And from my own stock provided with topics,
He gets to a window beyond both the tropics,
There out of my sight, just against the north zone,
Writes down my conceits, and then calls them his own;
And you, like a cully, the bubble can swallow: 
Now who but Delany that writes like Apollo? 
High treason by statute! yet here you object,
He only stole hints, but the verse is correct;
Though the thought be Apollo’s, ’tis finely express’d;
So a thief steals my horse, and has him well dress’d. 
Now whereas the said criminal seems past repentance,
We Phoebus think fit to proceed to his sentence. 
Since Delany hath dared, like Prometheus his sire,
To climb to our region, and thence to steal fire;
We order a vulture in shape of the Spleen,
To prey on his liver, but not to be seen. 
And we order our subjects of every degree
To believe all his verses were written by me: 
And under the pain of our highest displeasure,
To call nothing his but the rhyme and the measure. 
And, lastly, for Stella, just out of her prime,
I’m too much revenged already by Time,
In return of her scorn, I sent her diseases,
But will now be her friend whenever she pleases. 
And the gifts I bestow’d her will find her a lover
Though she lives till she’s grey as a badger all over.

[Footnote 1:  Collated with the original MS. in Swift’s writing, and also with the copy transcribed by Stella.—­Forster.]

[Footnote 2:  Stella’s copy has “the.”—­Forster.]

[Footnote 3:  Diana.]

[Footnote 4:  As originally written, this passage ran: 
  “Wherein she distinctly could read ev’ry line
  And found by the wit the Fancy was mine
  For none of his poems were ever yet shown
  Which he in his conscience could claim for his own.”
Forster.]

NEWS FROM PARNASSUS BY DR. DELANY

OCCASIONED BY “APOLLO TO THE DEAN” 1720

Parnassus, February the twenty-seventh. 
The poets assembled here on the eleventh,
Convened by Apollo, who gave them to know
He’d have a vicegerent in his empire below;
But declared that no bard should this honour inherit,
Till the rest had agreed he surpass’d them in merit: 
Now this, you’ll allow, was a difficult case,
For each bard believed he’d a right to the place;
So, finding the assembly grow warm in debate,
He put them in mind of his Phaethon’s fate: 
’Twas urged to no purpose; disputes higher rose,
Scarce Phoebus himself could their quarrels compose;
Till at length he determined that every bard
Should (each in his turn) be patiently heard. 
  First, one who believed he excell’d in translation,[1]
Founds his claim on the doctrine of man’s transmigration: 
“Since the soul of great Milton was given to me,
I hope the convention will quickly agree.”—­
“Agree;” quoth Apollo:  “from