So the French, when our generals soundly did pay them,
Went triumphant to church, and sang stoutly, _Te Deum._
So the famous Tom Leigh[3], when quite run a-ground,
Comes off by out-laughing the company round:
In every vile pamphlet you'll read the same fancies,
Having thus overthrown all our farther advances.
My offers of peace you ill understood;
Friend Sheridan, when will you know your own good?
'Twas to teach you in modester language your duty;
For, were you a dog, I could not be rude t'ye;
As a good quiet soul, who no mischief intends
To a quarrelsome fellow, cries, Let us be friends.
But we like Antaeus and Hercules fight,
The oftener you fall, the oftener you write:
And I'll use you as he did that overgrown clown,
I'll first take you up, and then take you down;
And, 'tis your own case, for you never can wound
The worst dunce in your school, till he's heaved from the ground.
I beg your pardon for using my left hand, but I was in great haste, and
the other hand was employed at the same time in writing some letters of
business. September 20, 1718.--I will send you the rest when I have
leisure: but pray come to dinner with the company you met here last.
[Footnote 1: The humour of this poem is partly lost, by the impossibility
of printing it left-handed as it was written.
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