of rout etiquette. "Think," she exclaimed, "of his hiding himself behind Dr Minchett's chair, when I wanted him to quote Byron and Scott to a party of unentertainable young ladies; and then, when I discovered his retreat, and woke him from his trance, to be told he was thinking of the Bears!" 66 May I," said Mr Trevor, "ask the defendant one question? Who or what were the Bears that thus unwarrantably ran away with him from whist and flirting?" 66 "The Bears, answered George, or, I should rather say, the Bears' bones, which, with all the wonders of the Ashmolean Museum, flitted before my mental vision, while my bodily eyes were fixed, not on vacancy, but on the expanse of broad-cloth which covered Dr Minchett's ample shoulders, were brought from the cavern by Gaylenoeuth; the secret of their accumulation there has long been a puzzle to geologists." "Then," said Richard, "I decree that the defendant do, this evening, write a poem, to inform the unlearned how the said bones did find their way into the said cavern."-George protested loudly against the iniquity of this sentence, declared the subject beneath the dignity of his Muse, the explanation impracticable, and ended by appealing to his mother. It was a difficult question, and Mrs De Coverley decided it in a manner peculiar to herself. Acting from the same principle of strict justice which made her, when they were children, divide the contested cake amongst the clamorous disputants, thereby avoiding all useless and troublesome inquiries into individual right, she now neutralized George's punishment, by sharing his task amongst his accusers and judges. "It was impossible," she said, "that George could write a poem, while all the rest were talking so loud and so fast; they had much better, therefore, sit down all of them, and each write a bit." This plan promised so much amusement, that it was acquiesced in immediately; and it was settled that Miss Wilmot, my wife, Mrs Eleanor, uncle David, and myself, were to set the tasks for the others to write. And now suppose the party assembled in the drawingroom, the five poets are seated each at a separate table,the pens are dip ped in ink,-each" poetic eye in a fine phrenzy rolling,"-glances from floor to ceiling, from book-case to pier-glass, in search of some obstinate rhyme that will keep aloof,-Mrs De Coverley and her brother are playing at cribbage,-Aunt Eleanor is devouring a political pamphlet which Richard has brought her from town,-Miss Wilmot is taking a sketch of the party, and I am watching the progress of her pencil, and writing you, Mr Editor, an account of the scene. Twelve o'clock has struck, the poem has been read, and the merry groupe are gone laughing to bed. Mr Trevor is enchanted with his first essay in poetics, and Richard declares his would have been much better if he had not been situated so close to the cribbage players, that it was with the greatest difficulty he could prevent himself from writing his canto in a measure of fifteen two, fifteen four. I am going to sit up for another half hour, to copy the Bears for you, that you may see how foolish people dare to be when they are happy. Perhaps, if I had waited till to-morrow morning, my enthusiasm would have subsided, and I might then think the verses not worth sending. THE BEARS. CANTO I. Argument.-George at a rout-how he comes to fancy himself in the Ashmolean Museum-description of what he sees there is awoke from his reverie, and retires to bed. MRS DE COVERLEY. No more must I delighted stray Where Charwell's classic stream Meanders through the meadows gay, Where students green and doctors grey Bask in the sunny beam. Far other beams I now must seek, Far other rays descryThe beams that glow on Beauty's cheek, That through her smiling dimples speak, And sparkle in her eye. Since you, my mother, choose the lay On which my Muse must write, Above the battlemented wall Of Bandyborough's tower When youthful belles, and ladies sage, Or go in chairs, To assemble in the brilliant room At last the party all has met, In little groups we now divided, With partner or with flirt; One ancient maid is slyly seen With scandal, cards, or tea? The lights all faded from my sight, My thoughts had ta'en their rapid flight The model of a Spanish ship, Could shut the eye of tedium on mankind, And place my raptured spirit there. Upset into a lady's lap. The lady's shriek was shrill and strong, The ladies, feelingly, complain, Of hidden things Or throw an empire down. So while this subject all employs, I slyly slunk away to bed, And on my pillow laid my head, CANTO II. Argument.-George falls asleep sees in I fain, ere I begin the story, So The point so deep I cannot sound it, Whose prompt assistance I must ask But in my case I own she's blameless. Spied in his brain a space to fix in, From out a corner, dark and dusty, One leg alone could not be found- But spite of wanting this supporter Well might George wonder-well might stare When he beheld this fossil bear, sen.) WIELAND'S KEY TO THE LAST EPIS- (Continued from p. 349.) Ir my hypothesis, as to the origin and design of the last of Horace's epistles, be admitted, every thing in it becomes clear, intelligible, and to the purpose. A piece which, when considered as an ars poetica, or compendium of the art of poetry, is a slovenly, ill connected, and even raving composition, is found to be, when taken for what it is, a poetical epistle, namely, written with the intention of weaning a young man from a passionate and ill-judged fondness for poetry, every thing that we can wish or expect: when it is taken for this, it is found to be a work altogether worthy of Horace. Upon this supposition, the reason is plain why he is not more complete in his rules:-he was not writing an ars poetica. It is obvious why he is not more methodical :-he was writing a letter, and had no other plan but the main design, of which he never loses sight. Why do most of his rules consist in warnings against faults? The young gentleman stood most in need of these. Why are those passages, in which the mysteries of the art of poetry really lie concealed, intelligible only to adepts? and why, even to this day, has no mere pretender learned the smallest thing from this epistle? Nothing was farther from the mind of Horace than to make a poet of his young friend. And why does more than one-half of the piece consist in sarcasms at the pitiful poets of those times-in warnings against the seductive charms of the muses-in showing the danger of poetical self-deceit-in the severe and almost intolerable conditions which he imposes on the young inan, and in that caustic satire, which he so liberally and unmercifully pours out on the crazy poets, as he calls the poor fellows? This was precisely the aim of the whole piece. I have called my opinion, with regard to the design of this epistle, an hypothesis, and as such I humbly lay it before the public; if, however, any one will take the trouble to follow our poet, step by step, along all the turnings and windings of this desultory composition, he will, perhaps, find that this is not a mere hypothesis, but may even be convinced, that, from the very beginning, Horace had the point in view at which he at last arrives. Should the reader wish, rather than go alone, to take this little trip in company with one, who has so long been following, as well as he could, this justly celebrated ancient writer, let him only please to come along. When the aim of an author is such, that, in order to its being attained, it must not be announced, the best way is to announce nothing at all. Accordingly, Horace begins this discourse without any introduction, and places before our eyes, in all its absurdity, the greatest fault which a poem or any other work of art can possibly have, a fault which, in poets of no real talents, is not to be corrected. Such people cannot form a whole: they be gin with one thing and end with another; a work of their getting up is pasted together of incongruous parts, without unity, relation, or propor tion. The objection which our poet now supposes brought against himself: "How! have not poets been ever allowed to venture what they chose?" could only be expected from such a novice, as, according to the present hypothesis, the young Piso was, and the objection is answered in such a manner as to set the rule here given in the clearest light; but, as the application of it depends entirely on the just judgment and delicate taste of the poet, it could be of no manner of service to the young gentleman in question. Horace proceeds to place the faults which are most usually committed against the rules of unity, in a soft light indeed, but such, however, as shows extremely well how ridiculous they are. Young people are very apt to value themselves on beautiful description, and, on any the slightest occasion in the world, they take up the pencil to paint you some landscape or other. Whether the painting be in its proper place; whether it be not contrary to the main design, that the reader be now detained by it; whether it be not in the light of another object, which should have stood in the very place which it occupies, is never once considered. A work is, accordingly, at last produced, in which there is no more coherence than in the dreams of a fever. We have the head of a beautiful woman, but it is joined to the neck of a horse; there is presented to your view a cypress most exactly copied from nature, but it is the principal figure in a piece, which should excite your compassion for an unfortunate man who has been shipwrecked; and the great master, who was to produce an elegant and capacious vase, disappoints your expectation, and puts you off with a paltry kitchen-pot. Here is another blunder into which young poets, who either have no warning Genius, or do not listen to his counsels, frequently fall; while they endeavour to avoid one extreme, they run into the other. Not to be harsh, they are insipidly smooth and soft; that they may not creep on the ground, they fly about in the aërial regions instead of advancing with an equal and manly pace; when they would be sublime they rave; and speak nonsense, when they aim at saying something new. One has observed that certain images produce a great effect, and forthwith concludes, that, in order to increase the effect to any degree whatever, nothing more is necessary than to give a double, triple, or quadruple dose of such images. Another remarks, that one or two small circumstances enliven a picture, and give it truth and expression; and now he believes that he cannot be sufficiently minute in detail. The chief source of all these blemishes is the poet's want of judgment or taste. Judgment must guide him, as a sharp and experienced eye guides the hand of the artizan. A man who has not this faculty may easily be told, that he has it not, but who can give him that which nature has refused to bestow? As children are often fool-hardy from their ignorance, so bearded children often attempt more than they can perform. Horace, therefore, admonishes (v. 72) those who delight in scribbling, above all things, to examine their force; not to venture upon any thing with which they are not intimately acquainted, and which they have not so scrupulously weighed and so narrowly viewed on all sides, as to be able to answer any question concerning it which they could put to themselves. How can a young man, who knows neither himself nor the objects around him, to whom things appear plain and easy only from ignorance or incapacity, ever be certain that he has not put too much confidence in his own strength, and that he has not chosen a wrong subject on which to try his talents? But even if he were certain of this, he is still far from having surmounted every difficulty. The same sound sense the same nice judgment, which must guide him in the choice and arrangement of his materials, in order to have first a complete and lively prototype of his work in his own mind, which he is afterwards to impress on the mind of his reader or hearer, must guide him in the use of language in the choice, arrangement, and connecting of words, (v. 87, &c.) Here the poet allows himself the first short digression, in which he seems to have had the then Roman public more than the Pisos in view. He justifies the prudent and modest use of antiquated words; the re-ennobling of such as did not deserve the neglect and dishonour, into which they had fallen; the coining of new words, when necessity requires it; and concludes with an observation which must, in some measure, damp the spirit of those who write for fame. If the Latin had remained to this day the language of Italy, Virgil and Horace would probably have been much less intelligible to the Italians, than those English authors who wrote under our first Henrys and Edwards are to us. Next to their language, there is nothing in which young and old pretenders to poetry are usually more negligent than in their versification. Precisely that, which is one of the most difficult things in the poetic art, appears to them both the easiest and of the smallest consequence. Horace runs over this subject from v. 134 to v. 158; and as it was more his design to make dull fellows ridiculous than to form good pocts, he positively asserts, after a few general rules which he gives on expression, stile, and versification, that no one could pretend to the name of a poet, who was not a complete master in these three points. Now, as he declared most of the poets of his own and of the preceding times, whose negligence in these three branches he had so often attacked, the merest dunces, he naturally leads the young Piso, who was encouraged perhaps by the ease of writing such verses as every body made at that time, to reflect, that to be a poet might probably not be a thing so extremely easy as he had imagined. Till now there has not been a single word about dramatic poetry. But as the Roman play-wrights were the people against whom our poet chiefly aimed the shafts of his ridicule; and as the young Piso, according to the present hypothesis, was either writing, or had a strong inclination to write, for the stage, it was quite natural for Horace to mention the drama. Accordingly, from v. 165 to v 241, he gives us a few of the principal rules of this species of writing, and at the same time mentions some of the most glaring and most unpardonable faults committed by the dramatic writers of his age. Time has long ago swept away all their works, and, consequently, the frequent allusions to them, which one cannot avoid observing in this epistle, must, in a great measure, be lost upon us; we may, however, fairly conclude, from the warnings he gives, that, in what Horace says of the stage, his design was much less to show Piso how he himself might produce something excellent, than to teach him how to estimate performances of this kind, by which Rome was daily inundated. The progress of our poet in this piece has, as we have already observed, very much the appearance of a walk, when people have no other object but merely to saunter about. A small deviation from the path is of no consequence; they sometimes stand still to enjoy for a moment a fine prospect; they sometimes go a little from the straight line to gather a few flowers, or to recline in the shade of a |