The Virginia Gazette

A copy of VERSES in Praise of WINTER.

Meffer compare voi vi ricordate, &c.

GIROLAMO RuSCELLI

ANDANTE-BRIOSO.

YOUR ADE, last winter, you remember well,
Befide the fire, you did assume to tell
The charms of summer: Comrade, what a theme!
When I perceiv'd your maggot in that cream,
I felt such pleasure (Heav'n the bliss repay)
E'en such as fat cook wenches feel, when they
(Preparing for keen Burgesses a treat)
Make luscious sauce, and half of their own sweat.
But what of theirs? Not such had Doctor Brown,
When sudden his buffet came jangling down,
And caught beneath—no partridge, but—his boy:
The glass and china capering round for joy.
Now Plato says, that, view the solar round,
No season like the winter can be found:
Wherefore indulgent lend your ear to lays
That aim to sing its excellence and praise,
And while the cold they consecrate to fame,
To load hot weather with reproach and blame.
The winter's merits far exceed my vein
(For they wou'd Maro's tuneful talents strain)
Yet, as I may, permit me to make bold;
Ah! warm me, Phœbus, tho'the theme be cold.
I say that winter, as a season choice,
Shall ever at election have my voice:
And (when the Speaker, by some pheasant thrown,
Shall lie contented where he tumbles down,
No friend his shoulder and his hip to chafe.
Id est, in Heav'n when he shall nectar quaff)
I here protest (whoe'er against declare)
He shou'd be led with honour to the chair.
That chair, round which each Anglo Saxon dreads
To see yon old field gang of frozen-heads,
Which late, whatever wisdom cou'd propose,
Were sure to blight and overwhelm with noes.
O gracious winter, season of delight,
Handsome, genteel, jocose, and lovely quite,
How temperate is your air, serene, refin'd!
But summer, dusty slattern, seems design'd
For nothing better than, with aching head,
To throw good christians sprawling on a bed.
The summer puts us in a gasp, and Death,
In ambuscade, snatches at ev'ry breath;
From morn to night, from night till morn, she glows,
No glasshouse hotter, yielding no repose;
A perfect nuisance, which, to abate aright,
Jack Bolling only has attain'd the flight.
In vain she hopes to see his lungs oppress'd;
For when he's tir'd of blowing forth he'll rest.
Refresh'd, in half an hour, he buckles to,
And snores, as if t'evince what he can do.
Live long, dear brother, and her ills elude,
While we must pant, or do the maggots good.
O winter, super-excellent, divine,
Season for Lords, and those of Royal line,
We bow before you, seasoner of good cheer,
Blythe friend to Venus, we your worth revere.
Comrade, God's curse! reflect, when winter bites,
How strong our pow'rs, how keen our appetites.
Myriads of hecatombs before them fall,
In vain swine, muttons, beeves, for mercy call.
The stag resigns his haunches, and shelldrakes
Beshrew the day they left the western lakes.
Reflect on that, and the sweet consequence,
You'll own that to persist were want of sense.
O what ragouts the Ladies then prepare,
And, with them, with what ecstasy we share!
To see their pleasure we the greater feel,
And ev'ry moment yields increase of zeal.
But the desert! it puts a man in flames,
And tickles to the soul the lovely dames.
See the fair gluttons, how they teat-bits chufe;
Be curs'd the wretches who to give refuse!
'Tis well their skins are of relenting stuff,
Or they wou'd burst before they cried enough.

* Frozen head was a famous old field colt, but was never elected a Burgess: He beat the Chinkapin mare, and was otherwise a horse of such merit, that it is amazing he was never made a legislator.

The generous race, endearing sex, bestow'd,
For man ungrateful, to bear many a load!
Who gainsay this are frantic I maintain;
They say be mischievous, betimes enchain:
And, when the bettering house is done, be sure,
Give such its maidenhead, and lock secure,
O season sacred, glorious, rich, and mild,
In which a virgin wife produc'd a child!
Thou art perfection, winter, to the brim,
And I, poor I, can but the surface skim!
But why contemn myself? By Jove, I dare
Those sons of Helicon to treat the affair.
Burke, Hewitt, Henley, Gwatkin, in extreme
Tho' they have wit, 'tis far below the theme.
Camm (give you joy, but compliment apart)
Couldst thou thy courser like Atlante start;
Ascend the mount of brun':l worth, and drop
A sprig of bays, triumphant, on its top;
Cou'd thy bold hippo-griffon's vig'rous flight
Sustain his rider to that daunting height?
By Berkeley's stove, I do believe, he'd halt,
Tho' without your's or the good courser's fault;
For mortal efforts are to limits stay'd;
December's glories all extent pervade.
But honest ardour (conscious as I am,
That my poor Rozinante's blind and lame,
And that my bastard muse, whom in the cree
He stumbling threw, took cold, and scarce can speak)
Impels me on a feeble note to raise,
O cloud compeller, in your sacred praise.
Wou'd those bright spirits venture, who denies
But they wou'd compass more, and higher rise?
Their lively clarions wou'd charm nations round:
What then? Some hear the flute's minuter sound.
Enough for me, if this inferior song
Succeed so far as not the theme to wrong.
O winter, please your frostiness, bestow
On all things, but my verse, propitious snow,
To all things else propitious, but to verse,
That bane precise, than which exists no worse.
Winter (but stop a little, if you please,
Till I one tear on such sad numbers squeeze;
Whitefield erst on our sins assum'd to cry:
He try'd; the good man cou'd not; ah! nor I.
Then take the will, dear winter, for the deed,
As we le pauvre tartuffe's. I proceed)
You are, in truth, a Paradise, the while
You condescend upon mankind to smile.
Summer's a tyrant, and a Hell on earth,
A monster which gives ev'ry monster birth.
No rollers, flies, wasps, hornets, buzz about,
No candle bugs, or gnats, your eyes put out,
Nor dire moschettos, while December reigns,
Make, of your bed of rest, a bed of pains.
Such is the naked truth: I scorn a lie,
Which he scorns not who ventures to deny.
How say you, comrade, that I haste my flight,
And, conscious of the oozy ground, tread light?
That into merit I presume t'exalt
What is the winter's very worst default?
And numerous others leave at peace behind,
As tho'sweet winter had defects to blind?
Why take me up so short? Allow me room,
And ev'ry thing shall, in succession, come.
One tongue my mouth, one pen my fingers hold,
They one thing first, and then the next unfold.
If they're too tedious for your zeal, why go
And talk with Cerberus in the realms below.
If he be wanting, summon to his aid
Our late Lord's turtle with'the double head.
You wou'd suggest (for that, as I suppose,
Is what you mean) that winter has its snows.
If e'er, as it may please, the Olympian God,
Fierce lightning hiss, and thunderclaps explode;
(Tho' that be rarely, while most dismal dins
We seldom miss, when Phœbus leaves the twins)
If e'er it rain, or hail, or snow, or worse,
Invoke the muse, and meditate your verse;
Or in some comfortable, snug retreat,
Blair, Johnson, Nicholas, Wythe, Tazewell meet,
And on deep subjects, worthy such a train,
Regale your reason, and regale again:
To that with prudence join the social glass,
So the sweet days of winter time may pass,
Bestowing, in despite of cancer's rage,
Whate'er enjoyments can attach the sage.
The winter season, always gaily dress'd.
Looks like the King, or Prince of Wales at least.
For him each bosom feels affection glow,
But for foul summer's nakedness, not so:
For (except wheezing age's prating sons,
Antenor's grave and sage Ucalegons)
Who love the naked summer but dark knaves,
Or hate the winter but woolpated slaves:
Wretches so low that, when they think amiss,
E'en ridicule has not the heart to hiss.
The Gods invented those semestrial heats,
I do believe, to punish man's vile feats;
For Milton says when Satan did rebel,
To roast the hero, Heav'n created Hell.
Others assure that when poor mortals die,

* Atlant, the Chiron of Ruggiero. See Ariosto's Orlando Furioso: It is translated, or translating, by Hople, who has already translated Tasso and Metastasio: all which I greatly recommend to the Ladies, the last particularly

They certain sons, some say longer, fry
(Confirm their notions, Jove, who so believe,
According to their faith, may they receive)
Now I declare—tho' 'twere to obtain the grace,
That charms the girls, in Sawny Donald's face—
I do declare—tho' to possess a hoard,
Like Corbin's, and to sway the Council Board:
Nay, to become my Lord, and set my hand
To all the laws and patents of the land:
I wou'd not, without respite—take me right—
Submit my person to the Dogstar's spite.
We always find beneath the Dogstar's glow
Our limbs in languor, and our spirits low.
The heart on every little motion thumps,
The neck and bosom crimson o'er with bumps,
For weeks together, waxing in their size,
And if you scratch you aggravate disease.
Upon me rather let the murrain fall,
Or fairly bake me, and opossom call.
But you reply in green that summer clads
Waller's fair grove, and Brandon's lovely glades,
And that mild zephyr, to regale each nose,
Spoils Allen's violet, and Champion's rose:
I answer, clothe the forest how you will,
Thro' all our clothes she makes us sweat distil;
And that the fragrance zephyr brings about
From toes and armpits is immensely stout.
Approach, Hircina: Foh!—the filthy puff!
In pity, Skelton, haste; a pinch of snuff!
In short, 'tis folly winter to dispraise,
But he's stark mad who loves the solar rays.
Saw you not, comrade, that Campeche man,
Upon his chaps what Tuscarora tan?
Whence that? Because he lov'd his shade to view,
Phæbus, in recompence, bestow'd that hue.
And who the Deuce to Phœbus will pay court,
To turn, in recompence, Mulatto for't?
'Tis his old trick to smut his friends, you know,
To mourn his cuckoldom, he black'd the crow.
Now look at six-ace, set all fair as wax!
They go to bed as soon as day-light cracks:
The night they wisely pass at box and dice,
And yet some fools will call their prudence vice!
Beside, warm summers enervate the mind,
Behold East Indians timorous as the hind.
How fleet the dastards scamper'd for their lives
Soon as they saw one northern band of Clives?
Here too, where winter draws each fibre tight,
Are some who lov'd a combat more than flight.
Mercer, M'Neil, Gift, Fairfax, Washington,
Lewis and Stevens have beheld such fun,
That, tho' I wish I had beheld it too,
I'd not run in a circumstance to view,
T' obtain from Heav'n to follow frost and snow
To Nova Zembla: tho' I love them so.
Winter's a royal, an imperial time,
And worthy of a style the most sublime.
For (beside that, with oysters it agrees)
'Tis free from, what I loath, ticks, chinches, fleas.
Alas! that mighty man, creation's lord,
To such vile insects shou'd repast afford!
And shall I not July in horror hold?
Shall I not prize December more than gold?
That month salubrious like to which were all,
Bland and Siqueyra wou'd the hangman call?
Ah! why did not kind fate ordain me birth
In some cold corner of Novanglian earth,
Nor thus impel, while solar ardours teaze,
Almost to wish myself in Hell for ease?
I know that winter's virtues crowd as thick
As fiddlers on the shore of Matapreak.
I see, selecting here and there a few,
I greater prejudice than service do:
Wherefore I shall but add, and then have done,
Respected friend, that you're a simpleton,
'Tween gentle Christmas and hot Whitsuntide,
With such void of discernment to decide
Wou'd Heav'n concede, as erst Jack Falstaff laid,
A rank buck-basket shou'd become your bed,
That there (compress'd like him, and in his fright)
You shou'd your perfumes to your bed unite—
Sweet Lammas all a-blaze: ah then, dear friend,
You'd learn what to disparage, what commend.

* William Henry Fairfax, a youth of great and admirable qualities, died of a wound received at Montmorenci.