You were not tied by any painter's law : Which if in compass of no art it came With one great blot you had form'd me as I am. But whilst you curious were to have it be O, had I now your manner, mastery, might, Ne knows he flattering colours, or false light. calls it, to the following miserable attempt at verse, by sir William Burlase : "THE PAINTER TO THE POET. To paint thy worth, if rightly I did know it, But in this skill my unskilful pen will tire, Then, what a painter's here? or what an eater Then, what a poet's here! whom, by confession There's no expression." I cannot be confident that I understand this: It would seem as if sir W. Burlase had made a drawing or a painting of the poet, to which this doggrel served as an accompaniment. There is an Edmund Burlase who has a copy of verses on the death of sir Horace Vere (1642), but whether related to this sir William, I cannot tell. If he was his son, the family vein of poetry had much improved, for he writes well. Yet when of friendship I would draw the face, LXXI. AN EPIGRAM TO WILLIAM EARL OF NEWCASTLE. HEN first, my lord, I saw you back your horse, Provoke his mettle, and command his force To all the uses of the field and race, Methought I read the ancient art of Thrace, 3 Of this distinguished nobleman, the pride and ornament of the British Peerage, a most interesting account is given by lord Clarendon, with whom he stood deservedly high. "Nobody but lord Orford (says sir E. Bridges), who could decry sir Philip Sidney" (and lord Falkland), "would have traduced a man possessed of so many qualities to engage the esteem of mankind as the duke of Newcastle but lord Orford had a tendency to depreciate the loyalists." He had a tendency to depreciate whatever was great and good. Dead to every generous feeling, selfish, greedy, and sneakingly ostentatious, Walpole, in the midst of a baby-house, surrounded with a collection of childish trumpery, had the audacity to speak in this manner of a man, who, after strenuously fulfilling every duty of life, as a patriot, a soldier, and a statist, retired to his paternal seat, where he lived in the practice of a magnificent hospitality, the friend of genius, the liberal patron of worth, employing the close of an active and honourable life in innocent and elegant pursuits which might benefit many, and could injure none. "What a picture of foolish nobility was this stately poetic couple (the duke and duchess) retired to their own little domain" (it was at least as extensive as Strawberry-hill) "and intoxicating one another with circumstantial flattery on what was of consequence to no mortal but themselves." Surely the demon of Vengeance must have been at Walpole's elbow, when he penned this sentence. Royal and Noble Authors. And saw a centaur,* past those tales of Greece, Or Castor mounted on his Cyllarus ; Or what we hear our home-born legend tell, 4 Methought I read the ancient art of Thrace, And saw a centaur, &c.] The earl of Newcastle was the most accomplished horseman of his time: his celebrated work on the method of managing horses, of which a magnificent edition in folio appeared some years ago, was not published during the poet's life. 5 As I began to wish myself a horse.] This is probably an allusion to the very pretty incident with which sir Philip Sidney so aptly opens his Defence of Poesy. Pietro Pugliana, he says, discoursed with such fertileness and spirit on the various merits of the animal, "that if I had not been a piece of a logician before I came to him, I think he would have persuaded me to have wished myself a horse." 6 Away with the Cæsarian bread ! At these immortal mangers Virgil fed.] Alluding to that circumstance in the life of Virgil, of his being employed in the stables of Augustus, and having his customary allowance of bread doubled, for the judgment he gave of a colt the emperor had just bought. LXXII. EPISTLE TO MASTER ARTHUR SQUIB. AM to dine, friend, where I must be weigh'd A merchant's wife is regent of the scale. It do not come : one piece I have in store, And you shall make me good in weight and fashion, "An ill commodity, &c.] The lady alludes, I presume, to the decisive depression of the scale, exacted in the weighing of coarse merchandize. 8 But, rather with advantage to be found Full twenty stone; of which I lack two pound : That's six in silver.] The wager, it seems, was that the poet weighed full twenty stone, but he found that he wanted two pounds of that weight. This he artfully turns to a reason for borrowing five pounds in money of his friend Mr. Squib, which added to the pound he had of his own, would make up the deficiency in his weight. Six pounds in silver, he says, will weigh two pounds in weight it may be so; we will take his word. WHAL. I doubt whether we understand the nature of this wager, which was probably a mere jest. If the sense be as Whalley states it, there is as little of art as of honesty in it. Το go out after-till when take this letter For your security. I can no better. LXXIII. TO MASTER JOHN BURGES." OULD God, my Burges, I could think Yet with a dye that fears no moth, But scarlet-like, out-lasts the cloth. 9 To master John Burges.] Burges was probably the deputy paymaster of the household. He had made Jonson a present of some ink, and this little production, which wants neither spirit nor a proper self-confidence, inclosed, perhaps, the return for it. Master Burges might have sent the wine at the same time. Jonson, who lived much about the court while his health permitted him to come abroad, seems to have made friends of most of those who held official situations there, and to have been supplied with stationery, and, perhaps, many other petty articles. The following is transcribed from the blank leaf of a volume of miscellaneous poetry, formerly in the possession of Dr. John Hoadley, son of the bishop of Winchester. He has written over it, "A Relique of Ben Jonson." "To my worthy and deserving Brother as the Token of my Love, And the perpetuating of our Friendship, |