imitation can be ; but occasionally, as must have been perceived in our extracts, there is a sad falling off. Yet, on the whole, if Mr. Bowles gains no fame by the present attempt, as little should he lose any; in his own style he still remains unrivalled, and to that he should contine himself; to excel in one thing is sufficient praise. ART XV. The poetical Works of the Author of the Heroic Epistle to Sir William Chum bers. 8vo. pp. 127. WE should have commended the republication of these pieces, if the little volume in which they are comprized had not been made very unreasonably dear. The author, whoever he was, was a man of extraordinary wit; but it may be remarked that, of his six publications, each is progressively inferior to the former one. He seems fairly to have been burnt out. Nothing can be better in its kind than these lines in the Heroic Epistle. "Now to our lawns of dalliance and delight, And round that fane on many a Tyburn tree, In straw-stuft effigy, shall kick the air. Where shall our mimic London rear her walls? Who of three realins shall condescend to know No more than he can spy from Windsor's brow; line grace, Who ne'er before at sermon shew'd his face, See Jenimy Twitcher shambles; stop! stop thief! He's stol'n the earl of Denbigh's handkerchief. They seize, they bind, they circumcise Charles Fair Schwellenbergen smiles the sport to see, unbend His royal mind, whene'er, from state with drawn, He treads the velvet of his Richmond lawn; Mr. Almon, the editor, observes that the Heroic Epistle and Gray's Elegy were the two most popular short poems published in the last century. He had forfotten the Deserted Village; yet it is so nearly true, as to be a disgrace to a century in which mere personal satire could obtain such applause. We have had much of this during the present reign, and of much merit; but how inferior to Dryden! ART. XVL--London Cries; or, Pictures of Tumult and Distress: a Poem. To which is added, the Hull of Pedantry. With Notes. 8vo. pp. 87. THE London Cries is an ill-chosen title. One expects a poetical catalogue of the pedlars, who hawk their various wares from door to door: one finds pictures of distress, beggary, and prostitution: yet these melancholy scenes occupy but a small portion of the satire, which begins with the history and antiquities, and ends with the present state of the metropolis. The plan of the poem is too comprehensive, disconnected, and desultory. The third satire of Boileau has been admirably imitated by Goldsmith in his Haunch of Venison. This poem is not an equally successful imitation of the sixth satire: if that may be called an imitation, which perhaps owes its occasional resem blance to the common consultation of Horace and Juvenal. The French poet is more felicitous in the invention of circumstance, and more picturesque in the description of object. We shall transcribe some parallelisms, that we may not be thought to award the preference without examination. This writer has learn to make verses. His rhymes are generally correct, though common his structure of line is easy, natural, and various, in a higher degree than is usual with young artists. Most couplet-makers are content with the few forms of line employed by Pope, and repeat, like Darwin, to satiety the golden verses and hackneyed cadences of their master; as Cowper says, every warbler has his tune by heart. It is some merit bullfinch, to have learnt one whole song to have an original note; and not, like the from the hand-organ. In order to make poetry, a further apprenticeship is necessary. Much redundance must be thrown aside. The pictures, or descriptions, must be connected and grouped there must be some motive, leaves were separated and shuffled, they some reason, for their occurrence. If these might be reprinted in any new accidental order with nearly equal propriety. No one leading emotion, as in Boileau, provokes the recapitulation of the objects. Here are topics for three distinct satires. The first, on the change of the manners of London from ancient rudeness to modern refinement, which the ape of Juvenal would consider as a change for the worse. The second, on the embarrassments of thronged places, which Boileau has so admirably condensed. The third, on the distress of the unfortunate but necessary portion of the population of a great city; which seems to be the favourite topic of the author, as he has illustrated it by various notes relative to plans of beneficence. We recommend a separate poem on each of these subjects; but as didactic topics are not favourable to the display of fancy, a long elaboration will be requisite to infuse the sterling sense of Pope or Johnson. The hall of pedantry is composed in Spenser's dialect, but in a less picturesque manner. Personified abstractions belong to the philosophic, not to the poetic style: the Greeks wisely avoided them in poetry. ART. XVII.-Ballads. By WILLIAM HAYLEY, Esq. Founded on Anecdotes relating to Animals, with Prints, designed and engraved by WILLIAM BLAKE. Svo. pp. 212. MEDIOCRITY, as all the world knows, is forbidden to poets and to punsters; but the punster has a privilege peculiar to himself, the exceeding badness of his puns is imputed as a merit. This privilege may fairly be extended to Mr. Hayley: his present volume is so incomparably absurd that no merit within his reach could have amused us half so much. Let us treat our readers wish the first ballad : "Of all the speechless friends of man This feeling creature form'd to love, I sing, of all e'er known to live The truest friend canine; A dog of many a sportive trick, For conscious of her every care He strain'd each feeling nerve, Of many friends to Lucy dear, Tender and brave, her Edward came The farewell rack'd poor Lucy's heart, Lucy, who thro' her tears descried 'Go! with him, Fido!', fondly cried, And make his life thy care!' The dog her order understood, Or seem'd to understand, It was his glory to make good Affection's kind command." it seems, frequently to take a fearless swim, as Mr. Hayley poetically expresses himself, not being aware that there was a crocodile in the water. His custom was to leap from a high bank. One day when he was undressing, Fido did all he could to prevent him; his master, not understanding the meaning of this interruption, scolded, and at last beat him; but the dog finding all his efforts vain, and seeing Edward about to plunge in, ran before him, and leapt into the crocodile's mouth. The poet has had the singular good fortune to meet with a painter capable of doing full justice to his conceptions; and, in fact, when we look at the delectable frontispiece to this volume which represents Edward starting back, Fido volunt, and the crocodile rampant, with a mouth open like a boot-jack to receive him, we know not whether most to admire the genius of Mr. William Blake or of Mr. William Hayley. The conclusion of the story is equally original. "When Lucy heard of Fido's fate, What showers of tears she shed! But gold had not the power to raise Soon bids her sorrow end. A sculptor, pity's genuine son! He, rich in Lucy's sister's heart, By stealth in Lucy's chamber plac'd, The marble Fido in their sight, The second ballad relates how an engle in Scotland carried a child to his eyrie, and the mother climbed after it. Her son, a boy of seven years old, stands below watching her, and the story thus pro Edward, when he was in India, used, ceeds. "He saw, as far as eye may ken, The boy, tho' trusting much in God, His youthful mind was not aware And now he sees, or thinks he sees Now heaven fend thee, mother bold, Thy perils extreme: Thou'rt dead, if thou let go thy hold, And bravely if thou keep it fast, What yet may be thy doom! No! No! thank heaven! O nobly done! The remaining tales are equally marvellous in design, and equally extraordinary in execution. Virginibus puerisque canto, says the author. We could not help quot ing O'Keefe's song, Hayley-gayly gam borayly higgledy piggledy galloping draggle-tail'd dreary dun. ART. XVIII.-Oriental Tales, translated into English Verse. By J. HOPPNER, ESQ. R. A. Svo. pp. 123. IT would be unjust to examine the faults of these tales with any degree of rigour, after Mr. Hoppner's avowal in the preface. 6 "My eldest son having the prospect of an appointment in India, the attainment of the Persian language became an essential point in his education; and among other books laid before him, was the Tooti Nameh, or Tales of the Parrot. It was in a translation of this work that I first read the tale of the Ass and the Stag,' the genuine merit of which struck me se forcibly, as to engage me in an attempt at putting it into verse, where I conceived the humour and whimsical gravity of the dialogue would be seen to more advantage. Whether I was right in this conjecture will be ascertained by those less partial than the most diffident author ever was supposed to be: and to their decision I shall readily submit; satisfied that what I may lose on the side of vanity, I shall gain in a more just estimation of my own powers, and in the subsequent management of them accordingly. "Let it not however be inferred from this, that I have the slightest intention of ever making my appearance before the public again as a poet. I have too great a reverence for this art, to suppose that I may attain, at my leisure, what men with greater advantages have not been able to acquire after the most diligent study. My object in publishing these trifles was rather to prove my love than dis play my skill: and when I am called upon to shew some vanity of mine art,' it shall be in a mode in which I have a more legitimate claim to attention and public favour. If it be urged that this demonstration of attack ment to excellence out of my peculiar line of study was unnecessary, I reply—that I cannot think so. Every thing that artists may hope to achieve with the view of raising themselves in the just estimation of a public so little disposed in their favour, should be attempted The general opinion entertained of the etent of our acquisitions, is sufficiently indcated in the judgment passed upon sir Joshua Reynolds's Lectures: for, since they cannot be styled clumsy performances, the hour of having written them has been awarded to others, not only against the evidence of cammon sense, but of men of the highest respectability, who had ample means of better intermation. "On what this hostility to English artists is founded, it would perhaps be difficult to guess. Few men act more discreetly, er lBour with greater diligence to obtain that to which, in the present state of art in Europe, they have decidedly the best claim. The come arising from any liberal profession, however great it may be, is not a sufficient stinglus to noble exertions; and those, therefore, cut off the incitements to a virtuous ambition, who withhold their praise. He who is con demned to pursue his studies with ideas of loss and gain, will stop at that point where exertion ceases to be profitable; and labour to live now, instead of hereafter." The remainder of the preface, which is of considerable length, contains some very able and very just strictures upon the French artists, and, in particular, the success which madame le Brun has obtained in England. These strictures are not indeed quite-in their place, but they are well-founded, Where broad-cloth breathes, to talk where and well-justified. "I have, as the reader sees, availed myself of the present occasion to express my sentiments on this subject, not as it may at fect me; but public taste, so intimately connected with morals, and, indeed, with every thing that distinguishes a great from a barbarous nation. All private considerations in matters of this moment must give way to a more imperious duty; and whenever a spurious art appears among us, powerful enough in its patronage, hot in its inherent strength, to do mischief, I trust I shall neither want patriotism nor courage openly to meet, and cordially to assist in its defeat and extermination. "Although the age of chivalry is past, it may still be thought that the common laws of gallantry required me to spare the artist, in honour of her sex. But, in her overweening presumption, Madame le Brun has destroyed distinction, and ostentatiously waved her privilege. She has challenged hostility, When she might have escaped with impunity by falling into that rank which the mediocrity of her talents, and the state of the arts in this country, rendered it decent for her to take. To expose successful imposition is, at all times, a hazardous enterprise, and, unfortunately, personal considerations, in the present case, add a degree of unpopularity to the danger,--but silence miglit live been mistaken for acquiescence; and the world has nothing more painful to inflict than the imputation of inferiority to such miserable productions. That these are not merely the fretful and interested wailings of personal disappointment, every one the least acquainted with my intercourse in society will, I am pessuaded, do me the justice to believe. Were this a fit occasion to enlarge on matters of private concern, or to unbosom myself on such a subject, I could display instances of benefits conferred upon ine, in consideration of my professional character, which in the few boastful events of my life, stand as eminently distinguished as do the personages who, in addition to the high respect and veneration due to their rank and talents, have bound ine to them by indissoluble ties of the warmest gra titude. cushions strive, And all, but Sir, or Madam, looks alive.' The tales are not improved by being told in verse: they are not of that character of fiction in which poetry delights. Lest, however, we should be conceived to im ply a heavier censure than is our intention, we add a specimen which will by no means discredit the artist. An ass and a stag have broken into a garden, and the ass, intoxicated with cabbage and parsley, insists upon singing. The stag, half pitying, half zinazed Upon his old associate gazed; "What! hast thou lost thy wits?' he cried, 'Or art thou dreaming, open eyed? Sing, quotha! was there ever bred In any mortal ass's head So strange a thought! But, no offenceWhat if we first remove from hence; And talk, as erst, of straw and oats, Of scurvy fare, and mangy coats, Of heavy loads, or worse than those, Of cruel drivers, and hard blows? For recollect, my gentle friend,. We're thieves, and plunder is our end. See! through what parsley we've been toiling And what fine spinage we are spoiling! He most of all doth outrage reason, "His nose in scorn the songster rears, It is no trifling consolation to me, that the few strictures which I have advanced on O, past pretence! the expensive trash of this lady, cannot, by The ear must be deprived of sense," the most prejudiced of her partisans, be at- Rejoin'd the stag, form'd of dull clay tributed to any suggestions of jealousy, which The heart that melts not at thy lay! always implies a common aim; which has in But hold, my ardent prayer attend, view the same excellence to excite ambition-Nor yet with songs the welkin rend; the same powers to invigorate contention. Still the sweet murmur in thy throat, Enthusiasm is sufficiently contagious, but who Prelusive of the thrilling note! has ever heard of the attractions of inanity; Nor shrink not up thy nostrils, friend, or what English artist could be warmed with Nor thy fair ample jaws extend; the frigid productions of French art? Lest thou repent thee, when too late; And moan thy pains, and elkearn'd fate,' **Impatience stung the warbler's soul, Greatly he spurn'd the mean controul; Where burnish'd beads, silk, satin; laces vie, In leaden lustre with the gooseberry eye, ANN. REV. VOL. IV. Pp |