5
ON DEPUTY ——
By many a booby's vengeance bit
I leave your haunts, ye sons of wit!
And swear, by Heaven's blessed light,
That Epigrams no more I'll write.
Now hang that ***** for an ass,
Thus to thrust in his idiot face,
Which spite of oaths, if e'er I spy,
I'll write an Epigram—or die.
Laberius.
First published in Morning Post, Jan. 2, 1798. First collected, P. and D. W., 1877, ii. 369.