in the garden, with any thing that you can find, and make it rude and rough like one of those at Eartham.""Yes, Sir," says Sam, and straightway laying his own noddle, and the carpenter's noddle together, has built me a thing fit for Stow Gardens. Is not this vexatious?—I threaten to inscribe it thus: Beware of building? I intended Rough logs and thatch, and thus it ended. But my Mary says, I shall break Sam's heart and the carpenter's too, and will not consent to it. Poor Mary sleeps but ill. How have you lived who cannot bear a sun-beam ? Adieu ! My dearest Hayley, W.C. The following seasonable and edifying letter, addressed by Cowper to his beloved kinsman, on the occasion of his ordination, will be read with interest. TO THE REV. JOHN JOHNSON.* August 2, 1793. My dearest Johnny-The bishop of Norwich has won my heart by his kind and liberal behaviour to you; and, if I knew him, I would tell him so. I am glad that your auditors find your voice strong and your utterance distinct; glad, too, that your doctrine has hitherto made you no enemies. * Private Correspondence. You have a gracious Master, who, it seems, will not suffer you to see war in the beginning. It will be a wonder, however, if you do not, sooner or later, find out that sore place in every heart which can ill endure the touch of apostolic doctrine. Somebody will smart in his conscience, and you will hear of it. I say not this, my dear Johnny, to terrify, but to prepare you for that which is likely to happen, and which, troublesome as it may prove, is yet devoutly to be wished; for, in general, there is little good done by preachers till the world begins to abuse them. But understand me aright. I do not mean that you should give them unnecessary provocation, oy scolding and railing at them, as some, more zealous than wise, are apt to do. That were to deserve their anger. No; there is no need of it. The self-abasing doctrines of the gospel will, of themselves, create you enemies; but remember this, for your comfort-they will also, in due time, transform them into friends, and make them love you, as if they were your own children. God give you many such; as, if you are faithful to his cause, I trust he will! Sir John and Lady Throckmorton have lately arrived in England, and are now at the Hall. They have brought me from Rome a set of engravings on Odyssey subjects, by Flaxman, whom you have heard Hayley celebrate. They are very fine, very much in the antique style, from the Dowager Lady Spencer. and a present Ever yours, W. C. TO LADY HESKETH. Weston, August 11, 1793. My dearest Cousin-I am glad that my poor and hasty attempts to express some little civility to Miss Fanshaw and the amiable Count,* have your and her approbation. The lines addressed to her were not what I would have made them, but lack of time, a lack which always presses me, would not suffer me to improve them. Many thanks for her letter, which, were my merits less the subject of it, I should without scruple say is an excellent one. She writes with the force and accuracy of a person skilled in more languages than are spoken in the present day, as I doubt not that she is. I perfectly approve the theme she recommends to me, but am at present so totally absorbed in Homer, that all I do beside is ill done, being hurried over; and I would not execute ill a subject of her recommending. I shall watch the walnuts with more attention than they who eat them, which I do in some hope, though you do not expressly say so, that when their threshing-time arrives, we shall see you here. I am now going to paper my new study, and in a short time it will be fit to inhabit. Lady Spencer has sent me a present from Rome, by the hands of Sir John Throckmorton, engravings of Odyssey subjects, after figures by Flaxman,† a • Count Gravina, the Spanish Admiral. + These illustrations are executed in outline, and form one of the most beautiful and elegant specimens of professional art. statuary at present resident there, of high repute, and much a friend of Hayley's. Thou livest, my dear, I acknowledge, in a very fine country, but they have spoiled it by building London in it. Adieu, W. C. That the allusion in the former part of the letter, may be understood, it is necessary to state, that Lady Hesketh had lent a manuscript poem of Cowper's to her friend Miss Fanshaw, with an injunction that she should neither show it nor take a copy. This promise was violated, and the reason assigned is expressed by the young lady in the following verses. What wonder! if my wavering hand Had dared to disobey, When Hesketh gave a harsh command, And Cowper led astray? Then take this tempting gift of thine, By pen uncopied yet; But, canst thou memory confine, Or teach me to forget? More lasting than the touch of art When written by a feeling heart On tablets of the brain. COWPER'S REPLY. To be remember'd thus is fame, And in the first degree; And did the few, like her, the same, The press might rest for me, So Homer, in the memory stored Was once preserved-a richer hoard, We add the verses addressed to Count Gravina, whom Cowper calls "the amiable Count," and who had translated the well-known stanzas on the Rose* into Italian verse. My Rose, Gravina, blooms anew, TO WILLIAM HAYLEY, ESQ. Weston, Aug. 15, 1793. Instead of a pound or two, spending a mint Besides, my dearest brother, they have not only built for me what I did not want, but have ruined a notable tetrastic by doing so. I had written one which I designed for a hermitage, and it will by no means suit the fine and pompous affair which they have made instead of one. So that as a poet, I am every way afflicted; made poorer than I need have been, and robbed of my verses: what case can be more deplorable ?+ The Rose had been washed, just washed in a shower,' &c. The lines here alluded to are entitled, "Inscription for an Hermitage ;" and are as follows: |