Or were I where _Vishnu_, that four-handed god,
Is the quadruple giver of pensions and places,
I own I should feel it unchristian and odd
Not to find myself also in _Vishnu's_ good graces.
For among all the gods that humanely attend
To our wants in this planet, the gods to _my_ wishes
Are those that, like _Vishnu_ and others, descend
In the form so attractive, of loaves and of fishes![1]
So take my advice--for if even the devil
Should tempt men again as an idol to try him,
'Twere best for us Tories even then to be civil,
As nobody doubts we should get something by him.
[1] Vishnu was (as Sir W. Jones calls him) "a pisciform god,"--his first
Avatar being in the shape of a fish.
ENIGMA.
_monstrum nulla virtute_ redemptum.
Come, riddle-me-ree, come, riddle-me-ree,
And tell me what my name may be.
I am nearly one hundred and thirty years old,
And therefore no chicken, as you may suppose;--
Tho' a dwarf in my youth (as my nurses have told),
I have, every year since, been out-growing my clothes:
Till at last such a corpulent giant I stand,
That if folks were to furnish me now with a suit,
It would take every morsel of _scrip_ in the land
But to measure my bulk from the head to the foot.
Hence they who maintain me, grown sick of my stature,
To cover me nothing but _rags_ will supply;
And the doctors declare that in due course of nature
About the year 30 in rags I shall die.
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