Bouts Rimez[1]

ON SIGNORA DOMITILLA     Our schoolmaster may roar i' th' fit,         Of classic beauty, haec et illa;     Not all his birch inspires such wit         As th'ogling beams of Domitilla.     Let nobles toast, in bright champaign,         Nymphs higher born than Domitilla;     I'll drink her health, again, again,         In Berkeley's tar,[2] or sars'parilla.     At Goodman's Fields I've much admired         The postures strange of Monsieur Brilla;     But what are they to the soft step,         The gliding air of Domitilla?     Virgil has eternized in song         The flying footsteps of Camilla;[3]     Sure, as a prophet, he was wrong;         He might have dream'd of Domitilla.     Great Theodose condemn'd a town         For thinking ill of his Placilla:[4]     And deuce take London! if some knight         O' th' city wed not Domitilla.     Wheeler,[5] Sir George, in travels wise,         Gives us a medal of Plantilla;     But O! the empress has not eyes,         Nor lips, nor breast, like Domitilla.     Not all the wealth of plunder'd Italy,         Piled on the mules of king At-tila,     Is worth one glove (I'll not tell a bit a lie)         Or garter, snatch'd from Domitilla.     Five years a nymph at certain hamlet,         Y-cleped Harrow of the Hill, a-      - bused much my heart, and was a damn'd let         To verse - but now for Domitilla.     Dan Pope consigns Belinda's watch         To the fair sylphid Momentilla,[6]     And thus I offer up my catch         To the snow-white hands of Domitilla.