Let us see by what fine links they have now bound themselves to the great chain descending down and down," that begins with a few half crazed drivellers and libellers of higher estate, and ends in the fraternal embrace of the exhumator of Tom Paine's bones, and the hero of the red cap and the white feather of Manchester. The Edinburgh Reviewers cry up Mr John Cam Hobhouse as a noble English writer, and an accomplished advocate of the cause of liberty all over the world-they differ, indeed, from Mr John Cam Hobhouse in regard to a few matters of speculation-but he is grateful for what they give-and the Edinburgh Review is introduced, with his good word, into all the pamphlet clubs of Smithfield and Westminster; or if you prefer another channel of communication There is nothing so low and base in the whole world of plebeian profligacy with which the great genius of the North can now deny his connection -and assuredly, unless he be a true ATLAS, the burden to which he has voluntarily submitted, his shoulders, will be found too much for him. Who is so stupid, as not to see what is meant by all this fine talk, about the "more copious infusion of democracy"-the" approaching final struggle all over the world"-" the advocates of hierarchy-and legitimacy, or tyranny, or by whatever name it may be called," &c. &c.? These words will be echoed with equal delight in every radical weaving shop, from Manchester to Paisley-and it was meant that they should be so. Is he who sits calmly on the hill-top and issues the signal for the work of death, less a rebel, and less a traitor, than the poor mechanical butcher that bares his arm and whets his knife for the actual onset? Is a man to be spared, nay, courted and flattered, only because he wields the pen of a pretty writer, and can half disguise his purpose beneath gaudy trappings of longwinded declamation? Is insinuation a less deadly weapon than assertion?-it is only a more safe and elegant one. When a certain Edinburgh Reviewer talked of the late Spanish revolution, as "sounding a note that would be heard from Cadiz to KIRKWALL," was he less sensibly, less tangibly, a stirrer up of sedition, than Sir Francis Burdett was, when he wrote his famous Leicestershire letter, about the soldiers that deserted James the second? The world has been long enough gulled with smooth phrases-the time, I trust, is not far distant, when "he that tears off the mistletoe, shall be held," as the Druid law ran, an enemy to the sacred oak;" when the evil that is intended, if not produced, sæpe cadendo," shall be met and arranged as it ought to be, vi. 66 This article on the civil list, is really an abominable mixture of hypocrisy and malice. June 9th.-Mr Bridges called on me, and shewed me a letter from the Ettrick Shepherd, descriptive of his marriage. I am very sorry my friend Dr Morris had left Scotland before this interesting ceremony took place, as it unquestionably would have formed a much finer conclusion to his book, than any presbyterian sacrament that ever was celebrated in kirk or field. The marriage took place in Dumfriesshire, at the house of the bride's father, and there also the happy pair remained till next morning. The transition to Ettrick was performed on the morrow by the principal personages in four gigs. The first gig contained Mr and Mrs Hogg-the best man and best maid occupied the second gigthe third was filled by the two Messrs Bryden-and in the fourth sat the Shepherd's faithful black servant, in a new suit of the Hogg livery. They dined at the cottage of Altrive, and next day the solemn kirking took place at Yarrow kirk, the minister choosing for his text the following passage: "Blessed is the man whom thou honourest and causest to approach unto thee." Seriously I am rejoiced to hear of my worthy friend's excellent fortune-he has married, according to every account, a most amiable, prudent, and intelligent woman-and may he be as happy with her (his best friend could say nothing more strongly) as he deserves. I hope, however, his domestic felicity will form no obstacle in the way of his literary labours. His Jacobite Songs are collected with much judgment, and illustrated with much curious matter in the shape of notes; and with his 1 Tales I am quite delighted. They so great a measure the effects of unforare infinitely superior to the Brownie tunate circumstance, and juxta-posiof Bodsbeck in variety, in invention, tion, but which, at the same time, in every thing that ought to constitute were irreconcileable with the possesthe praise of a novelist. When one sion of many qualities, for which thinks of Hogg, and of the silent but Burns, as we may gather from his sure progress of his fame-or of Al- writings, would fain have obtained lan Cunningham, and of the hold he has credit. Burns was a dissipated licentaken of the heart of Scotland almost tious man-capable of all good feelwithout being aware of it himself-one ings, but just as capable of outraging cannot help feeling some qualms con- them, when the temptation of wit, cerning the late enormous puffing of the wine, or woman interfered. This is Northamptonshire peasant, John Clare. all that his friends or his foes can say I have never seen Clare's book, but of him-and surely, they are not the from all the extracts I have seen, and best friends of his memory, who are from all the private accounts I have continually trying to make that a subheard, there can be no doubt Clare is ject of debate and dispute, whereon a man of talents and a man of virtue; the whole world has long since come but as to poetical genius, in the higher to be of one way of thinking. The and the only proper sense of that Reverend Hamilton Paul's book is a word, I fear it would be very difficult most absurd one-so are all books to shew that he deserves half the fuss written by clergymen, that do not that has been made. Smoothness of know or feel what is the nature of versification and simplicity of thought their clerical office. Drinking and seem to be his chief merits; but alas! many others of Burns's faults, are sure in these days these are not enough to to find enough of defenders in the command or to justify such a sounding world, without the interference of of the trumpet. The Guardian takes parish-priests-and as to the blaspheby far the best view of this subject my of many of Burns' allusions, it is Clare has exhibited powers that not really quite an insult to common only justify but demand attention and sense to attempt their defence. This kindness-but his generous and en- Mr Paul, however, is, I am told, lightened patrons ought to pause ere something not to be despised in the they advise him to become any thing shape of a wit himself-in particular, else than a peasant-for a respectable he peasant is a much more comfortable man, and always will be so, than a mediocre poet. Let them pause and think of the fate of the far more highly-gifted Burns, and beware alike of the foolish zeal and the sinful neglect of his countrymen.By the way, what a noise has been made about this new edition of Burns, by the minister of the united parishes of Broughton, Glenholm, and Kilbucko-the Reverend Hamilton Paul. It seems, there was some idea of bringing this unhappy edition before the last General Assembly; but nothing surely could be more ill-judged, than such a proceeding. No clergyman that has any sense of what befits his own office, will ever write a life of Burns-for, if he says what he ought to say, he will throw a damp upon his theme-and if he does not, he will infallibly injure himself. Everybody understands the character of Burns now-a-days-and nobody but a fool, will ever attempt, either to exagger ate or extenuate errors, which were in is a reviver of Dean Swift's old walk of wit, the choice of texts. For example, when he left the town of Ayr, where he was understood to have been a great favourite with the fair sex, he preached his valedictory sermon from this passage," and they all fell upon Paul's neck, and kissed him.” Another time, when he was called on to preach before a regiment of sharpshooters, who came to church in their bottle-green uniforms, he held forth from, "and I beheld men like trees, walking." He has also published a little volume of jeux d'esprit, under the name of " Paul's Epistle to the ladies," I hope he did not mean to the Corinthians, in the Aristophanic sense of that term. έπαιραι Κορινθίαι κακιςαι.” Plutus, Act. 3. But the General Assembly ought to leave all these matters to the Christian Instructor, and Blackwood's Magazine. These are, in regard to all such matters, the best safeguards of the church. I had forgot to mention, that Mr Paul once made serious proposals to a up her ears could she hear me say so, young lady, whose christian name was that to this hour the manse of BroughLydia. On this occasion our reverend ton boasts no mistress. There is plenfriend took for his text, "And a cer- ty of trout-fishing, &c. in his neightain woman, named Lydia, heard us; bourhood-and I mean to advise whose heart the Lord opened, that Ebony to pitch his tent there this she attended unto the things which summer for a week or so. With Dr were spoken of Paul." Acts xvi. 14. Scott and Captain Odoherty the miniIt is to be supposed, however, that he ster would find himself quite at home had been over-estimating his own pro--and every overture of bottle or cupgress in the suit; for I believe, and board would be acceptable to both. no doubt many a spinster would prick CHEVY CHACE, FITTE THE SECOND; IDEM LATINE REDDITUM. MR EDITOR, As you have been so kind as to call my version of the first fitte of Chevy Chace by the flattering title of "beautiful," I think myself bound in courtesy to give you the second. The poetical, philological, and antiquarian world, will, I doubt not, rejoice at this my determination, and receive with due rapture the chivalrous though somewhat rudely equipped ballad of the exploits of the Percy and the Douglas, dressed up by me in the lordly language of imperial Rome. You see I am not afraid of praising myself or my productions. Great men, sir, despise such squeamishness. Does not Sir James Edward Smyth, in his attack on Cambridge, honestly avow, as his opinion, that the university is disgraced for ever-that the public interest and the cause of science are irreparably injured-by the rejection of the first botanist of Europe, (i. e. himself) from the chair of the botanical professor in our alma mater apud Cantabrigienses? Does not the Reverend Mr Maturin, in an account of his life, written by himself, in the New Monthly Magazine, (March 1819. p. 165-7) describe himself as a poet-some of whose writings "have scarce a parallel in English dramatic poetry"-an" unequalled novelist"-an unusually" handsome fellow-the gayest of the gay"-and "the most uxorious man breathing." Does not Mr Brougham puff himself in the Edinburgh Review? Does not Professor Leslie always tack "the celebrated" to his own name in that celebrated Journal? Is not the same done by Mr L. Hunt in the Examiner ? By Mr Cobbett, the Atlas of England, in his Political Register? By Mr Morgan Odoherty in Blackwood's Magazine? By Mr Kean in the bills of old Drury? By Dr Solomon, and Mr T. Bish, and Mr Napier Macvey every where? And shall I, with these bright and venerable names before me, (to say nothing of the polished example of Day and Martin), be afraid to utter, in a letter of my own, a sentence of panegyric on my own versiculi? 66 Now, should any malignant critic-any malevolus vetus poeta-venture to say in opposition to my own favourable critique, that my Latin is not Virgilian or Ciceronian-that my verses have sometimes a hitch in their gait—I shall merely answer, that however ungracious they may seem to his fastidious eyes and ears, they would have been as musical and grammatical in the opinion of the shaveling Latinists of the date of this ballad, as they are now acceptable from their other excellencies to the true judges of poetry. If this answer will not satisfy my objector, I can only pity the opacity of his intellect. But you, O more sensible readers, will peruse my verses with favourable eyes-not tormenting yourselves about the minute dovetailings of syntax, or the metrical ictus, or any other such buffoonery-but reading the words just as you find them set down for you in the honest old English manner, laying your accents a la mode Anglaise without any regard for the dicta of Dawes or Bentley, and pronouncing the letters (both vowels and consonants) as if they were members of the Christian alphabet of the ever to be beloved language of merry England; doing this, you will do well: and so my hearty service to vou, good people, and to you, sir, of whom I am the most obedient and very humble servant, VOL. VII. 2S O. P. I have, as before, modernized the spelling of the old ballad, and in a few places the language. (1) i. e. First Flight. Percy. (2) Dr Carey (Prowdy, p. 199, &c.) Condemns this licence. I therefore give him leave to alter my systolated præterites into preterpluperfects, as he has done in all the passages which stand in the way of his rule. I have no doubt that he will discover some new picturesque mood and tense beauty in the change, quite unknown to the author. (3) I hope I have hit the sense of my original. (4) Perhaps many plies or folds. Monyple is still used in this sense in the north, according to Mr Lambe.' Bp. Percy. I have followed him. (5) Swords made of Milan Steel. Percy. (6) Græce. Aúrgov Ennius uses it, or rather its plural, lytra, as the name of a play concerning the ransom of Hector's body. If this be not thought sufficient authority, the reader may substitute prælium in the text, with all my heart. Hugo Montgomoræus hunc Et equitavit fortiter Per sagittarios centum ; Persæum gravi vulnere 19. Exivit ulnæ spatio; Non tenuit ulla natio. Tres pedes longum calamum (7) From this it appears that Jerry-Benthamism is of an older date than the superficial commonly imagine. Fight-you-my-merry-men-while-you-may-for-my-life-days-aregone; or, as the original has it, Fyghte-ye-my-merry-men-whylles-ye-may-for-my-lyffdays-ben-gan is as pretty a single word as any we can find in the lucid pages of this most Euphuistical radical, and most radical Euphuist, who commonly passes in our days for the inventor of the many-words-clubbing-to-make-one style. We have here a much older authority; so that Jerry must be set down as one of the servum pecus in that instance. |