Yet on he mouths-ten minutes-tedious each As prelate's homily, or placeman's speech; Long as the last years of a lingering lease, When riot pauses until rents increase.

While such a minstrel, muttering fustian, strays O'er hedge and ditch, through unfrequented

ways,

If by some chance he walks into a well,

And shouts for succour with stentorian yell,

66

A rope! help, Christians, as ye hope for grace!" Nor woman, man, nor child will stir a pace; For there his carcase he might freely fling, From frenzy, or the humour of the thing. Though this has happen'd to more bards than

one;

I'll tell you Budgell's story,-and have done.

Budgell, a rogue and rhymester, for no good, (Unless his case be much misunderstood) When teased with creditors' continual claims, "To die like Cato, "64 leapt into the Thames! And therefore be it lawful through the town For any bard to poison, hang, or drown. Who saves the intended suicide receives

Small thanks from him who loathes the life he leaves;

And, sooth to say, mad poets must not lose
The glory of that death they freely choose.

Nor is it certain that some sorts of verse Prick not the poet's conscience as a curse; Dosed65 with vile drams on Sunday he was found, Or got a child on consecrated ground! And hence is haunted with a rhyming rageFear'd like a bear just bursting from his cage.

If free, all fly his versifying fit,
Fatal at once to simpleton or wit:

But him, unhappy! whom he seizes,-him
He flays with recitation limb by limb;
Probes to the quick where'er he makes his breach,
And gorges like a lawyer—or a leech.

Motes to Bints from borace.

I.

In an English newspaper, which finds its way abroad wherever there are Englishmen, I read an account of this dirty dauber's caricature of Mr H- as a "beast," and the consequent action, &c. The circumstance is, probably, too well known to require comment.-[Thomas Hope, Esq., the author of "Anastasius," having offended Dubost, that unprincipled painter revenged himself by a picture called "Beauty and the Beast," in which Mr Hope and his lady were represented according to the well-known fairy story. The exhibition of it is said to have fetched thirty pounds in a day. A brother of Mrs Hope thrust his sword through the canvas; and M. Dubost had the consolation to get five pounds damages.]

2.

["Moschus."-In the original MS., "Hobhouse."]

3.

[“All artists.”—Originally, "We scribblers."

4.

"Where pure description held the place of sense."-POPE.

5.

[This is pointed, and felicitously expressed.-MOORK.]

6.

Mere common mortals were commonly content with one tailor and with one bill, but the more particular

gentlemen found it impossible to confide their lower garments to the makers of their body clothes. I speak of the beginning of 1809: what reform may have since taken place I neither know, nor desire to know.

7.

["As one leg perfect and the other lame."-MS.]

8.

Mr Pitt was liberal in his additions to our parliamentary tongue; as may be seen in many publications, particularly the Edinburgh Review.

9.

Old ballads, old plays, and old women's stories, are at present in as much request as old wine or new speeches. In fact, this is the millennium of black letter: thanks to our Hebers, Webers, and Scotts!-[Weber was a poor German hack, a mere amanuensis of Sir Walter Scott.]

IO.

"Mac Flecknoe," the "Dunciad," and all Swift's lampooning ballads. Whatever their other works may be, these originated in personal feelings, and angry retort on unworthy rivals; and though the ability of these satires elevates the poetical, their poignancy detracts from the personal character of the writers.

II.

With all the vulgar applause and critical abhorrence of puns, they have Aristotle on their side; who permits them to orators, and gives them consequence by a grave disposition.

12.

[In Vanbrugh's comedy of the "Provoked Husband."]

15.

"And in his ear I'll hollow, Mortimer !"-1 Henry IV.

14.

["Johnson. Pray, Mr Bayes, who is that Drawcansir? Bayes. Why, Sir, a great hero, that frights his mistress, snubs up kings, baffles armies, and does what he will, without regard to numbers, good sense, or justice."-Rehearsal.]

15.

About two years ago a young man, named Townsend, was announced by Mr Cumberland, in a review (since deceased) as being engaged in an epic poem to be entitled "Armageddon." The plan and specimen promise much; but I hope neither to offend Mr Townsend, nor his friends, by recommending to his attention the lines of Horace to which these rhymes allude. If Mr Townsend succeeds in his undertaking, as there is reason to hope, how much will the world be indebted to Mr Cumberland for bringing him before the public! But, till that eventful day arrives, it may be doubted whether the premature display of his plan (sublime as the ideas confessedly are) has not,-by raising expectation too high, or diminishing curiosity, by developing his argument, rather incurred the hazard of injuring Mr Townsend's future prospects. Mr Cumberland (whose talents I shall not depreciate by the humble tribute of my praise) and Mr Townsend must not suppose me actuated by unworthy motives in this suggestion. I wish the author all the success he can wish himself, and shall be truly happy to see epic poetry weighed up from the bathos where it lies sunken with Southey, Cottle, Cowley (Mrs or Abraham), Ogilvy, Wilkie, Pye and all the "dull of past and present days." Even if he is not a Milton, he may be better than Blackmore; if not a Homer, an Antimachus. I should deem myself presumptuous, as a young man, in offering advice, were it not addressed to one still younger Mr Townsend has the greatest difficulties to encounter: but in conquering them he will find employment; in having conquered them, his reward. I know too well "the scribbler's scoff, the critic's contumely;" and I am afraid time will teach Mr Townsend to know them better. Those who succeed, and those who do not, must bear this alike, and it is hard to say which have most of it. I trust that Mr Townsend's share will be from envy; he will soon know mankind well enough not to attribute this expression to malice.

16.

Mde. Dacier, Mde. de Sévigné, Boileau, and others, have left their dispute on the meaning of this passage in a tract considerably longer than the poem of "Horace." It is printed at the close of the eleventh

volume of Madame de Sévigne's Letters, edited by Grouvelle, Paris, 1806. Presuming that all who can construe may venture an opinion on such subjects, particularly as so many who can not have taken the same liberty, I should have held my "farthing candle" as awkwardly as another, had not my respect for the wits of Louis the Fourteenth's Augustan siècle induced me to subjoin these illustrious authorities. 1st, Boileau: "Il est difficile de traiter des sujets qui sont à la portée de tout le monde d'une manière qui vous les rende propres, ce qui s'appelle s'approprier un sujet par le tour qu'on y donne." 2dly, Batteux: "Mais il est bien difficile de donner des traits propres et individuels aux êtres purement possibles." 3dly, Dacier: "Il est difficile de traiter convenablement ces caractères que tout le monde peut inventer." Mde de Sévigné's opinion and translation, consisting of some thirty pages, I omit, particularly as M. Grouvelle observes, "La chose est bien remarquable, aucune de ces diverses interpretations ne parait être la véritable." But, by way of comfort, it seems, fifty years afterwards, Le lumineux Dumarsais," made his appearance, to set Horace on his legs again," dissiper tous les nuages, et concilier tous les dissentimens :' and some fifty years hence, somebody, still more luminous, will doubtless start up and demolish Dumarsais and his system on this weighty affair, as if he were no better than Ptolemy and Tycho, or his comments of no more consequence than astronomical calculations on the present comet. I am happy to say, "la longueur de la dissertation" of M. D. prevents M. G. from saying any more on the matter. A better poet than Boileau, and at least as good a scholar as Sévigné, has said,

"A little learning is a dangerous thing." And 'by this comparison of comments, it may be perceived how a good deal may be rendered as perilous to the proprietors.

17.

[There is more of poetry in these verses upon Milton than in any other passage throughout the paraphrase.— MOORE.]

18.

Harvey, the circulator of the circulation of the blood, used to fling away Virgil in his ecstasy of