_North_.--And their literature!

_Landor_.--And their literature. As to their poets, bad as Ariosto
is, divide the Orlando into three parts, and take the worst of them,
and although it may contain a large portion of extremely vile poetry,
it will contain more of good than the whole French language. [105]

[Footnote 105: Vol. i. p. 290.]

_North_.--Is Boileau so very contemptible?

_Landor_.--Beneath contempt. He is a grub. [106]

[Footnote 106: See Mr. Landor's Polite Conversation with De Lille,
Vol. i. and Note at the end, p. 309, 310.]

_North_.--Racine?

_Landor_.--Diffuse, feeble, and, like Boileau, meanly thievish.
The most admired verse of Racine is stolen, [107] so is almost every other
that is of any value.

[Footnote 107: Vol. i. p. 293, 294.]

_North_.--But Voltaire, Mr. Landor?

_Landor_.--Voltaire, sir, was a man of abilities, and author of
many passable epigrams, besides those which are contained in his
tragedies and heroics, [108] though, like Parisian lackeys, they are
usually the smartest when out of place. I tell you I detest and
abominate every thing French. [109]

[Footnote 108: Vol. i. p. 254.]

[Footnote 109: We, however, find Mr. Landor giving the French credit
for their proceedings in one remarkable instance, and it is so
seldom that we catch him in good-humour with any thing, that we will
not miss an opportunity of exhibiting him in an amiable light. This
champion of the liberties of the world, who has cracked his lungs in
endeavouring, on the shores of Italy, to echo the lament of Byron
over Greece, and who denounced the powers of Europe for suffering
the Duke d'Angouleme to assist his cousin Ferdinand in retaking the
Trocadero, yet approves of French proceedings in Spain on a previous
occasion. Admiring reader! you shall hear Sir Oracle himself again:--
"The laws and institutions introduced by the French into Spain were
excellent, and the _king_" (Joseph Bonaparte!) "was liberal, affable,
sensible, and humane." Poor Trelawney, the friend of Byron, is made
to talk thus! Both Trelawney and Odysseus the noble Greek, to whom
he addresses himself, were more likely to participate in the
"indignation of a high-minded Spaniard," so vividly expressed by a
high-minded Englishman in the following sonnet:--

"We can endure that he should waste our lands,
Despoil our temples, and, by sword and flame,
Return us to the dust from which we came;
Such food a tyrant's appetite demands: