les,
and a second time, when the shade of Agamemnon speaks among the dead.
That awful spectre, called up by genius in after-time, shook the
Athenian stage. That scene was ever before me; father and daughter
were ever in my sight; I felt their looks, their words, and again I
gave them form and utterance; and, with proud humility, I say it_--

"I am tragedian in this scene alone.
Station the Greek and Briton side by side
And if derision be deserved--deride."

_Surely there can be no fairer method of overturning an offensive
reputation, from which the scaffolding is not yet taken down, than
by placing against it the best passages, and most nearly parallel,
in the subject, from AEschylus and Sophocles. To this labour the
whole body of the Scotch critics and poets are invited, and, moreover,
to add the ornaments of translation_. [120]

[Footnote 120: This strange rhapsody is verily Mr. Landor's. It is
extracted from his "Satire on the Satirists."]

_North_.--So you are not only a match for AEschylus and Sophocles,
but on a par with "almighty Homer when he is far above Olympus and
Jove." Oh! ho! ho! As you have long since recorded that modest
opinion of yourself in print, and not been lodged in Bedlam for it,
I will not now take upon myself to send for a straight-waistcoat.

_Landor_.--Is this the treatment I receive fron the Editor of
_Blackwood's Magazine_, in return for my condescension in offering
him my assistance? Give me back my manuscript, sir. I was indeed a
fool to come hither. I see how it is. You Scotchmen are all alike.
We consider no part of God's creation so cringing, so insatiable, so
ungrateful as the Scotch: nevertheless, we see them hang together by
the claws, like bats; and they bite and scratch you to the bone if
you attempt to put an Englishman in the midst of them. [121] But you
shall answer for this usage, Mr. North: you shall suffer for it.
These two fingers have more power than all your malice, sir, even if
you had the two Houses of Parliament to back you. A pen! You shall
live for it. [122]

[Footnote 121: Imaginary Conversations, vol. iv, p. 283.]

[Footnote 122: Ibid. vol. i. p. 126.]

_North_.--Fair and softly, Mr. Landor; I have not rejected your
article yet. I am going to be generous. Notwithstanding all your
abuse of Blackwood and his countrymen, I consent to exhibit you to
the world as a Contributor to _Blackwood's Magazine_, and, in the
teeth of all your recorde