'mere parody.' It is far more than an empty echo of the original, more than an amusing travesty, written for sound or for fun: it gives another version of the sense-or of the lurking nonsense-and that with a set and serious purpose. It is ridicule as well as parody, in the true spirit of the Aristophanic comedy. Its classic tone and allusions appealed to the educated classes, in whose hands the government then was; and its very want of adaptation to an age of household suffrage and penny papers is a testimony to its power at its own time. Of the very first poem-one of those which would perhaps find least sympathy in the present day-Sir Bartle Frere observes:

The shafts of ridicule told with still greater effect on the more impressible classes, and helped to keep in the ministerial fold many a young literary adventurer or sober dissenter, whose poetical or religious feelings might have been touched by such appeals as Southey's visions of a millennial reign of liberty, or by his description of the beauties of nature, from enjoying which the regicide was debarred.'

The final test of merit is the fact that many of these imitations have surpassed and survived the originals, as Sir George Cornewall Lewis observed of the admirable satire on Erasmus Darwin's poems in the Loves of the Triangles' by Canning and Frere. Those who read the poem for themselves may judge whether some passages have not the merit of anticipating modern Darwinism and other cosmogonic theories. Meanwhile we may call attention to a note in which an explanation is given of the genesis or original formation of SPACE itself, in the same manner in which Dr. Darwin has traced the whole of the organised creation to his SIX FILAMENTS.' The writers add :

SPACE being thus obtained, and presenting a suitable NIDUS, or receptacle for the generation of CHAOTIC MATTER, an immense deposit of it would gradually be accumulated; after which, the FILAMENT of fire being produced in the chaotic mass, by an idiosyncracy, or selfformed habit analogous to fermentation, explosion would take place; suns would be shot from the central chaos; planets from suns; and satellites from planets. In this state of things the FILAMENT of organization would begin to exert itself in those independent masses which, in proportion to their bulk, exposed the greatest surface to the action of light and heat. This FILAMENT, after an infinite series of ages, would begin to ramify, and its viviparous offspring would diversify their forms and habits, so as to accommodate themselves to the various incunabula which Nature had prepared for them. Upon this view of things it seems highly probable that the first effort of Nature terminated in the production of VEGETABLES, and that these being abandoned to their own energies, by degrees detached themselves from the surface of the earth, and supplied themselves with wings or feet, according as

their different propensities determined them in favour of aerial or terrestrial existence. Others, by an inherent disposition to society and civilization, and by a stronger effort of volition, would become MEN. These, in time, would restrict themselves to the use of their hind feet: their tails would gradually rub off, by sitting in their caves or huts as soon as they arrived at a domesticated state; they would invent language and the use of fire, with our present and hitherto imperfect system of society. In the meanwhile, the Fuci and Algæ, with the Corallines and Madrepores, would transform themselves into fish, and would gradually populate all the submarine portion of the globe.'

The concluding description of the advent of the guillotine and the execution of Pitt is in the finest vein of mock-heroic poetry :

'Ye Sylphs of DEATH! on demon pinions flit
Where the tall Guillotine is raised for PITT:
To the poised plank tie fast the monster's back,
Close the nice slider, ope the expectant sack;
Then twitch, with fairy hands, the frolic pin-
Down falls the impatient axe with deafening din;
The liberated head rolls off below,

And simpering FREEDOM hails the happy blow!'

Not less admirable is the description of the young Jacobins, who find their counterpart in the young Republicans of the present day :

'Tell of what wood young JACOBINS are made,

How the skill'd gardener grafts with nicest rule
The slip of coxcomb on the stock of fool-
Forth in bright blossom bursts the tender sprig,

A thing to wonder at, perhaps a Whig:

Should tell, how wise each new-fledged pedant prates
Of weightiest matters, grave distractions states-
How rules of policy, and public good,

In Saxon times were rightly understood;
That kings are proper, may be useful things,
But then, some gentlemen object to kings;
How in all times the minister 's to blame;
How British liberty's an empty name;
Till each fair burgh, numerically free,

Shall choose its members by the Rule of Three.'

German mysticism and enthusiasm come in for their share of ridicule in 'The Rovers,' an admirable parody of Schiller's Robbers,' which, we repeat, can only be judged of as a whole. It was the joint production of Canning, Frere, and Ellis. Canning's inimitable dungeon-song of Rogero, ending—

'Sun,

'Sun, moon, and thou vain world adieu,
That kings and priests are plotting in:
Here doomed to starve on water gru-
el, never shall I see the U-

niversity of Gottingen

niversity of Gottingen-'

is probably familiar to our readers; and to Frere belongs the merit of the well-known scene between Matilda and Cecilia :'Mat. Madam, you seem to have had an unpleasant journey, if I may judge from the dust on your riding-habit.

Cec. The way was dusty, madam, but the weather was delightful. It recalled to me those blissful moments when the rays of desire first vibrated through my soul.

Mat. (aside). Thank Heaven! I have at last found a heart which is in unison with my own-(To Cecilia)-Yes, I understand you-the first pulsation of sentiment-the silver tones upon the yet unsounded harp.

Cec. The dawn of life-when this blossom-(putting her hand upon her heart) first expanded its petals to the penetrating dart of love!

Mat. Yes-the time-the golden time, when the first beams of the morning meet and embrace one another!-The blooming blue upon the yet unplucked plum!

Cec. Your countenance grows animated, my dear madam.
Mat. And yours too is glowing with illumination.

Cec. I had long been looking out for a congenial spirit!-my heart was withered-but the beams of yours have re-kindled it.

Mat. A sudden thought strikes me- - Let us swear an eternal friendship.

Cec. Let us agree to live together!

Mat. (with rapidity and earnestness). Willingly.

Cec. Let us embrace.

[They embrace."

Frere also was the sole author of the imaginary reports of the 'Meetings of the Friends of Freedom,' in which the speeches of Fox, Erskine, and the other great opposition orators are parodied with inimitable felicity. Nothing can surpass the

flavour of the imitation of Erskine :

Mr. ERSKINE Concluded by recapitulating, in a strain of agonizing and impressive eloquence, the several more prominent heads of his speech-He had been a soldier and a sailor, and had a son at Winchester School-he had been called by special retainers during the summer into many different and distant parts of the country-travelling chiefly in post-chaises. He felt himself called upon to declare that his poor faculties were at the service of his country-of the free and enlightened part of it at least.-He stood here as a man.-He stood in the eye, indeed, in the hand of God-to whom (in the presence of the company and waiters) he solemnly appealed.-He was

of

of noble, perhaps royal blood-he had a house at Hampstead-was convinced of the necessity of a thorough and radical Reform-his pamphlets had gone through thirty editions--skipping alternately the odd and even numbers-he loved the Constitution, to which he would cling and grapple-and he was clothed with the infirmities of man's nature he would apply to the present French rulers (particularly BARRAS and REWBELL) the words of the poet :

"Be to their faults a little blind,

Be to their virtues very kind,

Let all their ways be unconfined

And clap the padlock on their mind!"

And for these reasons, thanking the gentlemen who had done him the honour to drink his health, he should propose "MERLIN, the late Minister of Justice, and Trial by Jury!"'

The PROGRESS OF MAN' is a satire upon Free Love':

'Learn hence, each Nymph, whose free aspiring mind
Europe's cold laws, and colder customs bind-

6

O! learn, what Nature's genial laws decree-
What Otaheite is, let Britain be!

Of WHIST OF CRIBBAGE mark th' amusing game—
The PARTNERS changing, but the sport the same.
Else would the gamester's anxious ardour cool,
Dull every deal, and stagnant every pool.
Yet must one move, with one unceasing Wife,
Play the LONG RUBBER of connubial life.'

The NEW MORALITY,' of which we have still many missionaries and preachers, comes in for its share of ridicule :

'First, stern PHILANTHROPY: not she who dries
The orphan's tears, and wipes the widow's eyes;
Not she who, sainted Charity her guide,

Of British bounty pours the annual tide :

But French Philanthropy;-whose boundless mind
Glows with the general love of all mankind;—
Philanthropy,-beneath whose baneful sway
Each patriot passion sinks, and dies away.'

Next comes a gentler virtue,—'Sweet SENSIBILITY':—
Taught her to mete by rules her feelings strong,
False by degrees, and delicately wrong;

For the crushed beetle first, the widowed dove,
And all the warbled sorrows of the grove;

Next for poor suffering guilt; and last of all,
For parents, friends, a king and country's full.'

The same poem contains Canning's celebrated panegyric on

Burke:

:

'O large

O large of soul, of genius unconfined,

Born to delight, instruct, and mend mankind-
BURKE! in whose breast a Roman ardour glow'd:
Whose copious tongue with Grecian richness flow'd;
Well hast thou found (if such thy country's doom)
A timely refuge in the sheltering tomb!'

We cannot find space for the amusing account of the mission of the Savans to the East (in allusion to the French expedition to Egypt), and must conclude our quotations with the list of passengers on board the Navis Stultifera,' who were secretly withdrawn from the British public without being so much as missed or inquired after' :

'There was SHUCKBOROUGH, the wonderful mathematician ;-
And DARWIN, the poet, the sage, and physician;

There was BEDDOES, and BRUIN, and GODWIN, whose trust is
He may part with his work on Political Justice

To some Iman or Bonze, or Judaical Rabbin;

So with huge quarto volumes he piles up the cabin.
There was great DR. PARR, whom we style Bellendenus,
The Doctor and I have a hammock between us—

Tho' 'tis rather unpleasant thus crowding together,
On account of the motion and heat of the weather.'

As to the cessation of the 'Anti-Jacobin' we are told :

'It has been asserted that the publication was at last discontinued at Pitt's direct instance, from an apprehension not, under the circumstances, at all unreasonable, that the satirical spirit to which so much of the success of the Anti-Jacobin was due, might in the long run prove a less manageable and discriminating ally than a party leader would desire.'

In fact the work was, from its very nature, strictly occasional, and would have lost all point and savour by an attempt tg prolong it; for its one definite purpose distinguishes it completely from the comic periodicals of our day. We have abstained from discussing the justice of the satire of the AntiJacobin,' as a question now out of date; nor indeed ought the spirit of satire and caricature to be tested by the laws of solemn controversy. But this much may be said, that its weapons were as polished as they were keen, and its sarcasm never degenerated into spite. It is pleasant to know that Frere lived to be the warm and kind friend of Southey and Coleridge.

The cessation of the 'Anti-Jacobin' marks the end of the first of the three periods into which Mr. Frere's life was clearly divided. On the second period of his political and diplomatic service it is not our purpose here to dwell. In 1799 he succeeded Canning, who was removed to the Board of Trade, as Under-Secretary of State in the Foreign Office. Like his friend