satisfaction of receiving, beneath his hospitable roof at Eartham, Cowper, and the amiable woman for whom he entertained so warm, though singular an attachment. The air of Sussex benefited Mrs. Unwin, whilst the company of her host, the comforts of his elegant mansion, and the beauties of its delightful grounds, had a healing influence on the frame of Cowper, now rapidly wearing away by the continued weight of extraordinary mental depression, produced by a temperament nervous in the highest possible degree. The poets spent their mornings together in carefully revising Cowper's beautiful translations of the Latin and Italian poetry of Milton, and amused themselves after dinner in throwing together a rapid metrical version of Andriano's Adamo. But a still more pleasant occupation to both of them was to administer to the comforts of their venerable friend, to whom Cowper's attention exhibited, at all times in a singular combination, the fondness of a child for a parent the respect of a lover for his mistress and the affection of a husband to a wife, without conveying to the mind of any one even a momentary suspicion, that there was any thing improper in so unusual a connexion. Cowper was delighted with the situation of Eartham, and the scenery around it, and paints it in such glowing colours, that, we are assured, our readers would rather have the description of Hayley's residence in his language than in ours. Of the pleasure grounds, which he styles "one of the most delightful in the world," he writes to one of his female correspondents, "They occupy three sides of a hill," "which," says he, in another lettert, "in Buckinghamshire might well pass for a mountain, lofty enough to command a view of the sea, which skirts the horizon to a length of many miles, with the Isle of Wight at the end of it; which may also be seen plainly," he tells another, "from the library in which we are writing." "The inland scene is equally beautiful, consisting of a large and deep valley, well culti vated, and inclosed by magnificent hills, all covered with wood. I had, for my part, no conception that a poet could be the owner of such a paradise. His house," he adds, "is as elegant as his scenes are charming." Here," he tells his friend, Mr. Greathead, "we are as happy as it is in the power of terrestrial good to make us. It is almost a paradise in which we dwell; and our reception has been the kindest that it was possible for friendship and hospitality to con Hayley's Life of Cowper, iii. 436. 66 + Ib. 433. trive. I have much to see and to enjoy," he adds, in concluding his letter, "before I can be perfectly apprized of all the delights of Eartham*." The charms of this pleasant spot were enhanced to the poet by the occasional society of some of Hayley's literary friends, who were invited to meet him there. In the number of these was Romney, who, during his stay, executed in crayons a portrait of Cowper, said not only to be the best likeness of the poet, but the happiest production of the painter's pencil. Romney himself considered it, indeed, the nearest approach he had ever made to a perfect representation of life and character. In this opinion Hayley also joined, representing, as he does, the resemblance to have been " so powerful, that spectators who contemplated the portrait with the original by its side, thought it hardly possible for any similitude to be more striking or more exact +." Nor was Cowper himself dissatisfied with the likeness, as is evident from his beautiful sonnet addressed to the artist; in which, speaking of the impression of the mind on the canvas, he says: "Thou hast so pencill'd mine, that though I own The subject worthless, I have never known The artist shining with superior grace." Yet who does not recollect the exquisite touch of characteristic melancholy, with which he closes one of the most elegant compliments ever paid by any one: “But this I mark, that symptoms none of woe Well! I am satisfied it should be so, Since, on maturer thought, the cause is clear; Sorrow, however, he did feel, even in circumstances in which he seems to have enjoyed more of happiness than fell to his lot; through a life rendered at times almost insupportable by nervous depression; so intense, as to have tempted him, it is but too well known, more than once to an act of suicide. His health continued to improve during his stay, and he slept as much in one night as he latterly had done in two; but still the great bane of his existence clung to him with little less than its wonted tenacity,-for nothing could shake off so constant, but unwelcome an intruder. "As to Hayley's Life of Cowper, iii. 454. Hayley's Life of Romney, 177, 8, 181, 2; Life of Cowper, iv. 25. that gloominess of mind which I have had for these twenty years," he thus affectingly writes to lady Hesketh, after he had been at Eartham about three weeks," it cleaves to me even here; and could I be translated to paradise, unless I left my body behind me, would cleave to me even there also*." After a stay of a fortnight longer, the change of air, and even the society of friends of tastes and habits the most congenial to his own, lost their effect; he abandoned the idea, which he seems at one time to have entertained, of seeking for a house in Sussex, and was anxious to get home. "This is, as I have already told you," he writes accordingly to lady Hesketh, "a delightful place; more beautiful scenery I have never beheld, nor expect to behold; but the charms of it, uncommon as they are, have not in the least alienated my affections from Weston. The genius of that place suits me better; it has an air of snug concealment, in which a disposition like mine feels peculiarly gratified; whereas here, I see from every window, woods like forests, and hills like mountains, a wildness, in short, that rather increases my natural melancholy, and which, were it not for the agreeables I find within, would soon convince me, that mere change of place can avail me little+." Amongst those agreeables, for a while at least, was numbered Hurdis, the poet, who joined the party at the earnest solicitation both of Cowper and of Hayley, to endeavour, in their company, to divert his mind from the sorrow which the recent loss of a beloved sister had occasioned, and which seems to have extended itself to the sympathetic heart of the bard of Weston. Charlotte Smith, the celebrated novelist, a woman almost as unfortunate in her life as she was highly gifted in her mental powers, came over also to Eartham from Brighton, on purpose to enjoy the society of Cowper, who admired her talents, and felt for her misfortunes. The evening parties of this poetical group were enlivened by the fruits of this most fertile writer's morning studies, in the composition of the Old Manor House, one of the novels which she had then just begun. In the middle of September, this literary congress was broken up by Cowper's departure for Weston, leaving Eartham with a heavy heart, which, as appears from a letter to his host, written on the following day, soon relieved itself in tears. Their correspondence was regularly continued; and a plan was formed by Hayley, and, after some difficulties arising from his excessive modesty, acceded + Ib. 10. Hayley's Life of Cowper, iv. 8. VOL. IV. - No. 7. C to by Cowper, for the publication of a volume of the joint productions of the two poets, embellished by designs of Romney and of Hodges. To this confederacy Cowper was to have contributed "The Four Ages," and several minor pieces, which he had for some time been occupied, at his leisure hours, in correcting for the press, and which, with the exception of a small fragment, alone made their appearance before the public after his decease. In November, 1793, Hayley paid a second visit to Weston, whence Cowper was invited by lord Spencer to accompany his guest to Althorpe, to spend a few days there with Gibbon, with whom Hayley had lived on terms of intimacy since he had addressed to him his poetical essay on History, was particularly esteemed by him*, and had the pleasure of receiving him as his guest at Eartham in the summer of this year. The shyness of the poet, and Mrs. Unwin's declining health, prevented, according to the representation of his biographer, the acceptance of this invitation. To these reasons, there is ground, however, for suspecting, that Cowper's known and marked aversion to the infidel principles of the historian ought in fairness to be added; for although their mutual friend expresses a very confident persuasion, that, "widely as they might differ on one important article, they were both able and willing to appreciate and enjoy the extraordinary mental powers and rare colloquial excellence of each other+," we must be allowed a doubt, whether the partiality of friendship, which unhappily led Mr. Hayley, on all occasions, to treat with too gentle a hand the scepticism of this celebrated writer, has not here misled him to the formation of a very false conclusion. For our parts, we cannot but feel satisfied, that neither Gibbon nor Cowper could have derived much gratification from a personal acquaintance. He who, in consoling the most intimate of his friends on the death of a beloved wife, in the midst of sorrows in which he deeply shared, could offer no better consolation than this," She is now at rest; and, if there be a future life, her mild virtues have surely entitled her to the reward of pure and perfect felicity+,"must have been any thing rather than a suitable companion for the pious poet, who, without the sure and certain hope of that future life, would indeed have been of all men the most miserable. On Hayley's return from lord * Lord Sheffield's Life of Gibbon, prefixed to his Miscellaneous Works, vol. i. p. 286. + Hayley's Life of Cowper, iv. 111. Letter from Gibbon to Lord Sheffield; Miscellaneous Works, i. 279. Spencer's, whither he had been accompanied by Mr. Rose, one of Cowper's most intimate friends, and one early lost both to him and to the world, the two poets occupied themselves in rendering mutual assistance in the completion of the works in which they were then engaged,-Hayley, in the Life of Milton-Cowper, in revising his translation of Homer; a work for which he was anxious to have his friend's assistance during the whole of the winter. The kind invitation to the subject of this sketch, to remain for so long a time a guest at Weston, occupied in an agreeable office, for which, he assures us in his memoirs of his friend*, he "wanted not inclination," was declined, partly, if not principally, in the hope that, in passing through London, he might render to Cowper a much more essential service, by quickening in the minds of his more powerful friends a seasonable attention to his interest and welfare. His fears were aroused by the then singular condition of the melancholy poet; in which, though he was in possession of all the powerful faculties of his mind, and the native tenderness of his heart, there was something so indescribable, as to lead to a well-founded apprehension, that, without some signal event in his favour to reanimate his spirits, they would gradually sink into hopeless dejection. In November, he accordingly left Buckinghamshire for London; his departure having been somewhat hastened by a slight attack,-so at least it at first seemed,-of epidemic fever, which raging with considerable virulence in the village of Weston, had affected both the poet and his guest; the latter so seriously, that he was laid up for some time in town, unable to do more towards the execution of his benevolent project than postponing the appearance of the edition of Milton, the preparations for which much agitated Cowper's mind; and making some advantageous arrangements for the publication of his Homer. But even these services had a beneficial, though but a temporary effect, upon a mind which, from the peculiar constitution of the body to which it was linked, often viewed as matters of the deepest moment what would to others have seemed but "trifles light as air." For a time-though, alas! it was but too short-he resumed his literary pursuits with cheerfulness, and even talked of having a work of his embellished by the pencil of Lawrence, and made a companion to one of Hayley's, as an event which he anticipated with the utmost complacence; adding immediately, "I *Hayley's Life of Cowper, vol. iv. p. 114. |