venom of the ruthless snake, and the grotesque beauties of a jetty mistress, swell the hoarse strains of the tropical bard. All imitate Nature as they know her, and the exactness of this imitation, or its corresponding effect, constitutes the excellence of the pastoral poem. After ages bringing new customs, introduced other kinds of poetry; the epic and moral poets obtained almost exclusive possession of the world of taste. Now the pastoral poet sung his loves in sequestered retreats, far from the busy haunts of men. Did the pastoral poem ever quit her habitation, to appear before the gaudy crowd of the city? She veiled the original humility, and the modesty of her nature, under the garb of a more fashionable poem. She has been known to borrow the science of the astronomer, the art of the husbandman, and the abstruse jargon of the priest, to ensure a favourable reception in courts and cities. Almost every pastoral poem has reached us in this motley garb. The shepherds of Theocritus are lascivious clowns; his shepherdesses wanton courtezans, in tawdry suits. Virgil's peasants are sublime moralists, excellent natural philosophers, and profound politicians. Those of the Italian school are covered with the tawdry trappings of romance, lascivious sentiments, and extravagant characters. The characters of Pope seem merely those of Virgil; the shepherds of Philips, gross clowns in uncouth apparel. All these poems have some merit, but none of them comes up to my idea of a poem purely pastoral. It has been reserved to Scotland to produce a pastoral, that too in the most difficult form (the dramatic) purer than any in the English, or, perhaps, in any other language. I must, however, acknowledge my little acquaintance with the pastorals of Spenser, or the idyls of Gessner. : The plot of the Gentle Shepherd is sufficiently simple and natural the loves of two Scotish peasants form the leading features of it. The embarrassments in consequence of the discovery of the high rank of the hero, give occasion to scenes extremely interesting. The removal of this obstacle, by the disclosure of the equally high rank of his mistress, though somewhat extravagant, does not so far violate probability as to interrupt the growth of passion. The episodes, without very much encumbering the plot, are highly comic. In one of them, superstitious notions are happily ridiculed. Poetical justice is strictly observed: the two lovers are made happy in marriage; the worthy landlord is reinstated in his possessions; and the fidelity and virtues of the old tenants are recompensed. The first scene of this pastoral drama is excellent, and the cha racters finely pourtrayed. The diffident disposition of Roger is well contrasted with the open generousness of Patie. The scene between Jenny and Peggy is too much a counterpart of the first. The animated description of rural happiness, given by the latter, is not, in my opinion, surpassed in any language. The portrait of a bashful lover is well depicted in the passage beginning with the words "I dinna like him," &c. The scenes betwixt the two old shepherds are highly characteristic: their description of a good landlord is a strong appeal to every feeling heart, in favour of humanity to the Scots peasantry. The scene betwixt Patie and Peggy contains some fine sketches of genuine passion and disinterested character. The soliloquies in this piece are unnecessary; the author had too much genius to be obliged to resort to this clumsy mode of giving information. That of Bauldy, however, in his description of the witch, contains a fine sketch of the popular superstitions of Scots peasants. By the way, the treachery and black designs of this character are properly punished, though, had he been compelled to wed Neps, it would have been more complete. The diction and sentiments of the dramatis persona, with a few exceptions, are almost equal; the proverbs are apposite and well expressed. The dialect has my decided disapprobation. A poet should write like a gentleman. It is, besides, obscure or unintelligible to three fourths of the island. The unities of place and time are well observed: that of action is not so well attended to. Towards the catastrophe, the business of the piece is interrupted by tedious dialogues. It may be observed that the dialogues, throughout, are by far too long, and even at times languid. The characters are not discriminated with sufficient strength of pencil. Those of Bauldy and Madge form exceptions, which are well supported, and possess much vis comica. They are the most natural in the piece. The versification, though at times crowded with expletives, is casy. The songs are admirable, but some of them too long. The want of incident, the length of the colloquies, as well as the antiquated, uncouth dialect of the piece, preclude it from the stage. Some of these defects might be removed, by throwing out, or greatly curtailing, the parts of Jenny and Roger; by giving Bauldy and Madge more conspicuous places; by introducing the loves of Neps, and by modernizing the language of the piece; but it would be no longer the pastoral drama of Allan Ramsay. Ramsay's pretensions to this piece have been questioned. It is, indeed, very far superior to any thing we have under his name.But, independent of the external evidence, the easiness of the versification; the extensive knowledge of the language, manners, and customs of Scots peasantry; the facility and aptness in the applica- . tion of proverbs used only by the lowest class, convince me that the author of the Gentle Shepherd must have been a Scotsman of very inferior rank, who had bestowed a considerable portion of his life in "warbling his native wood-notes wild." Who but Allan Ramsay answers this description? A grave senator of the Scotish College of Justice has written a long dissertation, and employed manifold weighty and overwhelming arguments, to prove that the "habbies how" of this piece lies more than a mile from the spot generally supposed. He may be right; but I care not whether it be at Pentland, Pennycrick, or Perthshire;-the loves of Patie and Peggy will engage my sympathy, and excite my sensibility, while the "bleezing ingle on the clean hearth stane," and the smiles of his rosy-checked housekeeper shall have delights for the peasant of Caledonia. Banks of Carron, Nov. 10th 1804. SOME REMARKS ON OUR ELDER DRAMATIC WRITERS, AND THEIR COMMENTATORS. JUSTTS. BECAUSE the nature of our old drama, the construction of the fable, and the idiom of the language, threw a general colour over all the cotemporary theatrical poets, many critics have been tempted to draw parallels between Massinger, Beaumont and Fletcher, and Shakespeare; as if any resemblance, as to poetical merit, could be deduced from a resemblance arising out of such circumstances. In the preface to the last edition of Beaumont and Fletcher, the following passages are found, which, taken together, give a prouder panegyric on the dramatic colleagues, than their most sanguine admirers can justify. The editor first allows the superiority of Shakespeare to Beaumont and Fletcher, and, indeed, " to all other poets, Homer PERHAPS excepted;" and adds afterwards, though at some distance, "The works of Beaumont and Fletcher may proudly claim a second place in the English drama (and nearer to the first than the third) to those of Shakespeare." Without entering into the question whether the tragedies of Beaumont and Fletcher are at all superior, if equal, to those of Rowe, Otway, and Southern; and their comedies to those of Congreve and Sheridan, (a question which would admit of much doubt,) it is a commendation beyond the licence of hyperbole to maintain, that their dramas approach nearer in merit to the works of a poet who is allowed not to have had a superior, if a rival, in the whole annals of poetry, than the writings of those ornaments of the British theatre approach to them. The indecency of Beaumont and Fletcher is beyond comparison greater than that of Shakespeare. In Shakespeare we sometimes find a gross expression, in compliance with the rude manners of his times but the others wallow in obscenity. Their comedy called The Captain is full of the most abominable impurities; and in The Wife for a Month (on the whole a very interesting play) sentiments are put into the mouth of a lady who is called the chaste Evanthe, that would disgrace a common prostitute. In this play, also, we find a mixture of Spanish and Greek names, to the full as improper as the mixture of Roman and modern Italian names in Cymbeline; neither is there any anachronism in all Shakespeare's plays so glaring as the arming Demetrius Poliorcetes with a pistol, in the Humorous Lieutenant.* Yet these poets, like the pedantic and supercilious Johnson, are fond of taking any occasion of ridiculing Shakespeare, as in The Captain, for instance : "1 Boy. How now ! "How does your master? "2 Boy. 'Faith, he lies drawing on apace. 66 1 Boy. That's an ill sign. "2 Boy. And fumbles with the pots too. "1 Boy. Then there's no way but one with him.” This is manifestly a sarcastic parody on the account of Falstaff's death, in Henry V. In the Knight of the burning Pestle also, we find a parody on, or rather a misrepresented quotation from, the speech of Hotspur. Ralph heing desired to "speak a huffing part," begins, * I apprehend many readers of the present day mistake the character meant to be conveyed by the title of this play. HUMOUROUS does not signify DROLL, according to the modern acceptation of that word, but rather HUMOURSOME, 26 applied to a froward child, in the language of the nursery. "By Heavens, methinks it were an easy leap, "To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon: "Where never fathom line touch'd any ground, "And pluck up drowned honour from the lake of hell.” But while they thus parody and misrepresent what they can neither equal nor imitate, they sometimes also try to copy particular passages. In the tragedy of Dioclesian, is plainly taken from a similar expression of Sir Andrew Aguecheek. And in the same play, "Farewel pride, and pomp, “And circumstance of glorious majesty, "Farewel for ever" is as plainly copied from the splendid speech of Othello This exclamation of the Duke of Sesse, in the Double Marriage, is an imitation of one of Macduff, "Could I but get "Within my sword's length of him, and if then "Be added unto mine !" Beaumont and Fletcher have not been happier in the sagacity of their commentators, in proportion to their numbers, than Shake speare. Of these, Messrs. Seward and Simpson are, in point of absurdity, facile principes. It is surprising that many of their observations are retained, and even suffered to pass without a comment, in the more correct edition published by the late Mr. Colman. In the comedy of The Martial Maid, there is a long note to prove that Grave Maurice is only an epithet, and that it was an error in the late editions to print Grave with a capital G, as if it were a title which it undoubtedly was: it occurs in a variety of old books, and was so intended by our poets. In The Island Princess, when Ruy Dias and Armusia are going to fight; and the princess and the disguised governor appear at the window to see the combat, the following dialogue takes place : "Ruy Dias. Stand still, I charge you, nephew, as you "Armusia. And you, Emmanuel, stir not. |