Crab. Lady Sneerwell, I kiss your hand! Mrs. Candour, I don’t believe you are acquainted with my nephew, Sir Benjamin Backbite? Egad, ma’am, he has a pretty wit, and is a pretty poet, too; isn’t he, Lady Sneerwell?
Sir B. Oh, fie, uncle!
Crab. Nay, egad! it is true; I back him at a rebus or a charade against the best rhymer in the kingdom. Has your ladyship heard the epigram he wrote last week on Lady Frizzle’s feather catching fire. Do, Benjamin, repeat it, or the charade you made last night extempore at Mrs. Drowzie’s conversazione. Come now; your first is the name of a fish, your second a great naval commander, and——
Sir B. Uncle, now—pr’ythee——
Crab. I’faith, ma’am, ’twould surprise you to hear how ready he is at these things.
Lady S. I wonder, Sir Benjamin, you never publish anything.
Sir B. To say the truth, ma’am, ’tis very vulgar to print; and as my little productions are mostly satires and lampoons on particular people, I find they circulate more by giving copies in confidence to the friends of the parties. However, I have some love elegies, which, when favoured with this lady’s smiles, I mean to give the public.
Crab. ’Fore heaven, ma’am, they’ll immortalise you! you will be handed down to posterity, like Petrarch’s Laura, or Waller’s Sacharissa.
Sir B. Yes, madam, I think you will like them, when you shall see them on a beautiful quarto page, where a neat rivulet of text shall meander through a meadow of margin. ’Fore gad! they will be the most elegant things of their kind.
Crab. But, ladies, have you heard the news?