the world is tolerably well contented with the poetry they have foolishly thought proper to give it; that though Mr. Campbell's criticism is sometimes a little vapid, yet that his verses are generally excellent; and that, if Lord Byron's system of moral and ethical poetry be after his old way—that is, if Beppo and Don Juan, like the brick of the pedant in Hierocles, are specimens of the materials of which it is to be composed, we should think, that the world will be contented with the specimens it has already enjoyed. Enough is as good as a feast; "where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise;" and, as I am tired of it, I will drop the subject.

Friend North, I have a crow to pluck with you, You are as strange a fellow as ever fell within the circle of my acquaintance, always excepting Mrs. M'Whirter, for she beats cockfighting. You will pretend, now, that you did not know to whom the memorandum-book belonged, out of which you treated your readers, or rather the world, for all the world are your readers, a month or two ago. Really this is provoking, and I do not take it altogether well at your hands. Would it not have been more creditable to you, instead of creating a few smiles at my expense, to have written to the wandering sinner of a Bagman, into whose hands my book fell, that you knew the proprietor; and that you would thank him to transmit it to you, that you might transmit it to the proper owner? It would not surprise me much, though you were yet to write me a letter, professing your entire ignorance of the whole transaction; and that you are free to give your oath, that you had not so much as the smallest suspicion that the memorandum-book could possibly belong to me. Do you think me innocent enough to believe any stuff of this sort? Though I am not a Highlander, I have enough of the secondsight to see clearly through trifles of this kind. But I will waste no more words on the subject; and, though we are hundreds of miles apart, our hearts are always together. I can take a joke, and can give one; so we will shake hands and forget the whole matter: Indeed I am almost sorry that I mentioned it; but don't give any more extracts without my consent.

Tell our divan, the first time you all meet in Ambrose's, to remember me in their prayers; as I am sure that I never empty

a tumbler or two, solus, without toasting them all alternately; and, as I allow each a bumper, it sometimes obliges me to have a third brewing. Let them know, that I will see them all in July, and that I have a budget of famous anecdotes and rencontres to entertain them with; some of them out-hector Hector, and they are all personal, ipso teste, as Maturin says. But I shall drop the subject, as I do not wish to promise. "There's a braw time coming," as the deacon's son observes.

What would you think of it, I have been amusing myself with some imitations of the living authors; — it was during the time I was confined to my room, from having sprained my left ankle, in leaping over a five-bar gate for a wager, and I intend to make a complete cabinet of them. I have already allowed Hazlitt a complete ration of epigram, antithesis, and paradox. Goodwin sails in a parachute of theory, suspended to a balloon inflated with sulphureted hydrogen; Cobbet writes an official document, currente calamo, with all the courtier-like dignity becoming a secretary to her majesty; and Charley Phillips, with his fists tied into large bladders, knocks arguments from off their feet by repeated douces on either side of the chops, with his unceasing one, twos. I have, likewise, a complete set of the poets, good, bad, and indifferent. The Cockneys I found it desperately hard to imitate, as I could not make my genius to descend so low. I do not know, but that I have caricatured some of them a little; but this was unintentional, as they have fairly baffled me in many particulars.

As you seem interested in my literary doings, I will treat you with two or three short specimens, as I see you are already in for a double postage. To begin with the mightiest man of our age, do you think that in the following, I have caught the chivalrous flow, the tone of the olden time, the grace, and the harmony, and the strength, that characterize the poetry of the Ariosto of the North? The Lay of the Last Minstrel, and Marmion, form eras in the mind of every true living admirer of poetical excellence.

The hounds in the kennel are yelling loud,

The hawks are boune for flight;

For the sun hath burst from his eastern shroud,

And the sky is clear, without a cloud,

And the steed for the chase is dight:
The merry huntsmen, up in the morn,
Crack the long whip, and wind the horn.

Lord Timothy rubbed his eyes, and rose
When he heard the merry crew;
He scarce took space to don his clothes,
And his night-cap quick he threw
Back on the pillow, and down the stair,
Disdaining brush or comb for hair,
With lightning speed he flew;
And in the twinkling of a fan,
With frock and cap, the gallant man,
Caparison'd all spick and span,

Was with the waiting crew.
Sir Abraham rode his bonny gray;

Sir Anthony his black;

Lord Hector hath mounted his sprightly bay; Lord Tom, Lord Jack, and all are away;

Curvet, and demivolte, and neigh,

Mark out their bold and brisk array,

With buckskins bright, and bonnets gay,
And bugles at each back.

They had hardly ridden a mile, a mile,
A mile but barely ten,

As each after each they leaped a stile,

When their heart play'd pit-a-pat the while,

To see a troop of armed men,

A troop of gallant men at drill,

With well soap'd locks, and stiffen'd frill;

Each in his grasp held spear or sword,

Ready to murder at a word,

And ghastly was each warrior's smile,
Beneath his barred aventayle;

Buff belts were girt around each waist;

Steel cuisses round each thigh were braced;
Around each knee were brazen buckles;
And iron greaves to save their knuckles;
High o'er each tin-bright helmet shone
The casque, and dancing morion,

Which reach'd to where the tailor sets,

On shoulder, woollen epaulets;
Their blades were of Toledo steel,
Ferarra, or Damascus real;

Yea! human eye did never see,

Through all the days of chivalry,

Men more bedight from head to heel, &c.

Lady Alice she sits in the turret tower,
A-combing her raven hair;

The clock hath tolled the vesper hour,
Already the shadows of evening lower
To veil the landscape fair.

To the jetty fringe of her piercing eye
She raised her opera glass,

For she was anxious to espy

If her worthy knight should pass.
"Lo! yonder he comes, "—she sigh'd and said,

Then with a rueful shake of head
"Shall I my husband ne'er discover
'Tis but the white cow eating clover!"
She looked again,· -"Sure yon is he,
That gallops so fast along the lea!
Alas! 'tis only a chestnut tree!!
Standing as still as still can be!!!??

-“Come hither, come hither, my little foot page,

And dance, my anguish to assuage;

And be it jig, or waltz, or reel,

I care not, so it doth conceal

The ghosts, that of a thousand dies,
Float evermore before mine eyes;
And I, to make thee foot it gay,
With nimble finger, by my fay,

Upon the tambourine will play!" &c.

But I must not give you too much of it, as it will spoil the interest of the work, which will shortly appear in three octavo volumes, printed uniformly, and with portraits; something like Peter's Letters. The imitation extends to three cantos, together with an introductory epistle to my friend Dr. Scott.— Under the head of Coleridge, you will find the continuation of Christabel,* and the Auncient Waggonere; both of which were ushered into public notice by your delightful and discriminating work, together with the following

*The continuation of Christabel, published in Blackwood, was written, not by Maginn, but by the late D. M. Moir, the "Delta" of Maga.— M.

FRAGMENT OF A VISION.

A dandy, on a velocipede,*

I saw in a vision sweet,

Along the highway making speed,

With his alternate feet.

Of a bright and celestial hue

Gleam'd beauteously his blue surtout;

While ivory buttons, in a row,

Show'd like the winter's cavern'd snow,

Which the breezy North

Drives sweeping forth,

To lodge in the cave below:

Ontario's beaver, without demur,

To form his hat did lend its fur:

His frill was of the cambric fine,

And his neckcloth starch'd, and aquiline;

And oh, the eye with pleasure dwells

On his white jean indescribables;

And he throws the locks from his forehead fair,
And he pants, and pants, and pants for air;
What is the reason I cannot tell,-

There is a cause I know it well ;
Too firmly bound too tightly braced,
The corsets grasp his spider waist,
Till his coat tails are made to fly
Even from the back they glorify.
Look again, he is not there

Vanish'd into the misty air!

Look again! do ye see him yet?

Ah no! the bailiff hath seized him for debt;

And, to and fro, like a restless ghost,

When peace within the grave is lost,
He paces as far, as far he should,
Within the bounds of Holyrood!

His Lordship of Byron, I have not handled roughly enough; I cannot yet forget the tower of Babel; what a speech! —as if we were a parcel of jackasses! I shall yet have at him for it. What do you think of The Galiongee,—A fragment of a Turkish Tale?

* The velocipede was a slight carriage on which a man sat astride, and had his pedestrian motions rapidly accelerated by its large wheels. M.