highwater mark of genius upon every page, lit by as true a sun as ever the ocean mirrored. Perfect and inimitable from beginning to end, that it has not become the most popular of all the books relating to Shakspeare, is only to be accounted for by some perversity or dulness of the public. The book is, certainly, not read. There is great love and reading bestowed upon every cant about Shakspeare, and much interest has been shown in all the hoaxes. Perhaps the public thought this book was authentic.

In an age of criticism like this, when to "take" a position over a man and his work, is supposed to include proportionably superior powers of judgment, though not one discovery, argument, or searching remark, be adduced in proof; when analysis is publicly understood to mean every thing that can be done for the attainment of a correct estimate, and the very term, alone, of synthesis looks pedantic and outrè; and when any anonymous young man may gravely seat himself, in the fancy of his unknowing readers, far above an author who may have published works-of genius, learning, or knowledge and experience, at the very period that his We Judge was perhaps learning to write at school-it is only becoming, in an attempt like that of the present paper, to disclaim all assumption of finality of judgment upon a noble veteran of established genius, concerning whom there has never yet been one philosophically elaborated criticism. To be the first to "break ground" upon the broad lands of the authors of characters and scenes from real life, is often rather a perilous undertaking for any known critic who values his reputation; but to unlock the secret chambers of an ethereal inventiveness, and pronounce at once upon its contents, would only manifest the most short-sighted presumption. Simply to have unlocked such chambers for the entrance of others, were task enough for one contemporary.

Any sincere and mature opinions of the master of an art are always valuable, and not the less so when commenting upon established reputations, or those about which a contest still exists. We may thus be shaken in our faith, or confirmed in it. Mr. Landor's mode of expressing his opinion. often amounts to appealing to an inner sense for a corroboration of the truth. He says, in a letter to a friend, "I found the 'Faery Queen' the most delightful book in the

world to fall asleep upon by the sea-side. Geoffrey Chaucer always kept me wide awake, and beat at a distance all other English poets but Shakspeare and Milton. In many places Keats approaches him." After remarking on the faults and occasional affectations discoverable in two or three of the earliest poems of that true and beautiful genius, Mr. Landor adds, that he considers "no poet (always excepting Shakspeare) displays so many happy expressions, or so vivid a fancy, as Keats. A few hours in the Pæcile with the Tragedians would have made him all he wantedmajestically sedate. I wonder if any remorse has overtaken his murderers."

Mr. Landor is not at all the product of the present age; he scarcely belongs to it; he has no direct influence upon it but he has been an influence to some of its best teachers, and to some of the most refined illustrators of its vigorous spirit. For the rest for the duty, the taste, or the favour of posterity-when a succession of publics shall have slowly accumulated a residuum of "golden opinions" in the shape of pure admiring verdicts of competent minds, then only, if ever, will he attain his just estimation in the not altogether impartial roll of Fame. If ever?-the words fell from the pen-and the manly voice of him to whom they were applied, seems to call from his own clear altitude, "Let the words remain." For in the temple of posterity there have hitherto always appeared some immortalities which had better have burnt out, while some great works, or names, or both, have been suffered to drift away into oblivion. That such is likely to be the fate of the writings of Walter Savage Landor, nobody can for a moment believe; but were it so destined, and he could foresee the result, one can imagine his taking a secret pleasure in this resolution of his works into their primitive elements.

THE numerous literary labours of William and Mary Howitt, are so inextricably and so interestingly mixed up with their biographies, that they can only be appropriately treated under one head.

William Howitt is a native of Derbyshire, where his family have been considerable landed proprietors for many generations. In the reign of Elizabeth, a Thomas Howitt, Esq., married a Miss Middleton, and on the division of the estate, of which she was co-heiress, the manors of Wansley and Eastwood fell to the lot of Mrs. Howitt, who came to reside with her husband at Wansley Hall in Nottinghamshire.

The Howitts-according to a memoir of their early days, now out of print, and of which we shall avail ourselves, as far as it goes, having ascertained its authenticity—

the Howitts appear to have been of the old school of country squires, who led a jolly, careless life-hunting, shooting, feasting, and leaving their estate to take care of itself as it might, and which, of course, fell into a steady consumption. The broad lands of Wansley and Eastwood slipped away piecemeal; Wansley Hall and its surrounding demesne followed; the rectory of Eastwood, which had been a comfortable birth for a younger son, was the last portion of Miss Middleton's dowry which lingered in the family, and that was eventually sold to the Plumtre family, in which it. yet remains. The rectors of Eastwood appear, from family documents, to have very faithfully followed out such an education as they may be supposed to have received from their parents. They were more devoted to the field than the pulpit; and the exploits of the last rector of the name of Howitt and old Squire Rolleston, of Watnall, are not yet forgotten.

The demesne of one heiress being dissipated, there was not wanting another with which to repair the waste with her gold. The great-grandfather of our author married the daughter and sole heiress of a gentleman of Nottinghamshire, with whom he received a large sum in money. This was soon spent, and so much was the lady's father exasperated at the hopeless waste of his son-in-law, that he cut off his own daughter with a shilling, and left the estate to an adopted son. The disinherited man did not, however, learn wisdom from this lesson, unless he considered it wisdom "to daff the world aside and let it pass;" he adhered stoutly to the hereditary habits and maxims of his ancestors; and a wealthy old aunt of his, residing at Derby, getting a suspicion that he only waited her death to squander her hoard too, adopted the stratagem of sending a messenger to Heanor to announce to him the melancholy intelligence of her decease. The result justified her fears. The jolly squire liberally rewarded the messenger, and setting the village bells a-ringing, began his journey towards Derby to take possession. To his great consternation and chagrin, however, instead of finding the lady dead, he found her very much alive indeed, and ready to receive him with a most emphatic announcement, that she had followed the example of his father-in-law, and had struck him out of her will altogether. She faithfully kept her word. The only legacy which she left to this jovial spendthrift was his great

two-handled breakfast-pot, out of which he consumed every morning as much toast and ale as would have "filled" a baron of the fourteenth century.

This old gentleman seems to have been not only of a most reckless, but also of an unresentful disposition. He appears to have continued a familiar intercourse with the gentleman who superseded him in the estate, who likewise maintained towards him a conduct that was very honourable. The disinherited squire was one of the true Squire-Western school, and spent the remainder of his life in a manner particularly characteristic of the times. He and another dilapidated old gentleman of the name of Johnson, used to proceed from house to house amongst their friends, till probably they had scarcely a home of their own, carousing and drinking "jolly good ale and old." They sojourned a long time at one of these places, regularly going out with the greyhounds in the morning, or if it were summer, a-fishing, and carousing in the evenings, till one day the butler gave them a hint, by announcing that "the barrel was out." On this they proceeded to Lord Middleton's, at Wollerton, and after a similar career and a similar carousing, to the house of a gentleman in Lincolnshire. The building of Wallerton Hall, it is said had considerably impoverished the Middleton family; but Lord Middleton was unmarried; and as the Lincolnshire gentleman had an only daughter and a splendid fortune, family tradition says, that by extolling the parties to each other a match was brought about by these old gentlemen, much to the satisfaction of both sides; and they were made free of the cellar and the greyhounds for the remainder of their lives.

The son of this spendthrift, instead of being possessor of an estate, became a manager of a part of it for the fortunate proprietor. There was, however, a friendly feeling always kept up between the new proprietors and the Howitts, and by this means the father of our author-who was a man of a different stamp from his progenitors, was enabled, in some degree, to restore the fortunes of the family, and to establish a handsome property. Miss Tantum, whom he married, was a member of the Society of Friends, as her ancestors had been from the commencement of the Society; and Mr. Thomas Howitt, previous to his marriage, as was required by the rules of the Friends, entered the Society, and has always continued in it.