“The maid is virtuous,” said the dame - Quoth he,
“Let her give proof, by acting virtuously:
Is it in gaping when the Elders pray?
In reading nonsense half a summer’s day?
In those mock forms that she delights to trace,
Or her loud laughs in Hezekiah’s face?
She - O Susannah! - to the world belongs;
She loves the follies of its idle throngs,
And reads soft tales of love, and sings love’s soft’ning songs.
But, as our friend is yet delay’d in town,