Читать книгу The Humorous Poetry of the English Language; from Chaucer to Saxe - Various - Страница 23

Jacob! I do not like to see thy nose

Turn'd up in scornful curve at yonder pig,

It would be well, my friend, if we, like him,

Were perfect in our kind!..And why despise

The sow-born grunter?..He is obstinate,

Thou answerest; ugly, and the filthiest beast

That banquets upon offal. … Now I pray you

Hear the pig's counsel.

Is he obstinate?

We must not, Jacob, be deceived by words;

We must not take them as unheeding hands

Receive base money at the current worth

But with a just suspicion try their sound,

And in the even balance weigh them well

See now to what this obstinacy comes:

A poor, mistreated, democratic beast,

He knows that his unmerciful drivers seek

Their profit, and not his. He hath not learned

That pigs were made for man, … born to be brawn'd

And baconized: that he must please to give

Just what his gracious masters please to take;

Perhaps his tusks, the weapons Nature gave

For self-defense, the general privilege;

Perhaps, … hark, Jacob! dost thou hear that horn?

Woe to the young posterity of Pork!

Their enemy is at hand.

Again. Thou say'st

The pig is ugly. Jacob, look at him!

Those eyes have taught the lover flattery.

His face, … nay, Jacob! Jacob! were it fair

To judge a lady in her dishabille?

Fancy it dressed, and with saltpeter rouged.

Behold his tail, my friend; with curls like that

The wanton hop marries her stately spouse:

So crisp in beauty Amoretta's hair

Rings round her lover's soul the chains of love.

And what is beauty, but the aptitude

Of parts harmonious? Give thy fancy scope,

And thou wilt find that no imagined change

Can beautify this beast. Place at his end

The starry glories of the peacock's pride,

Give him the swan's white breast; for his horn-hoofs

Shape such a foot and ankle as the waves

Crowded in eager rivalry to kiss

When Venus from the enamor'd sea arose; …

Jacob, thou canst but make a monster of him!

All alteration man could think, would mar

His pig-perfection.

The last charge, … he lives

A dirty life. Here I could shelter him

With noble and right-reverend precedents,

And show by sanction of authority

That 'tis a very honorable thing

To thrive by dirty ways. But let me rest

On better ground the unanswerable defense.

The pig is a philosopher, who knows

No prejudice. Dirt? … Jacob, what is dirt?

If matter, … why the delicate dish that tempts

An o'ergorged epicure to the last morsel

That stuffs him to the throat-gates, is no more.

If matter be not, but as sages say,

Spirit is all, and all things visible

Are one, the infinitely modified,

Think, Jacob, what that pig is, and the mire

Wherein he stands knee-deep!

And there! the breeze

Pleads with me, and has won thee to a smile

That speaks conviction. O'er yon blossom'd field

Of beans it came, and thoughts of bacon rise.