"And he stirr'd it round and round and Asylums, hospitals, and schools,

round,

And he sniff'd at the foaming froth; When I ups with his heels, and smothers his squeals

In the scum of the boiling broth.

"And I eat that cook in a week or less, And as I eating be

He used to swear were made to cozen;
All who subscribed to them were fools,-
And he subscribed to half a dozen:
It was his doctrine that the poor
Were always able, never willing;
And so the beggar at his door
Had first abuse, and then a shilling.

The last of his chops, why I almost drops, Some public principles he had,
For a wessel in sight I see.

NEAR a small village in the West,

Where many very worthy people
Eat, drink, play whist, and do their best
To guard from evil church and steeple,
There stood-alas! it stands no more!—

A tenement of brick and plaster,

Of which, for forty years and four,

But was no flatterer nor fretter;
He rapp'd his box when things were bad,
And said, "I cannot make them better!"
And much he loathed the patriot's snort,
And much he scorn'd the placeman's

snuffle;

And cut the fiercest quarrels short

With "Patience, gentlemen, and shuffle!" For full ten years his pointer Speed

Had couch'd beneath her master's ta-
ble;

For twice ten years his old white steed
Had fatten'd in his master's stable;
Old Quince averr'd, upon his troth,

They were the ugliest beasts in Devon;
And none knew why he fed them both

With his own hands six days in seven.

Whene'er they heard his ring or knock,
Quicker than thought the village slat-

terns

My good friend Quince was lord and Flung down the novel, smoothed the frock,

master.

Welcome was he in hut and hall

And took up Mrs. Glasse and patterns;
Adine was studying baker's bills;
Louisa look'd the queen of knitters;

To maids and matrons, peers and peas- Jane happen'd to be hemming frills,

ants;

He won the sympathies of all

By making puns and making presents. Though all the parish were at strife,

He kept his counsel and his carriage,

And laugh'd, and loved a quiet life,

And Bell by chance was making fritters.

But all was vain; and while decay

Came like a tranquil moonlight o'er him,
And found him gouty still and gay,
With no fair nurse to bless or bore him,

And shrank from chancery suits and His rugged smile and easy-chair,

marriage.

Sound was his claret-and his head;

Warm was his double ale-and feelings; His partners at the whist-club said

That he was faultless in his dealings: He went to church but once a week;

Yet Dr. Poundtext always found him An upright man who studied Greek,

And liked to see his friends around him.

His dread of matrimonial lectures,
His wig, his stick, his powder'd hair,
Were themes for very strange conjec-

tures.

Some sages thought the stars above

Had crazed him with excess of know

ledge;

Some heard he had been crost in love

Before he came away from college;

And sure a righteous zeal inspired

The hand and head that penn'd and plann'd them,

For all who understood admired,

And some who did not understand them.

He wrote too, in a quiet way,

Small treatises, and smaller verses,
And sage remarks on chalk and clay,
And hints to noble lords and nurses;
True histories of last year's ghost;

Lines to a ringlet or a turban,
And trifles for the "Morning Post,"
And nothings for Sylvanus Urban.

He did not think all mischief fair,
Although he had a knack of joking;
He did not make himself a bear,

Although he had a taste for smoking;
And when religious sects ran mad,

He held, in spite of all his learning, That if a man's belief is bad,

It will not be improved by burning.

And he was kind, and loved to sit

In the low hut or garnish'd cottage, And praise the farmer's homely wit,

And share the widow's homelier pottage.

At his approach complaint grew mild,

And when his hand unbarr'd the shutter, The clammy lips of fever smiled

Sit in the vicar's seat; you'll hear

The doctrine of a gentle Johnian, Whose hand is white, whose tone is clear,

Whose phrase is very Ciceronian. Where is the old man laid? Look down And construe on the slab before you"Hic jacet Gulielmus Brown,

Vir nulla non donandus lauru."

WINTHROP MACKWORTH PRAED.

THE VICAR OF BRAY.

IN good King Charles's golden days,
When loyalty no harm meant,
A zealous high-churchman was I,
And so I got preferment.
To teach my flock I never miss'd:

Kings were by God appointed,
And lost are those that dare resist
Or touch the Lord's anointed.
And this is law that I'll maintain
Until my dying day, sir,
That whatsoever king shall reign,

Still I'll be the vicar of Bray, sir.

When royal James possess'd the crown,
And popery grew in fashion,
The penal laws I hooted down,

And read the declaration;
The Church of Rome I found would fit
Full well my constitution;

The welcome which they could not utter. And I had been a Jesuit,

He always had a tale for me

Of Julius Cæsar or of Venus;
From him I learnt the rule of three,
Cat's cradle, leap-frog, and Quæ genus.

I used to singe his powder'd wig,
To steal the staff he put such trust in,
And make the puppy dance a jig

When he began to quote Augustine.

Alack, the change! In vain I look
For haunts in which my boyhood trifled,
The level lawn, the trickling brook,

The trees I climb'd, the beds I rifled!
The church is larger than before,

You reach it by a carriage entry; It holds three hundred people more, And pews are fitted up for gentry.

But for the revolution.

And this is law that I'll maintain
Until my dying day, sir,
That whatsoever king shall reign,

Still I'll be the vicar of Bray, sir.

When William was our king declared,
To ease the nation's grievance;
With this new wind about I steer'd,

And swore to him allegiance;
Old principles I did revoke,

Set conscience at a distance;
Passive obedience was a joke,
A jest was non-resistance.

And this is law that I'll maintain
Until my dying day, sir,
That whatsoever king shall reign,
Still I'll be the vicar of Bray, sir.