Our 'bound to be her beadsman-she was always more 'civil to me in person than during my absence. 'dear defunct friend, M** L* *†, who was too great a bore ever to lie, assured me, upon his tiresome word of honour, that, at Florence, the said Madame de S** was open-mouthed against me; ' and when asked, in Switzerland, why she had changed 'her opinion, replied, with laudable sincerity, that I had named her in a sonnet with Voltaire, Rousseau, ' &c. &c. and that she could not help it through decency. Now, I have not forgotten this, but I have been generous, as mine acquaintance, the late Cap'tain Whitby, of the navy, used to say to his seamen (when "married to the gunner's daughter')" two 'dozen, and let you off easy." The "two dozen" were 'with the cat-o'-nine tails ;-the "let you off easy" was 'rather his own opinion than that of the patient. Of this gentleman, the following notice occurs in the Detached Thoughts. L** was a good man, a clever man, but a bore. My only 'revenge or consolation used to be setting him by the ears with some 'vivacious person who hated bores especially,-Madame de S― or H—, 'for example. But I liked L**; he was a jewel of a man, had he been 'better set;-I don't mean personally, but less tiresome, for he was tedious, as well as contradictory to every thing and every body. Being short-sighted when we used to ride out together near the Brenta in the 'twilight in summer, he made me go before, to pilot him: I am absent * at times, especially towards evening; and the consequence of this pilotage was some narrow escapes to the M ** on horseback. Once I led him into a ditch over which I had passed as usual, forgetting to warn 'my convoy; once I led him nearly into the river, instead of on the moveable bridge which incommodes passengers; and twice did we both 'run against the Diligence, which, being heavy and slow, did communicate less damage than it received in its leaders, who were terrafied by 'the charge; thrice did I lose him in the gray of the gloaming, and was 'obliged to bring-to to his distant signals of distance and distress;-all the time he went on talking without intermission, for he was a man of 'many words. Poor fellow! he died a martyr to his new riches—of a 'second visit to Jamaica. My acquaintance with these terms and practices arises from my having been much conversant with ships of war and naval heroes in the year of my voyages in the Mediterranean. Whitby was in the gallant action off Lissa in 1811. He was brave, but a disciplinarian. When he left his frigate, he left a 'parrot, which was taught by the crew the following 'sounds (it must be remarked that Captain Whitby was the image of Fawcett the actor, in voice, face, and figure, and that he squinted). The Parrot loquitur. "Whitby! Whitby! funny eye! funny eye! two dozen, and let you off easy. Oh you -!" Now, if Madame de B. has a parrot, it had better 'be taught a French parody of the same sounds. 'With regard to our purposed Journal, I will call it what you please, but it should be a newspaper, to make it pay. We can call it "The Harp," if you like or any thing. 'I feel exactly as you do about our "art*,” but it comes over me in a kind of rage every now and then, like ****, and then, if I don't write to empty my mind, I go mad. As to that regular, uninterrupted *The following passage from the letter of mine, to which the above was an answer, will best explain what follows:- With respect to the newspaper, it is odd enough that Lord **** and myself had been (about a week or two before I received your letter) speculating upon your assistance in a plan somewhat similar, but more literary and less regularly periodical in its appearance. Lord **, as you will see by his volume of Essays, if it reaches you, has a very sly, dry, and pithy 'way of putting sound truths, upon politics and manners, and whatever scheme we adopt, he will be a very useful and active ally in it, as he has a pleasure in writing quite inconceivable to a poor hack scribe like 'me, who always feel, about my art, as the French husband did when he found a man making love to his (the Frenchman's) wife:-"Comment, Mounsier,-sans y être obligé !" When I say this, however, I mean it only of the executive part of writing; for the imagining, the shadowing out of the future work is, I own, a delicious fool's-paradise.' love of writing, which you describe in your friend, 'I do not understand it. I feel it as a torture, which 'I must get rid of, but never as a pleasure. On the contrary, I think composition a great pain. 'I wish you to think seriously of the Journal scheme -for I am as serious as one can be, in this world, ' about any thing. As to matters here, they are high and mighty-but not for paper. It is much about 'the state of things betwixt Cain and Abel. There 'is, in fact, no law or government at all; and it is 'wonderful how well things go on without them. Excepting a few occasional murders (every body killing whomsoever he pleases, and being killed, in turn, by a friend, or relative, of the defunct), there is as quiet a society and as merry a Carnival as can be ' met with in a tour through Europe. There is nothing like habit in these things. 'I shall remain here till May or June, and, unless "honour comes unlooked for," we may perhaps meet, ' in France or England, within the year. 'Yours, &c. 'Of course, I cannot explain to you existing cir'cumstances, as they open all letters. Will you set me right about your curst "Champs 'Elysées?"—are they "és" or "ées" for the adjec'tive? I know nothing of French, being all Italian. 'Though I can read and understand French, I never attempt to speak it; for I hate it. From the second of the Memoirs cut what you please." part 'I just see, by the papers of Galignani, that there 'is a new tragedy of great expectation, by Barry 'Cornwall. Of what I have read of his works, I liked 'the Dramatic Sketches, but thought his Sicilian Story ' and Marcian Colonna, in rhyme, quite spoilt, by I 'know not what affectation of Wordsworth, and Moore, and myself,-all mixed up into a kind of chaos. I think him very likely to produce a good tragedy, if he keep to a natural style, and not play 'tricks to form harlequinades for an audience. Ast he (Barry Cornwall is not his true name) was a 'schoolfellow of mine, I take more than common inIterest in his success, and shall be glad to hear of it speedily. If I had been aware that he was in that line, I should have spoken of him in the preface to 'Marino Faliero. He will do a world's wonder if he produce a great tragedy. I am, however, persuaded, that this is not to be done by following the old dra' matists, who are full of gross faults, pardoned only for the beauty of their language, but by writing 'naturally and regularly, and producing regular tragedies, like the Greeks; but not in imitation,-merely the outline of their conduct, adapted to our own times and circumstances, and of course no chorus. You will laugh, and say, "Why don't you do so?" 'I have, you see, tried a sketch in Marino Faliero ; but many people think my talent "essentially undramatic," and I am not at all clear that they are not right. If Marino Faliero don't fall-in the perusal -I shall, perhaps, try again (but not for the stage); and, as I think that love is not the principal passion ' for tragedy (and yet most of ours turn upon it), you ' will not find me a popular writer. Unless it is love, 'furious, criminal, and hapless, it ought not to make a tragic subject. When it is melting and maudlin, it does, but it ought not to do; it is then for the gallery ' and second-price boxes. If you want to have a notion of what I am trying, 'take up a translation of any of the Greek tragedians. 'If I said the original, it would be an impudent presumption of mine; but the translations are so in'ferior to the originals, that I think I may risk it. Then judge of the "simplicity of plot," &c. and do 'not judge me by your old mad dramatists, which is ⚫ like drinking usquebaugh and then proving a fountain. 'Yet after all, I suppose that you do not mean that 'spirits is a nobler element than a clear spring bubbling in the sun? and this I take to be the difference 'between the Greeks and those turbid mountebanks'always excepting Ben Jonson, who was a scholar and a classic. Or, take up a translation of Alfieri, and try the interest, &c. of these my new attempts in the 'old line, by him in English; and then tell me fairly your opinion. But don't measure me by YOUR OWN 'old or new tailors' yards. Nothing so easy as intri'cate confusion of plot and rant. Mrs. Centlivre, in comedy, has ten times the bustle of Congreve; but are 'they to be compared? and yet she drove Congreve 'from the theatre.' "Ravenna, January 19th, 1821. 'Yours of the 29th ultimo hath arrived. I must really and seriously request that you will beg of 'Messrs. Harris or Elliston to let the Doge alone: it 'is not an acting play; it will not serve their 'it will destroy yours (the sale); and it will distress It is not courteous, it is hardly even gentlemanly, to persist in this appropriation of a man's 'writings to their mountebanks. purpose; I have already sent you by last post a short pro |