expression, the little subtleties of style. But Maltravers, fresh, as
he himself had said, from the study of great and original writers, could
not but feel that he was listening to feeble though melodious
mediocrity. It was the poetry of words, not things. He thought it
cruel, however, to be hypercritical, and he uttered all the commonplaces
of eulogium that occurred to him. The young man was enchanted: "And
yet," said he with a sigh, "I have no Public. In England they would
appreciate me." Alas! in England, at that moment, there were five
hundred poets as young, as ardent, and yet more gifted, whose hearts
beat with the same desire--whose nerves were broken by the same
disappointments.

Maltravers found that his young friend would not listen to any judgment
not purely favourable. The archbishop in /Gil Blas/ was not more touchy
upon any criticism that was not panegyric. Maltravers thought it a bad
sign, but he recollected Gil Blas, and prudently refrained from bringing
on himself the benevolent wish of "beaucoup de bonheur et un peu, plus
de bon gout." When Cesarini had finished his MS., he was anxious to
conclude the excursion--he longed to be at home, and think over the
admiration he had excited. But he left his poems with Maltravers, and
getting on shore by the remains of Pliny's villa, was soon out of sight.

Maltravers that evening read the poems with attention. His first opinion
was confirmed. The young man wrote without knowledge. He had never
felt the passions he painted, never been in the situations he described.
There was no originality in him, for there was no experience; it was
exquisite mechanism, his verse,--nothing more. It might well deceive
him, for it could not but flatter his ear--and Tasso's silver march rang
not more musically than did the chiming stanzas of Castruccio Cesarini.