]
[Footnote 21: Whose hair consisted of snakes, and who turned all she
looked upon to stone.--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 22: A suggestion that if the tithe of _agistment_ were
abolished, the clergy might be sent to graze.--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 23: On the margin of a Broadside containing this poem is
written by Swift:
"Except the righteous Fifty Two
To whom immortal honour's due,
Take them, Satan, as your due
All except the Fifty Two."--_Forster._
probably the number of those who opposed the Bill.--_W. E. B._]
ON A PRINTER'S[1] BEING SENT TO NEWGATE
Better we all were in our graves,
Than live in slavery to slaves;
Worse than the anarchy at sea,
Where fishes on each other prey;
Where every trout can make as high rants
O'er his inferiors, as our tyrants;
And swagger while the coast is clear:
But should a lordly pike appear,
Away you see the varlet scud,
Or hide his coward snout in mud.
Thus, if a gudgeon meet a roach,
He dares not venture to approach;
Yet still has impudence to rise,
And, like Domitian,[2] leap at flies.
[Footnote 1: Mr. Faulkner, for printing the "Proposal for the better
Regulation and Improvement of Quadrille."]
[Footnote 2: "Inter initia principatus cotidie secretum sibi horarum
sumere solebat, nec quicquam amplius quam muscas captare ac stilo
praeacuto configere; ut cuidam interroganti, essetne quis intus cum
Caesare, non absurde responsum sit a Vibio Crispo, _ne muscam quidem_"
(Suet.
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