Rather than that, mix on my plate With men I like the meat I hate-- Colman with pig and treacle; Luttrell with ven'son-pasty join, Lord Normanby with orange-wine, And rabbit-pie with Jekyll.
Add to George Lambe a sable snipe, Conjoin with Captain Morris tripe, By parsley roots made denser; Mix Macintosh with mack'rel, with Calves-head and bacon Sydney Smith, And mutton-broth with Spencer.
Shun sitting next the wight, whose drone Bores, _sotto voce_, you alone With flat colloquial pressure: Debarr'd from general talk, you droop Beneath his buzz, from orient soup, To occidental Cheshire.
He who can only talk with one, Should stay at home, and talk with none-- At all events, to strangers, Like village epitaphs of yore, He ought to cry, "Long time I bore," To warn them of their dangers.
There are whose kind inquiries scan Your total kindred, man by man, Son, brother, cousin joining. They ask about your wife, who's dead, And eulogize your uncle Ned, Who died last week for coining.
When join'd to such a son of prate, His queries I anticipate, And thus my lee-way fetch up-- "Sir, all my relatives, I vow, Are perfectly in health--and now I'd thank you for the ketchup!"
Others there are who but retail Their breakfast journal, now grown stale, In print ere day was dawning; When folks like these sit next to me, They send me dinnerless to tea; One cannot chew while yawning.
Seat not good talkers one next one, As Jacquier beards the Clarendon; Thus shrouded you undo 'em; Rather confront them, face to face, Like Holles-street and Harewood-place, And let the town run through 'em.
Poets are dangerous to sit nigh-- You waft their praises to the sky, And when you think you're stirring Their gratitude, they bite you. (That's The reason I object to cats-- They scratch amid their purring.)
For those who ask you if you "malt," Who "beg your pardon" for the salt, And ape our upper grandees, By wondering folks can touch Port-wine; That, reader's your affair, not mine-- I never mess with dandies.
Relations mix not kindly; shun Inviting brothers; sire and son Is not a wise selection: Too intimate, they either jar In converse, or the evening mar By mutual circumspection.
Lawyers are apt to think the view That interests them must interest you; Hence they appear at table Or supereloquent, or dumb, Fluent as nightingales, or mum As horses in a stable.