that is now crowded with pinks, roses, and honey-fuckles, and the window into my neighbour's orchard. It formerly ferved an apothecary, now dead, as a smoking room, and under my feet is a trap door, which once cov. ered a hole in the ground, where he kept his bottles. At prefent however it is dedicated to fublimer uses. Having lined it with garden mats, and furnished it with a table and two chairs, here I write all that I write in fummer time, whether to my friends, or to the public. It is fecure from all noife, and a refuge from all intrufion; for intruders fometimes trouble me in the winter evenings at Olney. But thanks to my Boudoir, I can now hide myself from them, a Poet's retreat is facred: they acknowledge the truth of that propofition, and never prefume to violate it.

The last sentence puts me in mind to tell you, that I have ordered my volume to your door. My bookfeller is the most dilatory of all his fraternity, or you would have received it long fince: it is more than a month fince I returned him the laft proof, and confequently fince the printing was finished. I fent him the manufcript at the beginning of laft November, that he might publifh while the town is full, and he will hit the exact moment when it is entirely empty. Patience you will perceive is in no fituation exempted from the feverest trials; a remark that may serve to comfort you under the numberless trials of your own.

W. C.

His fecond volume, of whofe delay in the prefs he fpeaks fo feelingly, was published in the fummer of 1785. It not only raised him to the fummit of poetical reputation, but obtained for him a bleffing infinitely dearer to his affectionate heart, another female friend, and lively affociate, now providentially led to contribute to his com

fort, when the advanced age and infirmities of Mrs. Unwin made fuch an acquifition of new, or rather revived friendship, a matter of infinite importance to the tranquillity and welfare of the fequeftered Poet.

The lady to whom I allude had the advantage of being nearly related to Cowper. Their intercourse had been frequent, and endeared by reciprocal esteem in their early years; but the whirlwinds of life had driven them far from the fight of each other. During the Poet's long retirement, his fair coufin had paffed fome years with her husband abroad, and others, after her return, in a variety of mournful duties. She was at this time a widow, and her indelible regard for her poetical relation, being agreeably infpirited by the publication of his recent works, fhe wrote to him, on that occasion, a very kind letter.

It gave rise to many from him, which I am particu-larly happy in being enabled to make a part of this work, because they give a minute account of their admirable Author, at a very interefting period of his life; and because I perfuade myself they will reflect peculiar honour on my departed Friend in various points of view, and lead the public to join with me in thinking that his Letters are rivals to his Poems, in the rare excellence of reprefenting life and nature with graceful and endearing fidelity.

LETTER XL:

To Lady HESKETH, New Norfolk Street, Grofvenor

Square.

October 12, 1785.

MY DEAR COUSIN,

IT is no new thing with you to give pleafure, but I will venture to say that you do not often give more than you gave me this morning. When I came down to breakfast, and found upon the table a letter

franked by my uncle, and when opening that frank I found that it contained a letter from you, I said within myself, this is just as it should be; we are all grown young again, and the days that I thought I should fee no more, are actually returned. You perceive therefore that you judged well when you conjectured that a line from you would not be difagreeable to me. It could not be otherwise, than as in fact it proved, a most agreeable furprize, for I can truly boast of an affection for you that neither years, nor interrupted intercourse have at all abated. I need only recollect how much I valued you once, and with how much cause, immediately to feel a revival of the fame value; if that can be faid to revive, which at the moft has only been dormant for want of employment. But I flander it when I fay that it has flept. A thousand times have I recollected a thoufand fcenes in which our two felves have formed the whole of the drama, with the greatest pleasure; at times too when I had no reason to suppose that I should ever hear from you again. I have laughed with you at the Arabian Nights Entertainment, which afforded us, as you well know, a fund of merriment that deferves never to be forgot. I have walked with you to Nettley Abbey, and have fcrambled with you over hedges in every direction, and many other feats we have performed together, upon the field of my remembrance, and all within these few years, fhould I fay within this twelvemonth I fhould not tranfgrefs the truth. The hours that I have spent with you were among the pleasantest of my former days, and are therefore chronicled in my mind fo deeply as to fear no erafure. Neither do I forget my poor friend Sir Thomas. I fhould remember him indeed at any rate on account of his perfonal kindneffes to myself, but the laft teftimony that he gave of his regard for you, endears him to me still more. With

his uncommon understanding (for with many peculiarities he had more fenfe than any of his acquaintance) and with his generous fenfibilities, it was hardly poffible that he should not distinguish you as he has done; as it was the last, so it was the best proof, that he could give of a judgment, that never deceived him, when he would allow himself leifure to confult it.

You fay that you have often heard of me: that puzzles me. I cannot imagine from what quarter, but it is no matter. I must tell you, however, my coufin, that your information has been a little defective. That

I am happy in my fituation is true; I live and have lived thefe twenty years with Mrs. Unwin, to whofe affectionate care of me during the far greater part of that time, it is, under Providence, owing that I live at all. But I do not account myself happy in having been for thirteen of those years in a state of mind that has made all that care and attention neceffary. An attention, and a care, that have injured her health, and which, had fhe not been uncommonly fupported, muft have brought her to the grave. But I will pafs to another fubje&t; it would be cruel to particularize only to give pain, neither would I by any means give a fable hue to the first letter of a correfpondence fo unexpectedly renewed.

1 am delighted with what you tell me of my uncle's good health; to enjoy any measure of cheerfulness at fo late a day is much, but to have that late day enlivened with the vivacity of youth, is much more, and in these poftdiluvian times a rarity indeed. Happy for the most part, are parents who have daughters. Daughters are not apt to outlive their natural affections, which a fon has generally furvived even before his boyifh years are expired. I rejoice particularly in my uncle's felicity, who has three female defcendants from his little person, who leave him nothing to wish for upon that head.

My dear coufin, dejection of fpirits, which I fupp may have prevented many a man from becoming an author, made me one. I find conftant employment neceffary, and therefore take care to be conftantly employed. Manual occupations do not engage the mind fufficiently, as I know by experience, having tried many. But compofition, efpecially of verfe, abforbs it wholly. I write therefore generally three hours in a morning, and in an evening I transcribe. I read alfo, but less than I write, for I must have bodily exercife, and therefore never pass a day without it.

I an

You afk me where I have been this fummer. fwer, at Olney. Should you afk me where I spent the laft seventeen fummers, I fhould still answer at Olney. Ay, and the winters alfo, I have seldom left it, and except when I attended my brother in his last illness, never I believe a fortnight together.

Adieu, my beloved coufin; I fhall not always be thus nimble in reply, but fhall always have great pleasure in anfwering you when I can.

Yours, my friend and coufin,

LETTER XLI.

W. COWPER.

To Lady HESKETH.

OLNEY, Nov. 9, 1785.

MY DEAREST COUSIN,

WHOSE last most affectionate letter has run in my head ever fince I received it, and which I now fit down to answer two days fooner than the post will ferve me. I thank you for it, and with a warmth for which I am sure you will give me credit, though I do not spend many words in defcribing it. I do not feek new friends, not being altogether fure that I fhould