The same results will follow, and for the same reason; because "images taken from what is SUB"LIME or beautiful in nature," are more beautiful and sublime, and therefore more poetical, "than "any images drawn purely from art." "Quod erat "demonstrandum;" and, let me add, my Lord, "ex ore tuo," from your own poetry, opposed to your own criticisms.

I think it best to divide the subject, for more clearness, into two parts; and I cannot better end this part than with the battle against your principal deities;—and I remain, my Lord,

LETTER II.

Mrs. UNWIN'S NEEDLE.

MY LORD,

THE transition from all the Gods of Art to this humble instrument is rather abrupt; but it is important, although you have included it in the note, because we now leave mere works of art for passions; and Mrs. UNWIN's needle alone, in my opinion, is as much superior to all your Gods, poetically considered, as it is to CowPER's "sylvan sampler." The affecting beauty of this image does not depend in the least upon being a needle, quoad needle, but upon being that needle, which, like the horn-box of STERNE, sets all the interesting circumstances connected with the sacred remembrance of the dead, and the bereaved friend, before us. ·

Does your Lordship think a spoon, per se, poetical ? Probably not. Yet when the companions of the brave and unfortunate CoоK, so long sepa

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rated from their country, and in the wildest regions, thousands of leagues from their native land, accidentally saw a spoon, with the name of London on it; their distant country, and their tenderest connections, from whom they had been separated so long, and whom they might never see again, were more strongly recalled to their recollection; and this spoon, like Mrs. UNWIN's needle, thus becomes poetical, not because it is a spoon, but because, under the peculiar circumstances with which it is presented to the imagination, it wakes the tenderest and most affectionate feelings of our NATURE.

But we had better be a little more particular concerning this one circumstance. Mrs. UNWIN'S needle is, indeed, submitted to my judgment, with a kind of especial emphasis. "I submit to Mr. "BOWLES's own judgment a passage from another

poem of COWPER's, to be compared with the same "writer's sylvan sampler.'" I will let the "syl"van sampler" alone at present; it shall be all "twaddle;" but the comparison is not fair. You take pure description, and compare it with poetry that affects the heart and passions. I say a tree, any tree, is, per se, quoad tree, more poetical than any needle, quoad needle, or quoad needle and

stockings," which is your Lordship's association. "I submit to Mr. BowLES's own judgment!" A subject so respectfully submitted requires deliberation; and after deliberation, and after deliberation, " I submit" the

following observations to Lord BYRON's own judgment! But first referring me to the stanza, he asks, if these three lines are not worth all the "boasted twaddling" about trees, so triumphantly re-quoted. I answer, Yes, yes, yes; worth ten thou sand trees, merely as trees, visible trees, connected with no passions of the heart. But, after shewing that you feel the affecting beauty of the needles as much as I do, you add, "a homely collection of

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images and ideas, associated with the darning of stockings, the hemming of shirts, and mending of breeches; and will any one deny they "are eminently poetical, and beautiful, and pa"thetic, as addressed by CowPER to his nurse?" No, my Lord: no one will deny, and I the last, I hope, that they are eminently poetical and beautiful. But what I marvel at is this, that this image should be so touching and affecting to your Lordship, with your associations, darning of stockings! hemming of shirts! and mending of breeches! Why, I could not extract the passage without laughing to myself, though I never read the stanzas of poor CowPER without tears in my eyes. I do marvel, that with these associations in your Lordship's mind, of shirt, stockings, and BREECHES! the image should seem affecting to your Lordship at all. In my mind, it is poetically associated neither with one, nor all, nor any, of these auxiliaries that art has brought in versus nature: the thought