Cho. Yet let it like an odour rise

To all the senses here,

And fall like sleep upon their eyes,
Or music in their ear.

entertainments which were usually looked for by the audience, and cannot boast a single excellence to distinguish it from those of Fletcher, Shirley, Brome, and twenty others. Iris enters and calls for Ceres; after a short dialogue, they are joined by Juno, who sings the following song:

"Honour, riches, marriage-blessing,

Long continuance, and increasing,
Hourly joys be still upon you!

Juno sings her blessings on you."

On the conclusion of this rich poetry, Ferdinand exclaims, This is a most majestic vision! &c. There were but three personages upon the stage, and no scenery of any kind is even hinted at: yet Hurd is not ashamed to affirm that this trite mythology, which disgraced the very best of Jonson's pieces, by the ingenuity of its construction, left them still more behind it, in the beauty of its shew! and called forth an involuntary exultation from Shakspeare on his superiority! When we consider that the Masques of Jonson were exhibited with all the magnificence of scenery which the taste and splendor of a court could bestow, that the performers in them were the most accomplished of the nobility of both sexes, headed by the queen, and royal family; that the most skilful musicians were constantly called in to compose the songs; and the most exquisite voices that could be found, engaged to execute them; and when we know, on the other hand, that the theatres had no scenery, and that the songs and dances were left to the ordinary performers, what language of reprobation is sufficiently strong to mark the portentous ignorance which could deliberately affirm that the homely and unadorned interlude in the Tempest, exceeded in the splendor of its exhibition, that of all the Masques of Jonson !

With respect to Shakspeare-he is no party in the dispute. The exclamation of Ferdinand is natural and proper to the character, and has nothing to do with the real circumstances of the stage. For the rest, I make no apology. I love and reverence Shakspeare as truly as the warmest of his admirers, and in addition, flatter myself that my understanding goes with my worship; but I will not silently suffer his name to be made a stalking horse, under cover of which malice and folly may wantonly shoot from age to age, their poisoned bolts at the name and reputation of Jonson. I know the fate which I am preparing for myself; but if I had not

The Scene here changed to cloud, from which PHANT'SIE breaking forth, spake.

Phan. Bright Night, I obey thee, and am come at thy call,

But it is no one dream that can please these all; Wherefore I would know what dreams would delight 'em :

For never was Phant'sie more loth to affright 'em. And Phant'sie, I tell you, has dreams that have wings, And dreams that have honey, and dreams that have

stings:

Dreams of the maker, and dreams of the teller,
Dreams of the kitchen, and dreams of the cellar :
Some that are tall, and some that are dwarfs,
Some that are halter'd, and some that wear scarfs ;
Some that are proper, and signify o' thing,
And some another, and some that are nothing.-
For say the French verdingale, and the French hood
Were here to dispute; must it be understood 3

been utterly regardless of personal abuse in the cause of sound literature and truth, I should never have ventured on so unpopular a task as that of attempting to do simple justice to the talents and integrity of one of the most injured and calumniated of men.

To return to the quotation with which this long note began:Jonson has a similar thought in Love's Triumph, where Euphemus says, very beautifully,

"Love in perfection longeth to appear,

But prays, of favour, he be not call'd on
Till all the suburbs and the skirts be clear
Of perturbations, and the infection gone.
"Then will he flow forth like a rich perfume

3 For say

Into your nostrils or some sweeter sound
Of melting music, that shall not consume
Within the ear, but run the mazes round."

the French verdingale, and the French hood Were here to dispute, &c.] The medley that follows is purposely designed, I suppose, to intimate the inconsistency of dreams;

A feather for a wisp were a fit moderator?
Your ostrich, believe it, 's no faithful translator
Of perfect Utopian; and then 'twere an odd piece
To see the conclusion peep forth at a cod-piece.

The politic pudding hath still his two ends, Though the bellows and bag-pipe were ne'er so good friends:

And who can report what offence it would be
For a squirrel to see a dog climb a tree?

If a dream should come in now to make you afeard,
With a windmill on his head, and bells at his beard;
Would you straight wear your spectacles here at
your toes,

And your boots on your brows, and your spurs on your nose?

Your whale he will swallow a hogshead for a pill;
But the maker o' the mousetrap is he that hath skill.
And the nature of the onion is to draw tears,
As well as the mustard: peace, pitchers have ears,
And shittle-cocks wings, these things do not mind 'em,
If the bell have any sides, the clapper will find 'em :
There's twice so much music in beating the tabor,
As in the stock-fish, and somewhat less labour.
Yet all this while, no proportion is boasted

'Twixt an egg and an ox, though both have been roasted;

For grant the most barbers can play on the cittern, Is it requisite a lawyer should plead to a ghittern? You will say now the morris-bells were but bribes To make the heel forget that e'er it had kibes;

and has at least, if no other merit, the praise of being spoken in character. WHAL.

Our old poets seem to have found some amusement in stringing together these sheer absurdities, as they frequently indulged in them. Jonson's, as Whalley observes, is not ill placed; and, if there be any degree of comparison in nonsense, his is also the best that we have. It might have been shorter: but if it amused the audience, we need not quarrel with it.

I say, let the wine make ne'er so good jelly,
The conscience of the bottle is much in the belly:
For why? do but take common council i' your way,
And tell me who'll then set a bottle of hay
Before the old usurer, and to his horse
A slice of salt-butter, perverting the course
Of civil society? open that gap,

And out skip your fleas, four and twenty at a clap,
With a chain and a trundle-bed following at th' heels,
And will they not cry then, the world runs a-wheels?
As for example, a belly, and no face,

With the bill of a shoveler may here come in place;
The haunches of a drum, with the feet of a pot,
And the tail of a Kentish man to it: why not?
Yet would I take the stars to be cruel,

If the crab and the rope-maker ever fight duel,
On any dependence, be it right, be it wrong:
But, mum a thread may be drawn out too long.

Here the second Antimasque of Phantasms came forth, and danced.

Phan. Why, this you will say was phantastical now, As the Cock and the Bull, the Whale and the Cow, But vanish! away! [They retire.] I have change to present you,

And such as I hope will more truly content you.—
Behold the gold-hair'd Hour descending here,
That keeps the gate of heaven, and turns the year,
Already with her sight how she doth cheer,
And makes another face of things appear.

With the bill of a shoveler.] A particular kind of sea-bird, with a broad bill. In the Entertainment given to queen Elizabeth by the earl of Leicester at Kenelworth-castle, we are told there were two square wire cages, and in them live bitterns, curlieus, shovelars, &c. WHAL.

Here one of the Hours descending, the whole scene changed to the bower of ZEPHYRUS, whilst PEACE sung as followeth :

Peace. Why look you so, and all turn dumb,

To see the opener of the new year come?
My presence rather should invite,

And aid and urge, and call to your delight;
The many pleasures that I bring

Are all of youth, of heat, of life and spring,
And were prepared to warm your blood,
Not fix it thus, as if you statues stood.

Cho. We see, we hear, we feel, we taste,

We smell the change in every flow'r,
We only wish that all could last,

And be as new still as the hour.

Wonder. Wonder must speak or break; what is this? grows

The wealth of nature here, or art? it shows
As if Favonius," father of the spring,

Who in the verdant meads doth reign sole king,

As if Favonius, &c.] At length we have a word with which Jonson is admitted to have furnished Milton: but Milton is indebted for somewhat more than a word to this beautiful speech. It is to be lamented that Hurd, while looking for specimens of Jonson's manner of translating, or, as he is pleased to term it, "of murdering" the ancients, for the "entertainment" of his friend, should have missed this passage, in which Claudian is so comically travestied:

Compellat Zephyrum, Pater O gratissime Veris,
Qui mea lascivo regnas per prata volatu, &c. &c.

Rap. Proserp. lib. ii. v. 73, et seq.

Jonson was the first who made this excellent poet familiar to us. At a time when he was little known or studied in this country, our author was already intimately acquainted with his merits, and had many allusions to his most striking beauties, dispersed through his works. I should have remarked, that in the charming address of