158 



TOETKY AND POETS. 



by my ' invincible spirit of antago- 

 nism.' I wish the North American 

 Review to express no opinion of me 

 whatever for I have none of it. 

 In the meantime, as I see no motto 

 on its title-page, let me recommend 

 it one from Sterne's Letter from 

 France. Here it is : ' As we rode 

 along the valley, we saw a herd of 

 asses on the top of one of the moun- 

 tains how they viewed and re- 

 viewed ITS.' " 



A ROBBER'S REMORSE. 

 Somebody once robbed the poet 

 Montgomery of an inkstand, pre- 

 sented to him by the ladies of 

 Sheffield. The public execration 

 was so loud, that the thief restored 

 the booty with the folio wing note : 



"Birmingham, March, 1812. 

 ''Honoured Sir: When we robbed 

 your house we did not know that 

 you wrote such beautiful verses as 

 you do. I remember my mother 

 told some of them to me when I 

 was a boy. I found what house 

 we robbed by the writing on the 



fortunes arelndexes of the wrath of I inkstand. Honoured sir, I send it 

 heaven, what must you think of i back. It was my share of the 



A poetaster brought Addison 

 one of his compositions, and begged 

 his opinion of it. It was a copy of 

 very indifferent verses, and they 

 appeared the worse because he had 

 prefixed to them several lines from 

 Homer, and thus exposed them to 

 a very disadvantageous contrast. 

 Addison, with great warmth, struck 

 out the lines from Homer; and 

 when the surprised poetaster asked 

 the reason, " Do you not recollect," 

 said Addison, " the Eoman empe- 

 ror, whose statues appeared to him 

 very ridiculous when they were 

 placed near those of the gods T 



HILTOK AND JAMES II. 



James II., when Duke of York, 

 made a visit to Milton, out of curi- 

 osity. In the course of their con- 

 versation, the duke said to the poet, 

 that he thought his blindness was 

 a judgment of heaven on him, 

 because he had written against 

 Charles I., his (the duke's) father, 

 when the immortal poet replied, 

 " If your highness thinks that mis- 



your father's tragical end? I have 

 only lost my eyes he lost his 

 head." 



POE THE AMERICAN POET. 



Edgar A. Poe, whose genius even 

 those who most dislike his wild 

 extravagances and psychological 

 transcendentalism will at once ac- 

 knowledge, thus vents his bitterest 

 sarcasm upon the North American 

 Review : 



" I cannot say that I ever fairly 

 comprehended the force of the term 

 ' insult,' until I was given to under- 

 stand, one day, by a member of the 

 North American Review clique, that 

 this journal was ' not only willing, 

 but anxious, to render me that jus- 

 tice which had been already ren- 

 dered me by the Revue Francaise, 

 and the Revue des Deux Mondes,' 

 but was ' restrained from so doing' 



booty, and I hope you and God will 

 forgive me." 



GOLDSMITH'S "DESERTED VILLAGE." 

 " The Deserted Village,''' says Mr. 

 Best, an Irish clergyman, " relates 

 to the scenes in which Goldsmith 

 was an actor. Auburn is a poetical 

 name for the village of Lissoy, in 

 the county of Westmeath, barony 

 of Kilkenny West. The name of 

 the schoolmaster was Paddy Burns. 

 I remember him well. He was, in- 

 deed, a man severe to view. A 

 woman called Walsey Cruse kept 

 the alehouse. 



' Imagination fondly stoops to trnce 

 The parlour splendours of that festive 



place.' 



I have been often in the house. 

 The hawthorn bush was remarkably 

 large, and stood opposite the ale- 

 house. 



