And meads lays waste before his sweeping hand."
—Gay's Pastorals, p. 5, l. 39, etc.
[125] When I was very young, I once paid a morning visit to a poet. Upon his table was Byshe's Art of Poetry. I naturally observed, "Your manager of a puppet-show is more prudent than you are; he keeps his wires out of sight." So tremblingly alive are these valets to the Muses, that this good-natured hint, which had its source in a wish to serve him, was never forgiven.
[126] This excellent paper is now no more; but our modern poets and poetesses have a still more extended channel in which to pour out their warm effusions. Reams of good white paper are daily metamorphosed, and become magazines, newspapers, and, though last mentioned, not less in regard, auctioneer's catalogues. That the last named is as poetical as are the two former, many examples might be adduced to prove. One shall suffice, and that one is so bespangled with beauteous metaphors, that, though neither in rhyme nor blank verse, yet, from its brilliancy of colouring and splendour of diction, it must be classed amongst the most sublime compositions of our most sublime bards. Thus is a sale announced:—"Particulars and conditions of sale of that elegant freehold villa called Luxborough, which will be sold on the 26th of June 1765, together with the several farms that encompass the premises, containing in the whole near six hundred acres of rich arable meadow, pasture, and woodland, lying and being in an extensive vale, whose surrounding acclivities are nobly clothed, and, rising in magnifique form, exhibit luxuriant prospects of unequalled richness and beauty.
"The pleasure-ground is comprised in a space of eleven acres, encompassed with ha-ha! and grub walls. The elegant disposition of the ground is beautifully improved with vistas, groves, and plantations, through which walks wind in extensive circuit. Store-ponds and elevated basons occupy the areas, regale those fragrant coverts, and afford a constant and inexhaustible supply of water for the house, by means of lead pipes, aqueducts, etc.
"Nature, propitious, hath luxuriantly featured the circumadjacent grounds, and art hath been judiciously introduced to give richness and effect. The lawn swells with gentle rise and easy slopes; clumps of trees are placed in pleasing irregularity; a serpentine stream flows through the vale, heightening the verdure of the divided pasture; and the villages of Chigwell, Woodford, and Woodford Bridge, dawn through that mass of prolific richness which fills the wide expanse."
[127] Had the artist given this speaking countenance to the girl who is exhibited in the first print of the "Rake's Progress," how much more should we have been interested in her situation?
[128] When this was first published, the following quotation from Pope's Dunciad was inscribed under the print:—
"Studious he sate, with all his books around,
Sinking from thought to thought, a vast profound: