THE BANKRUPT BAWD.

Near Jermyn-street a Bawd did trade, In credit, style, and splendor, Well known to ev’ry high-bred blade, And those of doubtful gender: How Nature once, in marring mood, Her body form’d, I’ll tell ye, Upon her back a swelling stood, To mock her barren belly. CHORUS. For some succeed, and others fail, That into commerce enter, So sew are chaste, and many frail, In this great trading Center. In coney skins her commerce lay, A charming stock she’d laid in; She ne’er to smugglers fell a prey, Her practice was fair trading: These skins when dress’d were red and white, The fur of each fair creature, Of diff’rent hues, hath day and night Kept warm man’s naked nature. For some succeed, &c. The trading stock of this old Bawd A vital stab sustain’d, sir; The news like wild-fire flew abroad, Each customer complain’d, sir; Some coney-skins lay with a lot, By caution uninspected; So quarantine, alas! forgot, Foul plague the whole infected. For some succeed, &c. Now old and young her shop forsook, Insolvent was her plight, sir, When Habeas Corpus Catchpole took Her body off by night, sir; From Banco Regis civil law, To liquidate her debt, sir, Between the sheets this old Bawd saw Of London’s fam’d Gazette, sir. For some succeed, &c. To give each creditor his due, Three men, the Lord’s Anointed, Jack Wilkes, Lord Sandwich, and old Q., Were Assignees appointed: But, luckless Bawd! the after day Her stock on fire they found, sir; So ’twas agreed she could not pay A cundum in the pound, sir. For some succeed, &c. The skin (her own) this Bawd had left, Each Assignee did handle; ’Twas found of all its fur bereft, By singing flame of candle: Some butter’d bunns conceal’d within, Old Q.’s keen eye beset, sir; So Wilkes defin’d this coney skin A fund for floating debt, sir. For some succeed, &c. By headlong lust her claimants led, They seiz’d her mortal treasure; The furless coney skin was spread, A dividend past measure. Now all came in, not one stood out; The Bawd was set at large, sir; Her coney skin (of worth, no doubt) Did ev’ry man discharge, sir. For some succeed, &c.