the smelling with pure scents, the feeling with soft and plump bodies, but the understanding with all these; for all which you must begin at the kitchen. There the art of Poetry was learn'd, and found out, or nowhere; and the same day with the art of Cookery.

Poet. I should have given it rather to the cellar, if my suffrage had been ask'd.

Cook. O, you are for the oracle of the bottle, I see; hogshead Trismegistus; he is your Pegasus. Thence flows the spring of your muses, from that hoof.

Seduced Poet, I do say to thee

A boiler, range, and dresser were the fountains Of all the knowledge in the universe,

And that's the kitchen. What! a master-cook! Thou dost not know the man, nor canst thou know him,

Till thou hast serv'd some years in that deep school,

That's both the nurse and mother of the arts,
And heard'st him read, interpret, and demonstrate.
A master-cook!' why, he's the man of men,
For a professor! he designs, he draws,

He paints, he carves, he builds, he fortifies,
Makes citadels of curious fowl and fish,

Some he dry-ditches, some motes round with broths;

Mounts marrow-bones; cuts fifty-angled custards; Rears bulwark pies; and, for his outer works, He raiseth ramparts of immortal crust;

1 A master-cook! &c.] Cartwright has reduced this into practice in his Ordinary, and furnished out a military dinner with great pleasantry, at the expense of Have-at-all, who is desirous to grow valiant, as lawyers do learned, by eating. This speech is also closely imitated by the master-cook in Fletcher's tragedy of Rollo Duke of Normandy.

And teacheth all the tactics at one dinner:"
What ranks, what files, to put the dishes in,
The whole art military! then he knows
The influence of the stars, upon his meats;
And all their seasons, tempers, qualities,
And so to fit his relishes, and sauces!

He has Nature in a pot, 'bove all the chemists,
Or bare-breech'd brethren of the Rosy-cross!
He is an architect, an inginer,

A soldier, a physician, a philosopher,

A general mathematician'!

Poet. It is granted.

Cook. And that you may not doubt him for a Poet

2 And teacheth all the tactics at one dinner.] This seems to be taken from the poet Posidippus, who in Athenæus compares a good cook to a good general:

Αγαθε ςρατηγε διαφέρειν εδεν δοκεί.

And Athenion in like manner (see Athenæus, l. 14. c. 23.) attributes to the art of cookery, and kitchen-philosophy, what the poets assign to the legislators of society, and the first founders of states and commonwealths. WHAL.

'The Greek poet is truly excellent; and the apparent seriousness with which his cook descants on the importance of his profession adds greatly to its genuine humour. The concluding lines are very amusing.

Καταρχομεθ ̓ ἡμεῖς οἱ μαγειροι, θυομεν,
Σπονδας ποιεμεν, τω μάλιςα τις θεός
Ημιν ὑπακέειν, δια το ταυθ' ευρηκεναι
Τα μαλιςα συντείνονία προς το ζην καλως.
We slay the victims,
We pour the free libations, and to us
The gods themselves lend a propitious ear;
And, for our special merits, scatter blessings
On all the human race, because from us
And from our art, mankind was first induced
To live the life of reason.

There is no translating the sly felicity of 'ny xaλws, which looks, at the same time, to good morals, and good eating.

Poet. This fury shews, if there were nothing

else;

And 'tis divine!

Cook. Then, brother poet.

Poet. Brother.

Cook. I have a suit.

Poet. What is it?

Cook. Your device.

Poet. As you came in upon me, I was then Offering the argument, and this it is.

Cook. Silence!

Poet. [reads.] The mighty Neptune, mighty in his styles,

And large command of waters, and of isles;
Not as the "lord and sovereign of the seas,'
But" chief in the art of riding," late did please,
To send his Albion forth, the most his own,
Upon discovery, to themselves best known,
Through Celtiberia; and, to assist his course,
Gave him his powerful Manager of Horse,
With divine Proteus,' father of disguise,
To wait upon them with his counsels wise,
In all extremes. His great commands being done,
And he desirous to review his son,

He doth dispatch a floating isle, from hence,
Unto the Hesperian shores, to waft him thence.
Where, what the arts were, us'd to make him stay,
And how the Syrens woo'd him by the way,
What monsters he encounter'd on the coast,
How near our general joy was to be lost,*

3 With divine Proteus, &c.] This, I believe, was sir Francis Cottington. He had been secretary to sir Charles Cornwallis, and was, at this time, private secretary to the Prince; he was well versed in political affairs, and particularly in those of Spain, where he had resided many years in a public capacity.

4 How near our general joy was to be lost.] This alludes to the storm which took place on the Spanish coast, and in which the prince, together with a number of the Spanish nobility who came

Is not our subject now; though all these make
The present gladness greater, for their sake.
But what the triumphs are, the feast, the sport,
And proud solemnities of Neptune's court,
Now he is safe, and Fame's not heard in vain,
But we behold our happy pledge again.
That with him, loyal Hippius is return'd,
Who for it, under so much envy, burn'd

With his own brightness, till her starv'd snakes saw
What Neptune did impose, to him was law.

Cook. But why not this, till now?

Poet. -It was not time,

To mix this music with the vulgar's chime.
Stay, till the abortive, and extemporal din
Of balladry, were understood a sin,

Minerva cried; that, what tumultuous verse,
Or prose could make, or steal, they might rehearse,
And every songster had sung out his fit;

That all the country, and the city wit,

Of bells and bonfires, and good cheer was spent,
And Neptune's guard had drunk all that they meant,
That all the tales and stories now were old

Of the sea-monster Archy, or grown cold:

to take leave of him, was nearly wrecked. The other dangers which Charles is said to have encountered are probably exaggerated by the "poet."

That with him loyal Hippius is return'd.] By Hippius is meant the duke of Buckingham, master of the horse to James the 1st, who accompanied the prince into Spain, to which this speech alludes. WHAL.

6 Of the sea-monster Archy.] Archibald Armstrong, the court jester, who followed the prince into Spain. Charles seems to have taken a strange fancy to this buffoon, who joined the surly savageness of the bear to the mischievous tricks of the monkey. Howell, who was at Madrid during the Prince's visit, says, in one of his letters, "Our cousin Archy hath more privilege here, than any, for he often goes with his fool's coat where the Infanta is with her Meninos and ladies of honour, and keeps a blowing and blustering among them, and flurts out what he lists." In

The Muses then might venture, undeterr'd,
For they love, then, to sing, when they are heard.
Cook. I like it well, 'tis handsome; and I have
Something would fit this. How do you present
them?

In a fine island, say you?

Poet. Yes, a Delos :

Such, as when fair Latona fell in travail,
Great Neptune made emergent.

Cook. I conceive you.

I would have had your isle brought floating in,

now,

In a brave broth,' and of a sprightly green,

conclusion, he gives a specimen of his ill-manners, which must have been offensive in the highest degree. Book I. lett. 18. 7 In a brave broth

With an Arion mounted on the back

Of a grown conger, but in such a posture

As all the world should take him for a dolphin.] This is hu morously imitated by Fletcher:

"For fish, I'll make a standing lake of white broth,

And pikes come ploughing up the plumbs before them,
Arion on a dolphin, playing Lachrymæ," &c.

Rollo, A. II. S. 2. Mr. Weber has happily discovered the pronomen of this cele. brated musician. He was called, it seems, Bike Arion, without the Mr.-" Bike," as he aptly observes, "which signifies a hive of bees, is not in the least applicable, for which reason I must leave it to the reader." This is kind: but Mr. Weber is unjust to the merits of his own text. Does he not know that bees will swarm to a brass kettle? How much rather, then, to the harp of Arion! Hence the name. The verse stands thus in his precious edition (vol. ii. p. 55.)

"Ride like Bike Arion on a trout to London." Former editors, whom Mr. Weber treats with all the contempt which his superior attainments justify him in assuming, had supposed that bike (which destroys the metre) was merely an accidental repetition of like, and therefore dropt it: but as this was done without writing a page or two about it, Mr. Weber wonders at their presumption, and very judiciously re instates it in the text.