Page images
PDF
EPUB
[ocr errors]

• Restric

author before us, have, no doubt, acquired their distinction from their peculiar aptitude to preserve in a small compass the value of a quantity of labour, as well as from their durability and facility of decomposition. Proceeding to the history of coinage in England, he explains that silver was long our standard of value; and that gold continued to be regarded, like other commodities, according to its relation in value to silver. For a century past, gold has taken the place of silver as our standard; and since there cannot be two common measures of invariable value, silver has been considered as a commodity, and has been liable to certain, though till of late immaterial, fluctuations. From gold and silver the author directs his attention to bank-notes, and treats our paper-system, in its present state, with great severity. In animadverting on the plausible words by which offensive measures are smoothed for the public ear, he ridicules the term "restriction" as applied to the bank-stoppage. tions from payment,' he adds, are hardly usual or necessary where there is any thing to pay with. A spur might not, indeed, answer the purpose; but it would, at least, be as good as a bridle.' In comparing the different result of an investment of money made twenty years ago in land, or in the stocks, he computes that, without taking into account the fall of stocks by war, the advantage of an investment in land would have been at least double. He does not, however, like other oppositionists to the Bank, go so far as to doubt the existence of a balance of payments from one nation to another; but we cannot compliment him on a knowlege of the principles of trade, and still less on his manner of communicating the share of information which he does possess. His style is often diffuse, and sometimes obscure; an obscurity which is increased, or perhaps created, by the careless manner in which the pamphlet is printed. The point on which he is most successful, that on which he drops his monotony and assumes a tone of animation, is in exhibiting the evils of war. War (he says, p. 55.) is the most active and dreadful bane of commercial nations. The first steps towards it plant in them the seeds of decay; and if ever they become fond of war, or that war is become a necessary form of their exist ence, they are making rapid strides towards dissolution. The wars of this reign have been unnatural, impolitic, and ruinous in the extreme. They have originated in a spirit hostile to the genius and character of the British nation; having for their constant object the depression of liberty and the elevation of despotism. The efficient cause of the present scarcity of bullion, as well as of the vast shoals of paper-money which devastate the country, is war.'

The enactment of a resumption of cash-payments at the end of two years, as recommended by the Bullion-Committee, is not, in this author's opinion, the fit measure to be adopted. The public,' he says, stand in need of no more promises, and this, like all halfmeasures, would be ineffectual. The Bank has acted like an imprudent banker who has expended the money of his customers in merchandise for which there is no demand; or has lent it to insolvent people; or, at least, to such people as stand in need of a long letter of licence. We must have recourse to the plain, honest methods resorted to, or which ought to be resorted to, in the like case in

private

private life. We must leave off gambling and fighting, and betake ourselves to work. Government must repay the Bank her advance, and the restriction may at last be removed; coin will then make its appearance, and paper will be fairly driven out of the field. But to effect all this, the obstacles which prevent the influx of bullion must be removed. These obstacles all tenaciously inhere in one great substratum, and that is war. We must look this formidable enemy fairly in the face. No fabrication of light silver crown pieces; no divisions or subdivisions of the miserable pittance of bullion we have still left; no ringing changes on denominations, particularly on paper-denominations; no multiplication of them will answer the purpose. We must abandon war, and extinguish, or effectually curb the system and the causes which engender war. Industry will then seek its natural channels; commerce may perhaps again flourish, and gold and silver once more revisit the land.' Here Mr. Pennyless brings his miscella neous production to a close; and those of his readers who, like us, have waded through the whole of it, will be tempted to exclaim that he would have saved them much tedium, “si sic omnia dixisset.”

POETRY.

Art. 21. The Fall of Cambria, in Twenty-four Books. By Joseph Cottle. Second Edition. 2 Vols. 8vo. 16s. Boards. Longman and Co. 1811.

In our Number for November 1808, we gave a sufficient account of the contents of this Blank Epic, and expressed our doubts of its popularity. In truth, although now much altered, and professedly amended, it still possesses no attraction for any readers but those whom duty compels to toil through all the worthless nonsense that is published. The twenty-fifth book, indeed, of the Fall of Cambria, is now omitted: we hinted at its superfluity in the critique above cited: but, alas! twenty-four books still remain, and nine new lyrical pieces are added, by way of compensation for the curtailment in question. We present our readers with a brief specimen of these additions; and we have little farther to remark, except that Mr. Cottle's Preface abounds in nice distinctions, which do not appear to us to make any very decided difference between the real faults of his composition, and those which he thinks may erroneously be attributed to it. This Preface is also new, and, together with the nine lyrical pieces, is published separately, gratis, for the benefit of the purchasers of the first edition of the Poem. This is a laudable practice.

Caradoc's Mad Song.

Before he leaped from a precipice into the ocean (introduced in the eighteenth book).

• Like a watch-tower, I stand on the verge of the sea,

Whilst the tempest arous'd in his vehemence raves.

The deep tones of ocean, how fearful they be,

When the storm wraps in darkness the mountainous waves!

What transports are these! Like myself, in despair
The white-headed billows dash madly the shore:

I love the rude tumult, the rocking of air,
And music to me is this perilous roar.

Behold!

[ocr errors]

Behold! The red thunderbolt ranges the sky,
Beside, rides a Spirit! Ere beheld, he is past:
Ah! seize in thine anger the bolts as they fly,

And crush me an atom upwhirl'd on the blast,'

We are positively frightened from proceeding." It is too, too

much!"

The gross defects of Mr, Cottle's style, which we censured four years ago, seem to have "grown with his growth, and strengthened with his strength." At all events, few indeed of the errors of the twenty-four books have disappeared.

• That arm of thine, oh Warwick, falls like fate

Ah, Talbot! thou art wounded! staggering back

He falls!'Book the 7th.

Falls, indeed! there is nothing but falling throughout the volume.
It is the Fall of Cambria, and the fall of its author.
Hear Llewellyn's Address to Snowdon;

[ocr errors]

Farewell, he cried, thou granite lord supreme!' -Book the 8th.
Destruction, with his besom, sweeps the plain !'-Ibid.

[ocr errors]

Through the whole host, joy, like a cordial, ran !-Book 11th. "The granite lord, the besom,' and the cordial,' are inimitable, A few more examples of this superior command of poetical expres. sion, and we have done :

The battle-axe

Earl Mortimer's stout helm-shivers. He fallsVanquish'd before the Cambrian's potency !'-Book 19 The rhythm also of this passage is unrivalled:

• Posting, with rapid speed, a man draws near !—Ibid.

[ocr errors]

The Song to the Winter Robin,' page 180. vol. 2. is so very pretty, and so very appropriate in an epic poem, that we long to in- but it must not be! Our limits sternly forbid. As our Poet has it,

sert it:

[ocr errors]

Leave me now alone

To silence, and the wormwood of the heart !'-Book 20. For, as his own young shepherd' simply and tenderly expresses himself, page 263. vol. 2.

• Nothing here can ease my ailing,

Forest simples will not heal

Know the cause of my complaining,

'Tis home-sickness which I feel!'

Another wild lay attracts our parting notice in the twenty-third Book:

• For David is dead!

Oh! his spirit is fled!.

And here, on the turf, rests his peaceable head!'

How can we conclude this revival of Mr. Joseph Cottle's fame better than by subjoining to it an " Epitaph" from the French, which we lately read, and which strikes us as applicable, in a peculiar

manner

manner, to the immortal Fall of Cambria,' and its perishable author?

"Here lies an author-pray forgive
The work that fed his pride-
Long after death he hoped to live,
And long before it, died."

Art. 22. Squibs and Crackers, serious, comical, and tender. By
Jasper Smallshot. 8vo. 7s. Boards. Harding. 1812.
The title of this book is taking, but the execution of it will
disappoint the most indulgent lover of laughter that ever resolved
to be pleased. Squibs and Crackers' are both stupid and vulgar;
and as much disgrace as can attach to an impotent trifle of this kind
certainly belongs to the worthless volume before, us. We take
specimen from the centre:

• Omnibus lassis-A Tale of Learning.'
Tom Tickler was a pedagogue,

Of temper good, tho' he could flog
Those under his tuition,

Who knew not qui from que or quod,
Which to confound, indeed seems odd,
Without much erudition.'

This is the first stanza of the Tale of Learning.' The last as follows:

I know myself a little Latin,

Tho' not, like you, it am I pat in ;-
But come, the bottle passes :-

So here I drink with all my heart,

The dark, the fair, the neat, the smart,
In short omnibus lasses!

Jasper Smallshot!" thou art a very silly fellow."

Art. 23. Translations from ancient Irish MSS., and other Poems. By James Martin. Crown 8vo. 78. Boards. Sherwood and

Co.

1811.

If from the dark wilderness of by-gone years, there can be rescued any of the humbler symphonies of Erin's lovely, long-silent harp, let none expect they shall be arranged with what the Sons of the Green Isle never studied, regularity, and attention to time or place!'-So much for the prose of this author. We sincerely hope that neither the style of this prose, nor that of the following verse, is indeed a native of Ireland, because we have the highest respect for that noble country.

• How dull, how dark, my hours roll,' &c. &c.

[ocr errors]

Rule Britannia,' Pope Joan,' and fill t'other cup,' &c.

You know how hard 'tis to get money,
And how it goes if one's not conny,' &c.

• Won't thou, Apollo, Pan, won't thou,
For once place laurels on my brow?"&c.

We close with a chef d'œuvre.

To a malignant old Woman.'

• Contemptible dotard, how boisterously roll,

On thy bile-colour'd phiz, the black waves of thy soul !
Lapsus lingua-beg pardon-thy soul did I say-

. In thee dwells there a soul-thou poor poison-fraught clay,' &c. To this terrific tirade, the poet subjoins a note, unrivalled in the annals of notification.

Old ladies not being always book-larn'd, her excellent ladyship is here informed, that we schollards, by lapsus lingua, mean a slip of the tongue.'

Χρη σιγάν, η κρεισσονα σιγης λεγειν

Art. 24. The Capital! A Satirical and Sentimental Poem. Dedicated to the Earl of Stanhope. 8vo. 2s. 6d. Rickman.

The Capital is by no means a capital poem. Its object reminds us of Johnson's London, and by the comparison into what a vapid nothing does it sink Satire consists in boldness of conception and in vigorous execution; in a striking and pointed delineation of men and manners; but here none of these qualities appear. London is a fertile subject, at all times, for the satiric muse: but to sketch this metropolis of the British Empire as it ought to be sketched requires a 'masterly pen, far superior to that which is wielded on the present occasion. Let a couplet or two be adduced in justification of our censure:

• Corrupted town! too deep involv'd to mend,

Like Paris late, and likely such thy end.'

• Two ranks alone remain, the greedy great
Have swallowed up the intermediate.'

Woe marks the hour of guilt, if e'en with kings,
The path of vice but leads to virtue's leavings.'
• Scotsmen, e'en at Hell's gate, persist in hope,
While Erin's sons desponding urge the rope.'

At the sons of Caledonia this writer points all the satire of which he is master but he manages his thunder so aukwardly, that we pity rather the satirizer than the satirized.

Art. 25. Somerset, a Poem. By F.Webb. 4to. pp.42. Bentley. 1811. Descriptive blank verse is an unpromising species of entertainment to the reader, however amusing it may have been to the writer:-but, moreover, Mr. F. Webb seems to be of that class of outrageous patriots, who, in the estimate of beautiful scenery, prefer Somerset to Swisserland, and Norton Sub-Hamdon (the author's residence) to St. Dizier sur Marne. With these two recommendations, poetry that palls, and patriotism that provokes, Mr. F. Webb advances a very powerful claim to our attention:- but, alas! that attention is diverted by a third source of delight, even more engaging than the others :-we mean, a vapid versification of the stalest mythological details from the Classical Dictionary; and a re-introduction of the reader to the happily-forgotten friends of his boyhood, Jason, and Phryxus, and Helle. We select a passage which will palpably display

the

« PreviousContinue »