Mr. S. will be amongst those which have given light and glory to their
country" (_Id._ p. 10); to prove, in short, the truth of a hundred other
laudations collected and printed by this modest author, we shall quote a
few passages from his play, and illustrate his genius by pointing out
their beauties--an office much needed, particularly by certain dullards,
the magazine of whose souls are not combustible enough to take fire at the
electric sparks shot forth _up_ out of the depths of George Stephens's
unfathomable genius!

The first gem that sparkles in the play, is where _Isabella_, the Queen
Dowager of Hungary, with a degree of delicacy highly becoming a matron,
makes desperate love to _Castaldo_, an Austrian ambassador. In the midst
of her ravings she breaks off, to give such a description of a
steeple-chase as Nimrod has never equalled.

ISABELLA (_hotly_). "Love _rides_ upon a thought,
And stays not dully to _inquire the way_,
But right _o'erleaps the fence_ unto the _goal_."

To appreciate the splendour of this image, the reader must conceive Love
booted and spurred, mounted upon a _thought_, saddled and bridled. He
starts. _Yo-hoiks_! what a pace! He stops not to "inquire the
way"--whether he is to take the first turning to the right, or the second
to the left--but on, on he rushes, clears the fence cleverly, and wins by
a dozen lengths!

What soul, what mastery, what poetical skill is here! We triumphantly put
forth this passage as an instance of the sublime art of sinking in poetry
not to be matched by Dibdin Pitt or Jacob Jones. Love is sublimed to a
jockey, Thought promoted to a race-horse!--"Magnificent!"