"You have seen Donna Isabella?" inquired | folding her in silence to his breast, kissed her with Alonzo. "Yes, I have," was the laconic reply, with evidently a wish of saying no more. After a considerable pause, Mr. Mordaunt asked whether he still kept to his purpose. "Certainly," said Alonzo firmly, and no further conversation passed. Half an hour brought them to their destination; with a throbbing heart Alonzo descended from the carriage. They were shown into the grand sala, brilliantly lighted. Here were assembled Senhor Josef and Senhora Theresa, the Marquess, and the Abbess, with an attendant nun; the old lady had not left her convent for many years, but on this occasion she was determined to be present. Alonzo saluted Senhor Josef and his sister with gravity, but perfect and sincere kindness; he kissed the hand of his aunt; then, turning to his father, begged to know where he might find Donna Isabella. She waits for you in her garden-room,” replied the Marquess; Alonzo bowed, and left the sala. He struggled successfully to continue the same appearance of composure, as he passed along the corridor which led to the garden-room; the door was ajar, he entered and closed it. The room was only lighted by a single Grecian lamp, suspended from the centre; the latticed doors leading to the garden were thrown open, and the moonbeams quivered brightly on the rich festoons of flowers and foliage that twined around them. Leaning on the harp near the furthest door, stood a lady magnificently dressed as a bride; one hand hung Estlessly at her side, in the other were gathered the folls of her veil, in which her face was buried. Alonzo advanced, and although somewhat prepared for a favourable alteration, he was struck with astonishment at the exquisitely fine and graceful form that stood before him. "Donna Isabella, I believe ;"no reply, and no change of position. He approached a little nearer, and ventured to take the unoccupied band, whose slight and delicate fingers were covered with gems, but on the arm was only a single bracelet, that was of pink topaz. "Donna Isabella, I vesture to claim a few minutes' private conversation with you, on a subject that deeply concerns the Lappiness of us both; permit me to lead you to a sat." He paused-the emotion that visibly pervaded ber whole frame convinced him that at least he was not addressing a statue. Suddenly, she raised her bead, clasped her hands, and sunk on her knees at his feet. Alonzo recoiled, as though a supernatural appearance had presented itself, while, with a tone that thrilled through heart and brain, she exclaimed Alonzo, can you forgive me?" It was Viola! "Can you forgive me, for all the deception I have practised, and caused others to practise? May the prize I strove for-my husband's heart-plead my excuse! I know it will!" While she spoke, Alonzo in some degree recovered himself. He raised up the beautiful suppliant, and VOL. XIII. pure, intense, and devoted affection. He could not speak; he thought not, and cared not how it had all been brought about; he only knew and felt that his wife was in his arms, and that-that wife was Viola. The party in the drawing-room, to whom the duenna was now added, were in an agony of impatient expectation. The Marquess at length led the way, and they all crept softly along the passage: "May we come in ?" "Come in!" said Alonzo; the first words he had spoken since the denouement. Their entrance dispersed, in a great measure, the concentrated feelings of Alonzo, and he became attentive to learn the mechanism by which his present happiness had been effected. It appeared that the prepossession Isabella had conceived for her husband at the altar, had produced a striking change on her, as love did on Cymon. Ill health, the absence of the usual means of education at St. Paul's, the ignorance and weak indulgence of those with whom she resided, had allowed weeds to spring up and choke the rich treasures of her mind. However, she accompanied the Marquess from St. Paul's, and was placed by him under the charge of the Abbess, where, in three years, her improvement in health, beauty, and mental attainments astonished all those who observed her. The two years she passed in England, under the most judicious care, had brought her to that point of perfection to which she had now arrived. Alonzo had not the slightest recollection of any of her features except her eyes, which on the day of their union had that large size and troubled expression which usually attend ill health. He could now account for the startling recollection that had passed over him one evening at the chess-board: the look she then gave, and that with which she had impressed him on her leaving the oratory, were the same. "And you, my grave and worthy tutor," said Alonzo, addressing Mr. Mordaunt, "did you join in this powerful league against me?" "I confess," replied Mr. Mordaunt, "that I was in the service of the enemy; so much so that, on the evening you first met Donna Viola, and were introduced to her at the Opera, I knew beforehand that such a meeting and such an introduction would take place. I take this opportunity, however, of hinting, that you may thank your own impetuosity that the discovery was not prematurely advanced on board of the Lisbon packet; for Donna Viola, terrified at your vehemence, would have revealed the whole truth, could she but have prevailed upon you to stay and hear it." "Alas, for my vehemence!" exclaimed Alonzo; and trying to collect his puzzled thoughts, he turned to the Abbess. "And you too, my dear aunt-you too, my Lady Abbess! it is well you have the power of absolving yourself for all those little fibs you told me the other day." BY FREDERICK LAWRENCE. PART II. Henry, now a man himself; the premature age at which I commenced author; the death of all who were about me in childhood; a body not made of lasting materials, and some wear and tear of mind." On the other hand, he possessed what he felt to be the best and bountifullest gift of heaven,-a happy, buoyant spirit,-ever gay and cheerful, and ready to be amused by the veriest trifles. "O, dear Lightfoot," he says, in a letter to the Reverend Nicholas Lightfoot, (a college friend,) "what a blessing it is to have a boy's heart! it is as great a blessing in carrying one through this world, as to have a child's spirit will be in fitting us for the next." Having encountered many difficulties in the course of his career, it must be mentioned to Southey's honour, that he always regarded the literary aspirant WE resume with pleasure the thread of a narrative with feelings of genuine sympathy and kindness, and which want of space compelled us to break off rather was ever ready at the proper time with a word of abruptly in a former number. Our readers will re-encouragement or advice. Among those in whose collect that we had traced Southey to his quiet abode welfare he had taken a peculiar interest, was Henry among the mountains of Cumberland, where he was Kirke White, a volume of whose poems had appeared destined to pass the remainder of his life. The situ-in 1804. The Monthly Review had noticed this little ation of his secluded dwelling-place was well suited work in the most cruel and insulting manner. "I to his habits and pursuits. The beauty of the scenery was provoked," says Southey, in a letter to Mr. Duppa, by which he was surrounded offered an inducement to " and wrote to encourage the boy, offering to aid him out-door exercise, which his laborious literary occu-in a subscription for a costlier publication." Soon pations rendered absolutely necessary; and being thoroughly domesticated in his habits, he fully appreciated the advantages of retirement, and the peaceful attractions of his home. Having reached the prime of manhood, he gave himself up to literature, and laboured at it with all his heart, and soul, and strength. 'Habitually an early riser," says his son, " he never encroached upon the hours of night; and finding his highest pleasure and his recreation in the very pursuits necessary for earning his daily bread, he was probably more continually employed than any other writer of his generation." By a careful appropriation of each moment of his times, and by assigning to himself different tasks for each portion of the day, he was able to get through a stupendous quantity of work, in reviewing, translating, and independent original composition in verse and prose. It may here also be observed that his opinions, social, religious, and political, which, to use his son's words, had been "for many years in a transition state," were now gradually settling and sobering down. His republicanism had fled with the enthusiasm of his youth; he had ceased to believe in human perfectibility; and his views of religious truth had gradually assumed an orthodox form. We have remarked that Southey's bodily constitution was originally weak, and the course of his life had been marked, in an unusual degree, by trouble and anxiety. The responsibilities which he had somewhat imprudently incurred at an early period of his life, and the harassing nature of his occupations, had told upon his nervous and excitable frame. Many things," he says, writing to his friend Wynn, "make me feel old;-ten years of marriage; the sort of fatherly situation in which I have stood to my brother (1) Continued from p. 30. after this, however, by the kindness of friends whom he had won by his talents and piety, Kirke White was sent to Cambridge, where he literally killed himself with study. His life," says Southey in another letter to Duppa, "will affect you, for he fairly died of intense application. Cambridge finished him. When his nerves were already so over-strained that his nights were utter misery, they gave him medicine to enable him to hold out during examination for a prize!" After his death a boxful of his papers was sent to Southey for inspection, "the sight of which," says the poet, "literally made my heart ache, and my eyes overflow, for never did I behold such proofs of human industry." From these papers he was enabled to construct two admirable volumes of "Remains," accompanied with a short Memoir. As may be imagined, it was a labour of love; his services (though it was a sacrifice of time he could then ill afford,) were given to the family of the deceased gratuitously; but he felt an interest in the undertaking far beyond that of mere literary taskwork, and the success of the publication was an ample recompense for his toil. In the spring of 1807 a pension of 2001. per annum was conferred upon Southey by the government of the day. As a timely recognition of his literary services and distinguished talent, it will not be denied that this was a proper and graceful proceeding. In a pecuniary point of view, however, the only advantage it conferred on the poet was to relieve him from an obligation which must have been rather galling to his independent spirit. Up to this period he had received from his friend Wynn an allowance of 1607. per annum, being about the sum which the pension, deducting fees and income-tax, actually realized. Such acts of friendship are of rare occurrence in the world, and deserve to be | and harder, wash the roots bare, and beat the blossoms recorded. Without this generous assistance, it is to the ground. I have been in the habit of reviewing | probable that Southey would have severely felt the more than eleven years; for the lucre of gain, and not, pressure of pecuniary embarrassment; for his literary God knows, from any liking to the occupation; and of exertions were, in general, but poorly requited, and all my literary misdeeds, the only ones of which I have his expectations of inheriting anything from wealthier repented have been those reviewals which were written branches of his family had been wofully disappointed. with undue asperity, so as to give unnecessary pain." The first edition of Madoc produced him the insig- We have always considered some of Southey's feant sum of 257., and though consoled with the idea familiar poems to rank among his most successful ❘ that the merits of the poem would procure him some efforts in verse. Of this class we would particularize posthumous renown, he had been convinced by expe- the "English Eclogues," which, in addition to their rience that "drafts upon posterity would not pass other merits, display considerable dramatic power. for current expenses." He had also found-and the They were founded upon incidents which fell under I discovery was not very agreeable-that "his poems the writer's observation, and have an air of truthfulhad sold exactly in an inverse ratio to their merit," ness about them which attracts and fixes the reader's and that he could not put himself upon a level with attention. The subject of one of them-"The Alderthe taste of book-buying readers. Under these dis- man's Funeral "—is thus alluded to in a letter to Sir couraging circumstances, in order to increase his Walter Scott, dated July 30, 1809:-"The Eclogue scanty income, he was compelled to give up the prin- which I have sent Ballantyne has suffered a little by cipal portion of his time to the more profitable em- having all it local allusions cut out. . . . The thing poyment of writing for reviews and periodicals,-an was suggested by my accidentally crossing such a occupation for which he was admirably qualified by funeral some years ago at Bristol; and had I been his varied information and excellent taste, although disposed to personal satire, the hero of the procession he felt it to be somewhat irksome. would have afforded ample scope for it. As soon as he knew his case was desperate, he called together all the persons to whom he was indebted in his mercantile concerns; 'Gentlemen,' said he, 'I am going to die, and my death will be an inconvenience to you, because it will be some time before you can get your accounts settled with my executors; now if you will allow me a handsome discount, I'll settle them myself at once.' They came into the proposal, and the old alderman turned his death into nine hundred pounds' profit." The establishment of the Quarterly Review, in the autumn of the year 1808, exercised a considerable influence in the direction of Southey's literary labours. Since its establishment, the renowned "Edinburgh" had assumed a kind of literary dictatorship, which, from its open avowal of Whig sentiments, and its decided party tone, had become most distasteful to some of the leading spirits of the time. It was now resolved to contest the ground with a Tory periodical of a similar character, and Gifford, the translator of Juvenal, had been appointed editor. Southey, who had formerly refused an offer to become a contributor to the Edinburgh, from a dislike to its principles, was solicited, through his friend Mr. Bedford, to co-operate in the new undertaking. To this request, without pledging himself to any particular political views, he willingly acceded. Announcing to Lieutenant Southey the expected appearance of the new Review, he says, "I think we shall do good, and will do my part with a hearty good-will. What I said to Bedford was, that as long as this government-caravan was travelling my road I was content to travel with it. . . . One good thing is, that I shall be pretty sure of civil treatment here, and the Review will carry great weight with it." The anxiously-expected periodical by no means, however, met with his unequivocal approval. "I could have wished," he says in a letter to Mr. Gifford-and many of our readers will sympathise, we hope, with the good feeling of these remarks,-" that this Review had less resembled the Edinburgh in the tone and temper of its criticisms. That book of Miss Owenon's is, I dare say, very bad, both in manners and morals; yet, had it fallen into my hands, I think I could have told her so in such a spirit that she herself would have believed me, and might have profited by the censure. The same quantity of rain which would clear a flower of its blights, will, if it falls heavier The sketch of this keen tradesman's character in the above-mentioned eclogue, is a favourable specimen of Southey's vigorous style, and contains some wholesome truths : "This man of half a million Had all those public virtues which you praise: Who should lament for him, sir, in whose heart When yet he was a boy, and should have breathed Smoke-dried, and sear'd, and shrivell'd up his heart. So from the way in which he was train'd up Southey had executed his task con amore, and a more delightful piece of biography was never penned. Poor muckworm! through his threescore years and ten; Writing to his uncle, the Rev. Herbert Hill, on the And when the earth shall now be shovell'd on him, If that which served him for a soul were still Within its husk, 't would still be dirt to dirt." In 1810 "the Curse of Kehama," upon which Southey had for some time laboured most assiduously at such intervals as he could spare from other engage. ments, was presented to the public. Notwithstanding the great merits of this production, like most of his other poems it was but coldly received. The oriental grandeur of the subject, its pomp of language, magnificent imagery, and occasional passages of sublimity and tenderness, were fully appreciated by the critical few; but the incidents were in general too wild and unnatural to please the ordinary readers of verse. Among the most enthusiastic admirers of Southey's poetry at this period was the celebrated and unfortunate Percy Bysshe Shelley. He had made a pilgrimage to Keswick in the winter of 1811-12, and the boldness and extravagance of his sentiments forcibly reminded the author of " Wat Tyler" and "Joan of Arc" of the views and opinions which he had himself entertained in his early days. The following description of Shelley occurs in a letter to Mr. Grosvenor Bedford, and is too characteristic for us to omit: "Here is a man at Keswick who acts upon me as my own ghost would do. He is just what I was in 1794. His name is Shelley, son of the member for Shoreham; with 6,000l. a-year entailed upon him, and as much more in his father's power to cut off. Beginning with romances of ghosts and murder and with poetry at Eton, he passed at Oxford into metaphysics; printed half-a-dozen pages, which he entitled The Necessity of Atheism; sent one anonymously to Coplestone, in expectation, I suppose, of converting him; was expelled in consequence; married a girl of seventeen, after being turned out of doors by his father; and here they both are in lodgings, living upon 2001. a-year, which her father allows them. He is come to the fittest physician in the world. At present he has got to the pantheistic stage of philosophy, and in the course of a week I expect he will be a Berkleyan, for I have put him upon a course of Berkeley. It has surprised him a good deal to meet, for the first time in his life, with a man who perfectly understands him, and does him full justice. I tell him that all the difference between us is that he is nineteen and I am thirty-seven; and I dare say it will not be very long before I succeed in convincing him that he may be a true philosopher, and do a great deal of good with 6,000l. a year; the thought of which troubles him a great deal more at present than ever the want of a sixpence (for I have known such a want) did me... God help us the world wants mending, though he did not set about it exactly in the right way." The "Life of Nelson," which may be fairly designated the most popular production which proceeded from Southey's pen, made its appearance in 1813. "It originated," says his son, "in an Article in the fifth number of the Quarterly Review, which was enlarged at Murray's request. My father received altogether 3007. for it; 1007. for the Review, 1007. when the 'Life' was enlarged, and 1007. when it was published in the Family Library." Although the subject was not of his own choosing, occasion of its completion, the poet says, "This is a subject which I should never have dreamt of touching, if it had not been thrust upon me. I have walked among sea-terms as carefully as a cat does among crockery; but, if I have succeeded in making the narrative continuous and clear-the very reverse of what it is in the lives before me-the materials are in themselves so full of character, so picturesque, and so sublime, that it cannot fail of being a good book.” We now come to an event of some importance in Southey's life. The office of Poet-laureate having become vacant by the death of Henry James Pye, Esq., the dignity (?) was in the first place tendered to Sir Walter Scott, and afterwards, upon his refusal, to Mr. Southey. In a letter to "his elder brother in the muse," Sir Walter explained that he had not refused the office "from any foolish prejudice" against it; but rather because being already in the receipt of official emoluments, he was unwilling to very few incur censure by engrossing another of the appointments "proper to be filled by a man of literature, who had no other views in life." Upon its being understood that the birth-day and occasional odes usually exacted from the laureate, were to be dispensed with, Southey signified his consent to accept the post, and, after some delay, received the appointment, and was duly sworn in at the office of the Lord Chamberlain. "I swore," said the new Laureate, in a letter to Sir Walter Scott, "to be a faithful servant of the king, to reveal all treasons which might come to my knowledge, to discharge the duties of my office, and to obey the Lord Chamberlain in all matters of the king's service, and in his stead Ilaving taken this upon my the Vice-Chamberlain. soul, I was thereby inducted into all the rights, privi leges, and benefits which Henry James Pye, Esq., did enjoy, or ought to have enjoyed." 66 We may here state that the net emoluments of the office did not exceed 907. a-year, and we believe that they have not since been raised beyond that sum. "The original salary," says Southey, was 100 marks. It was raised for Ben Jonson to 1007. and a tierce of Spanish Canary wine, now wickedly commuted for 267, which said sum, unlike the Canary, is subject to income-tax, laud-tax, and heaven knows what taxes besides." Upon being actually installed, Southey announced the event to his wife in the following choice lines, composed in St. James's Park, on his way from the Chamberlain's office, after the gentleman-usher, "a worthy sort of fat old man, in a wig and bag, and a snuff-coloured full-dress suit, with cut steel buttons and a sword," had administered the oath before described: "I have something to tell you, which you will not be sorry at, 'Tis that I am sworn in to the office of Laureat, Twas to do all the duties to the dignity belonging. 66 boy Herbert," in all respects a child after his father's own heart," and who had given many promising indications of intellectual ability and love of study, was Contrary to his expectations, however, he found, taken from him by the hand of death, in the tenth after his appointment, that official verses were fre- year of his age. It was long before the fond father quently required from him, and most reluctantly, as recovered from the effects of this blow, and many of many of his letters show, did he execute his allotted his letters indicate the severity of his sufferings. task. "When did this fool's custom begin?"-he" You more than most men," he writes to his friend writes to Mr. Bedford. Before Cibber's time? I Mr. Grosvenor Bedford, can tell what I have lost, would have made the office honourable if they would and yet you are far from knowing how large a portion have let me. If they will not, the dishonour will not of my hopes and happiness will be laid in the grave be mine." And again, after the lapse of two years, with Herbert. For years it has been my daily prayer he thus addresses the same gentleman. "I have not that I might be spared this affliction. . . . . In his been well used about the Laureateship. They require desk are the few letters which I had written to him, task verses from me,-not to keep up the custom of in the joy of my heart. I will fold up these and send having them befiddled, but to keep up the task,-in-them to you, that they may be preserved when I am stead of putting an end to this foolery in a fair and open manner, which would do the court credit, and save me a silly expense of time and labour." "Nature hath assign'd Two sovereign remedies for human grief; As soon as he was able to treat the subject with sufficient calmness he commenced the composition of a tributary poem to his boy's memory; but the mournful task was never completed, and the few fragments that remain possess but slight interest. gone, in memory of him and of me." As time wore on, he endeavoured by religious meditations and constant occupation to assuage the violence of his sorrow On the subject of the protracted contest with-practising, as he observed, what he had preached France, Southey had for some time felt and expressed in his poem of Roderick :himself most strongly. When the uselessness of the war was insisted on by some, and its hopelessness by others, he had not ceased to recommend vigorous measures, and to prophesy final success. He appears to have regarded the character and policy of Buonaparte with the most intense abhorrence, and to have watched with eager solicitude for the hour of final retribution. When the news of the battle of Waterloo | reached England nothing could exceed his exultation. He considered it "the greatest deliverance that civilized society had experienced since the days of Charles Martel." In honour of the event he kindled bonfires on the summit of Skiddaw," roasted beef and boiled plum-puddings there," sang "God save the king," fired cannons, and indulged in other manifestaticas of delight. Before his enthusiasm was suffered to cool, in the autumn of 1815, he started off to behold the scene of the portentous struggle, taking with him two dear companions. "So forth I set upon this pilgrimage, It was unfortunate for Southey's peace that his connexion with the "Quarterly," and the exigencies of the period converted him into a political writer. As a politician he had an evident tendency to fall into extremes, which arose perhaps from a natural ardour of disposition and warmth of temperament. He was emphatically a good hater," and a warm partisan. Living in strict seclusion, rarely mixing with the world, and scarcely ever brought into personal contact with a political opponent, his views and opinions were never modified by the notions of convenience and expedience which influence the conduct of more worldlyminded men. On the other hand, the violent tone of the political articles attributed to him in the "Quarterly" will sufficiently account for the rancour of his opponents, especially when we remember that he was regarded by them as a seceder and a renegade. early professions of republicanism had been too publicly made to be soon forgotten; and whilst party spirit was at its height an opportunity of annoying His And took the partner of my life with me, And one dear girl, just ripe enough of age Retentively to see what I should see; That thus, with mutual recollections fraught, We might bring home a store for after thought." It was about the end of September when they visited the field of Waterloo, and though so short a time had elapsed since the battle, the "fields were cultivated again, and wild flowers were in blossom upon some of the graves." To quote his more elabo-him occurred, of which his political foes gladly rate description of the scene is verse :— "The passing season had not yet effaced availed themselves. In the spring of 1817, to his great surprise, he found that "Wat Tyler, a poem by Robert Southey," had been advertised as "just published," in the newspapers. The history of this production belongs, perhaps, more properly to an earlier period of his life. It had been thrown off in the summer of 1794, when he was in his twenty-first year, and in the height of his democratic enthusiasm. The MS. was taken to London by his brother-in-law Lovel, who placed it in the hands of a |