find me therefore perhaps not only less alert in sleepless. The consequence has been, that ex. my manner than I usually am when my spirits cept the translation of about thirty lines at the are good, but rather shorter. I will however pro- conclusion of the thirteenth book, I have been ceed to scribble till I find that it fatigues me, and forced to abandon Homer entirely. This was a then will do as I know you would bid me do were sensible mortification to me, as you may suppose, you here, shut up my desk, and take a walk. and felt the more because, my spirits of course The good General tells me that in the eight failing with my strength, I seemed to have pecufirst books which I have sent him, he still finds liar need of my old amusement. It seemed hard alterations and amendments necessary, of which therefore to be forced to resign it just when I I myself am equally persuaded; and he asks my wanted it most. But Homer's battles can not be leave to lay them before an intimate friend of his, fought by a man who does not sleep well, and of whom he gives a character that bespeaks him who has not some little degree of animation in the highly deserving such a trust. To this I have no day time. Last night, however, quite contrary to objection, desiring only to make the translation as my expectations, the fever left me entirely, and I perfect as I can make it. If God grant me life slept quietly, soundly, and long. If it please God and health, I would spare no labour to secure that that it return not, I shall soon find myself in a point. The general's letter is extremely kind, and both for manner and matter like all the rest of his dealings with his cousin the poet. condition to proceed. I walk constantly, that is to say, Mrs. Unwin and I together; for at these times I keep her continually employed, and never I had a letter also yesterday from Mr. Smith, suffer her to be absent from me many minutes. member for Nottingham. Though we never saw She gives me all her time, and all her attention, each other, he writes to me in the most friendly and forgets that there is another object in the terms, and interests himself much in my Homer, world. and in the success of my subscription. Speaking Mrs. Carter thinks on the subject of dreams as on this latter subject, he says that my poems are every body else does, that is to say, according to read by hundreds, who know nothing of my pro- her own experience. She has had no extraordina posals, and makes no doubt that they would sub-ry ones, and therefore accounts them only the orscribe, if they did. I have myself always thought dinary operations of the fancy. Mine are of a them imperfectly, or rather inefficiently an- texture that will not suffer me to ascribe them to nounced. so inadequate a cause, or to any cause but the I could pity the poor woman, who has been operation of an exterior agency. I have a mind, weak enough to claim my song. Such pilferings my dear, (and to you I will venture to boast of it) are sure to be detected. I wrote it, I know not as free from superstition as any man living, neither how long, but I suppose four years ago. The do I give heed to dreams in general as predictive, rose in question was a rose given to Lady Austen though particular dreams I believe to be so. Some by Mrs. Unwin, and the incident that suggested very sensible persons, and I suppose Mrs. Carter the subject occurred in the room in which you among them, will acknowledge that in old times slept at the vicarage, which Lady Austen made God spoke by dreams, but affirm with much boldher dining room. Some time since, Mr. Bull ness that he has since ceased to do so. If you ask going to London, I gave him a copy of it, which them why? They answer, because he has now he undertook to convey to Nichols, the printer of revealed his will in the Scripture, and there is no the Gentleman's Magazine. He showed it to longer any need that he should instruct or admonish Mrs. C, who begged to copy it, and pro- us by dreams. I grant that with respect to docmised to send it to the printer's by her servant. trines and precepts he has left us in want of noThree or four months afterwards, and when I thing; but has he thereby precluded himself in had concluded it was lost, I saw it in the Gentle- any of the operations of his Providence? Surely man's Magazine, with my signature, W. C. not. It is perfectly a different consideration; and Poor simpleton! She will find now perhaps that the same need that there ever was of his interthe rose had a thorn, and that she has pricked her ference in this way, there is still, and ever must fingers with it. Adieu! my beloved cousin. be, while man continues blind and fallible, and a creature beset with dangers which he can neither foresee nor obviate. His operations however of this kind are, I allow, very rare; and as to the generality of dreams, they are made of such stuff, and are in themselves so insignificant, that though I believe them all to be the manufacture of others, not our own, I account it not a farthing-matter who manufactures them. So much for dreams' TO LADY HESKETH. W. C. The Lodge, Jan. 18, 1787. I HAVE been so much indisposed with the fever that I told you had seized me, my nights during he whole week may be said to have been almost My fever is not yet gone, but sometimes seems Adieu, very affectionately, W. C.* to leave me. It is altogether of the nervous kind, to write to you. The little taste that I have had and attended, now and then, with much dejection. of your company, and your kindness in finding me A young gentleman called here yesterday, who out, make me wish that we were nearer neighcame six miles out of his way to see me. He was bours, and that there were not so great a disparity on a journey to London from Glasgow, having in our years. That is to say, not that you were just left the university there. He came I suppose older, but that I were younger. Could we have partly to satisfy his own curiosity, but chiefly, as met in earlier life, I flatter myself that we might it seemed, to bring me the thanks of some of the have been more intimate than now we are likely Scotch professors for my two volumes. His name to be. But you shall not find me slow to cultivate is Rose, an Englishman. Your spirits being good, such a measure of your regard, as your friends of you will derive more pleasure from this incident your own age can spare me. When your route than I can at present, therefore I send it. shall lie through this country, I shall hope that the same kindness which has prompted you twice to call on me, will prompt you again, and I shall be happy if, on a future occasion, I may be able to give you a more cheerful reception than can be expected from an invalid. My health and spirits are considerably improved, and I once more associate with my neighbours. My head however has been the worst part of me, and still continues so; is subject to giddiness and pain, maladies very unfavourable to poetical employment; but a preparation of the bark, which I take regularly, has so far been of service to me in those respects, as to encourage in me a hope that by perseverance in the use of it, I may possibly find myself qualified to resume the translation of Homer DEAR SIR, TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ. When I can not walk, I read, and read perhaps more than is good for me. But I can not be idle. The only mercy that I show myself in this respect is, that I read nothing that requires much closeness of application. I lately finished the perusal Weston, July 24, 1787. THIS is the first time I have written these six months, and nothing but the constraint of obligation could induce me to write now. I can not be so wanting to myself as not to endeavour at least to thank you both for the visits with which you have favoured me, and the poems that you sent me; in my present state of mind I taste nothing, nevertheless I read, partly from habit, and partly because it is the only thing that I am capable of. I have therefore read Burns's poems, and have read them twice; and though they be written in a language that is new to me, and many of them on subjects much inferior to the author's ability, I think them on the whole a very extraordinary production. He is I believe the only poet these king-of a book, which in former years I have more than doms have produced in the lower rank of life, since Shakspeare, (I should rather say since Prior) who need not be indebted for any part of his praise to a charitable consideration of his origin, and the disadvantages under which he has laboured. It will be pity if he should not hereafter divest himself of barbarism, and content himself with writing pure English, in which he appears perfectly qualified to excel. He who can command admiration, dishonours himself if he aims no higher than to raise a laugh. once attacked, but never till now conquered; some other book always interfered, before I could finish it. The work I mean is Barclay's Argenis: and, if ever you allow yourself to read for mere amusement, I can recommend it to you (provided you have not already perused it) as the most amusing romance that ever was written. It is the only one indeed of an old date that I ever had the patience to go through with. It is interesting in a high degree; richer in incident than can be imagined, full of surprises, which the reader never I am, dear sir, with my best wishes for your pros- forestalls, and yet free from all entanglement and perity, and with Mrs. Unwin's respects, Your obliged and affectionate humble servant, confusion. The style too appears to me to be such as would not dishonour Tacitus himself. Poor Burns loses much of his deserved praise in this country, through our ignorance of his language. I despair of meeting with any Englishman who will take the pains that I have taken to understand him. His candle is bright, but shut up in a dark lantern. I lent him to a very sensible neighbour of mine: but his uncouth dialect spoiled all; and before he had half read hin through, he was quite ram-feezled. W.C TO LADY HESKETH. The Lodge, Aug. 30, 1787. MY DEAREST COUSIN, I write but little, because writing is become new to me; but I shall come on by degrees. Mrs. Unwin begs to be affectionately remembered to you. She is in tolerable health, which is the chief comfort here that I have to boast of. Yours, my dearest cousin, as ever, W. C. THOUGH it cost me something to write, it would cost me more to be silent. My intercourse with my neighbours being renewed, I can no longer seem to forget how many reasons there are, why you especially should not be neglected; no neighbour indeed, but the kindness of my friends, and MY DEAREST COz, ere long, I hope, an inmate. TO LADY HESKETH. The Lodge, Sept. 4, 1787. My health and spirits seem to be mending daily. COME when thou canst come, secure of being To what end I know not, neither will conjecture, always welcome! All that is here is thine, tobut endeavour, as far as I can, to be content that gether with the hearts of those who dwell here. I they do so. I use exercise, and take the air in am only sorry, that your journey hither is necessathe park and wilderness. I read much, but as yet rily postponed beyond the time when I did hope write not. Our friends at the Hall make them- to have seen you; sorry too that my uncle's inselves more and more amiable in our account, firmities are the occasion of it. But years will by treating us rather as old friends, than as friends have their course, and their effect: they are hapnewly acquired. There are few days in which piest, so far as this life is concerned, who like him we do not meet, and I am now almost as much escape those effects the longest, and who do not at home in their house as in our own. Mr. grow old before their time. Trouble and anguish Throckmorton, having long since put me in pos- do that for some, which only longevity does for session of all his ground, has now given me posses- others. A few months since I was older than sion of his library; an acquisition of great value your father is now, and though I have lately reto me, who never have been able to live without covered, as Falstaff says, some smatch of my books, since I first knew my letters, and who have no books of my own. By his means I have been so well supplied that I have not yet even looked at the Lounger, for which however I do not forget that I am obliged to you. His turn comes next, and I shall probably begin him to-morrow. youth, I have but little confidence, in truth none, in so flattering a change, but expect, when I least expect it, to wither again. The past is a pledge for the future. Mr. G. is here, Mrs. Throckmorton's uncle. He is lately arrived from Italy, where he has reMr. George Throckmorton is at the Hall. I sided several years, and is so much the gentleman, thought I had known these brothers long enough that it is impossible to be more so. Sensible, poto have found out all their talents and accomplish-lite, obliging; slender in his figure, and in manments. But I was mistaken. The day before ners most engaging-every way worthy to be reyesterday, after having walked with us, they car-lated to the Throckmortons. ried us up to the library (a more accurate writer I have read Savary's travels into Egypt; Mewould have said conducted us) and then they moirs du Baron de Tott; Fenn's original letters; showed me the contents of an immense port-folio, the letters of Frederick of Bohemia, and am now the work of their own hands. It was furnished reading Memoirs d' Henri de Lorraine, Duc de with drawings of the architectural kind, executed Guise. I have also read Barclay's Argenis, in a most masterly manner, and among others, con- Latin Romance, and the best Romance that ever tained outside and inside views of the Pantheon, was written. All these, together with Madan's I mean the Roman one. They were all, I believe, letters to Priestley, and several pamphlets, within made at Rome. Some men may be estimated at these two months. So I am a great reader. a first interview, but the Throckmortons must be seen often, and known long, before one can understand all their value. They often inquire after you, and ask me whether you visit Weston this autumn. I answer yes, and I charge you, my dearest cousin, to TO LADY HESKETH. W. C. The Lodge, Sept. 15, 1787. authenticate my information. Write to me, and MY DEAREST COUSIN, tell us when we may expect to see you. We ON Monday last I was invited to meet your vere disappointed that we had no letter from you friend Miss J at the Hall, and there we found this morning. You will find me coated and but- her. Her good nature, her humorous manner, toned according to your recommendation. and her good sense, are charming; insomuch tha even I, who was never much addicted to speech-there never been a throne so execrably tyrannical making, and who at present find myself particu- as theirs. The heads of the innocent that have larly indisposed to it, could not help saying at part-been cut off to gratify the humour or caprice of ing, I am glad that I have seen you, and sorry their tyrants, could they be all collected and disthat I have seen so little of you. We were some-charged against the walls of their city, would not times many in company; on Thursday we were leave one stone on another. fifteen, but we had not altogether so much vivacity O that you were here this beautiful day! It is and cleverness as Miss J, whose talent at too fine by half to be spent in London. I have a mirth-making has this rare property to recommend perpetual din in my head, and though I am not it, that nobody suffers by it. deaf, hear nothing aright, neither my own voice, Yours, W. C. I am making a gravel walk for winter use, un-nor that of others. I am under a tub, from which der a warm hedge in the orchard. It shall be fur- tub accept my best love. nished with a low seat for your accommodation,| and if you do but like it I shall be satisfied. In wet weather, or rather after wet weather, when the street is dirty, it will suit you well, for laying on an easy declivity through its whole length, it must of course be immediately dry. You are very much wished for by our friends at the Hall-how much by me I will not tell you till the second week in October Yours, W. C. TO LADY HESKETH. MY DEAR COZ, The Lodge, Sept. 29, 1787. TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ. DEAR SIR, Air and exercise are necessary to all men, but particularly so to the man whose mind labours; I THANK YOU for your political intelligence; re- and to him who has been all his life accustomed to tired as we are, and seemingly excluded from the much of both, they are necessary in the extreme. world, we are not indifferent to what passes in it; | My time since we parted has been devoted entirely on the contrary, the arrival of a newspaper, at the to the recovery of health and strength for this serpresent juncture, never fails to furnish us with a theme for discussion, short indeed, but satisfactory, for we seldom differ in opinion. vice, and I am willing to hope with good effect. Ten months have passed since I discontinued my poetical efforts; I do not expect to find the same I have received such an impression of the Turks readiness as before, till exercise of the neglected from the memoirs of Baron de Tott, which I read faculty, such as it is, shall have restored it to me. lately, that I can hardly help presaging the con- You find yourself, I hope, by this time as comquest of that empire by the Russians. The disci-fortably situated in your new abode as in a new ples of Mahomet are such babies in modern tac- abode one can be. I enter perfectly into all your tics, and so enervated by the use of their favourite feelings on occasion of the change. A sensible drug; so fatally secure in their predestinarian mind can not do violence even to a local attachdream, and so prone to a spirit of mutiny against ment without much pain. When my father died their leaders, that nothing less can be expected. I was young, too young to have reflected much. In fact, they had not been their own masters at He was Rector of Berkhamstead, and there I was this day, had but the Russians known the weak- born. It had never occurred to me that a parson ness of their enemies half so well as they un- has no fee-simple in the house and glebe he occudoubtedly know it now. Add to this, that there pies. There was neither tree, nor gate, nor stile, is a popular prophecy current in both countries, in all that country, to which I did not feel a relathat Turkey is one day to fall under the Russian tion, and the house itself I preferred to a palace. sceptre. A prophecy which, from whatever au- I was sent for from London to attend him in his thority it be derived, as it will naturally encourage last illness, and he died just before I arrived. Then, the Russians, and dispirit the Turks in exact pro- and not till then, I felt for the first time that I and portion to the degree of credit it has obtained on my native place were disunited for ever. I sighed both sides, has a direct tendency to effect its own a long adieu to fields and woods, from which I ccomplishment. In the mean time, if I wish once thought I should never be parted, and was at them conquered, it is only because I think it will no time so sensible of their beauties, as just when be a blessing to them to be governed by any other I left them all behind me, to return no more. hand than their own. For under Heaven has W.C TO LADY HESKETH. that though to a bystander it may seem an occupation surpassing the powers of a constitution never very athletic, and, at present, not a little the The Lodge, Nov. 10, 1787. worse for wear, I can invent for myself no employTHE Parliament, my dearest Cousin, prorogued ment that does not exhaust my spirits more. I continually, is a meteor dancing before my eyes, will not pretend to account for this; I will only say promising me my wish only to disappoint me, and that it is not the language of predilection for a fanone but the king and his ministers can tell when vourite amusement, but that the fact is really so. you and I shall come together. I hope however I have even found that those plaything avocations that the period, though so often postponed, is not which one may execute almost without any atten far distant, and that once more I shall behold you, and experience your power to make winter gay and sprightly. tion, fatigue me, and wear me away, while such as TO LADY HESKETH. I have a kitten, my dear, the drollest of all creatures that ever wore a cat's skin. Her gambols are not to be described, and would be incredible if they could. In point of size she is likely to be a kitten always, being extremely small of her age, The Lodge, Nov. 27, 1787. but time I suppose, that spoils every thing, will Ir is the part of wisdom, my dearest Cousin, to make her also a cat. You will see her I hope be- sit down contented under the demands of necesfore that melancholy period shall arrive, for no sity, because they are such. I am sensible that wisdom that she may gain by experience and re- you can not, in my uncle's present infirm state, and flection hereafter, will compensate the loss of her of which it is not possible to expect any considepresent hilarity. She is dressed in a tortoise-shell_rable amendment, indulge either us, or yourself, suit, and I know that you will delight in her. with a journey to Weston. Yourself I say, both Mrs. Throckmorton carries us to-morrow in her because I know it will give you pleasure to see chaise to Chicheley. The event however must be Causidice mi* once more, especially in the comsupposed to depend on elements, at least on the fortable abode where you have placed him, and state of the atmosphere, which is turbulent beyond because, after so long an imprisonment in London, measure. Yesterday it thundered, last night it you, who love the country, and have a taste for lightened, and at three this morning I saw the sky it, would of course be glad to return to it. For my as red as a city in flames could have made it. I have a leech in a bottle that foretels all these prodigies and convulsions of nature. No, not as you will naturally conjecture by articulate utterance at liberty to expatiate, and to make discoveries, I of oracular notices, but by a variety of gesticula- am daily finding out fresh scenes and walks, which tions, which here I have not room to give an ac- you would never be satisfied with enjoying: some count of. Suffice it to say, that no change of of them are unapproachable by you either on foot weather surprises him, and that in point of the or in your carriage. Had you twenty toes (whereearliest and most accurate intelligence, he is worth as I suppose you have but ten) you could not reach all the barometers in the world. None of them them; and coach wheels have never been seen there all indeed can make the least pretence to foretell since the flood. Before it indeed, (as Burnet says thunder-a species of capacity of which he has that the earth was then perfectly free from all inegiven the most unequivocal evidence. I gave but qualities in its surface) they might have been seen sixpence for him, which is a groat more than the market price, though he is in fact, or rather would be if leeches were not found in every ditch, an invaluable acquisition. TO JOSEPH HILL, ESQ. W. C. own part, to me it is ever new, and though I have now been an inhabitant of this village a twelvemonth, and have during the half of that time been there every day. We have other walks both upon hill tops, and in valleys beneath, some of which by the help of your carriage, and many of them without its help, would be always at your command. On Monday morning last, Sam brought me word that there was a man in the kitchen who desired to speak with me. I ordered him in. A plain, decent, elderly figure made its appearance, and Nov. 16, 1787. being desired to sit, spoke as follows: "Sir, I am I THANK you for the solicitude that you express clerk of the parish of All-saints in Northampton; on the subject of my present studies. The work brother of Mr. C. the upholsterer. It is customary is undoubtedly long and larious, but it has an for the person in my office to annex to a bill of end, and, proceeding leisurely, with a due attention' to the use of air and exercise, it is possible that I • The appellation which Sir Thomas Hesketh used to give may live to finish it. Assure yourself of one thing, him in jest, when he was of the Temple. |