"In vain at glory gudgeon Boswell snaps-- / His mind's a paper kite--compos'd of scraps / Just o'er the tops of chimneys form'd to fly."
— Wolcot, John, pseud. Peter Pindar, (1738-1819)
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed for G. Kearsley
Date
1786, 1816
Metaphor
"In vain at glory gudgeon Boswell snaps-- / His mind's a paper kite--compos'd of scraps / Just o'er the tops of chimneys form'd to fly."
Metaphor in Context
In vain at glory gudgeon Boswell snaps--
His mind's a paper kite--compos'd of scraps;
Just o'er the tops of chimneys form'd to fly;
Not with a wing sublime to mount the sky.
Say to the dog, his head's a downright drum
Unequal to the history of Tom Thumb:
Nay tell of anecdote that thirsty leech,
He is not equal to a Tyburn speech.
His mind's a paper kite--compos'd of scraps;
Just o'er the tops of chimneys form'd to fly;
Not with a wing sublime to mount the sky.
Say to the dog, his head's a downright drum
Unequal to the history of Tom Thumb:
Nay tell of anecdote that thirsty leech,
He is not equal to a Tyburn speech.
Categories
Provenance
Searching "paper" and "mind" in HDIS (Poetry); confirmed in ECCO
Citation
13 entries in ESTC (1786, 1788).
See Bozzy and Piozzi, or, the British Biographers, a Town Eclogue. By Peter Pindar, Esq. (London: Printed for G. Kearsley, at Johnson’s Head, No. 46, in Fleet Street, and W. Foster, No. 348, near Exeter Change, in the Strand, 1786). <Link to ESTC>
Text from The Works of Peter Pindar, 4 vols. (London: Printed for Walker and Edwards, 1816).
See Bozzy and Piozzi, or, the British Biographers, a Town Eclogue. By Peter Pindar, Esq. (London: Printed for G. Kearsley, at Johnson’s Head, No. 46, in Fleet Street, and W. Foster, No. 348, near Exeter Change, in the Strand, 1786). <Link to ESTC>
Text from The Works of Peter Pindar, 4 vols. (London: Printed for Walker and Edwards, 1816).
Date of Entry
03/26/2005
