The Works of Lord Byron Volume IV Part 109

_Lady Blueb_. Come, a truce with all tartness;--the joy of my heart Is to see Nature's triumph o'er all that is art.

Wild Nature!--Grand Shakespeare!

_Both_. And down Aristotle!

_Lady Bluem_. Sir George[628] thinks exactly with Lady Bluebottle: And my Lord Seventy-four,[629] who protects our dear Bard, And who gave him his place, has the greatest regard For the poet, who, singing of pedlers and a.s.ses, Has found out the way to dispense with Parna.s.sus. 120

_Tra_. And you, Scamp!--

_Scamp_. I needs must confess I'm embarra.s.sed.

_Ink_. Don't call upon Scamp, who's already so hara.s.sed With old _schools_, and new _schools_, and no _schools_, and all _schools_[630].

_Tra_. Well, one thing is certain, that _some_ must be fools.

I should like to know who.

_Ink_. And I should not be sorry To know who are _not_:--it would save us some worry.

_Lady Blueb_. A truce with remark, and let nothing control This "feast of our reason, and flow of the soul."

Oh! my dear Mr. Botherby! sympathise!--I Now feel such a rapture, I'm ready to fly, 130 I feel so elastic--"_so buoyant--so buoyant!_"[631]

_Ink_. Tracy! open the window.

_Tra_. I wish her much joy on't.

_Both_. For G.o.d's sake, my Lady Bluebottle, check not This gentle emotion, so seldom our lot Upon earth. Give it way: 'tis an impulse which lifts Our spirits from earth--the sublimest of gifts; For which poor Prometheus was chained to his mountain: 'Tis the source of all sentiment--feeling's true fountain; 'Tis the Vision of Heaven upon Earth: 'tis the gas Of the soul: 'tis the seizing of shades as they pa.s.s, 140 And making them substance: 'tis something divine:--

_Ink_. Shall I help you, my friend, to a little more wine?

_Both_. I thank you: not any more, sir, till I dine.[632]

_Ink_. Apropos--Do you dine with Sir Humphry to day?

_Tra_. I should think with _Duke_ Humphry[633] was more in your way.

_Ink_. It might be of yore; but we authors now look To the Knight, as a landlord, much more than the Duke.

The truth is, each writer now quite at his ease is, And (except with his publisher) dines where he pleases.

But 'tis now nearly five, and I must to the Park. 150

_Tra_. And I'll take a turn with you there till 'tis dark.

And you, Scamp--

_Scamp_. Excuse me! I must to my notes, For my lecture next week.

_Ink_. He must mind whom he quotes Out of "Elegant Extracts."

_Lady Blueb_. Well, now we break up; But remember Miss Diddle[634] invites us to sup.

_Ink_. Then at two hours past midnight we all meet again, For the sciences, sandwiches, hock, and champagne!

_Tra_. And the sweet lobster salad![635]

_Both_. I honour that meal; For 'tis then that our feelings most genuinely--feel.

_Ink_. True; feeling is truest _then_, far beyond question: I wish to the G.o.ds 'twas the same with digestion! 161

_Lady Blueb_. Pshaw!--never mind that; for one moment of feeling Is worth--G.o.d knows what.

_Ink_. 'Tis at least worth concealing For itself, or what follows--But here comes your carriage.

_Sir Rich_. (_aside_).

I wish all these people were d----d with _my_ marriage!

[_Exeunt._

FOOTNOTES:

[609] {573}[Benjamin Stillingfleet is said to have attended evening parties at Mrs. Montague's in grey or blue worsted stockings, in lieu of full dress. The ladies who excused and tolerated this defiance of the conventions were nicknamed "blues," or "blue-stockings." Hannah More describes such a club or coterie in her _Bas Bleu_, which was circulated in MS. in 1784 (Boswell's _Life of Johnson_, 1848, p. 689). A farce by Moore, ent.i.tled _The M. P., or The Blue-Stocking_, was played for the first time at the Lyceum, September 30, 1811. The heroine, "Lady Bab Blue, is a pretender to poetry, chemistry, etc."--Genest's _Hist. of the Stage_, 1832, viii. 270.]

[610] {574}[Compare the dialogue between Mr. Paperstamp, Mr.

Feathernest, Mr. Vamp, etc., in Peac.o.c.k's _Melincourt_, cap. x.x.xii., _Works_, 1875, i. 272.]

[611] [Compare--

"The last edition see by Long. and Co., Rees, Hurst, and Orme, our fathers of the Row."

_The Search after Happiness_, by Sir Walter Scott.]

[612] [This phrase is said to have been first used in the _Edinburgh Review_--probably by Jeffrey. (See review of _Rogers's Human Life_, 1818, _Edin. Rev._, vol. 31, p. 325.)]

[613] {575}[It is possible that the description of Hazlitt's Lectures of 1818 is coloured by recollections of Coleridge's Lectures of 1811-1812, which Byron attended (see letter to Harness, December 6, 1811, _Letters_, 1898, ii. 76, note 1); but the substance of the attack is probably derived from Gifford's review of _Lectures on the English Poets, delivered at the Surrey Inst.i.tution_ (_Quarterly Review_, December, 1818, vol. xix. pp. 424-434.)]

[614] {576}["Yesterday, a very pretty letter from Annabella.... She is ... very little spoiled, which is strange in an heiress.... She is a poetess--a mathematician--a metaphysician."--_Journal_, November 30, 1813, _Letters_, 1898, ii. 357]

[615] {578}[The term "renegade" was applied to Southey by William Smith, M.P., in the House of Commons, March 14, 1817 (_vide ante_, p. 482).

Sotheby's plays, _Ivan_, _The Death of Darnley_, _Zamorin and Zama_, were published under the t.i.tle of _Five Tragedies_, in 1814.]

[616] [Compare--

"I've bribed my Grandmother's Review the British."

_Don Juan_, Canto I. stanza ccix. line 9.

And see "Letter to the Editor of 'My Grandmother's Review,'" _Letters_, 1900, iv. Appendix VII. pp. 465-470. The reference may be to a review of the Fourth Canto of _Childe Harold_, which appeared in the _British Review_, January, 1818, or to a more recent and, naturally, most hostile notice of _Don Juan_ (No. xviii. 1819).]

[617] [_The Journal de Trevoux_, published under the t.i.tle of _Memoires de Trevoux_ (1701-1775, 265 vols. 12), edited by members of the Society of Jesus, was an imitation of the _Journal des Savants_. The original matter, the Memoires, contain a mine of information for the student of the history of French Literature; but the reviews, critical notices, etc., to which Byron refers, were of a highly polemical and partisan character, and were the subject of attack on the part of Protestant and free-thinking antagonists. In a letter to Moore, dated Ravenna, June 22, 1821, Byron says, "Now, if we were but together a little to combine our _Journal of Trevoux_!" (_Letters_, 1901, v. 309). The use of the same ill.u.s.tration in letter and poem is curious and noteworthy.]