Yes, Andrews' doggrel, Greathead's idiot line,
And Morton's catchword, all, forsooth, divine!
F. "Tis well. Here let th' indignant stricture
cease,

And LEEDS at length enjoy his fool in peace.

P. Come then, around their works a circle draw,

And near it plant the dragons of the law,
With labels writ, "Critics, far hence remove,
Nor dare to censure what the great approve."
I go. Yet Hall could lash with noble rage
The purblind patron of a former age;
And laugh to scorn th' eternal sonneteer,
Who made goose pinions and white rags so dear.
Yet Oldham, in his rude, unpolish'd strain,
Could hiss the clamorous, and deride the vain,
Who bawl'd their rhymes incessant through the

town,

Or bribed the hawkers for a day's renown. Whate'er the theme, with honest warmth they

wrote,

Nor cared what Mutius of their freedom thought;
Yet prose was venial in that happy time,
And life had other business than to rhyme.
And may not I-now this pernicious pest,
This metromania, creeps through every breast;
Now fools and children void their brains by loads,
And itching grandams spawl lascivious odes;
Now lords and dukes, cursed with a sickly taste,
While Burns' pure healthful nurture runs to
waste,

Lick up the spittle of the bed-rid muse,
And riot on the sweepings of the stews;
Say, may not I expose-

Prudence, my friend.

F. No-'tis unsafe;

P. What! not deride? not laugh? Well! thought at least is free

F. O yet forbear. P. Nay, then, I'll dig a pit, and bury there The dreadful truth which so alarms thy fears: THE TOWN, THE TOWN, GOOD PIT, HAS ASSES' EARS!

Thou think'st, perhaps, this wayward fancy strange;
So think thou still yet would not I exchange-
The secret humour of this simple hit
For all the Albums that were ever writ.
Of this, no more.-O THOU, (if yet there be
One bosom from this vile infection free,)
THOU who canst thrill with joy, or glow with ire,
As the great masters of the song inspire,
Canst bend enraptured o'er the magic page,
Where desperate ladies desperate lords engage,
Gnomes, sylphs, and gods the fierce contention

share,

And heaven and earth hang trembling on a hair:
Canst quake with horror, while Emilia's charms,
Against a brother point a brother's arms;
And trace the fortune of the varying fray,
While hour on hour flits unperceived away-
Approach: 'twixt hope and fear I wait. O deign
To cast a glance on this incondite strain :
Here, if thou find one thought but well express'd,
One sentence higher finish'd than the rest,
Such as may win thee to proceed a while,
And smooth thy forehead with a gracious smile
I ask no more, but far from me the throng
Who fancy fire in Laura's vapid song ;

Who Anna's bedlam rant for sense can take, And over* Edwin's mewlings keep awake;

* Edwin's mewlings, &c.-We come now to a character of high respect, the profound Mr. T. Vaughan, who, under the alluring signature of Edwin, favours us from time to time with a melancholy poem on the death of a bug, the flight of an earwig, the miscarriage of a cockchaffer, or some other event of equal importance.

His last work was an Emiraḍiov, (blessings on his learning!) which, I take for granted, means an epitaph, on a mouse that broke her heart: and, as it was a matter of great consequence, he very properly made the introduction as long as the poem itself. Hear how gravely he prologiseth.

"On a tame mouse, which belonged to a lady who sated its life, constantly fed it, and even wept, (poor lady !) at its approaching death. The mouse's eyes actually dropped out of its head (poor mouse !) THE DAY BEFORE IT DIED."

Επιταφιον.

"This feeling mouse, whose heart was warm'd
By pity's purest ray,

Because her mistress dropt a tear,
Wept both her eyes away.

"By sympathy deprived of light,
She one day darkness tried;
The grateful tear no more could flow,
So liked it not, and died.
"May we, when others weep for us,

The debt with interest pay-
And, when the generous fonts are dry,
Revert to native clay."-Edwin.

Mr. T. Vaughan has asserted that he is not the author of this matchless Extrapior with such spirit, and retorted upon one Baviad (whom the learned gentleman takes to be a man) with such strength of argument and elegance of diction, that it would wrong both him and the reader to give it in any words but his own.

"Well said, Baviad the correct!--And so the PROFOUND Mr. T. Vaughan, as you politely style him, writes under the alluring signature of Edwin, does he ? and therefore a very proper subject for your satiric malignity!-But suppose for a moment, as the truth and the fact is, that this gentleman never did use that signature upon any occasion, in whatever he may have written: Do not you, the identical Baviad, in that case, for your unprovoked abuse of him, immediately fall under your own character of that nightman of literature you so liberally assign Weston? And like him, too, if there is any truth in what you say or write, do you not

"Swell like a filthy toad with secret spite ?' "The ayes have it. And should you not be as well versed in your favourite author's fourth satire, as you are in the first, with your leave, I will quote from it two emphatic lines:

"Into themselves how few, how few descend,

And act, at home, the free, impartial friend!
None see their own, but all, with ready eye,
The pendent wallet on a neighbour spy;
And like a Baviad will recount his shame,
Tacking his very errors to his name.'

"Oracle, 12th Jan." And to whose name should they be tacked, but the au thor's Let not the reader, however, imagine the absurdity to proceed from Persius, or his ingenious translator. "The truth and the fact is," that our learned brother, having a small change to make in the last two lines, blundered them, with his usual acuteness, into nonsense. He is not much more happy when he accuses me of call ing WESTON "the nightman of literature."-But when a gentleman does not know what he writes, it is a little hard to expect him to know what he reads. After all, Edwin or not, our egregious friend is still the PROFOUND Mr. T. Vaughan.

Yes, far from me, whate'er their birth or place,
These long-ear'd judges of the Phrygian race;
Their censure and their praise alike I scorn,
And hate the laurel by their followers worn!
Let such (a task congenial to their powers)
At sales and auctions waste the morning hours,
While the dull noon away in Rumford's fane,
And snore the evening out at Drury-lane.

THE MÆVIAD.

Qui BAVIUM non odit, amet tua carmina, Mævi.

INTRODUCTION.

In the INTRODUCTION to the preceding pages, a brief account is given of the rise and progress of that spurious species of poetry which lately infested this metropolis, and gave occasion to the BAVIAD. I was not ignorant of what I exposed myself to by the publication of that work. If abuse could have affected me, I should not probably have made a set of people my enemies, habituated to ill language, and possessed of such convenient vehicles for its dissemination. But I never regarded it from such hands, and, indeed, deprecated nothing but their praise. I respect, in common with every man of sense, the censure of the wise and good; but the angry ebullitions of folly unmasked, and vanity mortified, pass by me like the idle wind," or, if noticed, serve merely to grace succeeding editions of the Baviad.

I confess, however, that the work was received more favourably than I expected. Bell, indeed, and a few others, whose craft was touched, vented their indignation in prose and verse; but, on the whole, the clamour against me was not loud, and was lost by insensible degrees in the applauses of such as I was truly ambitious to please.

lists by the reappearance of some of the scattered enemy.

It was not enough that the stream of folly flowed more sparingly in the Oracle than before; I was determined

"To have the current in that place damm'd up;" and accordingly began the present poem-for which, indeed, I had by this time other reasons. I had been told that there were still a few admirers of the Cruscan school, who thought the contempt expressed for it was not sufficiently justified by the few passages produced in the Baviad. I thought it best, therefore, to exhibit the tribe of Bell once more; and, as they passed in review before me, to make such additional extractst from their works, as should put their demerits beyond the power of future question.

I remembered that this great critic, in his excellent remarks on the Baviad, had charged the author with " bespattering nearly all the poetical eminence of the day." Anxious, therefore, to do impartial justice, I ran for the ALBUM, to discover who had been spared. Here I read, "In this collection are names whom genius will ever look upon as its best supporters! Sheridan"-what, is Saul also among the prophets!" Sheridan, Merry, Parsons, Cowley, Andrews, Jerningham, Greathead, Topham, Robin. son," &c.

Thus furnished with " ALL the poetical eminence of the day," I proceeded, as Mr. Bell says, to bespatter it; taking, for the vehicle of my design, a satire of Horace-to which I was led by its supplyiug me (amid many happy allusions) with an opportunity of briefly noticing the wretched state of dramatic poetry among us.‡

Thus supported, the good effects of the satire riose loquor) were not long in manifesting themselves. Della Crusca appeared no more in the Oracle, and, if any of his followers ventured to treat the town with a soft sonnet, it was not, as before, introduced by a pompous preface. Pope and Milton resumed their superiority; and Este and his coadjutors silently acquiesced in the growing opinion of their incompetency, and showed some sense of shame.

With this I was satisfied. I had taken up my pen for no other end, and was quietly retiring, with the idea that I had "done the state some service," and purposing to abandon for ever the cæstus, which a respectable critic fancies I wielded" with too much severity," when I was once more called into the

Most of these fashionable writers were connected with the public prints. Della Crusca was a worthy coadjutor of the mad and malignant idiot who conducted the World. Arno and Lorenzo were either proprietors or editors of another paper. Edwin and Anna Matilda were favoured contributors to several; and Laura Maria, from the sums squandered on puffs, could command a corner in all. This wretched woman, indeed, in the wane of her beauty, fell into merited poverty, exchanged poetry for politics, and wrote abusive trash against the government, at the rate of two guineas a week, for the Morning Post.

+ It will now be said that I have done it usque ad nau seam. I confess it; and for the reason given above. And yet I can honestly assure the reader, that most, if not all, of the trash here quoted, passed with the authors for superlative beauties, every second word being printed either in italics or capitals.

I know not if the stage has been so low, since the days of Gammer Gurton, as at this hour. It seems as if all the blockheads in the kingdom had started up, and exclaimed, with one voice, Come! let us write for the theatres. In this there is nothing, perhaps, altogether new; the strik

ing and peculiar novelty of the times seems to be, that ALL they write is received. Of the three parties concerned in this business, the writers and the managers seem the least culpable. If the town will feed on husks, extraordinary pains need not be taken to find them any thing more palatable. But what shall we say of the people? The lower orders are so brutified by the lamenta

! I recollect but two exceptions. Merry's idiotical opera, and Mrs. Ro binson's more idiotical farce. To have failed where Miles Andrews suc ceeded, argues a degree of stupidity scarcely credible. Surely "ignorance itself is a planet" over the heroes and heroines of the Baviad.

When the MÆVIAD, so I call the present poem, was nearly brought to a conclusion, I laid it aside. The times seemed unfavourable to such productions. Events of real importance were momentarily claiming the attention of the public, and the still voice of the muses was not likely to be listened to amid the din of arms. After an interval of two years, however, circumstances, which it is not material to mention, have induced me to finish, and trust it, without more preface, to the candour to which I am already so highly indebted for the kind reception of the Baviad.

YES, I DID say that Crusca's* "true sublime" Lack'd taste, and sense, and every thing but rhyme; ble follies of O'Keefe, and Cobbe, and Pilon, and I know not who-Sardi venales, each worse than the otherthat they have lost all relish for simplicity and genuine humour; nay, ignorance itself, unless it be gross and glaring, cannot hope for "their most sweet voices." And the higher ranks are so mawkishly mild, that they

That Arno's "easy strains" were coarse and rough,
And Edwin's "matchless numbers" woful stuff.
And who-forgive, O gentle Bell, the word,
For it must out-who, prithee, so absurd,
So mulishly absurd, as not to join
In this with me, save always THEE and THINE?
Yet still, the soul of candour! I allow'd
Their jingling elegies amused the crowd;
That lords hung blubbering o'er each woful line,
That lady-critics wept, and cried, “divine!”
That love-lorn priests reclined the pensive head,
And sentimental ensigns, as they read,
Wiped the sad drops of pity from their eye,
And burst between a hiccup and a sigh.
Yet, not content, like horse-leeches they come,
And split my head with one eternal hum
For" more! more! more!" Away! for should I grant
The full, the unreserved applause ye want,
St. John might then my partial voice accuse,
And claim my suffrage for his tragic muse;
And Greathead,t rising from his short disgrace,
Fling the forgotten "Regent" in my face,

When this was written, I thought the town had " sounded," as Shakspeare says, "the very bass string of humility;" but it has since appeared, that the lowest point of degradation had not then been reached. The force of English folly, indeed, could go no farther, and so far I was right; but the auxiliary supplies of Germany were at hand, and the taste, vitiated by the lively nonsense of O'Keefe and Co., was destined to be utterly destroyed by successive importations of the heavy, lumbering, monotonous stupidity of Kotzebue and Schiller.

The object of these writers has been detailed with such force and precision in the introduction to "THE ROVERS," that nothing remains to be said on that head-indeed the simple perusal of "The Rovers" would supersede the necessity of any critique on the merits of the German drama in general; since there is not a folly, however gross, an absurdity, however monstrous, to be found in that charming jeu d'esprit, that I would not undertake to parallel from one or other of the most admired works of the German Shakspeares. Why it has not been produced on the stage is to me a matter of astonishment, since it unites the beauties of "The Stranger" and "Pizarro;" and, though perfectly German in its sentiments, is English in its language-intelligible English; which is infinitely more than can be said of the translation from Kotzebue, so maliciously attributed to Mr. Sheridan.

In a word, if you take from the German dramas their horrid blasphemies, their wanton invocations of the sacred Name, and their minute and ridiculous stage directions, which seem calculated to turn the whole into a pantomime, nothing will remain but a caput mortuum, a vapid and gloomy mass of matter, unenlightened by a single ray of genius or nature. If you leave them their blasphemies, &c., you have then a nameless something, insipid though immoral, tedious though impious, and stupid though extravagant !-so much so, that, as a judicious writer well observes," it becomes a doubt which are the greatest objects of contempt and scorn, those who conceived and wrote them, or those who have the effrontery to praise them." Yet "these be thy gods, O Israel!" and to these are sacrificed our taste, our sense, and our national honour.

* Crusca's "true sublime." The words between inverted commas in this and the following verses, are Mr. Bell's. They contain, as the reader sees, a short character of the works to which they are respectively affixed. Though I have the misfortune to differ from this gentle

1 So Kotzebue and Schiller are styled by the critical reviewers..

have styled him the "profound" instead of the "gentle" Bell, if I had not previously applied the epithet to a still greater man, (absit invidia dicto,) to—Mr. T. Vaughan. I trust that this incidental preference will create no jealousy-for though, as Virgil properly remarks, “an oaken staff EACH merits," yet I need not inform a gentleman, who, like Mr. Bell, reads Shakspeare every day after dinner, that " if two men ride upon a horse, one of them must ride behind."

* St. John, &c. Having already observed in the Introduction, that the Mæviad was nearly finished two years since, and consequently before the death of this gentleman, I have only to add here, that though I should not have introduced any of the heroes of the Baviad, quorum Flaminia tegitur cinis, atque Latina, yet I scarcely think it necessary to make any changes for the sake of omitting such as have passed ad plures, in the interval between writing and publishing.

The reader will find, p. 181, another instance of my small pretensions to prophecy, and probably regret it more than the present.

+ Greathead's Regent.-Of this tragedy, which was and others, as "the work of a SCHOLAR," I want words to "recommended to the world" by the monthly reviewers express my just contempt. The plot of it is childish, he conduct absurd, the language unintelligible, the thoughts false and unnatural, the metaphors incongruous, the

general style grovelling and base; and, to sum up all in a word, the whole piece the most execrable abortion of stupidity that ever disgraced the stage.

It is to be wished that critics by profession, sensible of the influence which their opinions necessarily have on the public taste, would divest themselves of their partialities when they sit down to the execution of, what I hope they consider as, a solemn duty. We should not then find them, as in the present instance, prostituting their applause on works that call for universal reprobation. It is but fair, however, to observe, that Mr. Parsons has in favour of Mr. Greathead. added his all-sufficient suffrage to that of the reviewers,

"O bard! to whom belongs
Each purest fount of poesy!
Who old Ilyssus' hallow'd dews
In his own Avon dare infuse.
O favour'd clime! O happy age!
That boasts, to save a sinking stage,

A Greathead!!!"-Gent. Mag.

When I first read these, and other high sounding praises, scattered over reviews, magazines, newspapers, and 1