Fowle's New Hampshire Gazette And General Advertiser

POET'S CORNER.

The Modern Englishman.

My heart's as little touch'd by love,
As ever in my life:
Full well, dear Hal, to thee is known
Whom fortune to my lot has thrown,
To be my wedded wife.

But why I wed? should any ask,
To answer is an easy task:
Want, want! my bonny Hacky;
What can a man, whose fortune's spent,
Whose mortgag'd to the utmost rent,
Do but drown, or shoot, or marry?
Of these the best is sure the bride:
For when once plung'd beneath the tide,
Adieu to all our figure.

Full sudden is the pistol's fate,
When once 'tis touch'd, alas! too late,
We wish undrawn the trigger.

'Tis thus resolv'd my bonny boy;
To-morrow thou may'st wife me joy,
For why will I buy by wiving:
Soon to her mansion, far from town,
Six rapid bays just whirl us down,
As if the devil were driving.

There shall the brisk capacious bowl
Drown every care that haunts the soul,
And rinse me to new life:
And, hail, for all that she can say,
Some blooming village queen of May
Shall wait upon my wife.

When all the tedious farce is o'er,
And spruce has crown'd me with her dower,
Should sudden ruin meet her,
Ey'n though her coachman break her neck,
Unmov'd I'd stand amidst the wreck,
Nor fear at head less Peter.