"Ravenna, April. 28. 1821. "You cannot have been more disappointed than myself, nor so much deceived. I have been so at some personal risk also, which is not yet done away with. However, no time nor circumstances shall alter my tone nor my feelings of indignation against tyranny triumphant. The present business has been as much a work of treachery as of cowardice, though both may have done their part. If ever you and I meet again, I will have a talk with you upon the subject. At present, for obvious reasons, I can write but little, as all letters are opened, In mine they shall always find my sentiments, but nothing that can lead to the oppression of others.

--

"You will please to recollect that the Neapolitans are nowhere now more execrated than in Italy, and not blame a whole people for the vices of a province. That would be like condemning Great Britain because they plunder wrecks in Cornwall.

"And now let us be literary;-a sad falling off, but it is always a consolation. If 'Othello's occupation be gone,' let us take to the next best; and, if we cannot contribute to make mankind more free and wise, we may amuse ourselves and those who like it. What are you writing? I have been scribbling at intervals, and Murray will be publishing about now.

"Lady Noel has, as you say, been dangerously ill, but it may console you to learn that she is dangerously well again.

66

I have written a sheet or two more of Memoranda for you; and I kept a little Journal for about a month or two, till I had filled the paper-book. I then left it off, as

1 "Aye, down to the dust with them, slaves as they are," &c. &c.

2 I had not, when I wrote, seen this pamphlet, as he supposes, but had merely heard from some friends, that his pen had "run a-muck" in it, and that I myself had not escaped a slight graze in its career.

3 It may be sufficient to say of the use to which both Lord Byron and Mr. Bowles thought it worth their while to apply my name in this controversy, that, as far as my own knowledge of the subject extended, I was disposed to agree with neither of the extreme opinions into which, as

things grew busy, and, afterwards, too gloomy to set down without a painful feeling. This I should be glad to send you, if I had an opportunity; but a volume, however small, don't go well by such posts as exist in this Inquisition of a country. "I have no news. As a very pretty woman said to me a few nights ago, with the tears in her eyes, as she sat at the harpsichord, Alas! the Italians must now return to making operas.' I fear that and maccaroni are their forte, and motley their only wear.' However, there are some high spirits among them still. Pray write. "And believe me, &c."

So, you have got the Letter on Bowles? 2 I do not recollect to have said any thing of you that could offend, - certainly, nothing intentionally. As for **, I meant him a compliment. I wrote the whole off-hand, without copy or correction, and expecting then every day to be called into the field. What have I said of you? I am sure I forget. It must be something of regret for your approbation of Bowles. And did you not approve, as he says? Would I had known that before! I would have given him some more gruel. My intention was to

it appeared to me, my distinguished friends had diverged; -neither with Lord Byron in that spirit of partisanship which led him to place Pope above Shakspeare and Milton, nor with Mr. Bowles in such an application of the "principles" of poetry as could tend to sink Pope, on the scale of his art, to any rank below the very first. Such being the middle state of my opinion on the question, it will not be difficult to understand how one of my controversial friends should be as mistaken in supposing me to differ altogether from his views, as the other was in taking for granted that I had ranged myself wholly on

his side.

it deserves). However, and if there are any passages not personal to Bowles, and yet bearing upon the question, you may add them to the reprint (if it is reprinted) of my first Letter to you. Upon this consult Gifford ; and, above all, don't let any thing be added which can personally affect Mr. Bowles.

"I hope and trust that Elliston won't be permitted to act the drama. Surely he might have the grace to wait for Kean's return before he attempted it; though, even then, I should be as much against the attempt as

The controversy, in which Lord Byron, with so much grace and good-humour, thus allowed himself to be disarmed by the courtesy of his antagonist, it is not my intention to run the risk of reviving by any enquiry into its origin or merits. In all such discussions on matters of mere taste and opinion, where, on one side, it is the aim of the disputants to elevate the object of the contest, and on the other, to depreciate it, Truth will usually be found, like Shakspeare's gatherer of samphire on the cliff, "half way down." Whatever judgment, however, may be formed respecting the controversy itself, of the urbanity and gentle feeling on both sides, which (notwithstanding some slight trials of this good understanding afterwards) led ultimately to the result anticipated in the foregoing letter, there can be but one opinion; and it is only to be wished that such honourable forbearance were as sure of imitators as it is, deservedly, of eulogists. In the lively pages thus suppressed, when ready fledged for flight, with a power of self-command rarely exercised by wit, there are some passages, of a general nature, too curious to be lost, which I shall accordingly proceed to extract for the reader.

[The" Letter to Mr. Murray on Mr.Bowles's Strictures upon the Life and Writings of Pope" being printed entire at the end of this Volume, most of Mr. Moore's extracts are omitted.]

["Memoirs by James Earl Waldegrave, K. G."]

"Poor Scott is now no more. In the exercise of his vocation, he contrived at last to make himself the subject of a coroner's inquest. But he died like a brave man, and he lived an able one. I knew him personally, though slightly. Athough several years my senior, we had been schoolfellows together at the 'grammar-schule' (or, as the Aberdonians pronounce it, squeel') of New Aberdeen. He did not behave to me quite handsomely in his capacity of editor a few years ago, but he was under no obligation to behave otherwise. The moment was too tempting for many friends and for all enemies. At a time when all my relations (save one) fell from me like leaves from the tree in autumn winds, and my few friends became still fewer-when the whole periodical press (I mean the daily and weekly, not the literary press) was let loose against me in every shape of reproach, with the two strange exceptions (from their usual opposition) of The Courier' and 'The Examiner,'-the paper of which Scott had the direction was neither the last, nor the least vituperative. Two years ago I met him at Venice, when he was bowed in griefs by the loss of his son, and had known, by experience, the bitterness of domestic privation. He was then earnest with me to return to England; and on my telling him, with a smile, that he was once of a different opinion, he replied to me, that he and others had been greatly misled; and that some pains, and rather extraordinary means, had been taken to excite them.' Scott is no more, but there are more than one living who were present at this dialogue. He was a man of very considerable talents, and of great acquirements. He had made his way, as a literary character, with high success, and in a few years. Poor fellow! I recollect his joy at some appointment which he had obtained, or was to obtain, through Sir James Mackintosh, and which prevented the further extension (unless by a

2 ["Memoirs of the Last Ten Years of George II., by Horace Walpole, Lord Orford."]

rapid run to Rome) of his travels in Italy. I little thought to what it would conduct him. Peace be with him! and may all such other faults as are inevitable to humanity be as readily forgiven him, as the little injury which he had done to one who respected his talents and regrets his loss."

In reference to some complaints made by Mr. Bowles, in his Pamphlet, of a charge of "hypochondriacism" which he supposed to have been brought against him by his assailant, Mr. Gilchrist, the noble writer thus proceeds:

1

"I cannot conceive a man in perfect health being much affected by such a charge, because his complexion and conduct must amply refute it. But were it true, to what does it amount? - to an impeachment of a liver complaint. I will tell it to the world,' exclaimed the learned Smelfungus; you had better (said I) tell it to your physician.' There is nothing dishonourable in such a disorder, which is more peculiarly the malady of students. It has been the complaint of the good and the wise and the witty, and even of the gay. Regnard, the author of the last French comedy after Molière, was atrabilarious, and Molière himself saturnine. Dr. Johnson, Gray, and Burns, were all more or less affected by it occasionally. It was the prelude to the more awful malady of Collins, Cowper, Swift, and Smart; but it by no means follows that a partial affliction of this disorder is to terminate like theirs. But even were it so,

PENROSE. 2

"Nor best, nor wisest, are exempt from thee; Folly Folly's only free.' "Mendelsohn and Bayle were at times so overcome with this depression as to be obliged to recur to seeing 'puppet-shows,' and 'counting tiles upon the opposite houses,' to divert themselves. Dr. Johnson, at times, would have given a limb to recover his spirits.'

"In page, 14. we have a large assertion, that 'the Eloisa alone is sufficient to convict him (Pope) of gross licentiousness.' Thus, out it comes at last — Mr. B. does accuse

Pope of 'gross licentiousness,' and grounds the charge upon a poem. The licentiousness is a 'grand peut-être,' according to the turn of the times being:- the grossness I deny. On the contrary, I do believe that such a subject never was, nor ever could be, treated by any poet with so much delicacy mingled with, at the same time, such true and intense passion. Is the 'Atys' of Catullus licen tious? No, nor even gross; and yet Catullus is often a coarse writer. The subject is nearly the same, except that Atys was the suicide of his manhood, and Abelard the

victim.

"The licentiousness' of the story was not Pope's, -it was a fact. All that it had of gross he has softened; all that it had of indelicate he has purified; all that it had of passionate he has beautified; and all that it had of holy he has hallowed. Mr. Campbell has admirably marked this in a few words (I quote from memory), in drawing the distinction between Pope and Dryden, and pointing out where Dryden was wanting. 'I fear,' says he, that had the subject of Eloisa,' fallen into his (Dryden's) hands, that he would have given us but a coarse draft of her passion.' Never was the delicacy of Pope so much shown as in this poem. With the facts and the letters of Eloisa' he has done what no other mind but that of the best and purest of poets could have accom plished with such materials. Ovid, Sappho (in the Ode called hers) - all that we have of ancient, all that we have of modern poetry, sinks into nothing compared with him in this production.

"Let us hear no more of this trash about 'licentiousness.' Is not'Anacreon' taught in our schools? — translated, praised, and edited? and are the English schools or the English women the more corrupt for all this? When you have thrown the ancients into the fire, it will be time to denounce the moderns. Licentiousness!'- there is more real mischief and sapping licentiousness in a single French prose novel, in a Moravian hymn, or a German comedy, than in all the actual poetry that ever was penned or poured forth since the rhapsodies of Orpheus. The sentimental anatomy of Rousseau and Mad.

2 ["Hail, awful Madness, hail!

Thy realm extends, thy powers prevail,
Far as the voyager spreads his vent`rous sail;
Nor best, nor wisest, are exempt from thee;
Folly folly's only free."

These lines are from Penrose's poem, entitled 'Madness," -a composition which, in the opinion of Dr. Robert Anderson, "challenges a comparison with the Music Ode of Dryden, the Passions of Collins, and the Bard of Gray.' Penrose died, like Lord Byron, at the early age of thirtysix.]

de Stael are far more formidable than any quantity of verse. They are so, because they sap the principles by reasoning upon the passions; whereas poetry is in itself passion, and does not systematise. It assails, but does not argue; it may be wrong, but it does not assume pretensions to optimism."

Mr. Bowles having, in his pamphlet, complained of some anonymous communication which he had received, Lord Byron thus comments on the circumstance.

"I agree with Mr. B. that the intention was to annoy him; but I fear that this was answered by his notice of the reception of the criticism. An anonymous writer has but one means of knowing the effect of his attack. In this he has the superiority over the viper; he knows that his poison has taken effect when he hears the victim cry; -the adder is deaf. The best reply to an anonymous intimation is to take no notice directly nor indirectly. I wish Mr. B. could see only one or two of the thousand which I have received in the course of a literary life, which, though begun early, has not yet extended to a third part of his existence as an author. I speak of literary life only; -were I to add personal, I might double the amount of anonymous letters. If he could but see the violence, the threats, the absurdity of the whole thing, he would laugh, and so should I, and thus be both gainers.

To keep up the farce, within the last month of this present writing (1821), I have had my life threatened in the same way which menaced Mr. B.'s fame, excepting that the anonymous denunciation was addressed to the Cardinal Legate of Romagna, instead of to Mrs. Bowles. I append the menace in all its barbaric but literal Italian, that Mr. B. may be convinced; and as this is the only 'promise to pay' which the Italians ever keep, so my person has been at least as much exposed to a shot in the gloaming' from John Heatherblutter' (see Waverley), as ever Mr. B.'s glory was from an editor. I am, nevertheless, on horseback and lonely for some hours (one of them twilight) in the forest daily; and this, because it was my 'custom in the afternoon,' and that I believe if the tyrant cannot escape amidst his guards (should it be so written), so the humbler individual would find precautions useless.”

The following just tribute to my Reverend Friend's merits as a poet I have peculiar pleasure in extracting :

"Mr. Bowles has no reason to 'succumb' but to Mr. Bowles. As a poet, the author of The Missionary' may compete with the foremost of his contemporaries. Let it be recollected, that all my previous opinions of

Mr. Bowles's poetry were written long before the publication of his last and best poem ; and that a poet's last poem should be his best, is his highest praise. But, however, he may duly and honourably rank with his living rivals," &c. &c. &c.

Among various Addenda for this pamphlet, I find the following curious passages:

"The grand distinction of the under forms of the new school of poets is their vulgarity. By this I do not mean that they are coarse, but shabby-genteel,' as it is termed. A man may be coarse and yet not vulgar, and the reverse. Burns is often coarse, but never vulgar. Chatterton is never vulgar, nor Wordsworth, nor the higher of the Lake school, though they treat of low life in all its branches. It is in their finery that the new under school are most vulgar, and they may be known by this at once; as what we called at Harrow a Sunday blood' might be easily distinguished from a gentleman, although his clothes might be better cut, and his boots the best blackened, of the two; - probably because he made the one or cleaned the other with his own hands.

'In the present case, I speak of writing, not of persons. Of the latter, I know nothing; of the former, I judge as it is found. *

* They may be honourable and gentlemanly men, for what I know, but the latter quality is studiously excluded from their publications. They remind me of Mr. Smith and the Miss Broughtons at the Hampstead Assembly, in 'Evelina.' In these things (in private life, at least) I pretend to some small experience; because in the course of my youth, I have seen a little of all sorts of society, from the Christian prince and the Mussulman sultan and pacha, and the higher ranks of their countries, down to the London boxer, the flash and the swell, the Spanish muleteer, the wandering Turkish dervise, the Scotch highlander, and the Albanian robber ;-to say nothing of the curious varieties of Italian social life. Far be it from me to presume that there are now, or can be, such a thing as an aristocracy of poets; but there is a nobility of thought and of style, open to all stations, and derived partly from talent, and partly from education,—which is to be found in Shakspeare, and Pope, and Burns, no less than in Dante and Alfieri, but which is nowhere to be perceived in the mock birds and bards of Mr. Hunt's little chorus. If I were asked to define what this gentlemanliness is, I should say that it is only to be defined by examples· of those who have it, and those who have it not. In life, I should say that most military men have it, and few naval; that several men of rank have it, and few lawyers; that