English

THE Welch girl is pretty,
The E NGLISH girl fair,
The I RISH deem'd witty,
The F RENCH debonnaire ;
Tho' all may invite me,
I'd value them not;
The charms that delight me
I find in a S COT .

SIRS !
W E , the Maids of Exon City,
The Maids! good lack; the more's the pity!
Do humbly offer this petition,
To represent our sad condition;
Which once made known, our hope and trust is,
Your honored House will do us justice.
But lest our tender sense of wrong,
And volubility of tongue,
Should make us trespass on your leisure,
And speechify it out of measure,
To save our breath, and eke your time,
We clog our fluent speech with rhyme.

Love , art thou lonely to-day?
Lost love that I never see,
Love that, come noon or come night,
Comes never to me;
Love that I used to meet
In the hidden past, in the land
Of forbidden sweet.

Love! do you never miss
The old light in the days?
Does a hand
Come and touch thee at whiles
Like the wand of old smiles,
Like the breath of old bliss?
Or hast thou forgot,
And is all as if not?

What was it we swore?

Down where the unconquered river still flows on,
One strong free thing within a prison's heart,
I drew me with my sacred grief apart,
That it might look that spacious joy upon:
And as I mused, lo! Dante walked with me,
And his face spake of the high peace of pain
Till all my grief glowed in me throbbingly
As in some lily's heart might glow the rain.

So like a star I listened, till mine eye

1

Surely at last, O Lady, the sweet moon
That bringeth in the happy singing weather
Groweth to pearly queendom, and full soon
Shall Love and Song go hand in hand together;
For all the pain that all too long hath waited
In deep dumb darkness shall have speech at last,
And the bright babe Death gave the Love he mated
Shall leap to light and kiss the weeping past.

ACT III.

Scene I.

Theaspe, Periphas, Artemona.

Theas. Periphas , I have a Favour to ask of you, and positively I will not be refus'd.
Per. Your Majesty may command.
Theas. Nay, Nephew, 'tis for your own good.
Per. To obey your Commands, Madam, must be so.
Theas. I am not, Periphas , talking to you as a Queen, but as a Relation, a Friend. — I must have no Difficulties; therefore I insist upon your absolute Promise.

ACT II.

Scene I.

Diphilus. Achilles.

Ach. I am very sensible, my Lord, of the particular Honours that are shewn me.
Diph. Honours, Madam! Lycomedes is still more particular. How happy must that Woman be whom he respects!
Ach. What do you mean, my Lord?
Diph. Let this speak both for him and me: The Present is worthy him to give, and you to receive.
Ach. I have too many Obligations already.

ACT I.

SCENE, The Palace .

Scene I.

THETIS, ACHILLES.

T HETIS .

B EFORE I leave you, Child, I must insist upon your Promise, that you will never discover yourself without my Leave. Don't look upon it as capricious Fondness, nor think (because 'tis a Mother's Advice) that in Duty to yourself you are oblig'd not to follow it.

Written by Mr. GAY .

Spoken by Mr. QUIN .

I Wonder not our Author doubts Success;
One in his Circumstance can do no less.
The Dancer on the Rope that tries at all,
In each unpractis'd Caper risques a Fall:
I own I dread his ticklish Situation,
Criticks detest Poetic Innovation.
Had Ic'rus been content with solid Ground ,
The giddy vent'rous. Youth had ne'er been drown'd.
The Pegasus of old had Fire and Force ,
But your true Modern is a Carrier's Horse,

While taste refines a polish'd age,
While her own Hurd shall bid us trace
The lustre of the finish'd page
Where symmetry sheds perfect grace;
With sober and collected ray
To fancy, judgment shall display
The faultless model, where accomplish'd art
From nature draws a charm that leads the heart.