Let ABERDEEN and ELGIN* still pursue

The shade of fame through regions of Virtue; 1010
Waste useless thousands on their Phidian freaks,
Mis-shapen monuments and maimed antiques;
And make their grand saloons a general mart
For all the mutilated blocks of art:

Of Dardan tours let Dilettanti tell,
I leave topography to classic GELL**;
And, quite content, no more shall interpose
To stun mankind with Poesy, or Prose.

Thus far I've held my undisturbed career, Prepared for rancour, steeled 'gainst selfish

fear:

1020

typographical) deposed, on Sir JOHN CARR's unlucky suit, that DUBOIS's satire prevented his purchase of the << Stranger in Ireland.»-Oh fie, my Lord! has your Lordship no more feeling for a fellow-tourist? but « two of a trade, they say, etc.

* Lord ELGIN would fain persuade us that all the figures, with and without noses, in his stone-shop, are the work of Phidias! Credat Judæus!

** Mr. GELL's Topography of Troy and Ithaca cannot fail to ensure the approbation of every man possessed of classical taste, as well for the information Mr. G. conveys to the miud of the reader, as for the ability and research the respective works display.

This thing of rhyme I ne'er disdained to own-
Though not obtrusive, yet not quite unknown,
My voice was heard again, though not so loud,
My page, though nameless, never disavowed,
And now at once I tear the veil

away:

1030

Cheer on the pack! the Quarry stands at bay,
Unscar'd by all the din of MELBOURNE house,
By LAMBE's resentment, or by HOLLAND's spouse,
By JEFFREY'S harmless pistol, HALLAM's rage,
EDINA'S brawny sons and brimstone page.
Our men in Buckram shall have blows enough,
And feel, they too are « penetrable stuff: »
And though I hope not hence unscathed to go,
Who conquers me, shall find a stubborn foe.
The time hath been, when no harsh sound would
fall

From lips that now may seem imbued with gall,
Nor fools nor follies tempt me to despise
The meanest thing that crawled beneath my eyes;
But now, so callous grown, so changed since youth,
I've learned to think, and sternly speak the
truth;

Learned to deride the critic's starch decree,

1040

And break him on the wheel he meant for me;

To spurn the rod a scribbler bids me kiss,
Nor care if courts and crowds applaud or hiss:
Nay more, though all my rival rhymesters frown,
I too can hunt a Poetaster down;

And, armed in proof, the gauntlet cast at once
To Scotch marauder, and to Southern dunce.
Thus much I've dared to do; how far my lay
Hath wronged these righteous times let others

say;

1050 This, let the world, which knows not how to spare, Yet rarely blames unjustly, now declare.

POSTSCRIPT.*

I have been informed, since the present edition went to the Press, that my trusty and well-beloved cousins, the Edinburgh Reviewers, are preparing a most vehement critique on my poor, gentle; unresisting Muse, whom they have already so bedeviled with their ungodly ribaldry:

<< Tantæne animis cœlestibus Iræ ! »

I suppose I must say of JEFFREY as Sir ANDREW AGUECHEEK saith, « an I had known he was so cunning of fence, I had seen him damned ere I had fought him. » What a pity it is that I shall be beyond the Bosphorus, before the next number has passed the Tweed. But yet I hope to light my pipe with it in Persia.

My Northern friends have accused me, with justice, of personality towards their great literary Anthropophagus, JEFFREY; but what else was to be done with him and his dirty pack, who feed << by lying and slandering,» and slake their thirst by evil-speaking? I have adduced facts already well known, and of Jeffrey's mind I have stated my free opinion, nor has he thence sustained any injury;-what scavenger was ever soiled

Published to the Second Edition.

by being pelted with mud? It may be said that I quit England because I have censured there, « persons of honour and with about town »>, but I am coming back again, and their vengeance will keep hot till my return. Those who know me can testify that my motives for leaving England are very different from fears, literary or personal; those who do not, may one day be convinced. Since the publication of this thing, my name has not been concealed; I have been mostly in London, ready answer for my transgressions, and in daily expectation of sundry cartels; but, alas! << The age of chivalry is over, » or, in the vulgar tongue, there is no spilit now-a-days.

1

There is a youth ycleped Hewson Clarke, (subaudi, Esq. ) a Sizer of Emanuel College, and I believe a Denizen of Berwick upon Tweed, whom I have introduced in these pages to much better company than he has been accustomed to meet: he is, notwithstanding, a very sad dog, and for no reason that I can discover, except a personal quarrel with a bear, kept by me at Cambridge to sit for a fellowship, and whom the jealousy of his Trinity cotemporaries prevented from success, has been abusing me, and, what is worse, the defenceless innocent above mentioned, in the Satirist, for one year and some months. I am utterly unconscious of having given him any provocation; indeed I am guiltless of having heard his name, till it was coupled with the Satirist. He has therefore no reason to complain, and I dare say that, like Sir Fretful Plagiary, he is rather pleased than otherwise. I have now mentioned all who have done me the honour to notice me and mine, that is, my Bear and my Book, except the Editor of the Satirist, who, it seems, is a gentleman, God wot! I wish he could impart a little of his gentility to his subordinate scribblers. I hear that Mr.