SHEPHERD. I never heard sic even-doun nonsense in a' my born days. Mr. Tickler, there's nae occasion, man, to look sae doun-in-the-mouth-everybody kens ye're a man o' genius without your pretending to be melancholy.

TICKLER. I have no appetite, James. SHEPHERD. Nae appeteet! how suld ye hae an appeteet? A bowl o' Mollygotawny soup, wi' bread in proportion-twa codlins (wi' maist part o' a labster in that sass)-the first gash o' the jiget-stakes -then I'm maist sure, pallets, and finally guse no to count jeelies and coosturd, and bluemange, and many million mites in that Campsie Stilton-better than ony English-a pot o' draught-twa long shankers o' ale, noos and thans a sip o' the auld port, and just afore grace a caulker o' Glenlivet, that made your een glower and water in your head as if you had been looking at Mrs. Siddons in the sleep-walking scene in Shakespeare's tragedy of Macbeth-gin ye had an appetect after a' that destruction o' animal and vegetable matter, your maw would be like that o' Death himsel', and your stomach insatiable as the grave.

TICKLER. Mr. Ambrose, no laughter, if you please, sir.

NORTH. Come, come, Tickler- had Hogg and Heraclitus been contemporaries, it would have saved the shedding of a world of tears.

SHEPHERD. Just laugh your fill, Mr. Ambrose. A smile is aye becoming that honest face o' yours. But I'll no be sae wutty again, gin I can help it.

(Exit MR. AMBROSE with the épergne.)

TICKLER. Mr. Ambrose understands me. It does my heart good to know when his arm is carefully extended over my shoulder, to put down or to remove. None of that hurry-and-no-spreed waiterlike hastiness about our Ambrose! With an ever observant eye he watches the goings-on of the board, like an astronomer watching the planetary system. He knows when a plate is emptied to be filled no more, and lo! it is withdrawn as by an invisible hand. During some syncope and solemn pause you may lay down your knife and fork and wipe your brow, nor dread the evanishing of a half-devoured howtowdy; the moment your eye has decided on a dish, there he stands plate VOL. V.-W. H.

66

turkey! No playing at cross purposesthe sheep's head of Mullion usurping the place of the kidneys of O'Doherty. The most perfect confidence reigns round the board. The possibility of mistake is felt to be beyond the fear of the hungriest imagination; and sooner shall one of Jupiter's satellites forsake his orbit, jostling the stars, and wheeling away into some remoter system, than our Ambrose run against any of the subordinates, or leave the room while North is in his chair. NORTH. Hear the Glenlivet !-Hear the Glenlivet!

SHEPHERD. No, Mr. North, nane o' your envious attributions o' ae spirit for anither. It's the soul within him that breaks out, like lightning in the collied* night, or in the dwawm-like † silence o' a glen the sudden soun' o' a trumpet.

TICKLER. Give me your hand, James. SHEPHERD. There, noo-there noo! It's aye me that's said to be sae fond o' flattery; and yet only see how by a single word o' my mouth I can add sax inches to your stature, Mr. Tickler, and make ye girn like the spirit that saluted De Gama at the Cape o' Storms.

NORTH. Hear the Glenlivet!-Hear the Glenlivet!

SHEPHERD. Hush, ye haveril. Give us a speech yoursel', Mr. North, and then see who'll cry, "Hear the Glenlivet!— hear the Glenlivet!" then. But haud your tongues, baith o' you-dinna stir a fit. And as for you, Mr. Tickler, howk the tow out o' your lug, and hear till a

sang.

(The SHEPHERD sings The brakens wi' me.")

TICKLER (passing his hand across his eyes). "I'm never merry when I hear sweet music."

NORTH. Your voice, James, absolutely gets mellower through years. Next York Festival you must sing a solo-"Angels ever bright and fair, or "Farewell, ye limpid streams and floods.

SHEPHERD. I was at the last York Festival, and one day I was in the chorus, next to Grundy of Kirk-by-Lonsdale. Í kent my mouth was wide open, but I

"Like Lightning in the collied night."-Midsummer Night's Dream. Collied-blackened as with coal. † Diarm-like-swoon-like.

Haveril-a chattering half-witted person.

19

cent roar.

NORTH. Describe-James-describe. SHEPHERD. As weel describe a glorious dream of the seventh heaven. Thousands upon thousands o' the most beautiful angels sat mute and still in the Cathedral. Weel may I call them angels, although a' the time I knew them to be frail, evanescent creatures o' this ever-changing earth. A sort o' paleness was on their faces, ay, even on the faces where the blush-roses o' innocence were blooming like the flowers o' Paradise-for a shadow came ower them frae the awe o' their religious hearts that beat not, but were chained as in the presence of their Great Maker. All eyne were fixed in a solemn raised gaze, something mournful-like I thocht, but it was only in a happiness great and deep as the calm sea. I saw I did not see the old massy pillars-now I seem to behold the roof of the Cathedral, and now the sky o' heaven, and a licht-I had maist said a murmuring licht, for there surely was a faint spirit-like soun' in the streams o' splendor that came through the high Gothic window, left shadows here and there throughout the temple, till a' at ance the organ sounded, and I could have fallen down on my knees.

NORTH. Thank you, kindly, James. SHEPHERD. I understand the hint, sir. Catch me harpin ower lang on ae string. Yet music's a subject I could get geyan* tiresome upon.

NORTH. What think you, James, of the projected Fish Company?

SHEPHERD. Just everything that's gude. I never look at the sea without lamenting the backward state of its agriculture. Were every eatable land animal extinc', the human race could dine and soup out o' the ocean till a' eternity.

TICKLER. No fish-sauce equal to the following:-Ketchup-mustard-cayenne pepper-butter amalgamated on your plate proprio manu, each man according to his own proportions, Yetholm ketchup made by the gypsies. Mushroom forever -damn walnuts.

NORTH. I care little about what I eat or drink.

SHEPHERD. Lord have mercy on uswhat a lee! There does not, at this blessed moment, breathe on the earth's

* Geyan-rather.

eating and drinking to all ither pleasures o' body and sowl.* This is the rule: Never think about either the ane or the ither but when you are at the board. Then, eat and drink wi' a' your powers-moral, intellectual, and physical. Say little, but look freendly-tak care chiefly o' yoursel', but no, if you can help it, to the utter oblivion o a' ithers. This may soun' queer but it's gude manners, and worth a Chesterfield. Them at the twa ends o' the table maun just reverse that rule-till ilka body has been twice served-and then aff at a haun gallop.

NORTH. What think ye of luncheons? SHEPHERD. That they are the disturbers o' a' earthly happiness. I daurna trust mysel' wi' a luncheon. In my hauns it becomes an untimeous denner-for after a hantle o' cauld meat, muirfowl pies, or even butter and bread, what reasonable cretur can be ready afore gloamin for a het denner? So when'er I'm betrayed into a luncheon, I mak it a luncheon wi' a vengeance; and then order in the kettle, and finish aff wi' a jug or twa, just the same as gin it had been a regular denner wi' a tablecloth. Bewaur the tray.

NORTH. A few anchovies, such as I used to enjoy with my dear Davy at the corner, act as a whet, I confess, and nothing more.

SHEPHERD. I never can eat a few o' onything, even ingans. Ance I begin, I maun proceed; and I devoor them-ilka ane being the last-till my een are sae watery that I think it is raining. Break not upon the integrity o' time atween breakfast and the blessed hour o' denner.

NORTH. The mid-day hour is always, to my imagination, the most delightful hour of the whole alphabet.

SHEPHERD. I understaun. During that hour-and there is nae occasion to allow difference for clocks, for in nature every object is a dial-how many thousand groups are collected a' ower Scotland, and a' ower the face o' the earth-for in every clime wondrously the same are the great leading laws o' man's necessities-under bits o' bonny buddin or leaffu' hedgeraws, some bit fragrant and fluttering birk-tree,

"Some people," says Dr. Samuel Johnson, "have a foolish way of not minding, or pretending not to mind, what they eat. For my part, I mind my belly very studiously, and very carefully. For I look upon it, that he who does not mind his belly will hardly mind anything else."-Boswell's Life, chap. xvii.

aneath some owerhanging rock in the desert, or by some diamond well in its mossy cave-breakin their bread wi' thanksgiving, and eatin with the clear blood o' health meandering in the heavenblue veins o' the sweet lassies, while the cool airs are playing amang their haflinscovered* bosoms wi' many a jeist and sang atween, and aiblins kisses too, at ance dew and sunshine to the peasant's or shepherd's soul-then up again wi' lauchter to their wark amang the tedded grass, or the corn-rigs sae bonny, scenes that Robbie Burns lo'ed sae weel and sang sae gloriously-and the whilk, need I fear to say't, your ain Ettrick Shepherd, my dear fellows, has sung on his auld border harp, a sang or twa that may be remembered when the bard that wauk'd them is i' the mools, and at his feet the green-grass turf and at his head a stane.

TICKLER. Come, come, James, none of your pathos-none of your pathos, my dear James. (Looking red about the eyes.) NORTH. We were talking of codlins.† SHEPHERD. True, Mr. North, but folk canna be aye talkin o' codlins, any mair than aye eatin them; and the great charm o' conversation is being aff on ony wind that blaws. Pleasant conversation between friends is just like walking through a mountainous kintra-at every glen mouth the wun' blaws frae a different airt-the bit bairnies come tripping alang in opposite directions- -noo a harebell scents the air-noo sweet briar-noo heather bank-here is a gruesome quagmire, there a plat o' sheep-nibbled grass, smooth as silk and green as emeralds here a stony region of cinders and lava, there groves o' the lady-fern embowering the sleeping roe-here the hillside in its own various dyes resplendent as the rainbow, and there woods that the Druids would have worshipped-hark, sound sounding in the awfu sweetness o' evening wi' the cushat's sang, and the deadened roar o' some great waterfa' far aff in the very centre o' the untrodden forest. A' the warks o' ootward natur are symbolical o' our ain immortal souls. Mr. Tickler, is't not just even sae? TICKLER. Sheridan - Sheridan; what

Haflins covered-half-covered.

+ Codlins-small cod; not apples, as the American editor supposes.

† Airt-point of the compass.

was Sheridan's talk to our own Shepherd's, North?

NORTH. A few quirks and cranks studied at a looking-glass-puns painfully elaborated with pen and ink for extemporaneous reply-bon-mots generated in malice prepense-witticisms jotted down in short-hand to be extended when he had put on the spur of the occasion-the drudgeries of memory to be palmed off for the ebullitions of imagination-the coinage of the counter passed for currency hot from the mint of fancy-squibs and crackers ignited and exploded by a MerryAndrew, instead of the lightnings of the soul, darting out forked or sheeted from the electrical atmosphere of an inspired genius.

SHEPHERD. I wish that you but saw my monkey, Mr. North. He would make you hop the twig in a guffaw. I hae got a pole erected for him o' about some_150 feet high, on a knowe ahint Mount Benger; and the way the cretur rins up to the knob, lookin ower the shouther o' him, and twisting his tail roun' the pole for fear o' playin thud on the grun', is comical past a' endurance.

NORTH. Think you, James, that he is a link?

SHEPHERD. A link in creation? Not he, indeed. He is merely a monkey. Only to see him on his observatory, beholding the sunrise! or weeping, like a Laker, at the beauty o' the moon and stars!

NORTH. Is he a bit of a poet?

SHEPHERD. Gin he could but speak and write, there can be nae manner o' doubt that he would be a gran' poet. Safe us! what een in the head o' him! Wee, clear, red, fiery, watery, malignant-lookin een, fu' o' inspiration.

TICKLER. You should have him stuffed. SHEPHERD. Stuffed, man? say, rather, embalmed. But he's no likely to dee for years to come-indeed, the cretur's engaged to be married, although he's no in the secret himsel', yet. The bawnst are published.

TICKLER. Why, really, James; marriage, I think, ought to be simply a civil

contract.

SHEPHERD. A civil contract! I wuss

How carefully Sheridan's impromptus were prepared beforehand may be learned from Moore's Life of that celebrated wit, just published at the date of this number of the Noctes.

+ Burns-banns.

it was. But oh! Mr. Tickler, to see the cretur sittin wi' a pen in's hand, and pipe in's mouth, jotting down a sonnet, or odd, or lyrical ballad! Sometimes I put that black velvet cap ye gied me on his head, and ane o' the bairn's auld big-coats on his back; and then sure eneugh, when he takes his stroll in the avenue, he is a heathenish Christian.

NORTH. Why, James, by this time he must be quite like one of the family?

SHEPHERD. He's a capital flee fisher. I never saw a monkey throw alighter line in my life. But he's greedy o' the gude linns, and canna thole to see onybody else gruppin great anes but himsel'. He accompanied me for twa-three days in the season to the Trows, up aboon Kelso yonner; and Kersse* allowed that he worked a salmon to a miracle. Then, for rowing a boat!

TICKLER. Why don't you bring him to Ambrose's?

SHEPHERD. He's sae bashfu'. He never shines in company; and the least thing in the world will mak him blush.

SHEPHERD. Faith, I believe no. Let's tak anither bumper to his politics.

NORTH. James, do you know what you're saying?-the man is a Whig. If we do drink his politics, let it be in empty glasses.

SHEPHERD. Na, na. I'll drink no man's health, nor yet ony ither thing, out o' an empty glass. My political principles are so well known, that my consistency would not suffer were I to drink the health o' the great Whig leader, Satan himself; besides, James Montgomery is, I very believe, a true patriot. Gin he thinks himsel' a Whig, he has nae understanding whatever o his ain character. I'll undertak to bring out the Toryism that's in him in the course o' a single Noctes. Toryism is an innate principle o' human nature-Whiggism but an evil habit. O, sirs, this is a gran' jug!

TICKLER. I am beginning to feel rather hungry.

SHEPHERD. I hae been rather sharp-set even sin' Mr. Ambrose took awa the cheese.

SHEPHERD. I have the Iris-that means Rainbow-in my pocket, and it made me proud to see sic honors conferred on genius. Lang-wunded speech, Mr. Tickler! What! would you have had Montgomery mumble twa-three sentences, and sit down again, before an assemblage o' a hundred o the most respectable o' his fellowtownsmen, with Lord Milton at their head, a' gathered thegither to honor with heart and hand One of the Sons of Song?

NORTH. Right, James, right. On such an occasion, Montgomery was not only entitled, but bound to speak of himselfand by so doing he has graced his cause. Meanwhile let us drink his health in a bumper.

SHEPHERD. Stop, stop, my jug's done. But never mind, I'll drink't in pure speerit. (Bibunt omnes.)

TICKLER. Did we include his politics?

*Kersse, a celebrated Kelso salmon-fisher.

+James Montgomery, author of The World Before the Flood, and other esteemed poems, was born in 1771, and died in 1854.

"His march was o'er the mountain wave, His home was on the deep."

Nelson not only destroyed the naval power of all the enemies of England, but he made our naval power immortal. Thank God, he died at sea.

TICKLER. A noble creature; his very failings were ocean-born.

SHEPHERD. Yes-a cairn to his memory would not be out of place even at the head of the most inland glen. Not a sea-mew floats up into our green solitudes that tells not of Nelson.

NORTH. His name makes me proud that I am an islander. No continent has such a glory.

SHEPHERD. Look out o' the windowwhat a fleet o'stars in heaven! Yon is the Victory-a hundred-gun ship-I see the standard of England flying at the main. The brichtest luminary o' nicht says in that halo, "England expects every man to do his duty. What think

you of the Iliad, Mr. North?

NORTH. The great occupation of the power of man, James, in early society, is to make war. Of course, his great poetry will be that which celebrates war. The

mighty races of men, and their mightiest deeds, are represented in such poetry. It contains "the glory of the world" in some of its noblest ages. Such is Homer. The whole poem of Homer (the Iliad) is war, yet not much of the whole Iliad is fighting, and that, with some exceptions, not the most interesting. If we consider warlike poetry purely as breathing the spirit of fighting, the fierce ardor of combat, we fall to a much lower measure of human conception. Homer's poem is intellectual, and full of affections; it would go as near to make a philosopher as a soldier. I should say that war appears as the business of Homer's heroes, not often a matter of pure enjoyment. One would conceive that if there could be found anywhere in language the real breathing spirit of lust for fight which is in some nations, there would be conceptions and passion of bloodthirst, which are not in Homer. There are flashes of it in Eschylus.

SHEPHERD. I wish to Heaven I could read Greek. I'll begin to-morrow.

TICKLER. The songs of Tyrtæus goading into battle are of that kind, and their class is evidently not a high one. Far above them must have been those poems of the ancient German nations, which were chanted in the front of battle, reciting the acts of old heroes to exalt their courage. These, being breathed out of the heart of passion of a people, must have been good. The spirit of fighting was there involved with all their most ennobling conceptions, and yet was merely pugnacious.

NORTH. The Iliad is remarkable among military poems in this, that, being all about war, it instils no passion for war. None of the high inspiring motives to war are made to kindle the heart. In fact, the cause of war is false on both sides. But there is a glory of war, like the splendor of sunshine, resting upon and enveloping all.

SHEPHERD. I'm beginning to get a little clearer in the upper story. That last jug was a poser. How feel you, gentlemen-do you think you're baith quite sober? Our conversation is rather beginning to get a little heavy. Tak' a mouthfu. (NORTH quaffs.).

TICKLER. North, you look as if you were taking an observation. Have you discovered any new comet?

NORTH (standing up). Friends--countrymen-and Romans-lend me your ears. You say, James, that that's a gran' jug; well, then, out with the ladle and push about the jorum. No speech-no speech

for my heart is big. This may be our last meeting in the Blue Parlor. Our next meeting in

AMBROSE'S HOTEL, PICARDY PLACE!*

(NORTH suddenly sits down; TICKLER

and the SHEPHERD in a moment are at his side.)

TICKLER. My beloved Christopher, here is my smelling-bottle. (Puts the vinaigrette to his aquiline nose.)

SHEPHERD. My beloved Christopher, here is my smelling-bottle. (Puts the stately oblong Glenlivet crystal to his lips.) NORTH (opening his eyes). What flowers are those? Roses-mignonette, bathed in aromatic dew!

SHEPHERD. Yes; in romantic dewmountain dew, my respected sir, that could give scent to a sybo.t

TICKLER. James, let us support him into the open air.

NORTH. Somewhat too much of this. It is beautiful moonlight. Let us take an arm-in-arm stroll round the ramparts of the Calton Hill.

(Enter Mr. AMBROSE, much affected, with NORTH'S dreadnought; NORTH whispers in his ear, Subridens olli; Mr. AMBROSE looks cheerful, et exeunt omnes.)

PRESENTS.-If presents be not the soul of friendship, doubtless they are the most spiritual part of the body in that intercourse. There is too much narrowness of thinking on this point. The punctilio of acceptance, methinks, is too confined and straitened. I should be content to receive money, or clothes, or a joint of meat from a friend. Why should he not send me a dinner as well as a dessert? I would taste him in the beasts of the field, and through all creation.

CHARLES LAMB.