Thus Venus to the sea descends, As poets feign; but where's the moral? It shows the Queen of Love intends To search the deep for pearl and coral. The sea is richer than the land, I heard it from my grannam's mouth, Which now I clearly understand; For by the sea she meant the South. Thus, by directors we are told, "Pray, gentlemen, believe your eyes; Our ocean's cover'd o'er with gold, Look round, and see how thick it lies: "We, gentlemen, are your assisters, We'll come, and hold you by the chin."-- Alas! all is not gold that glisters, Ten thousand sink by leaping in. O! would those patriots be so kind, Here in the deep to wash their hands, Then, like Pactolus,[2] we should find The sea indeed had golden sands. A shilling in the bath you fling, The silver takes a nobler hue, By magic virtue in the spring, And seems a guinea to your view. But, as a guinea will not pass At market for a farthing more, Shown through a multiplying glass, Than what it always did before: So cast it in the Southern seas, Or view it through a jobber's bill; Put on what spectacles you please, Your guinea's but a guinea still. One night a fool into a brook Thus from a hillock looking down, The golden stars for guineas took, And silver Cynthia for a crown. The point he could no longer doubt; He ran, he leapt into the flood; There sprawl'd a while, and scarce got out, All cover'd o'er with slime and mud. "Upon the water cast thy bread, And after many days thou'lt find it;"[3] But gold, upon this ocean spread, Shall sink, and leave no mark behind it: There is a gulf, where thousands fell, Here all the bold adventurers came, A narrow sound, though deep as Hell-- 'Change Alley is the dreadful name. Nine times a-day it ebbs and flows, Yet he that on the surface lies, Without a pilot seldom knows The time it falls, or when 'twill rise. Subscribers here by thousands float, And jostle one another down; Each paddling in his leaky boat, And here they fish for gold, and drown. "Now buried in the depth below, Now mounted up to Heaven again, They reel and stagger to and fro, At their wits' end, like drunken men."[4] Meantime, secure on Garway[5] cliffs, A savage race, by shipwrecks fed, Lie waiting for the founder'd skiffs, And strip the bodies of the dead. But these, you say, are factious lies, From some malicious Tory's brain; For, where directors get a prize, The Swiss and Dutch whole millions drain. Thus, when by rooks a lord is plied, Some cully often wins a bet, By venturing on the cheating side, Though not into the secret let. While some build castles in the air, Directors build them in the seas; Subscribers plainly see them there, For fools will see as wise men please. Thus oft by mariners are shown (Unless the men of Kent are liars) Earl Godwin's castles overflown, And palace roofs, and steeple spires.