Another taught their babes to talk,
Ere they could yet in go-carts walk:
There Alma settled in the tongue,
And orators from Athens sprung.
Observe but in these neighb'ring lands
The diff'rent use of mouth and hands;
As men repos'd their various hopes,
In battles these, and those in tropes.
In Britain's isles, as Heylin notes,
The ladies trip in petticoats,,
Which for the honour of their nation,
They quit but on some great occasion.
Men there in breeches clad you view;,
They claim that garment as their due.
In Turkey the reverse appears;
Long coats the haughty husband wears,
And greets his wife with angry speeches,
If she be seen without her breeches.
In our fantastic climes the fair,
With cleanly powder dry their hair,
And round their lovely breast and head.
Fresh flow'rs their mingled odours shed:
Your nicer Hottentots think meet
With guts and tripe to deck their feet;
With downcast looks on Totta's legs
The ogling youth most humbly begs
She would not from his hopes remove
At once his breakfast and his love;
And if the skittish nymph should fly,
He in a double sense must die.
We simple toasters take delight
To see our women's teeth look white;
And ev'ry saucy ill-bred fellow,
Sneers at a mouth profoundly yellow.
In China none hold women sweet
Except their snaggs are black as jet:
King Chihu put nine queens to death,
Convict on statute, iv'ry teeth.
Now turn we to the farthest east, And there observe the gentry drest..
Prince Giolo and his royal sisters,
The marks remaining on the skin,
Scarr'd with ten thousand comely blisters
To tell the quality within :
Distinguish'd slashes deck the great,
As each excels in birth or state;
His oylet-holes are more and ampler;
The king's own body was a sampler.
Happy the climate where the beau
Wears the same suit for use and show;
And at a small expence your wife,
If once well pink'd, is cloath'd for li
Westward again, the Indian fair
Is nicely smear'd with fat of bear:
Before you see, you smell your toast,
And sweetest she who stinks the most.
The finest sparks and cleanest beaux
Drip from the shoulders to the toes,
How sleek their skins! their joints how easy!
Their slovens only are not greasy,
I mention'd diff'rent ways of breeding;
Begin we in our children's reading.
To Master John the English maid
A horn-book gives of gingerbread,
And that the child may learn the better,
As he can name he cats the letter;
Proceeding thus with vast delight,
He spells and gnaws from left to right.
But shew a Hebrew's hopeful son
Where we suppose the book begun,
The child would thank you for your kindness,
And read quite backward from our finis:
Devour he learning ne'er so fast,
Great A would be reserv'd the last,
An equal instance of this matter Is in the manners of a daughter.
In Europe if a harmless maid,
By Nature and by Love betray'd,
Should ere a wife become a nurse,
Her friends would look on her the worse.
In China, Dampier's Travels tell ye,
(Look in his index for Pagelli)
Soon as the British ships unmoor,
And jolly longboat rows to shore,
Down come the nobles of the land,
Each brings his daughter in his hand,
Beseeching the imperious tar
To make her but one hour his care:
The tender mother stands affrighted,
Lest her dear daughter should be slighted,
And poor Miss Yaya dreads the shame
Of going back the maid she came.
Observe how custom, Dick, compels
The lady that in Europe dwells:
After her tea she slips away,
And what to do we need not say.
'Now see how great Pomonque's queen
Behav'd herself amongst the men;
Pleas'd with her punch, the gallant soul,
First drank, then water'd in the bowl,
And sprinkled in the captain's face
The marks of her peculiar grace
To close this point we need not roam
For instances so far from home.
What parts gay France from sober Spain?
A little rising rocky chain.
Of men born south or north o' the hill,
Those seldom move, these ne'er stand still.
Dick, you love maps, and may perceive
Rome not far distant from Geneve.
If the good Pope remains at home,
He's the first prince in Christendom.
Choose then good Pope at home to stay,
Nor westward, curious, take thy way;
Thy way, unhappy, shouldst thou take
From Tiber's bank to Leman-lake,
Thou art an aged priest no more,
But a young flaring painted whore:
Thy sex is lost thy town is gone;
No longer Rome but Babylon.
Here with an artful smile, quoth Dick, Your proofs come mighty full and thick. The bard, on this extensive chapter Wound up into poetic rapture,
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