description of love," O heavy lightness, serious vanity." This sort of elegant trifling seems not very consonant to our insular genius. Prior has succeeded in some instances, and Pope's Rape of the Lock is admirable in its kind, but has had no worthy successor. The writer before us, whom we presume to be a very young one, seems desirous to unite two very discordant kinds of excellence; the learned and witty burlesque of Hudibras, and the playful ease and graceful gaiety of Pope. These, however, are styles utterly incompatible. He has made the mistake of a school-boy about to fly his kite, who loads it so heavily, that it refuses to mount. But the blemishes and the merits of this singular poem will be best understood by specimens of each.

It is but candid to begin with some of the lines which are least encumbered with those ponderous ornaments, premising, however, that there is a curious infelicity in his narrative which leaves much for conjecture. In a philippic against luxury, in which he very justly points out, in language rather strong than elegant, the advantages of occasional fatigue and hard living, to give a more poignant relish to subsequent ease and enjoyment, there is something of a story illustrative of the sufferings of a military wanderer, obscurely begun and abruptly concluded, yet not without merit, and free from the cumbrous ornaments which puzzle and embarrass the unlearned reader through the progress of the poem. The following lines, which introduce the little narrative, have both strength and ease, and are a specimen of the author's best manner.

O ye, for whom, or Inigo or Wren, Adams or Gibbs, I care not who nor when, Has hung aloft the swelling cove in air, And bid those fluted shafts support it there, While Echo lodg'd within the vaulted round,

Tells where the noisy steps of Grandeur sound.

Ye on the fretted couch that silks inclose,
Who stretch your limbs in indolent repose,
On whose depictur'd blinds the intrusive ray
Peeps trembling in, and hesitates to play,
Lest with unmannerly reproof it seem
To chide the lingering sloth of matin

dream;

Ye whom the scorching sun unblushing

sees,

Scalding your tasteless tongues with ner

vous teas;

"Hear on this head the language of a friend."

Now, whether this be the detail of sufferings and wanderings given to the author by a friend who had become, as he says, "A volunteer par force,' or whether our poet was himself the hero of his own tale, and entitles himself our friend, from giving us this warning against similar imprudence, is hard to say, from the inartificial manner in which it is introduced. It is told, however, with spirit, and there is in this, and indeed in the whole, an air of originality one does not often meet with in the beaten track of poetry.

In that dark period, those atrocious times, When civil Frenchmen fell by civil crimes; When Rapine brooded o'er an impious

race,

And hatch'd dismay, disaster, and disgrace;

Around, tricoloured plumes, would Discord fling

And scatter seeds of horror from her wing.— Some high-born souls to Freedom's colours true,

Wav'd in their crest the independent blue; Some prostrate laid, in Honour's sanguine bed,

Found their light boast,-a feather dipt in red;

While those whose nerves, unfitted for the fight,

Bore, emblem of their fear, the sickly. white.

Scar'd in these days, by menace and reproof,

I quitted, first, my dear paternal roof :'Tis said that scalds are cur'd by scorching heat,

And those by scorpions bit must scorpions

eat:

From terror thus, in arms, my sole re

source,

And I became a volunteer par force; The barbarous musket o'er my shoulder threw,

Which, thanks to Heaven, no fellow-creature slew ;

The bursting knapsack round my neck I slung,

Where all this world's dependencies I hung.

I went, and wearily I pac'd along The hoof-worn track, my fainting comrades throng.

The soleless shoe on crippled feet they bind,

That crimson marks of misery leave behind;

Or boist'rous railers, with the jest profane, Revile their own and their companions' pain.

Why should I blush the sorry meal to tell, That oft regal'd, as glimmering evening

fell.

That softly steals beneath the ivory lid :So beams the moon, by fleecy clouds half hid,

Whose darkling edge contrasts the silver light ;

The ebon lashes of the eye of night, On some lone wand'rer, as she sheds her ray

Through tangled forests to direct his way I came, I saw, I kiss'd-the noble Dame In Friendship's lamp relumes the vivid flame.

The walls, the gloom-dispelling taper brightens,

The kindling hearth the flaring branch enlightens.

In hardest times, by her superior merit, Her independence she maintain'd with spirit;

In spite of man and all his erring reason,
Authority legitimate, and treason.
Her means she husbanded, though through
her reign

No husband shar'd, nor aw'd her fair domain :

No lordly spouse she owned-yet had a head

scrawl:

The warrior chairs repair'd with oaken pegs, Their fractur'd arms and splinter'd wooden legs;

From my worn arm, the iron arm I threw,
And to her open arms enraptur'd flew :
Her tender hands around my neck supply
My wallet's bands-a more endearing tye!

fill,

With glowing fumes the fine medulla thrill,
Then through the nice alembic of the brain
Descend in drops-of gratitude again,
And sensibility, with glist'ning eye,
Repays the feast of Hospitality-
Such is of contrast the bewitching fruit,
Now well recruited-but no more recruit
I rise a hero-to the skies I soar,
And batteries of grape affright no more!
pp. 5-13.

There is, to be sure, some quaintness here, and the hospitable lady appears in a somewhat questionable form. We should hear either more or less about her, before we could decide whether her intents were wicked or charitable. We, however, are inclined to be charitable, and suppose the lady, his countrywoman, receiving him with all the cordiality of mere friendly kindness. The transition from this story to the dessert is as abrupt as may be, and here the faults (juvenile faults we hope) of our poet's style appear in full magnitude, and he becomes so ultra-classical, that, on many occasions, "the line too labours, and the words move slow," burdened as they are with sounds of no familiar use, or ready pronunciation.

There are a few easy sprightly lines free of this chiaro-scuro, referring to an ode which it seems the King of Prus

VOL. V.

sia addressed to his cook, the Sieur Noel. How important a person this artist was to the royal epicure, (not to say glutton,) any one who has read Zimmerman's account of his medical attendance on the last days of the great Frederick human being burdened with disease, may understand. To see a and drawing near the awful confines of that eternity from which he wished to shrink into mere oblivion, defeating all the efforts of his physicians to soften his misery by gross and forbidden indulgence in extravagant quantities of high seasoned and indipains that he suffered in consequence gestible food, though the excessive forced him, in three hours after these interdicted meats, to have recourse to the most powerful aperient medicines, is indeed melancholy. This curious narrative of Zimmerman's is of undoubted authority, being published immediately after the king's death, when there were many eye-witnesses of all that passed, very ready to correct any mis-statements. The good professor means neither satire nor ridicule by the plain detail given of the duct of his patient. remedies he prescribed, and the conSo far otherwise, that he appears to have approached him with a kind of blind adoration, and a most entire conviction that the king could do no wrong. He gives the most revolting and disgusting instances of this same king's propensity to indulge his appetite, conceal that indulgence from his medical attendtal coarseness, imputing to their ignoants, and then insult them with brurance or mismanagement, the consequence of his own sordid indulgence.

At some other time we shall enter

tain our readers with a few extracts from this curious narrative, in which of the philosophical and pious Doctor the devoted humility and simplicity is finely contrasted with the tyrannical caprice of the dying epicure,-who, moreover, died and made no sign. In the meantime, we shall insert the

the redoubted Sieur Noel.

lines which celebrate his celebration of

'Twas thus that he to latest times bequeath'd,

He, round whose front the bays and parThat rhym'd eulogium of the Sieur Noel, sley wreath'd, Illustrious hand, that with unerring art, The maitre, pride, and pearl of his hotel. The bolt of war or satire's shaft could dart;

E

Now, having done justice to some of his happier efforts, we shall instance some lines, that, if they do not require a comment, will, at least, even in this all-educating age, make young ladies at pause for explanation,— "Lo in this fine coagulated lymph, Which draws the eye of each admiring nymph."

I do not know that many of these admiring nymphs would recognise their old acquaintance Cheese under this name, or, if they should, I am not sure that it would engross much of their admiration amidst the display of far fetched and highly decorated viands that adorn The Dessert. The two following lines throw a dubious light over this same lymph.

"Tumultuous myriads rush upon the sight,

A mighty nation not a mouthful quite." The ornaments of the Dessert are thus described:

Amours of Sappho, Werter, Abelard;
Of Ovid, of Propertius, and Tibullus,
Candied and clarifi'd the sweet Catullus;
Group'd with Lestrygones the Laocoon,
Phyllis, her almond-tree and Demophoon,
A coal-brown Proserpine and black Co-
ronis,

Hoary with frost young Cycnus and Ado

nis.

Here Asia's florid birds, her ape and monkey,

And there Silenus on unsaddled donkey Astride Bucephalus, young Ammon enters With sirens, elephants, and hippocentaurs. pp. 18, 19.

Then we have

This needless parade of learning, and the conflicting powers of mind grasping, as we have mentioned before, at objects incompatible with each other, throw an air of indistinctness and labour over the whole.

Where something of great importance or deep interest is to be unfolded in poetry, the power of the subject illuminates the style in which it is conveyed. Our attention is kept up, and our expectation excited by the events or characters, and we unconsciously make exertions to penetrate obscurity, or disentangle perplexity,

coat;

and afterwards,

Yes, come, Lyæus, leave thy lucid rills,
Thy ivy borders and vindemial hills;
Come seat thee here in presidential chair,
On stain'd morocco and elastic hair :
Come share the heat of our carbonic fire,
And with true warmth thy votaries inspire,
&c.
p. 22,

where a lighter theme produced a less eager and serious interest. A song or a light ludicrous or playful satire must have nothing involved or perplexed, every sentence must have point, neatness, and ease, and the meaning must be obvious at the first glance.

No one thinks it worth while to ponder and pause over trifles whose

merit consists in polish and transparency. This Dessert might not improperly be served up after the feast that Smollet describes, as an imitation of a Roman repast, given by the learned Doctor to his friends at Paris. The Dessert is followed by the Tea. Here we hoped that where the theme is still lighter, the very title of it suggesting images of tranquil gaiety, social ease, and agreeable trifling, we should no longer be encumbered with hard words, or perplexed with intricacies of expression. It begins hopefully

Ambrosial plants! that from the east and

tongue,

our

That oft the Muse inspire, remain unsung?
Enlivening, mild, and sociable Tea !
Scandal-compelling Green, Pekoe, Bohea;
Without thee once Philosophy could write,
And wisdom's page the moral pen indite :
Without thee thesmothetes their laws en-
acted,
pp. 47, 48.

Here our poet's wings are again clogged by his learning. How many lovely and even literary tea-drinkers may be puzzled by the last line, we cannot say. But certainly some easier term may be found among the many which denote the law-makers and law-breakers who exercised all their functions for without drinkages ing tea.

Some search the scorched Savannas of

Sabea,

For sun burnt draughts from spicy Nabathea.

Query, Are there or can there be -Savannas in Sabea?

The line immediately following certainly seems to mean something, but we cannot exactly say what.

They are well accustomed both to give and receive such, though seldom in a strain so peculiar as that which closes "The Tea." Here it follows. Shall I of all the tribe erratic seen, The morsure of their fangs escape alone?— To haunt the slippery falls of Hippocrene, Their mouths I cannot shut, I can my

own.

Our morsure, however deprecated, is certainly well meant. We do by no means depreciate the author's powers; on the contrary, we only regret the misapplication of so much vigour of thought, and affluence of language. His muse is dressed like a Grecian beauty of Rhodes or Cyprus, who, instead of slight and well fancied ornaments in her daily dress, wears strings of sequins about her neck, from not knowing to distinguish what is elegant from what is merely costly. Here we have materials, that with good management might turn to considerable account, lost in gorgeous confusion and heavy littleness. Yet this is no hopeless case. On the contrary, it is exactly one of those which may derive benefit from the pruning knife of the well-meaning critic. We much oftener meet with that correct insipidity which affords little room for censure, and none at all for praise ; here much is to be blamed, but merely on the score of redundance and bad taste. There is nothing tame or feeble, nothing indicative of a propensity to subsist on charity, and gather

the crumbs below the tables of the wealthier dwellers on Parnassus, to use a little of his own phraseology; he is sufficiently bold and original, and when he is content to speak pure English, and learns the value of simplicity in arranging his ornaments, we may expect something that shall not only escape the morsure of our fangs, but exhilarate us like

“Enlivening, mild, and sociable tea.' ,,

The Rose that is brought in after tea is abundantly beautiful and fragrant, and the lines that describe it are spirited, and not void of grace and

sweetness.

mind.

That a few hard words should be assigned to critics is easily pardoned.

LIFE OF COLONEL GARDINER.

[The following very judicious Observa tions, written by a sound and pious di̟