The Virginia Gazette

POETS CORNER.

EPILOGUE spoken by Mr. CHRISTOPHER BROMADGE, last Monday evenight, at a benefit acted for him by some Young Gentlemen, &c. in town.

Sailors are seldom poets, though often poor;
Nor know your classic or Pierian lore;
Our harsher phrases of Avast—Belay,
Would sound but roughly tacked unto a play:
Yet honest gratitude we sailors speak,
Although unversed in Latin or in Greek.
Long have I been capricious Fortune's sport,
Now met a friendly, then a hostile, port;
Through variegated scenes of life been tossed,
And oft escaped with all the cargo lost.
Which now's the case, I speak it to my cost;
Pestered with warrants, writs, and capias',
With dire petitions, and your cruel cases;
Yet thanks to friends, whose bosoms still are warm,
By their kind aid I hope to brave the storm;
In happier scenes to spend my future days,
And bid adieu to epilogues and plays.
To all this audience too my thanks I give,
In peace and plenty may they happy live,
Nor ever feel Oppression's iron-hand,
But LIBERTY for ever bless their land.