There Affectation with a fickly mien, 35 45 Unnumber'd throngs, on ev'ry fide are seen, Of bodies chang'd to various forms by Spleen. Here living Tea-pots ftand, one arm held out, One bent; the handle this, and that the spout: 50. A Pipkin there, like Homer's Tripod walks; Here fighs a Jar, and there a Goofe-pye talks ; NOTES. VER. 41. Dreadful, as hermits dreams in haunted bades, Men The Poet by this comparison would infinuate, that the temptations of the mortified Reclufes in the Church of Rome, and the extatic vifions of their female Saints, were as much IMITATIONS. the VER. 51. Homer's Tripod walks ;] See Hom. Iliad xviii. of Vulcan's walking Tripods. VER. 52. and there a Goose-pye talks ;] Alludes to a a Lady of distinction imagined herself in this condition. P. real fact, P. Men with child, as pow'rful fancy works, 56 Safe past the Gnome through this fantastic band, A branch of healing Spleenwort in his hand. Then thus addrefs'd the pow'r-Hail wayward Queen! Who rule the sex to fifty from fifteen: Parent of vapours and of female wit, Who give th' hyfteric, or poetic fit, On various tempers act by various ways, 60 Make some take phyfic, others fcribble plays; And fend the godly in a pet to pray. A nymph there is, that all thy pow'r disdains, If e'er with airy horns I planted heads, NOTES. 65 70 Or the effects of hypochondriac diforders, the Spleen, or, what was then the fashionable word, the Vapours, as any of the imaginary transformations he speaks of afterwards. W. VER.53. Men prove with child,] Van Swirten, in his Commentaries on Boerhaave, relates, that he knew a man who had ftudied till he fancied his legs to be of glass; his maid bringing wood to his fire, threw it carelessly down; our fage was angry and terrified for his legs of glafs; the girl, out of patience with his megrims, gave him a blow with a log on the parts affected; he instantly ftarted up in a rage, and from that moment recovered the ufe of his glafs legs. Or caus'd fufpicion when no foul was rude, Which not the tears of brightest eyes could ease: The Goddess with a discontented air Seems to reject him, tho' fhe grants his pray❜r. A wond'rous Bag with both her hands fhe binds, 75 80 85 Soft forrows, melting griefs, and flowing tears.. Sunk in Thalestris' arms the nymph he found, Her eyes dejected, and her hair unbound. 99 Full o'er their heads the fwelling bag he rent, And all the Furies iffu'd at the vent. Belinda burns with more than mortal irc, And fierce Thaleftris fans the rifing fire. 94 O wretched maid! fhe spread her hands, and cry'd, 99 For For this with fillets ftrain'd your tender head? While the Fops envy, and the Ladies stare! 105 How shall I, then, your hapless fame defend? 'Twill then be infamy to feem your friend! And fhall this prize, th' inestimable prize, NOTES. 120 (Sir VER. 121. Sir Plume repairs,] Sir George Brown. He was the only one of the Party who took the thing seriously. He was angry that the Poet fhould make him talk nothing but nonfenfe; and in truth one could not well blame him. W. An engraving of Sir Plume, with feven other figures, by Hogarth, was executed on the lid of a gold fnuff box, and presented to one of the parties concerned; the original impreffion of a print of it was fold, at Mr. Gulfton's fale, for thirty-three pounds. (Sir Plume, of amber fnuff-box justly vain, And thus broke out-" My Lord, why, what the devil! 135 140 But Umbriel, hateful Gnome! forbears not fo; He breaks the Vial whence the forrows flow. Then fee! the nymph in beauteous grief appears, Her eyes half-languishing, half-drown'd in tears; NOTES. VER. 141. But Umbriel, hateful Gnome! forbears not fo; On These two lines are additional; and affign the cause of the different operation on the Paffions of the two Ladies. The poem went on before without that distinction, as without any Machinery, to the end of the Canto. IMITATIONS. P. VER. 133. But by this Lock,] In allufion to Achilles's oath in Homer, ll. i, P. |