The Poetical Writings of Fitz-Greene Halleck/To Quackery

by Fitz-Greene Halleck and Joseph Rodman Drake

TO QUACKERY.

oddess! for such thou art, who rules
This honest and enlightened city;
True patroness of knaves and fools,
To thee we dedicate our ditty.
Whether in Barclay Street thou sittest,
Or, on papyrean pinions borne,
Dropping mercurial dews, thou flittest
Around thine own anointed Horne:⁷⁰

Whether, arrayed in gown and band,
Thy pious zeal distributes Bibles,
Or, perched on Spooner’s classic hand,
Writes merry eulogistic libels;
Where’er we turn our raptured eyes,
We see this puffing generation,
Cheered by thy smile, propitious, rise
To profit, power, and reputation.

Then come, ye Quacks! the anthem swell;
Come, Allen, with thy lottery bills;
Come, four-herbed Angelis,⁷⁰ who fell
From heaven in a shower of pills;
Come, Geib, whose potent word creates
Prime analytical musicians;

And come, ye hosts that hold brevets
From Hosack’s college of physicians.

And thou, botanic Hosack, bring
Thy poppy-breathing lips along;
Thy name in steeple-bells shall ring,
Thou monarch of the motley throng.
Yet Mitchill may the votes estrange,
Or Doctor Clinton, to confound ye,
Again produce some queer melange
Of scientific Salmagundi.

Clinton! the name my fancy fires,
I see him, with a sage’s look,
Exhausting Nature, and whole quires
Of foolscap, in his wondrous book.
Columbia’s genius hovers o’er him,
Fair Science, smiling, lingers near,
Encyclopædias lie before him,
And Mitchill whispers in his ear.

Enough! the swelling wave has borne
Upon its bosom chiefs and kings—
From Mitchill, Clinton, Hosack, Home,
One cannot stoop to meaner things.
Yet once again we’ll raise the song,
And passing forums, banks, and brokers,
Join with the bubble-blowing throng,
Seize Quackery’s pipe, and puff the Croakers.

D.