us. Of his character little more than has already been stated is necessary to add. When I asked a friend, who saw him more frequently than myself, what faults he possessed, as drawbacks to his apparent excellencies; shadows that might enable me to show him, to use my own phrase, "as flesh and blood;" the answer after a pause was, "Why, I know of no faults, unless it is that he was hardly even of flesh and blood." What the French call caractère is a word he might be said to want: formed into too many sensitive, delicate, and refining lineaments, to present the prominent and muscular outlines of human greatness and human imperfection, yet he wanted neither courage, nor spirit, nor dignity, only they showed less under the flexible and soft proportions of his nature. He was singularly truthful, whether in his opinions or his friendships: he could maintain what was unpopular in society, if he held it good; and defend with warmth the absent, if honoured by his esteem.' Such was the author of the poetical works which I now submit, for the first time, in a collected form to the public: and in this I fulfil the double duty of a godson and a son-in-law. A POET'S BRIDE. I SHE stood beside the ruin of a wall Painted and carved; where unplucked flowers and moss O'ergrew the beauty of the ruling Cross : And sainted foreheads, which in other time Had bowed their earth in heaven's cloud-columned hall, Were queenly wreathed in mockery of age. And here a bank its purple shadow kept Above a lake, where Hope perchance had wept, |