that France consisted of nothing but ladies' toilettes. The army are the muscular part of the state; mere patriotism is a pasteboard visor, which opposes no resistance to the sword. Whatever they determine will be done; an effeminate public is a non-entity. They will not relish the Bourbons long, if they remain at peace; and if they go to war, they will want a monarch who is also a general.
The Lay of the Laureate, Carmen Nuptiale, by Robert Southey, Esq. Poet-Laureate, Member of the Royal Spanish Academy, and of the Royal Spanish Academy of History.—London: Longmans, 1816.
Examiner, July 7, 1816.
The dog which his friend Launce brought as a present to Madam Silvia in lieu of a lap-dog, was something like "The Lay of the Laureate," which Mr. Southey has here offered to the Princess Charlotte for a Nuptial Song. It is "a very currish performance, and deserves none but currish thanks." Launce thought his own dog, Crab, better than any other; and Mr. Southey thinks his own praises the fittest compliment for a lady's ear. His Lay is ten times as long, and he thinks it is therefore ten times better than an Ode of Mr. Pye's.
Mr. Southey in this poem takes a tone which was never heard before in a drawing-room. It is the first time that ever a Reformist was made Poet-laureate. Mr. Croker was wrong in introducing his old friend, the author of "Joan of Arc," at Carlton House. He might have known how it would be. If we had doubted the good old adage before, "Once a Jacobin and always a Jacobin," since reading "The Lay of the Laureate," we are sure of it. A Jacobin is one who would have his single opinion govern the world, and overturn every thing in it. Such a one is Mr. Southey. Whether he is a Republican or a Royalist,—
