pane sentiments and language suitable to his character. And lastly, you have much merit in the delicacy of the gyrick which you have contrived to throw on each of the dramatis persona, perfectly appropriate to his character. The compliment to Sir Robert, the blunt soldier, is peculiarly fine. In short, this composition, in my opinion, does you great honour, and I see not a line or a word in it which I could wish to be altered. "As to "The Lament,' I suspect from some expressions in your letter to me, that you are more doubtful with respect to the merits of this piece than of the other, and I own I think you have reason; for, although it contains some beautiful stanzas, as the first, 'The wind blew hollow,' &c.; the fifth, 'Ye scatter'd birds;' the thirteenth, Awake thy last sad voice,' &c., yet it appears to me faulty as a whole, and inferior to several of those you have already published in the same strain. My principal objection lies against the plan of the piece. I think it was unnecessary and improper to put the lamentation in the mouth of a fictitious character, an aged bard.—It had been much better to have lamented your patron in your own person, to have expressed your genuine feelings for his loss, and to have spoken the language of nature, rather than that of fiction on the subject. Compare this with your poem of the same title in your printed volume, which begins, O thou pale Orb!' and observe what it is that forms the charm of that composition. It is, that it speaks the language of truth and of nature." ED.] No. CXCVII. TO MR. AINSLIE. Ellisland, 1791. MY DEAR AINSLIE, CAN you minister to a mind diseased? can you, amid the horrors of penitence, regret, remorse, head-ache, nausea, and all the rest of the d-d hounds of hell, that beset a poor wretch, who has been guilty of the sin of drunkenness -can you speak peace to a troubled soul? Miserable perdu that I am, I have tried every thing that used to amuse me, but in vain : here must I sit, a monument of the vengeance laid up in store for the wicked, slowly counting every chick of the clock as it slowly, slowly, numbers over these lazy scoundrels of hours, who, d-n them, are ranked up before me, every one at his neighbour's backside, and every one with a burthen of anguish on his back, to pour on my devoted head—, and there is none to pity me. My wife scolds me! my business torments me, and my sins come staring me in the face, every one telling a more bitter tale than his fellow.-When I tell you even *** has lost its power to please, you will guess something of my hell within, and all around me—I began Elibanks and Elibraes, but the stanzas fell unenjoyed, and unfinished from my listless tongue: at last I luckily thought of reading over an old letter of yours, that lay by me in my book-case, and I felt something for the first time since I opened my eyes, of pleasurable existence.Well-I begin to breathe a little, since I began to write to you. How are you, and what are you doing? How goes Law? Apropos, for connexion's sake do not address to me supervisor, for that is an honour I cannot pretend to-I am on the list, as we call it, for a supervisor, and will be called out by and bye to act as one; but at present, I am a simple gauger, tho' t'other day I got an appointment to an excise division of 251. per annum better than the rest. My present income, down money, is 70l. per annum. I have one or two good fellows here whom you would be glad to know. R. B. : [The poet was one of the most candid of correspondents he confessed his follies freely to his friends: nay it has been surmised that he sometimes aggravated them, in order to excuse his indolence in answering letters or from imagining that it was incumbent in a son of song to maintain a reputation of irregularity. -ED.] : No. CXCVIII. TO MISS DAVIES. IT is impossible, Madam, that the generous warmth and angelic purity of your youthful mind, can have any idea of that moral disease under which I unhappily must rank as the chief of sinners; I mean a torpitude of the moral powers, that may be called, a lethargy of conscience.-In vain Remorse rears her horrent crest, and rouses all her snakes beneath the deadly-fixed eye and leaden hand of Indolence, their wildest ire is charmed into the torpor of the bat, slumbering out the rigours of winter in the chink of a ruined wall. Nothing less, Madam, could have made me so long neglect your obliging commands. Indeed I had one apologythe bagatelle was not worth presenting. Besides, so strongly am I interested in Miss Davies's fate and welfare in the serious business of life, amid its chances and changes that to make her the subject of a silly ballad, is downright mockery of these ardent feelings; 'tis like an impertinent jest to a dying friend. : Gracious Heaven! why this disparity between our wishes and our powers? Why is the most generous wish to make others blest, impotent and ineffectual-as the idle breeze that crosses the path less desert? In my walks of life I have met with a few people to whom how gladly would I have said-" Go, be happy! I know that your hearts have been wounded by the scorn of the proud, whom accident has placed above you-or worse still, in whose hands are, perhaps, placed many of the comforts of your life. But there! ascend that rock, Independence, and look justly down on their littleness of soul. Make the worthless tremble under your indignation, and the foolish sink before your contempt; and largely impart that happiness to others, which, I am certain will give yourselves so much pleasure to bestow." Why, dear Madam, must I wake from this delightful reverie, and find it all a dream? Why, amid my generous enthusiasm, must I find myself poor and powerless, incapable of wiping one tear from the eye of pity, or of adding one comfort to the friend I love!-Out upon the world! say I, that its affairs are administered so ill! They talk of reform ;-good Heaven! what a reform would I make among the sons, and even the daughters of men!-Down, immediately, should go fools from the high places where misbegotten chance has perked them up, and through life should they skulk, ever haunted by their native insignificance, as the body marches accompanied by its shadow.As for a much more formidable class, the knaves, I am at a loss what to do with them: Had I a world, there should not be a knave in it. |