The only deed for
which he is praised, is for having broken off the negotiation for peace;
and for this act of firmness, it is added, Heaven rewarded him with a
share in the honoured grave of Pitt! It is then said, that his errors
should be forgotten, and that he _died_ a Briton--a pretty plain
insinuation, that, in the author's opinion, he did not live one; and
just such an encomium as he himself pronounces over the grave of his
villain hero Marmion. There was no need, surely, to pay compliments to
ministers or princesses, either in the introduction or in the body of a
romance of the 16th century. Yet we have a laboured lamentation over the
Duke of Brunswick, in one of the epistles; and in the heart of the poem,
a triumphant allusion to the siege of Copenhagen--the last exploit,
certainly, of British valour, on which we should have expected a
chivalrous poet to found his patriotic gratulations. We have no
business, however, on this occasion, with the political creed of the
author; and we notice these allusions to objects of temporary interest,
chiefly as instances of bad taste, and additional proofs that the author
does not always recollect, that a poet should address himself to more
than one generation.
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