Dunedin! view thy children with delight,

They write for food-and feed because they write:
And lest, when heated with the unusual grape,
Some glowing thoughts should to the press escape,
And tinge with red the female reader's cheek,
My lady skims the cream of each critique;
Breathes o'er the page her purity of soul,
Reforms each error, and refines the whole. (1)

Now to the Drama turn-Oh! motley sight!
What precious scenes the wondering eyes invite!
Puns, and a prince within a barrel pent, (2)
And Dibdin's nonsense, yield complete content.
Though now, thank Heaven! the Rosciomania's o'er,
And full-grown actors are endured once more;
Yet what avail their vain attempts to please,
While British critics suffer scenes like these;
While Reynolds vents his "dammes!" poohs!" and
"zounds!" (3)

And common-place and common sense confounds?
While Kenney's "World"-ah! where is Kenney's (4)
Tires the sad gallery, lulls the listless pit; [wit?—
And Beaumont's pilfer'd Caratach affords
A tragedy complete in all but words? (5)
Who but must mourn, while these are all the rage,
The degradation of our vaunted stage!
Heavens! is all sense of shame and talent gone?
Have we no living bard of merit?-none!
Awake, George Colman! (6) Cumberland, (7) awake!
Ring the alarum bell! let folly quake!
Oh, Sheridan! if aught can move thy pen,
Let Comedy assume her throne again;
Abjure the mummery of the German schools;
Leave new Pizarros to translating fools;

that Lord Holland has subsequently published any verses, except a universally-admired version of the 28th canto of the Orlando Furioso, which is given by way of appendix to one of Mr. W. Stewart Rose's volumes.-L. E.]

(1) Certain it is, that her ladyship is suspected of having displayed her matchless wit in the Edinburgh Review. However that may be, we know, from good authority, that the manuscripts are submitted to her perusal-no doubt for correction.

(2) In the melo-drama of Tekeli, that heroic prince is clapt into a barrel on the stage; a new asylum for distressed heroes.-[In the original MS. the note stands thus:

In the melo-drama of Tekeli, that heroic prince is clapt into a barrel on the stage, and Count Evrard in the fortress hides himself in a green-house built expressly for the occasion. 'Tis a pity that Theodore Hook, who is really a man of talent, should confine his genius to such paltry productions as the Fortress, Music Mad, etc. etc." This extraordinary humourist, who was a mere boy at the date of Lord Byron's satire, has since distinguished himself by works more worthy of his abilities-nine volumes of highly popular novels, entitled Sayings and Doings-a world of political jeux d'esprit, etc. etc.-L. E.]

(3) All these are favourite expressions of Mr. Reynolds, and prominent in his comedies, living and defunct.-[The reader is referred to Mr. Reynolds's Autobiography, published in 1826, for a full account of his voluminous writings for the stage.-L. E.]

(4) Mr. Kenney has since written many successful dramas.-L. E

(5) Mr. T. Sheridan, the new manager of Drury Lane theatre, stripped the tragedy of Bonduca of the dialogue, and exhibited the scenes as the spectacle of Caractacus. Was this worthy of his sire? or of himself?-Thomas Sheridan, who united much of the convivial wit of his parent to many amiable qualities, received, after the termination of his theatrical management, the appointment of colonial paymaster at the Cape of Good Hope, where he died in September, 1817, leaving a widow, whose novel of Carwell has obtained much approbation, and several chil

Give, as thy last memorial to the age,
One classic drama, and reform the stage.
Gods! o'er those boards shall Folly rear her head,
Where Garrick trod, and Siddons lives to tread? (8)
On those shall Farce display Buffoonery's mask,
And Hook conceal his heroes in a cask?
Shall sapient managers new scenes produce
From Cherry, Skeffington, and Mother Goose?
While Shakspeare, Otway, Massinger, forgot,
On stalls must moulder, or in closets rot?
Lo! with what pomp the daily prints proclaim
The rival candidates for Attic fame!
In grim array though Lewis' spectres rise,
Still Skeffington and Goose divide the prize. (9)
And sure great Skeffington must claim our praise,
For skirtless coats and skeletons of plays
Renown'd alike; whose genius ne'er confines
Her flight to garnish Greenwood's gay designs; (10)
Nor sleeps with "Sleeping Beauties," but anon
In five facetious acts comes thundering on, (11)
While poor John Bull, bewilder'd with the scene,
Stares, wondering what the devil it can mean;
But as some hands applaud, a venal few!
Rather than sleep, why John applauds it too.

Such are we now. Ah! wherefore should we

turn

To what our fathers were, unless to mourn?
Degenerate Britons! are ye dead to shame,
Or, kind to dulness, do you fear to blame?
Well may the nobles of our present race
Watch each distortion of a Naldi's face;
Well may they smile on Italy's buffoons,
And worship Catalani's pantaloons, (12)

dren; among others, the accomplished authoress of Rosalie and other poems, now the Honourable Mrs. Norton.L. E.J

(6) Lord Byron entertained a high opinion of George Colman's convivial powers.-"If I had," he says, "to choose and could not have both at a time, I should say, 'Let me begin the evening with Sheridan, and finish it with Colman.' Sheridan for dinner, and Colman for supper; Sheridan for claret or port, but Colman for every thing. Sheridan was a grenadier company of life-guards, but Colman a whole regiment of light infantry, to be sure, but still a regiment." -L. E.

(7) Richard Cumberland, the well-known author of the West Indian, the Observer, and one of the most interesting of autobiographies, died in 1811.-L. E.

(8) In all editions previous to the fifth, it was, "Kemble lives to tread." Lord Byron used to say, that, "of actors, Cooke was the most natural, Kemble the most supernatural, Kean the medium between the two; but that Mrs. Siddons was worth them all put together." Such effect, however, had Kean's acting on his mind, that once, on seeing him play Sir Giles Overreach, he was seized with a sort of convulsive fit. John Kemble died in 1823,-his illustrious sister in 1830.-L. E.

(9) Dibdin's pantomime of Mother Goose had a run of nearly a hundred nights, and brought more than twenty thousand pounds to the treasury of Covent Garden theatre. -L. E.

(10) Mr. Greenwood is, we believe, scene-painter to Drury-lane theatre as such, Mr. Skeffington is much indebted to him.

(11) Mr. [now Sir Lumley] Skeffington is the illustrious author of the Sleeping Beauty; and some comedies, particularly Maids and Bachelors: "Baccalaurii baculo magis quam lauro digni."

(12) Naldi and Catalani require little notice; for the visage of the one, and the salary of the other, will enable us long to recollect these amusing vagabonds. Besides, we are still black and blue from the squeeze on the first night of the lady's appearance in trousers.

Since their own drama yields no fairer trace
Of wit than puns, of humour than grimace. (1)

Then let Ausonia, skill'd in every art
To soften manners, but corrupt the heart,
Pour her exotic follies o'er the town,

To sanction Vice, and hunt Decorum down:
Let wedded strumpets languish o'er Deshayes,
And bless the promise which his form displays;
While Gayton bounds before the enraptured looks
Of hoary marquises and stripling dukes :
Let high-born lechers eye the lively Presle
Twirl her light limbs, that spurn the needless veil;
Let Angiolini bare her breast of
snow,

Wave the white arm, and point the pliant toe;
Collini trill her love-inspiring song,

Strain her fair neck, and charm the listening throng!

Whet not your scythe, (2) suppressors of our vice!
Reforming saints! too delicately nice!

By whose decrees, our sinful souls to save,
No Sunday tankards foam, no barbers shave;
And beer undrawn, and beards unmown, display
Your holy reverence for the Sabbath-day.

Or hail at once the patron and the pile
Of vice and folly, Greville and Argyle! (3)
Where you proud palace, Fashion's hallow'd fane,
Spreads wide her portals for the motley train,
Behold the new Petronius (4) of the day,
Our arbiter of pleasure and of play!
There the hired eunuch, the Hesperian choir,
The melting lute, the soft lascivious lyre,
The song from Italy, the step from France,
The midnight orgy, and the mazy dance,
The smile of beauty, and the flush of wine,

For fops, fools, gamesters, knaves, and lords combine:
Each to his humour-Comus all allows;
Champaign, dice, music, or your neighbour's spouse.
Talk not to us, ye starving sons of trade!
Of piteous ruin, which ourselves have made;
In Plenty's sunshine Fortune's minions bask,
Nor think of poverty, except "en masque,"

(1) The following twenty lines were struck off one night after Lord Byron's return from the Opera, and sent the next morning to the printer, with a request to have them placed where they now appear.-L. E.

(2) In the first edition, "Raise not your scythe," etc."Good." B. 1816.-P. E.

(3) To prevent any blunder, such as mistaking a street for a man, I beg leave to state, that it is the institution, and not the duke of that name, which is here alluded to. A gentleman, with whom I am slightly acquainted, lost in the Argyle Rooms several thousand pounds at back-gammon. It is but justice to the manager in this instance to say, that some degree of disapprobation was manifested: but why are the implements of gaming allowed in a place devoted to the society of both sexes? A pleasant thing for the wives and daughters of those who are blest or cursed with such connections, to hear the billiard-tables rattling in one room and the dice in another! That this is the case I myself can testify, as a late unworthy member of an institution which materially affects the morals of the higher orders, while the lower may not even move to the sound of a tabor and fiddle, without a chance of indict. ment for riotous behaviour.[Conceiving the foregoing note, together with the lines in the text, to convey a reflection upon his conduct, as manager of the Argyle Institution, Colonel Greville demanded an explanation of Lord

• "Trus. It was Billy Way who lost the money. I knew him. and was a subscriber to the Argyle at the time of the event." 1316.-L. E.

B.

When for the night some lately titled ass
Appears the beggar which his grandsire was.
The curtain dropp'd, the gay burletta o'er,
The audience take their turn upon the floor;
Now round the room the circling dow'gers sweep,
Now in loose waltz the thin-clad daughters leap;
The first in lengthen'd line majestic swim,
The last display the free unfetter'd limb!
Those for Hibernia's lusty sons repair
With art the charms which nature could not spare;
These after husbands wing their eager flight,
Nor leave much mystery for the nuptial night.

Oh! blest retreats of infamy and ease,
Where, all forgotten but the power to please,
Each maid may give a loose to genial thought,
Each swain may teach new systems, or be taught:
There the blithe youngster, just return'd from Spain,
Cuts the light pack, or calls the rattling main;
The jovial caster's set, and seven's the nick,
Or-done!-a thousand on the coming trick!
If, mad with loss, existence'gins to tire,
And all your hope or wish is to expire,
Here's Powell's pistol ready for your life,
And, kinder still, two Pagets for your wife; (5)
Fit consummation of an earthly race
Begun in folly, ended in disgrace;

While none but menials o'er the bed of death, Wash thy red wounds, or watch thy wavering breath; Traduced by liars, and forgot by all,

The mangled victim of a drunken brawl,

To live like Clodius, and like Falkland fall. (6)

Truth! rouse some genuine bard, and guide his hand To drive this pestilence from out the land. E'en I-least thinking of a thoughtless throng, Just skill'd to know the right and choose the wrong, Freed at that age when reason's shield is lost, To fight my course through passion's countless host,(7) Whom every path of pleasure's flowery way Has lured in turn, and all have led astrayE'en I must raise my voice, e'en I must feel Such scenes, such men, destroy the public weal;

Byron. The matter was referred to Mr. Leckie (the author of a work on Sicilian affairs) on the part of Colonel Greville, and to Mr. Moore on the part of Lord Byron; by whom it was amicably settled.-L. E.]

(4) Petronius, "arbiter elegantiarum" to Nero, and "a very pretty fellow in his day," as Mr. Congreve's Old Bachelor saith of Hannibal.

(5) The original reading was, "a Paget for your wife." -L. E.

(6) I knew the late Lord Falkland well. On Sunday night I beheld him presiding at his own table, in all the honest pride of hospitality; on Wednesday morning, at three o'clock, I saw stretched before me all that remained of courage, feeling, and a host of passions. He was a gallant and successful officer: his faults were the faults of a sailor as such, Britons will forgive them. He died like a brave man in a better cause; for had he fallen in like manner on the deck of the frigate to which he was just appointed, his last moments would have been held up by his countrymen as an example to succeeding heroes.-[Lord Falkland was killed in a duel, by Mr. Powell, in 1809. It was not by words only that Lord Byron gave proof of sympathy on the melancholy occasion. Though his own difficulties pressed on him at the time, he contrived to administer relief to the widow and children of his friend.-L. E.] "He lost his life," said Lord Byron, "for a joke, and one too he did not make himself." Medwin.-P. E. B. 1816. (7) "Yes; and a precious chase they led me." -L. E.

Although some kind censorious friend will say,
"What art thou better, meddling fool! (1) than they?"
And every brother rake will smile to see
That miracle, a moralist, in me.

No matter when some bard in virtue strong,
Gifford, perchance, shall raise the chastening song,
Then sleep my pen for ever! and my voice
Be only heard to hail him, and rejoice;
Rejoice, and yield my feeble praise, though I
May feel the lash that Virtue must apply.

As for the smaller fry, who swarm in shoals,
From silly Hafiz (2) up to simple Bowles,
Why should we call them from their dark abode,
In broad St. Giles's or in Tottenham-road?
Or (since some men of fashion nobly dare

To scrawl in verse) from Bond-street or the Square?
If things of ton their harmless lays indite,
Most wisely doom'd to shun the public sight,
What harm! In spite of every critic elf,
Sir T. may read his stanzas to himself;
Miles Andrews (3) still his strength in couplets try,
And live in prologues, though his dramas die.

(1)Fool enough, certainly, then, and no wiser since." B. 1816.-L. E.

(2) What would be the sentiments of the Persian Anacreon, Hafiz, could he rise from his splendid sepulchre at Sheeraz (where he reposes with Ferdousi and Sadi, the oriental Homer and Catullus), and behold his name assumed by one Stott of Dromore, the most impudent and execrable of literary poachers for the daily prints?

(3) Miles Peter Andrews, many years M. P. for Bewdley, Colonel of the Prince of Wales's Volunteers, proprietor of a gunpowder-manufactory at Dartford, author of numerous prologues, epilogues, and farces, and one of the heroes of the Baviad. He died in 1814.-L. E.

(4) In the original manuscript we find these lines:"In these our times, with daily wonders big,

A letter'd peer is like a letter'd pig;

Both know their alphabet, but who, from thence
Infers that peers or pigs have manly sense?

Still less that such should woo the graceful nine;
Parnassus was not made for lords and swine."-L. E.

(5) Instead of the four lines commencing with "Roscommon," etc. the satire, as originally intended for the press, contained the following couplet:

"On one alone Apollo deigns to smile

And crowns a new Roscommon in Carlisle." In the interval however between the inditing of this couplet and the delivery of the manuscript to the press, the fancied slight offered to him by Lord Carlisle, in neglecting to introduce him to the House of Lords, on first taking his seat, was sufficient to rouse in the poet's sensitive mind a strong feeling of resentment. The result was that the laudatory couplet was expunged, and the vituperative verses, now published, were inserted in its place.

Lord Byron appears to have long retained a bitter recollection of the circumstances under which he first presented himself in the House of Lords; and, as the reader may also feel an interest in them, we take the present opportunity of giving Mr. Dallas's striking account of that episode in the noble poet's life:—“I accompanied Lord Byron to the House. He was received in one of the ante-chambers by some of the officers in attendance, with whom he settled respecting the fees he had to pay, One of them went to apprise the Lord Chancellor of his being there, and soon returned for him. There were very few persons in the House. Lord Eldon was going through some ordinary business when Lord Byron entered. I thought he looked still paler than before; and he certainly wore a countenance in which mortification was mingled with, but subdued by, indignation. He passed the Woolsack without looking round, and advanced to the table where the proper officer was attending to administer the oaths. When he had gone through them, the Chancellor quitted his seat, and went towards him with a smile, putting out his hand warmly to welcome him; and though I did not catch his words, I saw that he paid him some compli ment. This was all thrown away upon Lord Byron, who

Lords too are bards, such things at times befall,
And 'tis some praise in peers to write at all.
Yet, did or taste or reason sway the times,
Ah! who would take their titles with their rhymes? (4)
Roscommon! Sheffield! with your spirits fled, (5)
No future laurels deck a noble head;

No muse will cheer, with renovating smile, (6)
The paralytic puling of Carlisle. (7)
The puny schoolboy and his early lay
Men pardon, if his follies pass away;
But who forgives the senior's ceaseless verse,
Whose hairs grow hoary as his rhymes grow
worse?

What heterogeneous honours deck the peer!
Lord, rhymester, petit-maître, pamphleteer! (8)
So dull in youth, so drivelling in his age,
His scenes alone had damn'd our sinking stage;
But managers for once cried, "Hold, enough!"
Nor drugg'd their audience with the tragic stuff.
Yet at their judgment let his lordship laugh,
And case his volumes in congenial calf;
Yes! doff that covering, where morocco shines,
And hang a calf-skin (9) on those recreant lines.(10)

made a stiff bow, and put the tips of his fingers into the Chancellor's hand. The Chancellor did not press a welcome so received, but resumed his seat, while Lord Byron carelessly seated himself for a few minutes on one of the empty benches to the left of the throne, usually occupied by the Lords in opposition. When, on his joining me, I expressed what I had felt, he said-If I had shaken hands heartily he would have set me down for one of his party-but I will have nothing to do with any of them, on either side; I have taken my seat, and now I will go abroad.' We returned to St. James's Street, but he did not recover his spirits."

Moore, on the authority of Lord Byron's own report in one of his note-books, adds the particulars of the short conversation which he held with the Lord Chancellor on the occasion above referred to:-" When I came of age, some delays, on account of some birth and marriage certificates from Cornwall, occasioned me not to take my seat for several weeks. When these were over, and I had taken the oaths, the Chancellor apologized to me for the delay, observing, that these forms were a part of his duty.' I begged him to make no apology, and added (as he certainly had shown no vinlent hurry), Your lordship was exactly like Tom Thumb, (which was then being acted)-you did your duly and you did no more.'"-P. E.

(6) Instead of these lines, the original MS. had the following:

"Nor e'en a hackney'd muse will deign to smile
On minor Byron, or mature Carlisle."

It was the poet's intention to make this seeming attack on himself, for the purpose of concealment. Dallas.-P. E.

(7) On being told that it was believed he alluded to Lord Carlisle's nervous disorder in this line, Lord Byron exclaimed,-"I thank Heaven I did not know it; and would not, could not, if I had. I must naturally be the last person to be pointed on defects or maladies."-L. E.

(8) The Earl of Carlisle has lately published an eighteenpenny pamphlet on the state of the stage, and offers his plan for building a new theatre. It is to be hoped his lordship will be permitted to bring forward any thing for the stage except his own tragedies. (9)

"Doff that lion's hide,

And hang a calf skin on those recreant limbs." Shak. King John. Lord Carlisle's works, most resplendently bound, form a conspicuous ornament to his book-shelves:

"The rest is all but leather and prunella." (10) "Wrong also-the provocation was not sufficient to justify the acerbity." B. 1816.-Lord Byron greatly regretted the sarcasms he had published against his noble relation, under the mistaken impression that Lord Carlisle had intentionally slighted him. In a letter to Mr. Rogers, written in 1814, he asks,-"Is there any chance or possibility of making it up with Lord Carlisle, as I feel disposed to do any thing reasonable or ureasonable to effect it?" And, in the third Canto of Childe Harold, he thus adverts

With you, ye Druids! rich in native lead, Who daily scribble for your daily bread, With you I war not: Gifford's heavy hand Has crush'd, without remorse, your numerous band. On all the talents" vent your venal spleen; Want is your plea, let pity be your screen. Let monodies on Fox regale your crew, And Melville's Mantle (1) prove a blanket too! One common Lethe waits each hapless bard, And, peace be with you! 'tis your best reward. Such damning fame as Dunciads only give Could bid your lines beyond a morning live; But now at once your fleeting labours close, With names of greater note in blest repose. Far be't from me unkindly to upbraid The lovely Rosa's prose in masquerade, Whose strains, the faithful echoes of her mind, Leave wondering comprehension far behind. (2) Though Crusca's bards no more our journals fill, Some stragglers skirmish round the columns still; Last of the howling host which once was Bell's, Matilda snivels yet, and Hafiz yells; And Merry's metaphors appear anew, Chain'd to the signature of O. P. Q.(3)

When some brisk youth, the tenant of a stall,(4) Employs a pen less pointed than his awl, Leaves his snug shop, forsakes his store of shoes, St. Crispin quits, and cobbles for the muse, Heavens! how the vulgar stare! how crowds applaud! How ladies read, and literati laud! (5)

to the fate of the Hon. Frederick Howard, Lord Carlisle's youngest son, one of those who fell gloriously at Waterloo :

"Their praise is hymn'd by loftier harps than mine, Yet one I would select from that proud throng, Partly because they blend me with his line, And partly that I did his Sire some wrong, And partly that bright names will hallow song; And his was of the bravest, and when shower'd The death-bolts deadliest the thinn'd piles along, Even there the thickest of war's tempest lower'd, They reach'd no nobler breast than thine, young gallant Howard!" In the following extracts from two unpublished letters, written when Lord B. was at Harrow, may possibly be traced the origin of his conduct towards his guardian:"Nov. 11, 1804. You mistake me if you think I dislike Lord Carlisle. I respect him, and might like him did I know him better. For him my mother has an antipathywhy, I know not. I am afraid he could be but of little use to me; but I dare say he would assist me if he could; so I take the will for the deed, and am obliged to him, exactly in the same manner as if he succeeded in his efforts.""Nov. 21, 1804. To Lord Carlisle make my warmest acknowledgments. I feel more gratitude than I can well express. I am truly obliged to him for his endeavours, and am perfectly satisfied with your explanation of his reserve, though I was hitherto afraid it might proceed from personal dislike. For the future I shall consider him as more my friend than I have hitherto been taught to think."-L. E. (1) Melville's Mantle, a parody on Elijah's Mantle, a

poem.

(2) This lovely little Jessica, the daughter of the noted Jew King, seems to be a follower of the Della Crusca school, and has published two volumes of very respectable absurdities in rhyme, as times go; besides sundry novels in the style of the first edition of the Monk,-[" She since married the Morning Post-an exceeding good match; and is now dead-which is better." B. 1816.-L. E.]

(3) These are the signatures of various worthies who figure in the poetical departments of the newspapers.

(4) Joseph Blackett, the shoemaker. He died at Seaham, in 1810. His poems were afterwards collected by Pratt; aud, oddly enough, his principal patroness was Miss Milbank, then a perfect stranger to Lord Byron. In a letter written to Dallas, on board the Volage frigate, at sea, in

If chance some wicked wag should pass his jest,
'Tis sheer ill-nature-don't the world know best?
Genius must guide when wits admire the rhyme,
And Capel Lofft (6) declares 't is quite sublime.
Hear, then, ye happy sons of needless trade!
Swains! quit the plough, resign the useless spade!
Lo! Burns (7) and Bloomfield, nay, a greater far,
Gifford, was born beneath an adverse star,
Forsook the labours of a servile state,
Stemm'd the rude storm, and triumph'd over fate:
Then why no more? if Phoebus smiled on you,
Bloomfield! why not on brother Nathan too? (8)
Him too the mania, not the muse, has seized;
Not inspiration, but a mind diseased:
And now no boor can seek his last abode,
No common be enclosed without an ode.
Oh! since increased refinement deigns to smile
On Britain's sons, and bless our genial isle,
Let poesy go forth, pervade the whole,
Alike the rustic and mechanic soul!
Ye tuneful cobblers! still your notes prolong,
Compose at once a slipper and a song;
So shall the fair your handywork peruse,
Your sonnets sure shall please—perhaps your shoes.
May Moorland weavers (9) boast Pindaric skill,
And tailors' lays be longer than their bill!
While punctual beaux reward the grateful notes,
And pay for poems-when they pay for coats.

To the famed throng now paid the tribute due, Neglected genius! let me turn to you.

June 1811, he says, "I see that yours and Pratt's protégé, Blackett the cobbler, is dead, in spite of his rhymes, and is probably one of the instances where death has saved a man from damnation. You were the ruin of that poor fellow amongst you: had it not been for his patrons, he might now have been in very good plight, shoe- (not verse-) making; but you have made him immortal with a vengeance: who would think that any body would be such a blockhead as to sin against an express proverb,- Ne sutor ultra crepidam!"

But spare him, ye Crities, his follies are past,

For the Cobbler is come, as he ought, to his lastWhich two lines, with a scratch under last, to show where the joke lies, I beg that you will prevail on Miss Milbank to have inserted on the tomb of her departed Blackett."-L. E.

(5) "This was meant for poor Blackett, who was then patronised by A. J. B." (Lady Byron); "but that I did not know, or this would not have been written, at least I think not." B. 1816.-L. E.

(6) Capel Lofft, Esq., the Mæcenas of shoemakers, and preface-writer-general to distressed versemen; a kind of gratis accoucheur to those who wish to be delivered of rhyme, but do not know how to bring forth.-[The poet Bloomfield owed his first celebrity to the notice of Capel Lofft and Thomas Hill. Esquires, who read his Farmer's Boy in manuscript, recommended it to a publisher, and, by their influence in society and literature, soon drew general attention to its merits. It is distressing to remember that, after all that had been done by the zeal of a few friends, the public sympathy did not rest permanently on the amiable Bloomfield, who died in extreme poverty in 1823.-L. E.]

(7) "Read Burns to-day. What would he have been if a patrician? We should have had more polish-less forcejust as much verse, but no immorality-a divorce and a duel or two, the which bad he survived, as his potations must have been less spirituous, he might have lived as long as Sheridan, and outlived as much as poor Brinsley."B. Journal, 1813.-L. E.

(8) See Nathaniel Bloomfield's ode, elegy, or whatever he or any one else chooses to call it, on the enclosure of Honington Green.

(9) Vide Recollections of a Weaver in the Moorlands of Staffordshire.

Come forth, O Campbell! (1) give thy talents scope;
Who dares aspire if thou must cease to hope?
And thou, melodious Rogers! (2) rise at last,
Recall the pleasing memory of the past;
Arise! let blest remembrance still inspire,
And strike to wonted tones thy hallow'd lyre;
Restore Apollo to his vacant throne,
Assert thy country's honour and thine own.(3)
What! must deserted Poesy still weep
Where her last hopes with pious Cowper sleep?
Unless, perchance, from his cold bier she turns,
To deck the turf that wraps her minstrel, Burns!
No! though contempt hath mark'd the spurious brood,
The race who rhyme from folly, or for food,
Yet still some genuine sons 'tis hers to boast,
Who, least affecting, still affect the most:
Feel as they write, and write but as they feel-
Bear witness Gifford,(4) Sotheby,(5) Macneil. (6)

"Why slumbers Gifford?" once was ask'd in vain ;(7) Why slumbers Gifford? let us ask again. Are there no follies for his pen to purge? (8)

Are there no fools whose backs demand the scourge?

(2) "I have been reading," says Lord Byron, in 1813, "Memory again, and Hope together, and retain all my preference of the former. His elegance is really wonderfulthere is no such a thing as a vulgar line in his book."-L. E. (3) "Rogers has not fulfilled the promise of his first poems, but has still very great merit." B. 1816.-L. E.

(4) Gifford, author of the Baviad and Mæviad, the first satires of the day, and translator of Juvenal. (The opinion of Mr. Gifford had always great weight with Lord Byron. "Any suggestion of yours," he says in a letter written in 1813, "even were it conveyed in the less tender shape of the text of the Bariad, or a Monk Mason note in Massinger, would be obeyed." A few weeks before his death, on hearing from England of a report that he had written a satire on Mr. Gifford, he wrote instantly to Mr. Murray:-"Whoever asserts that I am the author or abetter of any thing of the kind lies in his throat. It is not true that I ever did, will, would, could, or should write a satire against Gifford, or a hair of his head. I always considered him as my literary father, and myself as his prodigal' son; and if I have allowed his fatted calf' to grow to an ox before he kills it on my return, it is only because I prefer beef to veal."— L. E.]

(5) Sotheby, translator of Wieland's Oberon and Virgil's Georgies, and author of Saul, an epic poem.-[Mr. Sotheby has since essentially raised his reputation by various original poems, and a translation of the Iliad.-L. E.]

(6) Macneil, whose poems are deservedly popular, particularly Scotland's Scaith, and the W ́aes of War, of which ten thousand copies were sold in one month.-[llector Macneil died in 1818-L. E.)

(7) Lord Byron here alludes to the masterly poem of New Morality (the joint production of Mr. Canning and Mr. Frere), in the Antijacobin, in which Gifford is thus apostrophised:

Rethink thee, Gifford, when some future age
Shall trace the promise of thy playful page:
The hand which brush'd a swarm of fools away.
Should rouse to grasp a more reluctant prey!"

Are there no sins for satire's bard to greet?
Stalks not gigantic Vice in every street?
Shall peers or princes tread pollution's path,
And 'scape alike the law's and muse's wrath?
Nor blaze with guilty glare through future time,
Eternal beacons of consummate crime?
Arouse thee, Gifford! be thy promise claim'd,
Make bad men better, or at least ashamed.

Unhappy White! (9) while life was in its spring, And thy young muse just waved her joyous wing, The spoiler swept that soaring lyre away, Which else had sounded an immortal lay. Oh! what a noble heart was here undone, When Science' self destroy'd her favourite son! Yes, she too much indulged thy fond pursuit, She sow'd the seeds, but death has reap'd the fruit. "T was thine own genius gave the final blow, And help'd to plant the wound that laid thee low: So the struck eagle, stretch'd upon the plain, No more through rolling clouds to soar again, View'd his own feather on the fatal dart, And wing'd the shaft that quiver'd in his heart; (10)

Think, then, will pleaded ignorance excuse
The tame secession of thy languid muse?
Ah! where is now that promise? why so long
Sleep the keen shafts of satire and of song?
Oh! come, with taste and virtue at thy side,
With ardent zeal inflamed, and patriot pride;
With keen poetic glance direct the blow,
And empty all thy quiver on the foe-

No pause-no rest-till weltering on the ground

The poisonous hydra lies, and pierced with inany a wound."-L. E. (8) Mr. Gifford promised publicly that the Bariad and Mæviad should not be his last original works: let him remember, "Mox in reluctantes dracones."-[Mr. Gifford became the editor of the Quarterly Review,-which thenceforth occupied most of his time, -a few months after the first appearance of this satire.-L. E.]

Mr. Gifford's life and character afford one of the finest examples on record of the irresistible power of principle and perseverance. Few boys, possessed of such mind and feelings, ever had to contend with such adverses of fortune: that he was an orphan, a charity-boy, and an apprentice to a humble occupation, were constant checks to that selfeducation which, in spite of every obstacle, ultimately placed him in a situation to receive higher attainments, and raised him to the honourable destination of being acknowledged "a giant in literature, in criticism, in politics, and in morals; and an ornament and an honour to his country and the age in which he lived." Finden's Illustrations. -P. E.

(9) Henry Kirke White died at Cambridge, in October, 1806, in consequence of too much exertion in the pursuit of studies that would have matured a mind which disease and poverty could not impair, and which death itself destroyed rather than subdued. His poems abound in such beauties as must impress the reader with the liveliest regret that so short a period was allotted to talents which would have dignified even the sacred functions he was destined to assume.in a letter to Mr. Dallas, in 1811, Lord Byron says, "I am sorry you don't like Harry White; with a great deal of cant, which in him was sincere (indeed it killed him, as you killed Joe Blackett), certes there is presy and genius. I don't say this on account of my simile and rhymes; but surely he was beyond all the Bloomfields and Blacketts, and their collateral cobblers, whom Lofft and Pratt have or may kidnap from their calling into the service of the trade. Setting aside bigotry, he surely ranks next to Chatterton. It is astonishing how little he was known; and at Cambridge no one thought or heard of such a man till his death rendered all notices useless. For my part, I should have been most proud of such an acquaintance: his very prejudices were respectable." L. E.]

(10) This beautiful thought may be found in Waller :"That eagle's fate and mine are one,

Which on the shaft that made him die,

Espied a feather of his own,

Wherewith he wont to soar on high."-P. E.