“I am very glad that you have essayed a new metre—new I mean for you to use. That which you have chosen is perhaps at once the most artificial and the most magnificent that our language affords; and your success in it ought to encourage you to believe, that for you, at least, the majestic march of Dryden (to my ear the perfection of harmony) is not, as you seem to pronounce it, irrecoverable. Am I wrong in imagining that Spenser does not use the plusquam-Alexandrine—the verse which is as much longer than an Alexandrine, as an Alexandrine is longer than an ordinary heroic measure? I have no books where I am, to which to refer. You use this—and in the first stanza.
“Your poem has been met on my part by an exchange
somewhat like that of Diomed’s armour
against Glaucus’s—brass for gold—a
heavy speech upon bullion. If you have never thought upon the subject—as to my
great contentment I never had a twelvemonth ago—let me counsel you to keep
clear of it, and forthwith put my speech into the fire, unread. It has no one
merit but that of sincerity. I formed my opinion most reluctantly;
| LETTER FROM MR CANNING. | 347 |
