BOZZY.

  “One Thursday morn did Doctor Johnson wake,
  And call out ‘Lanky, Lanky,’ by mistake—­
  But recollecting—­’Bozzy, Bozzy,’ cry’d—­
  For in contractions Johnson took a pride!”

MADAME PIOZZI.

“I ask’d him if he knock’d Tom Osborn down; As such a tale was current through the town,—­ Says I, ’Do tell me, Doctor, what befell.’—­ ’Why, dearest lady, there is nought to tell; ’I ponder’d on the proper’st mode to treat him—­ ’The dog was impudent, and so I beat him!  ’Tom, like a fool, proclaim’d his fancied wrongs; ‘Others, that I belabour’d, held their tongues.’”

  “Did any one, that he was happy, cry—­
  Johnson would tell him plumply, ’twas a lie. 
  A Lady told him she was really so;
  On which he sternly answer’d, ’Madam, no! 
  ’Sickly you are, and ugly—­foolish, poor;
  ’And therefore can’t he happy, I am sure. 
  ’’Twould make a fellow hang himself, whose ear
  ‘Were, from such creatures, forc’d such stuff to hear.’”

BOZZY.

  “Lo, when we landed on the Isle of Mull,
  The megrims got into the Doctor’s skull: 
  With such bad humours he began to fill,
  I thought he would not go to Icolmkill: 
  But lo! those megrims (wonderful to utter!)
  Were banish’d all by tea and bread and butter!”

At last they get angry, and tell each other a few home truths:—­

BOZZY.

  “How could your folly tell, so void of truth,
  That miserable story of the youth,
  Who, in your book, of Doctor Johnson begs
  Most seriously to know if cats laid eggs!”

MADAME PIOZZI.

  “Who told of Mistress Montagu the lie—­
  So palpable a falsehood?—­Bozzy, fie!”

BOZZY.

  “Who, madd’ning with an anecdotic itch,
  Declar’d that Johnson call’d his mother b-tch?”

MADAME PIOZZI.

  “Who, from M’Donald’s rage to save his snout,
  Cut twenty lines of defamation out?”

BOZZY.

“Who would have said a word about Sam’s wig, Or told the story of the peas and pig?  Who would have told a tale so very flat, Of Frank the Black, and Hodge the mangy cat?”

MADAME PIOZZI.

“Good me! you’re grown at once confounded tender; Of Doctor Johnson’s fame a fierce defender:  I’m sure you’ve mention’d many a pretty story Not much redounding to the Doctor’s glory. Now for a saint upon us you would palm him—­ First murder the poor man, and then embalm him!”

BOZZY.

“Well, Ma’am! since all that Johnson said or wrote,
You hold so sacred, how have you forgot
To grant the wonder-hunting world a reading
Of Sam’s Epistle, just before your wedding: 
Beginning thus, (in strains not form’d to flatter)
’Madam,
’If that most ignominious matter
’Be not concluded’—­[1]
Farther shall I say? 
No—­we shall have it from yourself some day,
To justify your passion for the Youth,
With all the charms of eloquence and truth.”