the letters of Cowper that can be proved to be disrespectful towards his sovereign. It would indeed be strange, and marvellous, if he could have used such expressions, when in truth he ever felt a manly constitutional reverence for the great office of royalty, and a most affectionate attachment to the personal character of his sovereign. You point to an objectionable letter without naming it. I am at a loss to guess what letter could be intended, except one on the patronage of India. Some persons might call that letter, perhaps, disrespectful to the King; but the writer of it (though modestly timid by nature) would, without apprehension, have put it himself into the hands of Majesty, as containing only those just sentiments and principles of a true and honest Whig, in which he gloried; and in defence of which he would willingly have staked his honour and his life. Do not, my dear Lady, suffer any one to mistake and misrepresent his pure and innocent whiggism, though, as he honestly told you in one of his excellent letters to yourself, You are a Tory, and answerable to the shades of all your whiggish ancestors for being so.' Yet, as Cowper and his biographer were ever as much the votaries of toleration as of truth, we both have loved you, Tory as you are, sincerely. I answer fearlessly, both for the departed angel, and for the infinitely less meritorious mortal, yet remaining on earth. As to cancelling any public sentiments of Cowper that may have been misrepresented, I would sooner be beheaded instantly than so servilely forsake what I deem my sacred duty to a dear, blameless, buried friend; and so basely desert the cause of his innocence and my own independence.

"Allow an old faithful Hermit to discharge all the duties of true friendship to the best of his time worn faculties; and believe him, in all points, where he can obey you without sinning against his own conscience, your most obedient, sincere, and affectionate,

"W.H.""

The "Life of Cowper" has been long before the public, and enjoyed, as its author tells us, a great share of favor. It must be confessed, however, that the degree of interest which that work called forth was far from being wholly owing to the merits of the biographer, who executed his part with a great deal of feeling, indeed, but with much less ability and judgment. The poetical talents of Cowper broke forth with a power which astonished, a purity which charmed, and a tenderness which touched all his readers. His fancy was rich, but under the control of a cultivated and correct taste; and such was the force of his genius, and so pliant was it, that, like Milton's elephant, he "wreathed his lithe proboscis,' and could rend an oak or pick up a pin. The curiosity of the public, then, was naturally stimulated by the announcement of a work which promised them the life of a man from whose productions they had derived so much delight and improvement. They knew, too, that there was something extra

ordinary

ordinary and mysterious in the structure of the poet's mind; that, with the most benevolent nature and exalted piety, he was overcast and shrouded by a cloud of settled melancholy, which no human hand could dissipate. Mr. Hayley's book was read with avidity, and it will never cease to be read; for it contains a collection of the most delightful letters, perhaps, that are to be found in the English language; unstudied, and alike redundant of fancy, feeling, and of thought. The curiosity of the public, however, so natural and so laudable, as to the early history of Cowper, the formation of his character, and the remote causes of his malady, was disappointed.

Not fewer than five hundred pages of the second volume of this biography are devoted to the short life of Mr. Hayley, junior. That this young man, had it pleased Providence to spare him, would have been an ornament and honor to his profession, there seems no reason to doubt: for his talents were of a high order, and they had been cultivated with judgment and assiduity. His accomplished mother took great delight in contributing her share to his improvement in his early years. At the age of eleven he not only wrote letters, but corresponded with his mother in the French language, and began to converse in it. Latin and Greek he studied under his father, who had taken him to Weston, the well known residence of Cowper. That poet became attached to the lad, and, observing his acuteness, had requested him, as an encouragement for the exercise of his talents, to "criticize his Homer," and send his remarks on it to Weston. The little critic- not yet thirteen-accordingly transmitted the following shrewd and sprightly specimen of his powers:

"Honoured King of Bards,

"Since you deign to demand the observations of an humble and inexperienced servant of yours, on a work of one who is so much his superior (as he is ever ready to serve you with all his might) behold what you demand! but let me desire you not to censure me for my unskilful, and perhaps (as they will undoubtedly appear to you) ridiculous observations, but be so kind as to receive them as a mark of respect and affection from

BOOK LINE 184.

i. 195.

196.

i. 508.

i. 651.

"Your obedient servant,

THOMAS HAYLEY."

'I cannot reconcile myself to these expressions, viz. "Ass clothed with impudence, &c. shameless wolf, and face of flint."

"Dishonoured foul," is, in my opinion, an uncleanly expression.

"Reel'd," I think, makes it appear as if Olympus was drunk.

B 3

i. 749.

317.

ii.

to

319.

ii.

300.

to

304.

"Kindler of the fires in Heaven," I think, makes Jupiter too much like a lamplighter.

{Jupi

}

in

'These lines are, my opinion, below the elevated genius of Mr. Cowper.

This appears to me rather Irish, since in line 300. you say, "No one sat," and in 304. " Polydorus rose.'

Young Hayley's taste for drawing was stimulated by seeing Romney, who annually paid an autumnal visit to his father, exert his splendid talents; and it was still farther encouraged by an acquaintance with Mr. Hodges, and by some instruction from Mr. Wright of Derby, while the youth was staying with his widowed mother at that place. His destination, however, was ultimately fixed by a noble offer from Mr. Flaxman, then at Rome, couched in these words to Mr. H. senior:

"If, as you say, you have not quite determined to make him a physician, and if you think he has talents for the fine arts, shew yourself my friend indeed, and accept my offer as frankly as I make it. Send him to me! I will instruct him in all the little I know, and it shall not cost you a farthing. You shall provide his board and lodging in the manner most agreeable to yourselves. The education he should have under me, would be a theory and practice of art and science, to make him profound in his profession, and not a drudge for the interest of his master. In your absence, I will be his father, and my dear Nancy promises to look to his morals. Think seriously of this, and remember, as soon as I arrive in England, I am ready to make my offer good: this, with the permission of Providence, will be in a very few months."

Mr. Flaxman did make his offer good in every sense of the word: he received his pupil; and he not merely instructed him in the art of sculpture, but regularly read with him every day some Greek or Roman writer, and laid such a foundation of knowlege in the sciences collateral to his immediate object of pursuit that, had health and strength been bestowed on him, he would in all human probability have risen to high eminence in his profession. The seeds of disease, however, germinated latently and insidiously: his case was mistaken by his medical attendants till it became irremediable; and the sufferer died at an immature age, and before the full expansion of those blossoms which had budded with extraordinary beauty and luxuriance. To commemorate the various virtues of his pupil, Mr. Flaxman requested permission to devote a marble monument, as a gratuitous offering to his memory; and it was placed in the church of Eartham with a prose inscription by Mr. F. and some verses by the afflicted father, in which the

deep

deep sorrow that he felt is softened by his resignation to the will of Heaven.

As Mr. H. elsewhere observes; Perhaps the records of mankind could afford very few examples of a father and a son in whom their reciprocal affection rose to such a height, and supported itself in so striking a manner through a series of chequered years. Indeed, this work was compiled for the purpose of exhibiting, in the fullest point of view, an affection so memorable; and with hopes that the just representation of its soothing delights may, in the progress of time, call forth and inspirit many new examples of filial and parental attach

ment.'

-

The propensity which Mr. Hayley indulged on all occasions, and to which we have already alluded, of pouring out his superlatives of praise in prose and verse, — in numbers innumerable and measures immeasurable, was not likely to be checked when the opening talents of his son were the objects of panegyric:-but the son appears to have had a stronger head than his father. In one of his letters he says, "Many, many thanks, my dear bard, for your kind sonnet. I really cannot say what you may puff me up to, thin as I am, if you bestow so much encomium on me yourself, and tell me of so much which my two kind friends are pleased to add to it. However, I think I am in no great danger, just now, for if I do happen to find myself a little swelled with vanity, a good spasm in the legs soon sets all to rights." Pray give my best love to Mr. Flaxman, and tell him, I set a very high value on his praise; I should also highly value any criticisms with which he would honour my performances." Laudari à laudato viro was the noble and sole object of the young man's ambition; and he obtained it too. During the long period of his sufferings, and with crippled powers of body, he continued to model, draw, and paint from subjects which his imagination suggested; with what success, may be inferred from the following passage in a letter from Mr. Flaxman :

66

"I was gratified beyond my expectations by the drawings your father brought to town. The Death of Demosthenes was conceived with a truly Grecian greatness and simplicity. The scene of Macbeth has an uniform terror of composition, and a noble effect of chiaro'scuro. The Queen of Naples and her child are elegant and affecting, and the painter fencing in his spectacles is as fine a characteristic comic figure, and striking likeness, as ever I saw. Your own portrait, perhaps, I admired more than them all, not only from its truth and nature, but because the sudden representation of my suffering and patient friend made an impression upon me which I shall not soon forget."

B 4

In

In the former part of this article, we expressed some regret that the very respectable editor of these volumes did not exercise the same sound discretion on other occasions, that had induced him to suppress the particulars of a love-affair in which the public could not possibly feel any interest. Had he consulted his own judgment only, and been guided by the delicate feelings of his own mind, we think he would likewise have suppressed a great many painful particulars which are introduced by the author relating to his separation from Mrs. Hayley. The biographer has obtruded the subject so frequently and so prominently, that, notwithstanding the profusion of endearing and sentimental epithets which he lavishes on this alienated lady, it is impossible not to suspect that he felt conscious of being put upon his trial, and was resolved to plead in his own defence against any unfavorable impression which the circle of their common friends might entertain concerning his behaviour. It was indelicate, because unnecessary, to introduce the subject of her mental infirmities: they are lamented with a great display and show of tenderness: but, from certain expressions in some of her letters, and the evident suppression of others, it may be thought that she had some provocation to urge in extenuation of the irritability of which her husband complained.

Whatever connubial infelicities Mr. Hayley experienced, however, in his first marriage, they were not sufficient to deter him from engaging in a second. After the loss of his son, his solitude and desolation of heart were for a time relieved by the preparation of that biographical memoir which is inserted in these volumes: but a visit to his hermitage from an old ecclesiastical acquaintance, attended by two young ladies, Mary and Harriet Welford, daughters of a retired merchant on Blackheath, gradually led to his second marriage, in the year 1809, with the elder sister. Great was the disparity of years between the parties, but not greater, it may be presumed, than was the dissimilarity of their tempers and dispositions: for in the short space of three years they also separated! We are spared the particulars of this ill-starred marriage, and feel obliged to Mr. Hayley for such an exertion of self-command on his part. He does not say a single word about this lady, nor address a single letter to her, nor even inform us whether she was still living when he finished his memoirs.

During the latter years of Mr. Hayley's life, it appears that he employed himself but little in compositions either of verse or prose. He had, indeed, ridden his Pegasus very hard for many years, and without giving it fair time to bait. The poor