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Title: A Vindication Of The Libel
Author: Jonathan Swift [
More Titles by Swift]
A NEW BALLAD, WRITTEN BY A SHOE-BOY, ON AN ATTORNEY WHO WAS FORMERLY A SHOE-BOY
"Qui color ater erat, nunc est contrarius atro."[1]
WITH singing of ballads, and crying of news,
With whitening of buckles, and blacking of shoes,
Did Hartley set out, both shoeless and shirtless,
And moneyless too, but not very dirtless;
Two pence he had gotten by begging, that's all;
One bought him a brush, and one a black ball;
For clouts at a loss he could not be much,
The clothes on his back as being but such;
Thus vamp'd and accoutred, with clouts, ball, and brush,
He gallantly ventured his fortune to push:
Vespasian[2] thus, being bespatter'd with dirt,
Was omen'd to be Rome's emperor for't.
But as a wise fiddler is noted, you know,
To have a good couple of strings to one bow;
So Hartley[3] judiciously thought it too little,
To live by the sweat of his hands and his spittle:
He finds out another profession as fit,
And straight he becomes a retailer of wit.
One day he cried--"Murders, and songs, and great news!"
Another as loudly--"Here blacken your shoes!"
At Domvile's[4] full often he fed upon bits,
For winding of jacks up, and turning of spits;
Lick'd all the plates round, had many a grubbing,
And now and then got from the cook-maid a drubbing;
Such bastings effect upon him could have none:
The dog will be patient that's struck with a bone.
Sir Thomas, observing this Hartley withal
So expert and so active at brushes and ball,
Was moved with compassion, and thought it a pity
A youth should be lost, that had been so witty:
Without more ado, he vamps up my spark,
And now we'll suppose him an eminent clerk!
Suppose him an adept in all the degrees
Of scribbling _cum dasho_, and hooking of fees;
Suppose him a miser, attorney, _per_ bill,
Suppose him a courtier--suppose what you will--
Yet, would you believe, though I swore by the Bible,
That he took up two news-boys for crying the libel?
[Footnote 1: Variation from Ovid, "Met.," ii, 541: "Qui color albus erat, nunc est contrarius albo."--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 2: So in _Hudibras_, Pt. II, Canto II:
"_Vespasian_ being dawb'd with Durt,
Was destin'd to the Empire for't
And from a Scavinger did come
To be a mighty Prince in _Rome_."]
[Footnote 3: Squire Hartley Hutcheson, "that zealous prosecutor of hawkers and libels," who signed Faulkner's committal to prison. See "Prose Works," vii, 234.--_W. E. B._]
[Footnote 4: Sir T. Domvile, patentee of the Hanaper office.--_F._]
[The end]
Jonathan Swift's poem: Vindication Of The Libel
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