Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 8.djvu/74

64 Presented him the weekly bills Of doctors, fevers, plagues, and pills. Pluto, observing since the peace The burial article decrease, And, vex'd to see affairs miscarry, Declar'd in council, Death must marry; Vow'd he no longer could support Old bachelors about his court; The interest of his realm had need That Death should get a numerous breed; Young Deathlings, who, by practice made Proficient in their father's trade, With colonies might stock around His large dominions under ground. A consult of coquettes below Was call'd, to rig him out a beau: From her own head Megera takes A periwig of twisted snakes; Which in the nicest fashion curl'd, (Like toupets of this upper world) With flowers of sulphur powder'd well, That graceful on his shoulders fell; An adder of the sable kind In line direct hung down behind; The owl, the raven, and the bat, Clubb'd for a feather to his hat; His coat, a usurer's velvet pall, Bequeath'd to Pluto, corpse and all. But, loth his person to expose Bare, like a carcase pick'd by crows, A lawyer o'er his hands and face Stuck artfully a parchment case. No new flux'd rake show'd fairer skin; Nor Phyllis after lying in. With