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What object, save a very malicious one, could the Writer have in view, in giving publicity to this miserable attempt at satirical exposure? The sentiments are probably correctly given; the dialogue is either fabricated or distorted; the comments are his own. We repress the feelings excited by a representation which disgraces no one but the Author, and content ourselves with intreating him, if such a man there be,' for his own sake, to cultivate a different spirit, and not to constitute himself the judge of his own works, nor to get into an ill-temper with men who take the very venial liberty of forming and expressing their own opinion. We offer these suggestions in a friendly mood, and by no means with the disposition to oppress a fallen man: but of this more hereafter. The remainder of this tale of wretchedness relates, mainly, to the Author's efforts to come before the public, in various ways, but with almost invariable ill-success. We give another passage of a similar cast to that last quoted.

Again I reached London, and again I pursued the same course with the booksellers, and with the same success. Mr. Murray, per note, was sorry my poem did not suit him. Longman and Co. disdainfully returned the MSS. as if they were unworthy to remain under their roof, though backed by the repeated recommendations of Mr. Warner of Bath, a gentleman well known for his erudition and valuable writings in the republic of letters. Baldwin would not give me the trouble to call again, it being no use to leave any papers, as poetry had seen its day and was now getting quite out of fashion, except short pieces which were luxuriously voluptuous, or blasphemously libellous. By the head of the house of Taylor and Hessey, I was most politely told, that my MSS. had been read by one of the firm, and found to contain no real poetry, not single specimen of genuine talent; and that even if they had, the work would be of no use to them, unless, in accordance with the taste of the present day, I could prove myself to be an absolute clown, and some great character would take upon him to assert that I had no more education or manners than a coal-heaver gentlemen's poetry was of no use in the present day, and therefore they could not think of publishing mine. Mr. Colburn was fairly frightened at the title of an epic poem, and one in blank verse too. No, it would not do; the taste of the age utterly neglected and condemned all such obsolete stuff, and whatever its merits might be, it would never answer to publish it.' pp. 80, 81.

If the matter were not somewhat too serious for jesting, we could make merry with the strange illustrations accumulated in the volumes before us, of the readiness and simplicity with which a man may become the dupe of his own vanity. Booksellers, reviewers, private individuals, are all abused or lauded to the skies, just in proportion as they may admire or yawn, patronize or neglect. In the passage just cited, the spiteful sneer at Clare does little honour to either the Writer's head or his heart. But

VOL. 1.-N.S.

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it is time that we should express our own opinion, such as it may be, on the general subject.

We say then at once, and sans phrase, that the Author has completely mistaken his own faculty. He has cajoled himself into the belief that he is a genuine poet; and he has been cockered up by the weak people with whom he has come in contact, until his mistaken fancies have become confirmed delusions, and hallucination has engendered fanaticism. He is not only no poet, but it is very evident that he does not even know what poetry is. He is a man of talent,—decidedly so; he is a ready, and sometimes an ingenious versifier;-he has an eye for nature and a turn for description;-but he may be all this, nay ten times more than this, and yet no poet. His lines run off well, but they want soul; his verse lacks mind; and it would be difficult to find a single specimen of decidedly original thought and expression, from beginning to end of the scraps before us. The following is the best: we have a lurking suspicion that we have seen it, or something very like it, before; but however this may be, it is well worth citing.

"Her brow, another Ida, on whose top
Beauty, and majesty, and wisdom sit

Contending for the prize; her radiant locks,
That o'er her forehead's white float gracefully,
Like waves of gold chafing an ivory shore;
Her lovely lids, fair as those fleecy clouds

Whose dazzling whiteness gems the summer sky,

And like them only chided at, because

'Tis heaven's own blue they hide; her eyes, whose lustre
A tender melancholy seems to shade,

Save when deep thought, or deeper feeling, fills
Those spirit-searching orbs; and then they flash
The mind's magnificent lightnings, and her face
Grows spiritually fine, as though her soul
(Like a bright flame enshrined in alabaster)
Shone through her delicate and transparent skin,
Revealing all its glory."

Vol. II. p. 203.

The volumes in our hands afford a strange proof of want of tact. They make up a whimsical olio of narrative, antiquarianism, description, and scraps of verse. The antiquarianism is shallow; but the story, had it been more highly wrought, and published without its perpetual interruptions, might have obtained circulation. The Author may yet do something effective, if he can but bring himself to make a sober estimate of his own powers; but he may be assured, that his present course is both mistaken and injurious. Nor will he find bimelf in safety, or at

peace, until he has chosen, in more senses than one, a more excellent way."

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The Tales of the Great St. Bernard' are by Mr. Croly, and exhibit all the characteristic qualities of that gentleman's composition. They are spirited and brilliant, highly interesting as narratives, and written, sometimes in a strain of rich and highly ornamented description, at other times with deep feeling, and again with a wild vivacity and effective humour, that make up, in the mixture, a combination of singular poignancy and high flavour. The Wallachian's Tale' is a magnificent romance, hurried and irregular, but full of interest and animation. Mustapha Bairacta is a noble portraiture, and the whirl, whim, noise, confusion, and gorgeous painting of the close, are gloriously flung together. We can afford room but for one scrap, a fine description of a burning forest.

As they reached the verge of the forest, where danger was to be apprehended again, the Albanian stopped to reconnoitre; and Hebe cast an involuntary glance on the spot where she had so lately expected to be intombed.

'Her eye was fixed by its unspeakable grandeur. The fire had long since devoured the copse and other incumbrances of the ground; the trunks of the trees stood upright, but black, and cleared of every lower branch and weed. Among the matted foliage of the summits, thick enough of old to shut out the light of day, the fire still raged; but it raged as in a solid vault of flame; there were no fantastic quiverings and playings of the blaze; it was the sullen magnificence of an endless roof of red hot iron. Colossal pillars, spreading in a thousand vistas; the ground cleared of all but the burning wreck of the soldier and his steed; and vault on vault above, red with concentrated flame; to her eye, it might have made a matchless temple of the Pagan deity of fire, or the more fearful king of evil.'

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Vol. II. pp. 173, 4.

The Red-nosed Lieutenant' is an old friend and favourite. The 'Woes of Wealth' give a title to a tale of pleasant exaggeration, marked by all that frolicsome humour in which Mr. Croly excels. The Patron Saint', the Married Actress', the Locked-up Beauty', and the Conspirator', are all good in their way.

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'Tales and Legends' seem to have been partly collected from different sources, and are worked up with considerable dexterity. We can only say further of them, that those who are given to such reading, will find them an agreeable after-dinner

amusement.

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The Protestant' is a tale of persecution and of martyrdom all but completed. It is of the Walter Scott school, and cleverly, but somewhat languidly written. The scenery is better than the dialogue. We give, as a specimen, part of a description of the interior of a gaol.

In one part of the court-yard, four or five men were amusing themselves in the game of jumping or leaping at the ring, accompanying their amusement with loud shouts and exclamations, according to the success or failure of the jumper. Another groupe of savage-looking sellows had collected themselves together, and were drawing straws for the cost of a flagon of beer.

In one corner, something apart from the rest, sat two persons of an extraordinary appearance, who amused themselves with playing a game at cards, that seemed deeply to interest them both. The younger player, in his dress exhibited a mixture of threadbare finery and dirty indigence. The gold lace that faced his doublet was tarnished, and the velvet of his cloak faded and worn; many a point was broken, and his hose shewed the skin of the wearer through more than one hole. But the beard, cut and knotted into two formal peaks, with a small velvet cap, from which depended a broken plume, set shantily on one side of the head, proclaimed an affectation of the fashion of Whitehall.

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This sorry and broken-down beau of his day, was engaged in play with an old fellow, whose beard, white, long, and flowing, would have seemed venerable, but for the shrewd and knavish cast of the features to which it belonged. The old man was dressed in a large black gown, his middle girt about with a broad leather belt, from which depended a rosary and a cross. Near these card-players stood a little, fat, stout fellow, whose only employment seemed to be the delight he took in disturbing the game, by singing, as loud as he could bawl, a ditty that appeared to be particularly disagreeable to the old man's ears, as from time to time he begged the singer to desist.

'One man, heavily ironed, whose fetters clanked in time to the motion of his feet, was seen pacing up and down the court-yard alone; his beard and hair hanging wild and matted, his clothes retaining in no part their original colour, and so tattered, as to leave bare his sinewy arms and legs; whilst, his countenance exhibiting an expression of the most reckless brutality, he gazed about him with the utmost indifference, as if wholly insensible to his condition. This man was charged with the crime of murder.

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Apart from all the rest, shunned by all, and even by the murderer, appeared a groupe of persons both male and female, whose sober appearance and quiet deportment, together with an air of composure and resignation strongly depicted in the countenance of each, at once proclaimed that their only crime was the result of conscience. These were accused of heresy.' Vol. I. pp. 143-145.

The character of Owen Wilford, the Protestant confessor, is well contrasted with the fierce subtlety of the Spanish friar, and with the brutal eagerness of the meaner agents of spiritual tyranny. Rose Wilford enacts an interesting part; and the rescue of the prisoners at the very stake, by the interference of the high-sheriff, is well-managed.

NOTICES.

Art. VIII. Scripture Natural History for Youth. By Esther Hewlett; with numerous illustrative Engravings. 2 Vols. 18mo. pp. 668. 82 Plates. London, 1828.

A VERY pleasing and useful addition to the juvenile library. The description appears to have been compiled with care, and is interspersed with instructive remarks, while the plates form a most attractive feature of the volumes. We cannot too highly commend the plan of thus connecting, in early instruction, the illustration of the Holy Scriptures with the acquirement of useful and entertaining knowledge.

Art. IX. The Life and Adventures of Alexander Selkirk; containing the real Incidents upon which the Romance of Robinson Crusoe is founded; in which also the Events of his Life, drawn from authentic Sources, are traced from his Birth, in 1676, till his Death in 1723. With an Appendix, comprising a Description of the Island of Juan Fernandez, and some curious Information relating to his Shipmates, &c. By John Howell, Editor of the "Journal "of a Soldier of the Seventy-first Regiment", &c. 12mo. pp. 196. Price 5s. Edinburgh, 1829.

THIS title-page is so long, that our notice of the publication needs be but very brief. It is really a very entertaining volume, and does great credit to the enthusiastic diligence of the Compiler, whom we commend to the Society of Antiquaries, as a right worthy fellow. In 1825, a great-grand-nephew of Selkirk's was a teacher in Canonmills, near Edinburgh; a pious and worthy man, struggling with adverse 'fortune in his old age.' He shewed to the Editor the identical flipcan which Robinson Crusoe had with him on the island; and he had also in his possession, a staff that had belonged to the same celebrated personage. His cup, and chest, and other articles are still shewn in the house in which he for some time resided at Largo, his native place, after his return. The simple history of the real Robinson Crusoe is not without interest. At the same time, the slender hints which furnished the ground-work of Defoe's unrivalled romance, detract nothing from the originality of his performance: all the incidents, details, and descriptions in that beautiful fiction, belong to Defoe', and the faithful Friday is altogether a creature of his imagination. A more malignant imputation has been cast upon the Author of Robinson Crusoe, than that which denies his original merit: he has been accused of having stolen the materials from the rightful owner. This silly calumny is completely refuted by the fact, that all the information which Defoe had to work upon, had been before the public seven years previous to the publication of the romance of Robinson Crusoe in 1719.

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