[43] May I have leave to notice an instance of the same agreeable discontinuity in my friend Lloyd's admirable poem on Christmas? DENHAM'S COOPER'S HILL The stream is so transparent, pure, and clear, That, had the self-enamour'd youth gaz'd here, So fatally deceived he had not been, While he the bottom, not his face had seen. _Scott_ The last two lines have more music than Denham's can possibly boast. _Ritson_ May I have leave to conjecture, that in the very last line of all, the word "the" has erroneously crept in? I am persuaded that the poet wrote "his." To my mind, at least, this reading, in a surprising degree, heightens the idea of the extreme clearness and transparency of the stream, where a man might see _more than his face_ (as it were) in it. COLLINS'S ORIENTAL ECLOGUES _Scott_ The second of these little pieces, called Hassan, or the Camel Driver, is of superior character. This poem contradicts history in one principal instance; the merchants of the east travel in numerous caravans, but Hassan is introduced travelling alone in the desart. But this circumstance detracts little from our author's merit; adherence to historical fact is _seldom_ required in poetry. _Ritson_ It is _always_, where the poet unnecessarily transports you to the ends of the world. If he must plague you with exotic scenery, you have a right to exact strict local imagery and costume. Why must I learn Arabic, to read nothing after all but Gay's Fables in another language? _Scott_ Abra is introduced in a grove, wreathing a flowery chaplet for her hair. Shakspeare himself could not have devised a more natural and pleasing incident, than that of the monarch's attention being attracted by her song: Great Abbas chanced that fated morn to stray, By love conducted from the chace away. Among the vocal vales he heard her song---- _Ritson_ Ch--t? * * * * * O stay thee, Agib, for my feet deny, No longer friendly to my life, to fly---- _Scott_ From the pen of Cowley, such an observation as Secander's, "that his feet were no longer friendly to his life," might have been expected; but Collins rarely committed such violations of simplicity. _Ritson_ Pen of Cowley! impudent goose-quill, how darest thou guess what Cowley would have written? GRAY'S CHURCH-YARD ELEGY Save where the beetle wheels---- _Scott_ The beetle was introduced in poetry by Shakspeare * * *. Shakspeare has made the most of his description; indeed, far too much, considering the occasion: ----to black Hecate's summons The shard-born beetle with his drowsy hum Hath rung night's yawning peal.----