Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 1.djvu/433

Rh Displays a crowd of figures incomplete,

Poetic Nightmares, without head or feet.

Poets and painters, as all artists know,

May shoot a little with a lengthened bow;

We claim this mutual mercy for our task,

And grant in turn the pardon which we ask;

But make not monsters spring from gentle dams—

Birds breed not vipers, tigers nurse not lambs.

A laboured, long Exordium, sometimes tends

(Like patriot speeches) but to paltry ends;

And nonsense in a lofty note goes down,

As Pertness passes with a legal gown:

Thus many a Bard describes in pompous strain