And tumbling topsyturvy round
Lit with its bottom on the ground.
For, by the laws of gravitation,
It fell into its proper station.

This is the little strutting pile,
You see just by the churchyard stile ;
The walls in tumbling gave a knock,
And thus the steeple got a shock;

From whence the neighbouring farmer calls
The steeple, Knock; the vicar, Walls.*
The vicar once a week creeps in,
Sits with his knees up to his chin;
Here cons his notes, and takes a whet,
Till the small ragged flock is met.
A traveller, who by did pass,
Observ'd the roof behind the grass:
On tiptoe stood, and rear'd his snout,
And saw the parson creeping out;
Was much surpris'd to see a crow
Venture to build his nest so low.

A schoolboy ran unto 't and thought,
The crib was down, the blackbird caught.
A third, who lost his way by night,
Was forc'd for safety to alight,
And stepping o'er the fabric roof,
His horse had like to spoil his hoof.
Warburton took it in his noddle,
This building was design'd a model;
Or of a pigeon-house or oven,
To bake one loaf, and keep one dove in.

Then Mrs. Johnsont gave her verdict, And every one was pleas'd that heard it :

* Archdeacon Wall, a correspondent of Swift's. F. Dr. Swift's curate at Laracor. F.

Stella. F.

All that you make this stir about
Is but a still which wants a spout.
The reverend Dr. Raymond* guess'd
More probably than all the rest;
He said, but that it wanted room,
It might have been a pigmy's tomb.
The doctor's family came by,

And little miss began to cry ;

Give me that house in my own hand !
Then madam bade the chariot stand,

Call'd to the clerk, in manner mild,
Pray, reach that thing here to the child :-
That thing, I mean, among the kale;
And here's to buy a pot of ale.

The clerk said to her, in a heat,

What! sell my master's country seat,
Where he comes every week from town?
He would not sell it for a crown.
Poh! fellow, keep not such a pother;
In half an hour thoul't make another.
Says Nancy, I can make for miss
A finer house ten times than this;
The dean will give me willow sticks.
And Joe my apron full of bricks.

* Minister of Trim. F. The waiting woman. F.

THE VIRTUES OF SID HAMET* THE MA

GICIAN'S ROD.

1710.

THE rod was but a harmless wand,
While Moses held it in his hand;
But, soon as e'er he laid it down,
'Twas a devouring serpent grown.
Our great magician, Hamet Sid,
Reverses what the prophet did:
His rod was honest English wood,
That senseless in a corner stood,
Till, metamorphos'd by his grasp,
It grew an all-devouring asp;
Would hiss, and sting, and roll, and twist,
By the mere virtue of his fist;

But, when he laid it down, as quick
Resum'd the figure of a stick.

So, to her midnight feasts, the hag
Rides on a broomstick for a nag.
That, rais'd by magic of her breech,
O'er sea and land conveys the witch;
But with the morning dawn resumes
The peaceful state of common brooms.
They tell us something strange and odd,
About a certain magic rod,‡
That bending down its top, divines
Whene'er the soil has golden mines;

*The Earl of Godolphin.

This poem was inserted in Morphew's Miscellanies, with this in troduction undoubtedly dictated by Dr. Swift: "The following being judged by some to be after the author's manner, I have ventured to print it." N.

The virgula divina, said to be attracted by minerals. SWIFT.

Where there are none, it stands erect,
Scorning to show the least respect;
As ready was the wand of Sid,

To bend where golden mines were hid;
In Scottish hills found precious ore,*
Where none e'er look'd for it before ;
And by a gentle bow divin'd
How well a cully's purse was lin'd
To a forlorn and broken rake,

Stood without motion like a stake.
The rod of Hermes was renown'd

For charms above, and under ground;
To sleep could mortal eyelids fix,
Ánd drive departed souls to Styx.
That rod was a just type of Sid's,
Which o'er a British senate's lids
Could scatter opium full as well,
And drive as many souls to Hell.
Sid's rod was lender, white, and tall,
Which oft he us'd to fish withal;
A place was fasten'd to the hook,
And many score of gudgeons took;
Yet still so happy was his fate,
He caught his fish, and sav'd his bait.
Sid's brethren of the conjuring tribe,
A circle with their rod describe,
Which proves a magical redoubt,
To keep mischievous spirits out.
Sid's rod was of a larger stride,
And made a circle thrice as wide,
Where spirits throng'd with hideous din,
And he stood there to take them in;

Supposed to allude to the Union. SWIFT.

But, when th' enchanted rod was broke,
They vanished in a stinking smoke.
Achilles' sceptre was of wood,

Like Sid's, but nothing near so good; :
Though down from ancestors divine
Transmitted to the hero's line;

Thence, through a long descent of kings,
Came an HEIRLOOM, as Homer sings.
Though this description looks so big,
That sceptre was a sapless twig,
Which, from the fatal day, when first
It left the forest where 'twas nurs'd,
As Homer tells us o'er and o'er,
Nor leaf, nor fruit, nor blossom bore.
Sid's sceptre, full of juice, did shoot
In golden boughs, and golden fruit;
And he, the dragon never sleeping,
Guarded each fair Hesperian pippin.
No hobby horse, with gorgeous top,
The dearest in Charles Mather's* shop,
Or glittering tinsel of May-fair,
Could with this rod of Sid compare.

Dear Sid, then, why wert thou so mad
To break thy rod like naughty lad!
You should have kiss'd it in your distress,
And then return'd it to your mistress;
Or made it a Newmarket† switch,
And not a rod for thy own breech.
But since old Sid has broken this,
His next may be a rod in piss.

* An eminent toyman in Fleet-street.

SWIFT.

Lord Godolphin is satirized by Mr. Pope for a strong attachment

to the turf. See his Moral Essays. H.