[13]. The Editor of the Englishman for many years was a Mr. Radcliffe. He had been formerly attached to some of our embassies into Italy, where his lady accompanied him; and here she imbibed that taste for picturesque scenery, and the obscure and wild superstitions of mouldering castles, of which she has made so beautiful a use in her Romances. The fair authoress kept herself almost as much incognito as the Author of Waverley; nothing was known of her but her name in the title-page. She never appeared in public, nor mingled in private society, but kept herself apart, like the sweet bird that sings its solitary notes, shrowded and unseen.
[14]. Many of these articles (particularly the Theatrical Criticism) are unavoidably written over night, just as the paper is going to the press, without correction or previous preparation. Yet they will often stand a comparison with more laboured compositions. It is curious, that what is done at so short a notice should bear so few marks of haste. In fact, there is a kind of extempore writing, as well as extempore speaking. Both are the effect of necessity and habit. If a man has but words and ideas in his head, he can express himself in a longer or a shorter time (with a little practice), just as he has a motive for doing it. Where there is the necessary stimulus for making the effort, what is given from a first impression, what is struck off at a blow, is in many respects better than what is produced on reflection, and at several heats.
[15]. One of Mr. Landor’s refinements in spelling.
[16]. ‘Calculating the prices of provisions, and the increase of taxes, the poet-laureate, in the time of Elizabeth, had about four times as much as at present: so that Cecil spoke reasonably, Elizabeth royally.’—Note by the Author.
We were unwilling to suppress this hint for the increase of the laureate’s salary, considering how worthily the situation is filled at present; and Mr. Landor’s recommendation must be peremptory at court. We observe that our author’s spelling of the word ‘laureate’ is the same as Mr. Southey’s. Is the latter indebted to the same source for the learned Orientalism of Tâtar for Tartar? What a significant age we live in! How many extravagant conclusions and false assumptions lurk under that one orthoepy! He who innovates in things where custom alone is concerned, must be proof against its suggestions in all other cases; and when reason and fancy come into play, must indeed be a law to himself.
[17]. We do not see this question in the same point of view as our author. By his leave (as a mere general and speculative question), the conquerors become amalgamated with the conquered: barbarism becomes civilized. The claim of tyrants to rule over slaves is the only principle that is eternal. These are the only two races, whose interests are never reconciled.
[18]. ‘Ææa, the island of Circe.’
[19]. ‘The viper was the armorial device of the Visconti, tyrants of Milan.’
[20]. Lectures on the Dramatic Literature of the Age of Elizabeth.
[21]. ‘The pavilions of the Caliphs of Bagdad were not so deliciously placed, nor so sumptuously raised, as this retreat of the self-denying brotherhood of the Certosa. It was founded in the fourteenth century by Charles, son of Robert of Arragon, King of Naples.’