tions, with Mrs. Unwin, I can reasonably expect such a blessing, that creature is yourself. I was not without such attacks when I lived in London, though at that time they were less oppressive, but in your company I was never unhappy a whole day in all my

life.

Of how much importance is an Author to himself. I return to that abominable Specimen again, just to notice Maty's impatient. censure of the repetition that you mention. I mean of the word Hand. In the original there is not a repetition of it. But to repeat a word in that manner, and on such an occasion, is by no means what he calls it, a modern invention. In Homer I could shew him many such, and in Virgil they abound. Colman, who in his judgment of classical matters, is inferior to none, says, " I know not why Maty objects to this expression." I could easily change it, but the case standing thus, I know not whether my proud stomach will condescend so low.. I rather feel myself disinclined to it.

One evening last week, Mrs. Unwin and I took our walk to Weston, and as we were returning through the grove, opposite the house, the Throckmortons presented themselves at the door. They are owners of a house at Weston, at present empty. It is a very good one, infinitely superior to ours. When we drank Chocolate with them, they both expressed their ardent desire that we would take it, wishing to have us for nearer neighbours. If you, my Cousin,

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Cousin, were not so well provided for as you are, and at our very elbow, I verily believe I should have mustered all my rhetoric to recommend it to you. You might have it for ever without danger of ejectment, whereas your possession of the Vicarage depends on the life of the Vicar who is eighty-six. The environs are most beautiful, and the village itself one of the prettiest I ever saw. Add to this, you would step immediately into Mr. Throckmorton's pleasure ground, where you would not soil your slipper even in winter. A most unfortunate mistake was made by that gentleman's bailiff in his absence. Just before he left Weston last year, for the winter, he gave him orders to cut short the tops of the flowering shrubs, that lined a serpentine walk in a delightful grove, celebrated by my Poetship in a little piece that you remember was called the Shrubbery." The dunce misapprehending the order, cut down and faggotted up the whole grove, leaving neither tree, bush, nor twig; nothing but stumps about as high as my ankle. Mrs. T. told us that she never saw her husband so angry in his life. I judge indeed by his physiognomy, which has great sweetness in it, that he is very little addicted to that infernal passion, but had he cudgelled the man for his cruel blunder, and the havoc made in consequence of it, I could have excused him.

I felt myself really concerned for the Chancellor's illness, and from what I learned of it both from the papers, and from General Cowper concluded that he must die. I am accordingly delighted

in the same proportion with the news of his recovery. May he live, and live to be still the support of Government. If it shall be his good pleasure to render me personally any material service, I have no objection to it, but Heaven knows that it is impossible for any living wight to bestow less thought on that subject than myself.

May God be ever with you, my beloved Cousin.

W. C.

LETTER LIV.

To Lady HESKETH.

Olney, May 15, 1786.

From this very morning I begin to date the last month of our long separation, and confidently, and most comfortably hope, that before the 15th of June shall present itself, we shall have seen each other. Is it not so? And will it not be one of the most extraordinary æras of my extraordinary life? A year ago, we neither corresponded nor expected to meet in this world. But this world is a scene of marvellous events, many of them more marvellous than fiction itself would dare to hazard, and blessed be God! they are not all of the distressing kind; now and then in the course of an existence, whose hue is for the most part sable, a day turns up that makes amends for many sighs, and many subjects

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subjects of complaint. Such a day shall I account the day of your arrival at Olney.

Wherefore is it, canst thou tell me, that together with all those delightful sensations, to which the sight of a long absent dear friend gives birth, there is a mixture of something painful? Flutterings, and tumults, and I know not what accompaniments of our pleasure, that are in fact perfectly foreign from the occasion? Such I feel when I think of our meeting, and such, I suppose, feel you, and the nearer the crisis approaches, the more I am sensible of them. I know, beforehand, that they will increase with every turn of the wheels, that shall convey me to Newport, when I shall set out to meet you, and that when we actually meet, the pleasure, and this unaccountable pain together, will be as much as I shall be able to support. I am utterly at a loss for the cause, and can only resolve it into that appointment, by which it has been fore-ordained that all human delights shall be qualified and mingled with their contraries. For there is nothing formidable in you, to me, at least, there is nothing such. No, not even in your menaces, unless when you threaten me to write no more. Nay, I verily believe, did I not know you to be what you are, than I have, I should have fewer would have none if I could help it. resolve to combat with, and to conquer them. They are dreams, they are illusions of the judgment, some enemy that hates the hap

and had less affection for you of these emotions, of which I But a fig for them all! Let us

piness of human kind, and is ever industrious to dash it, works them in us, and their being so perfectly unreasonable as they are, is a proof of it. Nothing that is such can be the work of a good agent. This I know too by experience, that like all other illusions, they exist only by force of imagination, are indebted for their prevalence to the absence of their object, and in a few moments after its appearance, cease. So then this is a settled point, and the case stands thus. You will tremble as you draw near to Newport, and so shall I. But we will both recollect, that there is no reason why we should, and this recollection will at least have some little effect in our favour. We will likewise both take the comfort of what we know to be true, that the tumult will soon cease, and the pleasure long survive the pain, even as long, I trust, as we ourselves shall survive it.

What you say of Maty gives me all the consolation that you intended. We both think it highly probable that you suggest the true cause of his displeasure, when you suppose him mortified at not having had a part of the Translation laid before him, ere the Specimen was published. The General was very much hurt, and calls his censure harsh and unreasonable. He likewise sent me a consolatory Letter on the occasion, in which he took the kindest pains to heal the wound that he supposed I might have suffered. I am not naturally insensible, and the sensibilities that I had by nature, have been wonderfully enhanced by a long series of shocks,