of pleasure: we are entertained at once with two imitations, of nature in the sentiments, of the original author in the style, and between them the mind is kept in perpetual employment 1.

The general recommendation of Shenstone is easiness and 33 simplicity; his general defect is want of comprehension and variety. Had his mind been better stored with knowledge, whether he could have been great I know not; he could certainly have been agreeable2.

APPENDIX T (PAGE 349)

'Being himself a poet, Johnson was peculiarly happy in mentioning how many of the sons of Pembroke were poets; adding with a smile of sportive triumph, "Sir, we are a nest of singing birds."" Boswell's Johnson, i. 75. He left the College in 1729; his Life of Shenstone appeared in 1781, so that he does not fall within the half-century. Neither, of course, does Sir Thomas Browne. In the half-century come Shenstone; Richard Graves, author of The Spiritual Quixote, one of the poets of Dodsley's Collection (iv. 323, v. 62); Anthony Whistler, another of the poets (ib. iv. 320, v. 60); Sir William Blackstone, also of the poets with his Lawyer's Farewell to his Muse (ib. iv. 224); and William Hawkins, Professor of Poetry (1751-6), of whom Goldsmith wrote (Works, iv. 253) :-'Be it enough to say in general that he was not born a poet, or that imitation has spoiled him.' When Whistler died Shenstone wrote to Graves :- 'The triumvirate, which was the greatest happiness and the greatest pride of my life, is broken.' Graves was the third member. Shenstone's Works, iii. 228.

Whitfield also falls within the half-century (Boswell's Johnson, i. 78 n.); John Henderson (ib. iv. 298; John. Misc. ii. 197); J. L. Smithson,

if he had used quite the Goody's own language?' Letters, ii. 42.

'Shenstone's poems are indifferent and tasteless, except his Pastoral Ballad and his Schoolmistress, which last is a perfect piece of writing.' HAZLITT, Lectures on the English Poets, 1819, p. 236. See also Wordsworth's Works, 1857, vi. 373.

2 'To some lady who was praising Shenstone's poems very much, and who had an Italian greyhound lying by the fire, Johnson said, "Shenstone holds amongst poets the same rank your dog holds amongst dogs; he has not the sagacity of the hound, the docility of the spaniel, nor the courage of the bull-dog, yet he is still a pretty fellow."" John. Misc. ii. 5.

founder of the Smithsonian Institute, Washington; and Dr. Thomas Beddoes. Macleane's Hist. of Pemb. Coll. pp. 370-81, 389-93.

Among the 'singing birds' of later days were T. L. Beddoes, that 'forgotten Oxford poet,' said Browning, 'on whom, if I were ever Professor of Poetry, my first lecture should be'; R. S. Hawker, whose Trelawny ballad deceived Macaulay; William Fulford, editor of The Oxford and Cambridge Magazine; R. W. Dixon and S. J. Stone. Dr. Edwin Hatch, the theologian, and Dr. Edward Moore, editor of Dante, were also members. So also were Professors Rolleston and Chandler, Sir John Scott, K.C.M.G., late Judicial Adviser to the Khedive, Mr. Sydney Prior Hall, and Mr. Charles Eamer Kempe.

Neither must I pass over the last master, Professor Bartholomew Price, who did so much for the Clarendon Press, in the improvement of which Johnson had taken a strong interest (Boswell's Johnson, ii. 424). Macleane's Pemb. Coll. pp. 240, 424, 470-2, 475, 478, 491.

'Sir Thomas Browne,' writes Johnson, 'was the first man of eminence graduated from the new college, to which the zeal or gratitude of those that love it most can wish little better than that it may long proceed as it began.' Works, vi. 476. Floreat Collegium Pembrochiae!

YOUNG

HE following life was written at my request by a gentle- 1 man who had better information than I could easily have obtained; and the publick will perhaps wish that I had solicited and obtained more such favours from him.

2

'Dear Sir,

'In consequence of our different conversations about authentick materials for the Life of Young I send you the following detail. It is not, I confess, immediately in the line of my profession; but hard indeed is our fate at the bar if we may not call a few hours now and then our own.

3 'Of great men something must always be said to gratify curiosity. Of the great author of the Night Thoughts much has been told of which there never could have been proofs; and little care appears to have been taken to tell that of which proofs, with little trouble, might have been procured.

4

‘EDWARD YOUNG was born at Upham, near Winchester, in June, 1681. He was the son of Edward Young, at that time Fellow of Winchester College and Rector of Upham, who was the son of Jo. Young of Woodhay in Berkshire, styled by Wood gentleman. In September, 1682, the Poet's father was collated to the prebend of Gillingham Minor, in the church of Sarum, by bishop Ward. When Ward's faculties were impaired by age his duties were necessarily performed by others. We learn from Wood that, at a visitation of Sprat's, July the 12th, 1686, the Prebendary preached a Latin sermon, afterwards published, with which the Bishop was so pleased that he told the Chapter he was concerned to find the preacher had one of the worst prebends in their church. Some time after this, in con consequence of his merit and reputation, or of the interest of Lord Bradford, to whom, in 1702, he dedicated two volumes of sermons, he was appointed chaplain to King William and Queen Mary, and preferred to the deanery of Sarum. Jacob, who wrote in 1720, says "he was chaplain and clerk of the closet to the late Queen, who honoured him by standing godmother to the Poet." His fellowship of

YOUNG in the Dict. Nat. Biog., has corrected several errors in Croft's Life and has given a very careful estimate of Young's place in English literature.]

Baronet and priest though he was, Croft seems to have been a rascal. Southey's son accuses him of having obtained possession from Mrs. Newton, Chatterton's sister, of all her brother's letters and MSS., under promise of speedily returning them. Instead of which he published them in a pamphlet entitled Love and Madness. Beyond the sum of £10 she could obtain no redress.' Her cause was supported by Southey, who, with Cottle, published for her benefit an edition of Chatterton's Works. It brought in over £300,

'a sum which rescued her and her daughter from great poverty.' Southey's Life and Corres. ii. 185.

Southey and Croft had had a controversy on this question in Gent. Mag. 1800, pp. 99, 222, 322. Southey wrote:-'Sir Herbert does not deny that he promised to return the letters in an hour when he borrowed them; nor that he published them without the knowledge of the family for his own emolument. He does not deny his promise to the family of after assistance; nor that, when Mrs. Newton applied for it, he required a certificate of her character from the clergyman of the parish.' 1b. p. 226. Croft blustered and quoted a testimonial from a Bishop. Ib. p. 323.

...

Winchester he resigned in favour of a Mr. Harris, who married his only daughter. The Dean died at Sarum, after a short illness, in 1705, in the sixty-third year of his age. On the Sunday after his decease Bishop Burnet preached at the cathedral, and began his sermon with saying, "Death has been of late walking round us, and making breach upon breach upon us, and has now carried away the head of this body with a stroke; so that he whom you saw a week ago distributing the holy mysteries is now laid in the dust. But he still lives in the many excellent directions he has left us, both how to live and how to die."

'The Dean placed his son upon the foundation of Winchester 5 College, where he had himself been educated. At this school Edward Young remained till the election after his eighteenth birth-day, the period at which those upon the foundation are superannuated. Whether he did not betray his abilities early in life, or his masters had not skill enough to discover in their pupil any marks of genius for which he merited reward, or no vacancy at Oxford afforded them an opportunity to bestow upon him the reward provided for merit by William of Wykeham; certain it is, that to an Oxford fellowship our Poet did not succeed. By chance, or by choice, New College does not number among its Fellows him who wrote the Night Thoughts.

'On the 13th of October, 1703, he was entered an independent 6 member of New College, that he might live at little expence in the Warden's lodgings, who was a particular friend of his father, till he should be qualified to stand for a fellowship at All-souls. In a few months the Warden of New College died. He then removed to Corpus College. The President of this Society, from regard also for his father, invited him thither, in order to lessen his academical expences. In 1708 he was nominated to a law fellowship at All-souls by Archbishop Tennison, into whose hands it came by devolution. Such repeated patronage, while it justifies Burnet's praise of the father, reflects credit on the conduct of the son. The manner in which it was exerted seems to prove that the father did not leave behind him much wealth.

'On the 23rd of April, 1714, Young took his degree of Batchelor 7 of Civil Laws, and his Doctor's degree on the 10th of June, 1719. 'Soon after he went to Oxford he discovered, it is said, an 8 inclination for pupils. Whether he ever commenced tutor is not known. None has hitherto boasted to have received his academical instruction from the author of the Night Thoughts.

'It is certain that his college was proud of him no less as a 9 scholar than as a poet, for in 1716, when the foundation of the Codrington Library was laid, two years after he had taken his Batchelor's degree, he was appointed to speak the Latin oration. This is at least particular for being dedicated in English "To the