that way, by a production on a new construction: she has baited her trap, in hopes to snap all that may come, with a sugar-plum.'-His opinion in this will not be amiss; 'tis what I intend my principal end; and if I succeed, and folks should read, till a few are brought to a serious thought, I shall think I am paid, for all I have said, and all I have done, though I have run, many a time, after a rhyme, as far from hence, to the end of my sense, and, by hook or crook, write another book, if I live and am here, another year.

"I have heard before of a room with a floor laid upon springs, and such like things, with so much art, in every part, that when you went in you was forced to begin a minuet pace, with an air and a grace, swimming about, now in and now out, with a deal of state, in a figure of eight, without pipe or string or any such thing; and now I have writ, in a rhyming fit, what will make you dance, and, as you advance, will keep you still, though against your will, dancing away, alert and gay, till you come to an end of what I have penn'd; which that you may do, ere Madam and you are quite worn out with jigging about, I take my leave; and here you receive a bow profound, down to the ground, from your humble W. C.

me

"P. S. When I concluded, doubtless you did think me right, as well you might, in saying what

I said of Scot; and then it was true, but now it is due to Him to note, that since I wrote, Himself and He has visited we."

He was at this time employed on his poem on Charity, which he considered would be a proper sequel to "Hope;" and on the 22nd of the same month he told Mr. Newton he was "in the middle of an affair called, 'Conversation,' which, as 'Table Talk' serves, in the present volume, by way of introductory fiddle to the band that follows, I design shall perform the same office in a second."

Neither constant occupation nor society was capable of entirely removing Cowper's constitutional dejection of spirits; and though his letters at this period evince much cheerfulness, and occasionally sportive vivacity, the seeds of his malady were far from eradicated. To Mr. Newton, in August, 1781, he observed: "My thoughts are clad in a sober livery, for the most part as grave as that of a bishop's servant's. They turn too upon spiritual subjects, but the tallest fellow, and the loudest amongst them all, is he who is continually crying, with a loud voice, Actum est de te, periisti. You wish for more attention, I for less. Dissipation itself would be welcome to me, so it were not a vicious one; but however earnestly invited, it is coy, and keeps at a distance. Yet with all this distressing gloom upon my mind, I experience, as you do, the slipperiness of the present hour, and the rapidity

C

with which time escapes me. Every thing around us, and every thing that befalls us, constitutes a variety, which, whether agreeable or otherwise, has still a thievish propensity, and steals from us days, months, and years, with such unparalleled address, that even while we say they are here, they are gone. From infancy to manhood is rather a tedious period, chiefly, I suppose, because at that time we act under the control of others, and are not suffered to have a will of our own. But thence downward into the vale of years, is such a declivity, that we have just an opportunity to reflect upon the steepness of it, and then find ourselves at the bottom."

About this time Lady Austen became the tenant of the parsonage in Olney: as it communicated by a door in the garden wall with the Poet's residence, a constant intercourse subsisted between the two families; and they dined alternately with each other. Her Ladyship's musical acquirements induced Cowper to write several songs for her, and for three years his happiest hours were spent in her society.

His letters to Mr. Newton, in the autumn of 1781, related chiefly to the publication of his Poems, and their progress through the press. Of "Retirement" he gave him the subjoined account:

"I have already begun and proceeded a little way in a poem called Retirement. My view in choosing that subject is to direct to the proper use of the opportunities it affords for the culti

vation of a man's best interests; to censure the vices and the follies which people carry with them into their retreats, where they make no other use of their leisure than to gratify themselves with the indulgence of their favourite appetites, and to pay themselves, by a life of pleasure, for a life of business. In conclusion, I would enlarge upon the happiness of that state, when discreetly enjoyed and religiously improved. But all this is, at present, in embryo. I generally despair of my progress when I begin; but if, like my travelling 'squire, I should kindle as I go, this likewise may make a part of the volume, for I have time enough before me."

Cowper was peculiarly fortunate in having a publisher who, to the habits of a man of business, united considerable critical judgment and good taste. Since literature has degenerated into a mere calculation of profit and loss, publishers of this class have nearly become extinct, but of the valuable assistance which an intelligent bookseller may afford to an author, no one is more aware than the writer of the Memoirs which are prefixed to this, and the preceding volumes of the present edition of the Poets.

Cowper repeatedly expresses to Mr. Newton and others his acknowledgments for his publisher Mr. Johnson's suggestions; and the following letters to him, which have not before been printed, still farther evince the poet's obligations:

SIR,

TO MR. JOHNSON.

I AM obliged to you for your queries, the poems will be the better for them. I wish you always to read me with the closest attention and to give my lines as strict a scrutiny as you can find time for: some things always escape a writer, which yet strike a judicious reader perhaps at the first view; and while you allow me a right of decision in the last instance, if I go into public with any uncorrected faults upon my head, the blame and the disgrace will be all my own. You will per

ceive that I have made some use of the liberty I stipulated for beforehand, and though I have followed your advice in several passages, yet not in all. I proceed according to previous engagements to give my reasons.

No man living abhors a louse more than I do, but hermits are notoriously infested with these vermin; it is even a part of their supposed meritorious mortification to encourage the breed; the fact being true becomes an important feature in the face of that folly I mean to expose, and having occasion to mention the loathsome animal, I cannot, I think, do better than call him by his loathsome name. It is a false delicacy that is offended by the mention of any thing God has seen fit to create, where the laws of modesty are not violated, and therefore we will not mind it.

Die then. The word italicised to direct the