Like freezing founts, where all that's thrown these poor bards, he was giving an admirable analysis of the machinery and effects of almost all that poets have ever done! The ingenuity with which the above simile is ap In 1563 severe enactments were issued against these plied, is not more remarkable than the success with gentlemen, to which was annexed the following-which the homely image of putting out the bed-candle "Item, for that those rhymers do, by their ditties and before we sleep, is divested of every particle of vulrhymes, made to dyvers lordes and gentlemen in Ire- garity. land, in the commendacion and highe praise of extor- In the same way, and with equal facility, the sudtion, rebellion, rape, raven, and outhere injustice, en- den revival of forgotten feelings, at meeting with courage those lordes and gentlemen rather to follow friends from whom we have been long separated, is those vices than to leve them, and for making of such compared to the discovering, by the application of rhymes, rewards are given by the said lordes and gen- heat, letters written invisibly with sympathetic ink :tlemen; that for abolishinge of soo heynouse an abuse," etc., etc. The feudal system, which encouraged the poetical state of manners, and afforded the minstrels worthy subjects for their strains, received a severe blow from the policy pursued by Elizabeth. This was followed up by Cromwell, and consummated by King William, of Orange memory. What soften'd remembrances come o'er the heart The warmth of a meeting like this brings to light. More recently a Scotch writer observes, "In Ireland the harpers, the original composers, and the chief depositories of that music, have, till lately, been uniformly cherished and supported by the nobility and gentry. They endeavoured to outdo one another in playing the airs that were most esteemed, with cor- The musical as well as the poetical taste of the rectness, and with their proper expression. The author is evident in every line, nor is one allowed to taste for that style of performance seems now, how-shine at the expense of the other. Moore has com ever, to be declining. The native harpers are not posed some beautiful airs, but seems shy of exercising much encouraged. A number of their airs have come this faculty, dreading, perhaps, that success in that into the hands of foreign musicians, who have at-pursuit would detract from his poetical fame. The tempted to fashion them according to the model of union of these talents is rare, and some have affirmed the modern music; and these acts are considered in that they even exclude one another. When Gretry the country as capital improvements." visited Voltaire at Ferney, the philosopher paid him We have gone into the above details, not only be a compliment at the expense of his profession : cause they are in themselves interesting and illustra-"Vous etes musicien," said Voltaire, "et vous avez tive of the "Irish Melodies," but because we fully de l'esprit : cela est trop rare pour que je ne prenne coincide with the bard of "Childe Harold," that the lasting celebrity of Moore will be found in his lyrical compositions, with which his name and fame will be inseparably and immortally connected. Mr. Moore possesses a singular facility of seizing and expressing the prevailing association which a given air is calculated to inspire in the minds of the greatest number of hearers, and has a very felicitous talent in making this discovery, even through the envelopes of prejudice or vulgarity. The alchemy by which he is thus accustomed to turn dross into gold is really surprising. The air which now seems framed for the sole purpose of giving the highest effect to the refined and elegant ideas contained in the stanzas "Sing, sing-music was given," has for years been known only as attached to the words of" Oh! whack! Judy O'Flanagan, etc.," and the words usually sung to the tune of Cumilum are of the same low and ludicrous description. He possesses, also, in a high degree, that remarkable gift of a poetical imagination, which consists in elevating and dignifying the meanest subject on which it chooses to expatiate : As they, who to their couch at night pas a vous le plus vif interet." Nature certainly may be supposed not over-inclined to be prodigal in bestowing on the same object the several gifts that are peculiarly hers; but, as far as the assertion rests on experience, it is powerfully contradicted by the names of Moore and Rousseau. The late Mr. Charles Wolfe, having both a literary and a musical turn, occasionally employed himself in adapting words to national melodies, and in writing characteristic introductions to popular songs. Being fond of "The Last Rose of Summer" (IRISH MEL. No. V.) he composed the following tale for its illustration: "This is the grave of Dermid :-He was the best minstrel among us all,-a youth of romantic genius, and of the most tremulous, and yet the most impetuous feeling. He knew all our old national airs, of every character and description: according as his song was in a lofty or a mournful strain, the village represented a camp or funeral; but if Dermid were in his merry mood, the lads and lasses hurried into a dance, with a giddy and irresistible gaiety. One day our chieftain committed a cruel and wanton outrage against one of our peaceful villagers. Dermid's harr was in his hand when he heard it-with all the thoughtlessness and independent sensibility of a poet's indignation, he struck the chords that never spoko without response, and the detestation became unives sal. He was driven from amongst us by our enraged | Angels," states, that he had somewhat hastened his chief; and all his relations, and the maid he loved, publication, to avoid the disadvantage of having his attended the minstrel into the wide world. For work appear after his friend Lord Byron's "Heaven three years there were no tidings of Dermid; and the and Earth;" or, as he ingeniously expresses it, “by song and the dance were silent; when one of our lit-an earlier appearance in the literary horizon, to give tle boys came running in, and told us that he saw our myself the chance of what astronomers call a heliacal minstrel approaching at a distance. Instantly the rising, before the luminary, in whose light I was to whole village was in commotion; the youths and be lost, should appear." This was an amiable, but by maidens assembled on the green, and agreed to cele- no means a reasonable modesty. The light that plays trate the arrival of their poet with a dance; they round Mr. Moore's verses, tender, exquisite, and brilfixed upon the air he was to play for them; it was liant, was in no danger of being extinguished even in the merriest of his collection; the ring was formed; the sullen glare of Lord Byron's genius. One might all looked eagerly to the quarter from which he was as well expect an aurora borealis to be put out by an to arrive, determined to greet their favourite bard with eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Though both bright a cheer. But they were checked the instant he ap-stars in the firmament of modern poetry, they were as peared; he came slowly, and languidly, and loiteringly distant and unlike as Saturn and Mercury; and along; his countenance had a cold, dim, and careless though their rising might be at the same time, they aspect, very different from that expressive cheerfulness never moved in the same orb, nor met or jostled in which marked his features, even in his more melancho- the wide trackless way of fancy and invention. ly moments; his harp was swinging heavily upon his Though these two celebrated writers in some arm; it seemed a burthen to him; it was much shattered, measure divided the poetical public between them, and some of the strings were broken. He looked at us yet it was not the same public whose favour they sefor a few moments, then, relapsing into vacancy, ad- verally enjoyed in the highest degree. Though both vanced without quickening his pace, to his accustomed read and admired in the same extended circle of taste stone, and sate down in silence. After a pause, we and fashion, each was the favourite of a totally differventured to ask him for his friends;-he first looked ent set of readers. Thus a lover may pay the same up sharp in our faces, next down upon his harp; then attention to two different women; but he only means struck a few notes of a wild and desponding melody, to flirt with the one, while the other is the mistress which we had never heard before ; but his hand drop-of his heart. The gay, the fair, the witty, the happy, ped, and he did not finish it.-Again we paused: idolize Mr. Moore's delightful muse, on her pedestal then knowing well that, if we could give the smallest of airy smiles or transient tears. Lord Byron's se mirthful impulse to his feelings, his whole soul would verer verse is enshrined in the breasts of those whose soon follow, we asked him for the merry air we had gaiety has been turned to gall, whose fair exterior has chosen. We were surprised at the readiness with a canker within-whose mirth has received a rebuke which he seemed to comply; but it was the same wild as if it were folly, from whom happiness has fled like and heart-breaking strain he had commenced. In a dream! By comparing the odds upon the known fact, we found that the soul of the minstrel had be- chances of human life, it is no wonder that the ad come an entire void, except one solitary ray that vi- mirers of his lordship's works should be more numer brated sluggishly through its very darkest path; it was ous than those of his more agreeable rival. We are like the sea in a dark calm, which you only know to not going to speak of any preference we may have, be in motion by the panting which you hear. He but we beg leave to make a distinction. The poetry had totally forgotten every trace of his former strains, of Moore is esentially that of fancy, the poetry of not only those that were more gay and airy, but even Byron that of passion. If there is passion in the effu. those of a more pensive cast; and he had gotten in sions of the one, the fancy by which it is expressed their stead that one dreary simple melody; it was predominates over it; if fancy is called to the aid of about a Lonely Rose, that had outlived all its com- the other, it is still subservient to the passion. Lord panions; this he continued singing and playing from Byron's jests are downright earnest; Mr. Moore, day to day, until he spread an unusual gloom over the when he is most serious, seems half in jest. The whole village: he seemed to perceive it, for he re- latter dallies and trifles with his subject, caresses and tred to the church-yard, and continued repairing grows enamoured of it; the former grasped it eagerly thither to sing it to the day of his death. The afflicted to his bosom, breathed death upon it, and turned from constantly resorted there to hear it, and he died sing-it with loathing or dismay. The fine aroma that is ing it to a maid who had lost her lover. The orphans exhaled from the flowers of poesy, every where lends have learnt it, and still chaunt it over Dermid's grave." its perfume to the verse of the bard of Ein. The noble "The Fudge Family in Paris" is a most humorous bard (less fortunate in his muse) tried to extract poison work, written partly in the style of "The Twopenny- from them. If Lord Byron cast his own views or feelPost Bag." These poetical epistles remind many ings upon outward objects (jaundicing the sun,) Mr. persons of the "Bath Guide," but a comparison can Moore seems to exist in the delights, the virgin fancies hardly be supported; the plan of Mr. Moore's work of nature. He is free of the Rosicrucian society; and being less extensive, and the subject more ephemeral. in ethereal existence among troops of sylphs and We pity the man, however, who has not felt pleased spirits,-in a perpetual vision of wings, flowers, rainwith this book; even those who disapprove the author's politics, and his treating Royalty with so little reverence, must be bigoted and loyal to an excess if they dony his wit and humour. bows, smiles, blushes, tears, and kisses. Every page of his work is a vignette, every line that he writes glows or sparkles, and it would seem (to quote again the expressive words of Sheridan) "as if his airy Mr. Moore, in his preface to the "Loves of the spirit, drawn from the sun, continually fluttered with D fond aspirations, to regain that native source of light and wearisome. It is the fault of Mr Wordsworth's and heat." The worst is, our author's mind is too Like moonlight on a troubled sea, poetry that he has perversely relied too much (or wholly) on this reaction of the imagination on subjects that are petty and repulsive in themselves; and of Mr. Moore's, that he appeals too exclusively to the flattering support of sense and fancy. Secondly, we have remarked that Mr. Moore hardly ever describes entire objects, but abstract qualities of objects. It is not a picture that he gives us, but an inventing of beauty. He takes a blush, or a smile, and runs on whole stanzas in ecstatic praise of it, and then diverges to the sound of a voice, and "discourses eloquent music" on the subject; but it might as well be the light of heaven that he is describing, or the voice of echo-we have no human figure before us, no palpable reality answering to any substantive form or We do not believe that Mr. Moore ever writes a nature. Hence we think it may be explained why it line that in itself would not pass for poetry, that is not is that our author has so little picturesque effect-with at least a vivid or harmonious common-place. Lord such vividness of conception, such insatiable ambition Byron wrote whole pages of sullen, crabbed prose, after ornament, and such an inexhaustible and dethat, like a long dreary road, however, leads to dole-lightful play of fancy. Mr. Moore is a colourist in ful shades or palaces of the blest. In short Mr. poetry, a musician also, and has a heart full of tenMoore's Parnassus is a blooming Eden, and Lord derness and susceptibility for all that is delightful and Byron's a rugged wilderness of shame and sorrow. amiable in itself, and that does not require the ordeal On the tree of knowledge of the first you can see of suffering, of crime, or of deep thought, to stamp it nothing but perpetual flowers and verdure; in the last with a bold character. In this we conceive consists you see the naked stem and rough bark; but it heaves the charm of his poetry, which all the world feels, at intervals with inarticulate throes, and you hear the but which it is difficult to explain scientifically, and shrieks of a human voice within. in conformity to transcendant rules. It has the charm Critically speaking, Mr. Moore's poetry is chargea- of the softest and most brilliant execution; there is no ble with two peculiarities: first, the pleasure or interest wrinkle, no deformity on its smooth and shining surhe conveys to us is almost always derived from the face. It has the charm which arises from the confirst impressions or physical properties of objects, not tinual desire to please, and from the spontaneous from their connexion with passion or circumstances. sense of pleasure in the author's mind. Without His lights dazzle the eye, his perfumes soothe the being gross in the smallest degree, it is voluptuous in smell, his sounds ravish the ear; but then they do so the highest. It is a sort of sylph-like spiritualized for and from themselves, and at all times and places sensuality. So far from being licentious in his Lalla equally-for the heart has little to do with it. Hence Rookh, Mr. Moore has become moral and sentimental we observe a kind of fastidious extravagance in Mr. (indeed he was always the last,) and tantalizes his Moore's serious poetry. Each thing must be fine, young and fair readers with the glittering shadows soft, exquisite in itself, for it is never set off by reflec- and mystic adumbrations of evanescent delights. tion or contrast. It glitters to the sense through the He, in fine, in his courtship of the Muses, resembles atmosphere of indifference. Our indolent luxurious those lovers who always say the softest things on all bard does not whet the appetite by setting us to hunt occasions; who smile with irresistible good humour after the game of human passion, and is therefore at their own success; who banish pain and truth from obliged to hamper us with dainties, seasoned with their thoughts, and who impart the delight they feel rich fancy and the sauce piquante of poetic diction. in themselves unconsciously to others! Mr. Moore's Poetry, in his hands, becomes a kind of cosmetic art-poetry is the thornless rose-its touch is velvet, its it is the poetry of the toilet. His muse must be as hue vermilion, and its graceful form is cast in beauty's fine as the Lady of Loretto. Now, this principle of mould. Lord Byron's, on the contrary, is a prickly composition leads not only to a defect of dramatic bramble, or sometimes a deadly upas, of form uncouth interest, but also of imagination. For every thing in and uninviting, that has its root in the clefts of the this world, the meanest incident or object, may re-rock, and its head mocking the skies, that wars with ceive a light and an importance from its association the thunder-cloud and tempest, and round which the with other objects, and with the heart of man; and loud cataracts roar. the variety thus created is endless as it is striking and profound. But if we begin and end in those objects that are beautiful or dazzling in themselves and at the first blush, we shall soon be confined to a human reward of self-pleasing topics, and be both superficial We here conclude our Sketch of Anacreon Moore, LALLA ROOKH. as fragrant as if a caravan of musk from Khoten had passed through it. The Princess, having taken leave of her kind father, who at parting hung a cornelian of Yemen round her neck, on which was inscribed a verse from the Koran,—and having sent a considerable present to the Fakirs, who kept up the Perpetual Lamp in her sister's tomb, meekly ascended the palankeen prepared for her; and, while Aurungzebe stood to take the last look from his balcony, the procession moved slowly on the road to Lahore. IN the eleventh year of the reign of Aurungzebe, Abdalla, King of the Lesser Bucharia, a lineal descendant from the Great Zingis, having abdicated the throne in favour of his son, set out on a pilgrimage to the Shrine of the Prophet; and, passing into India through the delightful valley of Cashmere, rested for a short time at Delhi on his way. He was entertained by Aurungzebe in a style of magnificent hospitality, Seldom had the Eastern world seen a cavalcade so worthy alike of the visiter and the host, and was superb. From the gardens in the suburbs to the Imafterwards escorted with the same splendour to Surat, perial palace, it was one unbroken line of splendour. where he embarked for Arabia. During the stay of The gallant appearance of the Rajas and Mogul lords, the Royal Pilgrim at Delhi, a marriage was agreed distinguished by those insignia of the Emperor's faupon between the Prince, his son, and the youngest vour, the feathers of the egret of Cashmere in their daughter of the Emperor, LALLA ROOKн';-a Prin- turbans, and the small silver-rimmed kettle-drums at cess described by poets of her time, as more beauti- the bows of their saddles ;-the costly armour of ful than Lelia, Shrine, Dewilde, or any of those hero- their cavaliers, who vied on this occasion, with the ines whose names and loves embellish the songs of guards of the great Keder Khan, in the brightness of Persia and Hindostan. It was intended that the nup- their silver battle-axes and the massiness of their maces tials should be celebrated at Cashmere; where the of gold;-the glittering of the gilt pine apples on the young King, as soon as the cares of empire would tops of the palankeens ;-the embroidered trappings permit, was to meet, for the first time, his lovely bride, of the elephants, bearing on their backs small turrets, and after a few months' repose in that enchanting in the shape of little antique temples, within which valley, conduct her over the snowy hills into Bucharia. the Ladies of LALLA ROOKH lay, as it were, enshrined; The day of LALLA ROOKH's departure from Delhi the rose-coloured veils of the Princess's own sump was as splendid as sunshine and pageantry could tuous litter, at the front of which a fair young female make it. The bazaars and baths were all covered slave sat fanning her through the curtains, with feawith the richest tapestry; hundreds of gilded barges thers of the Argus pheasant's wing; and the lovely upon the Jumna floated with their banners shining in troop of Tartarian and Cashmerian maids of honour, the water; while through the streets groups of beau- whom the young King had sent to accompany his tiful children went strewing the most delicious flow-bride, and who rode on each side of the litter, upon er around, as in that Persian festival called the Scatring of the Roses'; till every part of the city was small Arabian horses;—all was brilliant, tasteful, and magnificent, and pleased even the critical and fasti dious FADLADEEN, Great Nazir or Chamberlain of the Haram, who was borne in his palankeen imme diately after the Princess, and considered himself noting refreshed his faculties with a dose of that aeiithe least important personage of the pageant. FADLADEEN was a judge of every thing, from the pencilling of a Circassian's eye-lids to the deepest questions of science and literature; from the mixture of a conserve of rose-leaves to the composition of an epic poem; and such influence had his opinion upon the various tastes of the day, that all the cooks and poets of Delhi stood in awe of him. His political conduct and opinions were founded upon that line of Sadi, "Should the Prince at noon-day say, it is night, declare that you behold the moon and stars." And his zeal for religion, of which Aurungzebe was a munificent protector, was about as disinterested as that of the goldsmith who fell in love with the diamond eyes of the idol of Jaghernaut. cious opium, which is distilled from the black poppy of the Thebais, gave orders for the minstrel to be forthwith introduced into the presence. studied negligence;-nor did the exquisite embroidery of his sandals escape the observation of these fair critics; who, however they might give way to FADLADEEN upon the unimportant topics of religion and government, had the spirits of martyrs in every thing relating to such momentous matters as jewels and embroidery. The Princess, who had once in her life seen a poet from behind the screens of gauze in her father's hall, and had conceived from that specimen no very favourable ideas of the Cast, expected but little in this new exhibition to interest her;-she felt inclined however to alter her opinion on the very first appearance of FERAMORZ. He was a youth about LALLA ROOKн's own age, and graceful as that idol of women, Crishna,'-such as he appears to their young imaginations, heroic, beautiful, breathing music from his very eyes, and exalting the religion of his worshippers into love. His dress was simple, yet not During the first days of their journey, LALLA without some marks of costliness; and the Ladies of ROOKH, who had passed all her life within the the Princess were not long in discovering that the shadow of the Royal Gardens of Delhi, found enough cloth, which encircled his high Tartarian cap, was in the beauty of the scenery through which they of the most delicate kind that the shawl-goats of passed to interest her mind and delight her imagina- Tibet supply. Here and there, too, over his vest, tion; and, when at evening, or in the heat of the which was confined by a flowered girdle of Kashan, day, they turned off from the high road to those re-hung strings of fine pearl, disposed with an air of tired and romantic places which had been selected for her encampments, sometimes on the banks of a small rivulet, as clear as the waters of the Lake of Pearl; sometimes under the sacred shade of a Banyan tree, from which the view opened upon a glade covered with antelopes; and often in those hidden, embowered spots, described by one from the Isles of the West, as "places of melancholy, delight, and safety, where all the company around was wild peacocks and turtle doves ;"-she felt a charm in these scenes, so lovely and so new to her, which, for a time, made her indifferent to every other amusement. But LALLA ROOKн was young, and the young love variety; nor could the conversation of her ladies and the Great Chamberlain, FADLADEEN, (the only persons, of course, admitted to her pavilion,) sufficiently enliven those many vacant hours, which were devoted neither to the pillow nor the palankeen. There was a little Persian slave who sung sweetly to the Vina, and who now and then lulled the Princess to sleep -with the ancient ditties of her country, about the loves of Wamak and Ezra, the fair haired Zal and his mistress Rodahver; not forgetting the combat of Rustam with the terrible White Demon. At other times she was amused by those graceful dancing girls of Delhi, who had been permitted by the Bramins of the Great Pagoda to attend her, much to the horror of the good Mussulman FADLADEEN, who could see nothing graceful or agreeable in idolaters, and to whom the very tinkling of their golden anklets was an abomi nation. But these and many other diversions were repeated till they lost all their charm, and the nights and noondays were beginning to move heavily, when at length, it was recollected that, among the attendants sent by the bridegroom was a young poet of Cashmere, much celebrated throughout the Valley for his manner of reciting the Stories of the East, on whom his Royal Master had conferred the privilege of being admitted to the pavilion of the Princess, that he might help to beguile the tediousness of the journey by some of his most agreeable recitals. At the mention of a poet FADLADEEN elevated his critical eve-brows, and, hav-| For the purpose of relieving the pauses of recitation by music, the young Cashmerian held in his hand a kitar;-such as, in old times, the Arab maids of the West used to listen to by moonlight in the gardens of the Alhambra-and having premised, with much humility, that the story he was about to relate was founded on the adventures of that Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, who, in the year of the Hegira 163, created such alarm throughout the Eastern Empire, made an obeisance to the Princess, and thus began: THE VEILED PROPHET OF KHORASSAN.2 IN that delightful Province of the Sun, On either side, with ready hearts and hands, |