nobody can fail to perceive how much he haa been influenced in his descriptions of nature by "The Seasons" of Thomson. He outstrips his predecessor. The proportion in him of what is good is larger, and his good passages are in general of a higher grade of excellence. His language is more select and felicitous, his metre is more musical, his scenes are more picturesque, and his topics are more various. "The Winter" of Thomson, which is his noblest production, will not stand a comparison as a whole with the "Winter Evening" of Cowper.

of truth, goodness, and humanity, and were such opinions as might be expected from an amiable recluse, whose judgment was not warped by the prepossessions which are generated by self-interest or by party and personal ties. The execution of the delightful design is for the most part nearly perfect. He has displayed one quality in a stronger degree than it was ever possessed by any otner describer of nature-the capacity of painting scenes with a distinctness which makes them like visible objects to the mind. They are not more vivid than true, and he has blended the accuracy of the topographer It speaks well for the taste of the day that with the picturesqueness of the poet. The "The Task" became immediately popular. Language is no longer of the commonplace In the same volume appeared another piece character which is so often found in his pre- which was already famous. This was the vious works, but is as choice as it is simple. "History of John Gilpin," which was printed Nothing in "The Task " is more remarkable for the first time in the "Public Advertiser " than the skill with which he constantly picks towards the close of 1782. It was here again out the one felicitous word in the tongue Lady Austen who prompted him. She had which conveys his meaning with the happiest known the story from her childhood, and reeffect. The sketch he gives in "The Winter lated it to him one evening when he was sufEvening" of the appearance of the landscape fering under more than ordinary dejection. before snow, and of the fall of the "fleecy He continued to break out into convulsions snower" itself, is one instance out of many of of laughter after he retired to bed, and his nis wonderful faculty for picturesque delinea- merriment not permitting him to sleep, he tion. The whole, indeed, of the fourth book, turned the incidents into verse. From the which is his masterpiece, abounds both in effect which the tale had upon him, it may be out-door and in-door scenes of magical power. presumed that he owed the comical details as Like all works of consummate excellence, the | well as the outline to his friend, and that he impression of its greatness increases with pro- did little more than supply the language and onged acquaintance. The beauties are of the the metre. Nothing can be happier than the tranquil and not of the exciting kind, and the manner in which he has dressed up the diexquisiteness of the workmanship is easily verting mishaps which befall the London overlooked by hasty eyes. His reprobation shopkeeper, who, with all the confidence of of the vices and follies of his age is some-inexperience unconscious of the difficulty, attimes admirable, but sometimes declamatory, flat, and tedious; and where he aspires to be sublime, as in the description of the earthquake in Sicily, he is grandiloquent without true force or spirit. His ear for blank verse was much finer than for the heroic measure; and though it was not the swelling fulness nor the variety of Milton, it is limpid and harmonious, and suited to the subjects of which he treats. As "The Task" is one of the most charming poems in the world, so it is also among the most original. Mimicry, Cowper said, was his abhorrence, and he at one time avoided reading verse for fear he should be betrayed into unconscious imitation. He states, however, that the poets of established reputation remained as fresh in his memory as when taey were the companions of his youth; and

tempts to ride on horseback when he has never ridden before. The good-humor with which Cowper has endowed his "knight of the stone bottles" imparts an additional air of hilarity to the ballad.

"When Betty, screaming, came down stairs, 'The wine is left behind.""

a less amiable man would have broken out into angry exclamations at the dreadful neglect of his wife.

"Good lack!' quoth he, 'yet bring it me. " is all the vexation which John expresses, and he evinces the same beaming, easy disposition at every stage of his disasters. The ludicrous sallies of Cowper were by his own account a violent effort to turn aside his thoughts from the gloom which overwhelmed him; but how

ever low his spirits might be by nature, he had equally by nature a strong vein of pleasantry, which was too habitual to be always the result of determination.

still dearer alliance." The letter in which Cowper put an end to this expectation was burned by the disappointed lady in a moment of vexation, but she spoke of its contents to Hayley, who expressly declares that it would have "exhibited a proof that, animated by the warmest admiration of the great poet, she was willing to devote her life and fortune to his service and protection." It is extraordinary that there should have been any speculation upon the cause of the severance, when we have the direct testimony of a man of del

Before "The Task "was finished the friendship with the lady who suggested it was disso.ved. In the summer of 1781 she was staying with her sister, Mrs. Jones, the wife of a clergyman, who lived in the vicinity of Olney. The poet was on visiting terms with the Joneses, and chancing to see Lady Austen in their company when he was looking out of his window, he was so struck with her ap-icate feelings, who was far too scrupulous pearance, that he sent Mrs. Unwin to invite upon such subjects to have published a conthem to tea. His first impression was con- jecture in the form of an assertion.* firmed. He was charmed with his new acquaintance, an immediate intimacy ensued, and she was shortly known to him by the endearing title of "Sister Anne." She was a woman of quick sensibilities," had high spirits, a lively fancy, and great readiness of conversation." Her vivacity was tempered by a solid understanding, and a moral worth “which induced us," says Cowper, "in spite of that cautious reserve that marks our characters, to trust her, to love and value her, and to open our hearts for her reception." So sprightly, so intelligent, and so affectionate a companion was like new life to the lonely nypochondriac. To go into her society was to step out of gloom into sunshine, and his dark musings vanished under the influence of her contagious cheerfulness. Anxious to perpetu the blessing, he encouraged her to take lodgings in the vicarage-house, which was only occupied in part by the curate. Thither she removed in 1782, and there Cowper visited her every morning after breakfast, and there he and Mrs. Unwin dined with her every alternate day. The inervening days were not lost to friendship, for the sole difference was that Lady Austen dined with them. Thus it continued till the summer of 1784, when the poet during her absence wrote her a letter, in which, with many expressions of tender regret, he broke off the intimacy. His reason for this step was the supposition of Lady Austen that his Love meant marriage. He addressed "Sister Anne" some affectionate verses; and Hayley, who received his information from herself, says that, though it is not the inference he should have drawn," she might easily be pardoned if she was induced by them to hope that they might possibly be a prelude to a

It is certain that Cowper, on his part, had never entertained the notion of matrimony. He had contracted obligations towards Mrs. Unwin which must have precluded the idea, even if no other objection had existed. For twenty years she had waited upon him with a tender assiduity of which women alone are capable, spending her health in his service and never wearying of her mournful task. In his repeated fits of dejection she could hardly venture to leave him for a moment, night or day, and her poor bark, he said, was shattered by being tossed so long by the side of his own. Lady Hesketh never recovered the effects of a winter which she spent with him during one of his attacks. Lovable as he was from his genius and disposition, the exhaustion of body and spirit which the attendance upon him involved would have tired out any person who had not carried friendship to the pitch of devotion. Instead of being, as he was, among the worthiest of men, he must have been a monster of ingratitude if he could have been so little touched by Mrs. Unwin's self-sacrifice and affection as to desert her in her age for a newly discoverea acquaintance, and leave her to solitude and neglect. Neither is there the slightest reason' to suppose that, apart from his sense of duty, he would have given the preference to her rival. In conversation Lady Austen was more brilliant than Mrs. Unwin, but the most dazzling are seldom the most valuable qua. ities, and the fascinations which were a pleas ing supplement to existence would have il.supplied the place of the endurance, the meekness, the sterling sense, and sympa

Mr. Willmott is of the same opinion, and says that the cause of the separation from Lady Austen authority that cannot be questioned." is "stated by Hayley with a positiveness and

thetic tastes of his old and faithful ally. Her | feel the effect as long as he lived. Her archaracter has been drawn by Lady Hesketh, rival brought with it another advantage. who says of her, that she loved him as well Cowper had become friendly with the Throckas one human being could love another, that mortons, a Roman Catholic family, who lived she had no will or shadow of inclination that at the pretty village of Weston, about a mi.e was not his, and that she went through her from Olney. They had a house to let, which almost incredible fatigues with an air of ease was commodious in itself, and had the addwhich took away every appearance of hard- tional recommendation that it adjoined their ship. Notwithstanding her trials, she pre-own pleasure-grounds, "where a slipper would served a great fund of gayety, and laughed not be soiled even in winter," and where in upon the smallest provocation. Her knowl- summer avenues of limes and elms afforded a edge and intelligence were both considerable. delicious shade. Of all the places within his She was well read in the poets, and had a range it was the one which the poet preferred true taste for what was excellent in literature. for its beauties, but it was rendered inaccessiCowper had the highest opinion of her judg-ble to him in bad weather by the intervening ment. He submitted all his writings to her road of mud, and in sultry weather he was criticism, and asserted that she had a percep- fatigued before he reached it, and when he tion of what was good and bad in composition reached had not time to enjoy it." Though that he never knew deceive her. He always the Throckmortons were anxious to have him abided by her decision, altered where she for a tenant for the sake of his society, and he condemned, and, if she approved, had no fear was equally anxious to embrace the offer for that anybody else could find fault with rea- the sake of their walks and prospects, as we.. Such a rare combination of merits was as their company, his inability to bear the exnot likely, with a person of Cowper's disposi- pense of furnishing would not permit him to tion, to be cast into the shade by the clever-entertain the project. No sooner did Lady ness, vivacity, and personal charms of Lady Austen. He proved, indeed, by his conduct a few years later, that his attachment to his aamirable Mary was as deep as hers had oeen to him, and that he realized in practice the oeautiful ideal which he had drawn of friendship in his "Valediction," where he describes it as a

son.

"Union of hearts without a flaw between."

Hesketh appear upon the scene than she insisted upon defraying the cost of the remova.; and November saw her cousin comfortably housed in the "Lodge" at Weston. He had not shifted his quarters before it was neces sary. The ceilings of his miserable tenement at Olney were cracked, the walls were crum bling; and when a shoemaker and a publican proposed after his departure to share it be tween them, the village carpenter pronounced The literary fame of Cowper caused some that unless it was propped they would inhabit of the friends and relations, who supposed it at the hazard of their lives. Once the poet him lost to themselves and the world, to re- returned to take a look at his old, tottering open their intercourse with him. Foremost dwelling. "Never," he says, “did I see so among the number was his cousin Lady Hes- forlorn and woful a spectacle." Cold, dreary, keth. Their correspondence had been sus-dirty, and ruinous, it seemed unfit to be the pended for nearly nineteen years, when she once more addressed him in October, 1785. He was transported with pleasure at the renewal of his intimacy with this dear companion of his youth. His letters to her thence forth overflow with fondness, and were only interrupted by her annual visits to him. She Any gratification which may have been pro went to Olney in June, 1786, and was lodged duced by the removal to Weston was quickly in the rooms which Lady Austen had vacated dispelled. He had not been there above two at the vicarage. Never did the poet look for- or three weeks when Mr. Unwin caught a ward to any event with more eager delight fever and died. Cowper spoke of the loss toan to the anticipated meeting, and the real-with calmness in his letters; and, affectionate ity did not belie his expectations. Her com- and united as the friends had always been, pany, he said, was a cordial of which he should they met so seldom that the event could have

abode of numan beings. His eyes notwithstanding had filled with tears when he first bid adieu to it, for he remembered how often he had enjoyed there in happier days a sense of the presence of God, and that now, as he supposed, he had lost it forever.

left little void in his life. Mrs. Unwin bore | poured his spiritual grief, as he had once her heavier share in the calamity with the poured his spiritual joys, into the ears of his resignation she had acquired from prolonged confessor, and told him that to converse with trials and habitual piety; but, depressed her- him, even upon paper, was the most delightself, she must have been less equal than usual ful of all employments, since it helped to to cheering her companion, and the deeper make things seem as they had been. He goom which overshadowed him may have would not have penned these words if he had Deen the cause of the fresh attack of lunacy believed that he was addressing an impostor, which shortly after supervened. There is a any more than he would have signified to gap in his correspondence from January 18 him, as he did, the extreme satisfaction he to July 24, 1787; and he passed the interval had derived from his society when this honin a state of almost total insanity. As in his ored friend came to stay with him at Olney. two previous attacks, he attempted suicide. He gave practical proofs of the sincerity of He hanged himself, and was only saved by his professions. He submitted his first volume the accident of Mrs. Unwin coming in before of poems to Mr. Newton's revision, asked ne was dead and cutting him down. When him to write the preface, and requested that ne recovered he informed Mr. Newton that he would allow his name to appear on the for thirteen years he had believed him not to title-page as editor. His habitual words and be the friend he loved, but somebody else. acts all alike discountenance the idea that in He considered it at least one beneficial effect his more lucid years his madness was carried of his illness that it had released him from to the pitch of discrediting the identity of one this disagreeable suspicion, and that he no of his dearest intimates. It was a retrospec onger doubted the identity of his old familiar tive notion created and fixed in his mind durcompanion, nor was compelled to act a de-ing his latest fit of frenzy. ceitful part when he addressed him. No It was fortunate for the poet that before .imits can be placed to the hallucinations of a his attack he had embarked in an occupation disordered understanding; and it would be which engaged without trying his faculties, possible in the nature of things that, when he and which assisted to promote his returning emerged from the visitation of 1773, he might convalescence. When he had completed the fancy, in spite of the evidence of his senses, "Task " he found that a fresh scheme was es that the pastor at the vicarage was a mockery sential to draw off his attention from his dis and a cheat, and only the outward semblance tempered thoughts. He was unable, he says, of the genuine man. In this case, however, to produce another page of original poetry it is certain that no such delusion had existed, for as he did not go out of himself for his and that the impression was a chimera en- materials he soon exhausted the stock of gendered by the disease of 1787. After Mr. his experience. In his early manhood he had Newton settled in London, Cowper wrote to read Homer with a fellow-Templar, and as him once a fortnight, or oftener, and his they read they compared the original with the Letters have none of the constraint which the translation of Pope. They were disgusted to a..eged conviction must have produced. They find that puerile conceits, extravagant metaare, on the contrary, peculiarly confidential. phors, and modern tinsel had been substituted They chiefly turn upon those fearful secrets for the majesty and simplicity of the Grecian, of his heart which he would have been the and they were often on the point of burning Jenst willing to lay bare to a stranger, and his unfaithful representative. The recollec display throughout a strong attachment and tion came back upon Cowper when he was at a reverential regard. They have not the same a loss for employment, and induced him, as an playfulness as his sportive epistles to Mr. Un-experiment, to take up the “Hiad" and turn win, but this was because he thought it due to the apostolical character of Mr. Newton to abstain from trifling. Religion had been the original bond of their intimacy; and when the poet ceased to partake of the consolations of Christianity, the point of sympathy was not changed, though the instrument sent forth a melancholy, instead of a cheerful, sound. He

a few lines into blank verse. With no other' design than the amusement of the hour he went on with the work, till, pleased with his success, he resolved to translate both the Epics of Homer. He determined that he would accomplish at least forty lines a day; and as he was firm in his purpose, and never intermitted his task, the vast project proceeded

LIFE AND WORKS OF COWPER.

rapidly. He had been two years engaged the language was the worthy vehicle of his
upon
life-long affection for the revered mother wno
inspired them. He struck a cord which found
an echo in every heart that ever loved; and
the touching allusions to his own tragic story
redoubled the pathos. It is the glorious dis-
tinction of Cowper that he is the domestic
poet of England, and has his hold upon the
mind by more pervading and charming sen-
timents than any other writer of verse.
His "Homer" dismissed, Cowper had again

it when it was interrupted by his illness, and he resumed it with eagerness the moment nis madness abated. His first version was full of the quaint language of the writers of the fifteenth century, which he imagined was the kind of English that made the closest approach to the simplicity of the Greek. His friends objected to his obsolete phraselogy. He began by altering it with reluctance, and ended by wondering that he had ever adopted it. His corrections amounted to a retrans- to seek a scheme on which to employ his .ation of the work, and his retranslation thoughts. His publisher projected a splendid went through two claborate revisions. Five edition of Milton's works, and engaged him. years of incessant labor were expended on the to translate the Latin poems and annotate the undertaking, nor was it time thrown away. English. Hayley was employed about the His Homer is a great performance. He has same time to write a Life of the illustrious preserved the vivid pictures, the naked gran- bard for another edition; and the newspapers deur, and the primitive manners of the origi- represented the two editors as antagonists. na.. He does not excel Pope more in fidelity Upon this Hayley sent a sonnet and a .etter toan in true poetic power. The style may to Cowper disclaiming the rivalry, and exseem austere at a casual glance, but will be pressing the warmest admiration of his poetry. found on a close acquaintance to be full of pic- From being total strangers, a vehement turesqueness, dignity, and force. In the pas- friendship sprang up between them. An insages where he creeps, the old hard himself vitation to Weston was accepted by Hayley. nas seldom soared very high. The combined The personal intercourse increased their mu majesty and melody of the ancient measure tual attachment, and "dear brother" was the could not be approached, but the blank verse title they bestowed on one another. Shy and of Cowper's translation has a fuller swell and reserved as Cowper was, and little as he was greater variety of cadence than his "Task," disposed to seek acquaintances, he was no and is, in general, sufficient to sustain the sooner brought in contact with a congenia. ideas. His version is not, and never will be, spirit than his social feelings flamed forth. popular, but those who turn from the English His later correspondence glows with affection Homer with distaste would probably be de- for the new friends who were attracted to him by the delight they had received from his void of a genuine relish for the Greek. was still in prog-writings. But he did not long enjoy this acIn 1789, while "Homer ress, John Johnson, then an undergraduate cession to his pleasures. In December, 1791, at Cambridge, and grandson of Roger Donne, Mrs. Unwin had a slight paralytic attack. "I feel," he said, "the shock in every nerve. who was the brother of Cowper's mother, made a pilgrimage into Buckinghamshire, God grant that there may be no repetition of out of pure admiration for his kinsman's it!" The repetition came, nevertheless, and works. Charmed with the young man's sim- with increased severity, in May, 1792. She and could neither read, plicity, enthusiasm, and affection, the poet lost her powers of speech, and the use of her treated him like a son. Through his means legs and right arm, a communication was opened with some of nor kuit, nor do any thing to amuse herself. the great author's other maternal relations; "I have suffered," wrote the poet, “nearly and a cousin, Mrs. Bodham, sent as a present the same disability in mind on the occasion to Weston the portrait of his mother, which as she in body." He abandoned Milton, took produced the famous lines that are known and upon himself the office of nurse, and wore out treasured by thousands who care little for his strength and spirits in attending on her. poetry. He tells us that he wrote them "not He who had been unable to bear his burden Bowed down by without tears," and without tears they have without her assistance, had now to carry her as load as well as his own. The description was rarely been read. usua. the literal transcript of his feelings, and the double pressure, his gloom increased