transmitted the books to her Ma- | to talk in a tone of merry ridicule jesty; and, in the course of a day at this report, and ended by deor two, received in return this claring that as to love or marriage, elegant engraving, with her Ma- they were things that she never jesty's autograph, as you see below." thought of. 'What, then, have you He then directed particular atten- been doing with yourself this last tion to the royal signature, which month? was in her Majesty's usual bold and beautiful handwriting.

MOORE, BOWLES, AND CRABBE.

"ROBERT SOUTHEY.

'Keswick, Feb. 21, 1829."

The laureate had his wish; for in duty he was bound to say, that worthier strains than his bore inscribed the name of Caroline connected with his own; and, moreover, she was something more than a dear friend and sister poetess.

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as among the literary ornaments, if not of Bath itself, of its precincts; and in describing our respective characteristics, said, beginning with me, 'the one, a specimen of the most glowing, animated, and impassioned style,' &c.; this word impassioned' spoken out strongly in the very ear of the Bishop of Bath and Wells, who sat next him. On the healths of the three poets being given, though much called for, I did not rise, but motioned to Crabbe, who got up and said a few words. When it came to my turn received me as I could not but feel to rise, such a burst of enthusiasm proud of. Spoke for some time, and with much success. Concluded by some tributes to Crabbe and Bowles, and said of the latter, that 'his poetry was the first fountain at which I had drunk the pure freshness of the English language, and learned (however little I might have profited by my learning) of what variety of sweetness the music of English verse is capable. From admiration of the poet, I had been at length promoted into friendship with the man, and I felt it particularly incumbent upon me, from some late allusions, to say, that I had found the life and the poetry of my friend to be but echoes to

"The laureate," observes a writer in Fraser's Magazine, "is a fortunate man; his queen supplies him with butts (alluding to the laureateship), and his lady with Bowls: then may his cup of good fortune be over-each other; the same sweetness and flowing."

good feeling pervades and modulates both. Those who call my friend a wasp, would not, if they knew him better, make such a mistake in natural history. They would find that he is a bee, of the species called the apes neatina, and that, however he may have a sting ready on the defensive, when attacked, his native element is that garden of social life which he adorns, and the proper business and delight of his life are sunshine and flowers.' In talking of the 'springs of health with which nature had gifted the fair city of Bath,' and of her physicians, I said, 'it was not

necessary to go back to the relation- and a scholar;' I wish him joy of ship between Apollo and Esculapius her." to show the close consanguinity that exists between literature and

the healing art; between that art which purifies and strengthens the body, and those pursuits that refine and invigorate the intellect. Long,' I added, 'may they both continue to bless you with their beneficent effects! Long may health and the Muses walk your beautiful hills together, and mutually mingle their respective influences, till your springs themselves shall grow springs of inspiration, and it may be said,

'Flavus Apollo Pocula Castaliâ plena ministrat aquâ."

Quite overwhelmed with praises, I left the room. Elwyn and I, accompanied by Bayly, and a sensible Irishman, E. introduced me to (Ellis); went to the play together. Home to Elwyn's house, where I slept.

WORDSWORTH AND SIR H. DAVY.

We talked of Wordsworth's exceedingly high opinion of himself; and she mentioned that one day, in a large party, Wordsworth, without any thing having been previously said that could lead to the subject, called out suddenly from the top of the table to the bottom, in his most epic tone, "Davy!" and, on Davy's putting forth his head in awful expectation of what was coming, said, "Do you know the reason why I published the White Doe in quarto?" "No, what was it?" "To show the world my own opinion of it."—(Moore.)

H. K. WHITE'S LOVE OF FAME.

That youthful poet and eminent scholar, Henry Kirke White, toiled hard for fame. His ambition was, that his name might not be forJan. 22, 1825.-Bowles highly gotten; that among the aspirants gratified with what I said of him. to literary distinction he might be Asked by every one to give a cor-recognized, and his genius acknowrect copy of it for the newspapers, ledged. It was the fear of falling but shall not, for it would break short of this that made him mournthe charm which all lies in manner, fully inquire, the occasion, &c., &c. Duncan of Oxford said to me, 'I have had that sweet oratory ringing in my ears all night."'"

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"Fifty years hence, and who will hear of Henry?"

Under this impulse he sacrificed health, and even life. He trimmed the midnight lamp with a tremulous hand, and scanned the classic page with an eye almost drowsy in death.

"He nursed the pinion that impelled the steel."

April 11 to May 11.-For this whole month have been too closely occupied with my Sheridan task to write a word here, and must, therefore, only recollect what I can. Received a letter from some Mrs. F. (whom I never heard of before) in which she says, 'Your talents and excellence have long been the idols of my heart. With thee were the dreams of my earliest love,' &c. The object of the letter is to invite me to a dinner she is about to give to a few select friends in memory of Lord Byron! Her hus-But thorns about my bleeding brow?” band, she adds, is a 'gentleman In sacrificing health to fame, how

Having received, according to his aims, the highest honours of the university, he exclaimed, respecting these laurels, which he had so hardly won, and which, as the sequel proved, he was so soon to relinquish,

"What are ye now,

WORDSWORTH, COLERIDGE, AND COTTLE.

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ridge, "a little man by his side."
Of Miss Wordsworth he speaks
with equal enthusiasm.
"His ex-
quisite sister is a woman indeed!-

ever, Henry Kirke White saw his error in time to reach that higher, purer motive, which combines with feelings of regret and sorrow, the hopes and aspirations of the Chris-in mind, I mean, and heart; for her tian.

WORDSWORTH, COLERIDGE, AND

COTTLE.

person is such that, if you expected to see a pretty woman, you would think her rather ordinary-if you expected to see an ordinary woman, Coleridge had met with Words- you would think her pretty! Her worth's Descriptive Sketches in 1794, manners are simple, ardent, impresand discerned amid the faults of sive. In every motion her most an immature understanding the innocent soul outbeams so brightly promise of an original poetic genius. that who saw would say— He, on his part, needed no other 'Guilt was a thing impossible in her.' voucher for the possession of the richest intellectual gifts than what Her information varies; her eye proceeded from his own most elo- watchful in minutest observation quent tongue. His mind, as yet of nature, and her taste a perfect undimmed by the fumes of opium, electrometer-it bends, protrudes, was now in its fullest and freshest and draws in at subtlest beauties bloom. Transcendental metaphy- and most recondite faults." What sics had not monopolized his Wordsworth thought of his guest thoughts. His sympathies had a may be summed up in his wellwider range than afterwards, and, known saying, that other men of if his discourse sometimes lost itself the age had done wonderful things, in clouds, they were clouds which but Coleridge was the only wonglowed with gorgeous hues. All derful man he had ever known. who saw him in his early prime are agreed that his finest works convey a feeble notion of the profusion of "The publisher has preserved no ideas, the brilliancy of imagery, the memorials of his professional visit; subtlety of speculation, the sweep but some particulars he has reof knowledge, which then distin- corded of a former jaunt afford an guished his inexhaustible colloquial amusing glimpse of the simplicity displays. Each poet had traversed of living, and ignorance of common regions of thought to which the things, which then distinguished other was comparatively a stranger: the gifted pair. Cottle drove Wordsworth full of original con- Wordsworth from Bristol to Allfoxtemplations upon nature. - Cole- den in a gig, calling at Stowey by ridge more conversant with systems the way to summon Coleridge and of philosophy, and all the varieties Miss Wordsworth, who followed of general literature. Coleridge swiftly on foot. The Allfoxden was astonished to find a man who, pantry was empty-so they carried out of the common appearances of with them bread and cheese, and a the world, could evolve new and bottle of brandy. A beggar stole unexpected feelings-Wordsworth the cheese, which set Coleridge exwas dazzled with the splendour of patiating on the superior virtues apparently boundless intellectual of brandy. It was he that, with hoards. There sprang up between thirsty impatience, took out the them on the instant the strongest horse; but as he let down the sentiments of admiration and affec- shafts, the theme of his eloquence tion. "I feel myself," writes Cole-rolled from the seat, and was dashed

Here is an anecdote of these two poets and their publisher Cottle:

In a letter to his bookseller he pathetically writes, "If it please God that I must die of over-study, I cannot spend my life better than in preserving his."

It was on this occasion, on the verge of his seventieth year, as he describes himself in the dedication of his Virgil, that, "worn out with study, and oppressed with fortune,” he contracted to supply the bookseller with ten thousand verses at sixpence a line.

GEORGE BUCHANAN.

to pieces on the ground. Coleridge, abashed, gave the horse up to Cottle, who tried to pull off the collar. It proved too much for the worthy citizen's strength, and he called to Wordsworth to assist. Wordsworth retired baffled, and was relieved by the ever-handy Coleridge. There seemed more likelihood of their pulling off the animal's head than his collar, and they marvelled by what magic it had ever been got on. 'La, master,' said the servant-girl who was passing by, 'you don't go the right way RABELAIS' OPINION OF THE WORLD. to work; and turning round the Rabelais had written some sencollar, she slipped it off in an in-sible pieces, which the world did stant, to the utter confusion of the not regard at all. "I will write three luminaries. How Silas Cum- something," says he, "that they berbatch could have gone through shall take notice of." And so he his cavalry training, and W. W. sat down to writing nonsense. have spent nine-tenths of his life in the country, and neither of them have witnessed the harnessing or This illustrious scholar, comunharnessing of a horse, must re-pelled to fly from his own country main a problem for our betters." by the animosity of a priestly cabal, whose vices he had made the theme of his satire, sought refuge and protection under Henry VIII. of England. His appeal to that monarch was couched in terms of great pathos and elegance. "Look not," said the poet, "with an unrelenting countenance upon the humble advance of a man whose soul is devoted to your service; one who, a beggar, a vagrant, and an exile, has endured every species of misfortune which a perfidious world can inflict. A savage host of inveterate enemies pursued him, and the palace of his sovereign resounds with their menaces. Over mountains covered in snow, and valleys flooded with rain, I come a fugitive to the Athenian altar of mercy, and, exhausted by calamities, cast myself at your feet.

BOYSE.

Samuel Boyse, author of The Deity, a poem, was a fag author, and, at one time, employed by Mr. Ogle to translate some of Chaucer's tales into modern English, which he did with great spirit, at the rate of threepence a line for his trouble. Poor Boyse wore a blanket, because he was destitute of breeches; and was, at last, found famished to death, with a pen in his hand.

JOHN DRYDEN.

It was after preparing a second edition of Virgil, that the great Dryden, who had lived, and was to die, in harness, found himself still obliged to seek for daily bread. Scarcely relieved from one heavy task, he was compelled to hasten to another; and his efforts were now stimulated by a domestic feeling the expected return of his son in ill health from Rome.

Alas! London was not the Athens the fugitive sought, nor Henry the Pericles whose generosity was to succour him. But who can wonder that, after sacrificing to the