Where did you whet your knife to-night, he cries,

And shred the leeks that in your stomach rise?
Whose windy beans have ftuft your guts, and where
Have your black thumbs been dipt in vinegar?
With what companion-cobler have you fed,
On old ox cheeks, or he-goats tougher head?
What, are you dumb? Quick, with your answer,
quick,

Before my foot falutes you with a kick.

Say, in what nafty cellar under ground,
Or what church-porch, your rogueship may be

found?

Answer, or anfwer not, 'tis all the fame:
He lays me on, and makes me bear the blame.
Before the bar, for beating him you come;
This is a poor man's liberty in Rome.
You beg his pardon; happy to retreat
With fome remaining teeth, to chew

your meat.
Nor is this all; for when retir'd, you think
To fleep fecurely; when the candles wink,
When ev'ry door with iron chains is barr'd,
And roaring taverns are no longer heard;
The ruffian robbers by no juftice aw'd,
And unpaid cut-throat foldiers, are abroad,

Those venal fouls, who harden'd in each ill,
To fave complaints and profecution, kill.
Chas'd from their woods and bogs, the padders

come

To this vaft city, as their native home;
To live at ease, and fafely fkulk in Rome.

The forge in fetters only is employ'd;
Our iron mines exhausted and destroy'd
In fhackles; for these villains scarce allow

Goads for the teams, and plough-fhares for the plough.

Oh happy ages of our ancestors,

Beneath the kings and tribunitial powers!

One jail did all their criminals reftrain;
Which now the walls of Rome can scarce

contain.

More I could fay, more caufes I could show For my departure; but the fun is low: The waggoner grows weary of my stay; And whips his horfes forwards on their way. Farewel; and when like me o'erwhelm'd with

care,

You to your own Aquinum shall repair,
To take a mouthful of fweet country air,

Be mindful of your friend; and fend me word,
What joys your fountains and cool fhades afford;
Then, to affift
your fatires, I will come;
And add new venom when you write of Rome.

THE

SIXTH SATIRE

OF

JUVE NA L.

THE ARGUMENT.

This fatire, of almost double length to any of the reft, is a bitter invective against the fair fex. 'Tis indeed, a common-place, from whence all the moderns have notoriously folen their sharpest railleries. In his other fatires, the poet has only glanced on fome particular women, and generally fccurged the men. But this he referved wholly for the ladies. How they had offended him I know not: but upon the whole matter he is not to be excufed for imputing to all, the vices of fome few amongst them. Neither was it generously done of bim, to attack the weakest as well as the fairest part of the creation: neither do I know what moral he could reasonably draw from it. It could not be to avoid the whole fex, if all had been true which he alledges against them: for that had been to put an end to human kind. And to bid us be

ware of their artifices, is a kind of filent acknowledgment, that they have more wit than men: which turns the fatire upon us,, and particularly

upon the poet; who thereby makes a compliment,

where he meant a libel. If he intended only to exercife his wit, he has forfeited his judgment, by making the one half of his readers his mortal enemies and amongst the men, all the happy lovers, by their own experience, will disprove bis accufations. The whole world must allow this to be the wittiest of his fatires; and truly he had need of all his parts, to maintain with fo much violence, fo unjust a charge. I am satisfied ke will bring but few over to his opinion: and on that confideration chiefly I ventured to translate bim. Tho there wanted not another reason, which was, that no one elfe would undertake it: at least, Sir C. S. who could have done more right to the author, after a long delay, at length abfolutely refufed fo ungrateful an employment: and every one will grant, that the work must have been imperfect and lame, if it had appeared without one of the principal members belonging to it. Let the poet therefore bear the blame of his own invention; and let me fatisfy the world, that I am not of his opinion. Whatever his Roman ladies