University of Virginia Library

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LETTER LVIII.

Dear Charles,—“Mr. Keen says the Flag is tolerable!”
Well, that is more than Mr. Keen is. If he is so
hard to please, why does he not do his own articles, and let
us have a specimen of perfection? I suppose, however, Mr.
Keen, like most other critics, imagines his duty is simply to
criticise, although incapable of writing himself.

I have more than once read little poems and long tales, of
a very unmerciful and desperately unsparing and wholly
unpleasable cynic, which were certainly a little inferior
to his neighbor's wares, that in the same magazine had been
ruthlessly dashed and torn. Many a looker-on thinks he
could play chess better than either of the two engaged, who,
when his turn comes, moves with egregious blundering.

However, as I never set up for a tall poet, I have not far
to fall. Come, I will try again—two sonnets are suffixed,
like a long bob-tail to a little kite.

SONNET—PRIMO.
TO AN ABSENT WIFE.

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SONNET—SECUNDO.
THE WIFE'S REPLY.

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