Your beard is red, and swine-like is your nose, Like burning brush your bristly head of hair, The ugliest image of a Greenland bear-- Come on--attack me with your choicest rhimes, Sound void of sense betrays the unmeaning chimes-- Come, league your forces; all your wit combine, Your wit not equal to the bold design-- The heaviest arms the Muse can give, I wield, To stretch Mac Swiggen floundering on the field, 'Swiggen, who, aided by some spurious Muse, But bellows nonsense, and but writes abuse, 'Swiggen, immortal and unfading grown,[154] But by no deeds or merits of his own.-- So, when some hateful monster sees the day, In spirits we preserve it from decay, But for what end, it is not hard to guess-- Not for its value, but its ugliness. Now, by the winds which shake thy rubric mop, (That nest of witches, or that barber's shop) Mac Swiggen, hear--Be wise in times to come, A dunce by nature, bid thy muse be dumb, Lest you, devoted to the infernal skies, Descend, like Lucifer, no more to rise.-- Sick of all feuds, to Reason I appeal[155] From wars of paper, and from wars of steel, Let others here their hopes and wishes end, I to the sea with weary steps descend, Quit the mean conquest that such swine might yield, And leave Mac Swiggen to enjoy the field-- In distant isles some happier scene I'll choose, And court in softer shades the unwilling Muse, Thrice happy there, through peaceful plains to rove, Or the cool verdure of the orange grove, Safe from the miscreants that my peace molest, Miscreants, with dullness and with rage opprest. [144] I can find only two versions of this poem: that in the 1786 edition of the poet, which I have reproduced, and that in the 1809 edition, in which the title is changed to "A Satire in Answer to a Hostile Attack. [First written, and published 1775.]" From the nature of the concluding lines of the poem, it may be inferred that it was the last work done by the poet before starting on his voyage to the West Indies, late In November. I have not been able to find a trace of the hostile attack in the newspapers or publications of the period, or of the original publication of "Mac Swiggen." The poem was omitted from the 1795 edition, only the first eight lines being used in the short poem "To Shylock Ap-Shenken." The poet made many verbal changes for the later edition, but I have marked only the most significant. [145] "Urge your little soul to cruelty."--_Ed. 1809._ [146] "Castle."--_Ed. 1809._ [147] "Meant you harm."--_Ib._ [148] "Thou bright genius." In each case where Mac Swiggen is used in the earlier version, it is changed later.--"This giant," "Sangrado," "dear satirist," "a green goose," "scribbler," and "insect," are supplied in its place.