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And gave new edge to Lusitania's sword,
And taught her sons forgotten arms to wield--
Shivered my harp, and burst its every chord,

If it forget thy worth, victorious BERESFORD;' p. 64-66. Perhaps it is our nationality which makes us like better the following tribute to General Graham-though there is something, we believe, in the softness of the sentiment that will be felt, even by English readers, as a relief from the exceeding clamour and loud boastings of all the surrounding stanzas.

'Nor be his praise o'erpast who strove to hide

Beneath the warrior's vest affection's wound,

Whose wish, Heaven for his country's weal denied ;
Danger and fate he sought, but glory found.
From clime to clime, where'er war's trumpets sound,
The wanderer went; yet, Caledonia! still
Thine was his thought in march and tented ground;

He dreamed mid Alpine cliffs of Athole's hill,

And heard in Ebro's roar his Lyndoch's lovely rill.' p. 67.

We are not very apt to quarrel with a poet for his politics;and really supposed it next to impossible that Mr. Scott should have given us any ground of dissatisfaction on this score, in the management of his present theme. Lord Wellington and his fellow-soldiers have well deserved the laurels they have won ;-nor is there one British heart, we believe, that will not feel proud and grateful for all the honours with which British genius can invest their names. In the praises which Mr. Scott has bestowed, therefore, all his readers will sympathize; but for those which he has withheld, there are some that will not so readily forgive him: And in our eyes, we will confess, it is a sin not easily to be expiated, that in a poem written substantially for the purpose of commemorating the brave who have fought or fallen in Spain and Portugal, and written by a Scotchman,-there should be no mention of the name of MOORE!-of the only commander in chief who has fallen in this memorable contest;-of a commander who was acknowledged as the model and pattern of a British soldier, when British soldiers stood most in need of such an example ;-and was, at the same time, distinguished not less for every manly virtue and generous affection, than for skill and gallantry in his profession. A more pure, or a more exalted character, certainly has not yet appeared upon that scene which Mr. Scott has sought to illustrate with the splendour of his genius; and it is with a mixture of shame and indignation, that we find him grudging a single ray of that profuse and readily yielded glory to gild the grave of his lamented countryman. To offer a lavish tribute of praise to the living, whose task is still incomplete, may be generous and

munificent; but, to departed merit, it is due in strictness of justice. Who will deny that Sir John Moore was all that we have now said of him?-or who will doubt that his untimely death, in the hour of victory, would have been eagerly seized upon by an impartial poet, as a noble theme for generous lamentation and eloquent praise?-But Mr. Scott's political friends have fancied it for their interest to calumniate the memory of this illustrious and accomplished person;*-and Mr. Scott has permitted the spirit of party to stand in the way, not only of poetical justice, but of patriotic and generous feeling.

It is this for which we grieve, and feel ashamed;-this hardening and deadening effect of political animosities, in cases where politics should have nothing to do;-this apparent perversion, not merely of the judgment, but of the heart;-this implacable resentment, which wars not only with the living but with the dead;—and thinks it a reason for defrauding a departed warrior of his glory, that a political antagonist has been zealous in his praise. Those things are lamentable; and they cannot be alluded to without some emotions of sorrow and resentment. But they affect not the fame of him, on whose account these emotions are suggested. The wars of Spain, and the merits of Sir John Moore, will be commemorated in a more impartial, and a more impe

• When we recollect the terms of high respect and veneration with which Sir John Moore was mentioned by the Commander-in-chief, in his general orders, and even by his Majesty's ministers in Parliament, and compare it with the poor scurrilities that have since been vented by persons calling themselves their friends, we cannot fail to be struck with the perpetual union of Fancour with vulgarity, and with the infinite superiority that the true heads and leaders of parties always possess, in point of liberality, over their baser retainers. The same thing may be observed in the tone of the different classes of writers by whom parties are supported. Mr. Scott, for instance, only passes Sir John Moore over in silence, and condemns him to rest without his fame." But an ingenious person, who compiles what he calls the History of Europe, for the Edinburgh Annual Register, does not hesitate to say, that the plans of government were frustrated by the pusillanimity' of that gallant general!But this is as it should be ;-for he afterwards goes on to prove every one of his movements to have been wrong, by this very decisive circumstance, that they are all severely censured in the bulletins of the French army! that is to say, in those bulletins that have always censured most severely the movements which have given them the most trouble; and have not ceased to censure Lord Wellington, from his victory at Talavera down to his victory at Albuera. The annalist, however, proceeds to show, that if Sir John Moore and his colleague, had not despaired of the Spanish cause, they would have found reinforcements at Corunna, by the help of which the French must inevitably have been destroyed :-not a man of Soult's army would have escaped! This is delightful,—and it is only a specimen of the author's fairness, modesty, and knowledge upon all other subjects. The misfortune is, that his annual volume is rather too long to be conveniently read through within the year. In this, to which we have referred, he fills eight hundred close printed pages of double columns with the transactions of one year,-nearly as much, We take it, as one third of Hume's whole history.

rishable record, than the vision of Don Roderick; and his humble monument in the citadel of Corunna, will draw the tears and the admiration of thousands, who concern not themselves about the exploits of his more fortunate associates.

From reflections like these we cannot return to point out the verbal inaccuracies of Mr. Scott, or his faults of versification. The former are at least as numerous in this, as in any of his former productions ;-the latter, though less frequent, are of a more offensive character. Upon the whole, we can hardly recommend it to him to leave his own old style for that of which he has here presented us with a specimen ;-and earnestly entreat him not to throw away his fine talents upon subjects of temporary interest; subjects on which a bombastical pamphlet will always produce more present effect than the most exquisite poetry,—and to which no poetical merit will ever be able to draw the attention of pos terity.

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