PREFACEIMITATION OF HORACEEp. 20.—B. 1.Methinks, Oh! vain ill-judging Book,I see thee cast a wishful look,Where reputations won and lost areIn famous row called Paternoster.Incensed to find your precious olioBuried in unexplored port-folio,You scorn the prudent lock and key,And pant well bound and gilt to seeYour Volume in the window setOf Stockdale, Hookham, or Debrett.Go then, and pass that dangerous bournWhence never Book can back return:And when you find, condemned, despised,Neglected, blamed, and criticised,Abuse from All who read you fall,(If haply you be read at allSorely will you your folly sigh at,And wish for me, and home, and quiet.Assuming now a conjuror’s office, IThus on your future Fortune prophesy:—Soon as your novelty is o’er,And you are young and new no more,In some dark dirty corner thrown,Mouldy with damps, with cobwebs strown,Your leaves shall be the Book-worm’s prey;Or sent to Chandler-Shop away,And doomed to suffer public scandal,Shall line the trunk, or wrap the candle!But should you meet with approbation,And some one find an inclinationTo ask, by natural transitionRespecting me and my condition;That I am one, the enquirer teach,Nor very poor, nor very rich;Of passions strong, of hasty nature,Of graceless form and dwarfish stature;By few approved, and few approving;Extreme in hating and in loving;Abhorring all whom I dislike,Adoring who my fancy strike;In forming judgements never long,And for the most part judging wrong;In friendship firm, but still believingOthers are treacherous and deceiving,And thinking in the present aeraThat Friendship is a pure chimaera:More passionate no creature living,Proud, obstinate, and unforgiving,But yet for those who kindness show,Ready through fire and smoke to go.Again, should it be asked your page,“Pray, what may be the author’s age?”Your faults, no doubt, will make it clear,I scarce have seen my twentieth year,Which passed, kind Reader, on my word,While England’s Throne held George the Third.Now then your venturous course pursue:Go, my delight! Dear Book, adieu!M. G. L.Hague,Oct. 28, 1794.ADVERTISEMENTThe first idea of this Romance was suggested by the story of theSanton Barsisa, related in The Guardian.—TheBleeding Nunis a tradition still credited in many parts of Germany; and I have been told that the ruins of the Castle ofLauenstein, which She is supposed to haunt, may yet be seen upon the borders ofThuringia.—The Water-King, from the third to the twelfth stanza, is the fragment of an original Danish Ballad—AndBelerma and Durandarteis translated from some stanzas to be found in a collection of old Spanish poetry, which contains also the popular song ofGayferos and Melesindra, mentioned in Don Quixote.—I have now made a full avowal of all the plagiarisms of which I am aware myself; but I doubt not, many more may be found, of which I am at present totally unconscious.
IMITATION OF HORACEEp. 20.—B. 1.
Methinks, Oh! vain ill-judging Book,I see thee cast a wishful look,Where reputations won and lost areIn famous row called Paternoster.Incensed to find your precious olioBuried in unexplored port-folio,You scorn the prudent lock and key,And pant well bound and gilt to seeYour Volume in the window setOf Stockdale, Hookham, or Debrett.Go then, and pass that dangerous bournWhence never Book can back return:And when you find, condemned, despised,Neglected, blamed, and criticised,Abuse from All who read you fall,(If haply you be read at allSorely will you your folly sigh at,And wish for me, and home, and quiet.Assuming now a conjuror’s office, IThus on your future Fortune prophesy:—Soon as your novelty is o’er,And you are young and new no more,In some dark dirty corner thrown,Mouldy with damps, with cobwebs strown,Your leaves shall be the Book-worm’s prey;Or sent to Chandler-Shop away,And doomed to suffer public scandal,Shall line the trunk, or wrap the candle!But should you meet with approbation,And some one find an inclinationTo ask, by natural transitionRespecting me and my condition;That I am one, the enquirer teach,Nor very poor, nor very rich;Of passions strong, of hasty nature,Of graceless form and dwarfish stature;By few approved, and few approving;Extreme in hating and in loving;Abhorring all whom I dislike,Adoring who my fancy strike;In forming judgements never long,And for the most part judging wrong;In friendship firm, but still believingOthers are treacherous and deceiving,And thinking in the present aeraThat Friendship is a pure chimaera:More passionate no creature living,Proud, obstinate, and unforgiving,But yet for those who kindness show,Ready through fire and smoke to go.Again, should it be asked your page,“Pray, what may be the author’s age?”Your faults, no doubt, will make it clear,I scarce have seen my twentieth year,Which passed, kind Reader, on my word,While England’s Throne held George the Third.Now then your venturous course pursue:Go, my delight! Dear Book, adieu!
M. G. L.
Hague,Oct. 28, 1794.
The first idea of this Romance was suggested by the story of theSanton Barsisa, related in The Guardian.—TheBleeding Nunis a tradition still credited in many parts of Germany; and I have been told that the ruins of the Castle ofLauenstein, which She is supposed to haunt, may yet be seen upon the borders ofThuringia.—The Water-King, from the third to the twelfth stanza, is the fragment of an original Danish Ballad—AndBelerma and Durandarteis translated from some stanzas to be found in a collection of old Spanish poetry, which contains also the popular song ofGayferos and Melesindra, mentioned in Don Quixote.—I have now made a full avowal of all the plagiarisms of which I am aware myself; but I doubt not, many more may be found, of which I am at present totally unconscious.