Mr Editor
As the Attic Society encourage all the Arts, I cannot resist the temptation to send you the inclosed specimen of more than one of them.
The first stanza of the Illustration is an imitation of a well known poem on the subject of George Barnwell, the rest appear quite original.
Yours &c. &c. &c.
An Irregular Contributor
Esculapius sat at his shop door,
A customer hoping to find Sir;
His beard it was hanging before,
And his serpent’s tail twisting behind Sir:
When Venus she brought him her son,
For tooth-drawing to tip him a guinea,
Says he, “Ma’am your business is done
If you go to Chevalier Ruspini.”
“Pray who is Ruspini?” says she —
“A sage who to me was apprentic’d
To learn all the myst’ry,” says he,
“That belongs to the trade of a Dentist.”
“I wonder, my dear Esculape,
You relinquish the lucrative custom
Of giving our teeth all a scrape,
And selling a Dentifrice Nostrum!”
“Why, Venus, so great was the knack,
The skill and the cunning of the gent:
That Pall Mall quickly saw my young quack
Surgeon-Dentist unto the Prince Regent:
“Opposition I found of no use,
My apprentice becoming so clever
At drawing, or fixing, teeth loose;
And I gave up the bus’ness for ever.”