When correspondent tastes impart
Communion sweet from heart to heart.
You ne'er the cold gradations need
Which vulgar souls to union lead;
No dry discussion to unfold

The meaning caught ere well 'tis told.
In taste, in learning, wit, or science,
Still kindled souls demand alliance;
Each in the other joys to find
The image answering to his mind.
But sparks electric only strike
On souls electrical alike.
The flash of Intellect expires,
Unless it meet congenial fires :
The language to the Elect alone
Is, like the Mason's mystery, known;
In vain the unerring sign is made
To him who is not of the Trade.
What lively pleasure to divine
The thought implied, the hinted line,
To feel allusion's artful force,
And trace the image to its source !
Quick Memory blends her scattered rays,
Till Fancy kindles at the blaze;

The works of ages start to view,

And ancient wit elicits new.

But, wit and parts if thus we praise,
What nobler altars should we raise,
Those sacrifices could we see

Which Wit, O Virtue! makes to thee!
At once the rising thought to dash,
To quench at once the bursting flash,
The shining mischief to subdue,

And lose the praise, and pleasure too!
Though Venus' self, could you detect her,
Imbuing with her richest nectar

The thought unchaste-to check that
thought,

To spurn a fame so dearly bought;
This is high Principle's control!
This is true continence of soul!
Blush, heroes, at your cheap renown,
A vanquished realm, a plundered town!
Your conquests were to gain a name,—
This conquest triumphs over Fame;
So pure its essence 'twere destroyed
If known, and if commended void.
Amidst the brightest truths believed,
Amidst the fairest deeds achieved,

Shall stand recorded and admired
That Virtue sunk what Wit inspired!

But let the lettered and the fair,
And chiefly let the Wit, beware;
You, whose warm spirits never fail,
Forgive the hint which ends my tale.
Oh shun the perils which attend

On wit, on warmth, and heed your Friend.
Though Science nursed you in her bowers,
Though Fancy crown your brow with flowers,
Each thought though bright Invention fill,
Though Attic bees each word distil;
Yet, if one gracious power refuse
Her gentle influence to infuse;
If she withhold her magic spell,
Nor in the social circle dwell;

In vain shall listening crowds approve,-
They'll praise you, but they will not love.
"What is this power you're loth to mention,

This charm, this witchcraft?"-"Tis Attention:
Mute Angel, yes; thy looks dispense
The silence of intelligence;

Thy graceful form I well discern,

In act to listen and to learn.

'Tis thou for talents shalt obtain

That pardon Wit would hope in vain.

Thy wondrous power, thy secret charm,

Shall Envy of her sting disarm.

Thy silent flattery soothes our spirit,
And we forgive eclipsing merit;
Our jealous souls no longer burn,

Nor hate thee, though thou shine in turn;
The sweet atonement screens the fault,
And love and praise are cheaply bought.

With mild complacency to hear,
Though somewhat long the tale appear,—
The dull relation to attend

Which mars the story you could mend;
'Tis more than wit, 'tis moral beauty,

'Tis pleasure rising out of duty.
Nor vainly think the time you waste,
When temper triumphs over taste.

CHARLES DIBDIN.

[Born at Dibden, Southampton, in 1745; died in London in 1814. In boyhood he was placed under the organist of Winchester Cathedral. Going afterwards to London, he wrote part of the music for The Maid of the Mill, and himself acted in that opera. Love in a Village and many other operas followed; in several, such as The Waterman, Dibdin wrote both words and music. In 1788 he appeared in a monodramatic entertainment of his own composition, named The Whim of the Moment, or Nature in Little. He finally retired on a government pension of £200, well earned by his thoroughly British and popular strains, but not long paid in full. The nautical turn which is so distinctive of Dibdin's songs was caught by him from a brother, a master of a merchant-vessel. One of the song-writer's sons, also named Charles, wrote many other ditties of similar character].

JACK AT THE OPERA.

AT Wapping I landed, and called to hail Mog;
She had just shaped her course to the play:
Of two rums and one water I ordered my grog,
And to speak her soon stood under weigh.
But the Haymarket I for old Drury mistook,
Like a lubber so raw and so soft;

Half a George handed out, at the change did not look,
Manned the ratlins, and went up aloft.

As I mounted to one of the uppermost tiers,
With many a coxcomb and flirt,

Such a damnable squalling saluted my ears

I thought there'd been somebody hurt;

But the devil a bit-'twas your outlandish rips
Singing out with their lanterns of jaws;

You'd ha' swored you'd been taking of one of they trips
'Mongst the Caffres or wild Catabaws.

"What's the play, Ma'am?" says I, to a good-natured tit. "The play! 'tis the uproar, you quiz.”

4

"My timbers," cried I, "the right name on't you've hit, For the devil an uproar it is.'

For they pipe and they squeal, now alow, now aloft;

If it wa'nt for the petticoat gear,

With their squeaking so mollyish, tender, and soft,
One should scarcely know ma'am from mounseer.

Next at kicking and dancing they took a long spell,
All springing and bounding so neat,

And spessiously one curious Madamaselle,—

Oh she daintily handled her feet!

But she hopped, and she sprawled, and she spun round so queer, 'Twas, you see, rather oddish to me;

And so I sung out, "Pray be decent, my dear;

Consider I'm just come from sea,

"'Taint an Englishman's taste to have none of these goes;
So away to the playhouse I'll jog,

Leaving all your fine Bantums and Ma'am Parisoes,
For old Billy Shakspeare and Mog."

So I made for the theatre, and hailed my dear spouse;
She smiled as she sawed me approach;

And, when I'd shook hands and saluted her bows,
We to Wapping set sail in a coach.

Up the Mediterranin,

One day was explaining

ONE.

The chaplain and I about poets and bards;

For I'm pretty disarning,

And loves about larning

To know, and all notions that such things regards.

Then to hear him sing out 'bout the islands around,

Tell their outlandish names, call them all classic ground,
Where the old ancient poets all formerly messed,
And wrote about love and the girls they caressed;

Swore they thought 'em all goddesses, creatures divine ;-
I thinks that he said each old gemman had nine.

Cried I, "Well said, old ones!

These poets were bold ones;

But everything's vanity under the sun.

Love's as good sport as any ;

But nine's eight too many ;-

I have one worth all nine, and my Nancy's that one."

Then we read, for their wishes,

They turned to queer fishes,

To cocks and to bulls, in some verses they call
Ovid Metaramorphus ;

And one Mr. Orphus

Went to hell for his wife-but that's nothing at all.
Some figary each hour set these codgers agog;
Old Nackron swigged off his allowance of grog;
Master Jove had his fancies and fine falderals,
What a devil that god was for following the gals!
But what makes the curisest part of their lives,
They were always a-chasing of other men's wives.
What nonsense and folly!

'Tis quite melancholy

That a man can't be blessed till his neighbour's undone ;
Why, 'tis wicked to ax 'em!

Take the world, that's my maxum,

So one be left me, and my Nancy that one.

RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN.

271

Then we'd hot work between us

'Bout Graces and Wenus,

With their fine red and white, and their eyes full of darts. "To be sure, pretty faces

Be well in their places,

But, your reverence, in love there be such things as hearts! 'Tis unmanly to chatter behind people's back,

But 'tis pretty well known that the lady's a crack.

Besides, if these things about beauty be true,

That there is but one Wenus, why, I says there's two!

Say there is but one Nancy, you'll then not mistake,

For she's mine, and I'd sail the world round for her sake.
Then no further norations,

Or chatterifications,

Bout Wenus, and Graces, and such pretty fun,

That so runs in your fancy ;

Just see but my Nancy,

You'll find all their charms spliced together in one."

RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN, [Born in Dublin, September 1751; died in London, 7 July 1816.]

ODE TO SCANDAL.

"O THOU whose all-consoling power
Can calm each female breast,

Whose touch, in Spleen's most vapourish hour,
Can soothe our cares to rest :

"Thee, I invoke! Great Genius, hear!

Pity a Lady's sighs!

Unless thy kind relief be near,

Poor Colvileia dies!

"Haste thee then, and with thee bring

Many a little venomed sting,

Many a tale that no one knows

Of shall-be-nameless Belles and Beaux,

Just imported-curtain-lectures,

Winks and nods, and shrewd conjectures,
Unknown marriages, some twenty,
Private child-bed linen plenty;

And horns just fitted to some people's heads,
And certain powdered coats, and certain tumbled beds.

"Teach me, powerful Genius, teach
Thine own mysterious art,

Safe from Retaliation's reach
To throw Destruction's dart.