When Night her murky pinions spread,
And sober folks retire to bed,
To every public place they flew,
Where Jenny told them who was who.
Money was always at command,
And tripped with pleasure hand in hand.
Money was equipage, was show,
Gallini's, Almack's, and Soho;
The passe-partout through every vein
Of dissipation's hydra reign.
O London, thou prolific source,
Parent of vice, and folly's nurse!
Fruitful as Nile, thy copious springs
Spawn hourly births—and all with stings:
But happiest far the he, or she,
I know not which, that livelier dunce
Who first contrived the coterie,
To crush domestic bliss at once.
Then grinned, no doubt, amidst the dames,
As Nero fiddled to the flames.
Of thee, Pantheon, let me speak
With reverence, though in numbers weak;
Thy beauties satire's frown beguile,
We spare the follies for the pile.
Flounced, furbelowed, and tricked for show,
With lamps above, and lamps below,
Thy charms even modern taste defied,
They could not spoil thee, though they tried.
Ah, pity that Time's hasty wings
Must sweep thee off with vulgar things!
Let architects of humbler name
On frail materials build their fame,
Their noblest works the world might want,
Wyatt should build in adamant.
But what are these to scenes which lie
Secreted from the vulgar eye,
And baffle all the powers of song?—
A brazen throat, an iron tongue,
(Which poets wish for, when at length
Their subject soars above their strength,)
Would shun the task. Our humbler Muse,
Who only reads the public news
And idly utters what she gleans
From chronicles and magazines,
Recoiling feels her feeble fires,
And blushing to her shades retires,
Alas! she knows not how to treat
The finer follies of the great,
Where even, Democritus, thy sneer
Were vain as Heraclitus' tear.
Suffice it that by just degrees
They reached all heights, and rose with ease;
(For beauty wins its way, uncalled,
And ready dupes are ne'er black-balled.)
Each gambling dame she knew, and he
Knew every shark of quality;
From the grave cautious few who live
On thoughtless youth, and living thrive,
To the light train who mimic France,
And the soft sons of nonchalance.
While Jenny, now no more of use,
Excuse succeeding to excuse,
Grew piqued, and prudently withdrew
To shilling whist, and chicken loo.
Advanced to fashion's wavering head,
They now, where once they followed, led.
Devised new systems of delight,
A-bed all day, and up all night,
In different circles reigned supreme.
Wives copied her, and husbands him;
Till so divinely life ran on,
So separate, so quite bon-ton,
That meeting in a public place,
They scarcely knew each other's face.
At last they met, by his desire,
A tête-a-tête across the fire;
Looked in each other's face awhile,
With half a tear, and half a smile.
The ruddy health, which wont to grace
With manly glow his rural face,
Now scarce retained its faintest streak;
So sallow was his leathern cheek.
She lank, and pale, and hollow-eyed,
With rouge had striven in vain to hide
What once was beauty, and repair
The rapine of the midnight air.