All gaze with ardour: some a poet's name, Others a sword-knot and laced suit inflame.

But lofty Lintot[299] in the circle rose: 'This prize is mine; who tempt it are my foes; With me began this genius, and shall end.'

He spoke: and who with Lintot shall contend?

Fear held them mute. Alone, untaught to fear, Stood dauntless Curll:[300] 'Behold that rival here!

The race by vigour, not by vaunts is won; So take the hindmost Hell.' He said, and run. 60 Swift as a bard the bailiff leaves behind, He left huge Lintot, and out-stripp'd the wind.

As when a dab-chick waddles through the copse On feet and wings, and flies, and wades, and hops: So labouring on, with shoulders, hands, and head, Wide as a wind-mill all his figure spread, With arms expanded Bernard rows his state, And left-legg'd Jacob[301] seems to emulate.

Full in the middle way there stood a lake, Which Curll's Corinna[302] chanced that morn to make: 70 (Such was her wont, at early dawn to drop Her evening cates before his neighbour's shop,) Here fortuned Curll to slide; loud shout the band, And Bernard! Bernard! rings through all the Strand.

Obscene with filth the miscreant lies bewray'd, Fallen in the plash his wickedness had laid: Then first (if poets aught of truth declare) The caitiff vaticide conceived a prayer: 'Hear, Jove! whose name my bards and I adore, As much at least as any god's, or more; 80 And him and his if more devotion warms, Down with the Bible, up with the Pope's arms.'[303]

A place there is, betwixt earth, air, and seas,[304]

Where, from Ambrosia, Jove retires for ease.

There in his seat two spacious vents appear, On this he sits, to that he leans his ear, And hears the various vows of fond mankind; Some beg an eastern, some a western wind: All vain petitions, mounting to the sky, With reams abundant this abode supply; 90 Amused he reads, and then returns the bills Sign'd with that ichor which from gods distils.

In office here fair Cloacina stands, And ministers to Jove with purest hands.

Forth from the heap she pick'd her votary's prayer, And placed it next him, a distinction rare!

Oft had the goddess heard her servant's call, From her black grottos near the Temple-wall, Listening delighted to the jest unclean Of link-boys vile, and watermen obscene; 100 Where as he fish'd her nether realms for wit, She oft had favour'd him, and favours yet.

Renew'd by ordure's sympathetic force, As oil'd with magic juices for the course, Vigorous he rises; from the effluvia strong Imbibes new life, and scours and stinks along; Repasses Lintot, vindicates the race, Nor heeds the brown dishonours of his face.

And now the victor stretch'd his eager hand Where the tall Nothing stood, or seem'd to stand; 110 A shapeless shade, it melted from his sight, Like forms in clouds, or visions of the night.

To seize his papers, Curll, was next thy care; His papers light, fly diverse, toss'd in air; Songs, sonnets, epigrams the winds uplift, And whisk them back to Evans, Young, and Swift.[305]

The embroider'd suit at least he deem'd his prey, That suit an unpaid tailor snatch'd away.

No rag, no scrap, of all the beau, or wit, That once so flutter'd, and that once so writ. 120

Heaven rings with laughter: of the laughter vain, Dulness, good queen, repeats the jest again.

Three wicked imps, of her own Grub Street choir, She deck'd like Congreve, Addison, and Prior; Mears, Warner, Wilkins run: delusive thought!

Breval, Bond, Bezaleel,[306] the varlets caught.

Curll stretches after Gay, but Gay is gone, He grasps an empty Joseph[307] for a John: So Proteus, hunted in a nobler shape, Became, when seized, a puppy, or an ape. 130

To him the goddess: 'Son! thy grief lay down, And turn this whole illusion on the town:[308]

As the sage dame, experienced in her trade, By names of toasts retails each batter'd jade; (Whence hapless Monsieur much complains at Paris Of wrongs from duchesses and Lady Maries;) Be thine, my stationer! this magic gift; Cook shall be Prior,[309] and Concanen, Swift: So shall each hostile name become our own, And we too boast our Garth and Addison.' 140

With that she gave him (piteous of his case, Yet smiling at his rueful length of face[310]) A shaggy tapestry, worthy to be spread On Codrus' old, or Dunton's modern bed;[311]

Instructive work! whose wry-mouth'd portraiture Display'd the fates her confessors endure.

Earless on high, stood unabash'd Defoe, And Tutchin flagrant from the scourge below.[312]

There Ridpath, Roper,[313] cudgell'd might ye view, The very worsted still look'd black and blue. 150 Himself among the storied chiefs he spies,[314]

As, from the blanket, high in air he flies, And oh! (he cried) what street, what lane but knows Our purgings, pumpings, blanketings, and blows?

In every loom our labours shall be seen, And the fresh vomit run for ever green!

See in the circle next, Eliza[315] placed, Two babes of love close clinging to her waist; Fair as before her works she stands confess'd, 159 In flowers and pearls by bounteous Kirkall[316] dress'd.

The goddess then: 'Who best can send on high The salient spout, far-streaming to the sky; His be yon Juno of majestic size, With cow-like udders, and with ox-like eyes.

This China Jordan let the chief o'ercome Replenish, not ingloriously, at home.'

Osborne[317] and Curll accept the glorious strife, (Though this his son dissuades, and that his wife;) One on his manly confidence relies, One on his vigour and superior size. 170 First Osborne lean'd against his letter'd post; It rose, and labour'd to a curve at most.

So Jove's bright bow displays its watery round (Sure sign, that no spectator shall be drown'd), A second effort brought but new disgrace, The wild meander wash'd the artist's face: Thus the small jet, which hasty hands unlock, Spurts in the gardener's eyes who turns the cock.

Not so from shameless Curll; impetuous spread The stream, and smoking flourish'd o'er his head. 180 So (famed like thee for turbulence and horns) Eridanus his humble fountain scorns; Through half the heavens he pours the exalted urn; His rapid waters in their passage burn.

Swift as it mounts, all follow with their eyes: Still happy impudence obtains the prize.

Thou triumph'st, victor of the high-wrought day, And the pleased dame, soft-smiling, lead'st away.

Osborne, through perfect modesty o'ercome, Crown'd with the Jordan, walks contented home. 190

But now for authors nobler palms remain; Room for my lord! three jockeys in his train; Six huntsmen with a shout precede his chair: He grins, and looks broad nonsense with a stare.

His honour's meaning Dulness thus express'd, 'He wins this patron, who can tickle best.'

He chinks his purse, and takes his seat of state: With ready quills the dedicators wait; Now at his head the dext'rous task commence, And, instant, fancy feels the imputed sense; 200 Now gentle touches wanton o'er his face, He struts Adonis, and affects grimace: Rolli[318] the feather to his ear conveys, Then his nice taste directs our operas: Bentley[319] his mouth with classic flattery opes, And the puff'd orator bursts out in tropes.

But Welsted[320] most the poet's healing balm Strives to extract from his soft, giving palm; Unlucky Welsted! thy unfeeling master, The more thou ticklest, gripes his fist the faster. 210

While thus each hand promotes the pleasing pain, And quick sensations skip from vein to vein; A youth unknown to Phoebus, in despair, Puts his last refuge all in Heaven and prayer.

What force have pious vows! The Queen of Love Her sister sends, her votaress, from above.

As taught by Venus, Paris learn'd the art To touch Achilles' only tender part; Secure, through her, the noble prize to carry, He marches off, his Grace's secretary. 220

'Now turn to different sports (the goddess cries), And learn, my sons, the wondrous power of noise.

To move, to raise, to ravish every heart, With Shakspeare's nature, or with Jonson's art, Let others aim: 'tis yours to shake the soul With thunder rumbling from the mustard bowl,[321]

With horns and trumpets now to madness swell, Now sink in sorrows with a tolling bell; Such happy arts attention can command, When fancy flags, and sense is at a stand. 230 Improve we these. Three cat-calls be the bribe Of him whose chattering shames the monkey tribe: And his this drum whose hoarse heroic bass Drowns the loud clarion of the braying ass.'

Now thousand tongues are heard in one loud din: The monkey-mimics rush discordant in; 'Twas chattering, grinning, mouthing, jabbering all, And noise and Norton, brangling and Breval,[322]

Dennis and dissonance, and captious art, And snip-snap short, and interruption smart, 240 And demonstration thin, and theses thick, And major, minor, and conclusion quick.

'Hold' (cried the queen) 'a cat-call each shall win; Equal your merits! equal is your din!

But that this well-disputed game may end, Sound forth, nay brayers, and the welkin rend.'

As when the long-ear'd milky mothers wait At some sick miser's triple-bolted gate, For their defrauded, absent foals they make A moan so loud, that all the guild awake; 250 Sore sighs Sir Gilbert, starting at the bray, From dreams of millions, and three groats to pay.

So swells each windpipe; ass intones to ass, Harmonic twang! of leather, horn, and brass; Such as from labouring lungs the enthusiast blows, High sound, attemper'd to the vocal nose, Or such as bellow from the deep divine; There, Webster![323] peal'd thy voice, and, Whitfield![324] thine.

But far o'er all, sonorous Blackmore's strain; Walls, steeples, skies, bray back to him again. 260 In Tottenham fields, the brethren, with amaze, Prick all their ears up, and forget to graze; 'Long Chancery Lane retentive rolls the sound, And courts to courts return it round and round; Thames wafts it thence to Rufus' roaring hall, And Hungerford re-echoes bawl for bawl.

All hail him victor in both gifts of song, Who sings so loudly, and who sings so long.

This labour past, by Bridewell all descend, (As morning prayer, and flagellation end)[325] 270 To where Fleet-ditch with disemboguing streams Rolls the large tribute of dead dogs to Thames, The king of dikes! than whom no sluice of mud With deeper sable blots the silver flood.

'Here strip, my children! here at once leap in, Here prove who best can dash through thick and thin,[326]

And who the most in love of dirt excel, Or dark dexterity of groping well.

Who flings most filth, and wide pollutes around The stream, be his the weekly journals[327] bound; 280 A pig of lead to him who dives the best; A peck of coals a-piece[328] shall glad the rest.'

In naked majesty Oldmixon stands,[329]

And, Milo-like, surveys his arms and hands; Then sighing, thus, 'And am I now threescore?

Ah why, ye gods! should two and two make four?'

He said, and climb'd a stranded lighter's height, Shot to the black abyss, and plunged downright.

The senior's judgment all the crowd admire, Who but to sink the deeper, rose the higher. 290

Next Smedley dived;[330] slow circles dimpled o'er The quaking mud, that closed, and oped no more.

All look, all sigh, and call on Smedley lost; 'Smedley!' in vain, resounds through all the coast.

Then Hill[331] essay'd; scarce vanish'd out of sight, He buoys up instant, and returns to light: He bears no token of the sable streams, And mounts far off among the swans of Thames.

True to the bottom, see Concanen creep, A cold, long-winded, native of the deep: 300 If perseverance gain the diver's prize, Not everlasting Blackmore this denies: No noise, no stir, no motion can'st thou make, The unconscious stream sleeps o'er thee like a lake.

Next plunged a feeble, but a desperate pack, With each a sickly brother at his back:[332]

Sons of a day! just buoyant on the flood, Then number'd with the puppies in the mud.

Ask ye their names? I could as soon disclose The names of these blind puppies as of those. 310 Fast by, like Niobe (her children gone) Sits Mother Osborne,[333] stupified to stone!

And monumental brass this record bears, 'These are,--ah no! these were, the gazetteers!'[334]

Not so bold Arnall;[335] with a weight of skull, Furious he dives, precipitately dull.

Whirlpools and storms his circling arm invest, With all the might of gravitation bless'd.