It was this literary engagement that first laid the foundation of that intercourse, which commenced at this time between Cowper and Hayley; an intercourse which seems to have ripened into subsequent habits of friendship; As their names have been so much associated together, and Hayley eventually became the poet's biographer, we shall record the circumstances of the origin of their intimacy in Hayley's own words.

As it is to Milton that I am in a great measure indebted for what I must ever regard as a signal blessing, the friendship of Cowper, the reader will pardon me for dwelling a little on the circumstances that produced it; circumstances which often lead me to repeat those sweet verses of my friend, on the casual origin of our most valuable attach

ments.

Mysterious are his ways, whose power,
Brings forth that unexpected hour,
When minds that never met before,
Shall meet, unite, and part no more:
It is th' allotment of the skies,
The hand of the Supremely Wise,
That guides and governs our affections,
And plans and orders our connexions.'

These charming verses strike with peculiar force on my heart, when I recollect, that it was an idle endeavor to make us enemies which gave rise to our intimacy, and that I was providentially conducted to Weston at a season when my presence there afforded peculiar comfort to my affectionate friend under the pressure of a domestic affliction, which threatened to overwhelm his very tender spirits.*

"The entreaty of many persons, whom I wished to oblige, had engaged me to write a Life of Milton, before I had the slightest suspicion that my work could interfere with the projects of any man; but I was soon surprised and concerned in hearing that I was

• See verses addressed to John Johnson, Esq. An alarming attack with which Mrs. Unwin was visited.

represented in a newspaper as an antagonist of Cowper.

"I immediately wrote to him on the subject, and our correspondence soon endeared us to each other in no common degree."

We gave credit to Hayley for the kind and amiable spirit which he manifested on this delicate occasion; and for the address with which he converted an apparent collision of interests into a magnanimous triumph of literary and courteous feeling.

The succeeding letters will be found to contain frequent allusions both to his past and newly contracted engagement.

TO SAMUEL ROSE, ESQ.

The Lodge, Sept. 14, 1791. My dear Friend,-Whoever reviews me will in fact have a laborious task of it, in the performance of which he ought to move leisurely, and to exercise much critical discernment. In the meantime, my courage is kept up by the arrival of such testimonies in my favor as give me the greatest pleasure; coming from therefore, to hope that our periodical judges quarters the most respectable. I have reason, will not be very averse to me, and that pertaste and letters is pleased, another man so haps they may even favor me. qualified can hardly be displeased; and if critics of a different description grumble, they will not however materially hurt me.

If one man of

You, who know how necessary it is to me to be employed, will be glad to hear that I have been called to a new literary engagement, and that I have not refused it. A Milton, that is to rival, and, if possible, to exceed in splendor, Boydell's Shakspeare, is in contemplation, and I am in the editor's office. Fuseli is the painter. My business will be to select notes from others, and to write original notes; to translate the Latin and Italian

poems, and to give a correct text. I shall have years allowed me to do it in.

W. C.

TO THE REV. WALTER BAGOT.

Weston, Sept. 21, 1791. My dear Friend,-Of all the testimonies in favor of my Homer that I have received, none has given me so sincere a pleasure as that of Lord Bagot. It is an unmixed pleasure, and without a drawback; because I know him to be perfectly, and in all respects, whether erudition or a fine taste be in question, so well qualified to judge me, that I can neither expect nor wish a sentence more valuable than his

I hope by this time you have received your volumes, and are prepared to second the applauses of your brother-else, woe be to you! I wrote to Johnson immediately on the receipt of your last, giving him a strict injunction to despatch them to you without delay. He had sold some time since a hundred of the unsubscribed-for copies.

I have not a history in the world except Baker's Chronicle, and that I borrowed three years ago from Mr. Throckmorton. Now the case is this: I am translating Milton's third Elegy his Elegy on the death of the Bishop of Winchester.* He begins it with saying, that, while he was sitting alone, dejected, and musing on many melancholy themes, first, the idea of the Plague presented itself to his mind, and of the havoc made by it among the great. Then he proceeds thus:

Tum memini clarique ducis, fratrisque verendi Intempestivis ossa cremata rogis :

Et memini Heroum quos vidit ad æthera raptos; Flevit et amissos Belgia tota duces.

I cannot learn from my only oracle, Baker, who this famous leader and his reverend brother were. Nor does he at all ascertain for me the event alluded to in the second of these couplets. I am not yet possessed of Warton, who probably explains it, nor can be for a month to come. Consult him for me if you have him, or, if you have him not, consult some other. Or you may find the intelligence perhaps in your own budget; no matter how you come by it, only send it to me if you can, and as soon as you can, for I hate to leave unsolved difficulties behind me. In the first year of Charles the First, Milton was seventeen years of age, and then wrote this elegy. The period therefore to which I would refer you, is the two or three last years of James the First.

Ever yours, W. C.

TO THE REV. MR. KING.

Weston, Sept. 23, 1791.

Dear Sir, We are truly concerned at your account of Mrs. King's severe indisposition; and, though you had no better news to tell us, are much obliged to you for writing to inform us of it, and to Mrs. King for desiring you to do it. We take a lively interest in what concerns her. I should never have ascribed her silence to neglect, had she neither written to me herself nor commissioned

Moestus eram, et tacitus nullo comitante sedebam,
Hærebantque animo tristia plura meo: &c. &c.

Warton informs us that the distinguished brothers alluded to in Milton's elegy are the Duke of Brunswick and Count Mansfelt, who fell in the war of the Palatinate, that fruitful scene of warlike operations. The two latter are the Earls of Oxford and Southampton, who died at the siege of Breda, in the year 1625.

Private correspondence.

you to write for her. I had, indeed, for some time expected a letter from her by every post, but accounted for my continual disap pointment by supposing her at Edgeware, to which place she intended a visit, as she told me long since, and hoped that she would write immediately on her return.

Her sufferings will be felt here till we learn that they are removed: for which res son we shall be much obliged by the earliest notice of her recovery, which we most sincerely wish, if it please God, and which will not fail to be a constant subject of prayer at Woston.

I beg you, sir, to present Mrs. Unwin's and my affectionate remembrances to Mrs. King, in which you are equally a partaker, and to believe me, with true esteem and much sincerity,

Yours,

TO MRS. KING.*

W. C.

Weston, Oct. 21, 1791.

My dear Friend,-You could not have sent me more agreeable news than that of your better health, and I am greatly obliged to you for making me the first of your correspondents to whom you have given that welcome intelligence. This is a favor which I should have acknowledged much sooner, had not a disorder in my eyes, to which I have always been extremely subject, required that I should make as little use of my pen as possible. I felt much for you, when I read that part of your letter in which you mention your visitors, and the fatigue which, indisposed as you have been, they could not fail to occasion you. Agreeable as you would have found them at another time, and happy as you would have been in their company, you could not but feel the addition they necessarily made to your domestic attentions as a considerable inconvenience. But I have always said, and shall never say otherwise, that if patience under adversity, and submission to the afflicting hand of God, be true fortitude-which no reasonable person can deny

then your sex have ten times more true fortitude to boast than ours; and I have not the least doubt that you carried yourself with infinitely more equanimity on that occasion than I should have done, or any he of my acquaintance. Why is it, since the first of fender on earth was a woman, that the women are nevertheless, in all the most important points, superior to the men? That they are SO I will not allow to be disputed, having ob served it ever since I was capable of making the observation. I believe, on recollection. that, when I had the happiness to see you here we agitated this question a little; but I

• Private correspondence.

do not remember that we arrived at any decision of it. The Scripture calls you the weaker vessels; and perhaps the best solution of the difficulty, therefore, may be found in those other words of Scripture-My strength | is perfected in weakness. Unless you can furnish me with a better key than this, I shall be much inclined to believe that I have found the true one.

I am deep in a new literary engagement, being retained by my bookseller as editor of an intended most magnificent publication of Milton's Poetical Works. This will occupy me as much as Homer did for a year or two to come; and when I have finished it, I shall have run through all the degrees of my profession, as author, translator, and editor. I know not that a fourth could be found; but if a fourth can be found, I dare say I shall find it.

I remain, my dear madam, your affectionate friend and humble servant, W. C.

TO THE REV. WALTER BAGOT.

Weston, Oct. 25, 1791. My dear Friend,-Your unexpected and transient visit, like everything else that is past, has now the appearance of a dream, but it was a pleasant one, and I heartily wish that such dreams could recur more frequently. Your brother Chester repeated his visit yesterday, and I never saw him in better spirits. At such times he has, now and then, the very look that he had when he was a boy, and when I see it I seem to be a boy myself, and entirely forget for a short moment the years that have intervened since I was one. The look that I mean is one that you, I dare say, have observed. Then we are at Westminster again. He left with me that poem of your brother Lord Bagot's which was mentioned when you were here. It was a treat to me, and I read it to my cousin Lady Hesketh and to Mrs. Unwin, to whom it was a treat also. It has

I

great sweetness of numbers and much elegance of expression, and is just such a poein as I should be happy to have composed myself about a year ago, when I was loudly called upon by a certain nobleman* to celebrate the beauties of his villa. But had two insurmountable difficulties to contend with. One was that I had never seen his villa, and the other, that I had no eyes at that time for anything but Homer. Should I at any time hereafter undertake the task, I shall now at least know how to go about it, which, till I had seen Lord Bagot's poem, verily did not. I was particularly charmed with the parody of those beautiful lines of Milton:

Lord Bagot.

"The song was partial, but the harmony(What could it less, when spirits immortal sing?) Suspended hell, and took with ravishment The thronging audience." There's a parenthesis for you! The parenthesis it seems is out of fashion, and perhaps the moderns are in the right to proscribe what they cannot attain to. I will answer for it that had we the art at this day of insinuating a sentiment in this graceful manner, no reader of taste would quarrel with the practice. Lord Bagot showed his by selecting the passage for his imitation.

I would beat Warton, if he were living, for supposing that Milton ever repented of his compliment to the memory of Bishop Andrews. I neither do, nor can, nor will believe it. Milton's mind could not be narrowed by anything, and, though he quarrelled with episcopacy in the church of England idea of it, I am persuaded that a good bishop, as well as any other good man, of whatsoever rank or order, had always a share of his veneration.*

Yours, my dear friend,

Very affectionately, W. C.

TO JOHN JOHNSON, ESQ.

Weston, Oct. 31, 1791. My dear Johnny,-Your kind and affectionate letter well deserves my thanks, and should have had them long ago, had I not been obliged lately to give my attention to a mountain of unanswered letters, which 1 have just now reduced to a mole-hill; yours lay at the bottom, and I have at last worked my way down to it.

found a house to your minds. May you all It gives me great pleasure that you have three be happier in it than the happiest that ever occupied it before you! But my chief delight of all is to learn that you and Kitty are so completely cured of your long and threatening maladies. I always thought highly of Dr. Kerr, but his extraordinary suc

cess in your two instances has even inspired me with an affection for him.

My eyes are much better than when I wrote last, though seldom perfectly well many days together. At this season of the year I catch perpetual colds, and shall continue to do so till I have got the better of that tenderness of habit with which the summer never fails to affect me.

I am glad that you have heard well of my work in your country. Sufficient proofs have reached me from various quarters that I have not ploughed the field of Troy in

vain.

Were you here, I would gratify you with * How much more charitable is Cowper's comment, than the injurious surmise of Warton!