"Because, in the triangles D B C, A C B; D B is equal to A C; and B C
common to both; the two sides D B, B C, are equal to the two A C, C B,
each to each, and the angle D B C is equal to the angle A C B:
therefore, the base D C is equal to the base A B, and the triangle D B
C (Mr. Southey) is equal to the triangle A C B, the less to the
greater, which is absurd" etc.
The editor of the 'Edinburgh Register' will find the rest of the theorem
hard by his stabling; he has only to cross the river; 'tis the first
turnpike t' other side 'Pons Asinorum.'[A]
['The Curse of Kehama', by Robert Southey, was published 1810;
'Arthur, or The Northern Enchantment', by the Rev. Richard Hole, in 1789;
'Alfred', by Joseph Cottle, in 1801;
'Davideis`', by Abraham Cowley, in 1656;
'Richard the First', by Sir James Bland Surges, in 1801;
'Exodiad', by Sir J. Bland Surges and R. Cumberland, in 1808;
'Exodus', by Charles Hoyle, in 1802;
'Epigoniad', by W. Wilkie, D.D., in 1757;
'Calvary', by R. Cumberland, in 1792;
'Fall of Cambria', by Joseph Cottle, in 1809;
'Siege of Acre', by Hannah Cowley, in 1801;
'The Vision of Don Roderick', by Sir Walter Scott, in 1811;
'Tom Thumb the Great', by Henry Fielding, in 1730.
The 'Courier' of July 16, 1811, reports in full the first stage of the
case Sir F. Burdett 'v.' William Scott ('vide supra'), which was brought
before Lord Meadowbank as ordinary in the outer court. Jeffrey was
counsel for the pursuer, who sought to recover a sum of £5000 lent under
a bond. For the defence it was alleged that the money had been entrusted
for a particular purpose, namely, the maintenance of an infant. Jeffrey
denied the existence of any such claim, and maintained that whatever was
scandalous or calumnious in the defence was absolutely untrue. The case,
which was not included in the Scottish Law Reports, was probably settled
out of court. Evidently the judge held that on technical grounds an
action did not lie. Burdett's enemies were not slow in turning the
scandal to account. (See a contemporary pamphlet, 'Adultery and
Patriotism', London, 1811.)] ]
[Sub-Footnote A: This Latin has sorely puzzled the University of
Edinburgh. Ballantyne said it meant the "Bridge of Berwick," but
Southey claimed it as half English; Scott swore it was the "Brig o'
Stirling:" he had just passed two King James's and a dozen Douglasses
over it. At last it was decided by Jeffrey, that it meant nothing more
nor less than the "counter of Archy Constable's shop."]
[Footnote 62: Voltaire's 'Pucelle' is not quite so immaculate as Mr.
Southey's 'Joan of Arc', and yet I am afraid the Frenchman has both more
truth and poetry too on his side--(they rarely go together)--than our
patriotic minstrel, whose first essay was in praise of a fanatical
French strumpet, whose title of witch would be correct with the change
of the first letter.]
[Footnote 63: Like Sir Bland Burges's 'Richard'; the tenth book of
which I read at Malta, on a trunk of Eyre's, 19, Cockspur-street.
If this be doubted, I shall buy a portmanteau to quote from.
[Sir James Bland Burges (1752-1824), who assumed, in 1821, the name of
Lamb, married, as his first wife, the Hon. Elizabeth Noel, daughter of
Lord Wentworth, and younger sister of Byron's mother-in-law, Lady
Milbanke. He was called to the bar in 1777, and in the same year was
appointed a Commissioner in Bankruptcy. In 1787 he was returned M.P. for
the borough of Helleston; and from 1789 to 1795 held office as
Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. In 1795, at the instance of his
chief, Lord Grenville, he vacated his post, and by way of compensation
was created a baronet with a sinecure post as Knight-Marshal of the
Royal Household. Thenceforth he devoted himself to literature. In 1796
he wrote the 'Birth and Triumph of Love', by way of letter-press to some
elegant designs of the Princess Elizabeth. (For 'Richard the First' and
the 'Exodiad', see note, p. 436.) His plays, 'Riches and Tricks for
Travellers', appeared in 1810, and there were other works. In spite of
Wordsworth's testimony (Wordsworth signed, but Coleridge dictated and no
doubt composed, the letter: see 'Thomas Poole and His Friends', ii. 27)
"to a pure and unmixed vein of native English" in 'Richard the First
(Bland-Burges Papers', 1885, p. 308), Burges as a poet awaits
rediscovery. His diaries, portions of which were published in 1885, are
lively and instructive. He has been immortalized in Person's
Macaronics--
"Poetis nos lætamur tribus,
Pye, Petro Pindar, parvo Pybus.
Si ulterius ire pergis,
Adde his Sir James Bland Burges!"]
[Footnote 64: [Charles Lamb, in "Christ's Hospital Five and Thirty Years
Ago" (_Prose Works_, 1836, ii. 30), records his repeated visits, as a
Blue Coat boy, "to the Lions in the Tower--to whose levée, by courtesy
immemorial, we had a prescriptive title to admission."]
[Footnote 65: Lines 677, 678 are not in 'MS. L. (a)'.]
[Footnote 66: Lines 689-696 are not in 'MS. L. (a)' or 'MS. L. (b)'.]
[Footnote 67: 'MS. L.' ('a' and 'b') continue at line 758.]
[Footnote 68:
"Tum quoque marmorea caput a cervice revulsum,
Gurgite cum medio portans OEagrius Hebrus,
Volveret Eurydicen vox ipsa, et frigida lingua;
Ah, miseram Eurydicen! animâ fugiente vocabat;
Eurydicen toto referebant flumine ripæ."
'Georgic', iv. 523-527.]
[Footnote 69: I beg Nathaniel's pardon: he is not a cobbler; 'it' is a
'tailor', but begged Capel Lofft to sink the profession in his preface
to two pair of panta--psha!--of cantos, which he wished the public to
try on; but the sieve of a patron let it out, and so far saved the
expense of an advertisement to his country customers--Merry's
"Moorfields whine" was nothing to all this. The "Delia Cruscans" were
people of some education, and no profession; but these Arcadians
("Arcades ambo"--bumpkins both) send out their native nonsense without
the smallest alloy, and leave all the shoes and small-clothes in the
parish unrepaired, to patch up Elegies on Enclosures, and Pæans to
Gunpowder. Sitting on a shop-board, they describe the fields of battle,
when the only blood they ever saw was shed from the finger; and an
"Essay on War" is produced by the ninth part of a "poet;"
"And own that 'nine' such poets made a Tate."
Did Nathan ever read that line of Pope? and if he did, why not take it
as his motto?
['An Essay on War; Honington Green, a Ballad ... an Elegy and other
Poems,' was published in 1803.]]
[Footnote 70: This well-meaning gentleman has spoiled some excellent
shoemakers, and been accessory to the poetical undoing of many of the
industrious poor. Nathaniel Bloomfield and his brother Bobby have set
all Somersetshire singing; nor has the malady confined itself to one
county. Pratt too (who once was wiser) has caught the contagion of
patronage, and decoyed a poor fellow named Blackett into poetry; but he
died during the operation, leaving one child and two volumes of
"Remains" utterly destitute. The girl, if she don't take a poetical
twist, and come forth as a shoemaking Sappho, may do well; but the
"tragedies" are as ricketty as if they had been the offspring of an Earl
or a Seatonian prize poet. The patrons of this poor lad are certainly
answerable for his end; and it ought to be an indictable offence. But
this is the least they have done: for, by a refinement of barbarity,
they have made the (late) man posthumously ridiculous, by printing what
he would have had sense enough never to print himself. Certes these
rakers of "Remains" come under the statute against "resurrection men."
What does it signify whether a poor dear dead dunce is to be stuck up in
Surgeons' or in Stationers' Hall? Is it so bad to unearth his bones as
his blunders? Is it not better to gibbet his body on a heath, than his
soul in an octavo? "We know what we are, but we know not what we may
be;" and it is to be hoped we never shall know, if a man who has passed
through life with a sort of éclat is to find himself a mountebank on the
other side of Styx, and made, like poor Joe Blackett, the laughing-stock
of purgatory. The plea of publication is to provide for the child; now,
might not some of this 'Sutor ultra Crepidaitis' friends and seducers
have done a decent action without inveigling Pratt into biography? And
then his inscription split into so many modicums!--"To the Duchess of
Somuch, the Right Hon. So-and-So, and Mrs. and Miss Somebody, these
volumes are," etc. etc.--why, this is doling out the "soft milk of
dedication" in gills,--there is but a quart, and he divides it among a
dozen. Why, Pratt, hadst thou not a puff left? Dost thou think six
families of distinction can share this in quiet? There is a child, a
book, and a dedication: send the girl to her grace, the volumes to the
grocer, and the dedication to the devil.
[For Robert Bloomfield, see 'English Bards', ll. 774-786, and note 2.
For Joseph Blacket, see 'English Bards', ll. 765-770, and note 1.
Blacket's 'Remains', with Life by Pratt, appeared in 1811. The work was
dedicated "To Her Grace the Duchess of Leeds, Lady Milbanke and Family,
Benevolent Patrons of the Author," etc.]]
[Footnote 71: Lines 737-758 are not in either of the three original MSS.
of 'Hints from Horace', and were probably written in the autumn of 1811.
They appear among a sheet of "alterations to 'English Bards, and S.
Reviewers', continued with additions" ('MSS. L.'}, drawn up for the
fifth edition, and they are inserted on a separate sheet in 'MS. M.' A
second sheet ('MSS. L.') of "scraps of rhyme ... principally additions
and corrections for 'English Bards', etc." (for the fifth edition), some
of which are dated 1810, does not give the whole passage, but includes
the following variants (erased) of lines 753-756:--
(i.)
"Then let thy ponderous quarto steep and stink,
The dullest fattest weed on Lethe's brink.
Down with that volume to the depths of hell!
Oblivion seems rewarding it too well."
(ii.)
"Yet then thy quarto still may," etc.
A "Druid" (see 'English Bards', line 741) was Byron's name for a
scribbler who wrote for his living. In 'MS. M.', "scribbler" has been
erased, and "Druid" substituted. It is doubtful to whom the passage, in
its final shape, was intended to apply, but it is possible that the
erased lines, in which "ponderous quarto" stands for "lost songs," were
aimed at Southey (see 'ante', line 657, 'note' 1).]
[Footnote 72: 'MS. L. (a)' recommences at line 758.]
[Footnote 73: Here will Mr. Gifford allow me to introduce once more to
his notice the sole survivor, the "ultimus Romanorum," the last of the
Cruscanti--"Edwin" the "profound" by our Lady of Punishment! here he is,
as lively as in the days of "well said Baviad the Correct." I thought
Fitzgerald had been the tail of poesy; but, alas! he is only the
penultimate.