Her face too, all the while, sedate,
No signs of life or motion showing.
Like a bright _pendule's_ dial-plate--
So still, you'd hardly think 'twas _going_.
Full fronting her stood Country Dance--
A fresh, frank nymph, whom you would know
For English, at a single glance--
English all o'er, from top to toe.
A little _gauche_, 'tis fair to own,
And rather given to skips and bounces;
Endangering thereby many a gown,
And playing, oft, the devil with flounces.
Unlike _Mamselle_--who would prefer
(As morally a lesser ill)
A thousand flaws of character,
To one vile rumple of a frill.
No rouge did She of Albion wear;
Let her but run that two-heat race
She calls a _Set_, not Dian e'er
Came rosier from the woodland chase.
Such was the nymph, whose soul had in't
Such anger now--whose eyes of blue
(Eyes of that bright, victorious tint,
Which English maids call "Waterloo")--
Like summer lightnings, in the dusk
Of a warm evening, flashing broke.
While--to the tune of "Money Musk,"[1]
Which struck up now--she proudly spoke--
"Heard you that strain--that joyous strain?
"'Twas such as England loved to hear,
"Ere thou and all thy frippery train,
"Corrupted both her foot and ear--
"Ere Waltz, that rake from foreign lands,
"Presumed, in sight of all beholders,
"To lay his rude, licentious hands
"On virtuous English backs and shoulders--
"Ere times and morals both grew bad,
"And, yet unfleeced by funding block-heads,
"Happy John Bull not only _had_,
"But danced to, 'Money in both pockets.
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