which he never forgot, conceiving that there was a great distinction (as he wrote to Pope) 'between the English gentry of Ireland and the savage old Irish.' His grandfather was vicar of Goodrich, in Herefordshire, who lost his fortune through his zeal and activity for Charles I. during the Civil War. Three of the vicar's sons settled in Ireland; and Jonathan Swift, father of the celebrated author, was bred to the law in Dublin. He was steward to the society of the King's Inns, but died in great poverty before the birth of his distinguished son. Swift was supported by his uncle; and the circumstances of want and dependence with which he was early familiar, seem to have sunk deep into his haughty soul. Born a posthumous child,' says Sir Walter Scott, and bred up an object of charity, he early adopted the custom of observing his birthday as a term, not of joy, but of sorrow, and of reading, when it annually recurred, the striking passage of Scripture in which Job laments and execrates the day upon which it was said in his father's house "that a man-child was born."' Swift was 'sent to Trinity College, Dublin, which he left in his twenty-first year-having only obtained his degree by special favour-and was received into the house of Sir William Temple, a distant relation of his mother. Here Swift met King William, and indulged hopes of preferment, which were never realised. In 1692, he repaired to Oxford, for the purpose of taking his degree of M.A.; and shortly after obtaining this distinction, he resolved to quit the establishment of Temple, and take orders in the Irish Church. He procured the prebend of Kilroot, in the diocese of Connor, but was soon disgusted with the life of an obscure country clergyman with an income of £100 a year. He returned to Moor Park, the house of Sir William Temple, and threw up his living at Kilroot. Temple died in 1699, and the poet was glad to accompany Lord Berkeley to Ireland in the capacity of chaplain. From this nobleman he obtained the rectory of Aghar, and the vicarages of Laracor and Rathveggan; to which was afterwards added the prebend of Dunlavin, making his income only about £200 per annum. At Moor Park, Swift had (as stated in our notice of Temple) contracted an intimacy with Miss Esther Johnson, nominally the daughter of Sir William Temple's housekeeper; but her face, her position in the family, and Sir William's treatment of her, seemed to some to proclaim the fact that she was Temple's natural child. He left her £1000. She went, with a female friend, to reside in Ireland, to be near Swift, her early instructor, but they never were alone together.

In 1701, Swift became a political writer on the side of the Whigs, and on his visits to England, he associated with Addison, Steele, and Halifax. In 1704 was published his Tale of a Tub, the wildest and wittiest of all polemical or controversial works. In 1710, conceiving that he was neglected by the ministry, he quarrelled with the Whigs, and united with Harley and the Tory administration. He was received with open arms. 'I stand with the new people,' he writes to Stella, 'ten times better than ever I did with the old, and forty times more caressed.' He carried with him shining weapons for party warfare-irresistible and unscrupulous satire, steady hate, and a dauntless spirit. From his new allies, he received, in 1713, the deanery of

Did

St Patrick's. During his residence in England, he had engaged the affections of another young lady, Esther Vanhomrigh, who, under the name of Vanessa, rivalled Stella in poetical celebrity, and in personal misfortune. After the death of her father, this young lady and her sister retired to Ireland, where their father had left a small property near Dublin. Human nature has, perhaps, never before or since presented the spectacle of a man of such transcendent powers as Swift involved in such a pitiable labyrinth of the affections. His pride or ambition led him to postpone indefinitely his marriage with Stella, to whom he was early attached. Though, he said, he 'loved her better than his life a thousand millions of times,' he kept her hanging on in a state of hope deferred, injurious alike to her peace and her reputation. he fear the scorn and laughter of the world, if he should marry the obscure daughter of Sir William Temple's housekeeper? He dared not afterwards, with manly sincerity, declare his situation to Vanessa, when this second victim avowed her passion. He was flattered that a girl of eighteen, of beauty and accomplishments, 'sighed for a gown of fortyfour,' and he did not stop to weigh the consequences. The removal of Vanessa to Ireland, as Stella had gone before, to be near the presence of Swift-her irrepressible passion, which no coldness or neglect could extinguish-her life of deep seclusion, only checkered by the occasional visits of Swift, each of which she commemorated by planting with her own hand a laurel in the garden where they met her agonising remonstrances, when all her devotion and her offerings had failed, are touching beyond expression.

'The reason I write to you,' she says, ' is because I cannot tell it to you, should I see you. For when I begin to complain, then you are angry; and there is something in your looks so awful, that it strikes me dumb. Oh! that you may have but so much regard for me left, that this complaint may touch your soul with pity. I say as little as ever I can. Did you but know what I thought, I am sure it would move you to forgive me, and believe that I cannot help telling you this and live.'

To a being thus agitated and engrossed with the strongest passion, how poor, how cruel, must have seemed the return of Swift!

Cadenus, common forms apart,

In every scene had kept his heart;

Had sighed and languished, vowed and writ,
For pastime, or to shew his wit;
But books, and time, and state affairs,
Had spoiled his fashionable airs;
He now could praise, esteem, approve,
But understood not what was love:
His conduct might have made him styled
A father, and the nymph his child.
That innocent delight he took
To see the virgin mind her book,
Was but the master's secret joy

In school to hear the finest boy.

The tragedy continued to deepen as it approached the close. Eight years had Vanessa nursed in solitude the hopeless attachment. At length she wrote to Stella, to ascertain the nature of the connection between her and Swift; the latter obtained the fatal letter, and rode instantly to Marley Abbey, the residence of the unhappy Vanessa. 'As he entered the apartment,' to adopt the picturesque language of Scott in recording the

The purity of his prose style renders it a model of English composition. He could wither with his irony and invective; excite to mirth with his wit and invention; transport as with wonder at his marvellous powers of grotesque and ludicrous combination, his knowledge of human nature— piercing quite through the deeds of men-and his matchless power of feigning reality, and assuming at pleasure different characters and situations in life. He is often disgustingly coarse and gross in his style and subjects; but he is never licentious; his grossness is always repulsive, not seductive.

Swift's poetry is perfect, exactly as the old Dutch artists were perfect painters. He never attempted to rise above this 'visible diurnal sphere.' He is content to lash the frivolities of the age, and to depict its absurdities. In his too faithful representations, there is much to condemn and much to admire. Who has not felt the truth and humour of his City Shower, and his description of Morning? Or the liveliness of his Grand Question Debated, in which the knight, his lady, and the chambermaid, are so admirably drawn? His most ambitious flight is his Rhapsody on Poetry, and even this is pitched in a pretty low key. Its best lines are easily remembered:

Not empire to the rising sun,
By valour, conduct, fortune won;
Not highest wisdom in debates
For framing laws to govern states;
Not skill in sciences profound,
So large to grasp the circle round,
Such heavenly influence require,
As how to strike the Muses' lyre.

Not beggar's brat on bulk begot;
Not bastard of a pedler Scot;
Not boy brought up to cleaning shoes,
The spawn of Bridewell or the stews;
Not infants dropt, the spurious pledges
Of gipsies littering under hedges,
Are so disqualified by fate

To rise in church, or law, or state,
As he whom Phoebus in his ire
Hath blasted with poetic fire.

Swift's Verses on his own Death are the finest example of his peculiar poetical vein. He predicts what his friends will say of his illness, his death, and his reputation, varying the style and the topics to suit each of the parties. The versification is easy and flowing, with nothing but the most familiar and common-place expressions. There are some little touches of homely pathos, which are felt like trickling tears, and the effect of the piece altogether is electrical: it carries with it the strongest conviction of its sincerity and truth; and we see and feel-especially as years creep on -how faithful a depicter of human nature, in its frailty and weakness, was the misanthropic Dean of St Patrick's.

A Description of a City Shower. Careful observers may foretell the hour (By sure prognostics) when to dread a shower. While rain depends, the pensive cat gives o'er Her frolics, and pursues her tail no more. Returning home at night, you'll find the sink Strike your offended sense with double stink. If you be wise, then go not far to dine; You'll spend in coach-hire more than save in wine. A coming shower your shooting corns presage, Old aches will throb, your hollow tooth will rage: Sauntering in coffee-house is Dulman seen; He damns the climate, and complains of spleen. Meanwhile the south, rising with dabbled wings, A sable cloud athwart the welkin flings, That swilled more liquor than it could contain, And, like a drunkard, gives it up again. Brisk Susan whips her linen from the rope, While the first drizzling shower is borne aslope; Such is that sprinkling, which some careless quean Flirts on you from her mop-but not so clean : You fly, invoke the gods; then turning, stop To rail; she, singing, still whirls on her mop. Not yet the dust had shunned the unequal strife, But aided by the wind, fought still for life, And wafted with its foe by violent gust, 'Twas doubtful which was rain, and which was dust. Ah! where must needy poet seek for aid, When dust and rain at once his coat invade? Sole coat, where dust cemented by the rain Erects the nap, and leaves a cloudy stain!

Now in contiguous drops the flood comes down, Threatening with deluge this devoted town. To shops in crowds the daggled females fly, Pretend to cheapen goods, but nothing buy. The Templar spruce, while every spout's a-broach, Stays till 'tis fair, yet seems to call a coach. The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oiled umbrella's sides. Here various kinds, by various fortunes led, Commence acquaintance underneath a shed. Triumphant Tories and desponding Whigs, Forget their feuds, and join to save their wigs. Boxed in a chair the beau impatient sits, While spouts run clattering o'er the roof by fits; And ever and anon with frightful din The leather sounds; he trembles from within. So when Troy chairmen bore the wooden steed, Pregnant with Greeks impatient to be freedThose bully Greeks, who, as the moderns do, Instead of paying chairmen, run them throughLaocoon struck the outside with his spear, And each imprisoned hero quaked for fear.

Now from all parts the swelling kennels flow, And bear their trophies with them as they go: Filths of all hues and odours seem to tell What street they sailed from by their sight and smell. They, as each torrent drives, with rapid force, From Smithfield or St 'Pulchre's shape their course, And in huge confluence joined at Snowhill ridge, Fall from the conduit prone to Holborn Bridge. Sweepings from butchers' stalls, dung, guts, and blood, Drowned puppies, stinking sprats, all drenched

mud,

Dead cats, and turnip-tops, come tumbling down the flood.

Baucis and Philemon.

Imitated from the Eighth Book of Ovid.-Written about 1708.
In ancient times, as story tells,
The saints would often leave their cells,
And stroll about, but hide their quality,
To try good people's hospitality.

It happened on a winter night-
As authors of the legend write-
Two brother-hermits, saints by trade,
Taking their tour in masquerade,
Disguised in tattered habits, went
To a small village down in Kent;
Where, in the strollers' canting strain,
They begged from door to door in vain ;
Tried every tone might pity win,
But not a soul would let them in.

Our wandering saints in woful state,
Treated at this ungodly rate,
Having through all the village past,
To a small cottage came at last,
Where dwelt a good old honest yeoman,
Called in the neighbourhood Philemon,
Who kindly did the saints invite
In his poor hut to pass the night.
And then the hospitable sire
Bid Goody Baucis mend the fire,
While he from out the chimney took
A flitch of bacon off the hook,
And freely from the fattest side
Cut out large slices to be fried;
Then stepped aside to fetch them drink,
Filled a large jug up to the brink,
And saw it fairly twice go round;
Yet-what was wonderful-they found
'Twas still replenished to the top,
As if they ne'er had touched a drop.
The good old couple were amazed,
And often on each other gazed:
For both were frightened to the heart,
And just began to cry: What art?'
Then softly turned aside to view
Whether the lights were burning blue.
The gentle pilgrims soon aware on 't,
Told them their calling and their errant :
'Good folks, you need not be afraid,
We are but saints,' the hermits said;
'No hurt shall come to you or yours;
But, for that pack of churlish boors,
Not fit to live on Christian ground,
They and their houses shall be drowned:
While you shall see your cottage rise,
And grow a church before your eyes.'

They scarce had spoke, when fair and soft,
The roof began to mount aloft ;
Aloft rose every beam and rafter,
The heavy wall climbed slower after.

The chimney widened, and grew higher;
Became a steeple with a spire.

The kettle to the top was hoist,
And there stood fastened to a joist ;
But with the up-side down, to shew
Its inclination for below:

In vain; for some superior force,
Applied at bottom, stops its course;
Doomed ever in suspense to dwell,
'Tis now no kettle, but a bell.

A wooden jack, which had almost
Lost by disuse the art to roast,
A sudden alteration feels,
Increased by new intestine wheels;
And, what exalts the wonder more,
The number made the motion slower;
The flier, though it had leaden feet,

Turned round so quick you scarce could see 't;
But, slackened by some secret power,
Now hardly moves an inch an hour.

The jack and chimney, near allied,
Had never left each other's side :
The chimney to a steeple grown,
The jack would not be left alone,
But, up against the steeple reared,
Became a clock, and still adhered:
And still its love to household cares,
By a shrill voice at noon, declares ;
Warning the cook-maid not to burn
That roast meat, which it cannot turn.
The groaning chair began to crawl,
Like a huge snail, along the wall;
There stuck aloft in public view,
And with small change a pulpit grew.

The porringers, that in a row
Hung high, and made a glittering show,
To a less noble substance changed,
Were now but leathern buckets ranged.

The ballads pasted on the wall,
Of Joan of France, and English Moll,
Fair Rosamond, and Robin Hood,
The Little Children in the Wood,
Now seemed to look abundance better,
Improved in picture, size, and letter;
And, high in order placed, describe
The heraldry of every tribe.

A bedstead of the antique mode,
Compact of timber many a load;
Such as our ancestors did use,
Was metamorphosed into pews;
Which still their ancient nature keep,
By lodging folks disposed to sleep.

The cottage, by such feats as these,
Grown to a church by just degrees;
The hermits then desire their host
To ask for what he fancied most.
Philemon, having paused a while,
Returned them thanks in homely style;
Then said: 'My house is grown so fine,
Methinks I still would call it mine :
I'm old, and fain would live at ease:
Make me the parson, if you please.'

He spoke, and presently he feels
His grazier's coat fall down his heels :
He sees, yet hardly can believe,
About each arm a pudding sleeve:
His waistcoat to a cassock grew,
And both assumed a sable hue;
But, being old, continued just

As threadbare and as full of dust.
His talk was now of tithes and dues ;
Could smoke his pipe, and read the news:
Knew how to preach old sermons next,
Vamped in the preface and the text:
At christenings well could act his part,
And had the service all by heart :
Wished women might have children fast,
And thought whose sow had farrowed last :
Against Dissenters would repine,
And stood up firm for right divine:
Found his head filled with many a system,
But classic authors-he ne'er missed them.
Thus having furbished up a parson,

Dame Baucis next they played their farce

When on a day, which proved their last,
Discoursing o'er old stories past,
They went by chance, amidst their talk,
To the churchyard to take a walk;
When Baucis hastily cried out:

"My dear, I see your forehead sprout !'
Sprout,' quoth the man, 'what's this you tell us?
I hope you don't believe me jealous?
But yet, methinks, I feel it true;
And really yours is budding too-
Nay-now I cannot stir my foot;
It feels as if 'twere taking root.'

Description would but tire my muse;
In short, they both were turned to yews.
Old Goodman Dobson, of the green,
Remembers he the trees has seen;
He'll talk of them from noon to night,
And goes with folks to shew the sight;
On Sundays, after evening-prayer,
He gathers all the parish there;
Points out the place of either yew,
Here Baucis, there Philemon, grew.
'Till once a parson of our town,
To mend his barn, cut Baucis down;
At which 'tis hard to be believed,
How much the other tree was grieved;
Grew scrubby, died a-top, was stunted;
So the next parson stubbed and burnt it.

From Verses on the Death of Dr Swift, Nov. 1731.*

As Rochefoucault his Maxims drew
From nature, I believe them true:
They argue no corrupted mind
In him; the fault is in mankind.

This maxim more than all the rest
Is thought too base for human breast:
'In all distresses of our friends
We first consult our private ends;
While nature kindly bent to ease us,
Points out some circumstance to please us.'
If this perhaps your patience move,
Let reason and experience prove.

We all behold with envious eyes
Our equal raised above our size.
Who would not at a crowded show
Stand high himself, keep others low?
I love my friend as well as you;
But why should he obstruct my view?
Then let me have the higher post;
Suppose it but an inch at most.
If in a battle you should find
One whom you love of all mankind,
Had some heroic action done,
A champion killed, or trophy won;
Rather than thus be overtopt,
Would you not wish his laurels cropt?
Dear honest Ned is in the gout,

Lies racked with pain, and you without :
How patiently you hear him groan !
How glad the case is not your own!

What poet would not grieve to see
His brother write as well as he?
But, rather than they should excel,
Would wish his rivals all in hell?

Her end when emulation misses,
She turns to envy, stings, and hisses:
The strongest friendship yields to pride,
Unless the odds be on our side.

Vain human kind! fantastic race!
Thy various follies who can trace?
Self-love, ambition, envy, pride,

Their empire in our hearts divide.

*Occasioned by reading the following maxim in Rochefoucault: 'Dans l'adversité de nos meilleurs amis, nous trouvons toujours quelque chose qui ne nous déplait pas.' (In the adversity of our best friends, we always find something that does not displease us.) |

Give others riches, power, and station, 'Tis all on me an usurpation. I have no title to aspire;

Yet, when you sink, I seem the higher.
In Pope I cannot read a line,
But with a sigh I wish it mine:
When he can in one couplet fix
More sense than I can do in six,
It gives me such a jealous fit,
I cry: 'Pox take him and his wit.'
I grieve to be outdone by Gay
In my own humorous biting way.
Arbuthnot is no more my friend,
Who dares to irony pretend,
Which I was born to introduce,
Refined it first, and shewed its use.
St John, as well as Pulteney, knows
That I had some repute for prose;
And, till they drove me out of date,
Could maul a minister of state.
If they have mortified my pride,
And made me throw my pen aside;
If with such talents heaven hath blest 'em,
Have I not reason to detest 'em?

1

To all my foes, dear Fortune, send
Thy gifts, but never to my friend:
I tamely can endure the first;

But this with envy makes me burst.

Thus much may serve by way of proem; Proceed we therefore to our poem.

The time is not remote, when I
Must by the course of nature die;
When, I foresee, my special friends
Will try to find their private ends:
And, though 'tis hardly understood,
Which way my death can do them good,
Yet thus, methinks, I hear them speak :
'See, how the dean begins to break!
Poor gentleman! he droops apace!
You plainly find it in his face.
That old vertigo in his head
Will never leave him, till he's dead.
Besides, his memory decays:

He recollects not what he says;
He cannot call his friends to mind;
Forgets the place where last he dined;
Plies you with stories o'er and o'er;
He told them fifty times before.
How does he fancy we can sit
To hear his out-of-fashion wit?
But he takes up with younger folks,
Who for his wine will bear his jokes.
Faith, he must make his stories shorter,
Or change his comrades once a quarter:
In half the time he talks them round,
There must another set be found.

'For poetry, he's past his prime;
He takes an hour to find a rhyme:
His fire is out, his wit decayed,
His fancy sunk, his Muse a jade.
I'd have him throw away his pen→
But there's no talking to some men.'
And then their tenderness appears
By adding largely to my years:
'He's older than he would be reckoned,
And well remembers Charles the Second.
He hardly drinks a pint of wine;
And that, I doubt, is no good sign.

His stomach, too, begins to fail;

Last year we thought him strong and hale;

But now he's quite another thing;

I wish he may hold out till spring.'

They hug themselves and reason thus: 'It is not yet so bad with us.'