miration at the execution of a tremendous passage, and then disappoints you by singing a few sustained notes in a tremulous, uncertain manner. In making the above observations on ballads, let us not be supposed to throw discredit upon that style of composition. Robin Gray,' Oh no we never mention her,' The Soldier's Tear,' and such compositions, are a description of bullads, of which, with the Irish, Scotch, and Welsh melodies, we are proud; but if we admit that the drum and fife compositions of Mr. Lee and others, such as Bonnets of blue,'Blue bonnets,' 'Charley's over the water,' and Over the water to Charley,' are other than trash, fit only to amuse the gentlemen and ladies of colour in the gallery, we should be unworthy to be editor of the 'Euterpeiad.'" Harmonicon.-Ño. 1.

HENRY MACKENZIE, ESQ.

We regret to announce the death of this eminent literary character, and ve nerable citizen, so well known as the the author of The Man of Feeling, and many other productions. Mr. Mackenzie had been confined almost to his room for a considerable time past by the general decay attending old age, and expired, we understand, on the evening of Friday the 14th. 'There will no doubt in time come from his friends a biographical account of so distinguished and excellent a man; and although it might not be proper to enter into detail at present, we cannot but with feelings of regret notice the departure of almost the last of that eminent class of literary men, who, above fifty years ago, cast such a lustre on our city. They were succeeded, indeed, by a more stern, and probably more philosophical class of writers, as displayed in the papers of the Edinburgh Review, and similar productions; but in that delicate perception of human character and human manners, so correctly, so elegantly, and often so humourously delineated in the numbers of the Mirror and Lounger, where Mr. Mackenzie was the chief contributor, as well as in his other works, and in his general views of the great principles of moral conduct, there have been few authors more distinguished. The elegant society in Edinburgh, well known in former days by the name of the " Mirror Club," consisted, besides Mr. Mackenzie, of several gentlemen who were afterwards Judges in the Court of Session-viz. Lord Bannatyne, Lord Cullen, Lord Abercrombie, Lord Craig, and also Mr. George Home and Mr. George Ogilvie. The first, now

Sir William Bannatyne, a venerable and most accomplished gentleman of the old school, is the only survivor. Mr. Mackenzie was in his 86th year, having been born in 1745. His eldest son is Lord Mackenzie, at present an eminent Judge in the Courts of Session and Justiciary, Edinburgh Evening Courant.

The Gatherer.

A snapper up of unconsidered trifles.
SHAKSPEARE

ARCH POETRY.

POPE LEO X. was particularly fond of Querno, a poet, the author of "The Alexiad," and who, at an entertainment given by some young men of rank, had been dignified with the appellation of "The Arch Poet." Leo used occasionally to send him some dishes from his table; and he was expected to pay for each dish with a Latin distich. One

day, as he was attending Leo at dinner, and was ill of the gout, he made this line:

Archi-poeta facit versus pro mille poetis : What pains for others the arch poet takes,

He for a thousand poets verses makes.

As Querno hesitated for the next line, the good-humoured Pontiff replied-

Et pro mille aliis Archi-poeta bibit: If for a thousand he's obliged to think, He chooses for as many more to drink.

Querno, willing to make up for his former deficiency, exclaimed Porrige, quod facient mihi carmina docta

Falernum:

To aid my genius, and my wit refine, Most Holy Pontiff, pour Falernian wine.

The Pope immediately repliedHoc vinum enervat debilitatque pedes: I shall supply that wine with sparing hand,

Which from the feet takes off the power to stand. J. G. B.

DOUBTING.

THE mind that never doubts shall learn nothing; the mind that ever doubts shall never profit by learning. Our doubts only stir us up to seek truth; our resolution settles us in the truth we have found. There were no pleasure in resolution, if we had not been formerly troubled with doubts; there were nothing but discomfort and disquietness in doubts, if it were not for the hope of resolution. It is not good to let doubts dwell too long upon the heart; there may be good use of them as passengers, but dangerous as inmates,

HALL.

CURIOUS ANECDOTE OF A PICTURE.

IN Windsor Castle is the celebrated painting representing "The Interview of Henry the Eighth with Francis the First," between Guisnes and Ardres, near Calais, in the year 1520, on an open plain, since denominated Le Champ de Drap d'or. "After the execution of Charles the First," says Britton, "the parliament appointed commissioners to dispose of his effects, and an agent from France began a treaty with them for this painting. Philip, Earl of Pembroke, an eminent admirer of the arts, who considered the picture as a valuable appendage to an English palace, resolved, if possible, to prevent the bargain being concluded, and went privately to the royal apartments, cut out the head of King Henry from the canvass, placed it in his pocket-book, and retired unnoticed. The agent, finding the picture so materially mutilated, declined to purchase; and it remained in its station till Cromwell, having obtained the supreme command, prevented any further disposal of the collection. On the Restoration, the then Earl of Pembroke delivered the dissevered fragment to Charles the Second, who ordered it to be reinserted in its place. By looking sideways at the picture in a proper light, the reparation becomes visible." P. T. W.

talk to him on some business of importance, whilst the luxurious prince was occupied in arranging one of his parties of pleasure, was interrupted by the monarch, who asked him what he thought of his arrangement. "I think, sire," said he, "that it is impossible for any one to lose his kingdom more pleasantly than your majesty." J. G. B.

A LINCOLNSHIRE farmer on being told that the low countries had risen, said he" was glad to hear it, for they would not be so often injured by floods." A. H. R-T.

DEXTEROUS SHAVING.

DESPATCH is the order of things, and I think the following cannot be out-done by all the barberizing annals of ancient or modern times, not even by the Patent Steam Shaving Machine, talked so much of a few years ago :-There are opposite each other, in George-street, St. Giles's, two barbers' shops, whose weekly customers average 3,000, and in one of them is a man who has frequently, on a Sunday, mown the chins of the almost incredible number, 500, the majority of these being Irish labourers, with beards of a week's growth. In the other, a woman takes no inconsiderable share in the arduous but unpolite performance-pulling men by the JAC-CO.

nose.

No. 474.]

OF

LETTERS AND JOURNALS OF LORD BYRON, WITH NOTICES OF HIS LIFE, BY THOMAS MOORE, Vol. ii.

[To attempt anything like an analysis of a 66 great big book," of 823 pages, like the present, and that within a sheet of 16 pages, would be an effort of condensation indeed. Besides, the very nature of the volume before us will not admit of such a task being performed with much regard to accuracy or unique character. The "Letters," of which the work is, in great part, composed, are especially ill adapted for such a purpose; since, many of them become interesting only from manner rather than importance of matter. Horace Walpole's Correspondence would make but a dull book cut in "little stars" in the letter style; and Lord Byron, as a letter writer, resembles Walpole more closely than any other writer of his time. His gay, anecdotical style is delightful-his epithets and single words are always well chosen, and often convey more than one side of the letter of a common-place mind.

Our sheet of Extracts is from such portions of Mr. Moore's volume as appear to illustrate the main points of the Noble Poet's character and habits, as the superscriptions will best explaincurrente calamo from pages 22 to 769-within a few leaves of the Appendix.]

HIS SENSIBILITY.

WITH the following melancholy passage one of his journals concludes:-

"In the weather for this tour (of thirteen days) I have been very fortunate-fortunate in a companion (Mr. H.)-fortunate in all our prospects, and exempt from even the little petty accidents and delays which often render journeys in a less wild country disappointing. I was disposed to be pleased. I am a lover of nature, and an admirer of beauty; I can bear fatigue and welcome privation, and have seen some of the noblest views in the world. But in all this the recollection of bitterness, and more especially of recent and more home desolation, which must accompany me through life, have preyed upon VOL. XVII.

G

[PRICE 2d.

me here; and neither the music of the shepherd, the crashing of the avalanche, nor the torrent, the mountain, the glacier, the forest, nor the cloud, have for one moment lightened the weight upon my heart, nor enabled me to lose my own wretched identity in the majesty, and the power, and the glory, around, above, and beneath me

On his return from an excursion to Diodati, an occasion was afforded for the gratification of his jesting propensities by the avowal of the young physician (Polidori) that he had fallen in love. On the evening of this tender confession they both appeared at Shelley's cottage-Lord Byron, in the highest and most boyish spirits, rubbing his hands as he walked about the room, and in that utter incapacity of retention which was one of his foibles, making jesting allusions to the secret he had just heard. The brow of the doctor darkened as this pleasantry went on, and, at last, he angrily accused Lord Byron of hardness of heart. "I never," said he, "met with a person so unfeeling. This sally, though the poet had evidently brought it upon himself, annoyed him most deeply. "Call me cold-hearted-me insensible!" he exclaimed, with manifest emotion-" as well might you say that glass is not brittle, which has been cast down a precipice, and lies dashed to pieces at the foot!"

The fault was mine; nor do I seek to screen

My errors with defensive paradox ;
Ibave been cunning in mine overthrow,
The careful pilot of my proper woe.

IV.

Mine were my faults, and mine be their reward.
My whole life was a contest, since the day
That gave me being, gave me that which marr'd
The gift-a fate, or will, that walk'd astray;
And I at times have found the struggle hard,
And thought of shaking off my bonds of clay :
But now I fain would for a time survive,
If but to see what next can well arrive.

V.

Kingdoms and empires in my little day
I have outlived, and yet I am not old;
And when I look on this, the petty spray
Of my own years of trouble, which have roll'd
Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away:
Something I know not what-does still uphold
A spirit of slight patience not in vain,
Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain.

VI

Perhaps the workings of defiance stir
Within me-or perhaps a cold despair,
Brought on when ills babitually recur-
Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air,
(For even to this may change of soul refer,
And with light armour we may learn to bear,)
Have taught me a strange quiet, which was not
The chief companion of a calmer lot.

VII.

I feel almost at times as I have felt

In happy childhood; trees, and flowers, and brooks,

Which do remember me of where I dwelt
Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books,
Come as of yore upon me, and can melt
My heart with recognition of their looks:
And even at moments I could think I see
Some living thing to love-but none like thee.

VIII.

Here are the Alpine landscapes which create
A fund for contemplation.—to admire
Is a brief feeling of a trivial date;
But something worthier do such scenes inspire:
Here to be lonely is not desolate.

For much I view which I could most desire,
And, above all, a lake I can behold
Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old.

IX.

Oh that thou wert but with me!-but I grow
The fool of my own wishes, and forget
The solitude which I have vaunted so
Has lost its praise in this but one regret;
There may be others which I less may show ;-
I am not of the plaintive mood, aud yet
I feel an ebb in my philosophy

And the tide rising in my alter'd eye.

X.

I did remind thee of our own dear lake,
By the old ball which may be mine no more,
Leman's is fair but think not I forsake
The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore:
Sad havoc Time must with my memory make
Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before;
Though, like all things which I have loved, the

are

Resigu'd for ever, or divided far.

XI.

The world is all before me; I but ask
Of nature that with which she will comply-
It is but in her summer sun to bask,
To mingle with the quiet of her sky,
To see her gentle face without a mask,

And never gaze on it with apathy.

She was my early friend, and now shall be My sister-till I look agam on thee.

XII.

I can reduce all feelings but this one;
And that I would uot;- for at length I see
Such scenes as those wherein my life begun.
The earliest-even the only paths for me-
Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to shun,
I had been better than I now can be:
The passions which have toru me would have
slept:

I had not suffered, and thou hadst not wept.

XIII.

With false ambition what had I to do?
Little with love, and least of all with fame;
And yet they came unsought, and with me grew,
And made me all which they can make-a name.
Yet this was not the end I did pursue;
Surely I once beheld a nobler aim.
But all is over-I am one the more

To baffled millions which have gone before.

XIV.

And for the future, this world's future may
From me demand but little of my care;
I have outlived myself by many a day;
Having survived so many things that were;
My years have been no slumber, but the prey
Of ceaseless vigils; for I had the share
Of life that might have filled a century,
Before its fourth in time had passed me by.

XV.

And for the remnant which may be to come
I am content; and for the past I feel
Not thankless-for within the crowded sum
Of struggles, happiness at times would steal,
And for the present I would not benumb
My feelings farther.-Nor shall I conceal,
That with all this I still can look around,
And worship Nature with a thought profound.

XVI.

For thee my own sweet sister, in thy heart
I know myself secure, as thou in mine:
We were and are-I am even as thou art-
Beings who ne'er each other can resign;
It is the same, together or apart,
From life's commencement to its slow decline.
We are entwined-let death come slow or fast,
The tie which bound the first endures the last!

AMOUR AT VENICE.

Venice, November 17, 1816. "I WROTE to you from Verona the other day in my progress hither, which letter I hope you will receive. Some three years ago, or it may be more, I recollect you telling me that you had received a letter from our friend, Sam, dated "On board his gondola." My gondola is, at this present, waiting for me on the canal; but I prefer writing to you in the house, it being autumn-and rather an English autumn than otherwise. It is my intention to remain at Venice during the winter, probably, as it has always been (next to the east) the greenest island of my imagination. It has not disappointed me; though its evident decay would, perhaps, have that effect upon others. But I have been familiar with ruins too long to dislike desolation. Besides, I have fallen in love, which, next to falling into the canal (which would be of no use, as I can swim,) is the best or the worst thing I could do. I have got some extremely good apartments in the house of

a "Merchant of Venice," who is a good deal occupied with business, and has a wife in her twenty-second year. Marianna (that is her name) is in her appearance altogether like an antelope. She has the large, black, oriental eyes, with that peculiar expression in them which is seen rarely among Europeans -even the Italians-and which many of the Turkish women give themselves by tinging the eyelid—an art not known out of that country, I believe. This expression she has naturally — and something more than this. In short, I cannot describe the effect of this kind of eye-at least upon me. Her features are regular, and rather aquiline-mouth small-skin clear and soft, with a kind of hectic colour - forehead remarkably good; her hair is of the dark gloss, curl, and colour of Lady J's; her figure is light and pretty, and she is a famous songstress-scientifically so; her natural voice (in conversation, Í mean,) is very sweet; and the naïveté of the Venetian dialect is always pleasing in the mouth of a woman.

By way of divertisement, I am studying daily, at an Armenian monastery, the Armenian language. I found that my mind wanted something craggy to break upon; and this-as the most difficult thing I could discover here for an amusement-I have chosen, to torture me into attention. It is a rich language, however, and would amply repay any one the trouble of learning it. I try, and shall go on ;-but I answer for nothing, least of all for my intentions or my success. There are some very curious MSS. in the monastery, as well as books; translations also from Greek originals, now lost, and from Persian and Syriac, &c.; besides works of their own people. Four years ago the French instituted an Armenian professorship. Twenty pupils presented themselves on Monday morning, full of noble ardour, ingenuous youth, and impregnable in

dustry. They persevered with a courage worthy of the nation and of universal conquest, till Thursday; when fifteen of the twenty succumbed to the six and twentieth letter of the alphabet. It is, to be sure, a Waterloo of an Alphabet-that must be said for them. But it is so like these fellows, to do by it as they did by their sovereigns-abandon both; to parody the old rhymes, "Take a thing and give a thing "Take a king and give a king. They are the worst of animals, except their conquerors.

I hear that that H- -n is your neighbour, having a living in Derbyshire. You will find him an excellent hearted fellow, as well as one of the cleverest; a little, perhaps, too much japanned by preferment in the church and the tuition of youth, as well as inoculated with the disease of domestic felicity, besides being overrun with fine feelings about women and constancy (that small change of love, which people exact so rigidly, receive in such counterfeit coin, and repay in baser metal;) but, otherwise, a very worthy and (I suppose) a child by this time. man, who has lately got a pretty wife, Pray remember me to him, and say that I know not which to envy most-his neighbourhood, him, or you.

You

Of Venice I shall say little. must have seen many descriptions; and they and they are most of them like. It is a poetical place; and classical, to us, from Shakspeare and Otway. I have not yet sinned against it in verse, nor do I know that I shall do so, having been tuneless since I crossed the Alps, and feeling, as yet, no renewal of the "estro." By the way, I suppose you have seen "Glenarvon." Madame de Staël lent it me to read from Copet last autumn. It seems to me that, if the authoress had written the truth, and nothing but the truth-the whole truth -the romance would not only have been more romantic, but more entertaining. As for the likeness, the picture can't be good-I did not sit long enough. When you have leisure, let me hear from and of you, believing me ever and truly yours most affectionately.

B.

P.S. Oh! your Poem-is it out? I hope Longman has paid his thousands; but don't you do as H** T* *'s father did, who, having, made money by a quarto tour, became a vinegar merchant; when, lo! his vinegar turned sweet (and be d-d to it) and ruined him. My last letter to you (from Verona) was inclosed to Murray-have you got it? Direct to me here, poste restante.