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PDFAnd yet I must except the Rhine,
Because it clinks to Caroline.
Hail, queen of Britain, queen of rhymes!
Be sung ten hundred thousand times;
Too happy were the poets’ crew,
If their own happiness they knew:
Three syllables did never meet
So soft, so sliding, and so sweet:
Nine other tuneful words like that
Would prove even Homer’s numbers flat.
Behold three beauteous vowels stand,
With bridegroom liquids hand in hand;
In concord here for ever fix’d,
No jarring consonant betwixt.
May Caroline continue long,
For ever fair and young!—in song.
What though the royal carcass must,
Squeezed in a coffin, turn to dust?
Those elements her name compose,
Like atoms, are exempt from blows.
Though Caroline may fill your gaps,
Yet still you must consult your maps;
Find rivers with harmonious names,
Sabrina, Medway, and the Thames,
Britannia long will wear like steel,
But Albion’s cliffs are out at heel;
And Patience can endure no more
To hear the Belgic lion roar.
Give up the phrase of haughty Gaul,
But proud Iberia soundly maul:
Restore the ships by Philip taken,
And make him crouch to save his bacon.
Nassau, who got the name of Glorious,
Because he never was victorious,
A hanger-on has always been;
For old acquaintance bring him in.
To Walpole you might lend a line,
But much I fear he’s in decline;
And if you chance to come too late,
When he goes out, you share his fate,
And bear the new successor’s frown;
Or, whom you once sang up, sing down.
Reject with scorn that stupid notion,
To praise your hero for devotion;
Nor entertain a thought so odd,
That princes should believe in God;
But follow the securest rule,
And turn it all to ridicule:
’Tis grown the choicest wit at court,
And gives the maids of honour sport;
For, since they talk’d with Dr. Clarke,[5]
They now can venture in the dark:
That sound divine the truth has spoke all,
And pawn’d his word, Hell is not local.
This will not give them half the trouble
Of bargains sold, or meanings double.
Supposing now your song is done,
To Mynheer Handel next you run,
Who artfully will pare and prune
Your words to some Italian tune:
Then print it in the largest letter,
With capitals, the more the better.
Present it boldly on your knee,
And take a guinea for your fee.
Because it clinks to Caroline.
Hail, queen of Britain, queen of rhymes!
Be sung ten hundred thousand times;
Too happy were the poets’ crew,
If their own happiness they knew:
Three syllables did never meet
So soft, so sliding, and so sweet:
Nine other tuneful words like that
Would prove even Homer’s numbers flat.
Behold three beauteous vowels stand,
With bridegroom liquids hand in hand;
In concord here for ever fix’d,
No jarring consonant betwixt.
May Caroline continue long,
For ever fair and young!—in song.
What though the royal carcass must,
Squeezed in a coffin, turn to dust?
Those elements her name compose,
Like atoms, are exempt from blows.
Though Caroline may fill your gaps,
Yet still you must consult your maps;
Find rivers with harmonious names,
Sabrina, Medway, and the Thames,
Britannia long will wear like steel,
But Albion’s cliffs are out at heel;
And Patience can endure no more
To hear the Belgic lion roar.
Give up the phrase of haughty Gaul,
But proud Iberia soundly maul:
Restore the ships by Philip taken,
And make him crouch to save his bacon.
Nassau, who got the name of Glorious,
Because he never was victorious,
A hanger-on has always been;
For old acquaintance bring him in.
To Walpole you might lend a line,
But much I fear he’s in decline;
And if you chance to come too late,
When he goes out, you share his fate,
And bear the new successor’s frown;
Or, whom you once sang up, sing down.
Reject with scorn that stupid notion,
To praise your hero for devotion;
Nor entertain a thought so odd,
That princes should believe in God;
But follow the securest rule,
And turn it all to ridicule:
’Tis grown the choicest wit at court,
And gives the maids of honour sport;
For, since they talk’d with Dr. Clarke,[5]
They now can venture in the dark:
That sound divine the truth has spoke all,
And pawn’d his word, Hell is not local.
This will not give them half the trouble
Of bargains sold, or meanings double.
Supposing now your song is done,
To Mynheer Handel next you run,
Who artfully will pare and prune
Your words to some Italian tune:
Then print it in the largest letter,
With capitals, the more the better.
Present it boldly on your knee,
And take a guinea for your fee.
[Footnote 1: Alluding to the disputes between George I, and his son, while the latter was Prince of Wales.—Scott.]
[Footnote 2: The Electress Sophia, mother of George II, was supposed to have had an intrigue with Count Konigsmark.—Scott.]
[Footnote 3: The name of the goat with whose milk Jupiter was fed, and one of whose horns was placed among the stars as the Cornu Amaltheae, or Cornu Copiae. Ovid, “Fasti,” lib. v.—W. E. B.]
