Stinking’st of the stinking kind,
  Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,
  Africa, that brags her foison,
  Breeds no such prodigious poison,
  Henbane, nightshade, both together,
  Hemlock, aconite—­
                    Nay, rather,
  Plant divine, of rarest virtue;
  Blisters on the tongue would hurt you. 
  ’Twas but in a sort I blamed thee;
  None e’er prospered who defamed thee;
  Irony all, and feigned abuse,
  Such as perplexed lovers use
  At a need, when, in despair
  To paint forth their fairest fair,
  Or in part but to express
  That exceeding comeliness
  Which their fancies doth so strike,
  They borrow language of dislike,
  And, instead of Dearest Miss,
  Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
  And those forms of old admiring,
  Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
  Basilisk, and all that’s evil,
  Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
  Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor,
  Monkey, Ape, and twenty more;
  Friendly Trait’ress, Loving Foe,—­
  Not that she is truly so,
  But no other way they know
  A contentment to express,
  Borders so upon excess,
  That they do not rightly wot
  Whether it be pain or not.

  Or as men, constrained to part
  With what’s nearest to their heart,
  While their sorrow’s at the height,
  Lose discrimination quite,
  And their hasty wrath let fall,
  To appease their frantic gall,
  On the darling thing whatever
  Whence they feel it death to sever,
  Though it be, as they, perforce
  Guiltless of the sad divorce.

  For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
  Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. 
  For thy sake, Tobacco, I
  Would do anything but die,
  And but seek to extend my days
  Long enough to sing thy praise. 
  But, as she who once hath been
  A king’s consort is a queen
  Ever after, nor will bate
  Any title of her state,
  Though a widow or divorced,
  So I, from thy converse forced,
  The old name and style retain,
  A right Katherine of Spain;
  And a seat, too, ’mongst the joys
  Of the blest Tobacco Boys;
  Where, though I, by sour physician,
  Am debarred the full fruition
  Of thy favours, I may catch
  Some collateral sweets, and snatch
  Sidelong odours, that give life
  Like glances from a neighbour’s wife;
  And still live in the byplaces
  And the suburbs of thy graces,
  And in thy borders take delight,
  An unconquered Canaanite.

THOMAS MOORE.

(1779-1852.)

XLIX.  LINES ON LEIGH HUNT.

    Suggested by Hunt’s Byron and his Contemporaries.

  Next week will be published (as “Lives” are the rage)
    The whole Reminiscences, wondrous and strange,
  Of a small puppy-dog that lived once in the cage
    Of the late noble lion at Exeter ’Change.