much for myself. Mrs. Unwin is evidently better for her jaunt, though by no means as she was before this last attack; still wanting help when she would rise from her seat, and a support in walking; but she is able to use more exercise than she could at home, and moves with rather a less tottering step. God knows what he designs for me; but when I see those who are dearer to me than myself, distempered and enfeebled, and myself as strong as in the days of my youth, I tremble for the solitude in which a few years will place me. I wish her and you to die before me, but not till I am more likely to follow immediately." Laudanum, he tells her, was required for the "little nervous fever to which he was always subject," and for which he found it the best remedy. The scenery itself began to oppress him; more beautiful," said he,46 "I have never beheld, nor expect to behold; but the charms of it, uncommon as they are, have not in the least alienated my affections from Weston. The genius of that place suits me better; it has an air of snug concealment, in which a disposition like mine feels peculiarly gratified; whereas, here, see, from every window, woods like forests, and bills like mountains, a wildness, in short, that rather increases my natural melancholy, and which, were it not for the agreeables I find within, would soon convince me that mere change of place can avail me little. Accordingly, I have not looked out for a house in Sussex, nor shall." In a letter of the preceding year, to Mr. Newton,47 he had said, "I would that I could see some of the mountains that you have seen; especially because Dr. Johnson has pronounced that no-man is qualified to be a poet who has never seen a mountain. But mountains I shall never see, unless, perhaps, in a dream, or unless there are such in heaven; nor those, unless I receive twice as much mercy as ever yet was shown to any man.” When Cowper and Mrs. Unwin were about to remove from Huntingdon, and the land "was all before them where to choose," Helmsley, in the North Riding of Yorkshire, was one of the places where they thought of setting up their rest. If that place had been fixed on, Cowper would have been near 47 Nov. 16, 1791. 46 To Lady Hesketh, Sept. 9. the finest ruins in England, and within easy reach of the grandest descent from the highlands to a plain country. But, however the course of his life might have been affected in other points, if he had settled there, instead of at Olney, he could not have been better placed than where he was, for the development of his peculiar genius. "Cowper," says Sir James Mackintosh, "does not describe the most beautiful scenes in nature; he discovers what is most beautiful in ordinary scenes. In fact, Cowper saw very few beautiful scenes; but his poetical eye, and his moral heart, detected beauty in the sandy flats of Buckinghamshire." 48 The Task could not have been a more delightful poem than it is, and no other scenery could have suited its character so well, as none could have been more entirely in accord with the disposition of the poet. He missed, at Eartham, the repose, the shelter, and the seclusion which he felt at Weston. As the time for their departure drew nigh, his fears on Mrs. Unwin's account began again to trouble him; "but they are not now," said he,49 "quite so reasonable as in the first instance. If she could bear the fatigue of travelling then, she is more equal to it at present; and, supposing that nothing happens to alarm her, which is very probable, may be expected to reach Weston in much better condition than when she left it. Her improvement, however, is chiefly in her looks, and in the articles of speaking and walking; for she can neither rise from her chair without help; nor walk without a support; nor read, nor use her needles." She was indeed still so feeble as to keep him in a state of continual apprehension. "I live," said he,50 "under the point of a sword suspended by a hair." There were other things which disturbed him when he thought of his approaching journey. It had been arranged that he should dine with General Cowper on the way. "The pleasure I shall have in the interview," said he,51 "will hardly be greater than the pain I shall feel at the 49 Life of Sir James Mackintosh, vol. ii. p. 104. 49 To Mrs. Courtenay, Sept. 10. 50 To Charlotte Smith, Sept. 51 To Lady Hesketh, Sept. 9 end of it; for we shall part probably to meet no more." He had also engaged to pass through London, and breakfast with Rose at his house in Chancery Lane. That he, who had never been in London, since he was taken from thence to St. Alban's, should have chosen now to pass through it, at the risk of freshening the most painful recollections of his life, seems most remarkable. Hayley himself perceived that his friend began to feel the "attraction of home," and that Mrs. Unwin's infirm state, and the declining season of the year, rendered it highly necessary for them to reach their own fireside by the time they had proposed. "Their departure," he says, "was a scene of affectionate anxiety, and a perfect contrast to the gayety of their arrival at Eartham." Cowper wrote a few lines to him the same day, from Kingston. "I left you," said he, "with a heavy heart, and with a heavy heart took leave of our dear Tom at the bottom of the chalk-hill. But soon after this last separation, my troubles gushed from my eyes, and then I was better. We must now prepare for our visit to the General. I add no more, therefore, than our dearest remembrance, and prayers that God may bless you and yours, and reward you a hundred fold for all your kindness. Tell Tom I shall always hold him dear for his affectionate attentions to Mrs. Unwin. From her heart the memory of him can never be erased.” What he felt upon this visit to the General he described thus to Hayley: "I am inclined to think you will agree with me, that there is sometimes more true heroism passing in a corner, and on occasions that make no noise in the world, than has often been exercised by those whom that world esteems her greatest heroes, and on occasions the most illustrious: I hope so at least; for all the heroism I have to boast, and all the opportunities I have of displaying any, are of a private nature. After writing the note, I immediately began to prepare for my appointed visit to Ham; but the struggles that I had with my own spirit, laboring as I did under the most dreadful dejection, are never to be told. I would have given the world to have been excused. I went, however, and carried my point against rryself with a heart riven asunder-I have reasons The visit, for all this anxiety, which I cannot relate now. however, passed off well, and we returned in the dark to Kingston; I, with a lighter heart than I had known since my departure from Eartham, and Mary, too, for she had suffered hardly less than myself, and chiefly on my account. That night we rested well at our inn, and at twenty minutes after eight next morning set off for London; exactly at ten we reached Mr. Rose's door." Mr. Rose was acquainted with the Welsh bard, Edward Williams, who at that time worked at his trade, as a mason, in London. He had told Cowper of his singular character, his talent for verse, and his extraordinary knowledge of Welsh antiquities and bardic traditions. Cowper had been much interested by the account, and Williams, therefore, was invited to meet him at breakfast. But Cowper's spirits, as might have been expected, failed when he felt himself in London; he sate at the corner of the fireplace in total silence, and manifested no other interest in the conversation than occasionally raising his eyes toward the speaker. Williams was struck by the quiet melancholy of his aspect; he himself, however, was led to converse upon Welsh literature and the bardic institutions a subject with which no man was better acquainted, and few so well; and he was told afterwards that Cowper had been a pleased and attentive listener, though in too nervous a state to bear an introduction, or to converse.52 After breakfast they proceeded to St. Alban's; so far Rose accompanied them. "In the dark, and in a storm, at eight at night, they found themselves at their own back door.' - 52 This is stated in some Recollections of the Welsh Bard, by Mr. Waring, published in a series of letters in the Cambrian Newspaper, 1827. Williams's memory had deceived him, both as to the year and time of the day; for he spoke of it as an evening party, and as having been after the publication of his poems, which were not published till 1794. Such mistakes are easy, after a lapse of many years; but of the meeting there can be no doubt; and if Cowper had been in his better mood, there were few men to whom he would have listened with more pleasure than to my old acquaintance, nor from whom he could have received information which would have interested him so much. It grieves me to think what curious knowledge, and how much of it, has probably perished with poor old Edward Williains! CHAPTER XVII. COWPER AT WESTON. INCREASE OF HIS MALADY. HAYLEY'S In the letter which informed Hayley of their safe return, Cowper said that "Chaos himself, even the Chaos of Milton, was not surrounded with more confusion, nor had a mind more completely in a hubbub than his own at that time. At our first arrival," said he,1"after long absence, we found a hundred orders to servants necessary, a thousand things to be restored to their proper places, and an endless variety of minutia to be adjusted, which, though individually of little importance, are most momentous in the aggregate." This was written on the second day after his arrival, and on the third he wrote to Teedon, apologizing for having left him so long without a written notice of their return. "Mrs. Unwin," said he, "still wants much of restoration, and there is still much in that particular to be prayed for. As to myself, my frame of mind continues such as it was before I went to Eartham, almost always low, and often inexpressibly dejected. My work is still in suspense, or, to say truth, not yet begun; nor do I at present see that I am likely to have any leisure for such labors. But on this latter I do not ask you to pray, because you have already obtained sufficient assurances concerning it. God can enable me to do much in a short time; and that is the only hope I have of ever performing it at all." Cowper had written from Eartham to tell Johnson that he had hopes of carrying Mrs. Unwin back in such a state of health as would consist with a little more diligence and constancy, on his part, in the work which he had undertaken. "I thank you," said he, "for setting my heart at rest from the disquietude I felt, when I wrote last, on the score of time, lest I should not be ready at the moment. I |