A burst of laughter echoes all around,

While, sputtering dirt, and scrabbling from the ground,

'Cease, fools, your mirth, nor sneer at my disgrace,
This cursed bog, not Churchill, won the race;
And sure, who such disasters can foresee,
Must be a greater conjurer than me.'

While Churchill, careless, triumphs in his fall,
Up to the gulf his jaded rivals crawl;

Here some the watchful harpies on the shore
Plunge in-ah! destin'd to return no more!—
While others, wondering, view them as they sink,
And, scar'd, stand quivering on the dreadful brink.
Now rous'd the hero, by the trumpet's sound,
Turns from his rueful foe, and stares around;
No bard he views behind-but all have pass'd
Him, heedless of their flight, and now the last.
Stung at the thought, with double force he springs,
Rage gives him strength, and emulation wings:
The ground regain'd-Stand clear,' he sternly said,
'Who bars my passage, horror on his head!'-
Unhappy Dapper! doom'd to meet thy fate,
Why heard'st thou not the menace ere too late?
Fir'd with disdain, he spurn'd the witling's breech,
And headlong hurl'd him in Oblivion's ditch ;
Then instant bounding high with all his main,
O'erleap'd its utmost bounds, and scour'd along the
plain.

Sour critics, frowning, view'd him as he fled; Spite bit her nails, and Dulness scratch'd her head. The gulf once pass'd, no obstacle remains,

Smooth is the path, midst flower-enamell'd plains; Unrival'd now, with joyful speed he flies,

Performs the destin'd race, and claims the prize.

Fame gives the chaplet, while the tuneful Nine
The' acknowledg'd victor bail in notes divine.

Smollet stood grumbling by the fatal ditch; Hill call'd the goddess whore, and Jones a bitch; Each curs'd the partial judgment of the day, And, greatly disappointed, sneak'd away.

THE SNOW-BALL.

A CANTATA.

RECITATIVE.

As Harriot, wanton as the sportive roe,
Was pelting Strephon with the new-fall'n snow;
The' enamour'd youth, who'd long in vain admir'd,
By every look and every gesture fir'd,

While round his head the harmless bullets fly,
Thus breathes his passion, prefac'd with a sigh.

AIR.

'Cease, my charmer, I conjure thee,
Oh! cease this pastime too severe;
Though I burn, snow cannot cure me,
Fix'd is the flame that rages here.

'Snow in thy hand its chillness loses,
Each flake converts to glowing fire;
Whilst thy cold breast all warmth refuses,
Thus I, by contraries, expire.'

RECITATIVE.

At humble distance thus to tell your pain, What should you meet but coldness and disdain?"

Replied the laughing fair—' Observe the snow, The sun retir'd, broods o'er the vale below, But when approaching near he gilds the day, It owns the genial flame and melts away.'

AIR.

'Whining in this love-sick strain,
Strephon, you will sigh in vain;
For your passion thus to prove,
Moves my pity, not my love.
Phoebus points you to the prize,
Take the hint, be timely wise:
Other arts perhaps may move,
And ripen pity into love.'