Another Epic! Who inflicts again More books of blank upon the sons of men? Boeotian COTTLE, rich Bristowa's boast, Imports old stories from the Cambrian coast, And sends his goods to market--all alive! Lines forty thousand, Cantos twenty-five! 390 Fresh fish from Hippocrene! [54] who'll buy? who'll buy? The precious bargain's cheap--in faith, not I. Your turtle-feeder's verse must needs be flat, [xxxii] Though Bristol bloat him with the verdant fat; If Commerce fills the purse, she clogs the brain, And AMOS COTTLE strikes the Lyre in vain. In him an author's luckless lot behold! Condemned to make the books which once he sold. Oh, AMOS COTTLE!--Phoebus! what a name To fill the speaking-trump of future fame!-- 400 Oh, AMOS COTTLE! for a moment think What meagre profits spring from pen and ink! When thus devoted to poetic dreams, Who will peruse thy prostituted reams? Oh! pen perverted! paper misapplied! Had COTTLE [55] still adorned the counter's side, Bent o'er the desk, or, born to useful toils, Been taught to make the paper which he soils, Ploughed, delved, or plied the oar with lusty limb, He had not sung of Wales, nor I of him. 410 As Sisyphus against the infernal steep Rolls the huge rock whose motions ne'er may sleep, So up thy hill, ambrosial Richmond! heaves Dull MAURICE [56] all his granite weight of leaves: Smooth, solid monuments of mental pain! The petrifactions of a plodding brain, That, ere they reach the top, fall lumbering back again. With broken lyre and cheek serenely pale, Lo! sad Alcæus wanders down the vale; Though fair they rose, and might have bloomed at last, 420 His hopes have perished by the northern blast: Nipped in the bud by Caledonian gales, His blossoms wither as the blast prevails! O'er his lost works let _classic_ SHEFFIELD weep; May no rude hand disturb their early sleep! [57] Yet say! why should the Bard, at once, resign [xxxiii] His claim to favour from the sacred Nine? For ever startled by the mingled howl Of Northern Wolves, that still in darkness prowl; A coward Brood, which mangle as they prey, 430 By hellish instinct, all that cross their way; Aged or young, the living or the dead," [xxxiv] No mercy find-these harpies must be fed. Why do the injured unresisting yield The calm possession of their native field? Why tamely thus before their fangs retreat, Nor hunt the blood-hounds back to Arthur's Seat? [58]