"Waterre wytches, crownede wythe reytes," of an earlier day. In short, for the time, he must sink his own being in that of another, and must look upon the world and the men of it through a totally strange and unaccustomed light. Hence it is that imiThese verses, the best Chatterton ever tations are generally so unsuccessful. There wrote are evidently modern; it would be is a simplicity, and a beauty, and a strength preposterous to assert that they are not. in the genuine ballads, which the imitations Whatever the fifteenth century witnessed, do not, or but rarely possess. The simpliit did not witness the birth of such finished city degenerates into childishness; the verses and exquisite versification as we have given: become feeble; they have all the defects, It was left to a later age to witness that. and none of the beauties of the original. That did not take place till "the well of Dr. Johnson, who had a keen eye for the English undefiled" had become dry; till failings of a school to which he never bethe oracles were dumb, for the inspiration longed, and who had a deep contempt for was no more; till the freshness of English anything simple, as if it were necessarily poetry had departed, and till a degenerate childish, has very happily hit off this weak race sought its equivalent in stale and mis- point, in the imitation of ancient ballads, erable puns, and paltry conceits, and look- in such lines as these: "The tender infant, meek and mild, The nurse took up the squalling child, Notwithstanding that school in poetry, ed on them as the sure signs of the presence of the muse; and crowned with the laurel, and adorned with the name of poet, the man who had been the most active in this crusade against nature. Succeeding writers adhered to them as models for style, but regarded with disdain their coldness, their staleness, and their affected wit. They afterwards better known as the Lake School, turned away from them to bards of more is not a little indebted to the Doctor. A hallowed fire; they drank the waters at the generation that had been wearied with the fountain head. Hence the odes and songs pomp and monotony of his much sounding of our greatest poets. Thus it was with phrases, found in it a welcome relief. Of Chatterton, in the verses we have quoted. this new poetic gospel Dr. Percy was the They have no connexion with English poe- forerunner, and Wordsworth the high priest. try as it grew with Chaucer or languished The latter is a case in point. That the with Cowley, but with English poetry as author of the "Excursion" is a true poet; reinvigorated, bursting the fetters which that some of his grand sonnets are only inenchained it, it shone forth in "Grey's ferior to Milton's; that much that he has Elegy," "Beattie's Minstrel," in Gold- written posterity will not willingly let die, smith's "Traveller," and "Collins' Odes," we readily admit; but that he has failed the illustrious dawn of a yet more illustrious where others have done the same, we think day. Another circumstance which leads to cannot for a moment be denied. Without the conclusion that Chatterton's poems are giving in our unfeigned assent and consent forgeries, is their similarity to forgeries. to the severe criticism by which Jeffrey for Many of the poems professing to be ancient years endeavored to extinguish the rising ballads, are exactly like imitations of ancient school of lake poets, it strikes us that ballads. Successfully to attempt to do this, Wordsworth has not succeeded so well as requires no common power; we have seen his too partial admirers have thought. Ofit done in our day in lays of ancient Rome, ten he has been more successful in copying but such instances are rare; and Macaulay the defects, than the beauties of the ballad was aided by what had been already done writers of an earlier day. A parody, on by Sir Walter Scott, the great restorer of rather a fair, by no means a ridiculous or our ballad poetry. In Chatterton's day spiteful imitation, of that great poet, will the thing was untried, and he was unequal show our meaning. It is taken from the to the task. The man who would succeed Rejected Addresses." A verse or two in attempts of this kind, has many difficul- will suffice: ties to overcome. He must isolate himself from the age in which he lives; he must endeavor to attain the thoughts and feelings * Water-flags. 66 "My brother Jack was nine in May Bought me last week a doll of wax, Jack's in the pouts; and thus it is And melts off half her nose.". We shall skip the rest of the young lady's narrative, for the domestic tragedy is of too harrowing a nature, and conclude with this verse: of the mystery was-Adam and Eve would appear, sometimes naked, sometimes not; the serpent would join them; they were then driven from Paradise. The serpent would make his exit leaping; Adam would go and dig; Eve would spin to pass away the time; Cain would kill Abel, which occasions Adam no little sorrow when he returns. That was the common run of these mysteries. Chatterton assigns to Rowley, we find noEighty years after the date thing nearer the regular drama than the interludes of John Heywood. We gather a notion of what they were from an account given by Mr. Collier in his history of dramatic poetry, entitled, "A Mery Play between the Pardoner, and the Frere, the Curate and Neighbour Pratte." A pardoner and a friar have each obtained leave Now this half feeble simplicity, we might the exhibition of his relics, and the other of the curate to use his church-the one for say this downright childishness, is a sure for the delivery of a sermon-the object of sign that the poem is an imitation, or, at both being the same, that of procuring least, has been modernized. The reader will remember the ballad of to commence his discourse, when the parmoney. The friar arrives first, and is about "Chevy Chace," which was thus modern-doner enters and disturbs him; each is deized; may we not add, improved? "At first I caught hold of the wing, "Of Wadrington I needs must sing, sirous of being heard, and after many vain attempts, by force of lungs, they proceed to force of arms, kicking and cuffing each other unmercifully. The curate called, by the disturbance in the church, endeavors without avail, to part the combatants. He, Of this feeble attempt at simplicity, we therefore calls in neighbor Pratte to his meet with several instances in the Rowleian assistance; and while the curate seizes the MSS. One that is called the "Bristowe friar, Pratte undertakes to deal with the Tragedie, or the Death of Charles Baldwin," pardoner, in order that they may set them is so manifestly an imitation, so interlarded in the stocks. It turns out that both the with palpable plagiarisms, that we wonder friar and the pardoner are too much for Chatterton should have shown it, or should their assailants, and the latter, after a sound have suffered it to appear. drubbing, are glad to come to a composition Again, Rowley is made to write tragedies by which the former are allowed quietly to in which there is much that is beautiful; depart. "Ralph Roister Doyster," the but they were not even in existence when earliest English comedy yet discovered, Rowley is said to have lived. The drama must have been written by Nicholas Udall then can hardly be said to have existed at about 1530; Chatterton was, therefore, in all. Mysteries, as they were termed, were this respect guilty of a most egregious then the order of the day Moralities did blunder. At the time Rowley is made to not come into vogue till after Rowley's write a regular drama, "Mysteries formed time, and regular plays like his, were not on Bible Scenes," were the only rude apthought of till about an hundred years after proximations to the drama then thought of his death. Those were the days when the or desired. Chatterton allows this: he Chester, Widkirk, and Coventry miracle makes Rowley say, in a letter to his patron plays, with their twenty, and thirty, and Canynge ;forty acts astonished all classes, prince and peasant alike, with their wonderful scenic representations of all things that had happened, including the fall of Lucifer, and what might, would, or could happen down Plays made from hallie tales I hold unmeet, to the Day of Judgment. The general plan These sentiments are undoubtedly very cre 1 ditable to Thomas Rowley; but surely | mendous, that they ought not to continue. plays like this, so totally different from the It proclaims in a voice of thunder, that mysteries then in vogue must be considered there must be a freer and fairer course, as forgeries. It is absurd to look upon even for those in the most unfortunate cirthem, even for a moment, as the produc- cumstances, that they may find something tions of that age. To say the least, as to render life valuable, and lead them to great a revolution in dramatic literature as consider prolonged existence a blessing, and Rowley would appear to have effected, not a curse. could not have been passed over in silence, and it would not have been left to Chatterton to discover the writings of Rowley. The truth is, Chatterton panted for fame, -at any price he resolved to win her fickle smile. Dazzled by the success of Macpherson, he attempted a forgery, but failed; as Macpherson had some small portion of truth as his basis, his deception obtained a credit which was denied to Chatterton. Moreover, in spite of its bombast, Ossian, by large classes, will always be read and admired. As was the case with Macpherson, so was it also with Chatterton, that he wrote better with his mask, than without. Thus have we glanced at The marvellous boy who perished in his pride," THE NITRE LAKES OF EGYPT.-What a singular scene! In the midst of this sandy waste, where uniformity is rarely interrupted by grass or shrubs, there are extensive districts where nitre springs from the earth like crystallized fruits. One thinks he sees a wild overgrown with moss, weeds, and shrubs, thickly covered with hoar frost. And to imagine this wintry scene, beneath the fervid heat of an Egyptian sun, will give some idea of the strangeness of its aspect. The existence of this nitre upon the lakes. According to the quantity of nitre left the sandy surface is caused by the evaporation of behind by the lake do these fantastic shapes assume either a dazzling white color, or, are more or less tinted with the sober, hue of the sand. The nitre cious valley between two rows of low sandhills, lakes themselves, six in number, situated in a spa. presented at least the three which we visited-a at him who, young and gifted, cowered be- pleasing contrast, in their dark, blue and red colors, to the dull hues of the sand. The nitre, which forms neath the world's dread laugh-who ignoa thick crystallized crust upon these shallow lakes, bly fell, for his heart failed him in the hour is broken off in large square plates, which are either of need-who nursed the dart by which he of a dirty white, or of a flesh color, or of a deep, was laid low-who died as he had lived, dark red. The Fellahs employed upon this labor the victim of a sham. Genius has too often stand quite naked in the water, furnished with iron rods. The part which is removed being speedily taught the bitter lesson, that her smile is renewed, the riches of its produce are inexhaustible. a blight-that her embrace is death. And It is hence that nearly the whole of Europe is exChatterton was not the exception. He clusively supplied with nitre; and this has probably made but one blunder, it is true, but that been the case for ages; for Sicard mentions, at the commencement of the last century, that then sixblunder lasted his life. For his untimely and-thirty thousand hundred weight of nitre was end we may mourn. With our censure it broken annually for the grand seignior, to whom it will be but graceful and just, to mix some- yielded 36 purses. By the side of one of the lakes, what of sorrow and regret. piled in large layers, was heaped the produce of the We blame not last week's labors. My companion had occasion to those who, conscious of the evils that await find fault with the result of the work of one of the them, tread the path along which genius villages. The sheikh of the village stood before us. and poetry have shed their golden light; He sharply rebuked him, and to give greater effect to his words he crossed his naked shoulders two or rather we blame the world that can honor three times with his whip of elephant's skin. The the turtle-soup eating alderman, and can sheikh sprang as nimbly as a gazelle into the lake, let the poet starve. We blame those who and received his further instructions beyond arm's can turn from the altar, where alone men length. Such was the impressive discipline which even this Italian, who was a man of gentle manners, should worship, and bow the knee to Baal. considered it necessary to adopt towards these FelIn some sense the suicide is a martyr; his lahs. The plates of nitre, after undergoing a predeath is a protest against the abuses of so-liminary cleansing upon the banks of the lake, are ciety; his last expiring groan-what is it but the strong cry of misery for their immediate reform. The broken heart, in its agony and despair, thus pleads that life's burdens. may be more equitably borne. It declares, as Mr. Fox has well said, "the existence of injustice so enormous, and mistakes so tre-2s. carried to the castle, where, by various processes, they become a dazzling white powder; and in this state it is conveyed in large quantities to Teranneh. -Tischendorff's Travels. PROFITS OF THE SHAKSPEARE NIGHT.-The gross garden Theatre, on Tuesday last, amount to 1,1347. receipts of the Shakspeare performance, at CoventThe fund is still 5001. deficient. From Bentley's Miscellany. THE SIX DECISIVE BATTLES OF THE WORLD. BY PROFESSOR CREASY. "Those few battles of which a contrary event would have essentially varied the drama of the world in all its subsequent scenes."-HALLAM. No. I.-MARATHON. "Quibus actus uterque Europæ atque Asia fatis concurrerit orbis." to be reinstated by foreign seymitars in despotic sway over any remnant of his countrymen, that might survive the sack of their town, and might be left behind as too worthless for leading away into Median bondage. Two thousand three hundred and thirty- their own banished tyrant, who was seeking seven years ago, a council of Greek officers was summoned on the slope of one of the mountains that look over the plain of Marathon, on the eastern coast of Attica. The immediate subject of their meeting was to consider whether they should give battle to an enemy that lay encamped on the shore beneath them; but on the result of their deliberations depended, not merely the fate of two armies, but the whole future progress of human civilization. The numerical disparity between the force which the Athenian commanders had under them and that which they were called on to encounter, was hopelessly apparent to some of the council. The historians who The ten Athenian generals who, with the wrote nearest to the time of the battle do Archon entitled the War-Ruler, formed the not pretend to give any detailed statements council, had deep matter for anxiety, though of the numbers engaged, but there are suffilittle aware how momentous to mankind cient data for our making a general estimate. were the votes they were about to give, or The muster-roll of free Athenian citizens of how the generations to come would read an age fit for military service never exceedwith interest the record of their discussions. ed 30,000, and at this epoch probably did They saw before them the invading forces not amount to two-thirds of that number. of a mighty power, which had in the last Moreover, the poorer portion of these were fifty years shattered and enslaved nearly all unprovided with the equipments and unthe kingdoms and principalities of the then trained to the operations of the regular known world. They knew that all the re- infantry. Some detachments of the bestsources of their own country were comprised armed troops would be required to garrison in the little army entrusted to their guid- the city itself, and man the various fortiance. They saw before them a chosen host fied posts in the territory; so that it is imof the Great King, sent to wreak his special possible to reckon the fully equipped force wrath on that country, and on the other inso- that marched from Athens to Marathon, lent little Greek community, which had dared when the news of the Persian landing arto aid his rebels and burn the capital of one rived, at higher than 14,000. The gallant of his provinces. That victorious host had little allied state of Platea had sent its already fulfilled half its mission of ven- contingent of 1000 of its best men; so that geance. Eretria, the confederate of Athens the Athenian commanders must have had in the bold march against Sardis nine years under them about 15,000 fully-armed and before, had fallen in the last few days; and disciplined infantry, and probably a larger the Athenians could discern from their number of irregular light-armed troops; as, heights the island, in which the Persians besides the poorer citizens who went to the had deposited their Eretrian prisoners, field armed with javelins, cutlasses, and whom they had reserved to be led away targets, each regular heavy-armed soldier captives into Upper Asia, there to hear was attended in the camp by one or more their doom from the lips of King Darius slaves, who were armed like the inferior himself. Moreover, the men of Athens freemen. Cavalry or archers the Atheniknew that in the camp before them was ans (on this occasion) had none; and the use in the field of military engines was not | ery, or cut to pieces by the invincible veteat that period introduced into ancient war-rans of Cambyses and Cyrus. Moreover, fare. Sparta, the great war-state of Greece, had been applied to and had promised succor to Athens, though the religious observance which the Dorians paid to certain times and seasons had for the present delayed their march. Was it not wise, at any rate, to wait till the Spartans came up, and to have the help of the best troops in Greece, before they exposed themselves to the shock of the dreaded Medes?. Contrasted with their own scanty forces, the Greek commanders saw stretched before them, along the shores of the winding bay, the tents and shipping of the varied nations who marched to do the bidding of the king of the eastern world. The difficulty of finding transports and of securing provisions would form the only limit to the numbers of a Persian army. Nor is there any reason to suppose the estimate of Justin exag- Specious as these reasons might appear, gerated, who rates at 100,000 the force the other five generals were for speedier and which on this occasion had sailed, un- bolder operations. And, fortunately for der the Satraps Datis and Artaphernes, Athens and for the world, one of them was from the Cilician shores against the de- a man, not only of the highest military voted coasts of Euboea and Attica. And genius, but also of that energetic character after largely deducting from this total, so which impresses its own types and ideas as to allow for mere mariners and camp-upon spirits feebler in conception. Miltifollowers, there must still have remained ades, and his ancestors before him, besides fearful odds against the national levies of being of one of the noblest families at the Athenians. Nor could Greek generals Athens, had ruled a large principality in then feel that confidence in the superior the Thracian Chersonese; and when the quality of their troops, which ever since the Persian empire extended itself in that direcbattle of Marathon has animated Euro- tion, Miltiades had been obliged, like many peans in conflicts with Asiatics; as, for in- other small potentates of the time, to acstance, in the after struggles between Greece knowledge the authority of the Great King, and Persia, or when the Roman legions en- and to lead his contingent of men to serve countered the myriads of Mithridates and in the Persian armies. He had, however, Tigranes, or as is the case in the Indian incurred the enmity of the Persians during campaigns of our own regiments. On the their Scythian campaign; his Thracian contrary, up to the day of Marathon the principality had been seized: and he himMedes and Persians were reputed invincible.self, in his flight to Athens, had narrowly They had more than once met Greek troops escaped the hot pursuit of the Phoenician in Asia Minor and had invariably beaten galleys in the Persian service, which actuthem. Nothing can be stronger than the ally took the vessel in which part of his expressions used by the early Greek writers family sailed, and the first-born of Miltirespecting the terror which the name of the ades was at this moment a captive in the Medes inspired, in the prostrations of men's court of King Darius. Practically acspirits before the apparently resistless ca- quainted with the organization of the Perreer of the Persian arms.* It is, therefore, sian armies, Miltiades felt convinced of the little to be wondered at, that five of the ten superiority of the Greek troops, if properly Athenian generals shrank from the pros- handled: he saw with the military eye of a pect of fighting a pitched battle against an great general the advantage which the posienemy so vastly superior in numbers, and tion of the forces gave him for a sudden so formidable in military renown. Their attack, and as a profound politician he felt own position on the heights was strong, and the perils of remaining inactive, and of givoffered great advantages to a small defend- ing treachery time to ruin the Athenian ing force against assailing masses. They cause. deemed it mere foolhardiness to descend One officer in the council of war had not into the plain to be trampled down by the yet voted. This was Callimachus, the Asiatic horse, overwhelmed with the arch- War-Ruler. The votes of the generals were five and five, so that the voice of Callimachus would be decisive. On that vote, in all human probability, the destiny of all the nations of the world depended. Miltiades turned to him, and in simple soldierly eloquence, which we probably read faith * Αθηναίοι πρωτοι ανέσχοντο έσθητα τε Μηδικήν ορεωντες, και τους άνδρας ταύτην εσθημένους - τέως δε ην τοισι Ελλήσι και το ούνομα των Μήδων φόβος ακουσαι. .-HEROD. Αι δε γνώμαι διδουλωμένοι απάντων ανθρώπων ησαν ούτω πολλά και μεγάλα και μάχιμα γένη καταδεδουλωμένη την η Περσών αρχη.-PLATO, |