———“within his lab’ring throat The shrill shriek struggles with the harsh hoarse note.”
As we mean to excite, and not to satisfy at once the curiosity of our readers, we shall here put a period to our extracts for the present. We cannot, however, conclude this essay, without observing, that there are very few lines in the whole work which are at all inferior to those we have selected for the entertainment of our readers.
[1] See the Genealogy, p. xxvii, xxviii.
[2] Lord Graham.
* * * * *
NUMBER III.
In proof of the assurance with which we concluded our last number, we shall now proceed to give the character of SIR RICHARD HILL.
Our Readers, probably, are well acquainted with the worthy Baronet’s promiscuous quotations from the Bible and Rochester; and they may possibly remember (if they were awake, when they read them) some elegant verses, which he repeated in the House of Commons, and afterwards inserted in the public papers, as the production of a sleepless Night. We know not, however, if they may so easily recal to mind his remarkable declaration, both of his Loyalty and Religion, in the prettily-turned phrase, “that indeed he loved King GEORGE very well, but he loved King JESUS better.” But as our Poet has alluded to it, we thought necessary to mention it; and for the same reason to add, that like Lord MAHON, Major SCOTT, Mr. ATKINSON, Mr. WILKES, and Captain J. LUTTRELL, he writes his own speeches for the public Reporters. We should also have been happy to have enlivened our commentary with some extracts from the controversy, at which our Author glances; we mean the answer of Sir Richard to Mr. Madan, on the doctrine of Polygamy; a subject, which the tenour of our Baronet’s reading in his two favourite books, peculiarly qualified him to handle with equally pleasantry and orthodoxy. But all our industry to procure his pamphlet unfortunately proved ineffectual. We never saw more of it than the title-page, which we formerly purchased in the lining of a trunk, at the corner of St. Paul’s Church-yard.
We are conscious, that these introductory explanations must seem doubly dull, to Readers impatient for such exquisite poetry as the ROLLIAD. They appeared, however, indispensible to the due understanding of the verses, which we shall now give without further preface.
Brother of ROWLAND, or, if yet more dear
Sounds thy new title, Cousin of a Peer;
Scholar of various learning, good or evil,
Alike what God inspir’d, or what the Devil;
Speaker well skill’d, what no man hears, to write;
Sleep-giving Poet, of a sleepless night;
Polemic, Politician, Saint, and Wit,
Now lashing MADAN, now defending PITT;
Thy praise shall live till time itself be o’er,
Friend of King GEORGE, tho’ of King JESUS more!