n as a curate
prevented him from being drawn into any sort of unpleasant disputes with
the villagers about him"--an ambiguous statement which probably,
however, means that the absent rector had to settle difficulties as to
tithe, and other parochial grievances. Crabbe now again brought his old
medical attainments, such as they were, to the aid of his poor
parishioners, "and had often great difficulty in confining his practice
strictly within the limits of the poor, for the farmers would willingly
have been attended _gratis_ also." His literary labours subsequent to
_The Village_ seem to have been slight, with the exception of a brief
memoir of Lord Robert Manners contributed to _The Annual Register_ in
1784, for the poem of _The Newspaper,_ published in 1785, was probably
"old stock." It is unlikely that Crabbe, after the success of _The
Village,_ should have willingly turned again to the old and unprofitable
vein of didactic satire. But, the poem being in his desk, he perhaps
thought that it might bring in a few pounds to a household which
certainly needed them. "_The Newspaper_, a Poem, by the Rev. George
Crabbe, Chaplain to his Grace the Duke of Rutland, printed for J.
Dodsley, in Pall Mall," appeared as a quarto pamphlet (price 2s.) in
1785, with a felicitous motto from Ovid's _Metamorphoses_ on the
title-page, and a politic dedication to Lord Thurlow, evincing a
gratitude for past favours, and (unexpressed) a lively sense of favours
to come.

_The Newspaper_ is, to say truth, of little value, either as throwing
light on the journalism of Crabbe's day, or as a step in his poetic
career. The topics are commonplace, such as the strange admixture of
news, the interference of the newspaper with more useful reading, and
the development of the advertiser's art. It is written in the fluent and
copious vein of mild satire and milder moralising which Crabbe from
earliest youth had so assiduously practised. If a few lines are needed
as a sample, the following will show that the methods of literary
puffing are not so original to-day as might be supposed. After
indicating the tradesman's ingenuity in this respect, the poet adds.--

"These are the arts by which a thousand live,
Where Truth may smile, and Justice may forgive.
But when, amid this rabble-rout, we find
A puffing poet, to his honour blind:
Who slily drops quotations all about
Packet or Post, and points their merit out;
Who advertises what reviewers