Page:The dispensary - a poem in six canto's (sic) (IA b30356775).pdf/38

In a dark Grott the baleful Haggard lay,
Breathing black Vengeance, and infecting Day.
But how deform'd, and worn with spightful Woes,
When Accius has Applause Dorsennus shows.
The cheerful Blood her meager Cheeks forsook,
And Balilisks sate Brooding in her Look.
A bald and bloated Toad-stool rais'd her Head;
The Plumes of boding Ravens were her Bed.
From her chapp'd Nostrils scalding Torrents fall,
And her sunk Eyes boil o'er in Floods of Gall.
Volcano's labour thus with inward Pains,
Whilst Seas of melted Oar lay waste the Plains.

Around the Fiend in hideous Order sate
Foul bawling Infamy, and bold Debate:
Gruff Discontent, thro' Ignorance mis-led,
And clam'rous Faction at her Party's Head:
Restless Sedition still dissembling Fear,
And sly Hypocrisie with Pious Leer.^[1]

Glouting with sullen Spight the Fury shook
Her clotter'd Locks, and blasted with each Look,
Then tore with canker'd Teeth the pregnant Scrolls,
Where Fame the Acts of Demy-Gods enrolls,
And as the rent Records in pieces fell,
Each Scrap did some Immortal Action tell.

This show'd; how fix'd as Fate Torquatus stood,
That, the fam'd Passage of the Granick Flood;
The Julian Eagles, here, their Wings display,
And there, like setting Stars, the Decii lay;
This does Camillas as a God extol,
That points at Manlius in the Capitol;

1. See Dryd. Fab.