Pagina-afbeeldingen
PDF
ePub

"I could never love indeed;

Never see mine own heart bleed;
Never crucify my life,

Or for widow, maid, or wife.

I could never seek to please
One or many mistresses ;
Never like their lips to swear
Oil of roses still smelt there.

I could never break my sleep,
Fold mine arms, sob, sigh, or weep;
Never beg, or humbly woo,

With oaths and lies, as others do.

I could never walk alone,
Put a shirt of sackcloth on;
Never keep a fast, or pray
For good luck in love, that day.

But have hitherto liv'd free

As the air that circles me;

And kept credit with my heart,

Neither broke in whole or part."

In a Poem entitled "The Faerie Temple," an exuberantly fanciful satire on the Rites of the Romish Church, he thus playfully recounts the fairy saints:

"Saint Tit, Saint Nit, Saint Is, Saint Itis,

Who 'gainst Mab's State plac't here right is,

Saint Will o' th' Wispe (of no great bigness),
But alias call'd here Fatuus ignis.

Saint Frip, Saint Trip, Saint Fill, Saint Fillie.

Neither those other saintships will I
Here goe about for to recite,

Their number almost infinite;

Which, one by one, here set down are,

In this most curious calendar."

Common consent seems to have nominated Herrick the Laureat of the Fairies; and it must be acknowledged, that the quaint beauty of his verses well merited for their author the distinction. Herrick evidently took delight in fairy-sounding monosyllabic names. Those which occur in his epigrams furnish no inconsiderable list, as we find in them the following formidable muster-roll.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

GOLDSMITH, AND THE AMANUENSIS.

A VOLUMINOUS author was one day expatiating on the advantages of employing an amanuensis, and thus saving time, and the trouble of writing. "How do you manage it?" said Goldsmith."Why, I walk about the room, and dictate to a clever man, who puts down very correctly all that I tell him, so that I have nothing to do, more than just to look over the manuscript, and then send it to the press.”

Goldsmith was delighted with the information, and desired his friend to send the amanuensis the next morning. The scribe accordingly waited upon the Doctor, with the implements of pens, ink, and paper placed in order before him, ready to catch the oracle. Goldsmith paced the room with great solemnity, several times, for some time; but after racking his brains to no purpose, he put his hand into his pocket, and, presenting the amanuensis with a guinea, said, "It won't do, my friend, I find that my head and hand must go together."

POETICAL REPLY OF AN EDINBURGH

SPURZHEIMITE.

IN April, 1821, a medical gentleman in Edinburgh, aided by a landscape painter, fashioned a turnip into the nearest resemblance to a human skull which their combined skill and ingenuity could produce. They had a cast made from it, and sent it to Mr. George Coombe, requesting his observations on the mental talents and dispositions which it indicated,-adding, that it was a cast from the skull of a person of uncommon character. Mr. C. instantly detected the trick, and returned the cast, with the following parody, pasted on the coronal surface.

"There was a man in Edinburgh,
And he was wondrous wise;

He went into a turnip field,

And cast about his eyes.

And when he cast his eyes about,
He saw the turnips fine;

'How many heads are there,' said he,
"That likeness bear to mine!

So very like they are, indeed,
No sage, I'm sure, could know
This turnip-head that I have on
From those that there do grow.'
He pull❜d a turnip from the ground,
A cast from it was thrown;

[blocks in formation]

THE custom of using hard compounds, furnished Ben Jonson with an opportunity of shewing his satire and his learning together. These are the words of which he speaks sometimes as "un-in-one-breath-utterable." Redi mentions an Epigram against the Sophists, which is preserved in Athenæus, and is made up of compounds. He presents us with a Latin Translation, by Joseph Scaliger, which may be thus rendered into English:

"Lofty-brow-flourishers,

Nose-in-beard-wallowers,

Bag-and-beard-nourishers,

Dish-and-all-swallowers,

Old-cloak-investitors,'

Barefoot-look-fashioners,

Night-private-feast-eaters,

Craft-lucubrationers,

Youth-cheaters, word-catchers, vain-glory-osophers,
Such are your seekers of virtue Philosophers."

« VorigeDoorgaan »