With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
The lifted axe, the agonising wheel,

Luke's iron crown,' and Damien's bed of steel,2
To men remote from power but rarely known,
Leave reason, faith, and conscience all our own.

Luke's iron crow rown.-George Dosa, or Doscha, headed an insurrection of the Hungarian peasants (called Szeklers or Sicules) against the nobles in the reign of Ladislas II. in 1513, and was proclaimed king. They committed great cruelties, till they were defeated upon several occasions by the Veivode of Transylvania, John Zapolski, and finally subdued, when George and his brother Luke were taken prisoners. George (not Luke), in derision, was placed on a throne, with a crown on his head and a sceptre in his hand, all of red-hot iron; while still alive his veins were opened, and Luke was forced to drink the blood that flowed from them. The horrible tortures which they suffered are detailed in the "Nouvelle Biographie Universelle," voce Dosa. The name of Szeklers obviously gave rise to the mistake of calling these brothers by the name of Szeck. It is remarkable that in the Abbé Brenner's "Histoire des Revolutions de Hongaries," La Haye, 1739, vol. i., p. 99, George is called by the name of Szekely.

2 Damien's bed of steel-Robert Francois Damien, known as Robert le Diable, was a man of savage and moody disposition and disordered intellect. Upon the 5th of January, 1757, he attempted the life of Louis XV., by wounding him with a knife as he was going into his carriage. Damien was seized, and put to the torture to force a confession of his accomplices, but in vain. He was put to death on the 28th of March, in a manner too revolting to detail, and bore his tortures with unflinching firmness. See "Nouvelle Biographie Universelle," voce Damien. Tom Davis, in a letter to Granger, says that by the "bed of steel" Goldsmith meant the rack,

The Haunch of Venison.

A POETICAL EPISTLE TO LORD CLARE.

A

INTRODUCTION.

MONGST the intimate friends of Goldsmith was one Robert Nugent

On in

an Irishman, jovial, social, and not over-refined-tall, awkward, goodhumoured, and bold-possessed of a ready wit and no mean poetical ability. He was for many years an active member of the House of Commons, and the accession of the Chatham Administration he was raised to the peerage, 1766, as Baron Nugent and Viscount Clare, and ten years afterwards created Earl Nugent. The poet passed much time with the peer at his seat at Gosfield Park, in Essex, in unrestrained and joyous intercourse. On one occasion-probably early in 1771-the peer sent the poet a haunch of venison, and received in return the poem which follows, and which was not published till 1776.

This charming little piece has done more to preserve the memory of Lord Nugent than either his politics or his poetry. His peerage of Clare is extinct, but the name of the donor of 'the haunch of venison' will be always remembered.

Lively, graceful, and finished; harmless in its satire, and comic in its delineations of character, no doubt drawn from the life, it nowhere violates good taste or good feeling. Mr. Croker observes that Goldsmith "ought to have confessed that he borrowed the idea and some of the details from Boileau." Such a confession was needless; and to whom should it have been made? The jeu d'esprit was for the eye of a friend, and, when published after his death, it was unnecessary to draw attention to (what every scholar would have recognised) the resemblance to the few lines quoted by Croker, for it goes no farther.

HANKS, my lord, for your ven'son, for finer or fatter

Ne'er ranged in a forest, or smoked in a platter,

The haunch was a picture for painters to study,

The fat was so white, and the lean was so ruddy;

Though my stomach was sharp, I could scarce help regretting
To spoil such a delicate picture by eating:

I had thoughts in my chamber to place it in view,

To be shown to my friends as a piece of vertù ;

As in some Irish houses, where things are so-so,
One gammon of bacon hangs up for a show;
But, for eating a rasher of what they take pride in,
They'd as soon think of eating the pan it is fried in.
But hold—let me pause—don't I hear you pronounce,
This tale of the bacon's a damnable bounce?

Well, suppose it a bounce-sure a poet may try,
By a bounce now and then, to get courage to fly.

But, my lord, it's no bounce: I protest in my turn,
It's a truth, and your lordship may ask Mr. Byrne.1
To go on with my tale, as I gazed on the haunch,
I thought of a friend that was trusty and staunch;
So I cut it, and sent it to Reynolds undrest,

To paint it or eat it, just as he liked best.

Of the neck and the breast I had next to dispose-
'Twas a neck and a breast that might rival Monroe's: 2
But in parting with these I was puzzled again,

With the how and the who, and the where and the when,
There's H-d,3 and C—y, and H-rth," and H—ff,"
I think they love ven'son-I know they love beef;
There's my countryman Higgins-oh! let him alone,
For making a blunder, or picking a bone.
But hang it! to poets who seldom can eat
Your very good mutton's a very good treat;

Such dainties to them their health it might hurt,

It's like sending them ruffles when wanting a shirt.
While thus I debated, in reverie centred,

An acquaintance, a friend as he call'd himself, enter'd :

An under-bred, fine-spoken fellow was he,

And he smiled as he look'd at the ven'son and me.

Mr. Byrne.-Michael Byrne, Esq., of Cabinteely, in the county of Dublin; son of Robert Byrne and Clare, sister of Lord Clare.

2 Monroe's.-Dorothy Monroe, a celebrated beauty of the day.

3 H-d.-Possibly the Hon. Charles Howard, afterwards tenth duke of Norfolk, one of the literary mer of the day. Cy.-George Coleman, the celebrated dramatic writer, and lessee of Covent Garden Theatre, and afterwards of the Haymarket; born in 1733, and died in 1794.

Hrth. The great painter, William Hogarth, cannot be intended, as he died in 1764, previous to the elevation of Nugent to the peerage. Probably the person meant was Dr. John Hawkesworth, well known for his papers in "The Adventurer," and his tale of "Almoran and Hamet." He was born in 1715, and died in 1773.

H---Paul Hiffernan, a dramatic and periodical writer, born in Dublin in 1719 He was educated for the priesthood in France, and returned to his native city to practise medicine. He went to London, became known to Garrick and Murphy, and wrote four plays, one of which was successful. He was a man of some genius, but of coarse mind and offensive manners, led a dissipated and disreputable life, and died in poverty in London, 1777.

"What have we got here ?-Why, this is good eating! Your own, I suppose, or is it in waiting?"

"Why, whose should it be?" cried I, with a flounce;

I get these things often "--but that was a bounce :

"Some lords, my acquaintance, that settle the nation, Are pleased to be kind-but I hate ostentation."

"If that be the case, then," cried he, very gay, "I'm glad I have taken this house in my way. To-morrow you take a poor dinner with me; No words-I insist on't-precisely at three : We'll have Johnson and Burke, all the wits will be there; My acquaintance is slight, or I'd ask my Lord Clare.

And, now that I think on't, as I am a sinner,

We wanted this venison to make out the dinner.