2»d S. VIII. Ava. 27. '69.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



173 



and Gay, and included in their Miscellanies pub- 

 lished in the following year, 1727. 



That the three poets were residing together at 

 this time is evident from Lord Bolingbroke's let- 

 ter, dated July 23, 1726, addressed " To the three 

 Yahoos of Twickenham, Jonathan, Alexander, 

 John, most excellent Triumvirs of Parnassus." 

 During this interval, it is believed, that many ce- 

 lebrated pieces, well known to the present times, 

 were either planned or written, and submitted 

 there to the mutual correction of the parties 

 (Roscoe's Pope, i. 293.). From a passage in one 

 of Cowper's letters, we incidentally get a glimpse of 

 the employment of Mr. Mist's " two or three men 

 of wit " in the Twickenham villa, and can almost 

 fancy we see them engaged in decking "Pretty 

 Molly" for public admiration. Cowper, writing 

 to the Rev. Wm. Unwin, Aug. 4, 1783, says, 

 "What can be prettier than Gay's ballad, or 

 rather Swift's, Arbuthnot's, Pope's, and Gay's in 

 the What do ye call it — ' 'Twas when the seas 

 were roaring ? ' I have been well informed that 

 they all contributed, and that the most celebrated 

 association of clever fellows this country ever 

 saw did not think it beneath them to unite their 

 strength and abilities in the composition of a song. 

 The success, however, answered to their wishes, 

 and our puny days will never produce such an- 

 other." 



In the Gentleman's Magazine for June, 1755, 

 (p. 278.) occurs the following notice of this 

 song : — 



" Mr. Urban. — I suppose few of your readers need be 

 informed that the original song of Mollt/ Mog was written 

 by Pope about his seventeenth year, when the fair land- 

 lady of the Kose was the reigning toast for some miles 

 round. Oakingham. Th6re is at present in London an- 

 other Molly Mog, now nineteen, who has all the charms 

 of her predecessor. With this beauty a certain son of the 

 Muses is fallen desperately in love ; and if the following 

 translation of Mr. Pope's song into French finds a place 

 in your next Magazine, it will gratify many of your 

 readers, and amongst therest, — A. A. A." 



Then follows the song in French. Pope's seven- 

 teenth year, however, would take us back to 1705, 

 when Gay was figuring behind a linendraper's 

 counter, and Swift only known to Pope as the 

 suspected author of the Tale of a Tub. It was 

 not till after the publication of Windsor Forest, 

 in 1713, that Swift and Pope became personal 

 friends. Besides, as " pretty Molly" died in 1766, 

 in her sixty-seventh year, she would, in 1705, only 

 have been a bonnie lass in her sixth year, rather 

 too tender " a bit for the Vicar," or anyone else. 



The traditionary notices of the song, as stated 

 by Lysons, seem to favour the conjecture that it 

 was written in 1726. The enamoured swain al- 

 luded to in it, is said to have been Edward Stan- 

 den, Esq., of Arborfield, Berks, a young gentleman 

 of 600/. per annum, who died of apoplexy, Sept. 

 26, 1730. The allusion to the Vicar in the last 



verse is not apparent; but it maybe mentioned 

 as a singular coincidence, that the Rev. Benjamin 

 Moody, who had been nearly fifty years minister 

 of Oakingham, died on August 22, 1726, five days 

 before the publication of the song in Mist's Journal. 

 As a literary curiosity it may be as well to 

 quote the song as it flowed fresh from the pens of 

 this trio of wits. The words Italicised were al- 

 tered in the version printed in Pope and Swift's 

 Miscellanies, 1727, which also contains two addi- 

 tional verses. 



" MOLLY MOG. 



1. 



" Saj's my Uncle, I pray j^ou discover 

 What has been the cause of j'our woes, 

 That you pine and you whine like a lover ? 

 I've seen Molly Mog of the Rose. 



2. 



" Oh Nephew I your grief is but folly, 

 In town you may find better prog ; 

 Haifa crown there will get you a Molly, 

 A Molly much better than Mog. 



3. 



" The school boys delight in a play-day, 

 The schoolmaster's joy is to flog ; 

 Fop is the delight of a lady,* 

 But mine is in sweet Molly Mog. 



" Will a Wisp leads the traveller a gadding, 

 Thro' ditch, and thro' quagmire and bog; 

 Xo light can e'er set me a padding, 

 But the eyes of my sweet Molly Mog. 



5. 



" For guineas in other men's breeches 



Your gamesters will palm and will cog ; 

 But I envy them none of their riches, 

 So I palm my sweet Molly Mog. 



" The hart that's half wounded, is ranging,^ 

 It here and there leaps like a frog ; 

 But my heart can never be changing, 

 It's so fix'd on my sweet Molly Mog. 



74 

 '* I know that by Wits 'tis recited, 

 That women at best are a clog ; 

 But I'm not so easily frighted 

 From loving my sweet Molly Mog. 



" A letter, when I am inditing, 



Comes Cupid and gives me a jog. 



And I fill all 7ny paper with writing, 



Of nothing but sweet Molly Mog. 



* The corrected version is better : — 



"The milk-maid's delight is in May day, 

 But mine is on sweet Molly Mog." 



f This line is thus altered : — 



" The heart, when half wounded, is changing'' 

 so that the original pun in this verse is lost. 

 X This is the third verse in the Miscellanies. 



