"In all this business, I am the sorriest for Sir Ralph. He and I are equally punished, though magis pares quam similes in our affliction. Yet it is hard for both to suffer for the fault of one, and so it is I shall be separated from my wife; he will retain his. "Ever, etc."

TO MR. MOORE.

"March 8, 1816.

"I rejoice in your promotion as Chairman and Charitable Steward, etc., etc. These be dignities which await only the virtuous. But then, recollect you are six-and-thirty (I speak this enviously-not of your age, but the 'honourlove-obedience troops of friends,' which accompany it), and I have eight years good to run before I arrive at such hoary perfection; by which time, -if I am at all, *-it will probably be in a state of grace or progressing merits.

"I must set you right in one point, however. The fault was not-no, nor even the misfortune-in my 'choice' (unless in choosing at all) for I do not believe-and I must say it, in the very dregs of all this bitter businessthat there ever was a better, or even a brighter, a kinder, or a more amiable and agreeable being than Lady B. I never had, nor can have, any reproach to make her, while with me. Where there is blame, it belongs to myself, and, if I cannot redeem, I must bear it.

"Her nearest relatives are a -, -my circumstances have been and are in a state of great confusion-my health has been a good deal disordered, and my mind ill at ease for a considerable period. Such are the causes (I do not name them as excuses) which have frequently driven me into excess, and disqualified my temper for comfort.

* This sad doubt-" If I am at all," - becomes no less singular than sad when we recollect that six-and-thirty was actually the age when he ceased to "be," and at a moment, too, when (as even the least friendly to him allow) he was in that state of "progressing merits" which he here jestingly anticipates.

Something also may be attributed to the strange and desultory habits which, becoming my own master at an early age, and scrambling about, over and through the world, may have induced. I still, however, think that, if I had a fair chance, by being placed in even a tolerable situation, I might have gone on fairly. But that seems hopeless, and there is nothing more to be said. present-except my health, which is better (it is odd, but agitation or contest of any kind gives a rebound to my spirits and sets me up for a time) - I have to battle with all kinds of unpleasantnesses, including private and pecuniary difficulties, etc., etc.

At

"I believe I may have said this before to you, but I risk repeating it. It is nothing to bear the privations of adversity, or, more properly, ill-fortune; but my pride recoils from its indignities. However, I have no quarrel with that same pride, which will, I think, buckler me through everything. If my heart could have been broken, it would have been so years ago, and by events more afflicting than these.

"I agree with you (to turn from this topic to our shop) that I have written too much. The last things were, however, published very reluctantly by me, and for reasons I will explain when we meet. I know not why I have dwelt so much on the same scenes, except that I find them fading, or confusing (if such a word may be) in my memory, in the midst of present turbulence and pressure, and I felt anxious to stamp before the die was worn out. I now break it. With those countries, and events connected with them, all my really poetical feelings begin and end. Were I to try, I could make nothing of any other subject, and that I have apparently exhausted. 'Wo to him,' says Voltaire, 'who says all he could say on any subject.' There are some on which, perhaps, I could have said still more; but I leave them all, and too soon.

"Do you remember the lines I sent you early last year, which you still have? I don't wish (like Mr. Fitzgerald, in the Morning Post) to claim the character of 'Vates' in all its translations, but were they not a little prophetic? I mean those beginning, 'There's not a joy the world can,' etc., etc., on which I rather pique myself as being the truest, though the most melancholy, I ever wrote.

"What a scrawl have I sent you! You say nothing of yourself, except that you are a Lancasterian churchwarden, and an encourager of mendicants. When are you out? and how is your family? My child is very well and flourishing, I hear; but I must see also. I feel no disposition to resign it to the contagion of its grandmother's society, though I am unwilling to take it from the mother. It is weaned, however, and something about it must be decided. Ever, etc."

TO MR. MURRAY,

"February 20, 1816.

"To return to our business-your epistles are vastly agreeable. With regard to the observations on carelessness, etc., I think, with all humility, that the gentle reader has considered a rather uncommon, and designedly irregular, versification for haste and negligence. The measure is not that of any of the other poems, which (I believe) were allowed to be tolerably correct, according to Byshe and the fingers-or ears-by which bards write, and readers reckon. Great part of 'The Siege' is in (I think) what the learned call Anapests (though I am not sure, being heinously forgetful of my metres and my 'Gradus'), and many of the lines intentionally longer or shorter than its rhyming companion; and rhyme also occurring at greater or less intervals of caprice or convenience.

"I mean not to say that this is right or good, but merely that I could have been smoother, had it appeared to me of advantage; and that I was not otherwise without being aware of the deviation, though I now feel sorry for it, as I would undoubtedly rather please than not. My wish has been to try at something different from my former efforts;

as I endeavoured to make them differ from each other. The versification of 'The Corsair' is not that of 'Lara;' nor 'The Giaour' that of 'The Bride;' 'Childe Harold' is again varied from these; and I strove to vary the last somewhat from all of the others.

"Excuse all this d-d nonsense and egotism. The fact is, that I am rather trying to think on the subject of this note, than really thinking on it. -I did not know you had called ; you are always admitted and welcome when you choose.

"P.S.-You need not be in any apprehension or grief on my account: were I to be beaten down by the world and its inheritors, I should have succumbed to many things years ago. You must not mistake my not bullying for dejection; nor imagine that because I feel, I am to faint: -but enough for the present."

TO MR. MURRAY.

"Ouchy, near Lausanne, June 27, 1816.

"I am thus far (kept by stress of weather) on my way back to Diodati (near Geneva) from a voyage in my boat round the Lake; and I enclose you a sprig of Gibbon's acacia and some rose-leaves from his garden, which, with part of his house, I have just seen. You will find honourable mention, in his Life, made of this 'acacia,' when he walked out on the night of concluding his history. The garden and summer-house, where he composed, are neglected, and the last utterly decayed; but they still show it as his 'cabinet,' and seem perfectly aware of his memory.

"My route through Flanders, and by the Rhine, to Switzerland, was all I expected, and more.

"I have traversed all Rousseau's ground, with the Héloise before me; and am struck, to a degree that I cannot express, with the force and accuracy of his descriptions and the beauty of their reality. Meillerie, Clarens, and Vevay, and the Château de Chillon, are places of which I shall say little, because all I could say must fall short of the impressions they stamp.

"Three days ago, we were most nearly wrecked in a squall off Meillerie, and driven to shore. I ran no risk, being so near the rocks, and a good swimmer; but our party were wet, and incommoded a good deal. The wind was strong enough to blow down some trees, as we found at landing: however, all is righted and right, and we are thus far on our return.

"Dr. Polidcei is not here, but at Diodati, left behind in hospital with a sprained ankle, which he acquired in tumbling from a wall he can't jump.

"I shall be glad to hear you are well, and have received for me certain helms and swords, sent from Waterloo, which I rode over with pain and pleasure.

"I have finished a third canto of 'Childe Harold' (consisting of one hundred and seventeen stanzas), longer than either of the two former, and in some parts, it may be, better; but of course on that I cannot determine. I shall send it by the first safe-looking opportunity. Ever, etc."

TO MR. MURRAY.

"Diodati, September 29, 1816.

"I am very much flattered by Mr. Gifford's good opinion of the MSS., and shall be still more so if it answers your expectations and justifies his kindness. I liked it myself, but that must go for nothing. The feelings with which most of it was written need not be envied me. With regard to the price, I fixed none, but left it to Mr. Kinnaird, Mr. Shelley, and yourself, to arrange. Of course, they would do their best; and as to yourself, I knew you would make no difficulties. But I agree with Mr. Kinnaird perfectly, that the concluding five hundred should be only conditional; and for my own sake, I wish it to be added, only in case of your selling a certain number, that number to be fixed by