and my thoughts now turn towards printing it, which I find cannot be done here.

TO COTES.

May 28, 1765.

I LOOK forward to better times, and feel a resource in my old fortitude, adequate to every affliction but the death of Churchill, and the absence of a very few. I have told you fully about our dear friend's work, and the notes relative to yourself, as likewise of my history. I do not know your sentiments on any of these heads, but I am sure you and the public will approve what I shall soon submit to you both. No man has ever taken more pains, that notes, a dull business of itself, may not disgrace his fair classic page.

TO GEORGE COLMAN.

Nov. 10, 1765.

I HAD your friendly letter by M. de Beaumont, but I have not been able before this to write to you; your idea was so closely joined with that of poor Churchill, that for a long time I sought to avoid it, and though it returned upon me in my late pursuits, I could not cherish it as I used to do. My grief began to abate, when the additional shock of Lloyd's death almost overset me. I have tried ever since by journeys and a variety of company, to recover the tone of my mind, but I am at times more melancholy than it is almost possible for you to conceive a man of so good animal spirits to be.

I had fully opened my mind to Lloyd as to my

idea of the second volume of our friend's works, and he had undertaken to write a short preface, and to correct the press. I begged him likewise to announce the edition I had projected at our dear Churchill's desire. I wish you would take upon yourself the publication of the second volume, and tell the world how you loved the man, as well as honoured the poet.

The following epitaphs are preserved among the manuscripts of the Rev. William Cole at the British Museum. They appear to have been copied from the Cambridge Chronicle, and other prints about the period of the poet's death.

Churchill no more! O cruel death, 'twas hard
So soon to rob us of our favourite bard;
We should not thus bewail the fatal doom
Hadst thou but placed an equal in his room.

He's gone! great Churchill's gone! 'tis true,
Yet cease the fates to blame,

Years they allow'd him but a few,
But gave eternal fame.

Prose-driving dunces, waddling fools in rhyme,
Scoundrels by every kind of vengeance led,
Spit forth your venom, poison all your slime,
Churchill, who scourged you to your holes, is dead.

Wit, satire, humour, poetry, are fled,
For Churchill, who possess'd them all, is dead.

That Churchill's dead, Apocrypha don't lie,
The British Juvenal will never die;
'Tis only now that he begins to live,

And eat that bread which bishops cannot give;
But though he never more should lift his head,
Like Spanish flies he blisters, though he's dead.

Great Churchill gone! ye ministers rejoice,
Who conscious blush'd, or trembled at his voice;

But then once warn'd, repent, ere 'tis too late,
Nor dare the stroke of an avenging fate.

What though he laid aside the priestly gown,
All will allow his muse from Heaven came down.

BY CUNNINGHAM.

Says Tom to Richard, Churchill's dead,
Šays Richard, Tom, you lie;

Old rancour the report hath spread,
But genius cannot die.

EXTRACT FROM THE SCOURGE, A SATIRE.

Churchill's no more! corruption rears her head,
And points her foe supine amongst the dead.
True to her call, her numerous votaries come,
And tread insulting on the patriot's tomb;
Avenging meanly on the passive grave

And lifeless corpse, those wounds his spirit gave.
Churchill's no more! each muse has dropt a tear
Of heartfelt grief on his untimely bier;
E'en virtue's self, to human errors mild,
Pardoning the foíbles of a favourite child,
And, some few slips from her severer laws,
Has wept the honest champion of her cause.

BY ROBERT LLOYD.

Authors, as Dryden's maxim runs,
Have what he calls poetic sons;
Thus Milton, more correctly wild,
Was richer Spenser's lawful child;
And Churchill, got on all the nine,
Was Dryden's heir in every line.

ANONYMOUS.

Great Churchill's sword to vanquish'd France gave law,
His mighty deeds astonish'd Europe saw,
Great Churchill's pen unequall'd shines in story,
Fresh laurels gaining, never-fading glory.

Old Rome in vain her satirists may boast,
Whose fame in his superior merit's lost.
Dire scourge of knaves and fools
Whate'er their station,

He reaps a plenteous harvest through the nation:
Such honour to the name belongs, how fit,

The first supreme in arms, the last in wit.

EXTRACT FROM CHRYSAL,

OR THE ADVENTURES OF A GUINEA.*

THE company to which my new master was in such haste to go, consisted of a few persons, whom a similarity of temper had linked in the closest intimacy. With these, he spent the remainder of the evening, in a manner which few would dislike, though fewer still could approve; the spirited wit, and liveliness of their conversation gilding the grossest debaucheries; at the same time, that the rectitude and sublimity of their sentiments, whenever their hearts could find opportunity to speak, made the vices of their practice still more horrible by the contrast.

They broke not up, as it may be imagined, till nature sunk under their excesses, when my master, as he staggered home, was accosted by a female, who had something in her air and manner so different from those outcasts of humanity who offer themselves to casual prosti- · tution in the streets, that his curiosity was struck, and he stopped to take more particular notice of her. She appeared to be about fifteen. Her figure was elegant, and her features regular; but want had sicklied o'er their beauty and all the horrors of despair gloomed through the languid smile she forced, when she addressed him.

The sigh of distress, which never struck his ear without affecting his heart, came with double force from such an object. He viewed her with silent compassion for some moments; and reaching her a piece of gold, bade her go home, and shelter herself from the inclemencies of the night at so late an hour. Her surprise and joy at such unexpected charity overpowered her. She dropped upon her knees, in the wet and dirt of the street, and raising her hands and eyes toward heaven, remained in that posture for some moments, unable to give utterance to the gratitude that filled her heart.

Such a sight was more expressive than all the powers of eloquence. He raised her tenderly from the ground, and soothing her with words of comfort, offered to conduct her to some place, where she might get that refreshment of which she appeared to be in too great want.

* See p. xxxiv.

"O! Sir," (said she, pressing the hand that had raised her, with her cold trembling lips) "my deliverer, sent by heaven to save me from despair, let me not think of taking refreshment myself, till I have first procured it for those, whose greater wants I feel ten thousand times more severely than my own."

"Who can they be?" (interrupted he, with anxious impatience) can humanity feel greater wants than those under which you are sinking?"

My father," (exclaimed she, bursting into tears) "languishing under infirmities, acquired in the service of his country; my mother, worn out with attending on him, and both perishing of want, (heaven grant they are not already dead!) together with two infant brothers, insensible of the cause of their distress, and crying to them for a morsel of bread, which it is not in their power to give."

"Where can such a scene of wretchedness be hidden from relief? I'll go with you myself directly! But stop! let us first procure some comfortable nourishment from some of the houses which are kept open at this late hour, for a very different purpose. Come with me! we have no time to lose." With these words, he went directly to a tavern, and enquiring what victuals were dressed in the house, loaded her with as much as she could carry of the best, and putting a couple of bottles of wine in his own pocket, walked with her to her habitation, which was in a blind alley, happily for her not very far distant, as weakness, together with the conflict of passions struggling in her heart, made her scarce able to go.

When they came to the door, she would have gone up first for a light, but he was resolved to accompany her, that he might see the whole scene in its genuine colours. He therefore followed her up to the top of the house, where, opening the door of the garret, she discovered to him such a scene of misery, as struck him with astonishment. By the light of a lamp, that glimmered in the fireless chimney, he saw, lying on a bare bedstead, without any other covering than the relics of their own rags, a man, a woman, and two children, shuddering with cold, though huddled together to share the little warmth which exhausted nature still supplied them with.

While he stood gazing in horror at such complicated wretchedness, his conductress ran to the bedside, and falling on her knees, "O! Sir! Madam!" (exclaimed she in rapture)" Arise! I have got relief from an angel of heaven."