By more or less, are sung in every book,
From Captain Noah down to Captain Cook,
Nor this alone; but, pausing on the road,
The bard sighs forth a gentle episode ;*
And gravely tells-attend, each beauteous miss!
When first Madeira trembled to a kiss.

Bowles! in thy memory let this precept dwell,
Stick to thy connets, man!-at least they sell.
But if some new-born whim, or larger bribe,
Prompt thy crude brain, and claim thee for a scribe,
If chance some bard, though once by dunces fear'd,
Now, prone in dust, can only be revered;

If Pope, whose fame and genius, from the first,
Have foil'd the best of critics, needs the worst,
Do thou essay; each fault, each failing scan:
The first of poets was, alas! but man.
Rake from each ancient dunghill ev'ry pearl,
Consult Lord Fanny, and confide in Curll ;+
Let all the scandals of a former age

Perch on thy pen, and flutter o'er thy page;
Affect a candour which thou canst not feel,
Clothe envy in the garb of honest zeal;
Write, as if St. John's soul could still inspire,
And do from hate, what Mallet did for hire.‡
Oh! hadst thou lived in that congenial time,
To rave with Dennis, and with Ralph to rhyme ;§
Throng'd with the rest around his living head,
Not raised thy hoof against the lion dead,
A meet reward had crown'd thy glorious gains,
And link'd thee to the Dunciad for thy pains.

Another epic! who inflicts again

More books of blank upon the sons of men?
Boeotian Cottle, rich Bristowa's boast,
Imports old stories from the Cambrian coast,
And sends his goods to market-all alive!
Lines forty thousand, cantos twenty-five!

Fresh fish from Helicon ! who'll buy? who'll buy?
The precious bargain 's cheap-in faith, not I.
Too much in turtle Bristol's sons delight,
Too much o'er bowls of rack prolong the night!
If Commerce fills the purse, she clogs the brain,
And Amos Cottle strikes the lyre in vain.

The episode above alluded to, is the story of "Robert a Machin," and "Anna Arfet," a pair of constant lovers, who performed the kiss above mentioned, that startled the woods of Madeira.

Curll is one of the heroes of the " Dunciad" and was a bookseller. Lord Fanny is the Portical name of Lord Hervey, author of " Lines to the Imitator of Horace."

Lord Bolingbroke hired Mallet to traduce Pope after his decease, because the poet Bad retained some copies of a work by Lord Bolingbroke (the "Patriot King"), which Lat splendid but malignant genius had ordered to be destroyed.

Dennis, the critic, and Ralph, the rhymester.

"Silence, ye wolves! while Ralph to Cynthia howls,

Making night hideous; answer him, ye owls!"-Dunciad.

1 See Bowles's late edition of Pope's works, for which he received 300 pounds: thus B. has experienced how much easier it is to profit by the reputation of another, than

derate his own.

H

In him an author's luckless lot behold,
Condemn'd to make the books which once he sold.
Oh, Amos Cottle!-Phœbus! what a name,
To fill the speaking trump of future fame!
Oh, Amos Cottle! for a moment think
What meagre profits spring from pen and ink!
When thus devoted to poetic dreams,
Who will peruse thy prostituted reams'
Oh, pen perverted! paper misapplied!
Had Cottle still adorn'd the counter's side,*
Bent o'er the desk, or, born to useful toils,
Been taught to make the paper which he soils,
Plough'd, delved, or plied the oar with lusty limb,
He had not sung of Wales, nor I of him.

As Sisyphus against the infernal steep

Rolls the huge rock, whose motions ne'er may sleep,
So up thy hill, ambrosial Richmond! heaves
Dull Maurice all his granite weight of leaves :+
Smooth, solid monuments of mental pain!

The petrifactions of a plodding brain,

That ere they reach the top fall lumbering back again.

With broken lyre, and cheek serenly pale,

Lo sad Alcæus wanders down the vale;

Though fair they rose, and might have bloom'd at last,
His hopes have perish'd by the northern blast:
Nipp'd in the bud by Caledonian gales,
His blossoms wither as the blast prevails!
O'er his lost works let classic Sheffield weep;
May no rude hand disturb their early sleep!‡
Yet, say! why should the bard at once resign
His claim to favour from the sacred Nine?
For ever startled by the mingled howl
Of northern wolves, that still in darkness prowl;
A coward brood, which mangle as they prey,
By hellish instinct, all that cross their way;
Aged or young, the living or the dead,
No mercy find-these harpies must be fed.
Why do the injured unresisting yield
The calm possession of their native field?
Why tamely thus before their fangs retreat,

Nor hunt the bloodhounds back to Arthur's Seat? §

Health to immortal Jeffrey! once, in name,
England could boast a judge almost the same;

Mr. Cottle, Amos, Joseph, I don't know which, but one or both, once sellers of books they did not write, and now writers of books that do not sell, have published a pair of epics. "Alfred" (poor Alfred! Pye has been at him too !) "Alfred" and the "Fall of Cambria."

Mr. Maurice hath manufactured the component parts of a ponderous quarto, upon the" Beauties of Richmond Hill," and the like;-it also takes in a charming view of Turnham Green, Hammersmith, Brentford, Old and New, and the parts adjacent.

Poor Montgomery! though praised by every English review, has been bitterly reviled by the Edinburgh. After all, the bard of Sheffield is a man of considerable genius; his Wanderer of Switzerland" is worth a thousand" Lyrical Ballads," and at least fifty "degraded epics."

§ Arthur's Seat; the hill which overhangs Edinburgh.

In soul so like, so merciful, yet just,
Some think that Satan has resign'd his trust,
And given the spirit to the world again,
To sentence letters, as he sentenced men.
With hand less mighty, but with heart as black,
With voice as willing to decree the rack;
Bred in the courts betimes, though all that law
As yet hath taught him is to find a flaw.
Since well instructed in the patriot school
To rail at party, though a party tool,

Who knows, if chance his patrons should restore
Back to the sway they forfeited before,
His scribbling toils some recompense may meet,
And raise this Daniel to the judgment-seat.
Let Jeffries' shade indulge the pious hope,
And greeting thus, present him with a rope:
"Heir to my virtues! man of equal mind!
Skill'd to condemn as to traduce mankind,
This cord receive, for thee reserved with care,
To wield in judgment, and at length to wear.'

Health to great Jeffrey! Heaven preserve his life,
To flourish on the fertile shores of Fife,
And guard it sacred in its future wars,

Since authors sometimes seek the field of Mars!
Can none remember that eventful day,

That ever glorious, almost fatal fray,
When Little's leadless pistol met his eye,
And Bow Street myrmidons stood laughing by ?*
Oh, day disastrous! on her firm-set rock,
Dunedin's castle felt a secret shock:

Dark roll'd the sympathetic waves of Forth,
Low groan'd the startled whirlwinds of the north;
Tweed ruffled half his waves to form a tear,
The other half pursued its calm career; †
Arthur's steep summit nodded to its base,
The surly Tolbooth scarcely kept her place;
The Tolbooth felt-for marble sometimes can,
On such occasions, feel as much as man-
The Tolbooth felt defrauded of his charms,
If Jeffrey died, except within her arms:
Nay, last, not least, on that portentous morn,
The sixteenth story where himself was born,

In 1803, Messrs. Jeffrey and Moore met at Chalk Farm. The duel was prevented by the interference of the magistracy; and, on examination, the balls of the pistols, like the courage of the combatants, were found to have evaporated. This incident gave occa. sisa to much waggery in the daily prints.

The Tweed here behaved with proper decorum; it would have been highly reprəhensible in the English half of the river to have shown the smallest symptom of apprehension.

This display of sympathy on the part of the Tolbooth (the principal prison in Edinburgh), which truly seems to have been most affected on this occasion, is much to be ommended. It was to be apprehended, that the many unhappy criminals executed in the front might have rendered the edifice more callous. She is said to be of the softer ax, because her delicacy of feeling on this day was truly feminine, though, like most feminine impulses, perhaps a little selfish.

His patrimonial garret, fell to ground,

And pale Edina shudder'd at the sound:

Strew'd were the streets around with milk-white reams,
Flow'd all the Canongate with inky streams;

This of his candour seem'd the sable dew,
That of his valour show'd the bloodless hue;
And all with justice deem'd the two combined
The mingled emblems of his mighty mind.
But Caledonia's goddess hover'd o'er

The field, and saved him from the wrath of Moore;
From either pistol snatch'd the vengeful lead,
And straight restored it to her favourite's head;
That head, with greater than magnetic power,
Caught it, as Danae caught the golden shower,
And, though the thickening dross will scarce refine,
Augments its ore, and is itself a mine.

"My son," she cried, "ne'er thirst for gore again,
Resign the pistol, and resume the pen;
O'er politics and poesy preside,

Boast of thy country, and Britannia's guide!
For long as Albion's heedless sons submit,
Or Scottish taste decides on English wit,
So long shall last thine unmolested reign,
Nor any dare to take thy name in vain.
Behold, a chosen band shall aid thy plan,
And own thee chieftain of the critic clan.
First in the ranks illustrious shall be seen
The travell'd thane, Athenian Aberdeen.*
Herbert shall wield Thor's hammer, and sometimes,
In gratitude, thou'lt praise his rugged rhymes,
Smug Sydney too thy bitter page shall seek,
And classic Hallam, § much renown'd for Greek ;
Scott may perchance his name and influence lend,
And paltry Pillans || shall traduce his friend;
While gay Thalia's luckless votary, Lambe,¶
As he himself was damn'd, shall try to damn.

His lordship has been much abroad, is a member of the Athenian Society, and reviewer of" Gell's Topography of Troy."

Mr. Herbert is a translator of Icelandic and other poetry. One of the principal pieces is a "Song on the Recovery of Thor's Hammer:" the translation is a pleasant chaut in the vulgar tongue, and endeth thus :

"Instead of money and rings, I wot,

The hammer's bruises were her lot;
Thus Odin's son his hammer got."

The Reverend Sydney Smith, the reputed author of " Peter Plymley's Letters," and sundry criticisms.

§ Mr. Hallam reviewed Payne Knight's "Taste," and was exceedingly severe on some Greek verses therein: it was not discovered that the lines were Pindar's till the press rendered it impossible to cancel the critique, which still stands an everlasting monument of Hallam's ingenuity.

The said Hallam is incensed, because he is falsely accused, seeing that he never dineth at Holland House. If this be true, I am sorry-not for having said so, but on his account, as I understand his lordship's feasts are preferable to his compositions. If he did not review Lord Holland's performance, I am glad, because it must have been painful to read, and irksome to praise it. If Mr. Hallam will tell me who did review it, the real name shall find a place in the text; provided, nevertheless, the said name be of two orthodox musical syllables, and will come into the verse; till then, Hallam must stand for want of a better.

Pillans is a tutor at Eton.

The Honourable G. Lambe reviewed Beresford's Miseries," and is moreover author

Known be thy name, unbounded be thy sway!
Thy Holland's banquets shall each toil repay;
While grateful Britain yields the praise she owes
To Holland's hirelings and to learning's focs.
Yet mark one caution, ere thy next review
Spread its light wings of saffron and of blue,
Beware lest blundering Brougham* destroy the sale,
Turn beef to bannocks, cauliflowers to kail."
Thus having said, the kilted goddess kiss'd
Her son, and vanish'd in a Scottish mist.t

Illustrious Holland! hard would be his lot,
His hirelings mention'd, and himself forgot!
Holland, with Henry Petty‡ at his back,
The whipper-in and huntsman of the pack.
Blest be the banquets spread at Holland House,
Where Scotchmen feed and critics may carouse!
Long, long beneath that hospitable roof,
Shall Grub Street dine, while duns are kept aloof.
See honest Hallam lay aside his fork,

Resume his pen, review his lordship's work,
And, grateful to the founder of the feast,
Declare his landlord can translate at least ;§
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.||

Now to the Drama turn-Oh! motley sight,
What precious scenes the wondering eyes invite !
Puns, and a prince within a barrel pent,¶

And Dibdin's nonsense yield complete content.**

of a farce enacted with much applause at the Priory, Stanmore; and damned with great expedition at the late theatre, Covent Garden. It was entitled "Whistle for It."

• Mr. Brougham, in No. XXV. of the "Edinburgh Review," throughout the article concerning Don Pedro de Cevallos, has displayed more politics than policy; many of the worthy burgesses of Edinburgh being so incensed at the infamous principles it evinces, as to have withdrawn their subscriptions.

it seems that Mr. Brougham is not a Pict, as I supposed, but a Borderer, and his nanie is pronounced Broom, from Trent to Tay :-So be it.

I ought to apologize to the worthy deities for introducing a new goddess with short petticoats to their notice: but alas! what was to be done? I could not say Caledonia's genius, it being well known the 's no genius to be found from Clackmannan to CaithLes; yet without supernatural agency, how was Jeffrey to be saved? The national kelples," &c. are too unpoetical, and the " brownies" and "gude neighbours" (spirits of good disposition) refused to extricate him. A goddess, therefore, has been called for the purpose, and great ought to be the gratitude of Jeffrey, seeing it is the only communication he ever held, or is likely to hold, with anything heavenly.

Marquis of Lansdowne.

Lard H. has translated some specimens of Lope de Vega, inserted in his life of the author: both are bepraised by his disinterested guests.

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

In the melo-drama of "Tekeli," that heroic prince is clapt into a barrel on the stage; a new asylum for distressed heroes.

Thomas Dibdin, author of "The Cabinet," "English Fleet," "Mother Goose," an son of the great English lyrist.