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First line: ‘I said to my heart betwixt sleeping and waking’.

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Transcript

I said to my heart betwixt sleeping & waking
Thou wild thing that art always leaping & aking
For the black, for the fair, in what Clime or nation
Hast thou not felt a pit-a-pat-tation?

2
Thus Accused the Wild thing gave this sober reply,
See the heart without motion, tho’ Celia {1} pass by,
Nor the beauty she has, nor the wit that she borrows
Gives the eyes any Joy, or the heart any sorrow

3
When our Sapho {2} appears, whose wit’s so refin’d,
I am forc’d to applaud with the rest of mankind,
Her charms are confess’d her Spirits & fire,
Every word I attend; but I only admire.

4
Prudentia {3} as vainly doth put in her claim,
Ever gazing at Heaven, yet man is her aim.
’Tis love not Devotion, that turns up her eyes,
Those Starrs of this world are too good for the skies.

5
But my Cloe’s so easy so lively so fair,
Her wit so genteel, without art without Care,
When she comes in my way, Oh! the motion & pain
The leaping and aking, they return all again.

6
Thou Wonderful Creature, a woman of reason,
Never grave out of pride, never gay out of season,
When so easy to Guess who this Angel should be,
Would one think Mrs Howard ne’re thought, it was she

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{1} In the margin: 'Mrs Harvey'.

{2} In the margin: 'Lady Mary Wortley'.

{3} In the margin: 'Mrs Meadows'.

(i) ‘Introduction to all the Toasts.’
First line: ‘Such is the List of Our Heroick Fair’.

(ii) ‘On the Dutchess of Queensberry.’
First line: ‘Fair Patroness of Wit and Liberty’.

(iii) ‘On the dowager Dutchess of Marlborough.’
First line: ‘Tell me no more of Youth, this Glass shall Boast’.

(iv) ‘On the Countess of Denbigh.’
First line: ‘Walpole this Charge to Noble Denbigh Gave’.

(v) ‘On the Countess of Burlington.’
First line: ‘Walpole may Give himself strange Airs’.

(vi) ‘On Miss Barnard.’
First line: ‘O! Sprung from Barnard London’s proudest Boast’.

(vii) ‘On the Lady Wallace.’
First line: ‘Thou Patriot Dame, whose Generous Bosom Shares’.

(viii) ‘On Young Lady Walpole.’
First line: ‘Go Spritely Rolles, Go traverse Earth and Sea’.

(ix) ‘On Mrs Cantillion.’
First line: ‘Illustrious Sons of Liberty and Will’.

(x) ‘On Miss Jenny Johnson Niece to Sir John Barnard.’
First line: ‘Since in this Circle of the Brave and Great’.

(xi) ‘On Lady Harvey.’
First line: ‘While Witt or Beauty boast a Charm’.

(xii) ‘On Miss Peggy Hays.’
First line: ‘Unequal’d say what Matchless Dame’.

(xiii) ‘On Miss Fowler.’
First line: ‘Bacchus Crown the Swelling Bowl’.

(xiv) ‘On Miss Delmé.’
First line: ‘Let Some let Virtue and discerning Taste’.

Motto: ‘Intermissæ Venus diu | Rursus Bella Moves. | Hor: ad Venerem | Od: 1ma. Lib: 4’. First line: ‘My little Lodge! tease me no more’. The anonymous author describes himself as being fifty-five years of age. References to Lord and Lady Hervey and to Fanny Feilding suggest that the lines were composed between 1723 and 1729.

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Transcript

Intermissæ Venus diu
Rursus {1} Bella moves.—

Hor: ad Venerem
Od: 1ma. Lib: 4

Edgecombe | to Mother Lodge {2}

1
My little Lodge! tease me no more
With promise of the finest Whore
That Condom e’re was stuck in:
Give Younger Men the Beauteous dame
Alas I’m past the amourous Flame
And must have done with F—ing

2
I’m not that Hero once you knew
When I the Tygress did Subdue
By Noble Feats of Vigor;
Why shou’d I now pretend to swive {3}
Mother, you know at fifty five
A Man can only Fr–g Her

3
Go to Sr. Paul that vigorous Knight
Equal in F—ing or in Fight;
Ready for each Encounter;
He can a Lady’s Cause defend
In Senates, when she needs a Friend,
Or he in Bed can mount her

4
He says an hundred tender things,
Is Generous, & gives Ruby Rings,
In Prowess never wanting:
To Opera’s He’ll take the Jades,
And F–ck them too—at Masquerades
Three times without disc–nting.

5
But Lodge, Cold Customers like me
Entirely lost to Gallantry,
I fear wou’d quickly Starve You;
I value not who’ere I toast,
Nor care a Rush which pleases most
Or Lord or Ly. Her—y

6
And yet what means my faultring Tongue,
Again I sigh, again am Young,
In dreams I found her yeilding:
Oh! were she so, in day time too,
Still cou’d I dangle still pursue,
My Charming Fanny Feilding {4}.

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{1} MS ‘Russus’, with ‘r’ added above the first ‘s’.

{2} Sally Lodge, a brothel-keeper, known as Mother Lodge. See A Genuine Epistle … to the late famous Mother Lodge (1735).

{3} MS ‘swire’, with ‘r’ underlined and ‘? v.’ in the margin.

{4} Probably Lady Fanny Feilding, daughter of the 4th Earl of Denbigh, who was said to have been ‘distinguished for her beauty and amiable manners’. She married Daniel, 8th Earl of Winchilsea and 3rd Earl of Nottingham, in 1729 and died in 1734. See The Works of the English Poets, ed. A. Chalmers (1810), xvii. 589.