Editorial

Our readings this evening commence with a letter from Alopex who appears anxious to show that he has not died for love and to think that to be abusive is to be witty. We shall assert the authority of our office and assure him that he is dismissed unless both his style and manners are reformed. When he thinks, writes and acts like a gentleman he will be well received, but in any other character we shall without ceremony shut the Chest against him. It is easy to throw dirt and a scavenger at that business will perform better than a man of sense and learning, and the latter will disdain to abuse a lady.

The advertising lady seems to have quietly retired from her uncivil suitors without condescending to reply and we admire the calm dignity of her conduct. She however is not permitted to enjoy her repose for we have no less than three letters addressed to her, all we fear, with little pretensions to sincerity. We look on Antigynes to be as he calls himself a wag and we think little better of the “Blue Eye” and the West Indian. The latter however shows that his rum and sugar has not deprived him of with and ingenuity nor his indolence made him unable to place them in the best point of view, but (we warn the lady) he is a greater wag than any of them.

The song so much enquired after is at last discovered and the Blue Eye turns out to be a gentleman, not a lady — a very young gentleman, little William Kay.

The verses written for music would have merited praise if they had not assumed what is not true. We think that the exploits of the British heroes in Spain might have furnished employment for the Muses, if their servants had not been more inclined to bask in flowery meads, and

  “play with the tangle of Neæra’s hair”

than to sing of heroic deeds. They would have found in the actions of Graham and Wellington “fit matter for their songs.” Their lyres like Anacreon’s can only echo love, not because heroes are wanting but because the poets are idle.

We are pleased with Donald’s little poem and blame the person who has assumed his name, but merit like his will not be injured by triflers who may aspire to be his rivals. The Tale of Lady Flora is pleasingly told in the Scottish dialect.

We shall conclude with a Poem to Anna on her birthday which accords so much with our feelings that we might have claimed it for our own. One topic of praise however which ought to have taken place of all others the author has omitted that filial love and filial duty which shine among the other excellencies of the poem in the Pleasure of Human Life and would render it highly valuable if its poetic merits were less conspicuous.

We have now to notify to our friends that the next Attic Evening will be on Wednesday the 10th of June three weeks from this day, which will terminate the amusements of this season. That evening will of course be the time of acknowledgement and confession when each of our ingenious friends will gather their own laurels and in the language of Ossian receive their fame.