1832.] Goclhes Visit to Beireis. 67 



signed to the earth, and, to the past, like a common mortal. His goose- 

 egg Diamond, weighing 6,400 carats, which the Emperor of China had 

 solemnly intrusted to him, which all the kings then extant had not 

 wealth to buy, and which, after all, was but a Madagascar rock-crystal, 

 did not make its appearance among his posthumous effects, and, in all 

 probability, is lost to the universe. Whether Vaucanson's wooden 

 Duck got feathers again, and recovered its digestive faculty ; whether 

 the Flute-player, and the Shawm-player (for he, too, lodged with Beireis), 

 had awakened from their unmelodious trance, we know not ; the whole 

 three were, with those moth-eaten Birds, and the innumerable other 

 Curiosities, put up to public auction, and thus scattered through the wide 

 world, where, most probably, little remains of them but bones and dust. 

 Of such a Projector-character, wherein true talent strangely unites 

 itself with empty gasconading ; and in the Philosopher-quack are found 

 scientific insight, practical skill, faith, hope, charity, and all gifts and 

 graces, save that of common veracity we have seen specimens in Eng- 

 land, but none in nearly such perfection as this of Beireis ; which, there- 

 fore, as given in these few touches by a first-rate artist, we have thought 

 right to copy and communicate. 



THE project of a protegee of Mr. Hood's, put forth in the new " Comic 

 Annual" that of turning " Blank Verse into Rhyme" has excited a 

 considerable quantity of morning, evening, and weekly-journal cele- 

 brity. Every shelf of every publisher in the three kingdoms will bear 

 groaning witness to the amount of rhyme in " blank verse" that has 

 been produced in this most poetical of all ages ; but to reverse the pic- 

 ture, and to throw a perfume upon Paradise Lost by adding a very 

 novel set of rhymes to it, is certainly ingenious, and worthy of the 

 most Johnsonian days of England. Here is a specimen of this new 

 species of poetry, selected from the " Nocturnal Sketch :" 



" Now puss, while folks are in their beds, treads leads ; 

 And sleepers waking, grumble ' Drat that cat !' 

 Who in the gutter caterwauls, squalls, mauls 

 Some feline foe, and screams in shrill ill-will." 



Another part of the sketch introduces us to some paralytic watchmen, 

 that prowl 



" About the street, and take up Pall- Mall Sal, 



Who, in her nightly jobs, robs fobs." 



Whether this whimsical scheme could be brought to bear with advan- 

 tage upon any of our great rhymeless poems, we leave it to a committee 

 of taste, of which Mr. Robert Montgomery should be chairman, to decide. 

 How would it apply to the " Seasons ?" 



" Come, gentle Spring ! ethereal hum-drum, come !" 



But we shall not speculate upon the point, particularly as, although it 

 seems difficult, it is easy as lying. We are fearful of diminishing the 

 degree of admiration which it has excited among the critics and coteries, 

 were we to publish the whole thirty thousand lines sent to us by a youth- 



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