"Jun. I fear, Galgacus, you have caus'd too much; "Gal. Yes, Princess, of that I am well aware, "Jun. Heav'n forbid that such event should happen! To vent my tears, for I am sorrowful: My heart forebodes some sad disaster nigh, For your protection and your save return." This does not even possess the merit of being prose run mad, and may be pronounced to be the most insipid palling trash that ever was mis-called versification. What sort of measure (and we should hardly know that it was so intended, if it were not cut out into shreds of words) according to Mr. Monney's admirable rules, are the following lines: "That kind Galgacus, whose love should speed him, To prompt his tongue with increasing ardour."--And In short, never before was such a miserable attempt måde. What too, we should like to know, is the meaning of the eliptical commas that we find so often inserted, not merely before vowels to compress two syllables into one, but before consonants; thus, in the above extracts, we have "th' queen," "t you, ," "th' soldiers," &c.; and sometimes we are indulged with a further novelty of cutting off the vowel in the more important word, as "to 'vert all ill," instead of "t' avert all ill." What also is intended by writing duteous dut'ous, and victorious victor'ous, unless, to employ the author's own words, it be to give "the musical and expressive effect which blank verse is generally used to convey." But lest it should be thought that we have selected an unfair specimen, or that our poet's forte is not the moving pathos of love, we will subjoin an extract of a different kind, in which he deals in those great ingredients of tragedy, "treason, blood, and death." Vellocatus, like another Ganelon, has betrayed his king Caractacus, and on his way to the Roman camp meets Junia, to whom he offers violence; she resists in the admirable quotation already made. "What means you? Surely brave Vellocatus You cannot mean offencement to my sex?" But he succeeds in carrying her off to the skirts of the entrenchments of the enemy. "Jun. Oh, for good heaven's sake, spare, oh spare me! I shall die with anguish as you force me! Vell. Resist no longer, for it is in vain : No power on earth, in heaven, or hell, "Jun. Oh, heav'nly powers! Enter GALGACUS. [Near fainting. [As he enters. "Gal. Methinks I hear that heav'nly voice again. Oh you vile monster in a human shape! [Seizing Vellocatus. [Galgacus forces her from him. Enter a Roman Escort. -Here, here! "Vell. Who are you? Oh, the haughty prince Galgacus! Have at you, you impudent intruder, And thus we'll try to whom the prize belongs. "Gal. Words are but poor my proud contempt to speak; My sword shall tell it to your coward heart! [Fight, Vellocatus falls. "Jun. (reviving.) Where am I? Galgacus, oh, Galgacus! "Gal. Behold him here before you, heav'nly maid! And view that hell-hound, welt'ring in his gore! "Jun. Oh, all you heav'nly gods!-Is it he? It is, it is, and we shall still be blest! [She flies into Galgacus' arms. "Gal. Welcome, you greatest treasure of my soul! "Vell. Could I the wishes of my soul obtain, [Embrace. May blackest curses hang o'er these damn'd realms, I, mark of scorn for this proud prince to frown on! I would not glut his sight another moment [As he lifts up his sword, he expires. "Gal. There fled the blackest soul hell e'er received." Here we have our author in his true vein, " fierce as ten furies, terrible as hell!" Here, indeed, "his genius bubbles and boils o'er the brim." Imagine the self-satisfaction with which he read them over after pouring out those fine frothy lines put into the mouth of the dying Vellocatus: he had taken Bayes's recipe of stewed prunes to some purpose. It would not be fair to close our review without noticing two lines which we were much surprised to find in the tragedy, because the sentiment, though common, is tolerable, however ill exprest: "The soldier who wants oaths to bind his honour, Is not so dear as he whom honour binds.” And we should have been inclined to think them a plagiary, had we not been pretty certain that the author never heard of the name of Beaumont and Fletcher. He seems to have "stumbled on a virtue unawares," perhaps by using something like Swift's logographic machine. It is now time, however, to dismiss Mr. Monney and his "new tragedy," as he aptly calls it; new it is in every way, for even absurdity and stupidity were never carried so We defy any man to produce any thing in the whole range of the drama so pre-eminently bad: "Here ignorance and dullness meet, far before. To make the specimen complete." BIBLIOTHECA ANTIQUA. For out of the olde feldes, as men saieth, Chaucer's Assem. of Foules, st. 4. ART. X.-1. Stafford's Niobe: or his Age of Teares. The first part. A Treatise no less profitable and comfortable than the times damnable. Wherein Deaths visard is pulled off, and her face discouered not to be so fearefull as the Vulgar makes it: and withall it is shewed, that Death is onely bad to the bad, good to the good. The second edition; newlie corrected and amended. Printed at London, by Humphrey Lownes, 1611. 18mo. pp. 202. 2. Staffords Niobe, dissolv'd into a Nilus: or his Age drowned in her owne teares: seruing as a Second Part to the former Treatise. Wherein the vanilie and villanie of the Age, and the miserie of Man are so painted to the life, as that it will make a man long to leave this painted life, to come to that true and eternall one. Seclusus a Seculo. Printed at London by H: L: for Mathew Lownes, 1611. 18mo. pp. 263. WHEN we recollect how many critical works upon the' productions of our ancestors have been published within the last ten years, under the direction of most learned and assiduous men, it seems sigular that this curious and valuable work should have hitherto escaped notice; even the name of its author is not mentioned in the biographical dictionaries of Dr. Aikin, or Mr. Chalmers, nor in the Biographia Britannica: this is the more singular because the industrious Lempriere has noticed Anthony Stafford and his works, and has supplied a few dates (from what source does not appear) some of which are probably incorrect. This silence of bibliographers and biographers is no doubt to be, attributed to the extreme rarity of the book, which, we believe, has not been brought to the hammer for many years, and for which one of our most tasteful collectors has in vain offered a very high price. It will be our business to give such particulars of the author as we have been able to collect; and such extracts from his book as may serve to illustrate its character and curiosity. It seems certain that Staffords Niobe was not only known to, but used by Milton: the eloquence and zeal of the writer in the cause of morality and religion could not fail to excite the admiration of " that man of mighty mind." One passage of which he availed himself is to be found in the second part of this production, where Stafford supposes himself to be addressed by Satan; who gives a description of his infernal domain. True it is, Sir, (says he) that I (storming at the name of supremacie) sought to depose my Creator: which the watchfull, all-seeing eye of Providence finding, degraded me of my Angelicall dignitie, dispos sessed me of all pleasures; and the Seraphin, and Cheru bin, Throni, Dominationes, Virtutes, Potestates, Principatus, Arch-angeli, Angeli and all the celestial Hierarchyes (with a shout of applause) sung my departure out of Heaven: my Alleluia was turned into an Ehu; and too soone I found that I was corruptilibilis ab alio, though not in alio; and that he that gaue me my being, could againe take it from mee. Now, for as much as I was once an Angel of light, it was the will of Wisdome to confine me to Darkness, and to create mee Prince therof; that so I, who could not obey in Heauen, might commaund in Hell. And belieue mee, Sir, I had rather controule within my darke Diocese, then to reinhabile cœlum empyreum, and there liue in subiection, onder check." The first passage in italics will immediately call to mind Milton's enumeration of "Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers!" but this he might have obtained from learned writers of the time, who entered more into the subject than Stafford. In Aditus ad Logicam, autore Samuele Smith, 1634, the same enumeration is given as that of Stafford, though the order of rank is inverted. Smith is treating of the celestial intelligences, Cujus ordo est (he says) 1 Seraphin, 2 Cherubin, 3 Thronus, 4 Potestas, 5 Dominatio, 6 Virtus, 7 Principatus, 8 Archangelus, 9 Angelus. The last lines of the above quotation are more conclusive, and formed the basis of one of the finest characteristic passages in the Paradise Lost. Satan in triumphant despair exclaims "In my choice To reign is worth ambition, though in Hell; Which is precisely the sentiment expressed by Stafford. A reader who is well acquainted with the Paradise Lost will probably observe other coincidences as we proceed. |