Classic Poem

Two college sophs of Cambridge growth,
Both special wits and lovers both,
Conferring, as they used to meet,
On love and books, in rapture sweet;
(Muse find me names to fix my metre,
Cassinus this, and t'other Peter.)
Friend Peter to Cassinus goes,
To chat a while and warm his nose:
But such a sight was never seen,
The lad lay swallowed up in spleen.
He seemed as just crept out of bed;
One greasy stocking round his head,
The t'other he sat down to darn,
With threads of different coloured yarn;
His breeches torn, exposing wide
A ragged shirt and tawny hide.
Scorched were his shins, his legs were bare,
But well embrowned with dirt and hair.
A rug was o'er his shoulders thrown,
(A rug, for nightgown he had none,)
His jordan stood in manner fitting
Between his legs, to spew or spit in;
His ancient pipe, in sable dyed,
And half unsmoked, lay by his side.
Him thus accoutred Peter found,
With eyes in smoke and weeping drowned;
The leavings of his last night's pot
On embers placed, to drink it hot.
"Why, Cassy, thou wilt doze thy pate:
What makes thee lie a-bed so late?
The finch, the linnet, and the thrush,
Their matins chant in every bush;
And I have heard thee oft salute
Aurora with thy early flute.
Heaven send thou hast not got the hyps!
How! not a word come from thy lips?'
Then gave him some familiar thumps,
A college joke to cure the dumps.
The swain at last, with grief opprest,
Cried, "Celia!' thrice, and sighed the rest.
"Dear Cassy, though to ask I dread,
Yet ask I must--is Celia dead?
"How happy I, were that the worst!
But I was fated to be curst!'
"Come, tell us, has she played the whore?'
"O Peter, would it were no more!'
"Why, plague confound her sandy locks!
Say, has the small or greater pox
Sunk down her nose, or seamed her face?
Be easy, 'tis a common case.'
"O Peter! beauty's but a varnish,
Which time and accidents will tarnish:
But Celia has contrived to blast
Those beauties that might ever last.
Nor can imagination guess,
Nor eloquence divine express,
How that ungrateful charming maid
My purest passion has betrayed:
Conceive the most envenomed dart
To pierce an injured lover's heart.'
"Why, hang her; though she seemed so coy,
I know, she loves the barber's boy.'
"Friend Peter, this I could excuse,
For every nymph has leave to choose;
Nor have I reason to complain,
She loves a more deserving swain.
But oh! how ill hast thou divined
A crime that shocks all humankind;
A deed unknown to female race,
At which the sun should hide his face:
Advice in vain you would apply--
Then leave me to despair and die.
Yet, kind Arcadians, on my urn
These elegies and sonnets burn;
And on the marble grave these rhymes,
A monument to after-times--
"Here Cassy lies, by Celia slain,
And dying, never told his pain."
Vain empty world, farewell. But hark,
The loud Cerberian triple bark;
And there--behold Alecto stand,
A whip of scorpions in her hand:
Lo, Charon from his leaky wherry
Beckoning to waft me o'er the ferry:
I come! I come! Medusa see,
Her serpents hiss direct at me.
Begone; unhand me, hellish fry:
Avaunt--ye cannot say 'twas I.'
"Dear Cassy, thou must purge and bleed;
I fear thou wilt be mad indeed.
But now, by friendship's sacred laws,
I here conjure thee, tell the cause;
And Celia's horrid fact relate:
Thy friend would gladly share thy fate.'
"To force it out, my heart must rend;
Yet when conjured by such a friend--
Think, Peter, how my soul is racked!
These eyes, these eyes, beheld the fact.
Now bend thine ear, since out it must;
But, when thou seest me laid in dust,
The secret thou shalt ne'er impart,
Not to the nymph that keeps thy heart;
(How would her virgin soul bemoan
A crime to all her sex unknown!)
Nor whisper to the tattling reeds
The blackest of all female deeds;
Nor blab it on the lonely rocks,
Where Echo sits, and listening mocks;
Nor let the zephyr's treacherous gale
Through Cambridge waft the direful tale;
Nor to the chattering feathered race
Discover Celia's foul disgrace.
But, if you fail, my spectre dread,
Attending nightly round your bed--
And yet I dare confide in you;
So take my secret, and adieu:
Nor wonder how I lost my wits:
Oh! Celia, Celia, Celia shits!'