If all the griefs I am to have 1
Would only come today,
I am so happy I believe
They'd laugh and run away.
If all the joys I am to have 5
Would only come today,
They could not be so big as this
That happens to me now.
Would only come today,
I am so happy I believe
They'd laugh and run away.
If all the joys I am to have 5
Would only come today,
They could not be so big as this
That happens to me now.
(F.1756/J.1726)
[7] big:: ready to give birth (OED 4). big as this:: "so big deal as this big (with child) of mine."
[8] happens to me now:: she has a big belly now.
Indeed, she is big with child, and so big, that, as my Lady Northumberland says, it is plain she has a camel in her belly, and my Lord Edgecumbe says, it is as true it did not go through the eye of a needle. ─ The Letters of Horace Walpole (1866)