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wisdom for wisdom, song for song, jest for jest! In his one great art Chaucer would of course have had the better-indeed of whom except of Shakespeare and Milton would he not? But my friend would have made it up in his infinite variety. To say nothing of the classical learning for which he has always been renowned, a scholar amongst scholars; does he not write and talk as a native nearly all the languages of Europe, all certainly that have a literature to tempt to the acquirement? Was not his "Provence and the Rhone" almost the only book ever praised in the "Waverley Novels?" Does not he contrive in his journals to make his pen do double duty as sketcher and writer? And are not those pen and ink drawings of his something astonishing for spirit and truth? Is he not also an artist in wood, embroidering his oaken wainscoats with every quirk and quiddity that comes into his head from a comic masque to an old English motto? Is he not such a reciter that he can make people laugh till they cry with his fun, and afraid to go to bed with his ghost stories? Can the very beasts of the field resist him? Did not he frighten me out of my wits, by calling around him all the wild cattle of Highclere from the box of his own carriage? Unhappy creatures! he

enchanted them with his mimicry till they took him for one of themselves. Is there anything he cannot do? that is the fitter question. Cannot he, if he hears a German soldier in a barrack-yard singing an old song whilst polishing his musket, note down the air, retain the words, put them into English verse adapted to the tune, and sing it as heartily as the soldier could have done for the life of him? Did he

net do so by the ballad of "Prince Eugene," said to have been composed words and air by one of the Prince's old troopers, and long as popular in the German army as "Tom Bowling" or "Tom Tough" amongst the British tars. Here is Mr. Hughes's

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Prince Eugene, our noble leader,
Made a vow in death to bleed, or

Win the Emperor back Belgrade:
"Launch pontoons, let all be ready
To bear our ordnance safe and steady
Over the Danube"-thus he said.

There was mustering on the border
When our bridge in marching order

Breasted first the roaring stream;
Then at Semlin, vengeance breathing,
We encamped to scourge the heathen

Back to Mahound and fame redeem.

'Twas on August one and twenty,
Scouts with glorious tidings plenty
Galloped in through storm and rain ;
Turks they swore three hundred thousand
Marched to give our Prince a rouse, and
Dared us forth to battle-plain.

Then at Prince Eugene's head quarters
Met our fine old fighting Tartars,

Generals and Field-Marshalls all;

Every point of war debated,

Each in his turn the signal waited
Forth to march and on to fall.

For the onslaught all were eager
When the word sped round our leaguer :

"Soon as the clock chimes twelve to-night

Then bold hearts sound boot and saddle,
Stand to your arms and on to battle,

Every one that has hands to fight!"

Musqueteers, horse, yagers, forming
Sword in hand each bosom warming,
Still as death we all advance;
Each prepared come blows or booty
German-like to do our duty,

Joining hands in the gallant dance.

Our cannoneers, those tough old heroes
Struck a lusty peal to cheer us,
Firing ordnance great and small;
Right and left our cannon thundered
Till the Pagans quaked and wondered
And by platoons began to fall.

On the right like a lion angered
Bold Eugene cheered on the vanguard ;
Ludovic spurred up and down,
Crying "On, boys every hand to't,

Brother Germans nobly stand to't,

Charge them home for our old renown!"

Gallant Prince he spoke no more; he

Fell in early youth and glory

Struck from his horse by some curst ball:

Great Eugene long sorrowed o'er him,
For a brother's love he bore him,
Every soldier mourned his fall.

In Waradin we laid his ashes;
Cannon peals and musket flashes
O'er his grave due honours paid:
Then the old Black Eagle flying
All the Pagan powers defying

On we marched and stormed Belgrade.

Mr. Hughes was honoured with the friendship of Sir Walter Scott, and amongst the most valued treasures of the Priory is the last portrait ever taken of the great novelist.

XVI

UNRECOGNISED POETS.

GEORGE DARLEY-THE REV. EDWARD WILLIAM BARNARD.

UNRECOGNISED Poets! many, very many are there doubtless of the world's finest spirits, to whom these words may be truly applied; poets whom the world has not known, or has refused to acknowledge. If Wordsworth had died fifty years ago, after the " Excursion," after" Ruth," after the "Yew Trees," after the very finest of his shorter poems had been published, he would have been amongst the disowned. But he was strong of frame and of heart, vigorous and self-reliant; competence came to him early; moreover he dwelt in the healthy atmosphere of the northern hills, and heard no more of the critical onslaught than served to nerve hin for fresh battles. So he lived through the time of tribulation, and gathered from the natural effect of the reaction more of fame and praise than would have fallen to his share had he won his laurels without the long probation and the fierce contest which preceded his recognition as the "Great High Priest of all the Nine."

Men of less power and of less faith die of the trial. Of such was George Darley. Gifted certainly with high talents, and with the love of song, which to

enthusiastic youth seems the only real vocation, he offended his father, a wealthy alderman of Dublin, by devoting his whole existence to poetry, and found, when too late, that the fame for which he had sacrificed worldly fortune eluded his pursuit. It is impossible not to sympathise with such a trial; not to feel how severe must be the sufferings of a man conscious of no common power, who sees day by day the popularity for which he yearns won by far inferior spirits, and works which he despises passing through edition after edition, whilst his own writings are gathering dust upon the publisher's shelves, or sold as waste paper to the pastry cook or the chandler. What wonder that the disenchanted poet should be transmuted into a cold and caustic critic, or that the disappointed man should withdraw into the narrowest limits of friendly society, a hermit in the centre of London !

To add to these griefs, Mr. Darley was afflicted by a natural infirmity not uncommon with men of high talent, and nervous and susceptible temperament. He stammered so much as to render conversation painful and difficult to himself, and distressing to his companions. The consciousness of this impediment (which he called his mask) increased its intensity, causing him to shrink from all unnecessary communications, except with the few to whom he was familiarly accustomed, and of whose appreciation he was sure. They seem to have esteemed him much.

I myself never saw him. But I suppose I owed to the too partial report of some of his own most valued friends the honour of being admitted amongst his correspondents. Much as I admired him, and sin

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