Will they not trust me for a spy? 
  Dear Mullinix, your good advice
I beg; you see the case is nice: 
O! were I equal in renown,
Like thee to please this thankless town! 
Or blest with such engaging parts
To win the truant schoolboys’ hearts! 
Thy virtues meet their just reward,
Attended by the sable guard. 
Charm’d by thy voice, the ’prentice drops
The snow-ball destined at thy chops;
Thy graceful steps, and colonel’s air,
Allure the cinder-picking fair.
  M.  No more—­in mark of true affection,
I take thee under my protection;
Your parts are good, ’tis not denied;
I wish they had been well applied. 
But now observe my counsel, (viz.)
Adapt your habit to your phiz;
You must no longer thus equip ye,
As Horace says optat ephippia;
(There’s Latin, too, that you may see
How much improved by Dr.—­)
I have a coat at home, that you may try: 
’Tis just like this, which hangs by geometry;
My hat has much the nicer air;
Your block will fit it to a hair;
That wig, I would not for the world
Have it so formal, and so curl’d;
’Twill be so oily and so sleek,
When I have lain in it a week,
You’ll find it well prepared to take
The figure of toupee and snake. 
Thus dress’d alike from top to toe,
That which is which ’tis hard to know,
When first in public we appear,
I’ll lead the van, keep you the rear: 
Be careful, as you walk behind;
Use all the talents of your mind;
Be studious well to imitate
My portly motion, mien, and gait;
Mark my address, and learn my style,
When to look scornful, when to smile;
Nor sputter out your oaths so fast,
But keep your swearing to the last. 
Then at our leisure we’ll be witty,
And in the streets divert the city;
The ladies from the windows gaping,
The children all our motions aping. 
Your conversation to refine,
I’ll take you to some friends of mine,
Choice spirits, who employ their parts
To mend the world by useful arts;
Some cleansing hollow tubes, to spy
Direct the zenith of the sky;
Some have the city in their care,
From noxious steams to purge the air;
Some teach us in these dangerous days
How to walk upright in our ways;
Some whose reforming hands engage
To lash the lewdness of the age;
Some for the public service go
Perpetual envoys to and fro: 
Whose able heads support the weight
Of twenty ministers of state. 
We scorn, for want of talk, to jabber
Of parties o’er our bonnyclabber;
Nor are we studious to inquire,
Who votes for manors, who for hire: 
Our care is, to improve the mind
With what concerns all human kind;
The various scenes of mortal life;
Who beats her husband, who his wife;
Or how the bully at a stroke
Knock’d down the boy, the lantern broke. 
One tells the rise of cheese and oatmeal;
Another when he got a hot-meal;