"As Dick and I at Charing Cross were walking, Whom should we see on t'other side pass by, But INFORMATOR with a stranger talking, So I exclaimed--"O, what a lie!" Quoth Dick, "What, can you hear him?" Stuff! I saw him open his mouth--an't that enough?" * * * * * ON OBSERVING A LADY LICKING HER LAP-DOG, Thy Lap-dog Rufa, is a dainty beast; It don't surprise me in the least, To see thee lick so dainty clean a beast, But that so dainty clean a beast licks thee-- Yes--that surprises me. * * * * * Jack writes his verses with more speed Than the printer's boy can set 'em; Quite as fast as we can read, But only--not so fast as we forget 'em. Mr. Coleridge accompanied these epigrams with the translation of one of LESSING'S pieces, where the felicity of the expression, in its English form, will excite in most readers a suspicion, that no German original, could equal the poem in its new dress. MY LOVE. I ask'd my love, one happy day, What I should call her in my lay! By what sweet name from Rome or Greece; Iphigenia, Clelia, Chloris, Laura, Lesbia, or Doris, Dorimene, or Lucrece? Ah! replied my gentle fair, Beloved! what are names but air! Take whatever suits the line: Call me Clelia, call me Chloris, Laura, Lesbia, or Doris, Only, only, call me thine. Mr. C. told me that he intended to translate the whole of Lessing. I smiled. Mr. C. understood the symbol, and smiled in return. The above poem is thus printed in the last edition of 1835, by which the two may be compared, and the reader will perhaps think that the alterations are not improvements. NAMES. I asked my fair one happy day, What I should call her in my lay? By what sweet name from Rome or Greece: Lalage, Nesera, Chloris, Sappho, Lesbia, or Doris, Arethusa, or Lucrece. Ah, replied my gentle fair, Beloved, what are names but air? Choose thou whatever suits the line; Call me Sappho, call me Chloris, Call me Lalage, or Doris, Only, only, call me thine. Some time after this, Mr. Coleridge being in an ill state of health, recollected that a friend of his, Sir John Stoddart, was the Judge at Malta,[80] and he determined to repair to that island. Here he was introduced to Sir Alexander Ball, the Governor, who happened at that time to be in want of a Secretary, and being greatly pleased with Mr. Coleridge, he immediately engaged him in that capacity.[81] * * * * * I shall here for the present leave the narrative of Mr. C. in other and better hands, and proceed to remark, that Mr. Davy and Mr. Coleridge continued their friendly feeling toward each other, through life. Mr. Davy, in a letter to Mr. Poole, (1804.) thus expresses himself: