I

CHEAP COMPOSITION:-A BULL.

YESTERDAY met my friend Pat in the fquare, His hands in his pockets-his eyes in the air. "What d'ye think of," fays I," as you faunter along?""I'm not thinking at all; faith, I'm writing a fong.' "Oh, then," I replied, "if 't is ufelefs to think,

He that writes without thought faves paper and ink.". "Yes, the words and the tune both I catch as they come ; For the cheap way of writing," fays he, "is to hum."

LOPE DE VEGA.

L ORD Holland has just published an Account of the Life and Writings of Lope Felix de Vega Carpio, the celebrated Spanish poet. It is interfperfed with fpecimens of the ftyle and manner of Lope, which his Lordship has very happily tranflated.

The following is a fhort paffage, taken, as is ftated, at random, from a comedy of little celebrity.

LET no one fay that there is need
Of time for love to grow;

Ah no! the love that kills indeed
Dispatches at a blow.

The fpark which but by flow degrees
Is nurs'd into a flame,

Is habit, friendship, what you please ;
But love is not its name.

For love to be completely true,
It death at fight should deal,
Should be the firft one ever knew,
In short, be that I feel.

To write, to figh, and to converfe,
For years to play the fool;
'Tis to put paffion out to nurse,
And fend one's heart to school.

Love,

Love, all at once, fhould from the earth
Start up full grown and tall;
If not an Adam at his birth,

He is no love at all.

A

THE BUSINESS OF A WEEK.

YOUNG wag who was on a vifit about fifty miles from town, being in want of a remittance, wrote the following whimsical letter:

"DEAR FATHER,

"I write to you this day, which is Monday, and mean to fend it by the meffenger who goes from hence to-morrow, Tuesday; he will be in London by Wednefday, and you'll receive my letter on Thursday.You'll pleafe to let me have fome money by Friday; if not, I fhall quit this place on Saturday, and be with you on Sunday."

TO MY ARM CHAIR.

[From the Oracle.]

THOU lov'd companion of my lonely hours,
When fortune frown'd, and friends were far away,
Oft have I bleft thee for thy foothing powers,
And fondly courted thy narcotic fway.

Lull'd in thine arms, I taste a pleasing calm ;
With eyelids cios 'd, but thoughts that ever wake,
O'er my wrapt fenfes fteals an opiate balm,
And my rack'd head almost forgets to ache.

To brighter fcenes excurfive fancy flies,
The future finiles in gayer garb array'd,
Vifions of fweet domeftic joys arife,

As peeps the pars'nage from the fhelt'ring fhade.

The laugh, the jeft, the fleeting hours beguile,

While heav'nly mufic's foft'ning charms combine
With friends who bring good humour's ready fmile,
And hearts that beat in unifon with mine.

Not

AS

Not with one wifh Imagination burns

O'er proud Ambition's flippery paths to roam,
True as the needle to one point he turns-
The point comprising all I cherish-home.

No drowsy dulnefs o'er the powers of mind
Thy foothing charms, my honour'd chair, diffuse;
Oft in my bofom, by my fire, reclin'd,

I weave the verfe, and woo the playful Mufe.

Borne on her wing, 'mid fairy climes I ვი,
Though fad around me moans the wint'ry gale;
Crop Fancy's rofes 'mid December's fnow,

And balmy spring's ambrofial breeze inhale.

If fuch the calm, when blefs'd with thee. I share-
If fuch the joys thy gentle influence showers-
Can the proud defpot's tottering throne compare
With thee, companion of my lonely hours?

No; o'er his head though Parian columns rife,
And lends the cot its humble roof to me;
He, in his throne, 'mid torturing anguifh fighs-
I fmile ferene, and dream of blifs in thee.

CASIMIR.

THE CONTENTED IRISHMAN.

S Pat and companion were rambling together

One morning, from Wexford, in bitter cold weather, His poor fhiv'ring friend oft with envy would note Every one that pafs'd by, in warm doublet or coat; "By my confcience," fays Pat, "I don't envy at all The fine clothes, that fo warm and fo comely you call; The good in our garments, so tatter'd and old, Is-they'll let in the heat, and they 'll let out the cold.”

FORTUNEL

FORTUNE; OR IMPRUDENCE.

DEDICATED TO MANKIND IN GENERAL.
FROM THE GREEK.

BY OLD NICK.

Nullum numen abeft, fi fit prudentia,-JUVEN.

ON edge of-rock, by fleep opprefs'd,
A wayworn trav'ller funk to reft:
Fortune, who faw him, thus began:-
"Awake, awake, imprudent man!
And feek, far hence, a safer bed-
For if, by thy own folly led,
Thy life be loft, I well forefee
The fault will all be laid on me!"

APPLICATION.

Thus many ills we fortune name,
For which alone we are to blame.

FROM AUSONIUS.
UI te videt beatus eft,
Beatior qui te audit,
Qui bafiat Semi-deus eft,
Qui te potitur eft Deus.

TRANSLATION.

HAPPY, when I fee thine eyes,

Where love in beauteous foftness lies!
Happier, when thy voice I hear,
Breathing mufic in my ear!

A Demi-god, when from thy lip
Love's ambrofial fweets I fip;
When on thy fnowy breast I lie,
I then-am all a Deity.

LINES

WRITTEN BY A GENTLEMAN WHO HAD MARRIED THREE WIVES.

THOUGH marriage by moft folks be reckon❜d a curse,
Three wives did I marry for better or worse;

The firft for her perfon, the next for her purse,
And the third for a warming-pan, doctress, and nurse.

14.90

THE

A

THE WEST.

BY MR. MOORE.

BEAM of tranquillity fmil'd in the Weft,

The ftorms of the morning purfu'd us no more, And the wave, while it welcom❜d the moment of rest, Still heav'd, as remembering ills that were o'er!

Serenely my heart took the hue of the hour,

Its paffions were fleeping, were mute as the dead;
And the spirit becalm'd but remember'd their power,
As the billow the force of the gale that was fled!
I thought of the days, when to pleasure alone
My heart ever granted a wifh or a figh;
When the faddeft emotion my bofom had known,
Was pity for those who were wiser than I!

I felt, how the pure intellectual fire
In luxury lofes its heavenly ray;

How foon, in the lavishing cup of defire,
The pearl of the foul may be melted away

!

And I pray'd of that Spirit who lighted the flame,
That pleasure no more might its purity dim;
And that fullied but little, or brightly the fame,
I might give back the gem I had borrow'd from Him!
The thought was ecstatic! I felt as if Heaven
Had already the wreath of eternity fhown:
As if, paffion all chaften'd and error forgiven,
My heart had begun to be purely its own!

I look'd to the Weft, and the beautiful sky

Which morning had clouded, was clouded no more"Oh! thus," I exclaim'd, " can a heavenly eye Shed light on the foul that was darken'd before!".

NEW-LAID EGGS.

Α N Irishman having arrived from Dublin at the house of a refpectable merchant in the Borough, and having left Ireland three weeks before, and

brought