“Now I think that every observant critic will admit that the striking distinctions of the poetry most in the fashion of the present day, namely, of the Augustan age, are,--first, a selection of such verbal elegances as would have been most repulsive to the barbaric taste of the preceding century; and, secondly, a very lofty disdain of all prosaic condescensions to common-sense, and an elaborate cultivation of that element of the sublime which Mr. Burke defines under the head of obscurity. “These premises conceded, I will only ask you to choose the metre. Blank verse is very much in fashion just now.” “Pooh! blank verse indeed! I am not going so to free your experiment from the difficulties of rhyme.” “It is all one to me,” said Kenelm, yawning; “rhyme be it: heroic or lyrical?” “Heroics are old-fashioned; but the Chaucer couplet, as brought to perfection by our modern poets, I think the best adapted to dainty leaves and uncrackable nuts. I accept the modern Chaucerian. The subject?” “Oh, never trouble yourself about that. By whatever title your Augustan verse-maker labels his poem, his genius, like Pindar’s, disdains to be cramped by the subject. Listen, and don’t suffer Max to howl, if he can help it. Here goes.” And in an affected but emphatic sing-song Kenelm began:-- “In Attica the gentle Pythias dwelt. Youthful he was, and passing rich: he felt As if nor youth nor riches could suffice For bliss. Dark-eyed Sophronia was a nice Girl: and one summer day, when Neptune drove His sea-car slowly, and the olive grove That skirts Ilissus, to thy shell, Harmonia, Rippled, he said ‘I love thee’ to Sophronia. Crocus and iris, when they heard him, wagged Their pretty heads in glee: the honey-bagged Bees became altars: and the forest dove Her plumage smoothed. Such is the charm of love. Of this sweet story do ye long for more? Wait till I publish it in volumes four; Which certain critics, my good friends, will cry Up beyond Chaucer. Take their word for ‘t. I Say ‘Trust them, but not read,--or you’ll not buy.’” “You have certainly kept your word,” said the minstrel, laughing; “and if this be the Augustan age, and the English were a dead language, you deserve to win the prize-medal.” “You flatter me,” said Kenelm, modestly. “But if I, who never before strung two rhymes together, can improvise so readily in the style of the present day, why should not a practical rhymester like yourself dash off at a sitting a volume or so in the same style; disguising completely the verbal elegances borrowed, adding to the delicacies of the rhyme by the frequent introduction of a line that will not scan, and towering yet more into the sublime by becoming yet more unintelligible? Do that, and I promise you the most glowing panegyric in ‘The Londoner,’ for I will write it myself.” “‘The Londoner’!” exclaimed the minstrel, with an angry flush on his cheek and brow, “my bitter, relentless enemy.”