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I once that was great, Now full
little am grown; A mimic of multum in parvo. I'm buried alive in a cloister of stone; They say it is what I desarve, O. In what they have said there is something of truth; I've been a most wild and extravagant youth; The hundreds I spent upon Rachel and Ruth Have brought me at last into Limbo. My father, he left me five hundred a year, My mother, she left me her jointure; Then every good acre of mortgage was clear, To cross with my gun and my pointer. But field after field to the market I sent, My acres I sold, and the money I spent, My heart upon nothing but revelry bent, And that was the high-road to Limbo. My hall with abundance of old fashioned plate, And arras I packed off together, I dressed myself up in a pageant of state, In powdered wig, hat and feather. With hawks and with hounds and with fine ambling nags, I rioted round, till I emptied my bags, My gay coat was turned to contemptible rags, Besides I was clapt into Limbo. I used for to vaunt me as if I could fly, Or strut like a crow in a gutter. The people would cry out, whene'er I went by, There goes Master Fopling - a - Flutter! Like unto topgallant I hoisted my sails, My rapier, muff-ribbons, wig of two tails; But then I sat sighing and gnawing my nails, Confined to a chamber in Limbo. And now I am happy, on acres a few, With a cow, and a cob in my stable, An innocent wife, who is loving and true, And cherubs surrounding my table. I owe not a penny, My fortune is small, Though poverty pinches, it never can gall, I leave it to others to go to the wall And like Jackasses walk into Limbo. |