Are known to honest quadrupedes;

No single brute his fellows leads;
Brutes never meet in bloody fray,
Nor cut each other's throats for pay.
Of beasts, it is confess'd, the ape
Comes nearest us in human shape.
Like man, he imitates each fashion,
And malice is his ruling passion:
But both in malice and grimaces,
A courtier any ape surpasses.
Behold him, humbly cringing, wait
Upon the minister of state:

View him soon after to inferiors

Aping the conduct of superiors:

He promises with equal air,

And to perform takes equal care.
He in his turn finds imitators;

At court, the porters, lackeys, waiters,
Their masters' manners still contract,
And footmen lords and dukes can act;
Thus at the court, both great and small
Behave alike-for all ape all.

A

NEW SIMILE.

IN THE MANNER OF SWIFT.

LONG had I sought in vain to find
A likeness for the scribbling kind;
The modern scribbling kind, who write
In wit, and sense, and nature's spite:
Till reading, I forget what day on,
A chapter out of Tooke's Pantheon,
I think I met with something there,
To suit my purpose to a hair;
But let us not proceed too furious,
First please to turn to god Mercurius :
You'll find him pictur'd at full length
In book the second, page the tenth:
The stress of all my proofs. on him I lay,

And now proceęd we to our simile.

Imprimis, pray observe his hat,

Wings upon either side-mark that.

Well! what is it from thence we gather ?

Why these denote a brain of feather.
A brain of feather! very right,

With wit that's flighty, learning light;
Such as to modern bards decreed;
A just comparison-proceed.

In the next place, his feet peruse,
Wings grow again from both his shoes;
Design'd, no doubt, their part to bear,
And waft his godship through the air;
And here my simile unites ;
For, in a modern poet's flights,

I'm sure it may be justly said,

His feet are useful as his head.

Lastly, vouchsafe ť observe his hand,

Fill'd with a snake-encircled wand;
By classic authors term'd caduceus,
And highly fam❜d for several uses:
To wit-most wondrously endu'd,
No poppy water half so good;

For let folks only get a touch,
Its soporific virtue's such,

Though ne'er so much awake before,
That quickly they begin to snore.

Add too, what certain writers tell,
With this he drives men's souls to hell.
Now to apply, begin we then:

His wand's a modern author's pen;
The serpents round about it twin'd
Donote him of the reptile kind;
Denote the rage with which he writes,
His frothy slaver, venom'd bites;
An equal semblance still to keep,
Alike too both conduce to sleep.

This diff'rence only, as the god
Drove souls to Tart'rus with his rod,

With his goose-quill the scribbling elf

Instead of others damns himself.

And here my simile almost tript,

Yet grant a word by way of postscript.

Moreover, Merc'ry had a failing;

Well! what of that? out with it-stealing;

In which all modern bards agree,

Being each as great a thief as he:

But e'en this deity's existence

Shall lend my simile assistance.

Our modern bards! why what a pox

Are they but senseless stones and blocks?