"At Bartlemew Fair ne'er did Bullies so justle,
No country Election e'er made such a bustle:
From Garret, Mint, Tavern, they all post away,
Some thirsting for Sack, some ambitious of Bay."
Pope, Prior, Cibber, and Durfy arrive. Then
"Lampooners and Criticks rush'd in like a tide,
Stern Dennis and Gildon came first side by side,
Apollo confess'd that their lashes had stings,
But Beadles and Hangmen were never chose Kings."
There follows a description of Steele; and then
"Lame Congreve, unable such things to endure,
Of Apollo begg'd either a crown or a cure;
To refuse such a writer Apollo was loth,
And almost inclin'd to have granted him both."
The Duke next describes his own arrival:
"When Buckingham came he scarce car'd to be seen,
Till Phœbus desir'd his old friend to walk in,
But a Laureat Peer had never been known,
The Commoners claim'd that place as their own.
"Yet if the kind God had been e'er so inclin'd
To break an old rule, yet he well knew his mind,
Who, of such preferment, would only make sport,
And laugh'd at all suitors for places at Court."
Apollo is so perplexed by the various conflicting claims of the congregated Bards, that in despair he confers the laurel on a spectator, described as
"A hater of verse, a despiser of plays,"
And while all stand astounded at the election, this nodus is untied by the sudden advent of our "not inconsiderable versifier:"
"At last rush'd in Eusden, and cried, who shall have it
But I the true Laureat, to whom the King gave it?
Apollo begg'd pardon, and granted his claim,
But vowed, that till then, he had ne'er heard his name."
And so the squib goes off.
Before Eusden gave the world the poems which have
