free spirit of the Roman poet; he wrote much to flatter Augustus. Béranger could truly boast," Je n'ai flatté que l'infortune." Horace, however, had, in a pre-eminent degree, that grace and sweetness for which Lipsius gives him credit. Nothing can exceed the charm in the harmonious words so happily chosen, and collocated, and the exquisite turn of the expressions. The odes, one and all, breathe melody, and adapted to music, and sung at banquets to the lyre, would be heard to perfection. As it is, they do not disdain a union with modern airs, and it is by applying the test of so singing them that we acquire the most complete notion of the wonderful art with which they were composed, and the conviction that the lyre which he thus invokes was constantly called in aid of their effect upon the ear. nothing equal to Dryden's Ode on St. Cecilia's Day; or Milton's L'Allegro, and Il Penseroso; or Byron's Isles of Greece; or Campbell's Battle of the Baltic; or Wolfe's Burial of Sir John Moore; or Béranger's “Il est un Dieu devant lui je m'incline, Pauvre et content sans lui demander rien." Horace, in his heroic odes, never has the abandonment of one who feels himself the minister of a divine mission, impelled from within to launch out in "prophetic strain." The crowning glory of the poet is a species of moral self-annihilation, so that there shall be nothing in common between the mortal man and The versification, then, is delicious; but it is in this, rather than in the depth, or beauty, or fervour of the thoughts they body forth, that the enchantment lies. He is not a suggestive poet. In each ode all lies upon the surface-all lies within the picture-frame; and yet there is no complete drama as there ought to be in a perfect ode. No trains of thought are called into existence by a pregnant phrase, that teems under the maturing heat of the student's carnest imagination. Having once read the ode, you have mastered it; you have nothing more to learn from it; it dwells in your memory, and the divine poem. Such glory was Shakspeare's. There is no taint of Shakspeare's mortality about Humlet, or Macbeth, or Julius Cæsar. But Horace is part and parcel of every thing he writes, and every thing accordingly is trimmed and measured according to the personal feelings and responsibilities of the mortal Horace. When he descends even to buffoonery and the coarsest licentiousness of language, as, for instance, in the ode, "In anum libidinosum," there is no fun in it. The grossness is chilly, and thus devoid of its only redeeming quality, the suggestion of a reckless flow of animal spirits, which the bounds of decency are too feeble to restrain. His most admirably executed odes are, in my opinion, those on friendship, love, and wine. In the amatory ef fusions, there is an utter want of that gush of heart we find in Burns, and Béranger, and other modern poets. The love he paints in such exquisite forms of expression is altogether sensual. We could expect nothing else; but, even regarding it as such, there is a want of genuine fire, of real passion, of the power of communicating excitement to the reader, which we find, for example, in Tom Moore's Fanny of Timmol. The Lalages and Pyrrhas were, no doubt, very charming and desirable little persons; but they are drawn too obviously as the mere toys and playthings of an hour. He never condescends to elevate or idealise them in the least, and so nobody ever dreamed of falling in love with their image, or cared a rush about any recurs ever and anon with a soft pulsation in your ear; but you enshrine it only because of the felicity of its phraseology and the harmony of its numbers. There is no genuine fervour of effusion in any of his lyrics; they are as essentially cold at the core as they are polished on the surface. No man, perhaps, ever wrote so many good odes-good up to the standard it was in his power to attain,-and so few bad and indifferent ones. But, taking his best, there is none to compare (not to speak of the Greeks) with certain of the odes of modern lyrists. He has thing except the sweet and graceful flow of the verse on which their valueless names and unappreciated individualities are borne along like leaves upon the surface of a stream in autumn. But how could it be otherwise, it may be said; they were mere mistresses. True. But see how Burns and Béranger have dealt with individuals of lower degree, and, doubtless, less graceful and accomplished. See what a halo of sweet thoughts and passionate memories Burns has flung around the poor servant girl, Highland Mary! See with what exquisite delicacy and tenderness Béranger has woven spells of enchantment around the image of his grisette! How subtly sweet the soft, loving melancholy of the notion of addressing Lisette, yet young and blooming, and anticipating the season when she shall be old, and her lover's heart-throbs mute in the grave! + Or, ་་ In these verses of Béranger's there is true pathos and exquisite tenderness. Horace never approaches this. His love-ditties are, as it were, like flowers, beautiful in form and rich in hues, but without the scent that breathes to the heart. The effusions of the latter might be represented in the garden by the dahlia; of the former, by the rose. As a concluding observation, we have to say, that we think that, in Horace's odes sacred to wine and friendship, there is far more hearty and sincere feeling than in any of the others. His love of external nature also seems to have been genuine, and his snatches of description are often beautiful. We take our leave of him for the present. Perhaps on some future occasion we may say a word or two about some of his lyric poems, and the best versions of them into English. MORGAN RATTLER. "As time rolls on in its rapidity."-M. R. 'Oh, lift thine eyes towards that world unseen!"-M. R. RETROSPECTIVE GLEANINGS. ALL who have moved in scenes of busy life find continually recurring to recollection, from the chapter of the past, incidents calculated to awaken interest or gratify curiosity. Those who are least able to commit what they have seen or heard to permanent record, it often unfortunately happens, are the parties who have the most to communicate. With such the power waits not upon the will. Many who publish their own souvenirs are, on the other hand, adepts at dressing up their descriptions to advantage, although possessed of very scanty materials. In the present instance, the species which the senses have brought in," stored in memory, and redelivered as they recur, are all that can be offered. 66 our horses and set off for the "good At the time of which we are 66 We will take little money with us," said my companion; we can get that in Paris; and, being well mounted, we can perform our journey by daylight." We had been residing for some months in a French château in the department of the Eure. It was at the end of the eventful year 1815 that we crossed the Channel for the first time. The distance of our residence from Paris was forty miles. We had never seen the Gallic capital, so renowned for its gaiety and splendour, though we had resided four months in one of the largest provincial cities of the land of the vine. The armies of occupation still remained in the country. Solitary travelling was not deemed so safe as when the native police alone was in activity. An English commissary had been robbed and murdered on the highroad to the northward of our domicile, some considerable distance off, it was true. The emissaries of justice and the gens-d'armes were doubly watchful in consequence. After all, considering the position of the country with what had recently occurred, the good order maintained did not confer less credit upon the authorities than it reflected honour upon the peaceable disposition of the people. Duly weighing these circumstances, we determined, in company with a friend, to go on horseback to Paris. Our immediate object was to visit Count D, who was daily expected to go upon a foreign embassy: thus the occasion pressing. The morning after forming the resolution we mounted was Our horses will enable us to fight the battle of the spurs with any rogues who may attack us; my life we beat them at a race-allons donc !" Mine was a Waterloo horse, car rying on the shoulder the honourable graze of a bullet which passed through the leg of a British officer in the saddle, doing further execution in its line of direction. Both horses were full of spirit; mine "Son front cicatrice rend son air furieux, Et l'ardeur du combat étincelle en ses yeux." We soon reached Pontoise, with its narrow streets and remnants of old walls, glorious in gastronomic annals for the finest veal in the world. If England boasts the beef, France may be vain upon that which bears a close relationship to the baron. In the old town of Pontoise, through which flows the river of many agreeable recollections to ourselves, we pulled up at an inn, the name of which my notes omit. "What have you to eat, my friend?" we demanded of the landlord. He replied by a second question, "What does monsieur please to have?" which Sterne would have quoted, perhaps, as a proof of French politesse. This reminds us that, being at Montreuil in 1815, the landlord of the inn (we think it was the tête de bœuf) told us that he well remembered Sterne, who used to write in the very room where we were then carousing. He was an old man, eighty years of age; he added that he had weathered the stormy period of the revolution in the same house, and should probably end his days there. Revenons à nos moutons. We told our Pontoise host that we were content to leave the choice of our fare to him, as we did not presume ourselves competent to dictate to one of his nation upon les arts utiles-above all, on matters of the table. We English had roast beef, beef-steaks, and melted butter: what were these to the innumerable productions of gastronomical science in France? Monsieur, sensible of the compliment, bowed twice. There is nothing like putting a landlord in good humour to oblige ourselves. "Come, come," said our companion, "order something at once; you will palaver all day: I am hungry." We bade the landlord be quick with whatever he chose to bring us. He was one of the old school of Frenchmen, now passed away, wore powder, and carried a nosegay in his button-hole. of the landlord's own father, for the Parisians say such endearing food may be pleasantly taken so disguised. What matters it, particularly to travellers? Whatever it was, the vir tues it exhibited were transcendant, or our appetite was more than customarily complimentary. "Champagne!" This was our next demand, as it was that of most Englishmen on first visiting the country of its growth-not so much from preference, it is probable, as because it could be had for five francs the bottle, while in England it cost twelve or fourteen shillings. Our landlord feared he had not a bottle left. "How is that, monsieur ?” we inquired. "The English officers drank champagne before dinner, with dinner, and after dinner," he replied. When the only bottle that could be found was finished, we inquired for some other wine. We asked whether he had exhumed what he had buried on the approach of the allied armies: he told us he had as soon as order was perfectly restored, but then the offi cers drank so much every day, his stock was reduced very low. "Ma foi, messieurs, how your compatriots would drink! Four of mine do not take as much as one Englishman." 66 They paid you well for your wine." Yes, for all they drank." "Did the Russians and Prussians do the same?" ders, saying by signs what he was Our host shrugged up his shoul unwilling to relate in words, seeing the Cossacks were our dear alliesby the by, some of the most ill-looking, dirty savages we ever encountered. We thought this delicacy in sibility to the feelings of others our host was a part of that old senwhich marked the ancien régime. It has been evaporating rapidly in France during the last few years. We were no strangers to the conduct of the Russians and Prussians while in the country; we had been in Blangy after they marched out, and could get only the most miserable fare: the reason was that the Russians and Prussians had taken all. sauce might have covered a portion had forty British dragoons quartered The landlady of the inn told us she A few simple but excellent dishes were soon upon the table, the places of which, we were assured by our host, would have been occupied by things more recherché if time had permitted. There was one dish which the landlord denominated superb. It was recommendatory principally for its exquisite sauce; we have no idea of what the solid part consisted. Where the trappings are gay, who does otherwise than take the wearer upon trust for a gentleman? This there for two months, and that they paid for every thing they had. The Russians only took what they wanted for consumption, she said, which was to be expected at such times; but, as for the Prussians, they wantonly destroyed what they could not use, and almost made a famine around them. This wantonness of waste was abundantly borne out even in the conduct of the Prussian officers. One of these northern gentlemen was quartered in the house of a single lady at Rouen, a house handsomely furnished: he took possession of the best apartments, made the servants of the house his own, and seemed determined to prove the maxim, "Set a beggar on horseback," &c. He could not speak French, but endeavoured to make himself understood by signs. He rang the bell, and, when the servant came in, desired in a jargon not comprehended something which he wanted. The poor servant would go out of the room, and bring back a different article from that demanded. Upon this the Prussian would take his cane, and dash a glass chandelier to pieces, or push it through a mirror, in the way of retaliation, because the domestic could not perform a task of which he was ignorant. But we digress. choly that covers the perished past- We sat long in a merry cue, nor A bottle of choice burgundy was brought us, which we eyed sullenly. Englishmen have small regard for this, the finest wine in the world; it was exquisite St. George's: the first glass was swallowed in silence; the second elicited faint praise; the third restored the equilibrium of our integrity. The meed of merit could be no longer withheld, our prejudices springing clean out of the windows of the salle à manger. Although willing to respect our countrymen's prejudices when they are honest, we cannot admit the supremacy of the dye-stuff called port, nor can we agree in applauding their vituperation of the finest wine in the world. As Redi exclaims, "Montepulciano is the king of all wine," so we crown the côté d'or the imperial nectar. As the gentle pressure of a plain between that town and Paris. The trees which now bound the road on either side have been planted since We were now flung upon our own a fair hand from her we love was the good hôtel in the Rue St. Thomas gratefulness of that burgundy to our palate. The bare recollection makes us youthy again; it gilds the melan du Louvre, the Hôtel de France. |