CLXXXVIII.

There’s Morbid, all bile, and verjuice, and nerves,
Where other people would make preserves,
  He turns his fruits into pickles: 
Jealous, envious, and fretful by day,
At night, to his own sharp fancies a prey,
He lies like a hedgehog roll’d up the wrong way,
  Tormenting himself with his prickles.

CLXXXIX.

But a child—­that bids the world good night
In downright earnest and cuts it quite—­
  A Cherub no Art can copy,—­
’Tis a perfect picture to see him lie
As if he had supp’d on a dormouse pie,
(An ancient classical dish, by the bye)
  With a sauce of syrup of poppy.

CXC.

Oh, bed! bed! bed! delicious bed! 
That heaven upon earth to the weary head,
  Whether lofty or low its condition! 
But instead of putting our plagues on shelves,
In our blankets how often we toss ourselves,
Or are toss’d by such allegorical elves
  As Pride, Hate, Greed, and Ambition!

CXCI.

The independent Miss Kilmansegg
Took off her independent Leg
  And laid it beneath her pillow,
And then on the bed her frame she cast,
The time for repose had come at last,
But long, long, after the storm is past
  Rolls the turbid, turbulent billow.

CXCII.

No part she had in vulgar cares
That belong to common household affairs—­
Nocturnal annoyances such as theirs,
  Who lie with a shrewd surmising,
That while they are couchant (a bitter cup!)
Their bread and butter are getting up,
  And the coals, confound them, are rising.

CXCIII.

No fear she had her sleep to postpone,
Like the crippled Widow who weeps alone,
And cannot make a doze her own,
  For the dread that mayhap on the morrow,
The true and Christian reading to baulk,
A broker will take up her bed and walk,
  By way of curing her sorrow.

CXCIV.

No cause like these she had to bewail: 
But the breath of applause had blown a gale,
And winds from that quarter seldom fail
  To cause some human commotion;
But whenever such breezes coincide
    With the very spring-tide
    Of human pride,
There’s no such swell on the ocean!

CXCV.

Peace, and ease, and slumber lost,
She turn’d, and roll’d, and tumbled and toss’d,
  With a tumult that would not settle. 
A common case, indeed, with such
As have too little, or think too much,
  Of the precious and glittering metal.

CXCVI.