Fire, Famine, and Slaughter.

A WAR-ECLOGUE.

WITH

AN APOLOGETIC PREFACE.

ME TUMOR IMPULERIT, ME DEVIUS EGERIT ARDOR:
TE TAMEN HAUD DECUIT PARIBUS CONCURRERE TELIS.
EN ADSUM: RENIAM, CONFESSUS CRIMINA, POSCO.

CLAUD. Epist. ad Had.

THERE IS ONE THAT SLIPPETH IN HIS SPEECH, BUT NOT

FROM HIS HEART; AND WHO IS HE THAT HATH NOT offended

WITH HIS TONGUE?

Ecclesiasticus, xix. 16.

T the house of a gentleman, who by the principles and corresponding virtues of a sincere Christian consecrates a cultivated genius and the favorable accidents of birth, opulence, and splendid connexions, it was my good fortune to meet, in a dinner-party, with more men of celebrity in science or polite literature, than are commonly found collected round the same table. In the course of conversation, one of the party reminded an illustrious Poet, then present, of some verses which he had recited that morning, and which had appeared in a newspaper under the name of a War-Eclogue, in which Fire, Famine, and Slaughter, were introduced as the speakers. The gentleman so addressed replied, that he was rather surprised that none of us should have noticed or heard of the Poem, as it had been, at the time, a good deal talked of in Scotland. It may be easily supposed, that my feelings were at this moment not of the most comfortable kind. Of all present, one only knew, or suspected me to be the author;

a man who would have established himself in the first rank of England's living Poets, if the Genius of our country had not decreed that he should rather be the first in the first rank of its Philosophers and scientific Benefactors. It appeared the general wish to hear the lines. As my friend chose to remain silent, I chose to follow his example, and Mr. recited the Poem. This he could do with the better grace, being known to have ever been not only a firm and active Anti-Jacobin and Anti-Gallican, but likewise a zealous admirer of Mr. Pitt, both as a good man and a great Statesman. As a Poet exclusively, he had been amused with the Eclogue; as a Poet, he recited it; and in a spirit, which made it evident, that he would have read and repeated it with the same pleasure, had his own name been attached to the imaginary object or agent.

After the recitation, our amiable host observed, that in his opinion Mr. ***** had over-rated the merits of the poetry; but had they been tenfold greater, they could not have compensated for that malignity of heart, which could alone have prompted sentiments so atrocious. I perceived that my illustrious friend became greatly distressed on my account; but fortunately I was able to preserve fortitude and presence of mind enough to take up the subject without exciting even a suspicion, how nearly and painfully it interested me.