ROBERT SOUTHEY

_Madoc_, by ROBERT SOUTHEY. 4to. pp. 560. 2l. 2s. Boards. Printed at
Edinburgh, for Longman and Co., London. 1805.

It has fallen to the lot of this writer to puzzle our critical
discernment more than once. In the _Annual Anthology_ we had reason to
complain that it was difficult to distinguish his jocular from his
serious poetry; and sometimes indeed to know his poetry from his prose.
He has now contrived to manufacture a large quarto, which he has styled
a poem, but of what description it is no easy matter to decide. The
title of epic, which he indignantly disclaims, we might have been
inclined to refuse his production, had it been claimed; and we suppose
that Mr. Southey would not suffer it to be classed under the
mock-heroic. The poem of Madoc is not didactic, nor elegiac, nor
classical, in any respect. Neither is it _Macphersonic_, nor
_Klopstockian_, nor _Darwinian_,--we beg pardon, we mean _Brookian_. To
conclude, according to a phrase of the last century, which was applied
to ladies of ambiguous character, _it is what it is_.--As Mr. Southey
has set the rules of Aristotle at defiance in his preface, we hope that
he will feel a due degree of gratitude for this appropriate definition
of his work. It is an old saying, thoroughly descriptive of such an old
song as this before us.

Mr. Southey, however, has not disdained all ancient precedents in his
poem, for he introduces it with this advertisement:

'Come, listen to a tale of times of old!
Come, for ye know me! I am he who sung
The maid of Arc; and I am he who framed
Of Thalaba the wild and wonderous song.
Come, listen to my lay, and ye shall hear
How Madoc from the shores of Britain spread
The adventurous sail, explored the ocean ways,
And quelled barbarian power, and overthrew
The bloody altars of idolatry,
And planted in its fanes triumphantly
The cross of Christ. Come, listen to my lay!'

This _modest ostentation_ was certainly derived from the verses imputed
to Virgil;

"Ille ego, qui quondam gracili modulatus avena
Carmen; et egressus sylvis, vicina coegi
Ut quamvis avido parerent arva colono,
Gratum opus agricolis: at nunc horrentia Martis, &c."

In the very first part of the poem, also, we find Mr. Southey pursuing
the Horatian precept, "_prorumpere in medias res_;" for he commences
with the _return_ of Madoc to his native country. It is true that, like
the