ODE TO DRAGSMEh. 135 



On them the wintry tempests beat, 

 And summers pour their fevering heat ; 

 And yet, as rolls the year away, 

 They drive their hundred miles a day ! 



Then why shall busy Blame intrench 



On life's delightful things ? 

 There are who deem the coachman's bench 



More pleasant than the king's. 



And I maintain (whoso'er it shocks), 

 The jovial comrade on the box 



Is jovial at the board. 

 List any then the truth to try ? 

 Beside their bright mahogany, 



The deed the proof afford. 



Yet some there be (I pity much 

 The land that ever nurtures such) 



Gentility parading, 

 Who from the ribbons and the whip, 

 Would every lingering honour strip 



And call our art degrading. 



Accomplished Nimrod ! Clever Peer, 



And Taylor (gentle styled), 

 What dronish hypocrites are here ! 



By whom are ye reviled ? 

 By those cold hearts that never knew 

 The sparkling, creaming spirits' dew, 

 When o'er our bumper of champagne 

 We ride the fox-hunt o'er again, 

 Whose idleness — that intellectual scab — 



Anoints itself with reading ; 

 Their only vehicle a hackney cab, 



Their only pleasure — feeding. 



