But now, alas! a wicked wag

Has pull’d away the gaseous bag:

From heaven, where thron’d, like Jove I sat,

I’m fall’n! fall’n! fall’n! down, flat! flat! flat![8]

Thus, as the ancient story goes,

When o’er Avernus flew the crows,

They were so stench’d in half a minute,

They giddy grew and tumbled in it:

And thus a blade, who is too handy

To help himself to wine or brandy,