EPIGRAM ON MRS. TOFTS,

A handsome Woman with a fine Voice, but very covetous and proud.*

So bright is thy beauty, so charming thy song,
As had drawn both the beasts and their Orpheus along
But such is thy avarice and such is thy pride,
That the beasts must have starved, and the poet
have died.

EPIGRAM,

On one who made long Epitaphs.t
FRIEND, for your epitaphs I'm grieved;
Where still so much is said,
One half will never be believed,

The other never read.

TO SIR GODFREY KNELLER,
On his painting for me the Statues of Apollo,
Venus, and Hercules.

WHAT god, what genius, did the pencil move
When Kneller painted these?

'Twas Friendship-warm as Phoebus, kind as Love, And strong as Hercules.

* This epigram, first printed anonymously in Steele's Collection, and copied in the Miscellanies of Swift and Pope, is ascribed to Pope by sir John Hawkins, in his History of Music-Mrs. Tofts, who was the daughter of a person in the family of Bishop Burnet, is celebrated as a singer little inferior, either for her voice or manner to the best Italian women. She lived at the introduction of the opera into this kingdom, and sung in compa. ny with Nicolini; but, being ignorant of Italian, chant ed her recitative in English, in answer to his Italian yet the charms of their voices overcame the absurdity.

It is not generally known that the person here meant was Dr. Robert Friend, head master of West minster-school

A FAREWELL TO LONDON.

In the Year 1715.

DEAR, damn'd distracting town, farewell!
Thy fools no more I'll tease:
This year in peace, ye critics, dwell,

Ye harlots, sleep at ease.

Soft B*** and rough C*****, adieu !
Earl Warwick make your moan,

The lively H*****k and you

May knock up whores alone.

To drink and droll be Rowe allow'd
Till the third watchman toll;
Let Jervis gratis paint, and Frowde
Save three-pence and his soul.

Farewell Arbuthnot's raillery

On every learned sot,

And Garth, the best good christian ho,
Although he knows it not.

Lintot, farewell; thy bard must go!

Farewell, unhappy Tonson!

Heaven gives thee, for thy loss of Rowe,

Lean Philips, and fat Johnson.

Why should I stay? Both parties rago;
My vixen mistress squalls;

The wits in envious feuds engage;

And Homer (damn him!) calls.

The love of arts lies cold and dead
In Halifax's urn;

And not one Muse of all he fed,

Has yet the grace to mourn.

My friends, by turns, my friends confound,

Betray, and are betray'd:

Poor Y***r's sold for fifty pound,

And B******ll is a jade.

Why make I friendships with the great,
When I no favour seek?

Or follow girls seven hours in eight ?—
I need but once a week.

Still idle, with a busy air,
Deep whimsies to contrive;
The gayest valetudinaire,
Most thinking rake alive.
Solicitous for others' ends,

Though fond of dear repose;
Careless or drowsy with my friends,
And frolic with my foes.

Luxurious lobster-nights, farewell,
For sober, studious days!
And Burlington's delicious meal,
For salads, tarts, and pease!

Adieu to all but Gay alone,

Whose soul sincere and free,

Loves all mankind, but flatters none,

And so may starve with me.

Pope.

A DIALOGUE.

SINCE my old friend is grown so great
As to be minister of state,

I'm told (but 'tis not true I hope)
That Craggs will be ashamed of Pope.
Craggs. Alas! if I am such a creature,

To grow the worse for growing greater,
Why, faith, in spite of all my brags,
'Tis Pope must be ashamed of Craggs.

EPIGRAM,

Engraved on the Collar of a Dog, which I gave to his
Royal Highness.

I AM his Highness' dog at Kew;
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

EPIGRAM,

Occasioned by an Invitation to Court.

In the lines that you sent are the muses and graces: You've the nine in your wit, and the three in you:

faces.

ON AN OLD GATE

Erected in Chiswick Gardens.

O GATE, how camest thou here?

Gate. I was brought from Chelsea last year,

Batter'd with wind and weather;

Inigo Jones put me together;

Sir Hans Sloane

Let me alone:

Burlington brought me hither.

1742.

A FRAGMENT.

WHAT are the falling rills, the pendent shades,
The morning bowers, the evening colonnades,
But soft recesses for the uneasy mind
To sigh unheard in, to the passing wind!
So the struck deer, in some sequester'd part,
Lies down to die (the arrow in his heart;)
There hid in shades, and wasting day by day,
Inly he bleeds, and pants his soul away.

VERSES LEFT BY MR. POPE,

On his lying in the same Bed which Wilmot the cele brated Earl of Rochester slept in, at Adderbury, then belonging to the Duke of Argyle, July 9th, 1739.

WITH no poetic ardour fired

I press'd the bed where Wilmot lay;
That here he loved, or here expired,
Begets no numbers grave or gay.

But in thy roof, Argyle, are bred

Such thoughts as prompt the brave tɔ lie;
Stretch'd out in honour's noble bed,
Beneath a nobler roof-the sky.

Such flames as high in patriots burn,
Yet stoop to bless a child or wife;
And such as wicked kings may mourn,
When freedom is more dear than life

VERSES TO MR. C.

St. James's Place, London, October 22.
FEW words are best; I wish you well;
Bethel, I'm told, will soon be here:
Some morning-walks along the Mall,
And evening friends, will end the year.
If, in this interval, between

The falling leaf and coming frost,
You please to see, on Twit'nam green,
Your friend, your poet, and your host;
For three whole days you here may rest,
From office, business, news, and strife
And (what most folks would think a jesi
Want nothing else, except your wife.