parliament seem to have thought him hardly worth hanging. Cromwell bore
with him only as a kinsman, and respected him only as a scholar. Charles
II. liked to laugh at his jokes, and to Saville his company was as good
as an additional bottle of wine. His only chance of fame as a man of
action arose from his connexion with the plot, which, however, in its
issue covered him with infamy, as all bad things bungled, inevitably do
to those who attempt them.

Although he unquestionably in some points improved our correctness of
style and our versification, there is not much to be said either for or
against his poetry. It is as a whole a mass of smooth and easy, yet
systematic, trifling. Nine-tenths of it does not rise above mediocrity,
and the tenth that remains is more distinguished by grace than by
grandeur or depth. His lines on Cromwell we have already characterised.
It may seem odd, but in his verses on the head of a stag, which Johnson
singles out as bad, we see more of the soul of poetry than in any of his
other productions.

Let our readers, if they will not be convinced by our assertion, listen
to some of these lines:--

"So we some antique hero's strength,
Learn by his lance's weight and length--
As these vast beams express the beast
Whose shady brows alive they dress'd.
Such game, while yet the world was new,
The mighty Nimrod did pursue;
What huntsman of our feeble race
Or dogs dare such a monster chase?
* * * * *