Though no broad river swept along
To claim perchance heroic song;
Though sigh'd no groves in summer gale,
To prompt of love a softer tale;
Though scarce a puny streamlet's speed
Claimed homage from a shepherd's reed;
Yet was poetic impulse given

By the

green hill and clear blue heaven.
It was a barren scene and wild,
Where naked cliffs were rudely pil'd;
But ever and anon between

Lay velvet tufts of loveliest green;
And well the lonely infant knew
Recesses where the wall-flower grew,
And honey-suckle loved to crawl
Up the low crag and ruined wall.

I deem'd such nooks the sweetest shade,
The sun in all his round surveyed;

And still I thought that shattered tower
The mightiest work of human power;
And marvell'd, as the aged hind

With some strange tale bewitched my mind

Of Forayers, who, with headlong force,

Down from that strength had spurr'd their horse, Their southern rapine to renew,

Far in the distant Cheviots blue,

And, home returning, filled the hall
With revel, wassell, rout, and brawl.
Methought that still with tramp and clang
The gate-way's broken arches rang;

Methought grim features, seam'd with scars,
Glar'd through the window's rusty bars.

And ever by, the winter hearth,
Old tales I heard of woe or mirth,
Of lover's sleights, of ladies' charms,
Of witch's spells, of warriors' arms;
Of patriot battles, won of old

By Wallace wight and Bruce the bold;
Of later fields of feud and sleight,
When pouring from their Highland height,
The Scottish clans, in headlong sway,
Had swept the scarlet ranks away.
While stretch'd at length upon the floor,
Again I fought each combat o'er,
Pebbles and shells, in order laid,
The mimic ranks of war displayed;

And onward still the Scottish lion bore,
And still the scatter'd Southron fled before."

March 17, 1808.

N° XXVIII.

Genius incompatible with a narrow Taste.

THAT mighty gift of the Deity, which enables mankind to cast a glance over the whole surface of creation, and even to penetrate occasionally with some success into its internal movements, is sadly limited in its faculties by the exclusive contemplation of individual excellence, even though the most wonderful and super-eminent in the annals of human existence.

I have therefore always thought, that the sort of idolatry, which for nearly half a century we have been called on to pay even to Shakspeare himself, has been carried a little too far to be consistent with a due expansion of our intellects. A sound candour must admit that the words bigotry and idolatry are indeed literally applicable to this confined occupation of our taste and pleasures. Lord Grey, on Tuesday last,e applied the terms besotted bigotry to another occasion; and, whether applicable or not, described the evils of bigotry with

e March 15, 1808, in the House of Lords, on the Rever sion Bill.

f I do not mean to insinuate that the application was just. On that I give no opinion. I allude to his positions as general truths, well expressed.

great force and animation of language, and a poignant acuteness of discrimination.

Warton in his account of Sackville's Gorboduc remarks that such has been the undistinguishing or ill-placed fondness for the bard of Avon, that some of his worst and most tinsel passages, and surely a more unequal poet never wrote, have been admired the most.

The diversities of mental excellence are endless; and never did Providence, in its most favoured productions, unite all the varied powers, of which the progress of time is continually developing new hues. To bind ourselves fearfully to models is the mark of a secondary genius.

When I perceive a man incapable of deriving pleasure from more than one style of composition, and dogmatising on its exclusive merit, I pity his weakness, and despise his presumption. When he narrows his curiosity either to what is old or what is new, when he confines his praise to the dead, or to the living, though in both cases he is ridiculous, perhaps his folly is more venial in the last.

Why should one man of genius be envious or jealous of another? There is room enough for all. Another thousand years may roll over us without encumbering the stores of intellectual delight, or exhausting the topics of intellectual attention! Even in a selfish point of view, such envy or

jealousy is absurd. Can any individual, could even the richness of Shakspeare's vein, find food enough to satisfy the public mind? That mind grows voracious with indulgence; and the more it is exercised, the more quantity, and the greater variety, it requires. By the collision of intellects, new lights are struck out, and mutual assistance is derived for the new combinations of each. The most happy faculties require the infusion of new materials, which give new colours to the fancy, and resuscitate its creations.

We talk of Shakspeare's originality. He is original in the proper and best sense. But it is evident that all the literature and all the topics of his day contributed to his materials. There had been no Shakspeare, such as he now is, but for his predecessors and cotemporaries.

If we speak of a more modern author, who, however beautiful, cannot be put in the same class with Shakspeare, we shall be able to trace almost all the ingredients of his pathetic and sublime compositions home to their sources: yet without detracting much in my opinion from their merit, or even their invention. The poet I mean is GRAY. The particles of thought, and even expressions in numerous instances, belong to others: the combination is his own. His exquisite productions could not have existed, such as they are, without the