"Nay gather not that filbert, Nicholas, There is a maggot there; it is his house-- His castle--oh! commit not burglary! Strip him not naked; 'tis his clothes, his shell; His bones, the case and armour of his life, And thou shalt do no murder, Nicholas. It were an easy thing to crack that nut, Or with thy crackers or thy double teeth; So easily may all things be destroyed! But 'tis not in the power of mortal man To mend the fracture of a filbert shell. There were two great men once amused themselves Watching two maggots run their wriggling race, And wagering on their speed; but, Nick, to us It were no sport to see the pampered worm Roll out and then draw in his folds of fat Like to some barber's leathern powder bag Wherewith he feathers, frosts or cauliflowers, Spruce beau, or lady fair, or doctor grave." Also his Commonplace Book proves that, like many other hardworking men, he amused his leisure hours with what was light and fantastic. Moreover, he speaks in some places of the advantage of intermingling amusement and instruction-- "Even in literature a leafy style, if there be any fruit under the foliage, is preferable to a knotty one however fine the grain. Whipt cream is a good thing, and better still when it covers and adorns that amiable compound of sweetmeats and ratafia cakes soaked in wine, to which Cowper likened his delightful poem, when he thus described 'The Task'-- "'It is a medley of many things, some that may be useful, and some that, for aught I know, may be very diverting. I am merry that I may decoy people into my company, and grave that they may be the better for it. Now and then I put on the garb of a philosopher, and take the opportunity that disguise procures me to drop a word in favour of religion. In short there is some froth, and here and there some sweetmeat which seems to entitle it justly to the name of a certain dish the ladies call a 'trifle.' But in 'task' or 'trifle' unless the ingredients were good the whole were nought. They who should present to their deceived guests whipt white of egg would deserve to be whipt themselves." But Southey by no means follows the profitable rule he here lays down. On the contrary, he sometimes betrays such a love of the marvellous as would seem unaccountable, had we not read bygone literature, and observed how strong the feeling was even as late as the days of the "Wonderful Magazine." Among his strange fancies we find in the "Chapter on Kings:" "There are other monarchies in the inferior world beside that of the bees, though they have not been registered by naturalists nor studied by them. For example, the king of the fleas keeps his court at Tiberias, as Dr. Clark discovered to his cost, and as Mr. Cripps will testify for him." He proceeds to give humorous descriptions of the king of monkeys, bears, codfish, oysters, &c.