lectual improvement might I not gather in this wonderful country!" "At present," he adds, and we may imagine him sighing as he made the sad confession, "at present I write little else but poetry, and little of that . . . I consider poetry very subordinate to moral and political science, and if I were well certainly I would aspire to the latter; for I can conceive a great work embodying the discoveries of all ages and harmonising the contending creeds by which mankind have been ruled." After all this it comes as a relief to read "Far from me is such an attempt." His work, despite Matthew Arnold's surmise, was to "write little else but poetry," and fortunately his political mood soon passed. Perhaps a remark at the end of the letter from which we have quoted (referring to a slight derangement of the liver) may partly explain it. It is natural that an intellect so feverishly active as Shelley's should be continuously sketching out new plans for the future, and his correspondence gives ample indication that this was so. "I am full of all kinds of literary plans," he says more than once; and in another place, speaking more definitely, "my thoughts aspire to a production of a far higher character than [Charles the First] but the execution of it will require some years. I write what I write chiefly to inquire by the reception which my writings meet with how far I am fit for so great a task." If Shelley had seriously troubled himself about the reception given to his poems he might well have dissuaded himself from furnishing any more "jingling food for the hunger of oblivion;" but fortunately for mankind he did not suffer his faint welcome to interfere with his productiveness.

It is unlikely that what "Trollope called Thackeray's idleness lost the world another "Esmond" or another "Barry Lyndon." At the same time, procrastination was always a characteristic of the great novelist from the time when at Cambridge he entered in his diary, "No news to-day, but strong resolutions for to-morrow," to his later 718

LIVING AGE.

VOL. XIV.

and busier years. At eighteen he proposed to write for a college prize an essay on the influence of the Homeric poems on the religion, the politics, the literature, and the society of Greece, but modestly conceded that the subject would require more study than he had time to give it; then, when his brief career at college had come to a close, we find him at Weimar on visiting terms with Goethe but with a preference for Schiller, whose works he proposes to translate, apparently in their entirety. In a letter to his mother he quotes a little stanza as expressing Schiller's opinion, "or rather, as is said in an admirable translation of that great poet by a rising young man of the name of Thackeray." In the same vein, half serious, half in jest, he declared in after years that he was going to write a novel of Henry the Fifth's time in which the ancestors of his most famous characters should figure. It was to be "a most magnificent performance, and nobody would read it." A more serious loss is the history of the reign of Anne for which at the time of his death he had made considerable preparation by the accumulation of material. This work, for which he had some striking qualifications, was destined to remain unwritten, together with Goldsmith's "Dictionary of Arts and Sciences," Ascham's "Book of the Cockpit," and Adam Smith's great work on law and government of which "The Wealth of Nations" was to form but a small section.

In the preface to the first volume of his Conversations Landor describes a literary ambition that had long held a place in his thoughts. "Should health and peace of mind remain to me," runs the passage, "and the enjoy ment of a country where if there are none to assist at least there is none to molest me, I hope to leave behind me completed the great object of my studies, an orderly and solid work in history, and I cherish the persuasion that posterity will not confound me with the Coxes and Foxes of the age." His anxiety to figure as an historian reminds us rather of "Raphael's sonnets,

Dante's picture," but it was a design that haunted him for many years. Originally it had been his idea to join forces with Southey; but gradually the thought of collaboration died out and the scheme developed into one for a history of England from 1775 to be exhibited in a series of letters. That some part of this work was actually written we are informed in one of Landor's political pamphlets entitled "Letters of a Conservative," in which he speaks of his original intention as being well known ΤΟ many distinguished men; the title which he intended to give the work being bestowed on the pamphlet instead. In those letters he had attempted, he says, "to trace and to expose the faults and fallacies of every administration from the beginning of the year 1775;" but they were all thrown into the fire. Landor, like Collins, was in the habit of putting his compositions in the fire when anything happened to excite his temper, which, as we know, was very easily excited. As early as 1811, when Longman rejected his "Count Julian," he committed his new tragedy of "Ferranti and Giulio" to the flames, with a vow that no verse of his should thereafter be committed to anything else. Fortunately his resentment did not last very long; but at times it would break out again, and the destruction of more manuscripts would be necessary to appease it.

Much that Ben Jonson wrote went also into the fire, but not with his will. In his poem on the burning of his library Jonson gives a list of the lost manuscripts, one of which was the narrative of his journey into Scotland. While he was in that country he informed Drummond of his intention to write such an account, and at the same time spoke of a "fisher or pastoral" play that was engaging his thoughts, the scene of which was to be laid near Loch Lomond. Both these works are missing; the former is known to have been burned, the second was probably never written. It would have been a particularly interesting play in view of the dramatist's problematical Scot

tish descent. There is not much doubt that his forbears were of Border origin, and two of his lost plays certainly dealt with Scottish subjects, "The Scot's Tragedy" and "Robert the Second, King of Scots;" on the other hand there is the statement that the objection taken to "Eastward Ho" by those in authority was that it contained "something against the Scots." One may assume, however, that on the whole his attitude towards the Scottish people would have been more complimentary than that of his namesake of the eighteenth century. Besides this play he had it in his heart to write an epic to celebrate the heroes of his own time, and another to perform a similar kind office for the famous women of the same age; but neither of these projects came to anything.

Elizabethan writers seem to have been quite conscious of the greatness of their own time, and were anxious to leave no doubtful record of it behind them. Many years before the idea of his "Heroologia" had come to Jonson there was a young writer exercising his satirical pen on the people he saw around him. This led him incidentally to a defence of plays and, in the course of a spirited attack upon the actor's enemies, Nash takes occasion to commend the English practitioners in that profession, especially the subsequent founder of Dulwich College, famous Ned Allen. "If I ever write anything in Latin (as I hope one day I shall)," he says, “not a man of any desert here amongst us but I will have up. Tarleton, Ned Allen, knell, Bentley shall be made known to France, Spain, and Italy and not a part that they surmounted in more than other but I will there note and set down with the manner of their habits and attire." Unfortunately Nash died before he could carry out his intention. Had he achieved his desire our scanty knowledge of the Elizabethan stage would have received a valuable supplement, though if he had persevered in his design to use Latin for his purpose his book would have lost a great charm in the eyes of those who are able to ad

clared that he remembered the poet reading from his note-book the titles of no less than eighteen separate works which he had made up his mind to write, and not one of which ever saw the light. The work which advanced most nearly to completion was, according to the same authority, "Translations of the Modern Latin Poets" in two volumes octavo, of which Coleridge had really proceeded so far as to print a prospectus. It is easy to follow Cottle's lead and make fun of poor Coleridge for inconsistencies and discrepancies which all can see; but if any one is disposed to condemn him, let him read this passage from his "Table Talk," in which the dreamer pleads extenuation with all the sensitive eloquence that at all times characterized him, and then perhaps judgment will not be so harsh.

the

There are two sides to every question. If thou hast genius and poverty to thy lot, dwell on the foolish, perplexing, imprudent, dangerous, and even immoral, conduct of promise-breach in small things, of want of punctuality, of procrastination in all its shapes and disguises. . . . But if thy fate should be different, shouldst thou possess competence, health and ease of mind, and then be thyself called upon to judge such faults in another so gifted-O! then, upon the other view of the question, say, Am I in ease and comfort, and dare I wonder that he, poor fellow, acted so and so? Dare I accuse him? Ought I not to shadow forth to myself that, glad and luxuriating in a short escape from anxiety, his mind over-promised for itself; that, want combating with his eager desire to produce things worthy of fame, he dreamed of the nobler when he should have been producing the meaner, and so had the meaner obtruded on his moral being, when the nobler was making full way on his intellectual. . . . Take him in his whole-his head, his heart, his wishes, his innocence of all selfish crime, and, a hundred years hence, what will be the result? The good-were it but a single volume that made truth more visible, and goodness more lovely, and pleasure at once more akin to virtue and, self-doubled, more pleasurable! And the evil-while he lived, it injured none but himself; and where is it now? In his grave. Follow it not thither.

From Good Words. THE PATRIOT SONGS OF GREECE. The interposition of Greece in the troubles of Crete carries one's thoughts back to that stormy period, between 1770 and 1830, which closed with the recognition of the independence of the kingdom of Greece. It was a time rich in story and song-a Homeric time in the country of Homer; and it is singular how little it is remembered in this country or rather how little many of its most picturesque episodes have ever been known.

Perhaps the best possible way to enlist the sympathy and interest of the general reader in this past time is to give a few renderings of some of the popular songs of that epoch-songs which yet linger in remote corners of Greece, where there are still aged grandfathers who can remember the heroes of some of the later ballads.

We must explain, to begin with, that this long protracted conflict between Greece and Turkey was mainly a guerilla warfare, carried on by Greek Highlanders dwelling on the mountains

to which their forefathers had been driven as to well-nigh impregnable These men were called fortresses. "Klephts," and from time to time their numbers were augmented by the people of the plains, as tyranny became too bitter, or taxation too extortionate.

It may be noted that these songs-as is always the case with songs which spring, simple and strong, from the heart of a people are dramatic in form, and waste no words either in "description" or "sentiment." They have been intended for sympathetic and comprehending ears, on which every phrase would tell for its full value.

One of the oldest of these ballads recounts how certain Moslem rulers, desiring the death of a leading "Klepht," sought to compass it by guile, sending on the errand a Moslem who had been on friendly terms with the Greek. But the Moslem's heart failed him at the treachery, and though he did not refuse his errand he avowed it.

Three birds are seated on the heights above the outpost of the Klephts: One looks towards Armyros, the other to the way of Valtos;

And take him and hang him before his door, and take his little son,

And take all his wealth, and take care you do not lose a pin."

"Passers-by, what has become of Christos Milionis, for we see him not on the hills?"

"Bird," they answer, "they have told us he has crossed Arcania;

left the port and sailed to Achelos. He flew like a bird; he went like an arrow. Michalis Bey, as soon as he saw him, advanced to meet him.

"Be welcome, my lord," he said. "Be seated with us at breakfast."

oners the Cadi and two agas.

The Pasha has heard of this, and is griev

ously incensed;

He calls two of his council and he says, 'if you would do yourselves good, If you would have honors, go and kill Christos-this Captain Milionis,

For the Sultan has ordered it; he has sent his firman.''

The fatal day came-and oh, would it had not been he! Soliman is sent to search for Christos.

He goes, and he meets him in Armyros, and they embrace as old friends should.

All night they drink together, till day draws near, and as the dawn breaks they rise to part. Then Soliman cries to the Captain Mi

lionis: "Christos, the Sultan wants thee and so do his agas." "As long as Christos lives, he will never give himself up to the Turks." And they ran, and aimed their guns at each other: they fired again and again.

And they fell, both together, slain, upon the spot.

Another old song relates to the fate of a wealthy Greek living in peace and security.

I will tell you a story that will make you wonder.

There was a certain Greek named Kyritsos Michalis.

He possessed great riches and was held in much honor.

And he lived quietly in his own house, and

there was no malice in his heart. But somebody wrote a letter to the divana mischievous letter

And it said he troubled his neighborhood and was secretly plotting. As soon as the Sultan heard this, he got very angry and called to an official,

saying,

"Go quickly to Achelos-to the dwelling of Michalis,

And he threw his rope, and threw it round the neck of Michalis.

And so he took him and hung him before his door.

And then he sought for his little son and carried him off.

And put him in the ship with all the treasure of his father.

Was it any wonder that another song -one of many-declared by the mouth of a famous "Klepht" and his warriors:

Never heed that the passes belong to the Turks.

Never care that they are full of Albanians: Sterghios as long as he lives, will make no note of the pachas;

So long as there is snow on these mountains, we will never submit to the Turks.

Rather will we lodge in the lair of the wolves.

Let slaves live in the cities and on the plains, beside the Infidels:

But the cities of the brave men are in the solitudes of the mountain tops. Rather than live with the Turks we will live with the wild beasts.