566 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 189. 



cocious singing bird — does not appear: but we 

 suspect the former, for this sonnet is immediately 

 followed by "A Pastoral Ballad!" calling upon 

 some Celia unknown to " pity his tears and com- 

 plaint," &c., in the usual namby-pamby style of 

 these compositions. To any one who considers 

 the smart, espiegle, highly artificial style of "Tom 

 Moore's" after compositions, his " Pastoral Ballad" 

 will be what Coleridge called his Vision, a "psycho- 

 logical curiosity." 



JPassing'on through the volumes, in the Number 

 for February 1794 we find a paraphrase of the 

 Fifth Ode of Anacreon, by " Thomas Moore ; " 

 another short poem in June 1794, "To the 

 Memoi-y of Francis Perry, Esq.," signed "T. M.," 

 and dated " Aungier Street." These are all which 

 can be identified by outward and visible signs, 

 without danger of mistake : but there are a num- 

 ber of others scattered through the volumes which 

 I conjecture may be his ; they are under different 

 signatures, generally T. L., which may be taken 

 to stand for the alias " Thomas Little," by which 

 Moore afterwards made himself so well known. 

 There is an "Ode to Morning" in the Number 

 for March 1794, above the ordinary run of maga- 

 zine poetry. And in the Number for May fol- 

 lowing are "Imitations from the Greek" and 

 Italian, all under this same signature. And tliis 

 last being derived from some words in Petrarch's 

 will, bequeathing his lute to a friend, is the more 

 curious ; and may the more probably be supposed 

 Moore's, as it contains a thought which is not 

 unlikely to have suggested in after years the idea 

 of his celebrated melody, entitled the "Bard's 

 Legacy." The Number for Nov. 1794, last but 

 one in the fourth volume, contains a little piece on 

 " Variety," which, independent of a T. M. signa- 

 ture, I would almost swear, from internal evidence, 

 to be Moore's ; it is the last in the series, and in- 

 dicates such progress as two years might be sup- 

 posed to give the youthful poet, from the lack-a- 

 daisical style of his first attempts, towards that 

 light, brilliant, sportive vein of humour in which 

 he afterwards wrote " What the Bee is to the 

 Flowret," &c., and other similar compositions. I 

 now give Moore's first sonnet, including its foot- 

 note, reminding us of the child's usual explanatory 

 addition to his first drawing of some amorphous 

 animal — " This is a horse !" or "a bear !" as the 

 case may be. Neither the met7-e nor the matter 

 would prepare us for the height to which the writer 

 afterwards scaled " the mountain's height of Par- 

 nassus : " 



« To Zelia, 



( On her charging the Author with writing too much on 

 Love. ) 



'Tis true my Muse to love inclines, 

 And wreaths of Cypria's myrtle twines ; 

 Quits all aspiring, lofty views, 

 And chaunts what Nature's gifts infuse : 



Timid to try the mountain's* height, 

 Beneath she strays, retir'd from sight. 

 Careless, culling amorous flowers ; 

 Or quaffing mirth in Bacchus' bowers. 

 When first she raised her simplest lays 

 In Cupid's never-ceasing praise, 



The God a faithful promise gave — 

 That never should she feel Love's stings, 



Never to burning passion be a slave, 

 But feel the purer joy thy friendship brings. 



* Parnassus !" 



If you think this fruit of a research into a now 

 almost forgotten work, which however contains 

 many matters of interest (among the rest, " The 

 Baviad of Gifford"), worth insertion, please put it 

 among "N. & Q, ;" it may incite others to look 

 more closely, and perhaps trace other " disjecta 

 membra poeta3." A. B. R. 



Belmont. 



NOTES ON SEVERAL MISUNDERSTOOD WOEDS. 



(^Continued from p. 544.) 



Let no one say that a tithe of these instances 

 would have sufiiced. Whoever thinks so, little 

 understands the vitality of error. Most things die 

 when the brains are out : error has no brains, 

 though it has more heads than the hydra. Who 

 could have believed it possible that after Steevens's 

 heaped-up proofs in support of the authentic 

 reading, " carded his state " (King Henry IV.y 

 Act ill. Scene 2.), Warburton's corruption, 

 ^scarded, i. e. discarded, was again to be foisted 

 into the text on the authority of some nameless 

 and apocryphal commentator ? Let me be par- 

 doned if I prefer Shakspeare's genuine text, 

 backed by the masterly illustrations of his ablest 

 glossarist, before the wishy-washy adidterations of 

 Nobody : and as a small contribution to his abun- 

 dant avouchment of the original reading, the 

 underwritten passage may be llung in, by way of 

 make-weight : 



" Carded his state (says King Henry), 

 Mingled his royaltie with carping fooles." 



" Since which it hath been and is his daily practice, 

 either to broach doctrinas novas et peregrinas, new 

 imaginations never heard of before, or to revive the old 

 and new dress them. And these — for that by them- 

 selves they will not utter — to mingle and to card with 

 the Apostles' doctrine, &c., that at the least yet he may 

 so vent them." — One of the Sermons upon the Second 

 Commandment, preached in the Parish Church of St. 

 Giles, Cripplegate, on the Ninth of January, a.d. 

 MDXcii- : Andrewes' Sermons, vol. v. p. 55. Lib. Ang.- 

 Cath. Theol. 



Trash, to shred or lop. — So said Steevens, al- 

 leging that he had met with it in books containing 

 directions for gardeners, published in the time of 



