re be anything ridiculous, let it be attributed to me, at least as
much as to Mr. Wordsworth: of whom there can exist few greater admirers
than myself. I have blended what I would deem to be the beauties as well
as defects of his style; and it ought to be remembered, that, in such
things, whether there be praise or dispraise, there is always what is
called a compliment, however unintentional." There is, as Scott points
out, a much closer resemblance to Southey's "_English Eclogues,_ in
which moral truths are expressed, to use the poet's own language, 'in an
almost colloquial plainness of language,' and an air of quaint and
original expression assumed, to render the sentiment at once impressive
and _piquant_."]

[61] {47}[Compare--

"The under-earth inhabitants--are they
But mingled millions decomposed to clay?"

_A Fragment_, lines 23, 24, _vide post_, p. 52.

It is difficult to "extricate" the meaning of lines 19-25, but, perhaps,
they are intended to convey a hope of immortality. "As I was speaking,
the sexton (the architect) tried to answer my question by taxing his
memory with regard to the occupants of the several tombs. He might well
be puzzled, for 'Earth is but a tombstone,' covering an amalgam of dead
bodies, and, unless in another life soul were separated from soul, as on
earth body is distinct from body, Newton himself, who disclosed 'the
turnpike-road through the unpaved stars' (_Don Juan_, Canto X. stanza
ii. line 4), would fail to assign its proper personality to any given
lump of clay."]

[62] {48}[Compare--

"But here [i.e. in 'the realm of death'] all is
So shadowy and so full of twilight, that
It speaks of a day past."

_Cain_, act ii. sc. 2.

[63] ["Selected," that is, by "frequent travellers" (_vide supra_, line
12).]

[l]

----_then most pleased, I shook_
_My inmost pocket's most retired nook,_
_And out fell five and sixpence_.--[MS.]

[64] [Byron was a lover and worshipper of Prometheus as a boy. His first
English exercise at Harrow was a paraphrase of a chorus of the
_Prometheus Vinctus_ of AEschylus, line 528, _sq._ (see _Poetical Works_,
1898, i. 14). Referring to a criticism on _Manfred_ (_Edinburgh Review_,
vol xxviii. p. 431) he writes (October 12, 1817, _Letters_, 1900, iv.
174): "The _Prometheus_, if not exactly in my plan, has always been so
much in m