Reptile accurs'd !-O memorable long, 255 So may thy varied verse, from age to age, Inform the simple, and delight the sage! While canker'd Weston, and his loathsome rhymes, Stink in the nose of all succeeding times! 261 NOTES. blind and outrageous mercenary now so laboriously employed in it. Whatever be the design, the proceedings are by no means inconsistent with the plan of a work which may not unaptly be styled THE CHARNEL-HOUSE OF REPUTATION, and which, from the days of Lauder to the present, has delighted to asperse every thing ve nerable amongst us which accused Swift of lust, and Addison of drunkenness; which insulted the ashes of Toup while they were yet warm, and gibbeted poor Henderson alive; which affected to idolize the great and good Howard, while idolatry was painful to him; and the moment he fell, gloriously fell, in the exercise of the most sublime virtue, attempted to stigmatise him as a brute and a monster! (u) Enough. But where (for these, you seem to say, Are samples of the high, heroic lay) Where are the soft, the tender strains, that call (u)Quidnam igitur tenerum et laxa cervice legendum Torva Mimalloneis implerunt cornua bombis, NOTES. * Canst thou, Matilda, &c. (vide Album, vol. ii.) -Matilda! " nay then, I'll never trust a madman "again." It was but a few minutes since, that Mr. Merry died for the love of Laura Maria; and now is he going to do the same thing for the love of Anną Matilda? What the ladies may say to such a swain, I know not; but certainly he is too prone to run wild, die, &c. &c. Such indeed is the combustible nature of this gentleman, that he takes fire at every female signature in the papers and I remember, that when Olauda Equiano, (who, for a black, is not ill-featured) tried his hand at a soft sonnet, and by mistake subscribed it Olauda, Mr. Merry fell so desperately in love with him, and "yelled out such syllables of dolour" in consequence of it, that "the pitiful-hearted" negrą “O rash, severe decree! my maddening brain "Cannot the ponderous agony sustain; "But forth I rush, from vale to mountain run, 270 "And with my mind's thick gloom obscure the sun.” (v) Heavens! if our ancient vigour were not fled, Could VERSE like this be written, or be read? VERSE! THAT's the mellow fruit of toil intense, Inspir'd by genius, and inform'd by sense; THIS, the abortive progeny of Pride Begotten without thought, born without pains, 275 Et raptum vitulo caput ablatura superbo (v) Hæc fierent, si testiculi vena ulla paterni Hoc natat in labris: et in udo est Mænas et Atin; NOTES. was frightened at the mischief he had done, and transmitted in all haste the following correction to the editor" For OlaudA, please to read Olaud0, the black "MAN." : F. (w) So let it be and yet, methinks, my friend, Silence were wise, where satire will not mend. Why wound the feelings of our noble youth, And grate their tender ears with odious truth? 281 And hate the man who tells 'em they are wrong. 285 (w) Sed quid opus teneras mordaci radere vero Auriculas vide sis, ne majorum tibi forte Limina frigescant: sonat hîc de nare canina NOTES. * Of this spes altera Romae, this second hope of the age, the following stanzas will afford a sufficient specimen. They are taken from a ballad which Mr. Bell, an admirable judge of these matters, calls a very "mellifluous one; easy, artless, and unaffected." Softly steals the bird of night, "Whither now in silence bending, Your fate already I foresee. My Lord With cold respect will freeze you from his board; NOTES. "Seeking some kind hand to guide thee 66 Wistful turns thy fearful eye; "Trembling as the willows hide thee, "Shelter'd from thʼ inclement sky." The story of this poor owl, who was at one and the same time at sea and on land, silent and noisy, sheltered and exposed, is continued through a few more of these "mellifluous" stanzas: which the reader, I doubt not, will readily forgive me for omitting; more especially if he reads the ORACLE, a PAPER honoured -as the grateful editor very properly has it — by the effusions of this "artless" gentleman above all others. N. B. On looking again, I find the own to be a Nightingale.-N'importe. It was said of Theophilus Cibber (I think by Goldsmith), that as he grew older, he grew never the better. Much the same (mutatis mutandis) may be said of the gentlemen of the Baviad. After an interval of two years, I find the “ mellifduous”ARNO celebrating Mrs. Robinson's Novel in strains like these: |