Thus spectres arife, as by nurse-maids we're told,
And hie to the place where they buried their gold:
There hov❜ring around until morning remain;
Then fadly return to their torments again.
LETTER from MARSEILLES to my Sifters at CRUX-EASTON, May 1735.
SCENE, the fudy at Crux-Eafton. Molly and Fanny are fitting at work; enter to them Harriot in a passion.
ORD! fifter, here's the butcher come,
And not one word from brother Tom;
The punctual spark, that made his boast
He'd write by every other post!
That ever I was fo abfurd
To take a man upon his word!
Quoth Frances, Child, I wonder much
You could expect him to keep touch:
'Tis fo, my dear, with all mankind;
When out of fight you're out of mind.
he'd to his fifters write?
Was ever girl fo unpolite!
Some fair Italian ftands poffefs'd,
And reigns fole mistress in his breast;
To her he dedicates his time,
And fawns in profe, or fighs in rhyme.
She'll give him tokens of her love,
Perhaps not eafy to remove;
Such as will make him large amends
For lofs of fifters, and of friends.
Cries Harriot, when he comes to France,
I hope in God he'll learn to dance,
And leave his aukward habits there,
I'm fure he has enough to fpare.
O could he leave his faults, faith Fanny,
And bring the good alone, if any,
Poor brother Tom, he'd grow fo light,
The wind might rob us of him quite !
Of habits he may well get clear;
Ill humours are the faults I fear,
For in my life I ne'er faw
A creature half fo paffionate.
Good heav'ns! how did he rave and tear,
On my not going you know where;
I scarcely yet have got my dread off:
I thought he'd bite my fister's head off.
'Tween him and Jenny what a clatter
About a fig, a mighty matter!
I could recount a thousand more,
But fcandal's what I moft abhor.
Molly, who long had patient fate,
And heard in filence all their chat,
Obferving how they spoke with rancour,
Took up my caufe, for which I thank her.
What eloquence was then difplay'd,
The charming things that Molly faid,
Perhaps it fuits not me to tell;
But faith! fhe spoke extremely well.
She first, with much ado, put on
A prudifh face, then thus begun.
Heyday! quoth fhe, you let your tongue Run on most strangely, right or wrong.
'Tis what I never can connive at;
Befides, confider whom you drive at ;
A perfon of establish'd credit,
Nobody better, though I faid it.
In all that's good, fo tried and known,
Why, girls, he's quite a proverb grown,
His worth no mortal dares difpute:
Then he's your brother too to boot.
At this she made a moment's pause,
Then with a figh refum'd the cause.
Alas! my dears, you little know
A failor's toil, a trav❜ler's woe;
Perhaps this very hour he strays
A lonely wretch through defart ways;
Or fhipwreck'd on a foreign strand,
He falls beneath some ruffian's hand:
Or on the naked rock he lies,
And pinch'd by famine wastes and dies.
Can you this hated brother fee
Floating, the sport of wind and fea?
Can you his feeble accents hear,
Though but in thought, nor drop a tear?
He faintly strives, his hopes are fled,
The billows booming o'er his head;
He mounts upon the waves again,
He calls on us, but calls in vain;
To death preferves his friendship true,
And mutters out a kind adieu.
See now he rifes to our fight,
Now finks in everlasting night,
Here Fanny's colour rofe and fell,
And Harriot's throat began to fwell:
One fidled to the window quite,
Pretending fome unusual fight,
The other left the room outright;
While Molly laugh'd, her ends obtain❜d,
To think how artfully she feign'd.
'N Ruffia's frozen clime fome fince
There dwelt, hiftorians fay, a worthy prince,
Who to his people's good confin'd his care,
And fix'd the basis of his empire there
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