PREFACE.* Is an old letter of my own to a friend in Ireland, giving an account of this brilliant festival (the gala at Boyle Farm), I find some memorandums which, besides their reference to the subject of the poem, contain some incidents also connected with the first appearance before the public of one of the most successful of all my writings, the story of the Epicurean. I shall give my extracts from this letter, in their original diary-like form, without alteration or dressing:— June 30. 1827.-Day threatening for the Fête. Was with Lord Essex † at three o'clock, and started about half an hour after. The whole road swarming with carriages-and-four all the way to Boyle Farm, which Lady de Roos has lent, for the occasion, to Henry; the five givers of the Fête, being Lords Chesterfield, Castlereagh, Alvanley, Henry de Roos, and Robert Grosvenor, subscribing four or five hundred pounds each towards it. The arrangements all in the very best taste. The pavilion for quadrilles, on the bank of the river, with steps descending to the water, quite eastern-like what one sees in Daniel's pictures. Towards five the élite of the gay world was assembled the women all looking their best, and scarce a single ugly face to be found. About half-past five, sat down to dinner, 450 under a tent on the lawn, and fifty to the Royal Table in the conservatory. The Tyrolese musicians sung during dinner, and there were, after dinner, gondolas on the river, with ⚫ From the preface to the fifth volume of the collected edition of 190,1812] I cannot let pass the incidental mention here of this social and public-spirited nobleman, without expressing my strong sense of Caradori, De Begnis, Velluti, &c., singing barcarolles and rowing off occasionally, so as to let their voices die away and again return. After these succeeded a party in dominos, Madame Vestris, Fanny Ayton, &c., who rowed about in the same manner, and sung, among other things, my gondola song, “Oh come to me when daylight sets." The evening was delicious, and, as soon as it grew dark, the groves were all lighted up with coloured lamps, in different shapes and devices. A little lake near a grotto took my fancy particularly, the shrubs all round being illuminated, and the lights reflected in the water. Six-and-twenty of the prettiest girls of the world of fashion, the F****t* rs, Br *d *** lls, De R** s's Miss F ** ld ***, Miss F* x, Miss R * ss * 11, Miss B ** ly, were dressed as Rosières, and opened the quadrilles in the pavilion. While talking with D-n (Lord P.'s brother), he said to me, "I never read anything so touching as the death of your heroine." "What!" said I, "have you got so far already?"‡ "Oh, I read it in the Literary Gazette." This anticipation of my catastrophe is abominable. Soon after, the Marquis P-lm-a, said to me, as he and I and B-m stood together, looking at the gay scene, "This is like one of your Fêtes." "Oh yes," said B-m, thinking he alluded to Lalla Rookh, "quite oriental." "Non, non," replied P―lm-a, “je veux dire cette Fête d'Athènes, dont j'ai lu la description dans la Gazette d'aujourd'hui." his kindly qualities, and lamenting the loss which not only society, but the cause of sound and progressive Political Reform, has sustained by his death. : The Epicurean had been published but the day before. THE SUMMER FÊTE. ΤΟ THE HONOURABLE MRS. NORTON. - FOR the groundwork of the following Poem I am indebted to a memorable Fète, given some years since, at Boyle Farm, the seat of the late Lord Henry Fitzgerald. In commemoration of that evening of which the lady to whom these pages are inscribed was, I well recollect, one of the most distinguished ornaments - I was induced at the time to write some verses, which were afterwards, however, thrown aside unfinished, on my discovering that the same task had been undertaken by a noble poet', whose playful and happy jeu-d'esprit on the subject has since been published. It was but lately, that, on finding the fragments of my own sketch among my papers, I thought of founding on them such a description of an imaginary Fête as might furnish me with situations for the introduction of music. Such is the origin and object of the following Poem, and to Mrs. NORTON it is, with every feeling of admiration and regard, inscribed by her father's warmly attached friend, Thus spoke a young Patrician maid, Th' important sky, whose light or gloom Faint were her hopes; for June had now But Eurus in perpetual vigour; And, such the biting summer air, That she, the nymph now nestling there Sang as her own bright gems recline, At night, within their cotton shrineHad, more than once, been caught of late Kneeling before her blazing grate, Like a young worshipper of fire, With hands uplifted to the flame, Whose glow as if to woo them nigher, Through the white fingers flushing came. But oh! the light, th' unhop'd-for light, That now illum'd this morning's heaven! Up sprung länthe at the sight, Though-hark!-the clocks but strike elever, And rarely did the nymph surprise Mankind so early with her eyes. Who now will say that England's sun (Like England's self, these spendthrift days) His stock of wealth hath near outrun, And must retrench his golden raysPay for the pride of sunbeams past, And to mere moonshine come at last? "Calumnious thought!" Iänthe cries, Already had begun to dance: To kiss Firenze's City of Flowers. In one of those enchanted domes, The Fête is to be held to-night - Whose cards, in many a fair one's sight To the last new-mustachio'd chin- Live atoms, which, together hurl'd, She, like another Epicurus, Sets dancing thus, and calls "the World." Behold how busy in those bowers And now th' important hour drew nigh, To lend the night her crescent ray; Soon as through Grosvenor's lordly square 2- Of parting pennies rung the knell; : And by the daylight's westering beam, The young Iänthe, who with flowers Half-crown'd, had sat in idle dream Before her glass, scarce knowing where Her fingers rov'd through that bright hair, While, all capriciously, she now Dislodg'd some curl from her white brow, And now again replac'd it there; As though her task was meant to be One endless change of ministry A routing-up of Loves and Graces, But to plant others in their places. Meanwhile what strain is that which floats That point towards which when ladies rise, Tones of a harp, too, gently play'd, Came with this youthful voice communing, Tones true, for once, without the aid Of that inflictive process, tuning — the above lines were written, they still obstinately persevered in their old régime; and would not suffer themselves to be either well guarded or well lighted. A process which must oft have given In their light legions to enlist her, The song she thus, like Jubal's shell, Songs of the toilet " Some branch of feminine array, "That Barnett dreams, or Cooke conceives, "Can match for sweetness, strength, or fire, "This fine Cantata upon Sleeves. "The very notes themselves reveal "The cut of each new sleeve so well; "A flat betrays the Imbecilles,2 Light fugues the flying lappets tell; "While rich cathedral chords awake "Our homage for the Manches d'Evêque." Array thee, love, array thee, love, Put on the plumes thy lover gave, The plumes, that, proudly dancing, Now hie thee, love, now hie thee, love, And tracks of wond'ring eyes shall tell Now hie thee, love, now hie thee, love, Through Pleasure's circles hie thee, And hearts, where'er thy footsteps move, Shall beat when they come nigh thee. Now in his Palace of the West, Sinking to slumber, the bright Day, Like a tir'd monarch fann'd to rest, Mid the cool airs of Evening lay; While round his couch's golden rim The gaudy clouds, like courtiers, crept Struggling each other's light to dim, And catch his last smile e'er he slept. While, as the sparkling juice of France How sunbeams may be taught to dance. If not in written form exprest, 2 The name given to those large sleeves that hang loosely. |