How! what can O

-w, what can D———,

The wisdom of the one and other chair,

N- laugh, or D's sager,

Or thy dread truncheon M-'s' mighty peer?
What help from J's' opiates canst thou draw,
Or H- -k's' quibbles voted into law?

6

C, that Roman in his nose alone,

Who hears all causes, B-,' but thy own,

Or those proud fools whom nature, rank, and fate
Made fit companions for the sword of state.

Can the light pack-horse, or the heavy steer,
The sowzing prelate, or the sweating peer,
Drag out, with all its dirt and all its weight,
The lumb'ring carriage of thy broken state?
Alas! the people curse, the carman swears,
The drivers quarrel, and the master stares.

The plague is on thee, Britain, and who tries To save thee, in th' infectious office, dies.

8

The first firm P―y, soon resigned his breath.
Brave Sw' lov'd thee, and was ly'd to death.

doxy was the subject of constant attack by the High Church clergy of the time.

1 Onslow, Speaker of the House of Commons, and the Earl of Delawar, Chairman of the Committees of the House of Lords.

2 N., Newcastle; D., Dorset ; perhaps the last word should be "sneer." -BOWLES.

Newcastle was Secretary of State; Dorset Lord Steward.-CRoker.

3 Duke of Marlborough.-BOWLES. 4 Jekyll.-BOWLES. See Epilogue to Satires, i. 39.

5 Hardwick.-BOWLES. Lord Chancellor.

7.e., the

6 Probably Sir John Cummins, Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas.-BOWLES.

The person alluded to is more

60

65

70

75

likely to be Spencer Compton, Earl of Wilmington, Lord President of the Council. Pope says of him elsewhere: "His titles only must be his epitaph, and there can be nothing in his monument remarkable except his nose, which I hope the statuary will do justice to."--Marchmont Papers, vol. ii., p. 297.

7 Britain.-BOWLES.

8 Probably Daniel Pulteney, whose abilities were sometimes rated higher than William's, particularly after his death (in 1732), and William's peerage.-CROKER. The "firmness" of Daniel is meant to contrast with the vacillation of William, already reflected on in ver. 32.

9 Richard Lumley, Lord Scarborough, who died by his own hand, 29th January, 1740. His

2

Good M-m-t's fate tore Pth' from thy side,
And thy last sigh was heard, when Wm died.
Thy nobles Sls, thy Ses bought with gold,
Thy clergy perjur'd, thy whole people sold.
An atheist a ''''s' ad. . . .

Blotch thee all o'e, and sink

5

Alas! on one alone our all relies,

Let him be honest, and he must be wise;

Let him no trifler from his

Nor like his ... . . still a

Be but a man! unminister'd, alone,

school,

And free at once the senate and the throne;
Esteem the public love his best supply,
A's true glory his integrity;

Rich with his . . . . in his . . . . strong,
Affect no conquest, but endure no wrong."

friends, and Lord Chesterfield particularly, who wrote a most amiable character of him, affected to be unable to account for his suicide; but it seems from this hint of Pope's that the act was committed under the influence of despondency rising out of some scandalous imputation against him.-CROKER.

1 Alexander, Earl of Marchmont, died February, 1740, when Lord Polwarth of course had to vacate his scat in the House of Commons. 2 Wyndham.-BOWLES. Compare the verses on his Grotto : "When British sighs from dying Wyndham stole."

5 Note the ambiguity of leaving it in doubt whether this young Marcellus is to be a native or a foreigner, a Papist or a Protestant, and recollect that this was four years before the "45."-CROKER.

6 Bowles suggests:

Let him no trifler from his father's school
Nor like his father's father, still a fool-
Be but a man!

7 King's. -Bowles.

Probably the lines were intended

to run

Whatever his religion or his blood,'
His public virtue makes his title good.

Europe's just balance and our own may stand,
And one man's honesty redeem the land.

He probably means Frederick, Prince of Wales, who took a decided part with the malcontents against Walpole's administration.-BowLES.

Bowles first thought this related to Frederick, Prince of Wales. He subsequently thought they alluded to the

Pretender, and he filled up the blanks very plausibly. It is evident that he meant an heir apparent, and " whatever his religion or his blood." would equally suit either the heir de facto or de jure.-CROKER.

APPENDICES.