Then leave, ye wise, the lyre's precarious chords Condemn the unlucky curate to recite
To muse-mad baronets or madder lords,

Their last dramatic work by candle light,
Or country Crispins, now grown somewhat stale, How would the preacher turn each rueful lear,
Twin Doric minstrels, drunk with Doric ale! Dull as his sermons, but not ball so briefl
Hark to those notes, narcotically soft:

Yet, since it is promised at the rector's death. The cobbler laureates sing* to Capel Lotit it

He'll risk no living for a little breath. Till, lol that modern. Midas, as he hears,

Then spouts and foams, and cries at every line, Adds an ell growth to his egregious ears!

(The Lord forgive him !) “ Bravo! grand! divine

Hoarse with those praises (which, by flatt'ry sed, There lives one druid, who prepares in time Gainst future fends his poor revenge of rhyme;

Dependence barters for her bitter bread,)

He strides and stamps along with creaking boot, Racks his dull memory, and his duller muse,

Till the floor echoes bis emphatic foot;
To publish faults which friendship should excuse.
If friendship's nothing, self-regard might teach

Then sits again, then rolls his pious eye,
More polish'd usage of his parts of speech.

As when the dying vicar will not die! But what is shame, or what is aught, to him?

Nor feels, forsooth, emotion at his heart;

But all disemblers overact their part. He vents his spleen or gratifies his whim. Some fancied slight has roused his lurking hate, Ye who aspire to build the lofty rhyme, Some folly cross'd, some jest or some debate; Believe not all who laud your false “sublime;" Up to his den Sir Scribbler hies, and soon

But if some friend shall hear your work, and say, The gather'd gall is voided in lampoon.

* Expunge that stanza, lop that line away," Perhaps at some pert speech you've dared to frown,

Si carmina condes, Perhaps your poem may have pleased the town; Nunquam te fallant animi sub vulpe latentes. If so, alas! 'tis nature in the man

Quintilio si quid recitares, Corrige, sodes, May heaven forgive you, for he never can!

Hoc (aiebat) et hoc: melius te posse negares, Then be it so; and may his withering bays

Bis terque expertum frustra, delere jubebal,

Et male tornatos incudi reddere versus. Bloom fresh in satire, though they fade in praise ! Si defendere delictum quam vertere malles, While his lost songs no more shall steep and stink, Nullum ultra verbum, aut operam insumebat inanen The dullest, fattest weeds on Lethe's brink,

Quin sine rivali teque et tua solus amares. But springing upwards from the sluggish mould, Be, (what they never were before) be sold!

Fitzgerald had been the tail of poesy, but, alas! he is only the pealt

mate. Should some rich bard (but such a monster now,

A FAMILIAR EPISTLE TO THE EDITOR OF THE

MORNING CHRONICLE. In modern physics, we can scarce allow)

“What reams of paper, floods of ink," Should some pretending scribbler of the court,

Do some men spoil, who never think! Some rhyming peer-there's plenty of the sorti

And so perhaps you 'll say of me,

In which your readers may agree. All but one poor dependent priest withdrawn,

Still I write on, and tell you why; (Ah! too regardless of his chaplain's yawn !)

Nothing's so bad, you can't deny,
But may instruct or entertain

Without the risk of giving pain. • I beg Nathaniel's pardon; he is not a cobbler; it is a tailor, but begged

And should you doubt what I assert, Capel Lofft to sink the profession in his preface to two pair of panta

The name of Camden I insert, psha Sof cantos, which be wished the public to try on; but the sieve of a

Who novels read, and oft maintain patron let it out, and so far saved the expense of an advertisement to his

He here and there some knowledge gain'd. country customers.--Merry's "Moorfeld's whine" was nothing to all this

Then why pot l indulge my pen, The “ Della Cruscans” were people nf some education, and no profession;

Though I do fame or profit gain, but these Arcadians (" Arcades ainbo”-bumpkins both) send out their na

Yet may amuse your idle men; Give nonsense without the smallest alloy, and leave all the shoes and small.

of whom, though some may be severe, clothes in the parish unrepaired, to patch up Elegies on Enclosures and

Others may read without a speer? Pæans to Gunpowder. Sitting on a shopboard, they describe fields of battle,

Thus much premised, I next proceed when the only blood they ever saw was shed from the finger; and an "Es

To give you what I feel my creed, say on War" is produced by the ninth part of a "poet."

And in what follows to display
" And own that nine such poets made a Tale."
а

Some bumours of the passing day. Did Nathan ever read that line of Pope? and if he did, why not take it as ON SOME MODERN QUACKS AND REFORMISTS his motto?

In tracing of the human mind 1 This well-meaning gentleman has spoiled some excellent shoe-makers,

Through all its various courses, and been accessary to the poetical undoing of many of the industrious poor,

Though strange, 't is true, we often find Nathaniel Bloomfield and his brother Bobby have set all Somersetshire sing.

It knows not its resources: ing; nor has the malady confined itself to one county. Pralt too (who once was wiser) has caught the contagion of patronage, and decoyed a poor fel

And men through life assume a part

For which no talents they possess low named Blackett into poetry, but he died luring the operation, leaving one child, and two volumes of “Remains'utterly destitute. The girl, if

Yet wonder that, vith all their art,

They meet no better with success she don't take a poetical twist, and come forth as a shoe-making Sappho. may do well; but the “ tragedies" are as rickety as if they had been the

"Tis thus we see, through life's career, offspring of an Earl or a Seatonian prize poet. The patrons of this poor

So few excel in their profession; lad are certainly answerable for bis end, and it ought to be an indictable of

Whereas, would each man but appear fence. But this is the least they have done, for, by a refinement of barbari

In what s within his own possession, ty, they have made the (late) man posthumously ridiculous, by printing

And, after fruitless efforts, you return

If by some chance he walks into a well, Without amendment, and he answers, “ Burn!" And shouts for succour with stentorian yell, That instant throw your paper in the fire,

“A rope! help, Christians, as ye hope for grace !" Ask not his thoughts, or follow his desire;

Nor woman, man, nor child will stir a race; But if (true bard!) you scorn to condescend,

For there bis carcase lie might freely fling, And will not alter what you can't defend,

From frenzy, or the humour of the thing.
If you will breed this bastard of your brains,*- Though this has happen'd lo more bards than one
We'll have no words-I've only lost my pains. I'll tell you Budgell's story, and have done.

Yet, if you only prize your favourite thought Budgell, a rogue and rlyniester, for no good,
As crítics kindly do, and authors ought;

(Unless his case be much misunderstood)
If your cool friend annoy you now and then, When leased with creditors' continual claims,
And cross whole pages with his plaguy pen; "To die like Cato,"S leapt into the Thames!
No matter, throw your ornaments aside-

And therefore be it lawful through the town
Better let him than all the world deride.

For any bard to poison, hang, or drown. Give light to passages too much in shade,

Who saves the intended suicide receives Nor let a doubt obscure one verse you 've made; Small thanks from him who loathes the life he leaves; Your friend's "a Johnson," not to leave one word, And, sooth to say, mad poets must not lose Ilowever trifling, which inay seem absurd;

The glory of that death they freely choose. Such erring trifles lead to serious ils,

Nor is it certain that some sorts of verse And furnish food for critics,f or their quills. Prick not the poet's conscience as a curse; As the Scotch fiddle, with its touching tone,

| Dosed with vile drams on Sunday he was found Or the sad influence of the angry moon,

Or got a child on consecrated ground! All men avoid bad writers' ready tongues,

And hence is haunted with a rhyming rage

Fear'd like a bear just bursting from his cage.
As yawning waiters flyf Fitzscribble's lungs;
Yet on he mouths-ten minutes-tedious each

If free, all fly his versifying fit,
As prelate's homily or placeman's speech;

Fatal at once to simpleton or wit. long as the last years of a lingering lease,

But him, unhappy! whom he seizes,-him When riot pauses until rents increase.

He flays with recitation limb by limb; While such a minstrel, muttering fustian, strays

Probes to the quick wbere'er be makes his breach, O'er hedge and ditch, through unfrequented ways,

And gorges like a lawyer or a leech. Vir bonus et prudens versus reprehendet inertes:

Objectos cavere valuit si frangere clathros, Culpabit et duros; incomptis alinet atrum

Indoctum doctumque fugat recitator acerbus. Transverso calaino signum; ambitiosa recidet

Quem vero arripuit, tenet, occiditque legendo, Ornamenta; parum claris lucem dare coget;

Non missura cutem, nisi plena cruoris, hirudo Arguet ambigue dictum; mutanda notabit; Fiet Aristarchus: nec dicet, Cur ego amicum

On his table were found these words: I’hat Cato did and Addison ap

prived cannot be wrong." But Add son did not approve ;'' and if he had, Offendam in niigis? hæ nuge seria ducent

it would not have mended the matter. He had invited his daughter on the In mala derisi semel exceptuinque sinistre. same water party, but Miss Und gell, hy some accident, escaped this last paUt inala quem scabies aut morbus regius urguet,

fernal attention. Thus fell the sycophant of “Atticas," and the enemy of

Pope. Aut fanaticis error el iracunda Diana,

li If "donc with," &e, bo censured as low, I beg leave to refer to the Vesanum tetigisse timent fugiunque poetam,

or cica! for something still lower; and if any reader will translate Mint Qui sapiunt; agitant pieri, incautique sequuntur. erit in patries cineren, &c. into a decent couplel, I will insert said couplet

a Hie dum sublimes versus ructatur, et errat

in lieu of the present. Si veluti merulis intentus decidit auceps

"Difficile est proprie communia dicere."-Mde. Dacier, Mde. de Sevigne, In puteum, foveannve; licet, Succurrite, longum

Boileau, and others, live left their dispute on the meaning of this passage in Clamnet, lo cives! non sit qui tollere curet.

a tract considerably longer than the poem of Horace. It is printed at the Si quis curet opem ferre, et demittere funem, close of the eleveoth volume of Madame de Sevigne's Letters, edited by Qui scis an prudens huc se dejecerit, atque

Grovelle, Paris, 1-05. Presuming that all who can contre may venture

an opinion on such subjects, particularly as so many who can not have Servari nolit? Dicam : Siculique poeta

taken the same liberty. I should base held my " farthing candle" as awk. Narrabo interitum, Deus immortalis haberi

wardiy asarntler, had not my respect for the wils of Louis the Fourteenth's Dun cipit Empedocles, ardentein frigidus Ætnam Augustan kerie induced me to subjoin these illustrious authorities. Ist, Insiluit; sit jus liceatque perire poetis :

Ritenu: 11 cal difficile de traiter des sujets qui sont a la porter de tout lo

minde d'ene maniere qui vous les repre propres, ce qui s'appelle s'approInvitun qui servat, idem facit occidenti.

rrier un sujet par le tour qu'on y donne." 2dly, Balleux : Mais il est Nec semel hoc fecit; nec, si retractus crii, jam bien difficile de donner de Traits propres et individuels aux etren purement Fiet homo, et ponet famose inortis amorem.

possibles." 301y, Dacier : "Il est dithicile de traiter convenablement ces

caracteres que tout le monde peut inventer." Mde. de Sevinne's opinion Vec satis apparet cur versiis factitet; utruin

and translation consisting cr some thirty mges. Tomit, particularly as M. Minxerit in patrios cineres, an triste bidental Guvelle closerves " La chose est bien riniarquable, aucune de ces diversen Moverit incestus; certe farit, ac velui ursus,

interpreations de porait etre la veritable." But, or way of comfort, it seems, fifty years afterwands, "le luminetix Dumarais" made his appearance to set Homace on his legs again, "dissiper tous les nuages, et concilier tous les

dissentimien;" and, some tify year herce, somehody, still more luminous, • Bastard of your brains-Minerva being the first by Jupiter's head-piece, will doubtless start up and demolish Numar is and his systein on this anda sariety of equally unaccountable parturitions upon earth, such as Ma- weighty affir, as if he were no better than Ptolemy and Tycho, or com. doc, &c. Ac. &c.

Deuts of no more consequence than astronomical calculations on the presen! HA crust for the critics." -Barce, in the Rehearsal.

comel. I am happy to say, "la longueur de la dissertation" of M. D. pre : And the "waiters" are the only fortunale perple who can "ply" from verts. G. from saying any more on the matter. A better poet than Boileau, tem: all the rest, viz the sad subscribers to the Literary Fund," being and at least as good a scholar as Sevique, has said, compelled, hy courtesy, polnud the recitation without a hope of exclaim

"A little learning is a dangerous thing." log. Sic" (that is, by nuaxing Fitz, with ball wine or worse poetry) "me And by this comparison of comments it may be perceived how a good dea krvavit Apollo

may be rendered as perilous to the proprietors.

722

Additions to the Hours

to the Hours of koleness.

[There were several editions of the Hours of Idleness published in England; but no one of them, until that of 1832, contained all the pieces which properly belonged to that collection The following, when added to those in front of the book, make up the complete number.]

ON A DISTANT VIEW OF THE VILLAGE AND

TO D. SCHOOL OF HARROW ON TIIE HILL.

1.

In thee I fondly hoped to clasp
Oh! mihi præteritos referat si Jupiter annos.

A friend, whom death alone could sever;
Virgil, Æneid, lib. 8, 560.

Till envy, with malignant grasp,
1.

Detach'd thee from my breast for ever.
Ye scenes of my childhood, whose loved recollection
Embitters the present, compared with the past ;

2.
Where science first dawn'd on the powers of reflection, True, she has forced thee from my breast;
And friendships were form'd too romantic to last; Yet in my heart thou keep'st thy seat;

There, there thine image still must rest,

Until that heart shall cease to beat.
Where fancy yet joys to retrace the resemblance
Of comrades in friendship and inischief allied ;

3.
How welcome to me your ne'er-fading remembrance, And, when the grave restores her dead,
Which rests in the bosoin, though hope is denied! Wheu life again to dust is given,
3.

On thy dear breast I'll lay my headAgain I revisit the hills where we sported,

Without thee, where would be my heaven? The streams where we swam, and the fields where

February, 1803. we fought; The school where, loud warn'd by the bell, we resorted,

TO EDDLESTON, To pore o'er the precepts by pedagogues taught.

1. 4.

Let Folly sinile, to view the names Again I behold where for hours I have ponderd,

of thee and me in friendship twined; As reclining, at eve, on yon tomhstone I lay;

Yet Virtue will have greater clajins
Or round the steep brow of the churchyard I wander'd, To love, than rank with vice combined.
To catch the last gleam of the sun's setting ray.

2.
5.

And though unequal is thy fate, I once more view the room with spectators surrounited,

Since title deck'd my higher birth; Where, as Zanga, I trod on Alonzo o'erthrown;

Yet envy not this gaudy state; While to swell my young pride such applauses re.

Thine is the pride of modest worth. sounded,

3. I fancied that Mossop himself was outshone:

Our souls at least congenial meet, 6. Or, as Lear, I pour'd forth the deep imprecation,

Nor can thy lot my rank disgrace;

Our intercourse is not less sweet.
By my daughters of kingdom and reason deprived;

Since worth of rank supplies the place.
Till, fired by loud plaudits and self-adulation,
I regarded myself as a Garrick revived.

November, 1902.
7.
Ye dreams of my hoyhood, how much I regret you!

REPLY TO SOME VERSES OF JM B. PIGOT. ESQ l'ufaded your memory dwells in my breast;

ON THE CRUELTY OF HIS MISTRESS. Though sad and deserted, I ne'er can forget you;

1. Your pleasures may still be in fancy possest.

Why, Pigot, complain 8.

of this damsel's disinin, To Ha full of ray remembrance restore me,

Why thus in despair do you fret? While fate shall the shades of the future unroll!

For inonths you may try, Bince darkneng o'ershadows the prospect before me,

Yet, believe me, a sigh More dear is the beam of the past to my soul. Will never obtain a coquette.

9,
But if, through the course of the years which a wajt me, Would you teach her to lovo?
Some new scene of pleasure should open to view,

For a time sitem to rove:
I will say, while with rapture the thought shall At first she may frown in a pet;

Dit leave her a while, * Oh! such were the days which my infancy knew." She shortly will sinile,

LINES WRITTEN IN "LETTERS OF AN ITALIAN ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY

NUN AND AN ENGLISH GENTLEMAN. BY J. J. Cousin to the Author, and very dear to him. ROUSSEAU. FOUNDED ON FACTS."

1. " Away, a way! your flattering arts

Hush'd are the wirias, and still the evening glow May now betray some simpler hearts;

Not een a zephyr, wanders through the grove, And you will smile at their believing,

Whilst I return to view my Margaret's tomb, And they shall weep at your deceiving."

And scatter flowers on the dust I love.

2. NSIVER TO THE FOREGOING, ADDRESSED TO MISS

Within this narrow cell reelines her clay, Dear, simple girl, those flattering arts,

That clay where once such animation beam'd; From which thou'dst guard frail female hearts,

The King of 'Terrors seized her as his prey, Exist but in imagination,

Not worth, nor beauty, have lier life redeemid Mere phantoms of thine own creation; For he who views that witching grace,

3. That perfect form, that lovely face,

Oh! could that King of Terrors pity feel, With eyes admiring, oh! believe me,

Or Beaven reverse the dread decrees of fate! He never wishes to deceive thee:

Not here the mourner would his grief reveal,

Nor here the Muse her virtues would relate. Once in thy polish'd mirror glance, Thou 'lt there descry that elegance

4. Which from our sex demands such praises, But wherefore weep? her matchless spirit soars But envy in the other raises:

Beyond where splendid shines the orb of day; he who tells thee of thy beauty,

And weeping angels lead her to those bowers Believe me, only does his duty:

Where endless pleasures virtue's deeds repay. Ah! fly not from the candid youth;

5. It is not flattery,-'t is truth.

And shall presumptuous mortals heaven arraign,
July, 1804.

And, madly, godlike providence accuse ?
Ah! no, far fly from me attempts so vain,

I'll ne'er submission to my God refuse.
THE CORNELIAN.
1.

6. No specious splendour of this stone

Yet is remembrance of those virtues dear, Endears it to my memory ever;

Yet fresh the memory of that beauteous face; With lustre only once it shone,

Still they call furth my warm affection's tear, And blushes modest as the giver.

Still in my heart retain their wonted place.

Some, who can sneer at friendship's tics,

Have for my weakness of reproved me;
Yet still the simple gift I prize,-
For I am sure the giver loved me.

3.
He offer'd it with downcast look,

As fearful that I might refuse it;
I told him when the gift I took,
My only fear should be to lose it.

4.
This pledge attentively I view'd,

And sparkling as I held it near, Methought one drop the stone bedewid,' And ever since I've loved a tear.

5.
Still, to adorn his humble youth,

Nor wealth nor birth their treasures yield;
But he who sceks the flowers of trith,
Must quit the garden for the field.

6.
Tis not the plant upreard in sloth,

Which beauty shows, and sheds perfume; The flowers which yield the most of both

In Nature's wild luxuriance bloom.

TO EMMA.

1.
Since now the hour is come at last,

When you must quit your anxious lover;
Since now our dream of bliss is past,
One pang, my girl, and all is over.

2.
Alas! that pang will be severe,

Which bids iis part to meet no more,
Which tears me far from one so dear,
Departing for a distant shore.

3.
Well: we have pass'd some happy hours,

And joy will mingle with our tears;
When thinking on these ancient towers,
The shelter of our infant years;

4.
Where from the gothic casement's height,

We viewd the lake, the park, the dale,
And still, though tears obstruct our sight,
We lingering look a last farewell.

5.
O'er fields through which we used to run,

And spend the hours in childish play;
O'er shades where, when our race was done

Reposing on my breast you lay;

Had Fortune aided Nature's care,

For once forgetting to be blind,
His wouid have been an ample share,
If well.proportion'd to his mind.

8.
But had the goddess clearly seen,

His form had fix'd her fickle brcast; ller countless hoards would his have been,

And none remaind to give the rest.

Whilst I, admiring, too remiss,

Forgot to scare the hov'ring flies,
Yet envied every fly the kiss

It dared to give your slumbering eyes!