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PDFThat begs my interest for a place;
A hundred other men’s affairs,
Like bees, are humming in my ears.
“To-morrow my appeal comes on;
Without your help, the cause is gone—”
“The duke expects my lord and you,
About some great affair, at two—”
“Put my Lord Bolingbroke in mind,
To get my warrant quickly sign’d:
Consider, ’tis my first request.”—
Be satisfied I’ll do my best:
Then presently he falls to tease,
“You may for certain, if you please;
I doubt not if his lordship knew—–
And Mr. Dean, one word from you[4]——”
’Tis (let me see) three years and more,
(October next it will be four,)
Since Harley bid me first attend,[5]
And chose me for an humble friend;
Would take me in his coach to chat,
And question me of this and that;
As “What’s o’clock?” And, “How’s the wind?”
“Whose chariot’s that we left behind?”
Or gravely try to read the lines
Writ underneath the country signs;[6]
And mark at Brentford how they spell
Hear is good Eal and Bear to cell.
Or, “Have you nothing new to-day
To shew from Parnell, Pope and Gay?”
Such tattle often entertains
My lord and me as far as Staines,
As once a-week we travel down
To Windsor, and again to town;
Where all that passes inter nos
Might be proclaim’d at Charing-cross.
Yet some I know with envy swell,
Because they see me used so well:
“How think you of our friend the Dean?
I wonder what some people mean!
My lord and he are grown so great,
Always together, tete-a-tete;
What! they admire him for his jokes?—
See but the fortune of some folks!”
There flies about a strange report
Of mighty news arrived at court:
I’m stopp’d by all the fools I meet,
And catechised in every street.
“You, Mr. Dean, frequent the great:
Inform us, will the emperor treat?
Or do the prints and papers lie?”
Faith, sir, you know as much as I.
“Ah, Doctor, how you love to jest!
’Tis now no secret”—I protest
It’s one to me—“Then tell us, pray,
When are the troops to have their pay?”
And, though I solemnly declare
I know no more than my lord mayor,
They stand amazed, and think me grown
The closest mortal ever known.
Thus in a sea of folly toss’d,
My choicest[7] hours of life are lost:
Yet always wishing to retreat,
O, could I see my country-seat!
There leaning near a gentle brook,
Sleep, or peruse some ancient book;
And there in sweet oblivion drown
Those cares that haunt the court and town.[8]
A hundred other men’s affairs,
Like bees, are humming in my ears.
“To-morrow my appeal comes on;
Without your help, the cause is gone—”
“The duke expects my lord and you,
About some great affair, at two—”
“Put my Lord Bolingbroke in mind,
To get my warrant quickly sign’d:
Consider, ’tis my first request.”—
Be satisfied I’ll do my best:
Then presently he falls to tease,
“You may for certain, if you please;
I doubt not if his lordship knew—–
And Mr. Dean, one word from you[4]——”
’Tis (let me see) three years and more,
(October next it will be four,)
Since Harley bid me first attend,[5]
And chose me for an humble friend;
Would take me in his coach to chat,
And question me of this and that;
As “What’s o’clock?” And, “How’s the wind?”
“Whose chariot’s that we left behind?”
Or gravely try to read the lines
Writ underneath the country signs;[6]
And mark at Brentford how they spell
Hear is good Eal and Bear to cell.
Or, “Have you nothing new to-day
To shew from Parnell, Pope and Gay?”
Such tattle often entertains
My lord and me as far as Staines,
As once a-week we travel down
To Windsor, and again to town;
Where all that passes inter nos
Might be proclaim’d at Charing-cross.
Yet some I know with envy swell,
Because they see me used so well:
“How think you of our friend the Dean?
I wonder what some people mean!
My lord and he are grown so great,
Always together, tete-a-tete;
What! they admire him for his jokes?—
See but the fortune of some folks!”
There flies about a strange report
Of mighty news arrived at court:
I’m stopp’d by all the fools I meet,
And catechised in every street.
“You, Mr. Dean, frequent the great:
Inform us, will the emperor treat?
Or do the prints and papers lie?”
Faith, sir, you know as much as I.
“Ah, Doctor, how you love to jest!
’Tis now no secret”—I protest
It’s one to me—“Then tell us, pray,
When are the troops to have their pay?”
And, though I solemnly declare
I know no more than my lord mayor,
They stand amazed, and think me grown
The closest mortal ever known.
Thus in a sea of folly toss’d,
My choicest[7] hours of life are lost:
Yet always wishing to retreat,
O, could I see my country-seat!
There leaning near a gentle brook,
Sleep, or peruse some ancient book;
And there in sweet oblivion drown
Those cares that haunt the court and town.[8]
[Footnote 1: Collated with Stella’s copy in the Duke of Bedford’s volume.—Forster.]
[Footnote 2: Here followed twenty lines inserted by Pope when he published the Miscellanies. The version is here printed as written by Swift.—W. E. B.]
[Footnote 3: Swift was perpetually expressing his deep discontent at his Irish preferment, and forming schemes for exchanging it for a smaller in England, and courted Queen Caroline and Sir Robert Walpole to effect such a change. A negotiation had nearly taken place between the Dean and Mr. Talbot for the living of Burfield, in Berkshire. Mr. Talbot himself informed me of this negotiation. Burfield is in the neighbourhood of Bucklebury, Lord Bolingbroke’s seat.—Warton.]
