and attempt to detain her until the brig could come up with her. The captain consented-the launch was rigged out, and twenty staunch seamen jumped on board; they soon approached the pirate, who, undaunted, shewed them a bold front, in hopes of intimidating them, but the true British hearts that were afloat in the launch were not to be baffled; they brought up close alongside, every man had his work to do,-they rushed on board the pirate, and so impetuous was their charge, that the murderous pirates threw themselves overboard, and others rushed down below. The chief seized a lighted brand, and descending into the hold, was about to place it against a barrel of gunpowder, when Speedwell jumped down after him, and seizing the hand which held the torch, grappled him tightly by the throat with the other. The pirate was a powerful man, and Speedwell found he had his match-dreadful was their strife-often was the lighted torch within an inch of the powder cask-at last both fell; the pirate called to one of his crew, but he was answered by Hawser, who seeing the dangerous situation in which they were placed, instantly jumped down, and seizing the pirate by the throat, held him until Speedwell extinguished the torch. The brig by this time had come up, and in a few minutes took possession of her prize and such of the pirates as remained alive. The treasures which were on board the pirate's vessel were removed to the brig, and the ill-fated lugger soon swamped and sunk to rise no more. The three weeks had now nearly passed, and Harriet's hopes had diminished. The hated marriage was within two days of its completion, when one morning, on entering the breakfast parlour, the admiral handed her the newspaper, and (as was his usual custom) directed her to read the naval intelligence. She listlessly took up the paper, and glanced over it, when suddenly her eye seemed to fix on some intelligence which raised her hopes to a pitch of delight: she hastily conned it over-" Oh, Father!" she joyously exclaimed, "it is true-it is true-he will be a captain; -my dear, dear Speedwell." 66 Hey, what the devil's in the wind now?" exclaimed the admiral. "Oh such good, such great news, father; only listen." She then hastily read an account of the engagement and destruction of the pirates by the Rover schooner.' The old admiral raised himself up in his chair. "Ah, well done—well done,” exclaimed he, " that pirate Abdalec was a blood-thirsty hound; he ought to have been crammed into one of his powder casks, and blown to "Hush, father," interrupted Harriet, "pray don't use those harsh expressions— listen to me while I finish the account." She then read as follows : "Among the pirate crew was a black, who had received an injury from Abdalec, the pirate chief, and as an opportunity now offered to revenge himself, he did not let it pass, he therefore informed the British captain, that in an island not two days' sail from where they then lay, the pirates deposited all the spoil of which they robbed the various vessels which had fallen into their power, and for a stipulated reward, and freedom for himself, he would pilot them to the spot. This was agreed upon, and on reaching the island they found jewels and various merchandize, to the amount of some thousands of pounds. The captain of the schooner had taken possession of the island, and had sent Lieutenants Speedwell and Hawser with dispatches to England, by the Eliza sloop, which he had met at sea. Too much praise cannot be awarded to the enterprising Lieutenant Speedwell, by whose bold exertions the lives of the British crew were preserved, for had the explosion taken place, not only would the pirates' vessel have been blown to atoms, but the British vessel must also have been destroyed, as she had reached within a cable's length at the moment Hawser jumped into the hold. It is expected that both Lieutenant Speedwell and Lieutenant Hawser will be raised to the ranks of captain." "So they ought-so they ought," exclaimed the admiral- a couple of brave young dogs." "Now, father," said Harriet, looking stedfastly in his face, "I claim your promise." "My promise!—what promise?" inquired he. "Let me repeat your own words," replied she, "listen-if within the time stated in the margin, Speedwell should convince me of his bravery by achieving some act which may eventually raise him to the rank of captain-why then" "What then? " inquired the admiral. "You would consent," rejoined Har riet. "I didn't say that' "But you meant it.' "Pshaw-nonsense, how do you know what I meant," growled the admiral? "haven't I promised Sir Everard? and d'ye think I can break my word to a nobleman!" Harriet replied, "I will marry no nobleman-Sir Everard will never be my husband, and when you know all, you will oppose the match as much as I do myself." "What the devil do you mean," inquired the admiral, "what do you mean by-when I know all ?" "You shall know in good time," replied Harriet; "in the meanwhile let it be understood, that if the match is broken off with Sir Everard, there shall be no further objection to Speedwell." "Well, well-let it be so, let it be so," exclaimed the admiral; "serve out the coffee and be quiet." Breakfast was only half over when the bell sounded. The servant entered and said that a young lady, attended by an elderly person, was inquiring for Miss Harriet. "Oh, shew them into my chamber," said Harriet, "I will attend them immediately." "Now, who the devil can this young lady be?" exclaimed the admiral. "Patience, dear father," replied she; " in a short time you shall know all." "Why not now," growled the admiral, you obstinate young hussey.' "Don't find fault with my obstinacy, father," replied she;"it is probable that obstinacy will be as good a friend to me as it has been to you. I have been faithful to my dear Speedwell-you may call that obstinacy; I refused to accept a rich nobleman, and I have obstinately persevered until I am now certain of gaining my end-consequently, obstinacy has been my best friend." The conversation was broken off by the appearance of the servant, who announced Sir Everard. He entered, and taking his seat near Harriet, said he had called to remind them that the following day was the day appointed for the wedding, and that the carriage would be at the gate by ten o'clock, if they had no objection. Harriet rose, and looking seriously at Sir Everard, said, "Sir, in marriage the hand should be freely given, and the heart should freely sanction the choice. In this case as regards us both, the heart has not been consulted: neither my hand nor heart are free to give, because my heart has long been another's. Neither is your hand free to give, because it has long been promised to another." Sir Everard started, the colour rose in his cheek; the old admiral started with astonishment, and whistled "Hearts of Oak," while he beat time with his wooden leg. "Yes," continued Harriet, "I repeat it; your hand is not free to give, because another has a prior claim.” Sir Everard stammered, and after many attempts, at length in broken sentences inquired of Harriet what she meant. "I mean a promise of marriage, granted twelve months since to a young lady, named Melmoth. Observe, Sir Everard, your own hand writing "-with these words, she drew forth an open letter;"at the time you made that proposal, Miss Melmoth was in affluent circumstances; but in consequence of the failure of her bankers, has been lately much reduced. This, perhaps, has been the cause of your breach of promise." "Madam," Sir Everard stammered"Miss Harriet " (The admiral whistled the Rogue's March,' accompanied as usual by his wooden leg). "Miss Harriet!" continued Sir Everard, "I would gladly have kept my word with Miss Melmoth, but she put it completely out of my power, as she has left England some months since, and I have never been able to hear any tidings of her." "Indeed," added Harriet," then I am happy to have it in my power to give you an opportunity of redeeming your pledge, and preserving your honour." So saying she left the room, but quickly returned, leading in the young lady. "Give me leave to introduce Miss Melmoth," said Harriet, as she passed her to Sir Everard. A The admiral looked at all partiestwiddled his stick about, and seemed as it were completely out-manœuvred. pause ensued-a distant hum of voices broke upon their silence-the bell rang violently-and soon "Rule Britannia " was heard in full chorus. "What devils' racket is this?" exclaimed the admiral, " is the enemy going to board us, or run us down ?I think this day is full of events. I have lost a son-in-law, and my daughter has lost a husband." "No matter for that, here's another and a better for her," exclaimed Hawser, as he dashed into the room, followed by Speedwell. My letter promised that we would be on shore before the marriage took place, if possible, and here we are in good sailing order, and all prepared for action-guns shotted, tompions out, and a good supply of ammunition," so saying, Hawser placed a brace of pistols on the table, at sight of which, Sir Everard turned aside. "How now, you scape grace dogs," exclaimed the admiral, "d'ye think you've got aboard of the pirates again, that you come down into the cabin in this trim!" "Admiral, your pardon," said Speedwell, "I come not to offend, but to claim the victor's bright reward.-True it is I have no fortune but my sword, but while I've strength to raise it in my country's cause, it shall lead me on to fortune." “It shall—it will my boy," exclaimed the admiral, while his eyes teemed with delight. "Your hands my brave boys. You have acted nobly,-Speedwell, events have occurred which prevent Sir Everard marrying my daughter, as you perceive he is already taken in tow by a smart-built frigate. And this by the way, will save you the trouble of shooting each other-Come hither, HarrietYour hand-Speedwell yours. There— Heaven bless you both."-He placed their hands in each other-"To-morrow the parson shall do his office-Hawser my brave lad, I'm sorry I haven't got another daughter, or you should have had her with all my heart.-But no matter, we'll dine together, and make a merry party, and then we'll fight our battles o'er again-we'll drink health and happiness to both the new-married couples, and then success to the Navy of Old England." M. C. THE DEATH CHAPLET! (For the Parterre.) Dost thou hear! my sister fair, Hasten then my sister fair, Bring the red grape which may steep Weep thou not-though in mine eye THE ASSUMED PLAGIARISMS OF LORD BYRON, AND OTHER WRITERS. BY THE AUTHOR OF "BRITAIN'S HISTORICAL DRAMA." (For the Parterre.) MANY critics of the present age have exalted Lord Byron to a demigod, while others have degraded him to a heartless fiend. Some have declared that his poetry was never equalled, and will never be surpassed, and a few have been weak enough to maintain that every ninth man in England might rival his lordship in the idle craft of verse-making-the Edinburgh Reviewers for instance. much for the infallibility of criticism, that criticism with which the reading public are perpetually gulled. So The noble Bard has been frequently and loudly accused by certain writers, too envious of his fame, of that besetting and crying sin, termed plagiarism. Numerous poetic and bygone stores have been ransacked, and the lines of ancient and modern authors brought forward in proof of this accusation: by comparing many of which with the supposed imitations, the charge appears frivolous and ungrounded; and in defence of others, it may be urged that men in distant ages and countries have given birth to similar ideas, when writing or speaking on similar subjects, without the possibility of copying each other. We know that imputations of the same kind were poorly attempted to be cast on the poems of Chatterton, and those of Ossian, when the latter, translated by Macpherson, first made their appearance. We have seen an old poem, little if at all known in the present day, entitled "St. Peter's Lodge, a Serio - Comic Legendary Tale." It is utterly devoid of any merit, but its opening lines are very similar to those of Lord Byron's parody on Southey's Vision of Judgment, as the following short extract will prove: "St. Peter in his easy chair Sits dozing, to his lodge repair Souls made immortal: he inspects Their passports, asks their several sects, And after some confabulation, Shows each where lies his heavenly station." We do not believe his lordship has ever been accused of borrowing from this dull tale, and the reason may be, that none of his critics with all their invidious research and industry, have yet alighted on the precious morceau. It is, how ever, possible that his lordship might have seen it; and, like the alchymist, by the magic of his genius transmuted the time-corroded and valueless metal into gold. Be this as it may, we are of opinion that many writers accused, like Byron, of purloining some of their brightest thoughts, ought not in strict justice to be branded with the degrading stigma of being a literary thief. "Every observant man," it has been said, we forget by whom, "must have remarked how often the same thoughts, and even the same modes of expression, are used by persons who never were acquainted with each other. This brings to our recollection Dr. Johnson's celebrated sarcasm on Lord Chesterfield,-" He may be a wit among lords, but he is only a lord among wits;" yet it is a matter of doubt if this speech be original, for it is known that Voltaire once said to the Italian Abbé Bettinelli, when he visited him at Ferney, and spoke of Helvetius, who had presented his work "De L'Esprit' to some of the royal family—“ What We do not mean to imply that the poems of Rowley are genuine, but that, as the works of Chatterton, they are original. Those who are well versed in British antiquities cannot, we should imagine, doubt for a moment of the authenticity of Ossian. His manners and customs bear ample testimony to his truth, and we will venture to affirm that no one, had they been spurious, would have dared to introduce in them the sports of hawking: an amusement in the Celtic ages unknown to Europe, except in the British Isles, where the Romans found it to their astonishment, practised in great perfection. folly to attempt to be a philosopher at court, and a courtier among philosophers." Whether the taunts of both these great authors were original, or whether either of them were borrowed from the other, is not very easy to determine; but of this we are certain, that both have a striking resemblance to the following lines in "La Poete Courtesan," by Du Bellay, an old French poet, who died in 1559, though it is more than probable that they were never seen by Johnson :— "Bref pour estre en cest art des premiers de tonage, Sic tu veux finement jouer ton personage; Entre les courtesans du scavant tu feras, Et entre les scavans courtesan tu seras." Homer himself has been accused of having purloined a great portion, if not the whole, of his poetic treasures from the secret recesses of the Egyptian temples. But we are not inclined to believe, with Ptolemy Hephæstion, that the two great poems which bear the name of Homer were written by Phantasia, a lady or priestess of Memphis, who had deposited them in a temple of Vulcan in that city, from which the Grecian bard stole them by the aid of one of the sacred scribes. Nor do we pay much credit to the report of Diodorus Siculus, who has asserted that Daphni, a prophetess of Delphi, imparted to Homer the principal materials of both his immortal poems. however acknowledged in the Iliad and the Odyssey, that the Aodo, or bards, often sung of the "Tale of Troy divine." It is Herodotus says that Hesiod and Homer were the first who composed a Theogeny among the Greeks, giving to the Gods their different attributes, titles, and honours. We know that all the gods of Greece, with the groundwork of the fables of her poets, came from Egypt; and before the priesthood of that country had darkened its early religion, which was that of the one only and true God, they were but the innocent symbols of the arts and sciences, the seasons, and the different appearances of the heavens. Now, as Homer is believed to have visited and resided long in Egypt, it is highly probable that he there found a great portion of the story, and the principal characters in his Iliad, which, in honour to his own country, he translated to Greece. That the poems of Homer, whatever was their origin, were primitively in the regular, connected, and epic form in which they have come down to us, is not to be believed; for the fact is well authenticated, that until they were collected, arranged, and united into consistent narratives by the order, or in the age of the Pisistratidæ, they were continually sung in the different countries of Greece in disjointed episodes and mutilated fragments by the Paywoo, or Rhapsodists, the wandering minstrels of that classic land. What folly, then, have not the critics committed by laying down infallible rules for the Epopee, drawn from the writings of Homer, and maintaining those writings (put together ages before any poetic rules or laws existed) to be the invariable and eternal standard by which all future epic poems should be judged. Virgil has been denounced as the king of plagiarists! La Harpe accuses him, and it must be confessed in numerous instances, but too justly, of imitating Homer, not only in his plot, or fable, but also in his battles, machinery, incidents, and similes. He likewise charges him with having borrowed whole passages from the elder poets Ennius, Accius, Luevius, and Pacuvius; nor did even those of his own age escape the depredations of this literary plunderer. Milton, also, has not escaped the censure of the critic for boldly gathering many flowers planted in the Aonian groves by other bards, and twining them with the immortal wreaths that adorn his own brows. It is certain that he is greatly indebted for his strange account of the battle of the angels in heaven to the war of the Titans against the gods, in Hesiod. Lauder has maliciously pointed out many instances of Milton's imitations in his minor poems. It has been likewise asserted that he owes some of his beauties to a refinement on Silvester, and that bombastic author Du Bartas, of whom Dryden says, "Nor, like Du Bartas, bridle up the floods, And periwig with snow the baldpate woods." This writer was translated by Silvester, whose bold but barbarous style, and wretched taste, could only be equalled by that of his original. Warburton has pointed out "the Cave of Death," by Du Bartas, as the prototype of Milton's "Il Penseroso." There are some curious instances, however, on record, of a wonderful similarity in the productions of different authors, who have the advantage of certain concurrent circumstances as a testimony to prove their innocence of being servile copyists. It is asserted in a life of Shakspeare, that "two musical pieces by different persons, were sent to a musical composer, who found a song of ten lines the same verbatim, save three words in each, and the authors did not know one another, nor had ever seen the pieces." This, by the bye, is bad English, and worse sense but a very curious instance of similar ideas arising in the minds of different writers. Yet this is not so striking as what follows respecting Shakspeare and Brandt the Dutch poet. Gerard Brandt was born at Amsterdam in 1626. He wrote a tragedy, entitled "The Dessembling Torquatus:" the scene of this piece is laid at Rome, but it has not the least adherence to the history, manners, customs, or names of the Romans. Upon this play Van Kampen observes, "There is a remarkable resemblance in it to Hamlet. Shakspeare has drawn from an old northern tradition by Saxo Grammaticus. Brandt's idea seems to be entirely original. Torquatus is at Athens, like Hamlet at Wittenberg, pursuing his studies, while his father (Manlius) is murdered at Rome by his own brother (Noron) who espouses the widow (Plaucina). Who does not here immediately recognise Claudius, Gertrude, Hamlet, and the murdered king of Shakspeare? Torquatus says too, at the commencement: Hast thou, O heaven! e'er seen a wretch like me? Perfidious, joyless uncle, traitorous slave! How dar'dst thou thus my warlike father slay, And stain my mother's fame. son, The ghost of Manlius appears to his and incites him to avenge his death. Torquatus feigns madness like Hamlet. The object of his affections (Juliana) is also introduced. But the most striking point of resemblance is in the scene where the heroes of both tragedies reproach their mothers. Noron, being greatly afraid of his nephew, cunningly introduces his wife (Placina) into a chamber where Torquatus is, after having concealed one of his councillors under a couch, for the purpose of hearing whether he would openly avow his suspicions to his mother. Torquatus, aware of this, suddenly despatches him, and reproaches his mother for her immodesty, who after |