verse. He was a man of genius, a satirist, but not destitute of tenderness, and was full of romance. Some of his works having been five hundred years in manuscript, have lately been printed for the gratification of the curious.

From 1300 to 1400-a century-was the reign of romances. The devotion of all classes to them was great as it is in the present day. Then, as now, they were paramount to all other literature. King Arthur, Richard Cœur de Lion, Amadis de Gaul, were subjects of romance. Young ladies learned to write for the sake of copying these works; and when printing was discovered, these works soon issued from the press as rapidly as possible. These romances were seen and read in the groves of learning as well as in the alcoves of taste and beauty, as the Waverley Novels now are found not only at the toilet of the reigning belle, but in the study of the grave statesman and solemn divine. Under proper directions this may not be an evil. When the soul is waked by all the tender strokes of art, the genius inspired by master touches of fancy, and the whole current of thought is elevated by the deep knowledge of human nature in these productions of the imagination, who can resist the desire to become acquainted with their contents? But this taste is sometimes found to degenerate to a cormorant appetite for the whole mass of fictions, of every hue and quality. This excess is full of evils, and as deleterious to the wholesome desire for knowledge, in a plain and honest form, as confectionary is to our natural desire for plain and succulent food to sustain our animal frames. This vitiated taste is to be deplored; but, to our comfort, it often happens that a surfeit cures what reason will not.

If these romances did not exactly grow out of the ages of chivalry, they were matured by them, and lasted until the wit of Cervantes had laughed them down, or the habits of man, as well as his manners, had changed. If these romances were the offsprings or the nurslings of chivalry, ours had no such origin or nursing; for although these fictions of ours grew up in an age of wonders, they did not, in most instances, relate to them directly or indirectly. The fictions of the present day owe their popularity to two causes; the first, the power of the genius and learning of the writers, for if not the first and most voluminous of these works, certainly one of the sweetest tales of the whole of the mass is Johnson's Rasselas. It was followed, after some length of time, by Godwin's St. Leon, Caleb Williams, and others of the same school; but it was reserved for Sir Walter Scott to become the legitimate sovereign of the world of fiction. To this throne he was elected and anointed by public opinion, and probably will hold his empire without a brother near him for some ages to come. The second cause of this universal passion for fiction, or novels founded on fact, (a sort of deceptive epithet, to cheat those who wish to become acquainted with history, and who have not the courage to sit down and study it,) is the general appetite for reading, now so distinctly abroad in England and this country; and which, instead of being regulated and directed to particular objects, is desultory and miscellaneous, as we have before remarked. The progress in the arts, and the multiplicity of inventions of labor-saving machines, have given leisure to millions, who in former days devoted themselves principally to industrious methods for producing clothing or food.

But to return from this digression to the current history of English literature. It may be unnecessary for us to notice any other authors than those we have named, until the time of Chaucer, from whom English poetry generally has taken the date of its birth; but if time permitted, we could show that there was taste, and genius, and poetry, before the time of this bard. Still, however, he is justly entitled to the appellation of the "Father of English poetry," from the fact, that he effected a revolution in poetry similar to that effected by Shakspeare in the drama, or Scott in the novel. Before Chaucer, poetry was only descriptive, and narrative, without distinct character. The poets of his day seemed to have no objects in their narrative poems, except to tell a wonderful story. The persons concerned in their incidents were regarded as mere machines, only proper to give these incidents a sort of connexion. These poets presented us not with men and women, but with adventures that might, or might not have happened to men and women; and if they even gave us a glimpse of the characters introduced into their story, it was only by accident, and even then, only the most prominent features could be discovered.

"Chaucer reformed this altogether. He devoted his principal attention to the delineation of his characters; he made the incidents of his story all tend to the illustration of the actors in it. He did not merely sketch one or two of the most prominent features. He drew a full-length, and laid on the appropriate colors. He made every thing distinct, even to the most delicate shadowing. As his characters glide before us, we forget it is an illusion; we exclaim, 'They live—they move-they breathe-they are our fellow-creatures,

and as such awaken our sympathies to a degree that imparts to the story a far more intense interest than it could derive from the most romantic incidents.

None of Chaucer's characters can be confounded with one another; numerous as they are, each has its dramatic features; no action is ascribed to one which might as well be expected of another. .In this respect Chaucer is a dramatic poet, and one of the highest order; indeed a distinguished critic has drawn an ingenious parallel between a regular comedy and the series of the Canterbury tales.'

Lord Byron, in his journal, intimates that we reverence Chaucer not for his poetry, but for his antiquity, and passes a criticism upon him as dull, and vulgar, and obscene; but this was before the noble poet wrote Don Juan, or probably when he had read only some of Chaucer's first pieces. If he had ever read him thoroughly, in his maturer years, he probably would have recalled his opinion; most certainly if he were too proud to have done this, he would have reversed his judgment; at least, he would not have called him dull, whatever else he might have said of the "Father of English poetry." We wish not to be misunderstood as defending Chaucer in all his freedoms; but these freedoms were the errors of the age in which he lived. Indecency in that day was often taken for wit; and at the present time is often substituted for it. We can have but little to say on that score, against our ancestors, when we tolerate the poems of Little, and the freedoms in some of Byron's later works. Moore has atoned in some degree for his songs, by his sacred melodies; but who can forgive him for exhibiting Byron in perpetual moral deformity, rioting in the polluted

saloons of Venetian fascination and depravity. Chau cer is not without other faults common to his age. The authors of his period were apt to encumber their stories with minute descriptions, which, however just or beautiful, became tedious, by having nothing to do with the subject. The writers seem not to have been aware that misplaced beauties lose their charms.

In closing our remarks upon this poet-and we have been somewhat minute, as he stands confessedly at the head of the catalogue of English poets-we must say, that for his comic and satirical vein, he was superior to all his predecessors and his contemporaries. He knew the delicate from the coarse, and could easily distinguish between keen and vigorous satire, and vulgar abuse; between the club, the tomahawk, and the flaying-knife of the savage-and the shafts of "the lord of the unerring bow."

Many works have been charged to Chaucer which he never wrote, and therefore he should not be answerable for them. The great talents of Dryden and Pope, in their versions of Chaucer, have, it must be confessed, given him some new charms; but at the same time, we must say, that in getting rid of some of his peculiarities, they have obscured many of his great beauties. To be relished, the works of Chaucer should be read in the original, and with the accent intended by the author. That such poets as Dryden and Pope should have thought this early poet, of a rude age, worthy imitation, is saying how much they venerated his memory as a poet.

Chaucer was a politician, as well as a poet. He was sent an ambassador to the Doge of Venice, in 1370. He was for many years in favor with Edward III,