be, an aristocracy of poets,' add and insert these words -'I do not mean that they should write in the style of the song by a person of quality, or parle euphuism; but there is a nobility of thought and expression to be found no less in Shakspeare, Pope, and Burns, than in Dante, Alfieri,' etc. etc. and so on. Or, if you please, perhaps you had better omit the whole of the latter digression on the vulgar poets, and insert only as far as the end of the sentence on Pope's Homer, where I prefer it to Cowper's, and quote Dr Clarke in favour of its accuracy. Upon all these points, take an opinion; take the sense (or nonsense) of your learned visitants, and act thereby. I am very tractable—in PROSE. Whether I have made out the case for Pope, I know not; but I am very sure that I have been zealous in the attempt. If it comes to the proofs, we shall beat the blackguards. I will show more imagery in twenty lines of Pope than in any equal length of quotation in English poesy, and that in places where they least expect it. For instance, in his lines on Sporus,—now, do just read them over-the subject is of no consequence (whether it be satire or epic) --we are talking of poetry and imagery from nature and art. Now, mark the images separately and arithmetically : 1. The thing of silk. 2. Curd of ass's milk. 3. The butterfly. 5. Bug with gilded wings. 6. Painted child of dirt. 7. Whose buzz. 8. Well-bred spaniels. 9. Shallow streams run dimpling. 10. Florid impotence. II. Prompter. Puppet squeaks. 12. The ear of Eve. 13. Familiar toad. 14. Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad. 15. Fop at the toilet. 16. Flatterer at the board. 17. Amphibious thing. 18. Now trips a lady. 19. Now struts a lord. 22. The Rabbins. 23. Pride that licks the dust Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust; «Now, is there a line of all the passage without the most forcible imagery (for his purpose)? Look at the variety at the poetry of the passage—at the imagination: there is hardly a line from which a painting might not be made, and is. But this is nothing in comparison with his higher passages in the Essay on Man, and many of his other poems, serious and comic. There never was such an unjust outcry in this world as that which these fellows are trying against Pope. « Ask Mr Gifford if, in the fifth act of the Doge,' you could not contrive (where the sentence of the Veil is passed) to insert the following lines in Marino Faliero's answer? But let it be so. It will be in vain : The veil which blackens o'er this blighted name, Which glitter round it in their painted trappings, « Yours truly, etc. « P.S.-Upon public matters here I say little: you will all hear soon enough of a general row throughout Italy. There never was a more foolish step than the expedition to Naples by these fellows. "I wish to propose to Holmes, the miniature painter, to come out to me this spring. I will pay his expenses, and any sum in reason. I wish him to take my daughter's picture (who is in a convent) and the Countess G.'s, and the head of a peasant girl, which latter would make a study for Raphael. It is a complete peasant face, but an Italian peasant's, and quite in the Raphael Fornarina style. Her figure is tall, but rather large, and not at all comparable to her face, which is really superb. She is not seventeen, and I am anxious to have her face while it lasts. Madame G. is also very handsome, but it is quite in a different style-completely blonde and fair—very uncommon in Italy; yet not an English fairness, but more like a Swede or a Norwegian. Her figure, too, particularly the bust, is uncommonly good. It must be Holmes: I like him because he takes such inveterate likenesses. There is a war here; but a solitary traveller, with little baggage, and nothing to do with politics, has nothing to fear. Pack him up in the Diligence. Don't forget."> · These lines,—perhaps from some difficulty in introducing them,— were never inserted in the Tragedy. LETTER CCCCXVII. TO MR HOPPNER. " Ravenna, April 3d, 1821. " Thanks for the translation. I have sent you some books, which I do not know whether you have read or no-you need not return them, in any case. I enclose you also a letter from Pisa. I have neither spared trouble nor expense in the care of the child; and as she was now four years old complete, and quite above the control of the servants-and as a man living without any woman at the head of his house cannot much attend to a nursery—I had no resource but to place her for a time (at a high pension too) in the convent of Bagna-Cavalli (twelve miles off), where the air is good, and where she will, at least, have her learning advanced, and her morals and religion inculcated. I had also another reason;-things were and are in such a state here, that I had no reason to look upon my own personal safety as particularly insurable; and I thought the infant best out of harm's way, for the present. I « It is also fit that I should add that I by no means intended, nor intend, to give a natural child an English education, because with the disadvantages of her birth, her after settlement would be doubly difficult. Abroad, with a fair foreign education and a portion of five or six thousand pounds, she might and may marry very With such anxiety did he look to this essential part of his daughter's education, that notwithstanding the many advantages she was sure to derive from the kind and feminine superintendence of Mrs Shelley, his apprehensions lest her feeling upon religious subjects might be disturbed by the conversation of Shelley himself prevented him from allowing her to remain under his friend's roof. respectably. In England such a dowry would be a pittance, while elsewhere it is a fortune. It is, besides, my wish that she should be a Roman Catholic, which I look upon as the best religion, as it is assuredly the oldest of the various branches of Christianity. I have now explained my notions as to the place where she now is -it is the best I could find for the present; but I have no prejudices in its favour. « I do not speak of politics, because it seems a hopeless subject, as long as those scoundrels are to be permitted to bully states out of their independence. Believe me « Yours ever and truly. « P.S.—-There is a report here of a change in France; but with what truth is not yet known. « P.S.—My respects to Mrs H. I have the ‘best opinion' of her countrywomen; and at my time of life (three-and-thirty, 22d January, 1821), that is to say, after the life I have led, a good opinion is the only rational one which a man should entertain of the whole sex:-up to thirty, the worst possible opinion a man can have of them in general, the better for himself. Afterwards, it is a matter of no importance to them, nor to him either, what opinion he entertains-his day is over, or, at least, should be. « You see how sober I am become.” LETTER CCCCXVIII. TO MR MURRAY. « Ravenna, April 21st, 1821. «I enclose you another letter on Bowles. But I premise that it is not like the former, and that I am not |