Letters of Anna Seward, 
The above lines commence with that ac- 
cent; in the ensuing ones, it prevails 
wholly: 
* Ruin seize thee, ruthless king ; 
Helm norhauberk’s twisted mail.” 
The ear will better bear the long conti- 
nuance of the iambic accent, unmixed 
with the trochaic, especially in the ten- 
feet couplet, than the lavish prevalence 
of that more animated emphasis, Per- 
haps Darwin’s versification is too profuse 
of the latter. Dryden uses it too seldom. 
Pope seems to me to have been more ju- 
dicious in‘ the application of trochaics 
than Dryden in his abstinence,—than 
Darwin in his plenitude. 
Miss Cayley will observe, that fre- 
quently to begin a line, and frequently to 
close one with a verb-active, gives im- 
pressive strength to versification. She 
will feel, too, the awakening power of the 
apostrophe and of the interrogatory style, 
together with the grandeur of the i impe- 
rative, Also, the superiority which re- 
Sults from giving a passage rather in the 
present than in the past tense. Dryden 
was not sufficiently aware of this supe- 
riority; Pope knew it well. We may 
sometimes not unhappily, slide trom the 
he present teuse in the same 
jut the reverse never. 
remark, that pleasing effects 
re ‘often | prodaced by judicious discords 
in  Miceeae? well as in music; such as 
varying | ae at intervals, by two 
bles that should have equal emphasis, 
Gt ‘which may be placed in any part of 
e line—instance: 
What green cliff blossoms o’er thy place of 
rest, 
And roams the gaunt wolf o’er the dreary 
plain. J A. Seward, 
“6 What time the grey-Ay winds her sultry 
horn.” 
a og both ere the high lawns appear'd.” 
Milton. 
ve ‘Shall scorn thy pale shrine glimmering 
near.’ Collins. 
And she will feel the frequent happiness 
of transposition; which, however, should 
not be used wantonly, and only. where it 
may produce some picturesque: or in- 
‘pressive effect. Darwin says, 
“ Loud o’er her whirling flood Charybdis 
roars.’ 
Avoiding the transposition, the line had 
been less animated : 
=? 
« Over whirling floods Charybdis loudly roars.” 
. Suffer me to point out one great essen. 
647 
tial towards acquiring facility i in compos) 
sition, viz. the writing alternately in dif- 
ferent measures, and in great variety of 
measure, Self-set tasks of this sort are 
very useful. Choose either the eight or 
ten feet couplet, or the elegiac, the son- 
net, or one of the various forms of the: 
lyric, for the vehicle of ideas, which, on 
arising in the mind, seem capable of 
appearing to advantage in the poetic 
dress. Lay a fine poem in the chosea 
measure on your table; read it over 
aloud; endeavour to catch its spirit; ob 
serve its pauses sand general constructions 
Thus, a young poet should compose as a 
student in painting paints, from the best 
models, not with servile minuteness, but 
with generous emulation and critical at« 
tention, 
How far I am qualified to give these 
instructions may be very questionable ; 
but these are the habits by which I cul- 
tivated my own little poetic stock. If 
the harvest has beeu tolerably competent, 
it is to them that I am indebted for the 
produce. .Dr. Darwin tells people he 
never read or studied poetry. The ase 
sertion is demonstrably affected and un- 
true, from the artful accuracy and ste. 
died resplendence of his style; and I 
know, that through all the years he lived 
at Lichfield, he was in the habit of amu- 
sing a great part of his leisure hours by 
the most sedulous study of this exalted 
science, and by very critical attention to 
the poetic writing of others. 
HERSELF, 
Be assured, that if disease, in changing 
forms, and in successive periods, bad not 
assailed my frame from the date of that 
letter with which you favoured me in 
February, it could not have remained 6. 
long unacknowledged. For all. its rich 
contents, as well as for those which came 
to me from your kind hand last week, 
accept my sincere thanks, 
To a stubborn and feverish anit, 
which brought on my long existing dis. 
order, impeded respiration, succeeded a 
violent inflammation in my eyes. I en- 
dured it a fortnight, every person’s ins 
fallible remedy seeming to increase the 
malady, ull, applying to, Dr. Darwin, it 
was soon removed by his heahng skill. 
Beneath the most oppressive influence 
of this disorder, I was sitting in darkness 
and despondency when your brother and 
sister passed through Lichfield, whom, 
in hours of tolerable health, L should 
have rejoiged to welcome. 
spondency; for alas! the want of sizht, 
of 
I say des - 
