Page:Life of William Blake, Gilchrist.djvu/222

 a mind full of literary conventions, swiftly writing without thought; the other, with a head just as full of originalities,—right or wrong,—patiently busying his hands at his irksome craft, while his spirit wandered through the invisible world.

November 18th, 1801.—Hayley writes to Johnson from the house of his friend, Mrs. Poole: 'Your warm-hearted letter (that has met me this instant in the apartments of our benevolent Paulina, at Lavant) has delighted us all so much (by all, I mean Paulina, Blake, and myself) that I seize a pen, while the coffee is coming to the table, to tell you with what cordial pleasure we shall expect you and your young pupil. If my Epitaph' (on Mrs. Unwin) 'delighted you, believe me, your affectionate reception of it has afforded me equal delight. I have been a great scribbler of Epitaphs in the last month, and as you are so kindly partial to my monumental verses, I will transcribe for you even in the bustle of this morning, a recent Epitaph on your humble old friend, my good William, who closed his height of cheerful and affectionate existence (near eighty) this day fortnight, in the great house at Eartham, where Blake and I had the mournful gratification of attending him (by accident) in the few last hours of his life.'

November 22nd, 1801. * * * 'Did I tell you that our excellent Blake has wished to have Lawrence's original drawing to copy, in his second engraving; and that our good Lady Hesketh is so gracious as to send it?'

The engravings to the Life of Cowper—the first issue in two volumes quarto (they were omitted in the subsequent octavo edition)—are not of that elaborate character the necessity of their being executed under the 'biographer's own eye' might have led us to expect. One is after that portrait of Cowper, by Romney, in crayons, made during the poet's own visit to Eartham in 1792; which drew forth the graceful, half sad, half sportive sonnet, concluding with so skilful an antithesis of friendly hyperbole in complimenting his painter and host. A correct copy as to likeness, the