ver lace, against the last
birth-day.--Vid. the shopkeepers' books.]

[Footnote 18: Girls who love to hear themselves prate, and put on a
number of monkey-airs to catch men.]

[Footnote 19: I hope none will be so uncomplaisant to the ladies as to
think these comparisons are odious.]

[Footnote 20: Tell the whole world; not to proclaim them as robbers and
rapparees.]

AN ANSWER TO A SCANDALOUS POEM

Wherein the Author most audaciously presumes to cast an indignity upon
their highnesses the Clouds, by comparing them to a woman.
Written by DERMOT O'NEPHELY, Chief Cape of Howth.[1]

BY DR. SWIFT

ADVERTISEMENT FROM THE CLOUDS

N.B. The following answer to that scurrilous libel against us, should
have been published long ago in our own justification: But it was
advised, that, considering the high importance of the subject, it should
be deferred until the meeting of the General Assembly of the Nation.

[Two passages within crotchets are added to this poem, from a copy
found amongst Swift's papers. It is indorsed, "Quaere, should it go."
And a little lower, "More, but of no use."]

Presumptuous bard! how could you dare
A woman with a cloud compare?
Strange pride and insolence you show
Inferior mortals there below.
And is our thunder in your ears
So frequent or so loud as theirs?
Alas! our thunder soon goes out;
And only makes you more devout.
Then is not female clatter worse,
That drives you not to pray, but curse?
We hardly thunder thrice a-year;
The bolt discharged, the sky grows clear;
But every sublunary dowdy,
The more she scolds, the more she's cloudy.
[How useful were a woman's thunder,
If she, like us, would burst asunder!
Yet, though her stays hath often cursed her,
And, whisp'ring, wish'd the devil burst her:
For hourly thund'ring in his face,
She ne'er was known to burst a lace.]
Some critic may object, perhaps,
That clouds are blamed for giving claps;
But what, alas! are claps ethereal,
Compared for mischief to venereal?
Can clouds give buboes, ulcers, blotches,
Or from your noses dig out notches?
We leave the body sweet and sound;
We kill, 'tis true, but never wound.
You know a cloudy sky bespeaks
Fair weather when the morning breaks;
But women in a cloudy plight,
Foretell a storm to last till night.
A cloud in proper season pours
His blessings down in fruitful showers;
But woman was by fate design'd
To pour down curses on mankind.
When Sirius[2] o'er the welkin rage