THE COLLECTOR TO HIS LIBRARY
ROWN Books of mine, who never yet
Have caused me anguish or regret,—
Save when some fiend in human shape
Has set your tender sides agape,
Or soiled with some unmanly smear
The candour of your margin clear,
Or writ you with some phrase inane,
The bantling of an idle brain,—
I love you and because must end
This commerce between friend and friend,
I do implore each kindly Fate-
To each and all I supplicate-
That you, whom I have loved so long,
May not be vended "for a song" ;-
That you, my dear desire and care,
May 'scape the common thoroughfare,
The dust, the eating rain, and all
The shame and squalor of the Stall.
Rather I trust your lot may touch
Some Croesus-if there should be such-
To buy you, and that you may so
From Croesus unto Croesus go
Till that inevitable day
When comes your moment of decay.
This, more than other good, I pray.
THE BOOK-PLATE'S PETITION
THE BOOK-PLATE'S PETITION
BY A GENTLEMAN OF THE TEMPLE
WHILE cynic CHARLES still trimm'd
the vane
'Twixt Querouaille and Castlemaine,
In days that shocked JOHN EVELYN,
My First Possessor fixed me in.
In days of Dutchmen and of frost,
The narrow sea with JAMES I cross'd,
Returning when once more began
The Age of Saturn and of Anne.
I am a part of all the past:
I knew the GEORGES, first and last;
I have been oft where else was none
Save the great wig of ADDISON ;
And seen on shelves beneath me grope
The little eager form of POPE.
I lost the Third that owned me when
French NOAILLES fled at Dettingen ;
The year JAMES WOLFR surprised Quebec,
The Fourth in hunting broke his neck;
The day that WILLIAM HOGARTH dy'd,
The Fifth one found me in Cheapside.
This was a Scholar, one of those
Whose Greek is sounder than their hose;
He lov'd old Books and nappy ale,
So liv'd at Streatham, next to THRALE.
'Twas there this stain of grease I boast
Was made by Dr. JOHNSON'S toast.
(He did it, as I think, for Spite;
My Master call'd him Jacobite !)
And now that I so long to-day
Have rested post discrimina,
Safe in the brass-wir'd book-case where
I watch'd the Vicar's whit'ning hair,
Must I these travell'd bones inter
In some Collector's sepulchre!
Must I be torn herefrom and thrown
With frontispiece and colophon!
With vagrant E's, and I's, and O's,
The spoil of plunder'd Folios!
With scraps and snippets that to ME
Are naught but kitchen company!
Nay, rather, FRIEND, this favour grant me:
Tear me at once; but don't transplant me.
CHELTENHAM,
Sept. 31, 1792.
"BUY,-who'll buy?" In the market-place,
Out of the market din and clatter,
The quack with his puckered persuasive face
Patters away in the ancient patter.
"Buy,-who'll buy? In this flask I hold-
In this little flask that I tap with my stick, sir-
Is the famed, infallible Water of Gold,—
The One, Original, True Elixir !
"Buy,-who'll buy? There's a maiden there,-
She with the ell-long flaxen tresses,-
Here is a draught that will make you fair,
Fit for an Emperor's own caresses!
Buy,-who'll buy? Are you old and gray ? Drink but of this, and in less than a minute, Lo! you will dance like the flowers in May, Chirp and chirk like a new-fledged linnet!
"Buy, who'll buy? Is a baby ill?
Drop but a drop of this in his throttle, Straight he will gossip and gorge his fill, Brisk as a burgher over a bottle!
"Here is wealth for your life,—if you will but ask;
Here is health for your limb, without lint or lotion;
Here is all that you lack, in this tiny flask; And the price is a couple of silver groschen!
"Buy,-who'll buy?" So the tale runs on: And still in the Great World's market-places The Quack, with his quack catholicon,
Finds ever his crowd of upturned faces;
For he plays on our hearts with his pipe and drum, On our vague regret, on our weary yearning; For he sells the thing that never can come,
Or the thing that has vanished, past returning.
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