LOVET. Cease your contention, which has been too long; I grow impatient, and the Tea's too strong. GAY wrote a Quaker's Eclogue, and Swift a Footman's Eclogue; and faid to Pope, "I think the Pastoral Ridicule is not exhausted; what think you of a Newgate Paftoral, among the whores and thieves there?" When Lady M. W. Montagu would sometimes shew a copy of her verses to Pope, and he would make some little alterations, "No," said she, "Pope, no touching ! for then, whatever is good for any thing will pass for your's, and the rest for mine." WARTON VERBATIM FROM BOILEAU. UN JOUR DIT UN AUTEUR, etc. ONCE (fays an Author, where I need not fay) IT will be no unufeful or unpleasing amusement to compare this tranflation with the original : " Un jour, dit un Auteur, n'importe en quel chapitre, Devant elle à grand bruit ils expliquent la chose. Demande l'huître, l'ouvre, & l'avale à leur yeux, Meffieurs, l'huître étoit bonne. Adieu, Vivez en paix." In the fifth, fixth, seventh, ninth, and twelfth verses, Pope is inferior to the original. WARTON. ANSWER TO THE FOLLOWING QUESTION OF MRS. HOW. WHAT IS PRUDERY? 'Tis a Beldam, Seen with Wit and Beauty feldom. 'Tis a Virgin hard of Feature, 5 Old, and void of all good-nature; 10 VER. II. That rails at dear Lepell] Miss Lepell was one of the maids of honour to Queen Caroline, and she afterwards was married to Lord Hervey. She and Miss Mary Bellenden, mentioned in Gay's ballad, and in Pope's letters, were the ornaments of the court, for beauty, engaging manners, and amiable character. I have a MS. letter from her, written at Paris to Lord Melcomb, which sufficiently evinces her superior understanding, and might be classed with the letters of Lady M. W. Montagu. In Gay's ballad she is designated as, "Youth's youngest daughter, sweet Lepell." He also celebrates her with Miss Bellenden, in his ballad, intitled, Damon and Cupid : " So well I'm known at Court, None asks where beauty dwells, But readily refort, To Belienden's or Lepell's." Of Of Miss Meadows, mentioned in this little jeu d'esprit, I find the following notice in a MS. poem of Lord Melcomb, the celebrated Bubb Dodington: As chaste as "Hervey or Miss Meadows !" AMONG these smaller poems of our Author, the following couplet was exposed, on a dog's collar, which he gave to the Prince of Wales: " I am his Highness's dog at Kew; Pray tell me, Sir, whose dog are you?" which was taken from Sir William Temple's Miscellanies, vol. iii. p. 323. said to be the answer of Mr. Grantham's Fool to one who asked him whose fool he was. WARTON. OCCASIONED BY SOME VERSES OF HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM. MUSE, 'tis enough: at length thy labour ends, And thou shalt live, for Buckingham commends. Let Crouds of Critics now my Verse assail, Let Dennis write, and nameless numbers rail : This more than pays whole years of thankless pain, Time, health, and fortune, are not lost in vain. Sheffield approves, confenting Phœbus bends, And I and Malice from this hour are friends. NOTES. VER. 2. Buckingham commends, It would be difficult to add any thing to the finished portrait of this nobleman, given by Mr. Walpole in his Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 118. WARTON. VER. 5 and 6. This more] A very groundless complaint! Few authors, during their lives, were more respected and revered than himself by perfons of rank and judges of merit. WARTON. |