Hail fingerfooted lovely Creatures! 7
The females of our human Natures,
Formed to suckle all Mankind.
Tis you that come in time of need,
Without you we shoud never Breed,
Or any Comfort find.
For if a Damsel 's blind or lame, 13
Or Nature's hand has crooked her frame,
Or if she 's deaf, or is wall-eyed;
Yet, if her heart is well inclined,
Some tender lover she shall find
That panteth for a Bride.
The universal Poultice this, 19
To cure whatever is amiss
In damsel or in Widow gay!
It makes them smile, it makes them skip;
Like Birds, just curèd of the pip,
They chirp & hop away.
Then come, ye maidens! come, ye swains! 25
Come & be cured of all your pains
In Matrimony's Golden cage—
7 Hail] EY omit.17 Some tender lover] Some (? friend) or EY. 25 maidens] maids, and EY.27] Here the song abruptly breaks off. '"Go and be hanged!" said Scopprell, "how can you have the face to make game of matrimony?"' The phrase in the last line, as EY point out, explains the 'golden cage' in the third stanza of 'How sweet I roam'd from field to field'; see Poetical Sketches, 1783, p. 10.
iv
To be or not to be 1
Of great capacity,
Like Sir Isaac Newton,
Or Locke, or Doctor South,
Or Sherlock upon death—
I'd rather be Sutton!
Isl. in Moon, chap, ix—'Then Quid called upon Obtuse Angle for a Song, & he, wiping his face, & looking on the corner of the cieling, sang:—'Printed here for the first time.
6 Sutton] Thomas Sutton, founder of the Charterhouse (1532-1611).
