"With regard to poetry in general[9], I am convinced, the more I think of it, that he and _all_ of us--Scott, Southey, Wordsworth, Moore, Campbell, I,--are all in the wrong, one as much as another; that we are upon a wrong revolutionary poetical system, or systems, not worth a damn in itself, and from which none but Rogers and Crabbe are free; and that the present and next generations will finally be of this opinion. I am the more confirmed in this by having lately gone over some of our classics, particularly _Pope_, whom I tried in this way,--I took Moore's poems and my own and some others, and went over them side by side with Pope's, and I was really astonished (I ought not to have been so) and mortified at the ineffable distance in point of sense, learning, effect, and even _imagination_, passion, and _invention_, between the little Queen Anne's man, and us of the Lower Empire. Depend upon it, it is all Horace then, and Claudian now, among us; and if I had to begin again, I would mould myself accordingly. Crabbe's the man, but he has got a coarse and impracticable subject, and * * * is retired upon half-pay, and has done enough, unless he were to do as he did formerly." [Footnote 9: On this paragraph, in the MS. copy of the above letter, I find the following note, in the handwriting of Mr. Gifford:-- "There is more good sense, and feeling, and judgment in this passage, than in any other I ever read, or Lord Byron wrote."] * * * * * LETTER 298. TO MR. MURRAY. "September 17. 1817. "Mr. Hobhouse purposes being in England in November; he will bring the fourth Canto with him, notes and all; the text contains one hundred and fifty stanzas, which is long for that measure. "With regard to the 'Ariosto of the North,' surely their themes, chivalry, war, and love, were as like as can be; and as to the compliment, if you knew what the Italians think of Ariosto, you would not hesitate about that. But as to their 'measures,' you forget that Ariosto's is an octave stanza, and Scott's any thing but a stanza. If you think Scott will dislike it, say so, and I will expunge. I do not call him the '_Scotch_ Ariosto,' which would be sad _provincial_ eulogy, but the 'Ariosto of the _North_, meaning of all _countries_ that are _not_ the _South_. * * "As I have recently troubled you rather frequently, I will conclude, repeating that I am "Yours ever," &c. * * * * * LETTER 299. TO MR. MURRAY. "October 12. 1817.