THE TASK. BOOK I. THE SOFA. I SING the Sofa. I who lately fang Truth, Hope, and Charity*, and touched with awe Time was, when clothing sumptuous or for use, Save their own painted skins, our fires had none. As yet black breeches were not; satin smooth, Or velvet foft, or plufh with fhaggy pile: And fwayed the fceptre of his infant realms: And drilled in holes, the folid oak is found, At length a generation more refined Improved the fimple plan; made three legs four, And over the feat, with plenteous wadding ftuffed, And woven close, or needle-work fublime. There might ye fee the piony spread wide, The full-blown rofe, the fhepherd and his lafs, Lap-dog and lambkin with black ftaring eyes, And parrots with twin cherries in their beak. Now came the cane from India smooth and bright With Nature's varnish; fevered into ftripes, That interlaced each other, these supplied Of texture firm a lattice-work, that braced The new machine, and it became a chair. But reftlefs was the chair; the back erect Diftreffed the weary loins, that felt no ease; The flippery feat betrayed the fliding part, That preffed it, and the feet hung dangling down, Anxious in vain to find the diftant floor. These for the rich: the reft, whom fate had placed With bafe materials, fat on well-tanned hides, If cushion might be called, what harder seemed No want of timber then was felt or feared In Albion's happy ifle. The lumber ftood Than when employed to accommodate the fair, United yet divided, twain at once. So fit two kings of Brentford on one throne; Close packed, and smiling, in a chaife and one. But relaxation of the languid frame, By foft recumbency of outftretched limbs, The nurse fleeps fweetly, hired to watch the fick, Whom fnoring she disturbs. As sweetly he, Who quits the coach-box at the midnight hour To fleep within the carriage more fecure, His legs depending at the open door. Sweet fleep enjoys the curate in his defk; The tedious rector drawling over his head; And sweet the clerk below. But neither sleep Of lazy nurse, who fnores the fick man dead, Nor his, who quits the box at midnight hour To flumber in the carriage more secure, Nor fleep enjoyed by curate in his desk, Nor yet the dozings of the clerk, are sweet, Compared with the repose the SOFA yields. |