consciousness of these, if good-why that if?-ought to inspire fortitude sufficient to suppress-I will not say regret, for that, if I may judge from my own feelings, it would be difficult to withhold from the memory of a friend—but certainly remorse. The risk I run is great. If I perish, I don't know whether it were not better that my name and my actions should alike be buried in oblivion; since I am convinced that nothing that shall be found in my papers will do justice either to me, or the undertaking, or to the advantages to accrue from it, if completed. . . .

The Same to the Same.

J. A."

[PRESBURG],. “Sunday, 18 May 1800.

"DEAR SIR,-I write from Presburg. I have sent my manuscripts, &c., to the care of my sister, and have told her to deliver them unopened to you.

"Upon recollection, I am much pleased with your last letter in which you say you feel yourself identified in some measure with me. Our acquaintance was but short, yet I feel as if our souls were nearly allied. But our situations are very different. You live in retirement. Although in the neighbourhood of a great city, you may be said to be widely removed from the influence of those violent passions which agitate in so extraordinary a degree the present generation. But I am tossed to and fro in a tempestuous world. I have hourly to encounter the passions and prejudices of men, and to suppress my own passions, naturally strong, on occasions eminently calculated to rouse them to the utmost. Wherever I have turned my steps I have met with obstacles; in almost every man I have found an opposer; disease, poverty, and persecution have united to afflict me. If, in such circumstances as these, you have supposed that I was at all times to preserve the same collected coolness which I might be able to do in maturer age, and in the quiet of retirement, you have expected from me what is probably more than will ever be performed by man. It is perhaps enough that I can recover myself, and collect my powers for new efforts; and that I never lose sight of the main object, but continue to pursue it with steadiness while it is possible to be pursued. . .

"I am going to Pesth, Fünfkirchen, Semlin, Temeswar, Hermanstadt. I shall thence turn towards the north. I will visit Deehczin, Cashan, and Eperin, and cross the Carpathians into Poland. I have gotten an invitation from a Polish prince to visit him at his country seat, from whence, by the way of Cracow, we are to return together to Vienna.

"I shall write again from Pesth.

JOHN ARNOT."

Two more letters, in October and November, containing Arnot's thanks for £20 which Godwin had sent him from a "Mr Boswille or Borville," who heard from Godwin of, and pitied his sad condition, speak, but very cursorily, of a lady of whom he thinks more than of his travels, and announce his intention of returning to England.

And in a third and final letter there are these lines of interest.

7. Arnot to William Godwin.

"VIENNA, 26 Decr. 1800.

"The enemy are within a few posts of this city. In the midst of winter, all strangers are ordered to depart. not hinder you to write if you intend to write.

That need

"JOHN ARNOT."

It has seemed inexpedient to interrupt either series of the foregoing letters, to give those of Mrs Godwin which follow. They, however, and one from Mrs Robinson, fitly find place here, before those of Charles Lamb, so closely mixed up with the story of Godwin's tragedy, "Antonio," with which his brain had travailed during all the months of the spring and summer, which was produced, and failed at once with the failing year.

Mrs Godwin Sen. to William Godwin.

"Feb. 6, 1800.

"DEAR WM.,--I shoud be glad to hear a good account of Joseph. I doubt much his amendment it is not the first time he has overcome you with fine words. He seems according to what I can learn to be poorer for ye £44 I have given him than he was before he had it, he now can't neither board nor cloth · Harriot. I hear she is gone to service somewhere in the country. Well, she had better begin low than be puffd up with pride now and afterwards become low, for she had certainly no good exampels at home. I heard once she was in expectation of being sent to her Aunt Barker's, but what barbarity is it not to let her have shoes to her feet when she came to your sister's. I am glad she did not go where her education woud have been as bad as at home. London is the place where girls go too for Servises to get better wages than they can in the country, but I know the reason is he is given up to pride and sensuality and well know where yt will lead him to and all that tread in the same steps. I hoped, tho' it was not likely, to have done him good and your Sister too but I find I am misstaken. We in the country deny ourselves because of ye dearness of provisions, make meal dumplings, meal crusts to pies mix'd with boil'd rice and a very little butter in them, our bread meal and rice which we have bout at twopence per pound, and very good it is, pancakes wth boil'd rice in water till tender and very little milk or egg with flower. we have had a very favourable winter hitherto, only one sharp frost one fortnight. Did you pay Mary Bailey £5 or not, has her father done anything for them, how do they go on, what is their direction? Is J. Jex steady and give content in his sittuation. I wish him to learn his business stay his time I hope he is bound till 21 years of age I hope yr brother John will take a prudent care. I cannot promise for Natty he wishes to be in business for himself and to marry. He has made one attempt but she was pre-ingaged and I don't know another in the world I should like so well, so most likely he must remain a servant all his days. Providence ought

LETTERS FROM MRS GODWIN, SEN.

33

to be submited to, 'tis but a little while we have to live here in comparison of Eternity and wedlock is attended with many cares and fears. I am not well very few days together tho' I keep about. My great complaint is a bad dejestion. I desire to resign myself to ye almighty will in every thing but life to me is now a burthen rather than a pleasure. I wish you the truest happiness I don't mean what ye world calls happiness for that's of short duration, but a prospect of that happiness that will never fade away-from your affectionate mother A. GODWIN.

"I have not written to yr sister now because I have written not long since and she seems to be in her old strain, the same note and I am afraid ever will be remember me to her and John Mrs Cooper and Wilcox."

The Same to the Same.

"March 28, 1800.

"DEAR WM.—I have but just time to write three or four lines on a parcel to Mary Bailey. I hope you will write very soon. I wish to hear how you and Your dear children do and poor John Hanh Jax Godwin Mary Bailey goes on and poor Harriot. and if Mary Bailey have had the £5 I intended for her. Likewise if you recd Turkey and Saccages sent in a basket to Hanh about 2 of January. I understand Jo accepts an invitation from Hull of coming to Dalling the latter end of May or beginning of June. In his letter never mentioned wife or child. How shall I meet such a disgraceful wretch as He my god Sustain me if this be marrying may the others for ever keep single but what is men when left to their own unruly passions.

"I am as well as I can expect to be and the rest of the family who with Nath desire respects to you and yours."

The friendship which existed between Godwin and Mrs. Robinson has been already noticed. The only letters which passed between them now remaining are a few from the lady, belonging to the year on which we are now engaged. They show a clever woman, unregulated and undisciplined, whose hold over Godwin was maintained, after the glamour of her exceeding beauty had ceased to charm, by unbounded flattery, to which he was only too accessible. And he had a sincere pity for her sorrows. She was at this time a martyr to rheumatism, and in great poverty, owing to the irregular payment of the annuity from the Prince of Wales. The present generation has nearly learned to estimate that person at his true value, yet an extract from the letters of his former mistress may help to show what were some of the qualities which went to "mould a George."

The writer at the date of her letter was under arrest for debt.

Mrs Robinson to Godwin.

"Friday, 30th May 1800.

-The fact is simply this, were I to resist the action as a married woman, I might set it aside, and recover damages from my persecutor, because the arrest is for necessaries, and my husband is therefore by law obliged to pay the debt, there being no kind of legal separation between us. But then, I should involve that husband, and act, as I should feel, dishonestly towards my creditors. I therefore submit patiently. I have had various proposals from many friends to settle the business, but I am too proud to borrow, while the arrears now due on my annuity from the Prince of Wales would doubly pay the sum for which I am arrested. I have written to the Prince, and his answer is that there is no money at Carlton House-that he is very sorry for my situation, but that his own is equally distressing!! You will smile at such