have placed the cart before the horse, in allowing Mr. Landor's dialogue between Porson and Southey precedence of the following between Mr. Landor and yourself. You may object that it is a feigned colloquy, in which an unauthorized use is made of your name. True; but all Mr. Landor's colloquies are likewise feigned; and none is more fictitious than one that has appeared in your pages, wherein Southey's name is used in a manner not only unauthorized, but at which he would have sickened. You and I must differ more widely in our notions of fair play than I hope and believe we do, if you refuse to one whose purpose is neither unjust nor ungenerous, as much license in your columns as you have accorded to Mr. Landor, when it was his whim, without the smallest provocation, to throw obloquy on the venerated author of the _Excursion_. I am, Sir, your faithful servant, EDWARD QUILLINAN. * * * * * _Landor_.--Good-morning, Mr. North, I hope you are well. _North_.--I thank you, sir.--Be seated. _Landor_.--I have called to enquire whether you have considered my proposal, and are willing to accept my aid. _North_.--I am almost afraid to trust you, sir. You treat the Muses like nine-pins. Neither gods nor men find favour in your sight. If Homer and Virgil crossed your path, you would throw stones at them. _Landor_.--The poems attributed to Homer, were probably, in part at least, translations. He is a better poet than Hesiod, who has, indeed, but little merit![49] Virgil has no originality. His epic poem is a mere echo of the Iliad, softened down in tone for the polite ears of Augustus and his courtiers. Virgil is inferior to Tasso. Tasso's characters are more vivid and distinct than Virgil's, and greatly more interesting. Virgil wants genius. Mezentius is the most heroical and pious of all the characters in the Aeneid. The Aeneid, I affirm, is the most misshapen of epics, an epic of episodes.[50] There are a few good passages in it. I must repeat one for the sake of proposing an improvement. "Quinetiam _hyberno_ moliris sidere classem, Et mediis properas aquilonibus ire per altum ... Crudelis! quod si non arva aliena domosque Ignotas peteres, et Troja antiqua maneret, Troja per _undosum_ peteretur classibus aequor?" If _hybernum_ were substituted for _undosum_, how incomparably more beautiful would the sentence be for this energetic repetition? [51] _North_.--I admire your modesty, Mr. Landor, in quoting Virgil only to improve him; but your alteration is not an improvement. Dido, having just complained of her lover for putting out to sea under a wintry star, would have uttered but a graceless iteration had she in the same breath added--if Troy yet stood, must even Troy be sought through a wintry sea? _Undosum_ is the right epithet; it paints to the eye the danger of the voyage, and adds force to her complaint.