EPIGRAM

ON THE NUMEROUS EPITAPHS FOR GENERAL WOLFE; FOR BEST OF WHICH A PREMIUM OF £100 WAS

THE

PROMISED.

THE Muse, a shameless mercenary jade!

Has now assumed the arch-tongued lawyer's trade;
In Wolfe's deserving praises silent she,
Till flatter'd with the prospect of a fee.

ON A PREMIUM OF £100

BEING OFFERED FOR THE BEST EPITAPH ON GENERAL
WOLFE.

ONE hundred pounds! too small a boon
To set the Poet's muse in tune,

That nothing might escape her.
What? Wolfe's achievements to relate,
With every action good and great?
Pshaw! 'twouldn't buy the paper.

ON THE DEATH OF DR. TOSHACK OF
PERTH.

A GREAT HUMOURIST.

Where be those gibes, those flashes of merriment, that were wont to set the table in a roar?-Hamlet, Act V.

THE Doctor dead! let old St. Johnston mourn;
Let laughter's sons to sorrow's vot'ries turn;
Mirth, wit, and humour from the earth are gone,
And to the summit of Olympus flown.
Could Momus die, 'tis sure as Jove's in heaven,
The vacant chair to Toshack would be given.

EXTEMPORE,

ON BEING ASKED WHICH OF THREE SISTERS WAS THE

MOST BEAUTIFUL.

WHEN Paris gave his voice, in Ida's grove,
For the resistless Venus, queen of love,

'Twas no great task to pass a judgment there,
Where she alone was exquisitely fair;

But here what could his ablest judgment teach, When wisdom, power, and beauty, reign in each? The youth, nonplus'd, behoved to join with me, And wish the apple had been cut in three.

ON THE DEATH OF MR. THOMAS
LANCASHIRE, COMEDIAN.*

ALAS, poor Tom! how oft with merry heart
Have we beheld thee play the sexton's part!
Each comic heart must now be grieved to see
The sexton's dreary part perform'd on thee.

TO MR. GUION, COMEDIAN,

FOR HIS PANEGYRIC ON DR. WEBSTER.

THOUGH moralists may wisely say,

It is but barely civil

For all our enemies to pray,

And render good for evil;

*Mr. Lancashire possessed a great fund of dry humour, and filled Shuter's line in low comedy. He was a great favourite with the public. He kept a tavern, first in the Canongate, and afterwards in the New Town. He drank and joked with his customers; laughed and grew fat; and at length died, respected by many, and with the good word of all.-Jackson's History of the Scottish Stage.

I think it strange that Guion sage,
Should grow that very culprit,
To worship those who hate the stage
And lash it from the pulpit.

ON SEEING A COLLECTION OF PICTURES
PAINTED BY MR. RUNCIMAN.*

O COULD my Muse, like thee, with magic skill,
Subdue the various passions at her will,
Like thee make each idea stand confest,

That honours or depraves the human breast;
Like thee could make the awe-struck world admire,
An Ossian's fancy, and a Fingal's fire,

Boldly aspiring at exalted lays,

The Poet then should sing the Painter's praise.

EPIGRAM

ON JAMES BOSWELL, ESQ., AND DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON
BEING CONFINED TO THE ISLE OF SKYE.†

Two gems, the nation's greatest boast,
To Scotia's plains drew near,
Bright to illume her dismal coast,
And barren fields to cheer.

*Alexander Runciman, landscape painter and house-decorator, whose great work was the decoration of the Hall of Ossian (referred to by the poet) at Penicuik. He was a fellow-Knight with Fergusson of the Cape Club, and painted the poet's portrait. Born in 1736, he died suddenly in the streets of Edinburgh, in 1785.

+ Dr. Johnson and Mr. Boswell have at last appeared. It seems they sailed from the isle of Skye on the 3rd instant, bound for lcolmkill, but were driven by the remarkable storm which came on that day, to the isle of Coll, where they were wind bound for a fortnight. On getting loose from Coll, as they term it, they reached the isle of Mull, and from thence went to Icolmkill, under the conduct of Sir Allan Maclean.-Extract of a Letter from Inveraray, October 26, 1773.

She, fearing that their gracious forms,
To other climes might fly,
Learning and Liberty by storms
Confin'd to Isle of Skye.

ON THE MUSIC BELLS

PLAYING YESTERDAY FORENOON, PRIOR TO BROWN'S AND WILSON'S EXECUTION, ON THE DEACONS BEING PRE

HAPPY the folks that rule the roast!
Our Council men are cheerful;
To mirth they now devote each toast,
And bells fill ev'ry ear full.

When man's condemned to suffer death
For his unlicens'd crimes,
Instead of psalms they quit their breath
To merry-making chimes.

ON SEEING A LADY PAINT HERSELF.

WHEN, by some misadventure cross'd,
The banker hath his fortune lost,
Credit his instant need supplies

And for a moment blinds our eyes;

*John Brown and James Wilson were executed for the murder of Adam Thomson on Carnwathmuir. They were each only about twenty-six years old. They had made several efforts to escape from prison, in which they were as often detected; but when they found every attempt vain, they appeared reconciled to their fate, and at last by the persuasive influence of the clergyman who attended them, they were brought to a sense of their guilt, and a confession of the crime for which they were condemned.

So, Delia, when her beauty's flown,
Trades on a bottom not her own,
And labours to escape detection
By putting on a false complexion.

EXTEMPORE,

ON SEEING STANZAS ADDRESSED TO MRS. HARTLEY, THE ACTRESS, WHEREIN SHE IS DESCRIBED AS RESEMBLING MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS.

HARTLEY resembles Scotland's Queen,

Some bard enraptured cries;
A flattering bard he is, I ween,
Or else the painter lies.

EPIGRAM

ON SEEING SCALES USED IN A MASON LODGE.

WHY should the Brethren, met in lodge,
Adopt such awkward measures,

To set their scales and weights to judge
The value of their treasures?

The law laid down from age to age,
How can they well o'ercome it?

For it forbids them to engage

With aught but line and plummet.

EPIGRAM

ON THE AUTHOR'S INTENTION OF GOING TO SEA.

FORTUNE and Bob, e'er since his birth,
Could never yet agree;

She fairly kick'd him from the earth
To try his fate at sea.