our great dramatist: the writer, "parcus theatri cultor et infrequens," labours under the disadvantage of knowing more of Shakspeare in the closet than on the stage; and an intelligent actor or spectator will find himself probably more able to sound the depths of Shakspeare than a mere private reader; the illusion of the scene and clever byeplay stand in more stead than book-learning, in order to comprehend the heart of' Fancy's child.'

One is apprehensive of saying any thing about an author, on whom so much has been written, for fear of stumbling unawares on the remark of some other scribe, and so falling into the hands of the Philistines, on a charge of plagiarism; (indeed this remark is of almost universal application:) otherwise, we might hazard a mention of the great inequalities of Shakspeare, nihil unquam sic dispar sibi; nay, of his occasional mediocrity, Indignor, quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus: we might also burst out into ecstatic praise of passages in which he has mastered passion, and exhausted poetry. But these things have been done so often, that the reader will be thankful to be left alone with his Shakspearian meditations.

CERVANTES.

IF to have been wise Europe's pioneer

To truth, and sense, and better aims of life,-
If by thy satire's keen and caustic knife
To have had Ercles' might to lop and sear
The stolid hydra-heads of errant strife,
If these be worth a passing grateful thought,
Take it, Cervantes; we have few like thee
Full of right-minded wit, that wounds not aught
But folly, with its cutting gaiety:

Thanks to thy prison, that its dullness wrought
A lasting humorous good; the crazy knight,
His shrewd rough squire, and those unheard-of deeds,
Whereat the schoolboy shouts with huge delight,
And the philosopher wonders as he reads.

The monstrous notion of knighterrantry was still flourishing in Spain, when Cervantes Saavedra published Don Quixote, A. D. 1608, in the sixtieth year of his age. This work, more than any other, as well from its intrinsic merits, as from its entire suitability to the genius of the people to whom it is addressed, redeemed from the follies of adventurous heroism the romantic Spaniards. Cervantes published also thirty-eight dramas, many poems, and fourteen short novels, second only to Boccacio's, but all his genius could not raise his condition above its original poverty. He was never out of want, though he saw the various fates of a brave soldier, a successful dramatist, a secluded poet, an Algerine slave, and a writer famous throughout Europe: for lack of occupation, rather than hope of gain, he composed Don Quixote in a debtors' prison at Seville, reaped from it no advantage, was persecuted for his good fame, lived a humble dependent on a patron, the Comte de Lemos, dropped out of life unobserved, and was buried at Madrid in his sixty-eighth year, without the least mark of respect, and reposes there even now unhonoured by a common tombstone to his memory. Like Chatterton he lived most poor, like Bunyan, and Raleigh, wrote as a captive, like Ot

way died destitute, and like Butler, (till forty years after death, when Alderman Barber furnished the monument in Westminster Abbey,)-was thrown into the earth without the common Hic jacet. Such is the fortune of genius.

It would seem indeed that Schiller's poem on the partition of the earth is little short of being seriously true, for even when such a master-hand as that of "the wizard of the North" has had power to turn all it touched into gold, and has reaped the well-earned harvest of affluence, misfortune sweeps away the temporal treasure and leaves the poet bare. It would seem that, with far too even-handed justice, the world is content enough to give the wages of renown for the labours of intellect, repaying the pleasure which it experiences from a Scott, a Burns, or a Cervantes, with the pleasure it communicates by fame and approbation. The man whose writings have enlarged the mind, gladdened the heart, and cheered the day of sorrow, as only known spiritually, is apportioned a spiritual sustenance. Alexander, who never slept without a copy of Homer under his pillow, might have grudged an obolus to the mendicant bard; and the great nation, which owes the major part of its literary glories to Miguel de Cervantes, in death, as in life, have rewarded him with nothing but his fame.

HARVEY.

THE life which is the blood: O heedless men, How often unbelieving have ye heard

The side-dropp'd hints, that strew the written Word: The fountain-heart, that pours the stream of life; The circling wheel that sends it back agen

By vessels manifold; ye might have learned From the fool's scorn, a guide that never err'd, Without the clumsier aid of scalpel-knife,

These truths for ages, had ye but discerned The book of God with natural wisdom rife: Still, Harvey, be thy patient genius praised, The shrewdness of thy well-digested plan, Whose hand the strangely-woven curtain raised That veil the mysteries of life from man.