Page:The Works of Lord Byron (ed. Coleridge, Prothero) - Volume 7.djvu/81

Rh EPISTLE FROM MR. MURRAY TO DR. POLIDORI.

Doctor, I have read your play,

Which is a good one in its way,—

Purges the eyes, and moves the bowels,

And drenches handkerchiefs like towels

With tears, that, in a flux of grief,

Afford hysterical relief

To shattered nerves and quickened pulses,

Which your catastrophe convulses.

I like your moral and machinery;

Your plot, too, has such scope for Scenery!

Your dialogue is apt and smart;

The play's concoction full of art;

Your hero raves, your heroine cries

All stab, and every body dies.

In short, your tragedy would be

The very thing to hear and see:

And for a piece of publication,

If I decline on this occasion,

It is not that I am not sensible

To merits in themselves ostensible,

But—and I grieve to speak it—plays

Are drugs—mere drugs, Sir—now-a-days.