English Poetry I: From Chaucer to Gray.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 279. On a Certain Lady at Court |
| | | Henrietta Howard, Countess of Suffolk |
| | | Alexander Pope (1688–1744) |
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| I KNOW a thing that’s most uncommon | |
| (Envy, be silent, and attend); | |
| I know a reasonable woman, | |
| Handsome and witty, yet a friend. | |
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| Not warped by passion, awed by rumour, | 5 |
| Not grave through pride, or gay through folly; | |
| An equal mixture of good humour, | |
| And sensible soft melancholy. | |
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| ‘Has she no faults then,’ Envy says, ‘Sir?’ | |
| Yes, she has one, I must aver: | 10 |
| When all the world conspires to praise her | |
| The woman’s deaf, and does not hear! | |
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