ony, the biting
sarcasm, and the sardonic cynicism which characterize almost every line
of them are united to a brilliancy of imagination, a swiftness as well
as a felicity of thought, and an epigrammatic terseness of phrase which
even Byron himself has equalled nowhere else in his works. _The Vision
of Judgment_ is an example in the first instance of parody, and, in the
second, but not by any means so distinctly, of allegory. Its savage
ferocity of sarcasm crucified Southey upon the cross of scornful
contempt. Byron is not as good a metrist as a satirist, and the _Ottava
rima_ in his hands sometimes halts a little; still, the poem is a
notable example of a satiric parody written with such distinguished
success in a measure of great technical difficulty.

It is somewhat curious that all three of Byron's great satiric poems
should be written in the same measure. Yet so it is, for the poet,
having become enamoured of the metre after reading Frere's clever
satire, _Whistlecraft_, ever afterwards had a peculiar fondness for
it. Both _Beppo_ and _Don Juan_ are also excellent examples of the
metrical "satiric tale". The former, being the earlier satire of the
two, was Byron's first essay in this new type of satiric composition.
His success therein stimulated him to attempt another "tale" which in
some respects presents features that ally it to the mock-epic. _Beppo_
is a perfect storehouse of well-rounded satirical phrases that cleave
to the memory, such as "the deep damnation of his 'bah'" and the
description of the "budding miss",

"So much alarmed that she is quite alarming,
All giggle, blush, half pertness and half pout".

_Beppo_ leads up to _Don Juan_, and it is hard to say which is the
cleverer satire of the two. In both, the wit is so unforced and
natural, the fun so sparkling, the banter and the persiflage so bright
and scintillating, that they seem, as Sir Walter Scott said, to be the
natural outflow from the fountain of humour. Byron's earliest satire,
_English Bards and Scots Reviewers_, is a clever piece of work, but
compared with the great trio above-named is a production of his nonage.

Byron was succeeded by Praed, whose social pictures are instinct with
the most refined and polished raillery, with the true Attic salt of wit
united to a metrical deftness as graceful as it was artistic. During
Praed's lifetime, Lamb with his inimitable _Essays of Elia_, Southey,
Barham with the ever-popular _Ingo