T. H. on Bayley’s History of the Tower. 
ciently exemplified, by the series of 
cottages already alluded to; and I will 
venture to say, that no artist, or being 
of artist-like perceptions, has ever 
walked by that series of cottages, when 
the trees were in their foliage, with- 
out admiring the general effect which 
‘the mixture of well-grown hedge-row 
and shrubbery plantation, there pro- 
duces. 
Would one have imagined that, with 
the charm of such an example full in 
view—when the project was entertained 
of erecting another series of cottages, 
or villas, on the adjoining portion of 
the margin of this little rivulet, that the 
first act of Economical Taste, towards the 
accomplishment of this projected im- 
provement, would have been to liave 
felled and uprooted every individual 
tree which had hitherto protected and 
adorned its banks—not even sparing 
some fine old elms, which, by their 
distance from’ the brook and road, 
might have adorned the pleasure 
grounds behind?—or that the next 
step would have been, to cover over the 
rivulet itself w:th brick and mortar, and 
annihilate its visible existence. 
For the men of business, indeed, this 
may be all very right. The more they 
destroy, and alter, and metamorphose, 
the more they have to plan and 
replace—the more the expenditure, 
the more their commission and their 
profit. And a good speculation the 
instance in question must have been 
for them; for the archway was built 
three times over, before it was capable 
of bearing the autumn torrent, and 
hardly keeps its span at last. How- 
ever, to appearance, all is: now com- 
pleted, — the brook has become a 
road—the trees have disappeared— 
and a row of cottages has arisen; some 
of them with castellated turrets, and 
some in a good simple style of cottage 
architecture ; only that they must con- 
tinue to shew their naked fronts to the 
glare of the sun, and the gaze of the 
dusty road, till nursery plants shall 
grow into trees ; and then it may be a 
tomparatively pretty place—but not 
like the embowered row of cottages 
above, in which the expense of hewing 
and arching has been spared; and as 
for the brook, its murmurs shall be 
heard no more—nor shall sun-beam 
glitter, or moon-beam glimmer on its 
surface. So I will conclude, with 
transcribing a pastoral lament, or 
dirgeful sonnet, written upon the oc- 
casion. . 
Montuty Mac.—Supp. 
489 
SONNET 
ON THE RAPID EXTENSION OF THE SUBURHES, 
“ How far, ye Nymphs and Dryads! must 
we stray 
Beyond your once-lov’d haunts, ere we 
again 
May meet you in your freshness? My 
young day 
Has oft time seen me, in your sylvan train, 
Culling the wild-wood flowers, where now 
Temain, 
Nor break, nor hedge-row, nor clear bub- 
bling stream ‘ 
To feed their fragrance, or the fervid ray 
To mitigate ; but to the flaunting beam 
The domes of tasteless opulence display, 
Shadeless, their glaring. fronts; while the 
pure rill 
That wont to parley, or by noon or night, 
With Phoebus” or with Dian’s softer light, 
Now thro’ some drain obscene creeps dark 
and still, - 
To sweep the waste of luxury away. 7” 
Clipe ieee 
t —=a-—- 
To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. 
Sir: 
N your Monthly Review of Litera-~ 
ture, for July (p. 544.), there is a 
short notice of “ The History and An- 
tiquities of the Tower of London, with 
Memoirs of Royal and Distinguished Per- 
sons, &c. &c. By John Bayley, Esq. 
Part II.” The reviewer gives a very 
high character of the work, which it 
perhaps deserves, so far as it respects 
the second part, which I have not read, 
nor have I seen it. But I may be 
allowed to suspect whether the his- 
torian gives, even in ¢his volume, “a 
faithful record of events that have oc- 
curred,’ when I recollect having read 
with attention his first volume about 
four years ago. I fear the reviewer 
has neglected to look into the first 
part, or noted the dishonest and paltry 
way in which Mr. B. passes over an 
important period of English history, 
fraught with very interesting events, 
so intimately connected with the sub- 
ject on which he was then treating. 
When a person is fairly convicted of 
propagating a known and wilful false- 
hood, or omitting wilfully to state a 
fact, the neglect or misrepresentation 
of which becomes injurious either to 
individuals or society at large, what- 
ever that person may afterwards assert 
must be received with great caution, 
unless there be some other and better 
authority to depend upon. 
Of this showy History of the Tower, 
it is but fair to acknowledge that the 
paper is good, and the printer and en- 
graver have executed their parts uncom- 
3R monly 
