[“It was either during the present or a future visit to the same friends,[150] that the _jeu-d’esprit_ was produced which Mrs Hemans used to call her ‘sheet of forgeries’ on the use of the word Barb. A gentleman had requested her to furnish him with some authorities from the old English writers, proving that this term was in use as applied to a steed. She very shortly supplied him with the following imitations, which were written down almost impromptu: the mystification succeeded perfectly, and was not discovered until some time afterwards.”--_Memoir_, p. 43.] [150] The family of the late Henry Park, Esq., Wavertree Lodge, near Liverpool. The warrior donn’d his well-worn garb, And proudly waved his crest, He mounted on his jet-black barb, And put his lance in rest. Percy’s _Reliques_. Eftsoons the wight, withouten more delay, Spurr’d his brown _barb_, and rode full swiftly on his way. Spenser. Hark! was it not the trumpet’s voice I heard? The soul of battle is awake within me! The fate of ages and of empires hangs On this dread hour. Why am I not in arms? Bring my good lance, caparison my steed! Base, idle grooms! are ye in league against me? Haste with my _barb_, or, by the holy saints, Ye shall not live to saddle him to-morrow! Massinger. No sooner had the pearl-shedding fingers of the young Aurora tremulously unlocked the oriental portals of the golden horizon, than the graceful flower of chivalry and the bright cynosure of ladies’ eyes--he of the dazzling breastplate and swanlike plume--sprang impatiently from the couch of slumber, and eagerly mounted the noble _barb_ presented to him by the Emperor of Aspramontania. Sir Philip Sidney’s _Arcadia_. See’st thou yon chief whose presence seems to rule The storm of battle? Lo! where’er he moves Death follows. Carnage sits upon his crest-- Fate on his sword is throned--and his white barb, As a proud courser of Apollo’s chariot, Seems breathing fire. Potter’s _Æschylus_. Oh! bonnie look’d my ain true knight, His _barb_ so proudly reining; I watch’d him till my tearfu’ sight Grew amaist dim wi’ straining. _Border Minstrelsy._ Why, he can heel the lavolt, and wind a fiery _barb_, as well as any gallant in Christendom. He’s the very pink and mirror of accomplishment. Shakspeare. Fair star of beauty’s heaven! to call thee mine, All other joys I joyously would yield; My knightly crest, my bounding _barb_ resign, For the poor shepherd’s crook and daisied field; For courts or camps no wish my soul would prove, So thou wouldst live with me, and be my love! Earl of Surrey’s _Poems_.