address to Lord Sidmouth; of which we can only find room for

the concluding lines.

'Well have I mark'd your nature kind;
Unspoil'd by power your nobler mind,
Which can from loftier cares descend
To meet the homage of a friend.
Permit me then, with triple bow,
As forms of Parliament allow,
To lay upon your Lordship's table
Proof of the potency of Fable.

THE BELLY AND THE MEMBERS.

In days of old, the mob of Rome,
Like some we meet with nearer home,
To honest labour took dislike,

And, as the phrase is, chose to strike.
For ev'ry ill that on them came,

They thought the government to blame,
Each cobbler left his occupation;
Instead of shoes, to mend the nation;
Nightmen and scavengers alert

Would from the senate sweep the dirt:
All with one voice complain'd-the Great
Did nought but sport, and drink, and eat;
Whilst ev'ry grievous burthen they bore,
Half-stary'd and worn with endless labour.-
And now the ragamuffins swear

Such treatment they'll no longer bear,
Patricians shall be forced to toil,

And wrong'd Plebeians share the spoil;-
Share office, honours, public treasure,
And guide the state at their good pleasure.
With such wild notions in their pates
They camp'd without the city gates:
For at some time each country yields
Its H-s, its Ws, its Spa-fields.

Menenius then, a statesman grave,
Prudent, but not more wise than brave,
Fear'd not to face the noisy rabble :·
He check'd their fury with a fable!
Shew'd them how foolish their pretences.
And brought them to their sober senses.
Mobs of that day, we must allow,
Were quite as tractable as now.
Howe'er that be, the tale I'll give ye,
As chronicled by good old Livy :
Pleas'd if the moral prove a fit one,
To stop one factious mouth in Britain.

Овсе

Once on a time the human limbs

Were seiz'd with odd conceits and whims :
The stomach all the rest accuse

Of entertaining selfish views.

They cry: That sluggard lives at ease,
By us supplied with luxuries.

In secret indolence he lurks;
Enjoys our pains. and never works.
Shall we thus early toil and late,
To swell that pamper'd glutton's state?
Shall we comply with such demands ?"
"Forbid it, justice !"-cry the Hands.
"No-tho' for bread the tyrant begs-
"We swear the same !"-exclaim the Legs.
"Unmov'd, let that base lubber tarry-
We're slaves no more-we scorn to carry!"
The very feet,-till now so humble,
Loud as the rest began to grumble.
With one and all the gen'ral cry
Was, Freedom! and Equality!
The stomach proud was now subdued,
Debarr'd from necessary food:
For no kind hand prepar'd his dishes ;
Refus'd were all his wants and wishes.
But soon perceiv'd each wasting limb
The needful aid deriv'd from him,
Whose pow'r invisible had granted
To every member what it wanted :
And now cut off from his supply
The thoughtless rebels faint and die.

Menenius finish'd his oration,-
The People felt the application.'

By comparing this fable with the original, it will be seen, that the imitator has given us a paraphrase, rather than a version of the French poet; and to say the truth, we like him best when he emancipates himself from the fetters of translation, which generally seem to sit somewhat heavily upon him, and follows without any constraint the direction of his own fancy.

One of the prettiest things in his book is The Address to the Critics; in imitation of what La Fontaine has entitled-Contre ceux qui ont le Goût difficile. Here is a very slight adherence to the original; but no one will regret the departure, which has enabled the writer to substitute for a vapid translation, an address not altogether unlike what might have been expected from La Fontaine, if he had been born and bred in England. But, in bestowing this commendation upon his original efforts, we would suggest to the author the propriety of being more faithful, when he chuses to confine

confine himself to the task of turning one language into another. If he prefers to soar alone, we shall seldom feel inclined to repress his flights; but when he limits his aim to a mere verbal version of the French, he ought not to misrepresent the original,-to the manifest injury of the sense. For instance, La Fontaine, in the Fable of the Wolf and the Stork, says―

Les loups mangent gloutonment.

Un loup donc étant de frairie,
Se pressa, dit on, tellement,

Qu'il en pensa perdre la vie :

Un os lui demeura bien avant au gosier.

De bonheur pour ce loup, qui ne pouvait crier

Près de là passe une cicogne.

In rendering this into English, the sense has been altered without being improved; and instead of this simple and natural description of the silent agonies of the wolf, we read that

One day a wolf in bolting down his mutton

Found a sharp bone stick fast across his throat;
Writhing with pain acute, the half-chok'd glutton

Made the woods ring with his complaining note.—p. 135.

This is neither true to La Fontaine, nor to nature;-and nature and La Fontaine in this, as in most other cases, will be found identified; for his merit consists as much in the fidelity as in the picturesqueness of his sketches;-a wolf with a sharp bone sticking across his throat' would be in no condition for making the woods ring.' Again, in the Two Pigeons,' La Fontaine, in describing the danger that the wandering dove incurred from the wanton attack of a boy, says, 'Un fripon d'enfant (cette age est sans pitié,) hinting thus parenthetically at the proverbial cruelty of infancy, which is given in the English, how cruel are the sports of man!-as a grave reflection upon the general cruelty of the species. This is not Fontaine's meaning, nor indeed is it just. Children are cruel, not from malignity of disposition, but from inexperience and inattention. They scarcely know what pain is, they have little sympathy therefore; and it is some time before they can be taught, that what is sport to them is death to their victims.

It would not be difficult to point out other passages where the sense has been equally misrepresented; and there are occasional marks of carelessness and haste exhibited in slovenly syntax and faulty construction; but these are trifling blemishes, and redeemed by the general excellence of the work. The imitator is often very happy in the queer and quaint combinations of syllables, by which he has enlivened his pages with continual variety of rhyme. And here also we trace a resemblance to La Fontaine; for in both, syllables slide into verse and hitch together in rhyme,-which would, at

first sight seem to be as unmanageable as were ever proposed in a game of crambo.

THE SATYR AND THE TRAVELLER.

'A Satyr in a rocky den

Liv'd, distant from the haunts of men :
Tho' half a goat, he seldom ran

To revel in the train of Pan:

But led a quiet sober life,

With one fair Dryad for his wife;

And she, engross'd by household matters,
Prepard his soup, and brought young satyrs,
It happen'd on a wintry day,

A Traveller had lost his way;

And stiff with cold, and drench'd with rain,
He joy'd the Satyr's cave to gain.
He peeps; and midst recesses inner,
Espies his horned host at dinner.

He halts, and near the entrance lingers,
And, blowing hard his aching fingers,
He frames apologetic speeches,

To his landlord with the shaggy breeches.
But ere he could excuse begin,

A hoarse rough voice exclaims, "Come in!
If you can dine without a cloth,

Stranger, you're welcome to my broth.
My curious wife would fain be knowing
What 'tis with so much care you're blowing."
"Thanks," said the man, "I'll not be shy
To accept your hospitality.

To please your lady, I'll inform her,

I blow my hands to make them warmer."

The mistress of the rocky cottage

Pours for her guest some smoking pottage ;
Who to gulp down his mess the quicker,
Blows, ere he tastes, the scalding liquor.
The Satyr o'er the table leaning,

Surpris'd, once more inquires his meaning.

"Sir," said the stranger, "you shall know it-
It is to cool my broth I blow it."

"Hold!" cries the host, "is that your plan?
Are these the double ways of man?
Stranger, away! you see the door,
Nor dare approach my mansion more.
Whilst I possess this vaulted roof--
(And fiercely then he rais'd his hoof)
No mouth its mossy sides shall hold,
Which blows at once both hot and cold!"

'Tell

Tell me, ye Westminster Electors,
Who love political projectors,

Whom cunning state-empirics please,
Have you not met with mouths like these?
Mouths which advance assertions bold,
Blow sometimes hot, and sometimes cold.
Have you no smooth tongued sophist found,
Who Proteus like still shifts his ground,
Promulging, for the public good,
Schemes by no mortal understood?
Whose patriot soul, so truly Roman,
Would trust the regal power to no man,
Tho' check'd and limited it be
Like Britain's well pois'd monarchy;
Yet plasters praises thick and hearty
Upon his fav'rite Buonaparté ?
To British honour much alive,
Yet hates to see her laurels thrive :
And strives to pluck the shining bough
From her great hero's glorious brow?

6

This extract will serve to shew the nature of the Modern Instances,' as the author calls them, which, instead of the old moral, he has tacked to the end of his fables. The illustrations are generally of a political nature, and amongst these perhaps the application of the fable of The Two Bitches to the case of England and America is one of the happiest; that which pleases us least is the application of the Viper and the File to the author of a juvenile tirade long since forgiven and forgotten by the object of it. The example of France recurs too often; once or twice is well enough, but a good thing may be repeated till it becomes as tiresome as the perpetual uubos dos of our old school acquaintance Esop. As a specimen of the Notes, we subjoin the following strictures upon the family of the Fudges,' which we think more justifiable than the attack noticed above.

6

However its malignity may excite disgust, it is impossible not to smile at the whimsicality of the "Fudge Family at Paris," published under the name of Thomas Brown, jun. Beneficent nature is said often to place antidotes to the poison of noxious animals in the composition of the creature itself. Thus in the present instance, the superlative dulness of PHELIM O'CONNOR very happily counteracts the effect of the sprightly effusions of ESQUIRE PHILIP, MISS BIDDY and MASTER BOBBY FUDGE. We may moreover learn from this publication, that

the