When to study I incline Let her aid be such as thine: Such as thine her charming pow’r, In the vacant social hour Let her live to give delight, Ever _warm_ and ever _bright_: Let her deeds, whene’er she dies, Mount as _incense to the skies_. From _The Gentleman’s Magazine_. 1757. ―――― TRANSLATION OF A GERMAN SONG. When my pipe burns bright and clear, The gods I need not envy here; And as the smoke fades in the wind, Our fleeting life it brings to mind. Noble weed! that comforts life, And art with calmest pleasures rife; Heaven grant thee sunshine and warm rain, And to thy planter health and gain. Through thee, friend of my solitude, With hope and patience I’m endued, Deep sinks thy power within my heart, And cares and sorrows all depart Then let non-smokers rail for ever; Shall their hard words true friends dissever? Pleasure’s too rare to cast away My pipe, for what the railers say! When love grows cool, thy fire still warms me. When friends are fled, thy presence charms me; If thou art full, though purse be bare, I smoke, and cast away all care! ―――― THE PIPE OF TOBACCO.