Classic Poem

And, to draw on good wages, said 'twas late,
And grew so dark, that though he knew the way,
He durst not be so confident, to say
He might not miss it in so dark a night:
But if his Worship would be pleas'd t'alight,
And let him call a Friend, he made no doubt,
But one of them would surely find it out.
The Traveller well pleased at any rate,
To have so expert Guides , dismounted straight,
Giving his horse up to the treach'rous slave,
Who having hous'd him, forthwith fell to heave
And poize the Portmantu , which finding fraight
At either end with lumps of tempting weight,
The Devil and he made but a short dispute
About the thing they soon did execute:
For calling th'other Rogue , who long had bin
His complice in preceding acts of sin,
He tells him of the prize, sets out the gain,
Shews how secure and easie to obtain;
Which prest so home, where was so little need,
The strangers ruine quickly was decreed.
Thus to the poor proscrib'd , the Villains go,
And with joynt confidence assure him so,
That with his hap to meet such friends content
He put himself into their hands, and went.

The guilty night , as if she would express
Confederacy with such black purposes,
The sparkling Hemisphear had overspread
With darkest vapours from foul Lerna bred;
The world was hush't, all save a sighing wind,
That might have warn'd a more presaging mind,
When these two Sons of Satan , thus agreed,
With seeming wariness, and care proceed,
All the while mixing their amusing chat,
With frequent cautions of this step, and that;
Till having some six hundred paces gone,
Master here's but a scurvy grip , sayes one
Of the damn'd Rogues (and he said very right)
Pray for more safety, Sir, be pleas'd t'alight,
And let him lead your Horse a little space,
Till you are past this one uneven place,
You'l need to light no more, Ile warrant you;
And still this instrument of Hell said true.
Forthwith alights the innocent Trapan'd ,
One leads his Horse, the other takes his hand,
And, with a shew of care, conducts him thus
To these steep thresholds of black Erebus :
And there (O act of horror which out-vies
The direst of inhumane cruelties!)
Let me (my Muse ) repeat it without sin,
The barb'rous Villain pusht him headlong in.
The frighted wretch, having no time to speak,
Forc'd his distended throat in such a skriek,
As, by the shrilness of the doleful cry,
Pierc'd through, and through th'immense inanity ,
Enforming so the half dead fallers Ear
What he must suffer, what he had to fear,
When, at the very first befriending knock,
His trembling brains smear'd the Tarpeian rock,
The shatter'd carcass downward rattles fast,
Whilst thence dismist, the Soul with greater hast
From those infernal mansions does remove
And mounts to seek the happy seats above.
What bloody Arab of the fellest breed,
What but the yet more fell I — — n seed,
Could once have meditated such a Deed ?
But one of these Heaven 's vengeance did ere long
Call to account for this poor creatures wrong,
Who hang'd for other Crimes, amongst the rest
This horrid murther at his death confest:
Whilst th'other Rogue , to Justice foul disgrace,
Yet lives, 'tis said, unquestion'd near the place.
How deep this Gulph does travel under ground,
Though there have been attempts, was never found:
But I my self, with half the Peak surrounded,
Eight hundred, fourscore, and four yards have sounded,
And, though of these fourscore return'd back wet,
The Plummet drew, and found no bottom yet:
Though when I went again another day,
To make a further, and a new essay,
I could not get the lead down half the way.

Enough of Hell ! From hence you forward ride,
Still mounting up the Mountains groaning side,
Till having gain'd the utmost height, your Eye
North-ward a mile a higher does descry,
And steeper much, though from that prospect green,
With a black, moorish Valley stretcht between.
Unlike in stature, and in substance, this
To the South-East is a great precipice,
Not of firm Rock, like the rest here that shroud
Their lowring Summits in a dewy cloud:
But of a shaly Earth, that from the crown
With a continual motion mouldring down,
Spawns a less Hill of looser mould below,
Which will in time tall as the Mother grow,
And must perpetuate the Wonder so.
Which Wonder is, That though this Hill nere cease
To wast it self, it suffers no decrease:
But t'would a greater be, if those that pass
Should miss the Atomes of so vast a Mass :