Corinna, pride of Drury-Lane, For whom no shepherd sighs in vain; Never did Covent-Garden boast So bright a batter'd strolling toast! No drunken rake to pick her up, No cellar where on tick to sup; Returning at the midnight hour, Four stories climbing to her bower; Then, seated on a three-legg'd chair, Takes off her artificial hair; Now picking out a crystal eye, She wipes it clean, and lays it by. Her eyebrows from a mouse's hide Stuck on with art on either side, Pulls off with care, and first displays 'em, Then in a play-book smoothly lays 'em. Now dext'rously her plumpers draws, That serve to fill her hollow jaws, Untwists a wire, and from her gums A set of teeth completely comes; Pulls out the rags contrived to prop Her flabby dugs, and down they drop. Proceeding on, the lovely goddess Unlaces next her steel-ribb'd bodice, Which, by the operator's skill, Press down the lumps, the hollows fill. Up goes her hand, and off she slips The bolsters that supply her hips; With gentlest touch she next explores Her chancres, issues, running sores; Effects of many a sad disaster, And then to each applies a plaster: But must, before she goes to bed, Rub off the daubs of white and red, And smooth the furrows in her front With greasy paper stuck upon't. She takes a bolus ere she sleeps; And then between two blankets creeps. With pains of love tormented lies; Or, if she chance to close her eyes, Of Bridewell[1] and the Compter[1] dreams, And feels the lash, and faintly screams; Or, by a faithless bully drawn, At some hedge-tavern lies in pawn; Or to Jamaica[2] seems transported Alone, and by no planter courted; Or, near Fleet-ditch's[3] oozy brinks, Surrounded with a hundred stinks, Belated, seems on watch to lie, And snap some cully passing by; Or, struck with fear, her fancy runs On watchmen, constables, and duns, From whom she meets with frequent rubs; But never from religious clubs; Whose favour she is sure to find, Because she pays them all in kind.
Corinna wakes. A dreadful sight! Behold the ruins of the night! A wicked rat her plaster stole, Half eat, and dragg'd it to his hole. The crystal eye, alas! was miss'd; And puss had on her plumpers p--st, A pigeon pick'd her issue-pease: And Shock her tresses fill'd with fleas.
The nymph, though in this mangled plight Must ev'ry morn her limbs unite. But how shall I describe her arts To re-collect the scatter'd parts? Or show the anguish, toil, and pain, Of gath'ring up herself again? The bashful Muse will never bear In such a scene to interfere. Corinna, in the morning dizen'd, Who sees, will spew; who smells, be poison'd.
