Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 12.djvu/404

 Cowper add other poems during 1781. In the same year he published anonymously a poem, called ‘Anti-Thelyphthora,’ an attack, strangely coarse for Cowper, upon ‘Thelyphthora,’ a defence of polygamy published by his cousin Madan in 1780, which had caused a brisk controversy and no little annoyance to Cowper and his friends. Cowper allowed this production to sink into oblivion. Lady Hesketh and Hayley admired it, but thought it right to forbid the republication (Add. MS. 30803 A). It was added to his works by Southey, who accidentally discovered it. The volume of ‘Poems by William Cowper, of the Inner Temple, Esq.,’ appeared in February 1782. Besides eight longer poems, there were short pieces, including an address to Thurlow on his promotion. He had declined to apply to Thurlow, but evidently hoped for some fulfilment of the early promise. To Thurlow Cowper now sent a copy, with a respectful and formal letter. Thurlow took no notice of this, nor did Colman, to whom a copy was also sent. Cowper revenged himself by sending to Unwin an indignant ‘Valediction,’ complaining of the infidelity of his friends (for a similar incident in regard to Thurlow, see ). Both Colman and Thurlow had some friendly intercourse with him on occasion of his translation of Homer. The volume was condemned as ‘a dull sermon in very indifferent verse’ by the ‘Critical Review,’ but judiciously praised by the ‘Monthly.’ A warm letter of praise came from Benjamin Franklin, then in France. Cowper was sensitive, but seems to have taken the modest success of his volume philosophically. The ‘Critical Review,’ however unappreciative, had indicated the probable feeling of the general public. The poems are, for the most part, the satire of a religious recluse upon a society chiefly known by report or distant memory. His denunciations of the ‘luxury’ so often lamented by contemporaries is coloured by his theological views of the corruption of human nature. Some verses against popery in ‘Expostulation’ were suppressed as the volume went through the press, not, as Southey thinks, in deference to the catholic Throckmortons, with whom he only became intimate in 1784, but on consultation with Newton. The acuter critics alone perceived the frequent force of his writing, his quiet humour, and his fine touches of criticism. In the attack upon Pope's smoothness and the admiration of Churchill's rough vigour (see ‘Table Talk’) was contained the first clear manifesto of the literary revolution afterwards led by Wordsworth. Cowper had now discovered his powers, but had still to learn the best mode of applying them. In 1781 he made the acquaintance of Lady Austen. Her maiden name was Ann Richardson, and she was now the widow of Sir Robert Austen, a baronet, to whom she had been married early, and who had died in France. She had met Cowper (July 1781) when visiting her sister, Mrs. Jones, wife of a clergyman at Clifton, near Olney. She was a lively, impressionable woman, and ‘fell in love’ at once with Cowper and Mrs. Unwin. Cowper soon called her ‘Sister Ann,’ and sent her a poetical epistle when she returned to town in October. A correspondence followed which led to a temporary breach in the winter of 1781–2, in consequence of an admonition addressed to her by Cowper, with Mrs. Unwin's consent, warning her against an excessive estimate of their own merits. The little tiff blew over. Lady Austen returned to the neighbourhood in the spring of 1782, and at once brought about a reconciliation. She took part of the vicarage, whence a passage between the gardens, opened in Newton's time, was again made available (, ii. 60, 61). The two ladies and Cowper dined alternately with each other. Cowper's spirits were reviving amidst congenial society and renewed literary interest. Lady Austen urged him to try blank verse, and on his complaining of the want of a subject, replied, ‘You can write upon any subject; write upon this sofa.’ The result was the ‘Task’ begun early in the summer of 1783, and ‘ended, but not finished,’ by August. Lady Austen about the same time amused him one day with the story of John Gilpin (for a discussion as to the historical reality of John Gilpin, see Notes and Queries, 2nd series, viii. 110; ix. 33; x. 350; 3rd series, ii. 429; 5th series, ix. 266, 394, 418; 6th series, i. 377, 416; ii. 177; v. 489). Next morning Cowper had produced his famous ballad, sent to Unwin in November 1782, who was made to ‘laugh tears’ by it, and published it in the ‘Public Advertiser.’ At the end of 1783 Lady Austen went to Bristol, and Cowper writing to Unwin (12 July 1784) states that he does not wish to renew the connection (two undated letters which follow this in Collection, v. 54–62, speaking of the reconciliation, should be dated 1782). The cause of the final quarrel, which he assigns to Lady Hesketh (16 Jan. 1786), is that Lady Austen was too exacting. It is difficult to avoid the inference, though Southey argues against it, that some jealousy between Cowper's two muses was at the bottom of the breach. Some loverlike verses to Lady Austen, who wore a lock of his hair, were printed for the first time by Mr. Benham in the Globe edition of his poems. The relation was obviously a