Dear Sir, I have taken since you went away many of the walks which we have taken together, and none of them, I believe, without thoughts of you. I have, though not a good memory in general, yet a good local memory, and can recollect, by the help of a tree or stile, what you said on that particular spot. For this reason I purpose, when the summer is come, to walk with a book in my pockets: what I read at my fireside I forget, but what I read under a hedge, or at the side of a pond, that pond and that hedge will always bring to my remembrance; and this is a sort of memoria technica, which I would recommend to you, if I did not know that you have no occasion for it. I am reading Sir John Hawkins, and still hold the same opinion of his book as when you were here. There are in it undoubtedly some awkwardnesses of phrase, and which is worse, here and there, some unequivocal indications of a vanity not easily pardonable in a man of his years; but on the whole I find it amusing, and to me at least, to whom everything that has passed in the literary world, within these five-and-twenty years, is new, sufficiently replete with information. Mr. Throckmorton told me, about three days since, that it was lately recommended to him by a sensible man, as a book that would give him great insight into the history of modern literature, and modern men of letters, a commendation which I really think it merits. Fifty years hence, perhaps, the world will feel itself obliged to him. W. C. TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ. The Lodge, Jan. 24, 1789. My dear Sir,-We have heard from my cousin in Norfolk-street; she reached home safely, and in good time. An observation suggests itself, which, though I have but little time for observation making, I must al• Sir John Hawkins is known as the author of four quarto volumes on the general History of Music, and by a Life of Johnson. The former is now superseded by Burney's, and the latter by Boswell's. low myself time to mention. Accidents, as we call them, generally occur when there seems least reason to expect them; if a friend of ours travels far in different roads and at an unfavorable season, we are reasonably alarmed for the safety of one in whom do we hear a tragical account of such a jourwe take so much interest, yet how seldom ney! It is, on the contrary, at home, in our yard, or garden, perhaps in our parlor, that disaster finds us; in any place, in short, where we seem perfectly out of the reach of danger. The lesson inculcated by such a procedure on the part of Providence towards us seems to be that of perpetual dependence. Having preached this sermon, I must hasten to a close; you know that I am not idle, nor can I afford to be so; I would gladly spend more time with you, but, by some means or other, this day has hitherto proved a day of hindrance and confusion. W. C. TO THE REV. WALTER BAGOT. My dear Friend,-I shall be a better, at least a more frequent correspondent, when I have done with Homer. I am not forgetful of any letters that I owe, and least of all forgetful of my debts in that way to you; on the contrary, I live in a continual state of self-reproach for not writing more punctually: but the old Grecian, whom I charge myself never to neglect, lest I should never finish him, has, at present, a voice that seems to drown all other demands, and many to which I could listen with more pleasure than even to his Os rotundum. I am now in the eleventh book of the Odyssey, conversing with the dead. Invoke the muse in my behalf, that I may roll the stone of Sisyphus with some success. To do it as Homer has done it is, I suppose, in our verse and language, impossible; but I will hope not to labor altogether to as little purpose as Sisyphus himself did. Though I meddle little with politics, and can find but little leisure to do so, the present state of things unavoidably engages a share of my attention. But, as they say, Archimides, when Syracuse was taken, was found busy in the solution of a problem, so, come what may, I shall be found translating Homer. Sincerely yours, W. C. TO MRS. KING.* The Lodge, Jan. 29, 1789. My dear Madam,-This morning I said to Mrs. Unwin, "I must write to Mrs. King: her long silence alarms me—something has • Private correspondence. happened." These words of mine proved only a prelude to the arrival of your messenger with his most welcome charge, for which I return you my sincerest thanks. You have sent me the very things I wanted, and which I should have continued to want, had not you sent them. As often as the wine is set on the table, I have said to myself, "This is all very well; but I have no bottle-stands;" and myself as often replied, "No matter; you can make shift without them." Thus I and myself have conferred together many a day; and you, as if you had been privy to the conference, have kindly supplied the deficiency, and put an end to the debate forever. When your messenger arrived, I was beginning to dress for dinner, being engaged to dine with my neighbor, Mr. Throckmorton, from whose house I am just returned, and snatch a few moments before supper to tell you how much I am obliged to you. You will not, therefore, find me very prolix at present; but it shall not be long before you shall hear further from me. Your honest old neighbor sleeps under our roof, and will be gone in the morning before I shall have seen him. I have more items than one by which to remember the late frost: it has cost me the bitterest uneasiness. Mrs. Unwin got a fall on the gravel-walk covered with ice, which has confined her to an upper chamber ever since. She neither broke nor dislocated any bones; but received such a contusion below the hip, as crippled her completely. She now begins to recover, after having been helpless as a child for a whole fortnight, but so slowly at present, that her amendment is even now almost imperceptible. Engaged, however, as I am with my own private anxieties, I yet find leisure to interest myself not a little in the distresses of the royal family, especially in those of the Queen.* The Lord-Chancellor called the other morning on Lord Stafford: entering the room, he threw his hat into a sofa at the fireside, and, clasping his hands, said, "I have heard of distress, and I have read of it; but I never saw distress equal to that of the * The unfortunate malady of George III. is here alluded to, which first occurred after a previous indisposition, October 22nd, 1788. The nation was plunged in grief by this calamitous event, and a regency appointed, to the exclusion of the Prince of Wales, which occasioned much discussion in Parliament at that time. Happily the King's illness was only of a few month's duration: his recovery was announced to be complete, Feb. 27, 1789. Few monarchs have been more justly venerated than George the Third, or have left behind them more unquestionable evidences of real personal piety. The fol Queen." This I know from particular and certain authority. My dear madam, I have not time to enlarge at present on this subject, or to touch any other. Once more, therefore, thanking you for your kindness, of which I am truly sensible; and thanking, too, Mr. King for the favor he has done me in subscribing to my Homer, and at the same time begging you to make my best compliments to him, I conclude myself, with Mrs. Unwin's acknowledg ments of your most acceptable present to her, Your obliged and affectionate W. C. TO MRS. KING.* March 12, 1789. My dear Madam,-I feel myself in no small degree unworthy of the kind solicitude which you express concerning me and my welfare, after a silence so much longer than I gave you reason to expect. I should indeed account myself inexcusable, had I not to allege, in my defence, perpetual engage. ments of such a kind as would by no means be dispensed with. Had Homer alone been in question, Homer should have made room for you: but I have had other work in hand at the same time, equally pressing and more laborious. Let it suffice to say, that I have not wilfully neglected you for a moment, and that you have never been out of my thoughts a day together. But I begin to perceive that, if a man will be an author, he must live neither to himself nor to his friends so much as to others, whom he never saw, nor shall see. My promise to follow my last letter with another speedily, which promise I kept so ill, is not the only one which I am conscious of having made to you, and but very indif ferently performed. I promised you all the smaller pieces that I should produce, as fast as occasion called them forth, and leisure occurred to write them. Now the fact is, that I have produced several since I made that fair profession, of which I have sent you hardly any. The reason is that, transcribed into the body of a letter, they would leave me no room for prose; and that other conveyance than by the post I cannot find, even after inquiry made among all my neighbors for a traveller to Kimbolton. shall see you, I hope, in the summer; and then I will show you all. I will transcribe one for you every morning before breakfast, as long as they last; and when you come Well, we lowing lines written to commemorate his recovery, merit down, you shall find it laid on your napkin. to be recorded. Not with more grief did Adam first survey, With doubts perplext, the setting orb of day; Nor more his joy, th' ensuing morn, to view That splendid orb its glorious course renew; Than was thy joy, Britannia, and thy pain, When set thy sun, and when he rose again. I sent one last week to London, which, by some kind body or another, I know not whom, is to be presented to the Queen. The subject, as you may guess, is the King's * Private correspondence. I shall commission my cousin, who lately left us, to procure for me the book you mention. Being, and having long been, so deep in the business of translation, it was natural that I should have many thoughts on that subject. I have accordingly had as many as would of themselves, perhaps, make a volume, and shall be glad to compare them with those of any other writer recommended by Mr. Martyn. When you write next to that gentleman, I beg you, madam, to present my compliments to him, with thanks both for the mention of Mr. Twining's* book, and for the honor of his name among my subscribers. I remain always, my dear madam, TO MRS. KING.t The Lodge, April 22, 1789. My dear Madam,-Having waited hitherto in expectation of the messenger whom, in your last, you mentioned a design to send, I have at length sagaciously surmised that you delay to send him, in expectation of hearing first from me. I would that his errand hither were better worthy the journey. I shall have no very voluminous packet to charge him with when he comes. Such, however, as it is, it is ready; and has received an addition in the interim of one copy, which would not have made a part of it, had your Mercury arrived here sooner. It is on the subject of the Queen's visit to London on the night of the illuminations. Mrs. Unwin, knowing the burden that lies on my back too heavy for any but Atlantean shoulders, has kindly performed the copyist's part, and transcribed all that I had to send you. Observe, madam, I do not write this to hasten your messenger hither, but merely to account for my own silence. It is probable that the later he arrives, the more he will receive when he comes; for I never fail to write when I think I have found a favorable subject. The author of the translation of Aristotle. ↑ Private correspondence. We insert these verses, as expressive of the loyal feelings of Cowper. ON THE QUEEN'S VISIT TO LONDON. By right of worth, not blood alone, Then Loyalty, with all her lamps, New trimm'd, a gallant show, We mourn that we must give up the hope of seeing you and Mr. King at Weston. Had our correspondence commenced sooner, we had certainly found the means of meeting; but it seems that we were doomed to Chasing the darkness and the damps, "Twas hard to tell, of streets, of squares, Bright shone the roofs, the domes, the spires, Had all the pageants of the world And all the banners been unfurl'd For no such sight had England's Queen Where George recover'd made a scene Yet glad she came that night to prove, How much the object of her love Darkness the skies had mantled o'er Darkness, O Queen! ne'er call'd before On borrow'd wheels away she flies, That night except her own. Had known their sov'reign come. Which shook Belshazzar at his wine, Soon watery grew her eyes, and dim, It was a scene in every part But other magic there she knew To raise such wonders to her view, That cordial thought her spirit cheer'd, So, ancient poets say, serene Yet let the glories of a night Like that, once seen, suffice! Heaven grant us no such future sight- know each other too late for a meeting in this world. May a better world make us amends, as it certainly will, if I ever reach a better! Our interviews here are but imperfect pleasures at the best; and generally from such as promise us most gratification we receive the most disappointment. But disappointment is, I suppose, confined to the planet on which we dwell, the only one in the universe, probably, that is inhabited by sinners. I did not know, or even suspect, that when I received your last messenger, I received so eminent a disciple of Hippocrates; a physician of such absolute control over disease and the human constitution, as to be able to put a pestilence into his pocket, confine it there, and let it loose at his pleasure. We are much indebted to him that he did not give us here a stroke of his ability. I must not forget to mention that I have received (probably not without your privity) Mr. Twining's valuable volume.* For a long time I supposed it to have come from my bookseller, who now and then sends me a new publication; but I find, on inquiry, that it came not from him. I beg, madam, if you are aware that Mr. Twining himself sent it, or your friend Mr. Martyn, that you will negotiate for me on the occasion, and contrive to convey to the obliging donor my very warmest thanks. I am impatient till he receives them. I have not yet had time to do justice to a writer so sensible, elegant, and entertaining, by a complete perusal of his work; but I have with pleasure sought out all those passages to which Mr. Martyn was so good as to refer me, and am delighted to observe the exact agreement in opinion on the subject of translation in general, and on that of Mr. Pope's in particular, that subsists between Mr. Twining and myself. With Mrs. Unwin's best compliments, I remain, my dear madam, Your obliged and affectionate, W. C. TO MRS. KING.† April 30, 1789. A thousand thanks for your basket, and all the good things that it contained; particularly for my brother's Poems, whose hand-writing struck me the moment I saw it. They gave me some feelings of a mel ancholy kind, but not painful. I will return them to you by the next opportunity. I wish that mine, which I send you, may prove half as pleasant to you as your excellent cakes and apples have proved to us. You will then think yourselves sufficiently recompensed for your obliging present. If a crab-stock can transform a pippin into a nonpareil, what may not I effect in a translation of Homer? Alas! I fear nothing half so valuable. I have learned, at length, that I am indebted for Twining's Aristotle to a relation of mine, General Cowper. Pardon me that I quit you so soon. It is not willingly; but I have compassion on your poor messenger. Adieu, my dear madam, and believe me, TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ. The Lodge, May 20, 1780. My dear Sir,-Finding myself, between twelve and one, at the end of the seventeenth book of the Odyssey, I give the interval be tween the present moment and the time of walking, to you. If I write letters before I sit down to Homer, I feel my spirits too flat for poetry, and too flat for letter-writing if I address myself to Homer first; but the last I choose as the least evil, because my friends will pardon my dullness, but the public will not. I had been some days uneasy on your account when yours arrived. We should have rejoiced to have seen you, would your engage ments have permitted; but in the autumn, I hope, if not before, we shall have the pleasure to receive you. At what time we may expect Lady Hesketh, at present, I know not; but imagine that at any time after the month of June you will be sure to find her with us, which I mention, knowing that to meet you would add a relish to all the pleasures she can My dear Madam,-I thought to have sent | find at Weston. you, by the return of your messenger, a let- When I wrote these lines on the Queen's ter; at least, something like one: but in-visit, I thought I had performed well; but it stead of sleeping here, as I supposed he would, he purposes to pass the night at Lavendon, a village three miles off. This design of his is but just made known to me, and it is now near seven in the evening. Therefore, lest he should be obliged to feel out his way, in an unknown country, in the dark, I am forced to scribble a hasty word or two, instead of devoting, as I intended, the whole evening to your service. *The translation of Aristotle. belongs to me, as I have told you before, to dislike whatever I write when it has been written a month. The performance was therefore sinking in my esteem, when your approbation of it, arriving in good time, buoyed it up again. It will now keep possession of the place it holds in my good opinion, because it has been favored with yours; and a copy will certainly be at your service whenever you choose to have one. * We regret that we have not succeeded in procuring any traces of these poems of Cowper's brother." Nothing is more certain than that when I content to be troubled by country folks; for wrote the line, God made the country, and man made the town, I had not the least recollection of that very similar one, which you quote from Hawkins Brown. It convinces me that critics (and none more than Warton, in his notes on Milton's minor poems) have often charged authors with borrowing what they drew from their own fund. Brown was an entertaining companion when he had drunk his bottle, but not before this proved a snare to him, and he would sometimes drink too much; but I know not that he was chargeable with any irregularities. He had those among his intimates, who would not have been such had he been otherwise viciously inclined; the Duncombs, in particular, father and son, who were of unblemished morals. TO MRS. KING.* other W. C. The Lodge, May 30, 1789. Dearest Madam,-Many thanks for your kind and valuable despatches, none of which, except your letter, I have yet had time to read; for true it is, and a sad, truth too, that I was in bed when your messenger arrived. He waits only for my answer, for which reason I answer as speedily as I can. I am glad if my poetical packet pleased you. Those stanzas on the Queen's visit were presented some time since, by Miss Goldsworthy, to the princess Augusta, who has probably given them to the Queen; but of their reception I have heard nothing. I gratified myself by complimenting two sovereigns whom I love and honor; and that gratification will be my reward. It would, indeed, be unreasonable to expect that persons who keep a Laureat in constant pay, should have either praise or emolument to spare for every volunteer who may choose to make them his subject. I will take the greatest care of the papers with which you have entrusted me, and will return them by the next opportunity. It is very unfortunate that the people of Bedford should choose to have the small-pox, just at the season when it would be sure to prevent our meeting. God only knows, madam, when we shall meet, or whether at all in this world; out certain it is, that whether we meet or not, I am most truly yours, TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ. W. C. The Lodge, June 5, 1789. My dear Friend, I am going to give you a deal of trouble, but London folks must be • Private correspondence. †The daughter of General Goldsworthy. in London only can our strange necessities be supplied. You must buy for me, if you please, a cuckoo clock; and now I will tell you where they are sold, which, Londoner as you are, it is possible you may not know. They are sold, I am informed, at more houses than one in that narrow part of Holborn which leads into Broad St. Giles'. It seems they are well-going clocks and cheap, which are the two best recommendations of any clock. They are made in Germany, and such numbers of them are annually imported, that they are become even a considerable article of commerce. I return you many thanks for Boswell's Tour.* I read it to Mrs. Unwin after supper, and we find it amusing. There is much trash in it, as there must always be in every narrative that relates indiscriminately all that passed. But now and then the Doctor speaks like an oracle, and that makes amends for all. Sir John was a coxcomb, and Boswell is not less a coxcomb, though of another kind. I fancy Johnson made coxcombs of all his friends, and they in return made him a coxcomb; for, with reverence be it spoken, such he certainly was, and flattered as he was he was sure to be so. Thanks for your invitation to London, but unless London can come to me, I fear we shall never meet. I was sure that you would love my friend when you should once be well acquainted with him,† and equally sure that he would take kindly to you. Now for Homer. W. C. TO THE REV. WALTER BAGOT. Weston, June 16, 1789. My dear Friend,-You will naturally sup pose that the letter in which you announced your marriage occasioned me some concern, though in my answer I had the wisdom to conceal it. The account you gave me of the object of your choice was such as left me at liberty to form conjectures not very comfortable to myself, if my friendship for you were indeed sincere. I have since, however, been sufficiently consoled. Your brother Chester has informed me that you have married not only one of the most agreeable, but one of the most accomplished, women in the kingdom. It is an old maxim, that it is better to exceed expectation than to disappoint it; and with this maxim in your view it was, no doubt, that you dwelt only on circumstances of disadvantage, and would not treat me with a recital of others which abundantly overweigh them. I now congratulate not you only but myself, and truly rejoice that my friend has chosen for his fellow-traveller, through the re *Tour to the Hebrides. † Rev. John Newton, |