I believe few people know, what is certainly a fact, that the Macleane who was hanged for robbery, and who is mentioned in Gray's Long Story,— "He stood as mute as poor Macleane,” - was brother to Maclaine, the translator of Mosheim. Gray somewhere says that monosyllables should be avoided in poetry: but there are many lines consisting only of monosyllables, which could not possibly be improved. For instance, in Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, "Thou canst not speak of what thou dost not feel; and in Pope's Eloisa to Abelard, "Pant on thy lip, and to thy heart be prest; Give all thou canst, and let ine dream the rest." Matthias showed me the papers belonging to Pembroke Hall, Cambridge, which he had borrowed for his edition of Gray; and among them were several very indecent poems by Gray's friend West, in whose day it was the fashion for young men to write in that style. If West had lived, he • Act. iii. sc. 3.—ED. would have been no mean poet: he has left some lines which are certainly among the happiest imitations of Pope; "How weak is man to reason's judging eye! Born in this moment, in the next we die; Part mortal clay, and part ethereal fire, When I was at Nuneham, I read Mason's manuscript letters to Lord Harcourt, which contain nothing to render them worth printing. They evince the excessive deference which Mason showed to Gray," Mr. Gray's opinion" being frequently quoted. There is in them a very gross passage about Lady M. W. Montagu. Mason's poetry is, on the whole, stiff and tiresome. His best line is in the Elegy on Lady Coventry; "Yes, Coventry is dead. Attend the strain, So oft have tripp'd in her fantastic train, • See Mason's Gray, p. 20, ed. 4to.-ED. Topham Beauclerk (Johnson's friend) was & strangely absent person. One day he had a party coming to dinner; and, just before their arrival, he went upstairs to change his dress. He forgot all about them; thought that it was bed-time, pulled off his clothes, and got into bed. A servant, who presently entered the room to tell him that his guests were waiting for him, found him fast asleep. I remember taking Beattie's Minstrel down from my father's shelves, on a fine summer evening, and reading it, for the first time, with such delight! It still charms me (I mean the First Book; the Second Book is very inferior). During my youth umbrellas were far from common. At that time every gentleman's family had one umbrella,—a huge thing, made of coarse cotton, -which used to be taken out with the carriage, and which, if there was rain, the footman held over the ladies' heads, as they entered, or alighted from, the carriage. : My first visit to France was in company with Boddington, just before the Revolution began. When we arrived at Calais, we saw both ladies and gentlemen walking on the pier with small fox-muffs. While we were dining there, a poor monk came into the room and asked us for charity; and B. annoyed me much by saying to him, "Il faut travailler." The monk bowed meekly, and withdrew. Nothing would satisfy B. but that we should ride on horseback the first stage from Calais; and accordingly, to the great amusement of the inn-keeper and chambermaid, we were furnished with immense jack-boots and hoisted upon our steeds. When we reached Paris, Lafayette gave us a general invitation to dine with him every day. At his table we once dined with about a dozen persons (among them the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, Condorcet, &c.), most of whom afterwards came to an untimely end. At a dinner-party in Paris, given by a French "But we distinguish, said I, laying my hand upon the sleeve of his (the Monk's) tunic, in return for his appeal,-we distinguish, my good father, betwixt those who wish only to eat the bread of their own labour, and those who eat the bread of other people's, and have no other plan in life but to get through it in sloth and ignorance, for the love of God. Sterne's Sentimental Journey,-The Monk.-ED. nobleman, I saw a black bottle of English porter set on the table as a great rarity, and drank out of small glasses. Boddington had a wretchedly bad memory; and, in order to improve it, he attended Feinaigle's lectures on the Art of Memory. Soon after, somebody asked Boddington the name of the lecturer; and, for his life, he could not recollect it.-When I was asked if I had attended the said lectures on the Art of Memory, I replied, "No: I wished to learn the Art of Forgetting."* One morning, when I was a lad, Wilkes came into our banking-house to solicit my father's vote. My father happened to be out, and I, as his representative, spoke to Wilkes. At parting, Wilkes shook hands with me; and I felt proud of it for a week after. He was quite as ugly, and squinted as much, as his portraits make him; but he was very gentlemanly "Themistocles quidem, cum ei Simonides, an quis alius, artem memoriæ polliceretur, Oblivionis, inquit, mallem; nam memini etiam quæ nolo, oblivisci non possum quæ volo." Cicero de Fin. ii. 32.-ED. |