UNCLE IN ENGLAND. 75 



And darts his light through every guilty hole; 

 Then murders, treasons, and detested sins, 

 The cloak of night being pluck'd from off their backs, 

 Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves. 



In this case they all agreed that an author 

 might insensibly dwell on an idea, alter, dress, 

 and add to it, till he was no longer aware whence 

 the original thought had come as in a large 

 company, a single word which happens to 

 come to our ears from a group in another part 

 of the room produces sometimes an interesting 

 conversation, though none of the party engaged 

 in it know well how it began. 



Mrs. P. said that similar turns of thought 

 and expression may be traced back through the 

 whole chain of poets ; and that if Homer ap- 

 pears to be an original genius, it is because we 

 cannot now compare him with his predecessors. 

 Few of our old writers were less exposed to the 

 charge of borrowing than Spenser, and yet she 

 could not help imagining that the Persian tale of 

 Fadlallah was the origin of those pretty stanzas 

 in the Faerie Queene, where the dove who watches 

 over Belphoebe and her despairing swain, con- 

 trives that they shall once more be reconciled. 



Mary said she thought it had more resem- 

 blance to the story of Camaralzaman, in the 

 Arabian Nights, who was enticed from hill to 

 hill in pursuit of the bird who had carried off the 

 princess's talisman. " That cruel bird," said 

 she, " leads Camaralzaman away only to sepa- 



ii 2 



