To Germany, and highnesses serene,
Who owe us millions-don't we owe the queen?
To Germany, what owe we not besides?
So oft bestowing Brunswickers and brides;
Who paid for vulgar, with her royal blood,
Drawn from the stem of each Teutonic stud:
Who sent us-so be pardon'd all her faults-
A dozen dukes, some kings, a queen-and Waltz.
But peace to her-her emperor and diet,
Though now transferr'd to Buonaparte's "fiat!"
Back to my theme-O Muse of motion! say,
How first to Albion found thy Waltz her way?

Borne on the breath of hyperborean gales,
From Hamburg's port, (while Hamburg yet had mails,)
Ere yet unlucky Fame-compell'd to creep
To snowy Gottenburg-was chill'd to sleep;
Or, starting from her slumbers, deign'd arise,
Heligoland to stock thy mart with lies;
While unburnt Moscow yet had news to send,
Nor owed her fiery exit to a friend,

She came-Waltz came-and with her certain sets
Of true despatches, and as true gazettes:
Then flamed of Austerlitz the bless'd despatch,
Which Moniteur nor Morning Post can match;
And-almost crush'd beneath the glorious news-
Ten plays, and forty tales of Kotzebue's;
One envoy's letters, six composers' airs,
And loads from Frankfort and from Leipsic fairs;
Meiner's four volumes upon womankind,
Like Lapland witches to ensure a wind;
Brunck's heaviest tome for ballast, and, to back it,
Of Heyné, such as should not sink the packet.

Fraught with this cargo-and her fairest freight,
Delightful Waltz, on tiptoe for a mate,
The welcome vessel reach'd the genial strand,
And round her flock'd the daughters of the land.
Not decent David, when, before the ark,
His grand pas-seul excited some remark;
Not love-lorn Quixote, when his Sancho thought
The knight's fandango friskier than it ought:
Not soft Herodias, when, with winning tread,
Her nimble feet danced off another's head;
Not Cleopatra on her galley's deck,
Display'd so much of leg, or more of neck,
Than thou, ambrosial Waltz, when first the moon
Beheld thee twirling to a Saxon tune!

To you, ye husbands of ten years! whose brows Ache with the annual tributes of a spouse;

1 The patriotic arson of our amiable allies cannot be sufficiently commended-nor subscribed for. Amongst other details omitted in the various despatches of our eloquent ambassador, he did not state (being too much occupied with the exploits of Colonel C- -, in swimming rivers frozen, and galloping over roads impassable) that one entire province perished by famine in the most melancholy manner, as follows:-In General Rostopchin's consummate conflagration, the consumption of tallow and train oil was so great, that the market was inadequate to the demand: and thus one hundred and thirty-three thousand persons were starved to death, by being reduced to wholesome diet! The lamplighters of London have since subscribed a pint (of oil) a piece, and the tallow-chandlers have unanimously voted a quantity of best moulds (four to the pound) to the relief of the surviving Scythians-the scarcity will soon, by such exertions, and a proper attention to the quality rather than the quantity of provision, be totally alleviated. It is said, in return, that the untouched Ukraine has subscribed sixty thousand beeves for a day's meal to our suffering manufacturers.

2 Dancing girls-who do for hire what Waltz doth gratis. 3 It cannot be complained now, as in the Lady Baussière's

To you of nine years less, who only bear
The budding sprouts of those that you shall wear,
With added ornaments around them roll'd
Of native brass, or law-awarded gold;
To you, ye matrons, ever on the watch
To mar a son's, or make a daughter's, match;
To you, ye children of-whom chance accords-
Always the ladies, and sometimes their lords;
To you, ye single gentlemen, who seek
Torments for life, or pleasures for a week;
As Love or Hymen your endeavors guide,
To gain your own, or snatch another's bride ;-
To one and all the lovely stranger came,
And every ball-room echoes with her name.

Endearing Waltz!-to thy more melting tune
Bow Irish jig, and ancient rigadoon.
Scotch reels, avaunt! and country-dance, forego
Your future claims to each fantastic toe!
Waltz-Waltz alone-both legs and arms demands,
Liberal of feet, and lavish of her hands;

Hands which may freely range in public sight
Where ne'er before-but-pray "put out the light."
Methinks the glare of yonder chandelier
Shines much too far-or I am much too near;
And true, though strange-Waltz whispers this remark.
My slippery steps are safest in the dark!"
But here the Muse with due decorum halts,
And lends her longest petticoat to Waltz.

Observant travellers of every time!
Ye quartos publish'd upon every clime!
Oh say, shall dull Romaika's heavy round,
Fandango's wriggle, or Bolero's bound;
Can Egypt's Almas-tantalizing group-
Columbia's caperers to the warlike whoop-
Can aught from cold Kamschatka to Cape Horn
With Waltz compare, or after Waltz be borne?
Ah, no! from Morier's pages down to Galt's,
Each tourist pens a paragraph for " Waltz."

Shades of those belles whose reign began of yore,
With George the Third's-and ended long before!-
Though in your daughters' daughters yet you thrive,
Burst from your lead, and be yourselves alive!
Back to the ball-room speed your spectred host:
Fool's Paradise is dull to that you lost.
No treacherous powder bids conjecture quake;
No stiff-starch'd stays make meddling fingers ache;
(Transferr'd to those ambiguous things that ape
Goats in their visage, women in their shape ;)

3

time, of the "Sieur de la Croix," that there be "no whiskers" but how far these are indications of valor in the field. or elsewhere, may still be questionable. Much may be, and hath been avouched on both sides. In the olden ume parlosophers had whiskers, and soldiers none-Scipio himself was shaven-Hannibal thought his one eye handsome enough without a beard; but Adrian, the emperor, wore & beard (having warts on his chin, which neither the empress Sabina nor even the courtiers could abide)-Turenne had winskers, Marlborough none-Bonaparte is unwhiskered, the Regent whiskered; "argal" greatness of mind and whiskers may or may not go together: but certainly the different occurrences, since the growth of the last mentioned, go further in behalf of whiskers than the anathema of Anselm did against long hair in the reign of Henry L-Formerly, red was a favorite color. See Lodowick Barrey's comedy of Ram Alley, 1661: Act I. Scene 1.

"Taffeta. Now for a wager-What colored beard comes next by the window?

"Adriana. A black man's, I think.

Taffeta. I think not so: I think a red, for that is most in fashion."

There is "nothing new under the sun;" but red, then a favorite, has now subsided into a favorite's color.

No damsel faints when rather closely press'd,
But more caressing seems when most caress'd;
Superfluous hartshorn, and reviving salts,
Both banish'd by the sovereign cordial "Waltz."

Seductive Waltz !-though on thy native shore Even Werter's self proclaim'd thee half a whore; Werter-to decent vice though much inclined, Yet warm, not wanton; dazzled, but not blind— Though gentle Genlis, in her strife with Stael, Would even proscribe thee from a Paris ball; The fashion hails-from countesses to queens, And maids and valets waltz behind the scenes; Wide and more wide thy witching circle spreads, And turns-if nothing else-at least our heads; With thee even clumsy cits attempt to bounce, And cockneys practise what they can't pronounce. Gods! how the glorious theme my strain exalts, And rhyme finds partner rhyme in praise of " Waltz !"

Bless'd was the time Waltz chose for her début : The court, the Regent, like herself were new ;' New face for friends, for foes some new rewards; New ornaments for black and royal guards; New laws to hang the rogues that roar'd for bread; New coins (most new) to follow those that fled; New victories-nor can we prize them less, Though Jenky wonders at his own success; New wars, because the old succeed so well, That most survivors envy those who fell; New mistresses-no, old-and yet 'tis true, Though they be old, the thing is something new; Each new, quite new-(except some ancient tricks,)" New white-sticks, gold-sticks, broomsticks, all new sticks!

With vests or ribands-deck'd alike in hue,

New troopers strut, new turncoats blush in blue;
So saith the Muse: my- - what say you?
Such was the time when Waltz might best maintain
Her new preferments in this novel reign;

: Such was the time, nor ever yet was such;
Hoops are no more, and petticoats not much;
Morals and minuets, virtue and her stays,
And tell-tale powder-all have had their days.
The ball begins-the honors of the house
First duly done by daughter or by spouse,

Some potentate-or royal or serene--

With Kent's gay grace, or sapient Gloster's mien,
Leads forth the ready dame, whose rising flush
Might once have been mistaken for a blush.
From where the garb just leaves the bosom free,
That spot where hearts were once supposed to be;
Round all the confines of the yielded waist,
The strangest hand may wander undisplaced;
The lady's in return may grasp as much
As princely paunches offer to her touch.
Pleased round the chalky floor how well they trip,
One hand reposing on the royal hip;
The other to the shoulder no less royal
Ascending with affection truly loyal!
Thus front to front the partners move or stand,
The foot may rest, but none withdraw the hand;
And all in turn may follow in their rank,
The Earl of Asterisk-and Lady-Blank;
Sir-Such-a-one-with those of fashion's host,
For whose bless'd surnames-vide "Morning Post,"
(Or if for that impartial print too late,

Search Doctors' Commons six months from my date)-
Thus all and each, in movement swift or slow,
The genial contact gently undergo;

Till some might marvel, with the modest Turk,
If "nothing follows all this palming work?"
True, honest Mirza!-you may trust my rhyme—
Something does follow at a fitter time;
The breast thus publicly resign'd to man,
In private may resist him-if it can.

O ye who loved our grandmothers of yore,
Fitzpatrick, Sheridan,' and many more!

And thou, my Prince! whose sovereign taste and will

It is to love the lovely beldames still!
Thou ghost of Queensbury! whose judging sprite
Satan may spare to peep a single night,
Pronounce-if ever in your days of bliss
Asmodeus struck so bright a stroke as this?
To teach the young ideas how to rise,
Flush in the cheek, and languish in the eyes;
Rush to the heart, and lighten through the frame,
With half-told wish and ill-dissembled flame:
For prurient nature still will storm the breast-
Who, tempted thus, can answer for the rest?

1 An anachronism-Waltz and the battle of Austerlitz are before said to have opened the ball together: the bard means, (if he means any thing,) Waltz was not so much in Vogue till the Regent attained the acme of his popularity. Waltz, the comet, whiskers, and the new government, illuminated heaven and earth, in all their glory, much about the same time; of these the comet only has disappeared; the other three continue to astonish us still.-Printer's Devil.

* Amongst others a new ninepence-a creditable coin now forthcoming, worth a pound, in paper, at the fairest calculation.

"Oh that right should thus overcome might!" Who does not remember the "delicate investigation" in the " Merry Wives of Windsor ?"

Ford. Pray you, come near: if I suspect without cause, why then make sport at me: then let me be your jest; I deserve it. How now whither bear you this?

Mrs. Ford. What have you to do whither they bear it? -you were best meddle with buck-washing."

• The gentle, or ferocious, reader may fill up the blank as he pleases there are several dissyllabic names at his service, (being already in the Regent's :) it would not be fair to back any peculiar initial against the alphabet, as every month will add to the list now entered for the sweepstakes:-a distinguished consonant is said to be the favorite, much against the wishes of the knowing ones.

"We have changed all that," says the Mock Doctor

'tis all gone-Asmodeus knows where. After all, it is of no great importance how women's hearts are disposed of; they have nature's privilege to distribute them as absurdly as possible. But there are also some men with hearts so thoroughly bad, as to remind us of those phenomena often mentioned in natural history; viz. a mass of solid stoneonly to be opened by force-and when divided, you discover a toad in the centre, lively, and with the reputation of being

venomous.

In Turkey a pertinent, here an impertinent and superfluous, question-literally put, as in the text, by a Persian to Morier, on seeing a waltz in Pera-Vide Morier's Travels.

7 [I once heard Sheridan repeat, in a ball-room, some verses, which he had lately written on waltzing; and of which I remember the following

"With tranquil step, and timid, downcast glance,
Behold the well-pair'd couple now advance.

In such sweet posture our first parents moved,
While, hand in hand, through Eden's bowers they roved,
Ere yet the Devil, with promise fine and false,
Turn'd their poor heads, and taught them how to waltz.
One hand grasps hers, the other holds her hip:

*

For so the law's laid down by Baron Trip." This gentleman, whose name suits so aptly as a legal authority on the subject of waltzing, was, at the time these verses were written, well known in the dancing circles.-MOORE.]

But ye-who never felt a single thought
For what our morals are to be, or ought;
Who wisely wish the charms you view to reap,
Say-would you make those beauties quite so
cheap?

Hot from the hands promiscuously applied,
Round the slight waist, or down the glowing side,
Where were the rapture then to clasp the form,
From this lewd grasp and lawless contact warm?
At once love's most endearing thought resign,
To press the hand so press'd by none but thine;
To gaze upon that eye which never met
Another's ardent look without regret;
Approach the lip which all, without restraint,
Come near enough-if not to touch-to taint;

If such thou lovest-love her then no more,
Or give like her-caresses to a score;
Her mind with these is gone, and with it go
The little left behind it to bestow.

Voluptuous Waltz! and dare I thus blaspheme?
Thy bard forgot thy praises were his theme.
Terpsichore, forgive!—at every ball
My wife now waltzes--and my daughters shall;
My son- -(or stop-'tis needless to inquire-
These little accidents should ne'er transpire;
Some ages hence our genealogic tree

Will wear as green a bough for him as me)—
Waltzing shall rear, to make our name amends,
Grandsons for me-in heirs to all his friends.

'Tis done-but yesterday a King!

And arm'd with Kings to strive

And now thou art a nameless thing:

So abject-yet alive!

Is this the man of thousand thrones,
Who strew'd our earth with hostile bones,
And can he thus survive?"

Since he, miscall'd the Morning Star,
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far.

Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind
Who bow'd so low the knee?
By gazing on thyself grown blind,

Thou taught'st the rest to see.
With might unquestion'd,-power to save,-
Thine only gift hath been the grave,
To those that worshipp'd thee;

[The reader has seen that Lord Byron, when publishing "The Corsair," in January, 1814, announced an apparently quite serious resolution to withdraw, for some years at least, from poetry. His letters of the February and March following abound in repetitions of the same determination. On the morning of the ninth of April, he writes,-"no more rhyme for-or rather from-me. I have taken my leave of that stage, and henceforth will mountebank it no longer." In the evening, a Gazette Extraordinary announced the abdication of Fontainebleau, and the Poet violated his vows next morning, by composing this Ode, which he immediately published, though without his name. His Diary says, " Apríl 10. To-day I have boxed one hour-written an ode to Napoleon Bonaparte--copied it-eaten six biscuits-drunk four bottles of soda water, and redde away the rest of my time."] 2["Produce the urn that Hannibal contains,

And weigh the mighty dust which yet remains:
AND IS THIS ALL!"

I know not that this was ever done in the old world; at least, with regard to Hannibal: but, in the statistical account of Scotland, I find that Sir John Paterson had the curiosity to collect, and weigh, the ashes of a person discovered a few years since in the parish of Eccles; which he was happily enabled to do with great facility, as "the inside of the coffm

Nor till thy fall could mortals guess Ambition's less than littleness!

Thanks for that lesson-it will teach
To after-warriors more,
Than high Philosophy can preach,
And vainly preach'd before.
That spell upon the minds of men
Breaks never to unite again,

That led them to adore
Those Pagod things of sabre sway,
With fronts of brass, and feet of clay.

The triumph, and the vanity,

The rapture of the strife The earthquake voice of Victory, To thee the breath of life;

was smooth, and the whole body visible." Wonderful to relate, he found the whole did not exceed in weight one curre and a half! AND IS THIS ALL! Alas! the quot horas itself is a satirical exaggeration.-GIFFORD.]

3 ["I send you an additional motto from Gibbon, which you will find singularly appropriate."-Lord Byron to Mr. Murray, April 12, 1814.]

4 ["I don't know-but I think I, even 1. (an insect compared with this creature,) have set my life on casts not a millionth part of this man's. But, after all, a crown may not be worth dying for. Yet, to outlive Lodi for this!!! Oh that Juvenal or Johnson could rise from the dead! Expende-quot libras in duce summo invenies? I knew they were light in the balance of mortality; but I thought their living dust weighed more carats. Alas! this imperial diamond hath a flaw in it, and is now hardly fit to stick in a glazier's pencil;-the pen of the historian won't rate it worth a ducat. Psha! something too much of this.' But I won't give him up even now; though all his admirers have, like the Thanes, fallen from him."-Byron Diary, April 9.1

6" Certaminis gaudia"--the expression of Attila in his harangue to his army, previous to the battle of Chalons, given in Cassiodorus."

The sword, the sceptre, and that sway Which man seem'd made but to obey,

Wherewith renown was rife

All quell'd-Dark Spirit! what must be The madness of thy memory!

The Desolator desolate!

The Victor overthrown!

The Arbiter of others' fate

A Suppliant for his own!
Is it some yet imperial hope,

That with such change can calmly cope?
Or dread of death alone?
To die a prince-or live a slave-
Thy choice is most ignobly brave!

He who of old would rend the oak,'
Dream'd not of the rebound;
Chain'd by the trunk he vainly broke-
Alone-how look'd he round?
Thou, in the sternness of thy strength,
An equal deed hast done at length,
And darker fate hast found:
He fell, the forest prowlers' prey;
But thou must eat thy heart away!

The Roman,2 when his burning heart
Was slaked with blood of Rome,
Threw down the dagger-dared depart,
In savage grandeur, home-
He dared depart in utter scorn

Of men that such a yoke had borne,
Yet left him such a doom!
His only glory was that hour
Of self-upheld abandon'd power.

The Spaniard, when the lust of sway
Had lost its quickening spell,

Cast crowns for rosaries away,
An empire for a cell;

A strict accountant of his beads,
A subtle disputant on creeds,
His dotage trifled well:*

Yet better had he neither known

A bigot's shrine, nor despot's throne."

But thou-from thy reluctant hand

The thunderbolt is wrung

["Out of town six days. On my return, find my poor little pagod, Napoleon, pushed off his pedestal. It is his own fault. Like Milo, he would rend the oak; but it closed again, wedged his hands, and now the beasts-lion, bear, down to the dirtiest jackal-may all tear him. That Muscovite winter wedged his arms-ever since, he has fought with his feet and teeth. The last may still leave their marks: and I guess now,' (as the Yankees say,) that he will yet play them a pass."-Byron Diary, April 8.] Sylla-We find the germ of this stanza in the Diary of the evening before it was written :-" Methinks Sylla did better; for he revenged, and resigned in the height of his sway, red with the slaughter of his foes-the finest instance of glorious contempt of the rascals upon record. Dioclestan did well too-Amurath not amiss, had he become aught except a dervise-Charles the Fifth but so so: but Napoleon worst of all.”—Byron Diary, April 9.]

["Alter potent spell' to 'quickening spell:' the first (as Polonius says) is a vile phrase,' and means nothing, besides being commonplace and Rosa-Matildaish. After the resolution of not publishing, though our Ode is a thing of little length and less consequence, it will be better altogether that it is anonymous."-Lord Byron to Mr. Murray, April 11.1

[Charles the Fifth, Emperor of Germany, and King of Spain, resigned, in 1555, his imperial crown to his brother

Too late thou leav'st the high command To which thy weakness clung;

All Evil Spirit as thou art,

It is enough to grieve the heart

To see thine own unstrung;

To think that God's fair world hath been The footstool of a thing so mean;

And Earth hath spilt her blood for him,
Who thus can hoard his own!
And Monarchs bow'd the trembling limb,
And thank'd him for a throne!
Fair Freedom! we may hold thee dear,
When thus thy mightiest foes their fear
In humblest guise have shown.
Oh! ne'er may tyrant leave behind
A brighter name to lure mankind!

Thine evil deeds are writ in gore,
Nor written thus in vain-
Thy triumphs tell of fame no more,
Or deepen every stain:

If thou hadst died as honor dies,
Some new Napoleon might arise,

To shame the world again-
But who would soar the solar height,
To set in such a starless night?"

Weigh'd in the balance, hero dust
Is vile as vulgar clay;
Thy scales, Mortality are just
To all that pass away:
But yet methought the living great
Some higher sparks should animate,

To dazzle and dismay:

Nor deem'd Contempt could thus make mirth

Of these, the Conquerors of the earth.

And she, proud Austria's mournful flower,

Thy still imperial bride;

How bears her breast the torturing hour?

Still clings she to thy side?

Must she too bend, must she too share
Thy late repentance, long despair,

Thou throneless Homicide?

If still she loves thee, hoard that gem; "Tis worth thy vanish'd diadem!"

Ferdinand, and the kingdom of Spain, to his son Philip, and retired to a monastery in Estremadura, where he conformed, in his manner of living, to all the rigor of monastic austerity. Not satisfied with this, he dressed himself in his shroud, was laid in his coffin with much solemnity, joined in the prayers which were offered up for the rest of his soul, and mingled his tears with those which his attendants shed, as if they had been celebrating a real funeral.]

["I looked into Lord Kaimes's Sketches of the History of Man,' and mentioned to Dr. Johnson his censure of Charles the Fifth for celebrating his funeral obsequies in his lifetime, which, I told him, I had been used to think a solemn and affecting act. JOHNSON. Why, Sir, a man may dispose his mind to think so of that act of Charles; but it is so liable to ridicule, that if one man out of ten thousand laughs at it, he'll make the other nine thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine laugh too.'"- Boswell's Johnson, vol. vii. p. 78, ed. 1835.]

Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle,
And gaze upon the sea;
That element may meet thy smile-
It ne'er was ruled by thee!
Or trace with thine all idle hand,
In loitering mood upon the sand,

That Earth is now as free!

That Corinth's pedagogue' hath now Transferr'd his by-word to thy brow.

Thou Timour! in his captive's cage1

What thoughts will there be thine, While brooding in thy prison'd rage?

But one-"The world was mine!" Unless, like he of Babylon,

All sense is with thy sceptre gone,
Life will not long confine
That spirit pour'd so widely forth-
So long obey'd-so little worth!

Or, like the thief of fire from heaven,"
Wilt thou withstand the shock?
And share with him, the unforgiven,
His vulture and his rock!
Foredoom'd by God-by man accursed,"
And that last act, though not thy worst,
The very Fiend's arch mock;
He in his fall preserved his pride,
And, if a mortal, had as proudly died!

1 [Dionysius the Younger, esteemed a greater tyrant than his father, on being for the second time banished from Syracuse, retired to Corinth, where he was obliged to turn schoolmaster for a subsistence.]

2 The cage of Bajazet, by order of Tamerlane. 3 Prometheus.

4 [In first draught

"He suffer'd for kind acts to men,
Who have not seen his like again,
At least of kingly stock;

Since he was good, and thou but great,
Thou canst not quarrel with thy fate."]

"The very fiend's arch mock

To lip a wanton, and suppose her chaste."
SHAKSPEARE.

[We believe there is no doubt of the truth of the anecdote here alluded to-of Napoleon's having found leisure for an unworthy amour, the very evening of his arrival at Fontainebleau.]

[The three last stanzas, which Lord Byron had been solicited by Mr. Murray to write, in order to avoid the stamp duty then imposed upon publications not exceeding a sheet, were not published with the rest of the poem. "I don't like them at all," says Lord Byron, "and they had better be left out. The fact is, I can't do any thing I am asked to do, however gladly I would; and at the end of a week my interest in a composition goes off."]

[In one of Lord Byron's MS. Diaries, begun at Ravenna in May, 1821, we find the following:-" What shall I write? -another Journal? I think not. Any thing that comes uppermost, and call it

ter.

"My Dictionary.

"Augustus.-I have often been puzzled with his characWas he a great man? Assuredly. But not one of my GREAT men. I have always looked upon Sylla as the greatest character in history, for laying down his power at the moment when it was

'Too great to keep or to resign,'

and thus despising them all. As to the retention of his

But thou forsooth must be a king,
And don the purple vest,-
As if that foolish robe could wring
Remembrance from thy breast.
Where is that faded garment? where
The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,
The star-the string-the crest?
Vain froward child of empire! say,
Are all thy playthings snatch'd away?

Where may the wearied eye repose,
When gazing on the Great ;
Where neither guilty glory glows,
Nor despicable state?

Yes-one-the first-the last-the best-
The Cincinnatus of the West,

Whom envy dared not hate, Bequeath the name of Washington, To make man blush there was but One!

power by Augustus, the thing was already settled. If he had given it up-the commonwealth was gone-the republic was long past all resuscitation. Had Brutus and Cassius gained the battle of Philippi, it would not have restored the republic. Its days ended with the Gracchi; the rest was a mere struggle of parties. You might as well cure a consumption, or restore a broken egg, as revive a state so long a prey to every uppermost soldier, as Rome had long been. As for a despotism, if Augustus could have been sure that all his successors would have been like himself—(1 mean not as Octavius, but Augustus)-or Napoleon could have insured the world that none of his successors would have been like himself-the ancient or modern world might have gone on, like the empire of China, in a state of lethargic prosperity. Suppose, for instance, that, instead of Tiberius and Caligula, Augustus had been immediately succeeded by Nerva, Trajan, the Antonines, or even by Titus and his father-what a difference in our estimate of himself! So far from gaining by the contrast, I think that one-half of our dislike arises from his having been heired by Tiberius-and one-half of Julius Cæsar's fame, from his having had his empire consolidated by Augustus-Suppose that there had been no Octavius, and Tiberius had jumped the life' between, and at once succeeded Julius?— And yet it is difficult to say whether hereditary right or The popular choice produce the worser sovereigns. Roman Consuls make a goodly show; but then they only reigned for a year, and were under a sort of personal obli- | gation to distinguish themselves. It is still more difficult to say which form of government is the worst--all are so bad. As for democracy, it is the worst of the whole; for what is, in fact, democracy?—an aristocracy of blackguards."]

[On being reminded by a friend of his recent promise not to write any more for years-"There was," replied Lord Byron, "a mental reservation in my pact with the public, in behalf of anonymes; and, even had there not, the provocation was such as to make it physically impossible to pass over this epoch of triumphant tameness. 'Tis a sad business; and after all, I shall think higher of rhyme and reason, and very humbly of your heroic people, ull-Elba becomes a volcano, and sends him out again. I can't think it sa all over yet."]