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In which all modern bards agree,
Being each as great a thief as he:
But even this deity's existence
Shall lend my simile assistance.
Our modern bards! why what a pox

Are they but senseless stones and blocks?

DESCRIPTION

OF AN

AUTHOR'S BED-CHAMBER.

WHERE the Red Lion staring o'er the way,
Invites each passing stranger that can pay;
Where Calvert's butt, and Parson's black champagne
Regale the drabs and bloods of Drury-lane;
There, in a lonely room, from bailiffs snug,
The Muse found Scroggen stretch'd beneath a rug;
A window, patch'd with paper, lent a ray,
That dimly shew'd the state in which he lay;
The sanded floor that grits beneath the tread
The humid wall with paltry pictures spread;
The royal game of goose was there in view,
And the twelve rules the royal martyr drew;
The seasons, fram'd with listing, found a place,
And brave Prince William shew'd his lamp-black
face.

The morn was cold, he views with keen desire
The rusty grate unconscious of a fire:
With beer and milk arrears the frieze was scor'd,
And five crack'd tea-cups dress'd the chimney board;
A night-cap deck'd his brows instead of bay,
A cap by night-a stocking all the day!

THE HERMIT;

A BALLAD.

FIRST PRINTED IN MDCCLXV.

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THE FOLLOWING

LETTER,

ADDRESSED TO THE

PRINTER OF THE ST JAMES'S CHRONICLE,

APPEARED IN THAT PAPER IN JUNE,

MDCCLXVII.

SIR,

As there is nothing I dislike so much as newspaper controversy, particularly upon trifles, permit me to be as concise as possible in informing a correspondent of yours, that I recommended Blainville's Travels, because I thought the book was a good one, and I think so still. I said, I was told by the bookseller that it was then first published; but in that, it seems, I was misinformed, and my reading was not extensive enough to set me right.

*

Another correspondent of yours accuses me of having taken a ballad I published some time ago, from one by the ingenious Mr Percy. I do not think there is any great resemblance between the two pieces in question. If there be any, his ballad is taken from mine. I read it to Mr Percy some years ago; and he (as we both considered these

• The Friar of Orders Gray. "Reliq. of Anc. Poetry." Vol. I. Book 2.

No. 18.

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