“. . . . . The infrequency of my letters, my dear Wynn, God knows, is owing to no distaste. The pressing employments of one who keeps pace with an increasing expenditure by temporary writings,—the quantity which, from necessity as well as inclination, I have to read, and the multiplicity of letters which I have to write, are the sufficient causes. You do not know the number of letters which come to me from perfect strangers, who seem to think a poet-laureate has as much patronage as the Lord Chancellor. Not unfrequently the writers remind me so strongly of my own younger days, that I have given them the best advice I could, with earnestness as well as sincerity; and more than once been thus led into an occasional correspondence. The Laureateship itself with me is no sinecure. I am at work in consequence of it at this time. Do not suppose that I mean to rival Walter Scott. My poem will be in a very different strain. . . . .

“During my stay in London, I scarcely ever went out of the circle of my private friends. I dined in company with Mina and some other Liberals—a set of men who (while I cannot but respect them as individuals, and feel that under the late Administration I myself might probably have felt and acted with them,) do certainly justify Ferdinand, not in his ca-

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pricious freaks of favour and disfavour, but in the general and decided character of his measures. They are thorough Atheists, and would go the full length of their principles, being, I believe, all of them (as is, indeed, the character of the nation,) of the same iron mould as Cortes and Pizarro. Mina is a finer character,—young and ardent, and speaking of his comrades with an affection which conciliates affection for himself. . . . . .

“God bless you, my dear Wynn.

“Did you ever watch the sands of an hour-glass? When I was first at Oxford, one of these old-fashioned measurers of time was part of my furniture. I rose at four o’clock, and portioned out my studies by the hour. When the sands ran low, my attention was often attracted by observing how much faster they appeared to run. Applying this image to human life, which it has so often been brought to illustrate, (whether my sands run low or not, is known only to Him by whom this frail vessel was made, but assuredly they run fast), it seems as if the weeks of my youth were longer than the months of middle age, and that I could get through more in a day then, than in a week now. Since I wrote to you, I have scarcely done anything but versify; and certain it is that twenty years ago, I could have produced the same quantity of verses in a fourth part of the time. It is true they would have been more faulty; but the very solicitude to avoid faults, and the slow and dreaming state which it induces, may be considered as indications that the season for poetry is gone by,—that I am falling into the yellow leaf, or, to use a more consoling metaphor, and perhaps a more applicable one, that poetry is but the blossom of an intellect so constituted as mine, and that with me the fruit is set,—in sober phrase, that it would be wisely done, if henceforth I confined myself to sober prose.

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And this I could be well content to do, from a conviction in my own mind that I shall ultimately hold a higher place among historians (if I live to complete what is begun) than among poets. . . . .

“The affair of Lavalette, in France, pleases me well, except as far as regards the treatment of his wife for having done her duty. The king ought not to have pardoned him, and the law ought to have condemned him: both did as they ought, and, as far as depended upon them, his civil life was at an end. I should have had no pity for him if the axe had fallen; but a condemned criminal making his escape becomes a mere human creature striving for life, and the Devil take him, say I, who would not lend a hand to assist him, except in cases of such atrocious guilt as make us abhor and execrate the perpetrator, and render it unfit that he should exist upon earth.

“Of home politics, I grieve to say that the more I think of them, the worse they appear. All imaginable causes which produce revolution are at work among us; the solitary principle of education is the only counteracting power; and God knows this is very partial, very limited, and must be slow in its effects, even if it were upon a wider scale and a more permanent foundation. If another country were in this state, I should say, without hesitation, that revolution was at hand there, and that it was inevitable. If I hesitate at predicting to myself the same result here, it is from love or from weakness, from hope that we may mercifully be spared so dreadful a chastisement for our follies and our sins, and from fear of

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contemplating the evils under which we should be overwhelmed. God bless you!

“Is it true that the Princess Charlotte is likely to be married? You will guess why I wish to know; though, if I had not written half a marriage poem, I certainly would not begin one, for, between ourselves, I have not been well used about the Laureateship. They require task verses from me,—not to keep up the custom of having them befiddled, but to keep up the task,—instead of putting an end to this foolery in a fair and open manner, which would do the court credit, and save me a silly expense of time and trouble. I shall complete what I have begun, because it is begun, and to please myself, not to obtain favour with anybody else; but when these things are done, if they continue to look for New Years’ Odes from the Laureate, they shall have nothing else.

* A petition that some foreign books might come in duty free.

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“Tom has been here for the last fortnight, looking about for a house. I cannot write verses in the presence of any person, except my wife and children. Tom, therefore, without knowing it, has impeded my Pilgrimage; but I can prosify, let who will be present, and Brazil is profiting by this interruption.

“Were you not here when poor Lloyd introduced M. Simond? and have you seen the said M. Simond’s Travels in England, by a native of France? You will like the liveliness and the pervading good sense; and you will smile at the complacency with which he abuses Handel, Raphael, and Milton. He honours me with a couple of pages—an amusing mixture of journalising, personal civility, and critical presumption. My poems and Milton’s, he says, have few readers, although they have many admirers. He applies to me the famous speech of the Cardinal to Ariosto, Dove Diavolo, &c., and thinks I write nonsense. However, it is better than Milton’s, both Milton’s love and theology being coarse and material, whereas I have tenderness and spirituality!!! He sets down two or three things which I told him, states my opinions as he is pleased to suppose, and concludes that the reason why I disapprove of Mr. Malthus’s writings is, that I do not understand them. Bravo, M. Simond! Yet, in the main, it is a fair and able book, and I wonder how so sensible a man can write with such consummate self-assurance upon things above his reach.

“I long to have my Brazilian History finished, that that of the war may go to press in its stead; and could I abstain from reviewing, three months

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would accomplish this desirable object; but ‘I must live,’ as the French libeller said to Richelieu, and, unlike the Cardinal, I know you will see the necessity for my so doing. However, I am in a fair train, and verily believe that after the present year I and the constable shall travel side by side in good fellowship. You will be glad to hear that I have got the correspondence of the Portuguese committee, with the official details of the conduct of Massena’s army, and the consequent state of the people and the country. If I live to complete this work, I verily believe it will tend to mitigate the evils of war hereafter, by teaching men in command what ineffaceable infamy will pursue them if they act as barbarians.

“A natural but melancholy association reminds me of you. Between three and four years ago, a youth, as ardent in the study of poetry as yourself, but under less favourable circumstances of fortune, sent me some specimens of his poems, and consulted me concerning the course of life which he should pursue. He was the eldest of a very large family, and the father a half-pay officer. He wished to go to London, and study the law, and support himself while studying it by his pen. I pointed out to him the certain misery and ruin in which such an event

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would involve him, and recommended him to go to Cambridge, where, with his talents and acquirements, he could not fail of making his way, unless he was imprudent. I interested myself for him at Cambridge; he was placed at Emmanuel, won the goodwill of his college, and was in the sure road both to independence and fame, when the fever of last year cut him off. I do not think there ever lived a youth of higher promise. His name was James Dusautoy. This evening I have been looking over his papers, with a view of arranging a selection of them for the press. In seeking to serve him, I have been the means of sending him prematurely to the grave. I will at least endeavour to preserve his memory.*

“Of the many poets, young and old, whom I have known only by letter, Kirke White, Dusautoy, and yourself have borne the fairest blossom. In the blossom they have been cut off. May you live to bring forth fruit!

“Your sonnets have gratified me and my family.

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Study our early poets, and avoid all imitation of your contemporaries. You cannot read the best writers of Elizabeth’s age too often. Do you love Spenser? I have him in my heart of hearts.

“I have a debt upon my conscience, which has been too long unpaid. You left me a letter of introduction to the Duchess of Richmond, which I was graceless enough to make no use of, and, still more gracelessly, I have never yet thanked you for it. As for the first part of the offence, my stay at Brussels was not very long. I had a great deal to see there; moreover, I got among the old books; and having a sort of instinct which makes me as much as possible get out of the way of drawing-rooms, because I have an awkward feeling of being in the way when in them, I was much more at my ease when looking at Emperors and Princes in the crowd, than I should have been in the room with them.

“How I should have rejoiced if we had met at Waterloo! This feeling I had and expressed upon the ground. You have pictured it with your characteristic force and animation. My poem will reach you in a few weeks: it is so different in its kind, that, however kindly malice may be disposed, it will not

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be possible to institute a comparison with yours. I take a different point of time and a wider range, leaving the battle untouched, and describing the field only such as it was when I surveyed it. . . . .

“Mountaineer as I am, the cultivated scenery of Flanders delighted me. I have seen no town so interesting as Bruges,—no country in a state so perfect as to its possible production of what is beautiful and useful, as the environs of that city and the Pays de Waes. Of single objects, the finest which I saw were the market-place at Brussels and at Ypres, and the town-house at Louvain; the most extraordinary, as well as the most curious, the cathedral at Aix-la-Chapelle, which is, perhaps, the most curious church in existence. The most impressive were the quarries of Maestricht. I found a good deal of political discontent, particularly in the Liege country—a general sense of insecurity,—a very prevalent belief that England had let Bonaparte loose from Elba, which I endeavoured in vain to combat; and a very proper degree of disappointment and indignation that he had not been put to death as he deserved—a feeling in which I heartily concurred.

“Did I ever thank you for the Lord of the Isles? There are pictures in it which are not surpassed in any of your poems, and in the first part especially, a mixture of originality and animation and beauty, which is seldom found. I wished the Lord himself had been more worthy of the good fortune which you bestowed upon him. The laurel which it has pleased you, rather than any other person, to bestow upon me, has taken me in for much dogged work in rhyme;

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otherwise, I am inclined to think that my service to the Muses has been long enough, and that I should, perhaps, have claimed my discharge. The ardour of youth is gone by; however I may have fallen short of my own aspirations, my best is done, and I ought to prefer those employments which require the matured faculties and collected stores of declining life. You will receive the long-delayed conclusion of my Brazilian history in the course of the summer. It has much curious matter respecting savage life, a full account of the Jesuit establishments, and a war in Pernambuco, which will be much to your liking.

“Remember me to Mrs. Scott and your daughter, who is old enough to be entitled to these courtesies, and believe me, my dear Scott,

“You will shortly, I trust, receive my Pilgrimage, the notes and title-page to which would have been at this time in the printer’s hands, if I had not been palsied by the severe illness of my son, who is at this time in such a state that I know not whether there be more cause for fear or for hope. In the disposition of mind which an affliction of this kind induces, there is no person whom I feel so much inclined to converse with as with you.

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“Time, my own heart, and, more than all other causes, the sorrows with which it has been visited (in the course of a life that, on the whole, has been happy in a degree vouchsafed to few, even among the happiest), have made me fully sensible, that the highest happiness exists, as the only consolation is to be found, in a deep and habitual feeling of devotion. Long ere this would I have preached what I feel upon this subject, if the door had been open to me; but it is one thing to conform to the Church, preserving that freedom of mind which in religion, more than in all other things, is especially valuable; and another to subscribe solemnly to its articles. Christianity exists nowhere in so pure a form as in our own Church; but even there it is mingled with much alloy, from which I know not how it will be purified. I have an instinctive abhorrence of bigotry. When Dissenters talk of the Establishment, they make me feel like a high Churchman; and when I get among

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high Churchmen, I am ready to take shelter in dissent.

“You have thrown a new light upon the York and Lancaster age of our history, by showing the connection of those quarrels with the incipient spirit of Reformation. I wish we had reformed the monastic institutions instead of overthrowing them. Mischievous as they are in Catholic countries, they have got this good about them, that they hold up something besides worldly distinction to the respect and admiration of the people, and fix the standard of virtues higher than we do in Protestant countries. Would that we had an order of Beguines in England! There are few subjects which have been so unfairly discussed as monastic institutions: the Protestant condemns them in the lump, and the Romanist crams his legends down your throat. The truth is, that they began in a natural and good feeling, though somewhat exaggerated,—that they produced the greatest public good in their season, that they were abominably perverted, and that the good which they now do, wherever they exist, is much less than the evil. Yet, if you had seen, as I once did, a Franciscan of fourscore, with a venerable head and beard, standing in the cloister of his convent, where his brothers lay beneath his feet, and telling his beads, with a countenance expressive of the most perfect and peaceful piety, you would have felt with me how desirable it was that there should be such institutions for minds so constituted. The total absence of religion from our poor-houses, alms-houses, and hospitals, is as culpable in one way as the excess of superstition is in

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another. I was greatly shocked at a story which I once heard from Dr. Gooch. A woman of the town was brought to one of the hospitals, having been accidentally poisoned. Almost the last words which she uttered were, that this was a blasted life, and she was glad to have done with it! Who will not wish that she had been kissing the crucifix, and listening in full faith to the most credulous priest! I say this more with reference to her feelings at that moment, and the effect upon others, than as to her own future state, however awful that consideration may be. The mercy of God is infinite; and it were too dreadful to believe that they who have been most miserable here, should be condemned to endless misery hereafter.

“But I will have done with these topics, because I wish to say something respecting your second volume. You have surprised me by the additions you have made to our knowledge of our own early poetry. I had no notion that the Hermit of Hampole was so considerable a personage, nor that there remained such a mass of inedited poetry of that age. The Antiquarian Society would do well to publish the whole, however much it may be. You are aware how much light it would throw upon the history of our language, of our manners, and even of civil transaction;—for all these things I should most gladly peruse the whole mass. St. Francisco Xavier is not the Xavier who wrote the Persian Life of Christ. In p. 3. you mention some novel verses which relate to Portuguese history. If the Scald Halldon’s poem be not too long, may I request you to translate it for me, as a document for my history. Observe, that

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this request is purely conditional, as regarding the extent of the poem. If it is more than a half hour’s work, it would be unreasonable to ask for time which you employ so well, and of which you have so little to spare.

“Remember us to Mrs. Turner, Alfred, and your daughter. We are in great anxiety, and with great cause, but there is hope. My wish at such time is akin to Macbeth’s, but in a different spirit—a longing that the next hundred years were over, and that we were in a better world, where happiness is permanent, and there is neither change nor evil.

“Here is an end of hope and of fear, but not of suffering. His sufferings, however, are over, and, thank God, his passage was perfectly easy. He fell asleep, and is now in a better state of existence, for which his nature was more fitted than for this. You, more than most men, can tell what I have lost, and yet you are far from knowing how large a portion of my hopes and happiness will be laid in the grave with

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Herbert. For years It has been my daily prayer that I might be spared this affliction.

“In his desk there are the few letters which I had written to him, in the joy of my heart. I will fold up these and send them to you, that they may be preserved when I am gone, in memory of him and of me.* Should you survive me, you will publish such parts of my correspondence as are proper, for the benefit of my family. My dear Grosvenor, I wish you would make the selection while you can do it without sorrow, while it is uncertain which of us shall be left to regret the other. You are the fit person to do this; and it will be well to burn in time what is to be suppressed.

* These letters have not come into my hands. It does not appear that they have been preserved.

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“I wish you would tell Knox* what has happened. He was very kind to Herbert, and deserves that I should write to him.”

“Wherefore do I write to you? Alas, because I know not what to do. To-morrow, perhaps, may bring with it something like the beginning of relief. To-day I hope I shall support myself, or rather that God will support me, for 1 am weak as a child, in body even more than in mind. My limbs tremble under me; long anxiety has wasted me to the bone, and I fear it will be long before grief will suffer me to recruit. I am seriously apprehensive for the shock which my health seems to have sustained; yet I am wanting in no effort to appear calm and to console others; and those who are about me give me credit for a fortitude which I do not possess. Many blessings are left me—abundant blessings, more than I have deserved, more than I had ever reason to expect or even to hope. I have strong ties to life, and many duties yet to perform. Believe me, I see these things as they ought to be seen. Reason will do something. Time more. Religion most of all. The loss is but for

* A schoolfellow of my father’s at Westminster, who was afterwards one of the masters there.

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this world; but as long as I remain in this world I shall feel it.

“There would be no wisdom in going from home. The act of returning to it would undo all the benefit I might receive from change of circumstance for some time yet. Edith feels this; otherwise, perhaps, we might have gone to visit Tom in his new habitation. Summer is at hand. While there was a hope of Herbert’s recovery, this was a frequent subject of pleasurable consideration; it is now a painful thought, and I look forward with a sense of fear to the season which brings with it life and joy to those who are capable of receiving them. You, more than most men, are aware of the extent of my loss, and how, as long as I remain here, every object within and without, and every hour of every day, must bring it fresh to recollection. Yet the more I consider the difficulties of removing, the greater they appear; and perhaps by the time It would be possible, I may cease to desire it.

“Whenever I have leisure (will that ever be?) I will begin my own memoirs, to serve as a post-obit for those of my family who may survive me. They will be so far provided for as to leave me no uneasiness on that score. My life insurance is 4000l.; my books (for there is none to inherit them now) may be worth 1500l.; my copyrights, perhaps, not less; and

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you will be able to put together letters and fragments, which, when I am gone, will be acceptable articles in the market. Probably there would, on the whole, be 10,000l. forthcoming. The whole should be Edith’s during her life, and afterwards divided equally among the surviving children. I shall name John May and Neville White for executors,—both men of business, and both my dear and zealous friends. But do you take care of my papers, and publish my remains. I have perhaps much underrated the value of what will be left. A selection of my reviewals may be reprinted, with credit to my name and with profit. You will not wonder that I have fallen into this strain. One grave is at this moment made ready; and who can tell how soon another may be required? I pray, however, for continued life. There may be, probably there are, many afflictions for me in store, but the worst is past. I have more than once thought of Mr. Roberts; when he hears of my loss, it will for a moment freshen the recollection of his own.

“It is some relief to write to you, after the calls which have this day been made upon my fortitude. I have not been found wanting; and Edith, throughout the whole long trial, has displayed the most exemplary self-control. We never approached him but with composed countenances and words of hope; and for a mother to do this, hour after hour, and night after night, while her heart was breaking, is perhaps the utmost effort of which our nature is capable. Oh! how you would have admired and loved him, had you seen him in these last weeks! But you know something of his character. Never, perhaps,

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was child of ten years old so much to his father. Without ever ceasing to treat him as a child, I had made him my companion, as well as playmate and pupil, and he had learnt to interest himself in my pursuits, and take part in all my enjoyments.

“I have sent Edith May to Wordsworth’s. Poor child, she is dreadfully distressed; and it has ever been my desire to save them from all the sorrow that can be avoided, and to mitigate, as far as possible, what is inevitable. Something it is to secure for them a happy childhood. Never was a happier than Herbert’s. He knew not what unkindness or evil were, except by name. His whole life was passed in cheerful duty, and love and enjoyment. If I did not hope that I have been useful in my generation, and may still continue to be so, I could wish that I also had gone to rest as early in the day; but my childhood was not like his.

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“Desire Gifford to reserve room for me in this number: I will not delay it beyond the first week in May; he may rely upon this: I am diligently at work; the exertion is wholesome for me at this season, and I want the money. It is the La Vendee article.

“I am in all respects acting as you would wish to see me, not unmindful of the blessings which are left and the duties which I have to perform. But indeed, Grosvenor, it is only a deep, heartfelt, and ever-present faith which could support me. If what I have lost were lost for ever, I should sink under the affliction. Throughout the whole sorrow, long and trying as it has been, Edith has demeaned herself with a strength of mind and a self-control deserving the highest admiration. To be as happy ever again as I have been is impossible; my future happiness must be of a different kind, but the difference will be in kind rather than degree; there will

* Of the Pilgrimage to Waterloo.

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be less of this world in it, more of the next, therefore will it be safe and durable.

“Three things I prayed for,—the child’s recovery if it might please God; that if this might not be, his passage might be rendered easy; and that we might be supported in our affliction. The two latter petitions were granted, and I am truly thankful. But when the event was over, then, like David, I roused myself, and gave no way to unavailing grief, acting in all things as I should wish others to act when my hour also is come. I employ myself incessantly, taking, however, every day as much exercise as I can bear without injurious fatigue, which is not much. My appetite is good, and I have now no want of sleep. Edith is perfectly calm and resigned. Her

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fortitude is indeed exemplary to the highest degree, but her employments do not withdraw her from herself as mine do, and therefore I fear she has more to struggle with. Perhaps we were too happy before this dispensation struck us. Perhaps it was expedient for us that our hearts should be drawn more strongly towards another world. This is the use of sorrow, and to this use I trust our sorrow will be sanctified.

“You were right respecting the nature of my support under this affliction; there is but one source of consolation, and of that source I have drunk largely. When you shall see how I had spoken of my happiness but a few weeks ago, you will read with tears of sorrow what I wrote with tears of joy. And little did I think how soon and how literally another part of this mournful poem was to be fulfilled, when I said in it—

‘To earth I should have sunk in my despair, Had I not claspt the Cross, and been supported there.’

“I thank God for the strength with which we have borne this trial. It is not possible for woman to have

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acted with more fortitude than Edith has done through the whole sharp suffering; she has rather set an example than followed it. My bodily frame is much shaken. A little time and care will recruit it, and the mind is sound. I am fully sensible of the blessings which are left me, which far exceed those of most men. I pray for continued life that I may fulfil my duties towards those whom I love. I employ myself, and I look forward to the end with faith and with hope, as one whose treasure is laid up in Heaven; and where the treasure is, there will the heart be also.

* “Nature hath assigned Two sovereign remedies for human grief: Religion,—surest, firmest, first, and best; And strenuous action next.” Roderick, Canto xiv.

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“At present one of my daily employments is the Carmen Nuptiale, which is now nearly completed. It will extend to about a hundred and ten stanzas, the same metre as the Pilgrimage, which printed in the same manner may run to seventy pages,—say three sheets. Its English title the Lay of the Laureate, which is not only a taking title for an advertisement, but a remarkably good one. It is for Longman to determine in what form he will print it, and what number of copies: quarto pamphlets I think are not liked for their inconvenient size.

“There must be a presentation copy bound for the Princess. Through what channel shall I convey it? Lord William Gordon would deliver it for me if I were to ask him. Can you put me in a better way? Would Herries like to do it, or is it proper to ask him?

“In a few days I shall send you the MSS.; the printing will be done presently. It comes too close upon the Pilgrimage; but whatever may be thought of it at Court, it will do me credit now and hereafter. I am very desirous of completing it, that I may have leisure for what lies nearer my heart.

“I will have a copy for Edith bound exactly like the court copy. What would it cost to have both these printed upon vellum? more, I suspect, than the fancy is worth.

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“Press upon Gifford my earnest desire that the article of which the first portion accompanies this note may appear in the present number. It is of consequence to me, and the subject is in danger of becoming stale if it be delayed: dwell upon this point. It will be as interesting a paper as he has ever received from me.

“Herbert died on the 17th, and he was in the tenth year of his age; say nothing more than this. How much does it contain to me, and to the world how little!

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“It is not unlikely that Gifford will do for me in this number what he has done by me in others—displace some other person’s article to make room for mine. He will act wisely if he does so, for the freshness of the subject will else evaporate. I shall finish it with all speed upon this supposition. It would surprise you were you to see what I get through in a day.

“The remainder of the proofs might as well have been sent me. Surrounded as I am with mementos, there was little reason for wishing to keep them at a distance. And however mournful it must ever be to remember the Proem, and the delight which it gave when the proof sheet arrived, I am glad that it was written, and Edith feels upon this point as I do. The proofs had better come to me, if it is not too late. I can verify the quotations, which it is impossible for you to do, and may perhaps add something.

“Tell Pople I shall be obliged to him if he will make some speed with the History of Brazil; that I find it impossible to comprise it in two volumes; a third there must be, but it will go to press as soon as the second is printed; and that there will be no delay on my part (that is, as far as man can answer for himself) till the whole is completed. I send a portion of copy in the frank which covers this. If I mistake not, this second volume will be found very amusing as well as very curious.

“Edith May returned from Wordsworth’s this morning,—we missed her greatly, and yet her return was a renewal of sorrow. Her mother behaves

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incomparably well: it is not possible that any mother could suffer more, or support her sufferings better. She knows that we have abundant blessings left, but feels that the flower of all is gone; and this feeling must be for life. Bitter as it is it is wholesome.

“Time passes on. I employ myself, and have recovered strength; but in point of spirits, I rather lose ground. The cause, perhaps, is obvious. At first, we make great efforts to force the mind from thoughts which are intolerably painful; but as, from time, they become endurable, less effort is made to avoid them, and the poignancy of grief settles into melancholy. Both with Edith and myself, this seems to be the case. Certain I am that nothing but the full assurance of immortality could prevent me from sinking under an affliction which is greater than any stranger could possibly believe; and thankful I am that my feelings have been so long and so habitually directed toward this point. You probably know my poems better than most people, and may perceive how strongly my mind has been impressed upon this most consoling subject.

“Yesterday I finished the main part of the Lay. There remain only six or eight stanzas as a L’Envoy,

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which I may, perhaps, complete this night; then I shall send you the whole in one packet through Gifford. I have said nothing about it to Longman, for I think it very probable that you may advise me not to publish the poem now it is written, lest it should give offence; and having satisfied myself by writing it, it is quite indifferent to me whether it appears now or after my decease. The emolument to be derived from it is too insignificant to be thought of, and the credit which I should gain, I can very well do without. So take counsel with any body you please, and remember that I, who am easily enough persuaded in any case, am in this perfectly unconcerned; for were it a thing of course that I should produce a poem on this occasion, there is at this time, God knows, sufficient reason why I might stand excused.

“Do not imagine that the poem has derived the slightest cast of colouring from my present state of mind. The plan is precisely what was originally formed. William Nichol is likely to judge as well as any man whether there be any unfitness in publishing it. You are quite aware that I neither wish to court favour nor to give offence, and that the absurdity of taking offence (if it were taken) would excite in me more pity than resentment.

“Good night! I am going to the poem in hope of completing it. I cannot yet bear to be unemployed, and this I feel severely. You know how much I used to unbend, and play with the children, in frequent intervals of study, as though I were an idle man. Of this I am quite incapable, and shall long

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continue so. No circumstance of my former life ever brought with it so great a change as that which I daily and hourly feel, and perhaps shall never cease to feel. Yet I am thankful for having possessed this child so long; for worlds I would not but have been his father. Of all the blessings which it has pleased God to vouchsafe me, this was and is the greatest.

“You will have seen, by my last letters, that I am not exhausting myself by over-exertion. On the contrary, for many days I have been forcing myself to the more difficult necessity of bearing my own recollections. Time will soften them down; indeed, they now have, and always have had, all the alleviation which an assured hope and faith can bestow; and when I give way to tears, which is only in darkness or in solitude, they are not tears of unmingled pain. I begin to think that change of place would not be desirable, and that the pain of leaving a place where I have enjoyed so many years of such great happiness, is more than it is wise to incur without necessity. Nor could I reconcile either Edith or myself to the thought of leaving poor Mrs. Wilson*,

* Mrs. Wilson (the “aged friend” mentioned in the stanzas quoted from the Pilgrimage to Waterloo) had been housekeeper to Mr. Jack-

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whose heart is half broken already, and to whom our departure would be a death-stroke. Her days, indeed, must necessarily be few, and her life-lease will probably expire before the end of the term to which we are looking on.

“Murray has sent me 50l. for the La Vendee article, which makes me indifferent when it appears; and proposes to me half a dozen other subjects at 100l. each, at which rate I suppose in future I shall supply him with an article every quarter. This will set me at ease in money matters, about which, thank God and the easy disposition with which he has blessed me, I have never been too anxious.

“It is needless to say I shall be glad to see you here, but rather at some future time, when you will find me a better companion, and when your company would do me more good. Nor, indeed, must you leave your mother; her deliverance from the infirmities of life cannot be long deferred by any human skill, or any favourable efforts of nature. Whenever that event takes place, you will need such relief as change of scene can afford; and whenever it may be, I hold myself ready to join you and accompany you to the Continent, for as long a time as you can be spared from your office, and as long a journey as that

son, the former owner of Greta Hall, and she continued to occupy part of one of the two houses, which, though altogether in my father’s occupation, had not been wholly thrown together as was afterwards done. She had once been the belle of Keswick; and was a person of a marvellous sweetness of temper and sterling good sense, as much attached to the children of the family as if they had been her own, and remembered still by every surviving member of it with respect and affection.

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time may enable us to take. Remember this, and look to it as a fitting arrangement which will benefit us both. God bless you!

“These are my habitual feelings, not the offspring

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of immediate sorrow, for I have felt sorrow ere this, and, I hope, have profited by it.

“Let me see your poem when you have finished it, and tell me something more of yourself, where your home is, and where you have been educated. Anything that you may communicate upon this subject will interest me. In my communication with Kirke White, and with poor Dusautoy, I have blamed myself for repressing the expression of interest concerning them, when it has been too late. Perhaps they have thought me cold and distant, than which nothing can be farther from my nature; but may your years be many and prosperous. God bless you!

“I thank you for your letter. You may remember that in my youth I had a good deal of such practical philosophy as may be learned from Epictetus; it has often stood me in good stead; it affords strength, but no consolation; consolation can be found only in religion, and there I find it. My dear Lightfoot, it is now full two-and-twenty years since you and I shook hands at our last parting. In all likelihood, the separation between my son and me will not be for so long a time; in the common course of nature it cannot possibly be much longer, and I may be summoned to rejoin him before the year, yea, before the passing day or the passing hour be gone. Death has so often entered my doors, that he and I have long been familiar. The loss of five brothers and sisters (four of whom I remember well), of my father and mother, of a female cousin who grew up with me, and lived with me; of two daughters, and of several friends (among them two of the dearest friends that ever man possessed), had very much weaned my heart from this world, or, more properly speaking, had fixed its thoughts and desires upon a better state wherein there shall be no such separation, before this last and severest affliction. Still it would be senseless and ungrateful to the greatest degree, if I were not to feel and acknowledge the abundant blessings that I still possess, especially believing,

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trusting, knowing, as I do, in the full assurance of satisfied reason and settled faith, that the treasure which has been taken from me now, is laid up in heaven, there to be repossessed with ample increase.

“My estimate of human life is more favourable than yours. If death were the termination of our existence, then, indeed, I should wish rather to have been born a beast, or never to have been born at all; but considering nothing more certain than that this life is preparatory to a higher state of being, I am thankful for the happiness I have enjoyed, for the blessings which are left me, and for those to which I look with sure and certain hope. With me the enjoyments of life have more than counterbalanced its

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anxieties and its pains. No man can possibly have been happier; and at this moment, when I am suffering under almost the severest loss which could have befallen me, I am richer both in heart and hope than if God had never given me the child whom it hath pleased him to take away. My heart has been exercised with better feelings during his life, and is drawn nearer towards Heaven by his removal. I do not recover spirits, but my strength is materially recruited, and I am not unhappy.

“Edith sets me the example of suppressing her own feelings for the sake of mine. We have many blessings left,—abundant ones, for which to be thankful. I know, too, to repine because Herbert is removed, would be as selfish as it would be sinful. Yea, I believe that, in my present frame of mind, I could lay my children upon the altar, like Abraham, and say, ‘Thy will be done.’ This I trust will continue, when the depressing effects of grief shall have passed away. I hope in time to recover some portion

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of my constitutional cheerfulness, but never to lose that feeling with which I look on to eternity. I always knew the instability of earthly happiness; this woeful experience will make me contemplate more habitually and more ardently that happiness which is subject neither to chance nor change.

“Do not suppose that I am indulging in tears, or giving way to painful recollections. On the contrary, I make proper exertions, and employ myself assiduously for as great a portion of the day as is compatible with health. For the first week I did as much every day as would at other times have seemed the full and overflowing produce of three. This, of course, I could not continue, but at the time it was salutary. God bless you, my dear Neville!

“. . . . . If egotism* in poetry be a sin, God forgive all great poets! But perhaps it is allowable in them, when they have been dead a few centuries; and therefore they may be permitted to speak of themselves and appreciate themselves, provided they leave especial

* This refers to some observations which had been made upon the Proem to the marriage song for the Princess Charlotte.

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orders that such passages be not made public until the statute of critical limitation expires. Who can be weak enough to suppose that the man who wrote that third stanza would be deterred from printing it by any fear of reprehension on the score of vanity? Who is to reprehend him? None of his peers assuredly; not one person who will sympathise with him as he reads; not one person who enters into his thoughts and feelings; not one person who can enter into the strain and enjoy it. Those persons, indeed, may who live wholly in the present; but I have taken especial care to make it known, that a faith in hereafter is as necessary for the intellectual as for the moral character, and that to the man of letters (as well as the Christian) the present forms but the slightest portion of his existence. He who would leave any durable monument behind him, must live in the past and look to the future. The poets of old scrupled not to say this; and who is there who is not delighted with these passages, whenever time has set his seal upon the prophecy which they contain? . . . .

“My spirits do not recover: that they should again be what they have been, I do not expect,—that, indeed, is impossible. But, except when reading or writing, I am deplorably depressed: the worst is, that I cannot conceal this. To affect anything like my old hilarity, and that presence of joyous feelings which carried with it a sort of perpetual sunshine, is, of course, impossible; but you must imagine that the absence of all this must make itself felt. The change in my daily occupations, in my sports, my relaxations,

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my hopes, is so great, that it seems to have changed my very nature also. Nothing is said, but I often find anxious eyes fixed upon me, and watching my countenance. The best thing I can say is, that time passes on, and sooner or later remedies everything. . . . .

“I will have the books bound separately, because a book is a book, and two books are worth as much again as one; and if a man’s library comes to the hammer, this is of consequence; and whenever I get my knock-down blow, the poor books will be knocked down after me. But why did I touch upon this string? Alas! Grosvenor, it is because all things bear upon one subject, the centre of the whole circumference of all my natural associations

“Thank you for both your letters. The history of your school-boy days reminds me of my own childhood and youth. I had a lonely childhood, and suffered much from tyranny at school, till I outgrew it, and came to have authority myself. In one respect, my fortune seems to have been better than yours, or my nature more accommodating. Where intellectual sympathy was not to be found, it was sufficient for me if moral sympathy existed. A kind heart and a gentle disposition won my friendship

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more readily than brighter talents, where these were wanting. . . . .

“I left Westminster in a perilous state,—a heart full of feeling and poetry, a head full of Rousseau and Werter, and my religious principles shaken by Gibbon: many circumstances tended to give me a wrong bias, none to lead me right, except adversity, the wholesomest of all discipline. An instinctive modesty, rather than any purer cause, preserved me for a time from all vice. A severe system of stoical morality then came to its aid. I made Epictetus, for many months, literally my manual. The French revolution was then in its full career. I went to Oxford in January, 1793, a Stoic and a Republican. I had no acquaintance at the college, which was in a flagitious state of morals. I refused to wear powder, when every other man in the university wore it, because I thought the custom foolish and filthy; and I refused even to drink more wine than suited my inclination and my principles. Before I had been a week in the college, a little party had got round me, glad to form a sober society, of which I was the centre. Here I became intimate with Edmund Seward, whose death was the first of those privations which have, in great measure, weaned my heart from the world. He confirmed in me all that was good. Time and reflection, the blessings and the sorrows of life, and I hope I may add, with unfeigned humility, the grace of God, have done the rest. Large draughts have been administered to me from both urns. No man has suffered keener sorrows, no man has been more profusely blest. Four months ago no human

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being could possibly be happier than I was, or richer in all that a wise heart could desire. The difference now is, that what was then my chief treasure is now laid up in Heaven.

“I have not written to you for some weeks. Time passes on, and the lapse of two months may perhaps enable me now to judge what permanent effect this late affliction may produce upon my habitual state of mind. It will be long before I shall cease to be

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sensible of the change in my relaxations, my pleasures, hopes, plans, and prospects; very long, I fear, will it be before a sense of that change will cease to be my latest thought at night and my earliest in the morning. Yet I am certainly resigned to this privation; and this I say, not in the spirit with which mere philosophy teaches us to bear that which is inevitable, but with a Christian conviction that this early removal is a blessing to him who is removed. We read of persons who have suddenly become gray from violent emotions of grief or fear. I feel in some degree as if I had passed at once from boyhood to the decline of life. I had never ceased to be a boy in cheerfulness till now. All those elastic spirits are now gone; nor is it in the nature of things that they should return. I am still capable of enjoyment, and trust that there is much in store for me; but there is an end of that hilarity which I possessed more uninterruptedly, and in a greater degree, than any person with whom I was ever acquainted. You advised me to write down my recollections of Herbert while they were fresh. I dare not undertake the task. Something akin to it, but in a different form, and with a more extensive purpose, I have begun; but my eyes and my head suffer too much in the occupation for me to pursue it as yet; and as these effects cannot be concealed, I must avoid as much as possible all that would produce them. This, believe me, is an effort of forbearance, for my heart is very much set upon completing what I have planned. The effect upon Edith will be as lasting as upon myself; but she had not the

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same exuberance of spirits to lose, and therefore it will be less perceptible. The self-command which she has exercised has been truly exemplary, and commands my highest esteem. Your god-daughter, thank God, is well. Her daily lesson will long be a melancholy task on my part, since it will be a solitary one. She is now so far advanced that I can make some of her exercises of use, and set her to translate passages for my notes, from French, Spanish, or Portuguese. Of course this is not done without some assistance and some correction. Still while she improves herself she is assisting me, and the pleasure that this gives me is worth a great deal. She is a good girl, with a ready comprehension, quick feelings, a tender heart, and an excellent disposition. I pray God that her life may be spared to make me happy while I live, and some one who may be worthy of her when it shall be time for her to contract other ties and other duties.

“I suppose you will receive my Lay in a few days.

“. . . . . It will be unfortunate if chance should not one day bring me within reach of you; but I would rather that chance should bring you to Cumberland, when you can spare a few weeks for such a visit. You will find a bed, plain fare, and a glad welcome; books for wet weather, a boat for sunny evenings; the loveliest parts of this lovely county within reach and within sight; and myself one of the best guides to all the recesses of the vales and mountains. As a geologist, you will enjoy one more pleasure than I do, who am ignorant of every branch

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of science. Mineralogy and botany are the only branches which I wish that I had possessed, not from any predilection for either, but because opportunities have fallen in my way for making observations (had I been master of the requisite knowledge) by which others might have been interested and guided. These two are sciences which add to our out-door enjoyments, and have no injurious effects. Chemical and physical studies seem, on the contrary, to draw on very prejudicial consequences. Their utility is not to be doubted; but it appears as if man could not devote himself to these pursuits without blunting his finer faculties.

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“Your comments upon the Castle of Indolence express the feeling of every true poet; the second part must always be felt as injuring the first. I agree with you, also, as respecting the Minstrel, beautiful and delightful as it is. It still wants that imaginative charm which Thomson has caught from Spenser, but which no poet has ever so entirely possessed as Spenser himself. Among the many plans of my ambitious boyhood, the favourite one was that of completing the Faëry Queen. For this purpose I had collected every hint and indication of what Spenser meant to introduce in the progress of his poem, and had planned the remaining legends in a manner which, as far as I can remember after a lapse of four or five-and-twenty years, was not without some merit. What I have done as a poet falls far short of what I had hoped to do; but in boyhood and in youth I dreamt of poetry alone; and I suppose it is the course of nature, that the ardour which this pursuit requires should diminish as we advance in life. In youth we delight in strong emotions, to be agitated and inflamed with hope, and to weep at tragedy. In maturer life we have no tears to spare; it is more delightful to have our judgment exercised than our feelings.

“Whenever you come I shall rejoice to see you. Do not, however, wind up your expectations too high. In many things I may, in some things I must, disappoint the ideal which you have formed. No man has ever written more faithfully from his heart; but my manners have not the same habitual unreserve as my pen. A disgust at the professions of

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friendship and feeling and sentiment in those who have neither the one nor the other, has, perhaps, insensibly led me to an opposite extreme; and in wishing rather esse quam videri, I may sometimes have appeared what I am not.

“There is a paper of mine in the last Quarterly, upon the means of bettering the condition of the poor. You will be interested by a story which it contains of an old woman upon Exmoor. In Wordsworth’s blank-verse it would go to every heart. Have

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you read The Excursion? and have you read the collection of Wordsworth’s other poems, in two octavo volumes? If you have not, there is a great pleasure in store for you. I am no blind admirer of Wordsworth, and can see where he has chosen subjects which are unworthy in themselves, and where the strength of his imagination and of his feeling is directed upon inadequate objects. Notwithstanding these faults, and their frequent occurrence, it is by the side of Milton that Wordsworth will have his station awarded him by posterity. God bless you!

“I have been long in your debt; my summers are more like those of the grasshopper than of the ant. Wynn was here nearly a week, and when he departed I rejoined him with my friend Nash at Lowther. . . . . This, and a round home by way of Wordsworth’s employed a week; and what with the King of Prussia’s librarian, the two secretaries of the Bible Society, and other such out of the way personages who come to me by a sort of instinct, I have had little time and less leisure since my return.

“The last odd personage who made his appearance was Owen of Lanark*, who is neither more nor

* On this subject see Colloquies, vol. i. p. 132. &c.

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less than such a Pantisocrat as I was in the days of my youth. He is as ardent now as I was then, and will soon be cried down as a visionary (certainly he proposes to do more than I can believe practicable in this generation); but I will go to Lanark to see what he has done. I conversed with him for about an hour, and, not knowing anything about him, good part of the time elapsed before I could comprehend his views,—so little probable did it appear that any person should come to me with a levelling system of society, and tell me he had been to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Ministers, &c. But he will be here again in a day or two, and meantime I have read a pamphlet which is much more injudicious than his conversation, and will very probably frustrate the good which he might by possibility have produced.

“To this system he says we must come speedily. . . . . What he says of the manufacturing system has much weight in it; the machinery which enables us to manufacture for half the world has found its way into other countries; every market is glutted; more goods are produced than can be consumed; and every improvement in mechanism that performs the work of hands, throws so many mouths upon the public,—a growing evil which has been increasing by the premature employment of children, bringing them into competition with the grown workmen when they should have been at school or at play. He wants Government to settle its paupers and supernumerary hands in villages upon waste lands, to live in community; urging that we must go to the root of the evil at once. He talks of what he

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has done at Lanark (and this indeed has been much talked of by others); but his address to his people there has much that is misplaced, injudicious, and reprehensible. Did you see him in London? Had we met twenty years ago, the meeting might have influenced both his life and mine in no slight degree. During those years he has been a practical man, and I have been a student; we do not differ in the main point, but my mind has ripened more than his.

“You talk of brain transfusion, and placing one man’s memory upon another man’s shoulders. That same melancholy feeling must pass through the mind of every man who labours hard in acquiring knowledge; for, communicate what we can, and labour as assiduously as we may, how much must needs die with us? This reflection makes me sometimes regret (as far as is allowable) the time which I employ in doing what others might do as well, or what might as well be left undone. The Quarterly might go on without me, and should do so if I could go on without it. But what would become of my Portuguese acquirements and of yonder heap of materials, which none but myself can put in order, if I were to be removed by death?