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Mary Leapor, “The Genius in Disguise”

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MARY LEAPOR
“The Genius in Disguise”

As I Fidelia and my Sire,
Sat musing o’er a smoky Fire,
We heard a Knocking at the Door,
Rise, something is the Matter sure.
The little Turret seem’d to quake,                              5
The Shelves, the Chairs and Tables shake;
Fidelia cries, O, what’s the Matter?
And Mira’s Teeth began to chatter:
The frighted Door (as what could choose)
Flew open (pray believe the Muse)                           10
A hollow Voice for Entrance calls,
And soon – Although the dirty Walls
Were stain’d with Ignorance and Sin
Yet Mira’s Genius ventur’d in,
Not in a Cherub’s Form enshrin’d,                             15
Nor in the shape of human kind:
But Locks and Hinges round him glow,
In Figure like a neat Buroe;
Like Brambles in a thorny Gap
Stood Mira’s Hair beneath her Cap:                           20
Her frighted Senses gone astray,
She bent her Knees in act to pray;
But the presuming Priest drew near
As void of Piety as Fear,
And by its Side undaunted stood,                              25
And wou’d persuade us it was Wood:
With Rev’rence then we did presume
To place him in the little Room;
The Priest excluded with the rest,
The Stranger Mira thus address’d,                             30
(Tho’ shaking with Surprise and Fear)
‘O say what Power sent thee here,
‘Not Fortune, for I ne’er cou’d see
‘As yet her Favours bent on me:
‘Nor Chance although we often find                           35
‘She governs most of human kind;
‘Or can, against the Maid’s Desire,
‘Throw Madam’s Caudle in the Fire;
‘Can light a Candle, or can miss,
‘She never brought a thing like this.                            40

This said, pale Mira gazing stood,
And thus reply’d the seeming Wood;
‘Canst thou behold me and not find
‘The Picture of the Giver’s Mind?
‘Behold the Lock and shining Key,                            45
‘That ne’er its Mistress shall betray,
‘Not blemish’d with a Spot of Rust,
‘And always faithful to its Trust.

‘The rest may be to you consign’d,
‘For in this narrow Space you’ll find                           50
‘No Emblem large enough to fit
‘Her Bounty, Judgment, and her Wit.

‘But, Mira, since I have begun,
‘The Thread of my Discourse shall run,
‘Explaining how I am to you                                      55
‘A Monitor and Table too.
‘My hollow Spaces you may fill
‘With all your Verses good and ill;
‘One small one for your Wit may do,
‘But then your Faults will take up two.                     60
‘And from the rest I pray exclude
‘One sacred Place for Gratitude:
‘And what our Patron yours and mine
‘Shall to my trusty Care consign,
‘For those lov’d Strangers I’ll secure                          65
‘The Closest with its tiny Door.

‘And now I’ve prattl’d long, my Dear,
‘Yet you are list’ning still to hear,
‘Expecting that I shou’d supply
‘At once Advice and Prophesy;                                 70
‘But that’s not right for me nor you
‘To dive so deeply – tho’, ‘tis true,
‘Without Divining I can see
‘You’ll ne’er deserve the Gift of me:
‘More wou’d you know – why, may be then            75
‘Within these Mornings nine or ten,
‘Propitious Jet may trudge before,
‘And lead his Mistress to your Door;
‘And when the Sun (whose distant Wheels
‘But faintly warm the icy Fields)                               80
‘Shall gild your Cot with brighter Ray,
‘I hope to see her ev’ry Day.

‘But turn away thy stedfast Eyes,
‘That stare so ghastly with Surprise:
‘Go seek your Pillow and be still,                              85
‘And dream of me or what you will.

‘This said (which Mira hop’d was true)
‘The Lid shut up, and cries Adieu.”
Then gave a Crack, and spoke no more,
And all was silent as before.                                      90

 

NOTES:

5 Turret  A room or chamber (OED).

8 Mira Mary Leapor’s poetic name for herself.

15 Cherub’s Form A winged being or symbolic representations often mentioned throughout the Bible (OED).

18 Buroe A chest of drawers (OED).

26 Wood “A Hebrew word which designates a certain type of idol throughout the context of the Bible” (OED).

38 Caudle A warm drink of thin gruel usually mixed with wine, often given to sick people, usually women (OED).

51 Emblem Heroic device or symbolic object (OED).

62 sacred Place for Gratitude Biblical allusion centered on finding light amidst the darkness (Oxford Scholarship Online).

77 Jet Name for a dog (OED).

81 Cot A small house (OED).

88 Adieu To take one’s leave (OED).

Source: Poems Upon Several Occasions (1748), 131-135. [Google Books]

Edited by Magdalena Becerra

Janet Little, “From Snipe, a favourite Dog, to his Master”

JANET LITTLE

“From Snipe, a favourite Dog, to his Master”

 

O best of good masters, your mild disposition
Perhaps may induce you to read my petition:
Believe me in earnest, though acting the poet,
My breast feels the smart, and mine actions do shew it.
At morn when I rise, I go down to the kitchen,                               5
Where oft I’ve been treated with kicking and switching.
There’s nothing but quiet, no toil nor vexation,
The cookmaid herself seems possess’d of discretion.
The scene gave surprise, and I could not but love it,
Then found ’twas because she had nothing to covet.                          10
From thence to the dining-room I took a range sir,
My heart swells with grief when I think of the change there;
No dishes well dress’d, with their flavour to charm me,
Nor even so much as a fire to warm me.
For bread I ransack ev’ry corner with caution,                                      15
Then trip down the stair in a terrible passion.
I go with old James, when the soss is a dealing,
But brutes are voracious and void of all feeling;
They quickly devour’t: not a morsel they leave me,
And then by their growling ill nature they grieve me.                          20
My friend Jenny Little pretends to respect me,
And yet sir at meal-time she often neglects me:
Of late she her breakfast with me would have parted,
But now eats it all, so I’m quite broken hearted.
O haste back to Loudoun, my gentle good master,                              25
Relieve your poor Snipy from ev’ry disaster.
A sight of yourself would afford me much pleasure,
A share of your dinner an excellent treasure,
Present my best wishes unto the good lady,
Whose plate and potatoes to me are ay ready:                                    30
When puss and I feasted so kindly together;
But now quite forlorn we condole with each other.
No more I’ll insist, lest your patience be ended;
I beg by my scrawl, sir, you’ll not be offended;
But mind, when you see me ascending Parnassus,                             35
The need that’s of dogs there to drive down the Asses.

NOTES:

17 soss A sloppy mess or mixture; a dish of food having this character (OED).

25 Loudoun A castle where Little was employed by Frances Dunlop and took charge of dairy, a position that offered financial stability and the means to publish her volume of poems, with the help of her patron.

31 puss A conventional proper or pet name for a cat, freq. (sometimes reduplicated) used as a call to attract its attention (OED).

35 Parnassus A mountain in Greece that, according to Greek mythology, was sacred to the several gods and serves as a metaphor for the the home of poetry, literature, and by extension, learning.

36 The need that’s of dogs there to drive down the Asses Allusion to Robert Burns’s “Epistle to J. L*****k, An Old Scotch Bard” (ll. 67-72).

Source:  Janet Little, The Poetical Works of Janet Little, the Scotch Milkmaid (Air, 1792). [Hathi Trust]

Edited by Kent Congdon

John Frizzle, “An Irish Miller, to Mr. Stephen Duck”

JOHN FRIZZLE

“An Irish Miller, to Mr. Stephen Duck”   

O Stephen, Stephen, if thy gentler Ear
Can yet a rustick Verse unruffled hear,
Receive these Lines, but look not for much Skill
Nor yet for Smoothness, from a Water-mill.
I near the Hopper stand with dusty Coat,                                     5
And, if my Mouth be open, dusty Throat.
The Stones, the Wheels, the Water make a Din;
Hogs grunt without, or squeeks a Rat within.
To meditate sweet Verse is this a Place?
Or will the Muses such a Mansion grace?                                   10
Think when thy Flail rebounded from the Floor
Was’t then you made the Shunamite?–no sure.
And can I write? ah! make my Case your own,
A Miller Poet let a Thrasher own.
Smooth gliding Thames now bids thy Notes refine,                    15
And Royal Richmond’s Shades and Caroline.
The wond’rous Grotto may thy Song inspire,
And Foundress influence like Celestial Fire.
Where I awhile from Noise and Dust releas’d,                 
And Sacks, and Horses, and the mooter Chest;                          20
And I could see the Hermitage, even I,
As well as you, my little Skill might try,
The splendid Scene attempting to recite,
Princes can build–and shall not Poets write?
But the good Queen, as Fame acquaints us here,                      25
Does ev’ry way so excellent appear,
Around her such Diffusive Bounty sheds,
So constant in the path of Glory treads,
That they who know her Nobleness of Mind,
Not much t’admire in works of Art can find.                                30
Should she build Palaces that charm the sight,
Her Godlike virtues would give more delight.
Should she command high Pyramids to frame,
Her fair Perfections would more wonder claim.
The Grotto, Stephen, no hard Task has been,                              35
But where’s an equal Pen to such a Queen?

NOTES:

11 Flail A Flail was a tool used to thresh grain. This line alludes to lines 36-37 of “The Thresher’s Labour,” Duck’s most well known and breakthrough work: “From the strong Planks our Crab-Tree Staves rebound,/ And Echoing Barns return the rattling Sound.”

12 Shunamite  Another allusion to one of Duck’s poems, “The Shunammite,” a poem of some few hundred lines and recounting a biblical tale about the prophet Elisha.

12 no sure  Most likely, the phrase is an archaic variant of the modern, “surely not,” but with the order reversed in order to complete the couplet with “Floor” from line eleven.

15-17 Duck published a panegyric to Queen Caroline, his patron, titled, “On the Queen’s Grotto, in Richmond Gardens.”  Line fifteen of Frizzle’s work parallels line seven of the Duck poem: “Flow swiftly, THAMES; and flowing, still proclaim” (Duck, Poems on Several Occasions, 1736 [ECCO]).

18 Foundress  “Female founder” (OED). Another allusion to Duck’s “On the Queen’s Grotto, in Richmond Gardens”, wherein he refers to the Queen in line 29: “And You, Imperial Foundress! deign to smile” (Duck, Poems on Several Occasions, 1736 [ECCO]).

20 mooter Chest  A variant of “Multure-chest,” the receptacle where a miller collects his portion of what a mill produces (EDD).

21 Hermitage  An allusion to the Duck poem “Verses on the Hermitage,” which was an earlier version of “On the Queen’s Grotto, in Richmond Gardens” ostensibly published without Duck’s consent (See Jennifer Batt, “From the Field to the Coffeehouse: Changing Representations of Stephen Duck,” Criticism 47:4 [Fall, 2005]: pp. 460.)

33 Frame  “To give structure to, shape, or construct” (OED).

Source: The Gentleman’s Magazine, Vol. 3 (February 1733), p. 95

Edited by Joseph Watkins

Mary Masters, “On seeing a Lady…”

 

MARY MASTERS

“On seeing a Lady with a new fashion’d Riding-Dress, and a Hat cock’d up”

The Round-ear’d Cap (once worn with decent Pride)
And Velvet Bonnet both are thrown aside;
The Beaver, now, cock’d up with bolder Air,
And manly Habit, please the fickle Fair.
Yet, for Excuse, it justly may be said,                                                5
A Scheme with deepest Policy is laid:
Since, among Men, there is a stupid Race,
Who slight the Graces of the Female Face:
Since Fops so long have self-enamour’d been,
And view the Mirror with a raptur’d Mien;                                       10
They hope in this Disguise each Beau to charm,
And win th’ Apostates with a mimick Form.
With happy Art so justly they improve,
Sure all must now the Manlike Beauties love.


NOTES:

Title Riding-Dress, and a Hat cock’d up The female riding habit dates from the 1660s, and was usually comprised of a jacket and waistcoat in imitation of men’s fashion at the time, with a similar cravat worn at the neck, a periwig and cocked hat on the head, and full skirts and petticoats. Criticism of this androgynous female fashion came from influential literary men like Joseph Addison, Richard Steele, John Gay, Samuel Richardson, and Horace Walpole through the first half of the century, and popular periodicals like the London Journal and the Gentleman’s Magazine inveighed against the practice in the 1730s.

1 Round-ear’d cap Headwear for women, made of linen or cotton, that curved around the head to cover the ears and edged with lace or ruffles; fashionable in the early decades of the eighteenth century.

3 Beaver…cock’d up A hat made of felted beaver fur, with the brim folded up; probably a reference to the popular tri-corner style hat.

9 Fops A derogatory term for a vain, dandyish man.

11 Beau A handsome, fashionable young man; here a synonym for “fop.”

12 Apostates Those who have abandoned their religious faith, political allegiances, or principles in general.

SOURCE: Poems on Several Occasions (London, 1733), pp. 157-8.

Edited by Bill Christmas