PREFACE.

EVERY reader turns with pleasure to those passages of Horace, and Pope, and Boileau, which describe how they lived and where they dwelt; and which, being interspersed among their satirical writings, derive a secret and irresistible grace from the contrast, and are admirable examples of what in Painting is termed

repose.

We have admittance to Horace at all hours. We enjoy the company and conversation at his table; and his suppers, like Plato's, « non solum in præsentia, sed etiam postero die jucundæ sunt. But when we look round as we sit there, we find ourselves in a Sabine farm, and not in a Roman villa. His windows have every charm of prospect; but his furniture might have descended from Cincinnatus; and gems, and pictures, and old marbles, are mentioned by him more than once with a seeming indifference.

His English Imitator thought and felt, perhaps, more correctly on the subject; and embellished his garden and grotto with great industry and success. But to these alone he solicits our notice. On the ornaments of his house he is silent; and he appears to have reserved all the minuter touches of his pencil for the library, the chapel, and the banquetting-room of Timon. Le savoir de notre siècle, says Rousseau, tend beaucoup plus à détruire qu'à édifier. On censure d'un ton de maitre; pour proposer, il en faut prendre un autre.

It is the design of this Epistle to illustrate the virtue of True Taste; and to show how little she requires to secure, not only the comforts, but even the elegancies

of life. True Taste is an excellent Economist. She confines her choice to few objects, and delightsin producing great effects by small means: while False Taste is for ever sighing after the new and the rare; and reminds us, in her works, of the Scholar of Apelles, who, not being able to paint his Helen beautiful, determined to make her fine.

ARGUMENT.

An invitation-The approach to a Villa described-Its situation-Its few apartments-furnished with casts from the Antique, etc. -The dining-room--The library

-A cold-bath-A winter-walk-A summer-walkThe invitation renewed-Conclusion.

WHEN, with a Reaumur's skill, thy curious mind
Has classed the insect-tribes of human kind,
Each with its busy hum, or gilded wing,
Its subtle web-work, or its venom'd sting;
Let me, to claim a few unvalued hours,

Point out the green lane rough with fern and flowers;
The shelter'd gate that opens to my field,
And the white front through mingling elms reveal'd.

In vain, alas, a village-friend invites
To simple comforts, and domestic rites,
When the gay months of Carnival resume
Their annual round of glitter and perfume;
When London hails thee to its splendid mart,
Its hives of sweets, and cabinets of art;
And, lo, majestic as thy manly song,
Flows the full tide of human life along.

Still must my partial pencil love to dwell
On the home-prospects of my hermit-cell;
The mossy pales that skirt the orchard-green,
Here hid by shrub-wood, there by glimpses seen;
And the brown path-way, that, with careless flow,
Sinks, and is lost among the trees below.
Still must it trace (the flattering tints forgive)
Each fleeting charm that bids the landscape live.
Oft o'er the mead, at pleasing distance, pass (1)
Browsing the hedge by fits the pannier'd ass;
The idling shepherd-boy, with rude delight,
Whistling his dog to mark the pebble's flight;
And in her kerchief blue the cottage-maid,
With brimming pitcher from the shadowy glade.
Far to the south a mountain-vale retires,
Rich in its groves, and glens, and village-spires:
Its upland-lawns, and cliffs with foliage hung,
Its wizard-stream, nor nameless nor unsung:
And through the various year, the various day, (2)
What scenes of glory burst, and melt away!

When April-verdure springs in Grosvenor-square,
And the furred Beauty comes to winter there,
She bids old Nature mar the plan no more;
Yet still the seasons circle as before.

Ah, still as soon the young Aurora plays,
Though moons and flambeaux trail their broadest blaze;
As soon the sky-lark pours his matin-song,
Though evening lingers at the mask so long.

There let her strike with momentary ray,
As tapers shine their little lives away;
There let her practise from herself to steal,
And look the happiness she does not feel;
The ready smile and bidden blush employ
At Faro-routs that dazzle to destroy;
Fan with affected ease the essenced air,
And lisp of fashions with unmeaning stare.
Be thine to meditate a humbler flight,
When morning fills the fields with rosy light;
Be thine to blend, nor thine a vulgar aim,
Repose with dignity, with Quiet fame.

Here no state-chambers in long line unfold,
Bright with broad mirrors, rough with fretted gold;
Yet modest ornament, with use combined,
Attracts the eye to exercise the mind.

To hail our coming. Not a step profane

Dares, with rude sound, the cheerful rite restrain;

And, while the frugal banquet glows reveal'd,
Pure and unbought, -the natives of my field;
While blushing fruits through scattered leaves invite,

Still clad in bloom, and veiled in azure light!

With wine, as rich in years as HORACE sings,
With water, clear as his own fountain flings,
The shifting side-board plays its humbler part,
Beyond the triumphs of a Loriot's art. (13)

Thus, in this calm recess, so richly fraught
With mental light, and luxury of thought,
My life steals on; (O could it blend with thine!)
Careless my course, yet not without design.
So through the vales of Loire the bee-hives glide, (14)
The light raft dropping with the silent tide;
So, till the laughing scenes are lost in night,
The busy people wing their various flight,
Culling unnumber'd sweets from nameless flowers,
That scent the vineyard in its purple hours.

Rise, ere the watch-relieving clarions play, Caught through St James's groves a blush of day; (15) Ere its full voice the choral anthem flings Through trophied tombs of heroes and of kings. Haste to the tranquil shade of learned ease, 2 Though skilled alike to dazzle and to please; Though each gay scene be search'd with anxious eye, Nor thy shut door be passed without a sigh.

If, when this roof shall know thy friend no more, Some, formed like thee, should once, like thee, explore; Invoke the lares of his loved retreat, And his lone walks imprint with pilgrim-feet; Then be it said, (as, vain of better days, Some grey domestic prompts the partial praise) Unknown he lived, unenvied, not unblest; Reason his guide, and Happiness his guest. In the clear mirror of his moral page, We trace the manners of a purer age. His soul, with thirst of genuine glory fraught, Scorned the false lustre of licentious thought. -One fair asylum from the world he knew, One chosen seat, that charms with various view! Who boasts of more (believe the serious strain) Sighs for a home, and sighs, alas! in vain. Through each he roves, the tenant of a day, And, with the swallow, wings the year away!» (16)

Small change of scene, small space his home requires. Many a great man, in passing through the apartments of his palace, has made the melancholy reflection of the venerable Cosmo: Questa è troppo gran casa à si poco famiglia. -MACH. Ist. Fior. lib. vii.

«Parva, sed apta mihi, was Ariosto's inscription over his door in Ferrara; and who can wish to say more? • I confess,» says Cowley, I love littleness almost in all things. A little convenient estate, a little cheerful house, a little company, and a very little feast.-Essay vi.

When Socrates was asked why he had built for himself so small a house, Small as it is, he replied, I wish I could fill it with friends. -PHEDRUS, 1. iii, 9.

These indeed are all that a wise man would desire to assemble; << for a crowd is not company, and faces are but a gallery of pictures, and talk but a tinkling cymbal, where there is no love.>>

Note 4, page 21, col. 1.

From every point a ray of genius flows!

By this means, when all nature wears a lowering countenance, I withdraw myself into the visionary worlds of art; where I meet with shining landscapes, gilded triumphs, beautiful faces, and all those other objects that fill the mind with gay ideas, etc. ADDISON.

It is remarkable that Antony, in his adversity, passed some time in a small but splendid retreat, which he called his Timonium, and from which might originate the idea of the Parisian Boudoir, that favourite apartment, où l'on se retire pour être seul, mais où l'on ne boude point. STRABO, 1. xvii. PLUT. in Vit. Anton.

Note 5, page 21, col. 1. At Guido's call, etc.

Alluding to his celebrated fresco in the Rospigliosi

Palace at Rome.

Note 6, page 21, col. 1.

And still the Few best loved and most revered.

The dining-room is dedicated to Conviviality; or, as Cicero somewhere expresses it, Communitati vitæ atque victûs. There we wish most for the society of our friends; and, perhaps, in their absence, most require their portraits.

The moral advantages of this furniture may be illustrated by the pretty story of an Athenian courtezan, << who, in the midst of a riotous banquet with her lovers, accidentally cast her eye on the portrait of a philosopher, that hung opposite to her seat: the happy character of temperance and virtue struck her with so lively an image of her own unworthiness, that she instantly quitted the room; and, retiring home, became ever after an example of temperance, as she had been before of debauchery.

Note 7, page 21, col. 1.

Read ancient books, or dream inspiring dreams.

The reader will here remember that passage of Horace, Nunc veterum libris, nunc somno, etc. which was inscribed by Lord Chesterfield on the frieze of his library.

Note 8, page 21, col. 1. And, when a sage's bust arrests thee there. Siquidem non solum ex auro argentove, aut certe ex ære in bibliothecis dicantur illi, quorum immortales animæ in iisdem locis ibi loquuntur: quinimo etiam quæ non sunt, finguntur, pariuntque desideria non traditi vultus, sicut in Homero evenit. Quo majus (ut equidem arbitror) nullum est felicitatis specimen, quam semper omnes scire cupere, qualis fuerit aliquis.-PLIN. Nat. Hist.

Cicero speaks with pleasure of a little seat under Aristotle in the library of Atticus. Literis sustentor et recreor; maloque in illa tua sedecula, quam habes sub imagine Aristotelis, sedere quàm in istorum sella curuli! Ep. ad Att. iv, 10.

Nor should we forget that Dryden drew inspiration from the majestic face of Shakspeare; and that a portrait of Newton was the only ornament of the closet of Buffon.-Ep. to Kneller. Voyage à Montbart. In the chamber of a man of genius we

Write all down:

Such and such pictures;-there the window -the arras, figures,

Why, such and such.

Note 9, page 21, col. 1.

Which gathers round the Wise of every Tongue.

Quis tantis non gaudeat et glorietur hospitibus, exclaims Petrarch.-Spectare, etsi nihil aliud, certè juvat. -Homerus apud me mutus, imò verò ego apud illum surdus sum. Gaudeo tamen vel aspectû solo, et sæpe illum amplexus ac suspirens dico: O magne vir, etc.Epist. Var. lib. 20.

Note 10, page 21, col.2.

Like those blest Youths.

See the Legend of the Seven Sleepers. -GIBBON, C. 33.

Note 11, page 21, col. 2.

Catch the blest accents of the wise and great.

Mr Pope delights in enumerating his illustrious guests. Nor is this an exclusive privilege of the poet. The Medici Palace at Florence exhibits a long and imposing catalogue. Semper hi parietes columnæque cruditis vocibus resonuerunt.

Another is also preserved at Chanteloup, the seat of the Duke of Choiseul.

Note 12, page 21, col 2.
Sbeds, like an evening-star, its ray serene.

At a Roman supper statues were sometimes employed to hold the lamps.

-Aurea sunt juvenum simulacra per ædeis,
Lampadas igniferas manibus retinentia dextris.
LUCR. ii, 24.

A fashion as old as Homer!-Odyss. vii, 100.

On the proper degree and distribution of light we may consult a great master of effect. Il lume grande, ed alto, e non troppo potente, sarà quello, che renderà le particole de corpi molto grate.

Tratt. della Pittura di LIONARDO DI VINCI, c. xli.

Hence every artist requires a broad and high light. Hence also, in a banquet-scene, the most picturesque of all poets has thrown his light from the ceiling.Æn.i, 726.

And hence the starry lamps of Milton, that

from the arched roof

Pendent by subtle magic, yielded light

As from a sky.

Note 13, page 22, col. 1.
Beyond the triumphs of a Loriot's art.

At the petits soupers of Choisy were first introduced those admirable pieces of mechanism, afterwards carried to perfection by Loriot, the Confidente and the Servante; a table and a side-board, which descended, and rose again covered with viands and wines. And thus the most luxurious Court in Europe, after all its boasted refinements, was glad to return at last, by this singular contrivance, to the quiet and privacy of humble life. Vie privée de Louis XV, tom. ii, p. 43.

Between 1. 10 and 1. 11, col. 1, were these lines, since omitted:

Hail, sweet Society! in crowds unknown,
Though the vain world would claim thee for its own.
Still where thy small and cheerful converse flows,
Be mine to enter, ere the circle close.
When in retreat Fox lays his thunder by,
And Wit and Taste their mingled charms supply;
When Siddons, born to melt and freeze the heart,
Performs at home her more endearing part;
When he, who best interprets to mankind
The winged messengers from mind to mind,
Leans on his spade, and, playful as profound,
His genius sheds its evening-sunshine round,
Be mine to listen; pleased yet not elate,
Ever too modest or too proud to rate
Myself by my companions, self-compelled
To earn the station that in life I held.

They were written in 1796.

Note 14, page 22, col. 1.

So through the vales of Loire the bee-hives glide.

An allusion to the floating bee-house, or barge laden with bee-hives, which is seen in some parts of France and Piedmont.

Note 15, page 22, col. 1.

Caught through St James's groves at blush of day.

After this line in the MS.

Groves that Belinda's star illumines still,

And ancient Courts and faded splendours fill.

Note 16, page 22, col. 1.

And, with the swallow, wings the year away!

It was the boast of Lucullus that he changed his climate with the birds of passage-PLUT. in Vit. Lucull. How often must he have felt the truth here inculcated, that the master of many houses has no home!

I.

'T WAS Autumn; through Provence had ceased The vintage, and the vintage-feast.

The sun had set behind the hill,

The moon was up, and all was still,

And from the convent's neighbouring tower
The clock had toll'd the midnight-hour,
When Jacqueline came forth alone,
Her kerchief o'er her tresses thrown;

A guilty thing and full of fears,
Yet ah, how lovely in her tears!
She starts, and what has caught her eye?
What-but her shadow gliding by?
She stops, she pants; with lips apart
She listens to her beating heart!
Then, through the scanty orchard stealing,
The clustering boughs her track concealing,
She flies, nor casts a thought behind,
But gives her terrors to the wind;

Flies from her home, the humble sphere
Of all her joys and sorrows here,
Her father's house of mountain-stone,
And by a mountain-vine o'ergrown.
At such an hour in such a night,
So calm, so clear, so heavenly bright,
Who would have seen, and not confess'd
It looked as all within were blest?
What will not woman, when she loves?
Yet lost, alas, who can restore her?-
She lifts the latch, the wicket moves;
And now the world is all before her.

Up rose St Pierre, when morning shone;
And Jacqueline, his child, was gone!
Oh what the madd'ning thought that came?
Dishonour coupled with his name!
By Condé at Rocroy he stood;

By Turenne, when the Rhine ran blood;
Two banners of Castile he gave
Aloft in Notre Dame to wave;
Nor did thy Cross, St Louis, rest
Upon a purer, nobler breast.

He slung his old sword by his side,
And snatch'd his staff and rush'd to save;
Then sunk-and on his threshold cried,
Oh lay me in my grave!
-Constance! Claudine! where were ye then?
But stand not there. Away! away!
Thou, Frederic, by thy father stay.
Though old, and now forgot of men,
Both must not leave him in a day..
Then, and he shook his hoary head,
■ Unhappy in thy youth! he said.
■ Call as thou wilt, thou call'st in vain;
No voice sends back thy name again.
To mourn is all thou hast to do;
Thy play-mate lost, and teacher too."
And who but she could soothe the boy,
Or turn his tears to tears of joy?
Long had she kiss'd him as he slept,
Long o'er his pillow hung and wept;

And, as she pass'd her father's door,
She stood as she would stir no more.

But she is gone, and gone for ever!
No, never shall they clasp her-never!
They sit and listen to their fears;
And he, who through the breach had led
Over the dying and the dead,
Shakes if a cricket's cry he hears!

Oh! she was good as she was fair;
None-none on earth above her!
As pure in thought as angels are,
To know her was to love her.
When little, and her eyes, her voice,
Her every gesture said = rejoice,
Her coming was a gladness;
And, as she grew, her modest grace,
Her down-cast look 't was heaven to trace,
When, shading with her hand her face,
She half inclined to sadness.

Her voice, whate'er she said, enchanted;
Like music to the heart it went.

And her dark eyes-how eloquent;
Ask what they would, 't was granted.
Her father loved her as his fame;
-And Bayard's self had done the same!

Soon as the sun the glittering pane
On the red floor in diamonds threw,
His songs she sung and sung again,
Till the last light withdrew.
Every day, and all day long,
He mused or slumber'd to a song.
But she is dead to him, to all!
Her lute hangs silent on the wall;
And on the stairs, and at the door
Her fairy-step is heard no more!
At every meal an empty chair
Tells him that she is not there;
She, who would lead him where he went,
Charm with her converse while he leant;
Or, hovering, every wish prevent;
At eve light up the chimney-nook,
Lay there his glass within his book;
And that small chest of curious mould,
(Queen Mab's, perchance, in days of old,)
Tusk of elephant and gold;

Which, when a tale is long, dispenses
Its fragrant dust to drowsy senses.

In her who mourn'd not, when they miss'd her,
The old a child, the young a sister?

No more the orphan runs to take

From her loved hand the barley-cake.

No more the matron in the school
Expects her in the hour of rule,
To sit amid the elfin brood,
Praising the busy and the good.
The widow trims her hearth in vain,
She comes not-nor will come again!
Not now, his little lesson done,

With Frederic blowing bubbles in the sun;