-before her quake;
If daughters dread her for the mothers' sake;
If early habits--those false links, which bind
At times the loftiest to the meanest mind--[sd]
Have given her power too deeply to instil
The angry essence of her deadly will;[se]
If like a snake she steal within your walls,
Till the black slime betray her as she crawls;
If like a viper to the heart she wind,
And leave the venom there she did not find; 50
What marvel that this hag of hatred works[sf]
Eternal evil latent as she lurks,
To make a Pandemonium where she dwells,
And reign the Hecate of domestic hells?
Skilled by a touch to deepen Scandal's tints
With all the kind mendacity of hints,
While mingling truth with falsehood--sneers with smiles--
A thread of candour with a web of wiles;[sg]
A plain blunt show of briefly-spoken seeming,
To hide her bloodless heart's soul-hardened scheming; 60
A lip of lies; a face formed to conceal,
And, without feeling, mock at all who feel:
With a vile mask the Gorgon would disown,--
A cheek of parchment, and an eye of stone.[sh]
Mark, how the channels of her yellow blood
Ooze to her skin, and stagnate there to mud,
Cased like the centipede in saffron mail,
Or darker greenness of the scorpion's scale--[si]
(For drawn from reptiles only may we trace
Congenial colours in that soul or face)-- 70
Look on her features! and behold her mind[sj]
As in a mirror of itself defined:
Look on the picture! deem it not o'ercharged--
There is no trait which might not be enlarged:
Yet true to "Nature's journeymen,"[435] who made
This monster when their mistress left off trade--
This female dog-star of her little sky,
Where all beneath her influence droop or die.[sk]

Oh! wretch without a tear--without a thought,
Save joy above the ruin thou hast wrought-- 80
The time shall come, nor long remote, when thou
Shalt feel far more than thou inflictest now;
Feel for thy vile self-loving self in vain,
And turn thee howling in unpitied pain.
May the strong curse of crushed affections light[436]
Back on thy bosom with reflected blight!
And make thee in thy leprosy of mind
As loathsome to thyself as to mankind!
Till all thy self-thoughts curdle into hate,