Scent to match thy rich perfume
  Chemic art did ne’er presume
  Through her quaint alembic strain,
  None so sov’reign to the brain. 
  Nature, that did in thee excel,
  Framed again no second smell. 
  Roses, violets, but toys
  For the smaller sort of boys,
  Or for greener damsels meant;
  Thou art the only manly scent.

  Stinking’st of the stinking kind,

Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,
Africa, that brags her foison,
Breeds no such prodigious poison,
Henbane, nightshade, both together,
Hemlock, aconite——­

                            Nay, rather,
  Plant divine, of rarest virtue;
  Blisters on the tongue would hurt you. 
  ’Twas but in a sort I blamed thee: 
  None e’er prosper’d who defamed thee;
  Irony all, and feign’d abuse,
  Such as perplex’d lovers use,
  At a need, when, in despair
  To paint forth their fairest fair,
  Or in part but to express
  That exceeding comeliness
  Which their fancies doth so strike,
  They borrow language of dislike;
  And, instead of Dearest Miss,
  Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,
  And those forms of old admiring,
  Call her Cockatrice and Siren,
  Basilisk, and all that’s evil,
  Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil,
  Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor,
  Monkey, Ape, and twenty more;
  Friendly Trait’ress, loving Foe,—­
  Not that she is truly so,
  But no other way they know
  A contentment to express,
  Borders so upon excess,
  That they do not rightly wot
  Whether it be pain or not.

    Or, as men, constrain’d to part
  With what’s nearest to their heart,
  While their sorrow’s at the height,
  Lose discrimination quite,
  And their hasty wrath let fall,
  To appease their frantic gall,
  On the darling thing whatever,
  Whence they feel it death to sever,
  Though it be, as they, perforce,
  Guiltless of the sad divorce.

    For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
  Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. 
  For thy sake, TOBACCO, I
  Would do anything but die,
  And but seek to extend my days
  Long enough to sing thy praise. 
  But, as she, who once hath been
  A king’s consort, is a queen
  Ever after, nor will bate
  Any tittle of her state,
  Though a widow, or divorced,
  So I, from thy converse forced,
  The old name and style retain,
  A right Katherine of Spain;
  And a seat, too,’mongst the joys
  Of the blest Tobacco Boys;
  Where, though I, by sour physician,
  Am debarr’d the full fruition
  Of thy favors, I may catch
  Some collateral sweets, and snatch
  Sidelong odors, that give life
  Like glances from a neighbor’s wife;
  And still live in the by-places
  And the suburbs of thy graces;
  And in thy borders take delight,
  An unconquer’d Canaanite.