Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 7.djvu/245

Rh Descend to take that tribute due In gratitude alone to you. When men began to call me fair, You interpos'd your timely care; You early taught me to despise The ogling of a coxcomb's eyes; Show'd where my judgment was misplac'd; Refin'd my fancy and my taste. Behold that beauty just decay'd, Invoking art to nature's aid: Forsook by her admiring train, She spreads her tatter'd nets in vain; Short was her part upon the stage; Went smoothly on for half a page; Her bloom was gone, she wanted art, As the scene chang'd, to change her part; She, whom no lover could resist, Before the second act was hiss'd. Such is the fate of female race With no endowments but a face; Before the thirtieth year of life, A maid forlorn, or hated wife. Stella to you, her tutor, owes That she has ne'er resembled those; Nor was a burden to mankind With half her course of years behind. You taught how I might youth prolong, By knowing what was right and wrong; How from my heart to bring supplies Of lustre to my fading eyes; How soon a beauteous mind repairs The loss of chang'd or falling hairs; How wit and virtue from within Send out a smoothness o'er the skin: Your