Fair Isis, and ye banks of Cam! Be witness if I tell a flam, What prodigies in arts we drain, From both your streams, in George's reign. As from the flowery bed of Nile"-- But here's enough to show your style. Broad innuendoes, such as this, If well applied, can hardly miss: For, when you bring your song in print, He'll get it read, and take the hint; (It must be read before 'tis warbled, The paper gilt and cover marbled.) And will be so much more your debtor, Because he never knew a letter. And, as he hears his wit and sense (To which he never made pretence) Set out in hyperbolic strains, A guinea shall reward your pains; For patrons never pay so well, As when they scarce have learn'd to spell. Next call him Neptune: with his trident He rules the sea: you see him ride in't; And, if provoked, he soundly firks his Rebellious waves with rods, like Xerxes. He would have seized the Spanish plate, Had not the fleet gone out too late; And in their very ports besiege them, But that he would not disoblige them; And make the rascals pay him dearly For those affronts they give him yearly. 'Tis not denied, that, when we write, Our ink is black, our paper white: And, when we scrawl our paper o'er, We blacken what was white before: I think this practice only fit For dealers in satiric wit. But you some white-lead ink must get And write on paper black as jet; Your interest lies to learn the knack Of whitening what before was black. Thus your encomium, to be strong, Must be applied directly wrong. A tyrant for his mercy praise, And crown a royal dunce with bays: A squinting monkey load with charms, And paint a coward fierce in arms. Is he to avarice inclined? Extol him for his generous mind: And, when we starve for want of corn, Come out with Amalthea's horn:[3] For all experience this evinces The only art of pleasing princes: For princes' love you should descant On virtues which they know they want. One compliment I had forgot, But songsters must omit it not; I freely grant the thought is old: Why, then, your hero must be told, In him such virtues lie inherent, To qualify him God's vicegerent; That with no title to inherit, He must have been a king by merit. Yet, be the fancy old or new, Tis partly false, and partly true: And, take it right, it means no more Than George and William claim'd before. Should some obscure inferior fellow, Like Julius, or the youth of Pella,[4] When all your list of Gods is out, Presume to show his mortal snout, And as a Deity intrude, Because he had the world subdued; O, let him not debase your thoughts, Or name him but to tell his faults.-- Of Gods I only quote the best, But you may hook in all the rest. Now, birth-day bard, with joy proceed To praise your empress and her breed; First of the first, to vouch your lies, Bring all the females of the skies; The Graces, and their mistress, Venus, Must venture down to entertain us: With bended knees when they adore her, What dowdies they appear before her!