Vers de Société and other short and fugitive pieces, apparently collected by Margaret,...

Vers de Société and other short and fugitive pieces, apparently collected by Margaret, Duchess of Portland, and her mother Henrietta, Countess of Oxford; arranged alphabetically according to the first lines, A-Th. Among them are:- "A cock of family renown'd" (f.1); "The Apologie sent to Lady Carteret by Doctor Delany", beg. "A lady wise as well as fair" (f.6); "A paper book is sent by Boyle", by Dr Swift, 1732. (f.10) "All the world's in shift and hurry; in the hand of Edward, 2nd Earl of Oxford (f.16) "Inventory of the goods belonging to Dr Swift", beg. "An oaken broken elbow chair" (f.18); Sonnet, "By Avon's stream", by Sir Gilbert Elliot (f. 38) "The Squire and the Parson, an Eclogue", 1748, beg. "By his hall chimney" (f.40); "An invitation to the Jubilee, 1700", beg. "Come, beaus, virtuos (f.46); "To Matthew Prior, Esq, when under confinement", beg. "Could I, great bard" (f.57); "Verses wrote by Dr Swift in his late illness", beg. "Deaf, giddy, helpless" (f.61); "Ode to Hope", beg. "Deceiver, shadow" (f.68); "On Sir W[illiam] M[organ], K.B., losing the badge of the order", beg. "Hear, all ye friends of Knighthood", circ. 1726 (f.104); "Dean Swift upon his curate Robert Hewit", beg. "I march'd four miles" (f.119); "Mr. Dridens first song at Court,' beg. "I passe all my howers", etc. (f.123); "I said to my heart betwixt sleeping and waking", "by Lord Peterborough" (f.126) "A Satyr against snuff", beg. "I sing of snuff", by "Mr. Wesley, of Christ church in Oxford" (f.127); "Advice" to the Earl of Orrery, beg. "My Lord, I know not what you mean" (f.181); "Old and abandon'd by each venal friend", "written by Mr. Gray", 1766 (f.222); "On the wedding" of William, Prince of Orange and Anne, daughter of George II, 1734, beg. "Orange returns and we may now declare", and other verses recited at Westminster School (f. 228) "The Ancient Ballad of Hugh Spencer", beg. "Our King lay at Westminster (f.236); "On the death of the Lords beheaded in 1746", beg. "Pitied by gentle minds" (f.241); "Molly Mog", beg. "Says my uncle, I pray you discover" (f.250); "To the ... Earl of Oxford", by Samuel Wesley, beg. "Shall my plain verse" (f.261); "The Merry Patriot or Election in burlesque", beg. "Talk no more of the wars" (f.281); "Verses upon the Ladies of the Toast", beg. "The bravest heroe and the brightest dame" (f.290); "Molly Lepell", beg. "The Muses, quite jaded with rimeing" (f.308).

Folio; ff.347.

<p>For verses by Anne Finch, Countess of Winchelsea (d.1720) see XIX ff.85-86, 210-11. For editions of Anne Finch's verse see Myra Reynolds ed. The Poems of Anne, Countess of Winchelsea, Chicago, 1903 and Denys Thompson ed. Anne Finch, Countess of Winchelsea Selected Poems, Manchester and New York, 1987 (with further bibliography).</p>