it. You are all strangely deceived upon the nervous condition of poor Davies's mind. You will not forget Miss Seward's picture of him in a letter to me; but I am sure of my facts, and they are themes of the most awful morality. I shall take an opportunity of reprobating Miss Seward's conduct to me. Farewell, my friend. Love and best wishes to the tutti quanti." "DEAR LADY KNOWLES, Nov..., 1815. "Be kind enough to return the inclosed; and let me know what ground there is for your assertion that Neville of Billingbear was one of Davies's friends, though I have not any doubt of the fact. You see by this letter that Davies wrote the Epithalamium; the Friends born the same day; and the Birth of the First Son, as you had previously marked. But we have discovered who these two friends were, viz. Horace Walpole and John Dodd. Is there no letter from Neville to Davies? What is the evidence that Davies the father wrote the ballad? As my Circuit bag is just at present mislaid, pray tell me again from your de lightful book who were all his friends, and upon what grounds you do them that honour. He was a dear soul, and I long to make people love him-Apropos. The passage in his Father's will perhaps kindled the fire of ambition in his youthful mind, which else might have escaped from that fatal spur. Is there any trace of the Aldworth visit to Kingsland in 1746? You cannot imagine what an angel he was; the Son is most amiable and good, but the Father was a (omus without vice. I am afraid that I am capricious; for I begin to think the letter to Corn allis the noblest of his works, the most like Milton, and Shakespeare too. It is a wonderful performance, and is a most impressive picture of the conflict in Davies's mind between modest happiness and piqued ambition. I think he alludes evidently to his weak stamina Pray send more dates if you can fish them up. The imitations of Horace are superlative. But you have run away, and Ludlow does not seem to catch you-Que faire? I send this through the post-mistress of Ludlow; and esteem you dearly, but with a cold that makes me a little too picturesque, with a fountain at command from the eyes. Adieu." "You have not sent me all Phelps, my dear Lady Knowles, and I wish for the rest. The passage relative to Horace's villa is too curious to be suppressed, and especially if compared with Eustace just published on the very same theme. You are, like other precious things, very difficult of access. If I do not hear from you soon, I shall advertise you as an estray. I now lament that I did not even copy every dot of an i out of your book;— heigh ho! and I have lost or mislaid the letter of Davies in the original to Lord Camden! I had made notes of Timothy's dates at Presteigne; but these high winds have blown them away, nor do I know when he died, nor do I possess the inscription upon Davies's monument, without which I cannot proceed hand or foot. If you will send me your dear book once more, I will be a Catholic, and you shall be my Saint. I own that, whatever I am ain upon the Bench, I am as impatient at Walton Grove as an old maid upon tenter-hooks for a new anecdote of calumny. "I hate Sir John Denham, and begin to think his lines upon Cooper's Hill execrable, because his descendant coaxes you away from Ludlow and me, which reminds me of a most ludierous mock-heroic en sérieux in Gray, though much admired (and by me as well as all the world). It is the fourth line of his Church-yard, and represents the ploughman as leaving the world to darkness and to ME;' which really, if you analyze it, is perfect nonsense. Adieu, dear Lady Knowles." "Your last letter is charming at all points, and if I could like you better, I would. I send you the enclosed with delight. If the Picture comes, I will engrave it *, for I know it was like. You corroborate my account of it and of him, when you say that his colour was flushed. Lady Camden, as well as my Uncle, doated upon it. I wish I knew when you would be in Ludlow again, that I might sit cross-legged, and may dream in that position of the happy day, calculating from thence to York-street, and from York-street hither. I have only mislaid the letter of Davies to Camden; all the rest are amenable to your draft at sight. Your vindication of Lord Camden is beautiful, and may in part be just. But he was a man whom a feather would a long time call back to his youthful attachments; and I know that he was charmed with DAVIES, till the latter took vapourish huff, to the painful distress of the former. Your critique upon Miss Seward is just; but oh that I had nothing worse to urge against her than her inflation of style in prose! In verse, I think, she had gifted powers; but there too she was too fond of new and quaint words or phrases. In prose I think her the essence of a monstrous taste. But she had no heart; her behaviour to me, which I must expose to the world, was a base and cruel perfidy, as you will see. Farewell," Dec. 7, 1815. "MY DEAR LADY KNOWLES, "As I have quite finished the Memoirs of Sneyd, so far as the materials in my hand extend, I implore you upon my knees to send me the box and the book you entrusted before into my care. One of the letters which I did not copy I recollect alludes to a Chaucer sent by Thomas; he was the supplementary editor of it, and Tyrwhitt, who succeeded, speaks handsomely of this Thomas by naine: query, if Urry's Chaucer is not one of the Kingsland books? I have introduced Aldworth upon the scene, who was a divine creature, and has written three portrait-characters †, equal to the best in Lord Clarendon. I passed one day with him when I was of your age, and thought it heaven. "Adieu, my inspiring friend. Baisemains to Sir Charles, and the innumerables of your house and race." "DEAR LADY KNOWLES, Dec..., "How I long for the box! No lady in her fifth month can tell. Perhaps in the Denham House, Worcestershire, you picked up anecdotes of Sir John. You know the wit of his mercy to Wi+ See vol. I. p. 506. * See vol. I. p. 485. ther, ther, whom he petitioned the King to rescue from the rope, for that, if he should be living still, Denham would not be called the worst Poet in England. - Farewell, my dear Lady Knowles. Best regards to my school-fellow's brother Sir Charles. — My remove at Eton, as it is called, ran thus: "Oh, my Angel Friend! but Angel is too cold a word (pray give me a warmer if you can spare it) for my thanks and blessings. Never had I such a feast as that which the contents of the box afford me; but it compels me to new-make the life; and I am half afraid that benevolent creature Nichols, with all his partiality for me (like that of a shaking Mandarin for his nodding companion upon a mantle-piece) will refuse it, as being too voluminous. The verses you pinned together upon Lestock, &c. are gold. There is nothing better of him or of any one; it is perfect of its kind. I do not much care for the loss of the Oratorio, or of Thomas's Epictetus in verse; but I shall ever lament the loss of the Essay on Man,' translated by the two friends into Latin verse; particularly as Thomas corresponded with Pope, who did not select ordinary characters for his epistolary intercourse. I have obtained by magic, which belongs to hermits, two more English Poems; both of them excellent; one to Lord Anson, describing his seat; the other upon a Mr. Adams's Villa near Bath, which last is quite a gem. I have not seen the Caractacus Extempore. I wonder your eagle's eyes were not struck by the passage in which Davies goes the romantic length of stating that a man who takes preferment sells his soul. The lines to Lord Camden with the Picture are in the same tune. There are two remarkable features of Davies's simplicity. Lord Camden tells him from College, that, if he had been older, they would have chosen him for their Provost―ça va sans dire. I consider that hint as a goodhumoured and safe eloge, like many which I have received, assuring me, first that I should have the Seals, and when they were out of my reach that I might have had them. Secondly, the pique, operating upon vanity and a weak state of health, in 1766, may have sprung from a similar passage in Camden's letter of an earlier date, in which he laments that he was not then able to make him a Bishop. This he may have interpreted as a direct promise to make him a Bishop the moment he obtained the Seals. N. B. The Cornwallis account chimes in with Miss Seward. I do not think Davies was ever happy after he lost his Pyramus at Presteigne. Phelps was educated at Winchester, and was tutor to the Duke of Beaufort. Adicu." "DEAR Dec. 1815. "DEAR LADY KNOWLES, "To thank you as I should is out of all sight, for hope itself so prettily expressed in your lines upon the box of jewels. It is, indeed, not a little striking, that we have lost him in verse and in prose after 1750, the year before he lost his friend Thomas. All Thomas's letters would be of use in prompting materials for the Life; but they are dull as Erebus. The idea of translating Epictetus into verse appears to me the dotage of a Dutch Critic mounted on a Pegasus who had moulted his wings. I am a convert as to the verses to the Queen of Hungary, and have made room for her Majesty's Poet Laureat in the heavy coach, or, as I fear it will be called, the waggon creeping up a sandy hill on Midsummer day. Farewell, dear friend." "Dec. 30, 1815. "How good you are! you pelt me with roses, and bury me under them. I have written at least 100 sheets; and by your hint it should seem that I have just begun, though I had closed a second part last night. I had soon corrected the inaccuracy of making Davies the writer of George's character, which is equal to any thing in Plutarch, Tully, or Clarendon. Thomas's character is a very mysterious one; deep in ancient lore when a mere Student of Christ Church, he never touches upon it as Rector of Presteigne. You owe me 500 letters. God ever bless you and your house, all your houses, and all that you love." "DEAR AMARYLLIS, 1816. "I walk in air. I have all Knoll Hills. I have a translation of my Father's Latin Ode by Davies, an Address to his Home, and an Imitation of Horace to Cranke,—all of them superlative, and all of them gifts to me from Edward Evans, who appears to me a lively and clever man, full of enthusiasm for Davies and me. I owe much to him. Give me joy, and accept it in return. This Translation gives me an opportunity of publishing also my Father's Latin Ode, which Davies himself commends. "Ever affectionately, ever gratefully yours, G. HARDINGE." "DEAR LADY KNOWLES, 1816. Open all your eyes. If you had a cast in one of those diamonds, it would be an awkward challenge; but I never discerned any such égarémens in the optic nerve chez vous. Evans, the Major, has given me Caducan, admirable; verses to Mounteney, in 1737, beautiful; a Latin Ode to Cranke, perfect Horace; another ditto by Phelps to Davies at Oxford, inferior, but very elegant; verses on Lady Betty Southall's carpet, not inferior to Waller and Prior (grace of courtesy and moral satire united); a poetical address to Lord Bateman; an imitation of Horace, to Cambridge, good as a version, but heavy in its general effect, and much too long. Caducan alludes to some image or idol dug up at Bangor, and presented by Dr. Mills (to Lord Bateman). It is very animated and clever, a kind of mock-heroic. I am still in hopes of more from Mr. Evans of Brampton; they VOL. III. 3 G are are promised by him through Mr. Price; and then, but not before, I shall take my leave, not I hope of you, but of your hero and mine. I almost hope that you and Sir Charles have not escaped from colds and sore throats; they have been so very genteel; my nose and the fire have not quarrelled once for the last month. Adieu, my dear Lady Knowles. "I received a letter from W. W. Davies, the heir of the house, a very clever man, yesterday morning, containing much informa tion relative to the Davies family. G. HARDINGE." "DEAR LADY KNOWLES, 1816. "I have translated much from the Italian, which is my favourite language. I never could understand why, but I can demonstrate the fact, that its idiom has more analogy to ours than is to be found in any other tongue between any other two languages. I really think, in compass and variety, the Italian Poets beat all the world under their leg. Their faults and vices are their own; they want, in general, depth, and manly energies of thought and phrase, but their fancy, though it sometimes degenerates into conceit, is full of grace and beauty and poetical effect. Some of their petty and half epigrammatic Moralities are beautiful. I saw one the other day (when, like Foote's Dr. Tythe-'em, I was thinking of nothing at all), which I could not forbear to attempt in English. The attempt, and it is nothing more, is annexed. It accompanies My first Love' and 'Ludlow*.'-Farewell, dear Lady Knowles.-Apropòs to the name. Has not Sir Charles letters and anecdotes of his Father to shew me au revoir, and some of his Brother too, my Eton school-fellow, who was in my remove. Adieu. G. HARDINGE." MY BIRTH-DAY, TO MY FIRST LOVE. Again, the destined orbit roll'd, HUMAN GREATNESS. G. H. An Alpine oak despised the raging storm, * See before, p. 802. 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