Will's Coffee-house, April 24.
I yesterday came hither about two hours before the company generally
make their appearance, with a design to read over all the newspapers;
but, upon my sitting down, I was accosted by Ned Softly, who saw me from
a corner in the other end of the room, where I found he had been writing
something. "Mr. Bickerstaff," says he, "I observe by a late paper of
yours, that you and I are just of a humour; for you must know, of all
impertinences, there is nothing which I so much hate as news. I never
read a gazette in my life; and never trouble my head about our armies,
whether they win or lose, or in what part of the world they lie
encamped." Without giving me time to reply, he drew a paper of verses
out of his pocket, telling me, "that he had something which would
entertain me more agreeably, and that he would desire my judgment upon
every line, for that we had time enough before us till the company came
in."
Ned Softly is a very pretty poet, and a great admirer of easy lines.
Waller is his favourite: and as that admirable writer has the best and
worst verses of any among our great English poets, Ned Softly has got
all the bad ones without book, which he repeats upon occasion, to show
his reading, and garnish his conversation. Ned is indeed a true English
reader, incapable of relishing the great and masterly strokes of
this art; but wonderfully pleased with the little Gothic ornaments
of epigrammatical conceits, turns, points, and quibbles, which are so
frequent in the most admired of our English poets, and practised by
those who want genius and strength to represent, after the manner of the
ancients, simplicity in its natural beauty and perfection.
Finding myself unavoidably engaged in such a conversation, I was
resolved to turn my pain into a pleasure and to divert myself as well
as I could with so very odd a fellow. "You must understand," says Ned,
"that the sonnet I am going to read to you was written upon a lady, who
showed me some verses of her own making, and is, perhaps, the best poet
of our age. But you shall hear it."
Upon which he began to read as follows:
"TO MIRA, ON HER INCOMPARABLE POEMS.
1.
"When dressed in laurel wreaths you shine,
And tune your soft melodious notes,
You seem a sister of the Nine,
Or Phoebus' self in petticoats.
2.
"I fancy, when your song you sing,
Your song you sing with so much art,
Your pen was plucked from Cupid's wing;
For, ah! it wounds me like his dart."
"Why," says I, "this is a little nosegay of conceits, a very lump of
salt: every verse has something in it that piques; and then the dart in
the last line is certainly as pretty a sting in the tail of an epigram,
for so I think you critics call it, as ever entered into the thought
of a poet." "Dear Mr. Bickerstaff," says he, shaking me by the hand,
"everybody knows you to be a judge of these things; and, to tell you
truly, I read over Roscommon's translation of Horace's 'Art of Poetry'
three several times before I sat down to write the sonnet which I have
shown you. But you shall hear it again, and pray observe every line of
it; for not one of them shall pass without your approbation.
"'When dressed in laurel wreaths you shine,'
"That is," says he, "when you have your garland on; when you are writing
verses." To which I replied, "I know your meaning: a metaphor!" "The
same," said he, and went on.
"'And tune your soft melodious notes,'
"Pray observe the gliding of that verse; there is scarce a consonant
in it: I took care to make it run upon liquids. Give me your opinion
of it." "Truly," said I, "I think it as good as the former." "I am very
glad to hear you say so," says he; "but mind the next.
"'You seem a sister of the Nine,
"That is," says he, "you seem a sister of the Muses; for, if you look
into ancient authors, you will find it was their opinion that there were
nine of them." "I remember it very well," said I; "but pray proceed."
"'Or Phoebus' self in petticoats.'
"Phoebus," says he, "was the god of Poetry. These little instances, Mr.
Bickerstaff, show a gentleman's reading. Then to take off from the air
of learning, which Phoebus and the Muses had given to this first stanza,
you may observe, how it falls all of a sudden into the familiar; 'in
petticoats!'
"'Or Phoebus' self in petticoats.'"
"Let us now," says I, "enter upon the second stanza; I find the first
line is still a continuation of the metaphor.
"'I fancy when your song you sing.'"
"It is very right," says he; "but pray observe the turn of words in
those two lines. I was a whole hour in adjusting of them, and have still
a doubt upon me whether in the second line it should be, 'Your song you
sing; or, You sing your song?' You shall hear them both:
"'I fancy, when your song you sing,
Your song you sing with so much art,'
or,
"'I fancy, when your song you sing,
You sing your song with so much art.'"
"Truly," said I, "the turn is so natural either way, that you have made
me almost giddy with it." "Dear sir," said he, grasping me by the hand,
"you have a great deal of patience; but pray what do you think of the
next verse?
"'Your pen was plucked from Cupid's wing.'"
"Think!" says I; "I think you have made Cupid look like a little goose."
"That was my meaning," says he: "I think the ridicule is well enough hit
off. But we come now to the last, which sums up the whole matter.
"'For, ah! it wounds me like his dart.'
"Pray how do you like that Ah! doth it not make a pretty figure in
that place? Ah!--it looks as if I felt the dart, and cried out at being
pricked with it.
"'For, ah! it wounds me like his dart.'
"My friend Dick Easy," continued he, "assured me, he would rather have
written that Ah! than to have been the author of the AEneid. He indeed
objected, that I made Mira's pen like a quill in one of the lines, and
like a dart in the other. But as to that--" "Oh! as to that," says I,
"it is but supposing Cupid to be like a porcupine, and his quills and
darts will be the same thing." He was going to embrace me for the hint;
but half a dozen critics coming into the room, whose faces he did not
like, he conveyed the sonnet into his pocket, and whispered me in the
ear, "he would show it me again as soon as his man had written it over
fair."