By the gaily circling glass/The Last Shilling

THE LAST SHILLING.

As pensive one night in my garret I sat,
My last shilling produc’d on the table,
That advent’rer, cried I, might a hist’ry relate,
If to think and to speak it were able;
Whether fancy or magic ’twas play’d me the freak,
The face seem’d with life to be filling,
And cried, instantly speaking, or seeming to speak,
Pay ’ttention to me, thy last shilling.

‘I was once the last coin of the law, a sad limb
Who in cheating was ne’er known to faulter;
Till at length brought to justice, the law cheated him,
And he paid me to buy him a halter:
A Jack tar, all his rhino but me at an end,
⟨With⟩ a pleasure so hearty and willing,
Tho’ hungry himself, to a poor distress’d friend,
Wish’d it hundreds, and gave his fast shilling.

’Twas the wife of his messmate, whose glistening eye
With pleasure ran o’er, as she view’d me;
She ’chang’d me for bread, as her child she heard cry.
And, at parting, with tears she bedew’d me:
But I’ve other scenes known, riot leading the way
Pale want their poor families chilling;
Where rakes in their revels, the piper to pay,
Have spurn’d me, their best friend and last shilling.

’Thou thyself hast been thoughtless for profligates bail,
But to-morrow all care shalt thou bury;
When my little history thou offerest for sale:
In the interim, spend me and be merry.’
‘Never, never,’ cried I; thou’rt my mentor, my muse
And grateful, thy dictates fulfilling,
I’ll hoard thee in my heart.’ Thus men counsel refuse,
ill the lecture comes from the last shilling.