prose than Thackeray’s “Codlingsby” and “George de Barnwell;” but they are most unquestionably parodies. Indeed it is hard to see what virtue there can be in an imitation which is not also a parody――that is, as we take it, a consciously exaggerated imitation; an imitation which is not that, surely, instead of, as Jeffrey says, descending to the level of a parody, goes near to descend to the much lower level of a plagiarism. If we wished to distinguish between the parody designed to ridicule and that designed only to amuse, we should be inclined to say that, while the latter contents itself with an imitation of the style, the former aims also at an imitation of the thought and substance. In the parodies we have noticed, for example, Thackeray unquestionably intended to ridicule the authors of _Eugene Aram_ and _Coningsby_. Both their subjects and the manner of handling those subjects seemed to him such as deserved ridicule and he ridiculed them accordingly, as no one but Thackeray could. On the other hand, we do not for a moment suppose that the clever Oxford parodist who sang the labours and ultimate triumph of “Adolphus Smalls of Boniface” intended to ridicule Macaulay. He took _The Lays of Ancient Rome_ as his model, because they were more familiar probably to his readers than any other form of verse, and because their external characteristics were most easy to reproduce. We read such lines as―― Now thickly and more thickly To the Five Orders gates, In cap and gown throng through the town White-chokered candidates. Stunner of Christ Church, ne’er before In academics seen; And Nobby of the collars high, Girt with the scarf none else may tie; Loud-trowsered Boozer, stripes and all; And whiskered Tomkins from the hall Of seedy Magdalene; or as―― They gave him his _testamur_, Which was a passman’s right; He was more than three examiners Could plough from morn to night,―― we read such lines, and laugh at them without feeling that any injustice is done to Macaulay. Again, when we read of another and less fortunate sufferer,――in the schools of Cambridge this time――how In the crown of his cap Were the Furies and Fates, And a delicate map Of the Dorian States; And they found on his palms, which were dirty, What is frequent on palms――that is dates――[19] we entirely acquit the writer of any design to laugh at Mr. Bret Harte. In both these cases the parodies are really no more than proofs of the universal popularity of the writers parodied. But when we read in _Rejected Addresses_ the parodies on Wordsworth and Coleridge, we feel that the writers were intentionally casting ridicule on certain trivialities, certain commonplaces both of diction and thought, to which these great men did occasionally sink.