A hundred other men's affairs,
Like bees, are humming in my ears.70
"Tomorrow my appeal comes on,
Without your help, the cause is gone —."
The duke expects my lord and you,
About some great affair at two —
"Put my lord Bolingbroke in mind,75
To get my warrant quickly sign'd:
Consider, 'tis my first request." —
Be satisfy'd, I'll do my best:
Then presently he falls to teaze,
"You may for certain, if you please;80
I doubt not, if his lordship knew —
And, Mr. dean, one word from you[1] —"
'Tis (let me see) three years and more,
(October next it will be four)
Since Harley bid me first attend[2],85
And chose me for an humble friend;
- ↑ Very happily turned from "Si vis potes —."
- ↑ The rise and progress of Swift's intimacy with lord Oxford is minutely detailed in his very interesting Journal to Stella. And the reasons why a man, that served a ministry so effectually, was so tardily, and so difficultly, and so poorly rewarded, are well explained in Sheridan's Life of Swift, and arose principally from the insuperable aversion the queen had conceived to the author of a Tale of a Tub as a profane book; which aversion was kept alive, and increased by the duchess of Somerset, against whom Swift had written a severe lampoon. It appears from this life, that lords Oxford and Bolingbroke always kept concealed from
80. Si vis, potes, addit et instat.
83. Septimus octavo propior jam fugerit annus,
Ex quo Mecænas me cœpit habere suorum
In numero; duntaxat ad hoc, quem tollere rhedâ
Vellet, iter faciens, et cui concredere nugas.
