able promenades. Richmond, also, was in high pride of estimation. At Greenwich, Elizabeth held her court, and walked abroad amid the gallant service of the Sydneys and Raleighs. And Hampstead and Highgate, with the country about them, were, as they have been ever since, the favourite resort of the lovers of natural pro ductions. The Mermaid in Cornhill, the Devil Tavern in Fleet-street, the Boar's Head in Eastcheap, are town associations with Shakspeare. The reader who cannot get out of London on his birth-day, and who has the luck to be hard at work in Chancery-lane or the Borough, may be pretty certain that Shakspeare has admired the fields and the May-flowers there; for the fields were close to the latter, perhaps came up to the very walls of the theatre; and the suburban mansion, and gardens of his friend, Lord Southampton, occupied the spot now called Southampton-buildings. It was really a country neighbourhood. The Old Bourne (Holborn) ran by, with a bridge over it; and Gray's Inn was an Academic bower in the fields. The The dinner does not much signify. sparest or the most abundant will equally suit the various fortunes of the great poet; only it will be as well for those who can afford wine, to pledge Falstaff in a cup of "sherris sack,” which seems to have been a sort of sherry negus. After dinner, Shakspeare's volumes will come well on the table, lying among the desert like laurels, where there is one, and supplying it where there is not. Instead of songs, the persons present may be called upon for scenes. But no stress need be laid on this proposition, if they do not like to read out loud. The pleasure of the day should be as much at liberty as possible; and if the company prefer conversation, it will not be very easy for them to touch upon any subjects which Shakspeare shall not have touched upon also. If the enthusiasm is in high taste, the ladies should be crowned with violets, which (next to the roses of their lips) seem to have been his favourite flower. After tea should come singing and music, especially the songs which Arne set from his plays, and the ballad of "Thou soft-flowing Avon." If an engraving or bust of him could occupy the principal place in the room, it would look like the "present deity" of the occasion; and we have known a very pleasant effect produced by every body's bringing some quotation applicable to him from his works, and laying it before his image, to be read in the course of the evening. LEIGH HUNT. POETRY AND GORMANDIZING. CAMILLO QUERNO, one of the buffoon poets who contributed, by their foibles as well as by their talents, to the amusements of the gay and motley Court of the tenth Leo, was born at Monopoli, in the kingdom of Naples, A. D. 1470. His propensity to gormandizing was so great, that many historians make no mention of him but asa notorious glutton, whose other qualities were too trifling to redeem this unpardonable sin. He seems, however, early to have listened to the whisperings of his art, and ere he quitted his native country had composed a poem of 20,000 verses, called Alexias, in which, as it frequently happens, the author discovered more beauties than were clear to the indifferent reader. On its merits he determined to risk his reception at Rome, and, accordingly, proceeded thither with his poem. On his arrival, he presented himself to the scholars of the academy, and courted their inspection of his performance. The gentlemen, however, whom he chanced to meet, were much more inclined to merriment than criticism, loved a joke a great deal better than a poem, and concluding from the grotesque rusticity of his costume, the convivial ruddiness of his features, and the uncultivated shagginess of his long black hair, that he was a much fitter subject to laugh at, than to laugh with, voted him at once more likely to contribute to their amusement than do honour to their patronage. They, therefore, prepared an entertainment in a small island in the Tiber, to which Querno was invited; and while he was displaying his poetical as well as his guzzling qualities, and doing full as much justice to Liber Pater as to the Muses, they entwined a new wreath of poppies, cabbage, and laurel, and placing it solemnly upon his temples unanimously declared him "Arch-poet." Querno, inflated by an honour so far above his most sanguine expectations, thought himself quite competent to appear before the Pope, was presented, and displayed before his Holiness his versifying talents. Leo soon perceived how great an addition the Improvisatore might prove to the hilarity of his entertainments, and, accordingly, ordered him to beregularly admitted. With the notion of making the hope of gratifying his gluttony an incentive to his muse, he was always kept at some distance from the table, and little delicacies were occasionally sent him to provoke him to exertion. After he had devoured these with the most disgusting avidity, the Pope had him placed nearer to himself, and filling a tumbler of the choicest wine, promised it to him on the express condition, that he should immediately produce two extemporaneous verses at least, which if he failed to do, or his verses were not approved, he was condemned not only to forfeit his wine, but to swallow an equal quantity of pure water, or of wine very considerably diluted. On one of these tantalizing occasions, the disappointment seems to have produced what expectation could not, and Querno very appropriately, on receiving his penance, exclaimed: "In cratere meo, Thetisest conjuncta Lyæo In my goblet Lyæus and Thetis combine |