--------

Believing love was all a bubble,
And wooing but a needless trouble,
Damon grew fond of posied rings,
And many such romantic things;
But whether it were Fortune’s spite,
That study wound his brain too tight,
Or that his fancy play’d him tricks,
He could not on the lady fix. 
      He look’d around,
      And often found,
A damsel passing fair;
      “She’s good enough,” he then would cry,
      And rub his hands, and wink his eye,
“I’ll be enamour’d there!”

He thus resolved; but had not power
To hold the humour “half an hour”—­
And critics, vers’d in Cupid’s laws,
Pretended they had found a clause,
    In an old volume on the shelf;—­
Which said, if arrows chanc’d to fly,
When no bright nymph was passing by,
And lighted on a vacant breast;
The swain, Narcissus-like possest,
    Strait doated on himself!

If so, his anxious friends declar’d
All future trouble might be spar’d: 
A heart thus pierc’d would never rove,
Nor meanly seek a second love;
No distance e’er could give him pain—­
No rivalry torment his brain. 
Self-love will bear a many knocks,
A thousand mortifying shocks;
One moment languish in despair,
The next alert and debonair.

Poor Damon bit his nails and sigh’d,
But still he was not satisfied;
He could not rest, nor be content,
Until to Cupid’s court he went. 
Of rules establish’d in the place,
Or, how to enter with a grace,
He own’d he neither knew nor car’d,
But thought such nonsense better spar’d,
And went undaunted and alone
To place himself before the throne. 
He kiss’d no hand, he bent no knee,
Nor measur’d steps of one, two, three,
But made a careless, slouching bow,
And said, “Your highness will allow,
That I am personable, tall,
A rather handsome face withal,
And fit to serve as volunteer,
At least as any present here! 
Purblind, and deaf, and long and short,
Without distinction here resort;
Whilst I, neglected and forgot,
Sate daily watching in my cot;
And scarcely stirr’d, for fear there might,
Arrive that morning or that night
A captaincy, or some commission,
For I confess I have ambition,
And think if none had done me wrong
I had not been o’erlook’d so long. 
To come then, Sir, I thought my duty,
Oh! make me sensible to beauty! 
The ice about my bosom melt! 
Infuse a warmth it never felt! 
I come uncall’d! excuse my boldness! 
In truth I could not bear the coldness!”

Half piqued to see him thus intrude,
And question in a way so rude;
Half tickled at the strange address,
Cupid said gravely, “We confess
    There may be reason in your plea;
But still we very much admire
Your entering in such strange attire! 
    We cannot such omissions see,
And countenance—­It should appear,