An instance of the readiness of Mr. Canning’s Muse may be here related.
When Frere had completed the first part of the “Loves of the Triangles,” he exultingly read over the following lines to Canning, and defied him to improve upon them:
“Lo! where the chimney’s sooty tube ascends,
The fair Trochais from the corner bends!
Her coal-black eyes upturned, incessant mark
The eddying smoke, quick flame, and volant spark;
Mark with quick ken, where flashing in between,
Her much-loved smoke-jack glimmers thro’ the scene;
Mark how his various parts together tend,
Point to one purpose,—in one object end;