and he had to some extent lost sight of the true objects of his art.

...

Liberty was a failure with the public. It was brought out in separate parts in the years 1735 and 1736, and the gradual reduction in the number of copies printed, as each successive part was published, tells an unmistakable story. Of the first part, three thousand ordinary copies were printed; of the second and third, two thousand; while of the fourth and fifth, one thousand proved enough, and apparently more than enough, to satisfy the public.1 It was evidently a very unprofitable affair for Millar, who had paid money for the copyright, and though Thomson writes to Hill in May, 1736, "I think . . . of annulling the bargain I made with [my publisher], who would else be a considerable loser by the paper, printing, and publication of Liberty," we have no evidence that he actually did so. Hill, of course, had praised with his usual taste and judgment "this inimitable masterpiece both of language and genius," and in his reply to the letter above cited he endeavours to dissuade his correspondent from carrying out his intention, oddly arguing that the beauty of the action would prevent its being forgotten, and that the national reputation would permanently suffer, if it were recorded that such a poem, in such a nation as Great Britain, had failed to enrich its publisher.

A letter which Thomson wrote to Dr. Cranston in August, 1735, allows us to see something of his position and expectations. The immediate occasion of it was the illness of his brother John, who had been with him as an amanuensis, but had been attacked by consumption and was returning to his native country.

1 Woodfall's ledger: see Notes and Queries, first series, xi. 418.

In this letter, after recommending his brother to Dr. Cranston's care, he says:—

"Should you inquire into my circumstances, they blossomed pretty well of late, the Chancellor having given me the office of Secretary of Briefs under him: but the blight of an idle inquiry into the fees and offices of the Courts of Justice, which arose of late, seems to threaten its destruction. In that case I am made to hope amends: to be reduced, however, from enjoyment to hope will be but an awkward affair.”

He is sending his correspondent, besides the first three parts of Liberty, some of the best things that have recently been published, Pope's Essay on Man, the Persian Letters, and Hoadly's book on the Sacrament. "One Mr. Lyttelton, a young gentleman and member of Parliament, wrote the Persian Letters. They are reckoned prettily done."

In October he writes to the same correspondent again, on hearing news of his brother's death, and among other things he expresses that belief in a future life, consisting of a never-ending succession of states, each rising higher than the last, which we find suggested also in the later editions of the Seasons and in the Castle of Indolence.

With reference to the "idle inquiry into the fees and offices of the Courts of Justice," of which mention is made in the former of these letters, we have an interesting statement, published in the Critical Review of 1765, which seems to have escaped the attention of Thomson's biographers. It is there stated that "Thomson's place fell under the cognisance of a Commission of the great Officers of State for inquiring into the public offices. He made a speech explaining the duty, etc., of his place, in terms that, though very concise, were so perspicuous and elegant, that Lord Chancellor Talbot publicly said he preferred that

single speech to the best of his poetical compositions. The income of the place was by the Commissioners reduced from about £300 to £100 a year; but Mr. Thomson offered to resign it, nor did he ever receive a shilling from it during its reduced state. We have his own authority for saying that it was not optional to him whether he should remain in the place after his patron's death.”1

1 Quoted by Dr. Birkbeck Hill in his edition of Johnson's Lives of the Poets, vol. iii. p. 290.

CHAPTER II

LATER LIFE

IN the early part of 1736 Thomson took up his abode at a house in Kew Lane, Richmond, where he lived till his death. The letter to Hill already mentioned, which suggests the idea of securing Millar from loss, was written in May of that year, and gives his correspondent the new address, inviting him at the same time to spend an evening there, and suggesting that Pope and Savage might both be engaged to meet him, though as to Savage, "how to find him requires more intelligence than is allotted to mortals." The house to which he had now removed, some portions of which still exist, forming a part of the Royal Richmond Hospital, was on the right-hand side of the foot-lane leading from Richmond towards Kew. It was about a mile from Twickenham, and a real intimacy soon sprang up between Thomson and Pope, who had been fairly well acquainted even before this. Pope was jealous of all rivalry in his own province, but from Thomson he had nothing to fear in this respect; and he seems to have appreciated Thomson's genius, and to have been attracted by his simplicity and enthusiasm. He is said to have admitted him at all hours, and often to have walked back with him late at night as far as the bottom of Kew foot-lane. At the same time we may note the occurrence of Thomson's name in distinguished company on the

Committee of the Society for the Encouragement of Learning, formed in 1736, as an indication that he was now regarded as a leading personage in literature.

For the time he was at his ease as regards money matters, and he showed an affectionate regard for the welfare of his family in Scotland. He writes thus to his friend Ross, under date November 6th, 1736 :

:

"My sisters have been advised by their friends to set up at Edinburgh a little milliner's shop; and if you can conveniently advance to them twelve pounds on my account, it will be a particular favour. That will set them a-going, and I design from time to time to send them goods from hence. I will not draw upon you, in case you be not prepared to defend yourself; but if your purse be valiant, please to inquire for Jean or Elizabeth Thomson, at the Reverend Mr. Gusthart's; and if this letter be not sufficient testimony of the debt, I will send you whatever you shall desire.

"It is late, and I would not lose this post. Like a laconic man of business, therefore, I must stop short; though I have several things to impart to you, and through your canal to the dearest, truest, heartiest youth that treads on Scottish ground. The next letter I write you shall be washed clean from business in the Castalian fountain.

"I am whipping and spurring to finish a tragedy for you this winter, but am still at some distance from the goal, which makes me fear being distanced. Remember me to all friends, and above them all to Mr. Forbes. Though my affection to him is not favoured by letters, yet it is as high as when I was his brother in the virtu, and played at chess with him in a post-chaise."

This Mr. Forbes is John Forbes, the son of the Lord President, the "joyous youth" of the Castle of Indolence, and no doubt the same who is referred to above as the "dearest, truest, heartiest youth that treads on Scottish ground."

In February of the next year, 1737, Lord Chancellor