Parrots, who learn their only song by rote, And prate for ever in a borrowed note. E'en now, what numbers strive in vain to soar Where Scott and Campbell led the way before! 140 Didactic Bards could once the town engage, With "Pleasures" drugg'd, now "Lays" are all the rage. Croker, and all the swarm who " write with ease," Mitford, and Holford*, modern Sapphos, please Fantastic readers, that with equal eye 145 View'd Hayley'st drawling verse and Wordsworth's lullaby. NOTES. * Miss Mitford is authoress of "Christina, or the Maid of the South Seas;" and Miss Holford, of "Wallace, or the Fight of Falkirk;" both written in humble imitation of Mr. Scott, and "very pretty" poems" in their way.” + Mr. Hayley has left the "genus irritabile vatum" Nunc veterum libris, nunc somno et inertibus horis Ducere sollicitæ jucunda oblivia vitæ, Still, with the greatest, titled * Grenville vies, Whom awed Plebeians mark aspiring rise, Or, in other words, NOTES. ......every wheel of that unwearied mill That turn'd ten thousand verses, now stands still. * From Moore so lashed, example fit, Such was the advice of Green. But, alas! it is all in vain. If the plentiful supply of satirical acid, which has been administered to the literary offenders of this and the last century, had produced any effect in preventing others from catching the contagion, I should not have had the trouble of wading through the pages of the Right Honorable Lord George Grenville. I would willingly believe that Lord G66 -'s peccatum" is, like that of Terence, "imprudentia" Poetæ non qui furtum facere studueritt. But I am sadly afraid that his lordship's Muse has addicted herself to the bad habits of " picking and stealing," till she has lost + Prol. ad Terent. Eunuch. Blend, with some scraps from high Parnassus caught, The trite description, and the hackney'd thought; NOTES. all idea of "the difference between meum and tuum." In support of this opinion I have subjoined a few extracts from "Portugal;" and for further proofs, refer to the poem itself, from page 1 to the end. Then, fathering verse by nobler Poets writ, (An ample Plagiarist, tho' half-form'd Wit) NOTES. Is this your triumph? this your proud applause? Pleasures of Hope. The noontide breeze that swept the peopled heath, The wind's last breath had toss'd in air, The next but swept a lone hill-side, The sun's last glance was glinted back From spear and glaive, from targe and jack,— The next, all unreflected, shone On bracken green, and cold grey stone. The Lady of the Lake. The wolf steals trembling from the mountain glade, The fleet stag bounds from out his covert shade, |