POETRY OUTDONE BY NATURE. 307 



CHAPTER XXXII. 



NEREIDES. 



" I would not enter on my list of friends, 

 Though graced with polish'd manners and fine sense, 

 The man, who needlessly sets foot upon a worm." 



COWPER. 



IT certainly is a circumstance much to be regretted, 

 that the poets, both ancient and modern, when wishing 

 to indulge in nights of fancy, by describing monsters 

 and all sorts of prodigies, have never come to Nature 

 herself for a few lessons, or at least for a few hints 

 upon which they might have improved. Take them 

 altogether, they are a very timid race, and their best 

 fictions so infinitely below reality, that they ought to 

 be ashamed of themselves. When our late respected 

 friend Dr. Mantell discovered the "land of the 

 Iguanodon," he went the right way to work. First, 

 he reintegrated the great forms whose bones he had 

 exhumed, and with the data thus before him, applied 

 to the genius of John Martin to poetize the sub- 

 ject. The result was most satisfactory : the mighty 

 reptile stood at once, as terrible in aspect as if all the 

 poets of antiquity had had the making of him ; be- 

 striding acres of ground, his length of tail curling 

 off towards the horizon till lost in aerial perspective, 



