Our patrons are of quite a different strain,
With neither sense nor taste; against the grain 390
They patronise for Fashion's sake--no more--
And keep a bard, just as they keep a whore.
Melcombe (on such occasions I am loth
To name the dead) was a rare proof of both.
Some of them would be puzzled e'en to read,
Nor could deserve their clergy by their creed;
Others can write, but such a Pagan hand,
A Willes[320] should always at our elbow stand:
Many, if begg'd, a Chancellor,[321] of right,
Would order into keeping at first sight. 400
Those who stand fairest to the public view
Take to themselves the praise to others due,
They rob the very spital, and make free
With those, alas! who've least to spare. We see
---- hath not had a word to say,
Since winds and waves bore Singlespeech[322] away.
Patrons, in days of yore, like patrons now,
Expected that the bard should make his bow
At coming in, and every now and then
Hint to the world that they were more than men; 410
But, like the patrons of the present day,
They never bilk'd the poet of his pay.
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