Patience or Prudence,-what you will, Some prefix faintly fragrant still As those old musky scents that fill Our grandams' pillows And for her youthful portrait take Some long-waist child of Hudson's make, Stiffly at ease beside a lake With swans and willows. I keep her later semblance placed Beside my desk,-'tis lawned and laced, In shadowy sanguine stipple traced By Bartolozzi; A placid face, in which surprise Is seldom seen, but yet there lies And yet she once had been the rage ; It hath been hinted, Indeed, affirmed by one or two, Some spark at Bath (as sparks will do) Inscribed a song to "Lovely Prue," Which Urban printed. I know she thought; I know she felt ; Perchance could sum, I doubt she spelt; She knew as little of the Celt As of the Saxon; I know she played and sang, for yet We keep the tumble-down spinet To which she quavered ballads set By Arne or Jackson. Her tastes were not refined as ours; She liked plain food and homely flowers, Refused to paint, kept early hours, Went clad demurely ; Her art was sampler-work design, Fireworks for her were "vastly fine," Her luxury was elder-wine, She loved that "purely." |