Queen's secretaryship to lord Raby, then ambassador at the Hague. The income of this office should have been full a thousand pounds a year, but government paid him not a groat; and when he returned from Utrecht with the Barrier Treaty in January, 1713, he was not only three or four hundred pounds in debt, but without a farthing in his pocket. Of his extreme penury at this time, Swift has recorded a very striking proof. "Harrison," says he, 66 was with me this morning, (Jan. 31, 1712-13,) we talked three hours, and then I carried him to court. When we went down to the door of my lodging, I found a coach waiting for him. I chid him for it; but he whispered me, it was impossible to do otherwise; and in the coach he told me, he had not one farthing in his pocket to pay it; and therefore took the coach for the whole day, and intended to borrow money somewhere or other. So there was the Queen's minister intrusted in affairs of the greatest importance, without a shilling in his pocket to pay a coach.”*

It is probable, that had Mr. Harrison lived he would have obtained the revenue to which he was entitled; he survived the incident, however, that we have just quoted but a fortnight, and died, most sincerely lamented by Swift, on Fe

• Swift's Works, vol. xv. p. 374.

bruary the 14th, 1712-13. The passage in Swift's works, which records the illness and death of this amiable young man, reflects so much honour on the Dean's feelings and benevolence, and forms so pleasing a trait in his character, that I gladly seize the opportunity of presenting it to my

readers.

Journal to Stella, February the 12th, 1712-13. "I found a letter on my table last night, to tell me that poor little Harrison, the Queen's secretary that came lately from Utrecht with the Barrier Treaty, was ill, and desired to see me at night; but it was late, and I could not go till today. I went in the morning, and found him mighty ill, and got thirty guineas for him from Lord Bolingbroke, and an order for a hundred pounds from the treasurer to be paid him to-morrow; and I have got him removed to Knightsbridge for the air. He has a fever and inflammation on his lungs, but I hope will do well.

"13th. I was to see a poor poet, one Mr.Diaper, in a nasty garret, very sick. I give him twenty guineas from Lord Bolingbroke, and disposed the other sixty to two other authors, and desired a friend to receive the hundred pounds for poor Harrison, and will carry it to him to-morrow morning. I sent to see how he did, and he is extremely ill; and I am very much afflicted for him, as he is

my own creature, and in a very honourable post, and very worthy of it. I am much concerned for this poor lad. His mother and sister attend him, and he wants nothing.

"14th. I took Parnell this morning, and we walked to see poor Harrison.

I had the hunI told Parnell I was

dred pounds in my pocket. afraid to knock at the door; my mind misgave me. I knocked, and his man in tears told me his master was dead an hour before. Think what grief this is to me! I went to his mother, and have been ordering things for his funeral with as little cost as possible, to-morrow at ten at night. Lord Treasurer was much concerned when I told him. I could not dine with Lord Treasurer, nor any where else; but got a bit of meat toward evening. No loss ever grieved me so much: poor creature!

"15th. At ten this night I was at poor Harrison's funeral, which I ordered to be as private as possible. We had but one coach with four of us; and when it was carrying us home after the funeral, the braces broke, and we were forced to sit in it, and have it held up, till my man went for chairs, at eleven at night, in terrible rain. I am come home very melancholy, and will go to bed."*.

VOL. III.

*Swift's Works, vol. xv. p. 382, 383.
BB

Some parts of this description appeal strongly to the heart, and the lines in Italics shew that Swift was not only active in relieving distress, where his affections were engaged, but that he was charitable from principle: a feature in his conduct which will induce us, if any thing can, to overlook the frequent shades which darken and deform his character.

Mr. Harrison was the author of The Medicine, a Tale, in N° 2 of Steele's Tatler; the foundation of which, says Sir Richard, " is from a real accident which happened among my acquaintance." A story, however, very similar to this in the leading circumstances, is thus related by Burton in his entertaining folio, called "The Anatomy of Melancholy:"-" An honest woman, I cannot now tell where she dwelt, but by report an honest woman she was, hearing one of her gossips by chance complaine of her husband's impatience, told her an excellent remedy for it, and gave her withall a glasse of water, which when he brawled shee should hold still in her mouth, and that toties quoties, as often as heechid; shee did so two or three times with good successe, and at length seeing her neighbour, gave her great thanks for it, and would needs knowe the ingredients, she told her in briefe, what it was, Faire water, and no more; for it was not

the water, but her silence, which performed the cure. Let every froward woman imitate this example, and be quiet within dores."*

Harrison has certainly the merit of expanding and improving the tale, but with regard to his versification little commendatory can be said. Beside these verses, he was the author of some poems, which may be found in Dodsley's and Nichols's Collections.

42. GILBERT BUDGELL, the second brother of Eustace Budgell, whose life we have sketched at the commencement of the fourth part of these Essays, was the author of some elegant verses at the close of N° 591 of the Spectator. The paper to which they are appended, and which the annotators conjecture to have been the composition either of our author or his brother, is employed in detailing maxims and cases relative to the passion of love; and the poetry of Gilbert describes, with no common skill and beauty, his ardent, but almost hopeless, attachment for the fair Corinna. Some of the lines remind me of the second and third stanzas of Mrs. Barbauld's exquisite song, "Come here, fond youth, whoe'er thou be,"

Anatomy of Melancholy, Part iii, sect. iii. memb. iv. subsect 2.