THE

THE

o'er, When tired of Greek and Latin lore, Good SYNTAX sought his easy chair, And sat in calm composure there. His wife was to a neighbour gone, To hear the chit-chat of the town; And left him the unfrequent power Of brooding through a quiet hour, Thus, while he sat, a busy train Of images, besieged his brain. Of Church-preferment he had none; Nay, all his hope of that was gone: He felt that he content must be With drudging in a curacy. Indeed, on ev'ry Sabbath-day,

Were only thirty pounds a year.
Besides th' augmenting taxes press
To aid expense and add distress;
Mutton and beef and bread and beer,
And ev'ry thing was grown so dear;
The boys too always prone to eat
Delighted less in books than meat;
So that when holy Christmas came,
His earnings ceased to be the same;
And now, alas, could do no more,
Than keep the wolf without the door.
E'en birch, the pedant master's boast,
Was so increas'd in worth and cost,
That oft, prudentially beguil'd
To save the rod he spar'd the child.

way,

To preach, to grumble, and to pray:
To cheer the good, to warn the sinner,
And, if he got it,-eat a dinner :
To bury these, to christen those,
And marry such fond folks as chose
To change the tenor of their life,
And risk the matrimonial strife.
Thus were his weekly journeys made,
'Neath summer suns and wintry shade,

He to his school must put an end. How hard his lot! how blind his fate!

What shall he do to mend his state ? Thus did poor Syntax ruminate.

When, as the vivid meteors fly, And instant light the gloomy sky, A sudden thought across him came, And told the way to wealth and fame;