And, after fruitless efforts, you return

Without amendment, and he answers, “Burn!"
That instant throw your paper in the fire,
Ask not his thoughts, or follow his desire;
But (if true Bard!) you scorn to condescend,
And will not alter what you can't defend,
If you will breed this Bastard of your Brains,'
We'll have no words-I've only lost my pains.

Yet, if you only prize your favourite thought,
As critics kindly do, and authors ought;
If your cool friend annoy you now and then,
And cross whole pages with his plaguy pen;
No matter, throw your ornaments aside,-
Better let him than all the world deride.

Give light to passages too much in shade,

790

Nor let a doubt obscure one verse you've made; 800
Your friend's a "Johnson," not to leave one word,
However trifling, which may seem absurd;

Such erring trifles lead to serious ills,
And furnish food for critics, or their quills."

As the Scotch fiddle, with its touching tune,
Or the sad influence of the angry Moon,

i. But if you're too conceited to amend.—[MS. L. (a).]

1. Minerva being the first by Jupiter's head-piece, and a variety of equally unaccountable parturitions upon earth, such as Madoc, etc. etc.

2. "A crust for the critics."-Bayes, in "the Rehearsal" [act ii. sc. 2].

All men avoid bad writers' ready tongues

As yawning waiters fly1 Fitzscribble's lungs ; 1
Yet on he mouths-ten minutes-tedious each ii. 2

As Prelate's homily, or placeman's speech;
Long as the last years of a lingering lease,
When Riot pauses until Rents increase.

810

While such a minstrel, muttering fustian, strays
O'er hedge and ditch, through unfrequented ways,
If by some chance he walks into a well,
And shouts for succour with stentorian yell,
"A rope! help, Christians, as ye hope for grace !"
Nor woman, man, nor child will stir a pace;
For there his carcass he might freely fling,
From frenzy, or the humour of the thing.

820

Though this has happened to more Bards than one;
I'll tell you Budgell's story,-and have done.

Budgell, a rogue and rhymester, for no good,
(Unless his case be much misunderstood)

i. On pain of suffering from their pen or tongues.—

[MS. M. erased.]

- fly Fitzgerald's lungs.—[MS, M.] ii. Ah when Bards mouth! how sympathetic Time Stagnates, and Hours stand still to hear their rhyme.[MS. M. erased.]

iii. Besides how know ye? that he did not fling

Himself there for the humour of the thing.-[MS. M.] 1. And the "waiters" are the only fortunate people who can" fly" from them; all the rest, viz. the sad subscribers to the "Literary Fund," being compelled, by courtesy, to sit out the recitation without a hope of exclaiming, "Sic" (that is, by choking Fitz. with bad wine, or worse poetry) "me servavit Apollo!" [See English Bards, line 1 and note 3.] 2. [Lines 813-816 not in MS. L. (a) or MS. L. (b).]

When teased with creditors' continual claims,

1

"To die like Cato," 1 leapt into the Thames!

And therefore be it lawful through the town
For any Bard to poison, hang, or drown.

Who saves the intended Suicide receives

Small thanks from him who loathes the life he leaves;1

And, sooth to say, mad poets must not lose
The Glory of that death they freely choose.

Nor is it certain that some sorts of verse Prick not the Poet's conscience as a curse;

il.

i. Small thanks, unwelcome life he quickly leaves;
And raving poets—really should not lose.-[MS. M.]

ii.

Nor is it clearly understood that verse
Has not been given the poet for a curse;
Perhaps he sent the parson's pig to pound,
Or got a child on consecrated ground;
But, be this as it may, his rhyming rage
Exceeds a Bear who strives to break his cage.
If free, all fly his versifying fit;

The young, the old, the simpleton and wit.—[MS. L. (a).]

831

1. On his table were found these words :-"What Cato did, and Addison approved, cannot be wrong." But Addison did not "approve ;" and if he had, it would not have mended the matter. He had invited his daughter on the same waterparty; but Miss Budgell, by some accident, escaped this last paternal attention. Thus fell the sycophant of "Atticus," and the enemy of Pope! [Eustace Budgell (1686-1737), a friend and relative of Addison's, "leapt into the Thames" to escape the dishonour which attached to him in connection with Dr. Tindal's will, and the immediate pressure of money difficulties. He was, more or less, insane. "We talked (says Boswell) of a man's drowning himself. I put the case of Eustace Budgell. Suppose, sir,' said I, 'that a man is absolutely sure that, if he lives a few days longer, he shall be detected in a fraud, the consequence of which will be utter disgrace, and expulsion from society?' JOHNSON. 'Then, sir, let him go abroad to a distant country; let him

VOL. I.

2 G

Dosed1 with vile drams on Sunday he was found,

Or got a child on consecrated ground!

And hence is haunted with a rhyming rage---
Feared like a bear just bursting from his cage.
If free, all fly his versifying fit,

Fatal at once to Simpleton or Wit:

But him, unhappy! whom he seizes,-him

He flays with Recitation limb by limb;

840

Probes to the quick where'er he makes his breach,
And gorges like a Lawyer-or a Leech.

go to some place where he is not known. Don't let him go to the devil, where he is known."-Boswell's Life of Johnson (1886), p. 281.]

1. If" dosed with," etc. be censured as low, I beg leave to refer to the original for something still lower; and if any reader will translate "Minxerit in patrios cineres," etc. into a decent couplet, I will insert said couplet in lieu of the present.

[The last page of MS. M. is dated

BYRON,

Capuchin Convent,

Athens. March 14th, 1811.

The following memorandum, in Byron's handwriting, is also inscribed on the last page: "722 lines, and 4 inserted after and now counted, in all 726.-B. Since this several lines are added.-B. June 14th, 1811.

"Copied fair at Malta, May 3rd, 1811.-B."

BYRON,

March 11th and 12th,

Athens. 1811.-[MS. L. (a).]

BYRON, March 14th, 1811.

Athens, Capuchin Convent.-[MS. L. (b).]]

THE CURSE OF MINERVA.

"Pallas te hoc vulnere, Pallas

Immolat, et pœnam scelerato ex sanguine sumit."

Eneid, lib. xii. 947, 948.