A Volume Of Nonsense

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Title:     A Volume Of Nonsense
Author: Lord Byron [More Titles by Byron]

DEAR MURRAY,--

You ask for a "_Volume of Nonsense_,"
Have all of your authors exhausted their store?
I thought you had published a good deal not long since.
And doubtless the Squadron are ready with more.
But on looking again, I perceive that the Species
Of "Nonsense" you want must be purely "_facetious_;"
And, as that is the case, you had best put to press
Mr. Sotheby's tragedies now in M.S.,
Some Syrian Sally
From common-place Gally,
Or, if you prefer the bookmaking of women,
Take a spick and span "Sketch" of your feminine _He-Man_.[1]

Sept. 28, 1820.

FOOTNOTES:

[1] [For Felicia Dorothea Browne (1793-1835), married in 1812 to Captain Hemans, see _Letters_, iii. 368, _note_ 2. In the letter which contains these verses he writes, "I do not despise Mrs. Heman; but if she knit blue stockings instead of wearing them it would be better." Elsewhere he does despise her: "No more _modern_ poesy, I pray, neither Mrs. Hewoman's nor any female or male Tadpole of poet Wordsworth's."--_Ibid._, v. 64.]

[The end]
Lord Byron's poem: Volume Of Nonsense

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