me to observe a radical fault. There are no great masses, no striking divisions, no epochs; so that the attention is bewildered, and the memory has no pause. Arrangement is the first quality of a good book; and it is proper to form a skeleton or analysis, before putting pen to paper in the composition. The notes are often disjointed and desultory.

"Excuse these few remarks of a friend and well wisher."

J. C. WALKER, Esq. to Mr. Pinkerton.

66

January 22, 1807. "I consider your kind favour of the 15th inst. as the strongest proof you could give me of sincere friendship. As such I accept it, and am grateful for it. I must confess, however, that I am sorry that a work undertaken chiefly at your suggestion should not be so fortunate as to meet with your approbation. Should it ever reach a second edition, I shall hope, by attending to your excellent hints, to render it less unworthy the subject. In order to this, it would be necessary to enlarge my plan, and not to confine myself to a particular period, but to trace the history of the Italian stage from infancy to maturity. In the work in question, I have only (if I may so express myself) played about the cradle of the Italian drama. have merely noticed its first feeble efforts to speak-the imperfect accents of childhood. My specimens and remarks are therefore confined to the earliest attempts. I could, it is true, have noticed many more dramas, which might be said to fall within the narrow limits of my plan; but I was unwilling to weary, and perhaps disgust, the generality of readers. I promised a slight Essay, and have kept my word.

I

"Your idea that an author should form a skeleton of his intended work before putting pen to paper in the composition, I think a most excellent one. Should I

ever engage in another work, you will find your hint has not been thrown away. Something of what you recommend was attempted on the present occasion. The previous arrangement in my mind was such as the subject seemed to suggest. I determined to divide the work into sections, allotting to each respectively the different species of drama which appeared at the revival of the art in Italy, and devoting some of the concluding sections to the patrons of the art, and to the academies instituted for

promotion. This was the plan which occurred to me at the time. I will not say it was the best, but it was the best I could devise. Should I determine hereafter to give the work a new form, I shall beg leave to consult you, my kind friend.

"Allow me now to avail myself of your kind offer in a former letter. If you can with perfect convenience procure me the French translations of Irish Bards,' 'Memoir on Italian Tragedy,' and Essay on the Revival of the Drama,' I shall most thankfully reimburse you the expense. It would be obliging me exceedingly. I am sorry that it was not in my power to afford you any assistance in your great geographical undertaking. But our public libraries do not, I fear, contain any materials that would have been of use to you. If my memory does not deceive me, there are in our college library some old maps of the time of Elizabeth, by one Jobson, but they are poor things."

J. C. WALKER, Esq. to Mr. O. REES. "DEAR SIR, St. Valeri, Ireland, May 2, 1807. "Mr. Roscoe informed me several months since, that an Italian nobleman at Milan had undertaken to translate my 'Memoirs on Italian Tragedy." Has the translation reached London yet? Have you seen a French translation of that work, or of the Essay on the Revival of the Drama in Italy,' or of the Memoirs of the Irish Bards?' Mr. Edgeworth informed me that he had seen a French translation of the latter juvenile work at Paris. Yet I have never been able to procure a copy.

6

"I was lately indulged by a friend with a loan of the two first volumes of Censura Literaria,' which afforded me so much pleasure that I now regret that I did not subscribe to the work. I think the plan excellent; and the execution does much credit to Mr. Brydges. Every lover of elegant literature must feel obliged to him. As a literary antiquary he seems to be indefatigable, and as a critic and biographer he displays admirable talents. I sincerely hope he may be encouraged to proceed with his undertaking. I understand he has commenced, or means to commence, a new series on a new plan. Will his new plan embrace very scarce works in the French, Spanish,

and Italian languages, which have some connection with English literature? If you are personally acquainted with Mr. Brydges, might I beg of you to ask him whether any of the Egerton family ever resided at Handford in Cheshire?

"I have a correct list of the Strawberry-hill publications by the late Mr. Henry Quin; do you think it would be acceptable to Mr. Brydges, or his friend Mr. Park? "Believe me, dear Sir, &c. J. C. WALKER."

J. C. WALKER, Esq. to Rev. Mr. BOYD, Dromore House. "MY DEAR SIR, St. Valeri, Bray, 29th Nov. 1804. "Your obliging favour of the 4th inst. found me extremely ill; a violent fever had just then commenced. After being confined above a fortnight to bed, I was at length permitted to rise; but I have not yet quitted the bed-side. I write, as you may perceive, with a very feeble hand; but I will no longer postpone my grateful acknowledgment for the Bishop of Dromore's most acceptable gift. His Lordship's goodness towards me has been invariable ever since he first honoured me with his notice. Of this goodness I shall ever entertain a grateful sense; please to assure his Lordship of this; and at the same time be so good as to offer my warmest thanks for the Ode.* As yet that poem has not reached me. It lies, I am told, at my brother's, waiting the first safe hand. Your letter was duly forwarded. I am, you may suppose, extremely anxious to see any attempt to do justice to the various merits of a writer whom I so highly admire, and a friend whom I so warmly esteem, as the Bishop of Dromore.

"The account which you give me of the state of the Bishop's eyes distresses me deeply. I will not, however, despair of the sight being saved. May God preserve it! I shall anxiously expect a favourable account. Make every kind wish acceptable from me to his Lordship, and believe me to be, &c. J. C. WALKer.

"I am almost ashamed to send this scrawl. But I flatter myself you will read it with indulgence. It is my first attempt at a letter since the commencement of my illness."

* Miss Stewart's. See before, p. 126.

[The following remarks on the preceding letter were dictated by Bishop Percy.]

"Oct. 22, 1810.

"After the very strong expressions of respect and regard for the Bishop of Dromore, so ostentatiously displayed in Mr. Walker's letter to Mr. Boyd, Nov. 29, 1804, would it be thought credible that immediately after, in the following spring of 1805, Mr. Walker, in his Essay on the Origin of Romantic Fabling in Ireland,' which was read before the Royal Irish Academy, June 10, 1805, should call the reader's attention, and in effect hold up to his approbation, Ritson's scurrilous and abusive attack on the Bishop in the following note at the bottom of his page: "Vide Ritson's Dissertation on Romance and Minstrelsy, prefixed to Ancient English Metrical Romances, vol. Ï.' -He then adds, 'See also the elegant and accurate Mr. Ellis's Historical Sketch of the Rise and Progress of the English Poetry and Language, prefixed to Specimens of the Early English Poets."

"Here, if he had been disposed to do justice to the Bishop of Dromore, he might have thrown in a few lines in his vindication from Ritson's abuse, more especially as Dr. Percy's Essay on Metrical Romances, printed in the Reliques, &c. gave the first mention of the subject in any English publication; and whoever peruses Mr. Walker's letters in 1788-9, must conclude he would have been anxious to seize such an opportunity. Mr. Walker's pointed reference here to the abuse of Dr. Percy of course was highly censured by every impartial person that observed it, and especially all the Bishop's friends did not fail to express the highest indignation at such perfidious conduct. Among these it must be concluded none would take a deeper interest than Mr. Boyd, who himself had given the Bishop the letter written to him by Mr. Walker, and being much in his confidence, and often his visitant, must have been present at the frequent censure of Mr. Walker's duplicity, and have strongly concurred in the same. How much, therefore, must the Bishop have been surprised, when, after Mr. Walker's death, he saw in a Belfast newspaper a poem to his memory, written by that gentleman, holding up his character to the highest admira

* Mr. Boyd's Lines to the memory of Mr. Walker are preserved in the Editor's Preface to the " Memoirs of Tassoni." See p. 685.

tion, wherein, among other very peculiar sentiments, he speaks of Sir William Jones as the intimate friend of Mr. Walker, in the following lines:

'Time was when thou could'st chide the lingering sail
Which the kind billet from thy Jones* delay'd,

Or mark'd the swain slow winding up the vale,
With news from Allerton's't Pierian shade.

'But now thou meet'st thy Jones in light array'd,
Joining the chorus of the blest on high,

Or bent o'er Allerton's Pierian shade,

Behold'st thy Roscoe bright'ning for the sky.'

"On the Bishop's expressing to Mr. Boyd how little he could have expected that any friend of his, who had seen how perfidiously Mr. Walker had dealt with the Bishop, should load him with such unqualified praise, Mr. Boyd excused himself by declaring that he had entirely forgot Mr. Walker's injurious treatment of the Bishop, and that he had formerly conferred some favours on himself. This he stated in a letter, to which the Bishop replied."

* "Sir William Jones, whom Mr. Boyd styles in his Address to the memory of Walker, 'thy Jones, &c. &c.' as if they had been most intimate friends; whereas in the publication of Sir William's Correspondence, he appears to have been so little acquainted with Mr. Walker, that he did not even correctly know his name; for the letter which Mr. Walker had artfully extorted from him is addressed only to Joseph Cowper, Esq. See Memoirs of Sir William Jones, by Lord Teignmouth, vol. ii. p. 143."

+"Seat of William Roscoe, Esq."