"Honest-Honest Iago!
"If that thou be'st a devil, I cannot kill thee."
BORN in the garret, in the kitchen bred,
Promoted thence to deck her mistress' head;
Next--for some gracious service unexprest,
And from its wages only to be guess'd-
Raised from the toilet to the table,-where
Her wondering betters wait behind her chair.
With eye unmoved, and forehead unabash'd,
She dines from off the plate she lately wash'd.
Quick with the tale, and ready with the lie-
The genial confidante, and general spy—
Who could, ye gods! her next employment guess—
An only infant's earliest governess!
She taught the child to read, and taught so well,
That she herself, by teaching, learn'd to spell.
An adept next in penmanship she grows,
As many a nameless slander deftly shows:
What she had made the pupil of her art,
None know-but that high Soul secured the heart,
And panted for the trut it could not hear,
With longing breast and undeluded ear.
I'd was perversion by that youthful mind,
ich Flattery fool'd not-Baseness could not blind, ceit infect not-near Contagion soil
ulgence weaken-nor Example spoil
master'd Science tempt her to look down
humbler talents with a pitying frown
Genius swell-nor Beauty render vain
Envy ruffle to retaliate pain—
Fortune change-Pride raise-nor Passion bow, Virtue teach austerity-till now.
enely purest of her sex that live,
wanting one sweet weakness-to forgive, o shock'd at faults her soul can never know, deems that all could be like her below: to all vice, yet hardly Virtue's friend, Virtue pardons those she would amend.
to the theme:-now laid aside too long baleful burthen of this honest songough all her former functions are no more, rules the circle which she served before. nothers-none know why-before her quake; aughters dread her for the mothers' sake; arly habits-those false links, which bind times the loftiest to the meanest mindwe given her power too deeply to instil angry essence of her deadly will;
If like a snake she steal within your walls,
Till the black slime betray her as she crawls;
If like a viper to the heart she wind,
And leave the venom there she did not find;
What marvel that this hag of hatred works
Eternal evil latent as she lurks,
To make a Pandemonium where she dwells,
And reign the Hecate of domestic hells?
Skill'd by a touch to deepen scandal's tints
With all the kind mendacity of hints
While mingling truth with falsehood-sneers with smiles
A thread of candour with a web of wiles;
A plain blunt show of briefly-spoken seeming,
To hide her bloodless heart's soul-harden'd scheming ;
A lip of lies-a face form'd to conceal;
And, without feeling, mock at all who feel:
With a vile mask the Gorgon would disown;
A cheek of parchment-and an eye of stone.
Mark, how the channels of her yellow blood
Ooze to her skin, and stagnate there to mud,
Cased like the centipede in saffron mail,
Or darker greenness of the scorpion's scale-
(For drawn from reptiles only may we trace
Congenial colours in that soul or face)—
Look on her features! and behold her mind
As in a mirror of itself defined:
k on the picture! deem it not o'ercharged-
re is no trait which might not be enlarged:
true to "Nature's journeymen," who made
s monster when their mistress left off trade,-
s female dog-star of her little sky,
ere all beneath her influence droop or die.
wretch without a tear-without a thought, e joy above the ruin thou hast wroughtè time shall come, nor long remote, when thou It feel far more than thou inflictest now; 1 for thy vile self-loving self in vain,
turn thee howling in unpitied pain.
the strong curse of crush'd affections light
k on thy bosom with reflected blight!
I make thee in thy leprosy of mind
loathsome to thyself as to mankind!
all thy self-thoughts curdle into hate,
ck-as thy will for others would create :
thy hard heart be calcined into dust,
1 thy soul welter in its hideous crust.
, may thy grave be sleepless as the bed,
e widow'd couch of fire, that thou hast spread!
en, when thou fain would'st weary Heaven with
Down to the dust!-and, as thou rott'st away,
Even worms shall perish on thy poisonous clay.
But for the love I bore, and still must bear,
To her thy malice from all ties would tear-
Thy name-thy human name-to every eye
The climax of all scorn should hang on high,
Exalted o'er thy less abhorr'd compeers―
And festering in the infamy of years.
WHEN all around grew drear and dark,
And reason half withheld her ray-
And hope but shed a dying spark
Which more misled my lonely way;
In that deep midnight of the mind,
And that internal strife of heart,
When dreading to be deem'd too kind,
The weak despair-the cold depart;
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