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278 that his sympathy with the object has entirely destroyed all hope of profit from the work.

Mr. Milnes was an intimate friend of the poet, and his selection as orator was in good taste. He spoke with great delicacy and kindness of Hood's personal characteristics, and with much taste upon the artistic value of the dead humorist's works. He touched with great felicity and subtlety upon the value of humor. He defined its province, and showed how closely it was connected with the highest forms in which genius manifests itself. Mr. Milnes spoke, however, more as a friend than as a critic, and his genial utterances excited emotions in the hearts of his hearers which told how deep was their sympathy both with the orator and the subject of his eulogium. There were not many dry eyes amongst his hearers when he quoted one or two exquisite portions of Hood's poems. It was evident that the greater part of the audience were well acquainted with the works of the poet, and were delighted to hear the quotations from poems which had afforded them exquisite gratification in the perusal.

Hood was not a merely ephemeral writer. He did not address himself to the feelings which mere passing events generated in the minds of his readers. He smote deep down into the hearts of his admirers. Had he been nothing more than a literary man, the ceremony on this occasion would have been an impertinence. The nation cannot afford to have its time taken up by eulogiums on every citizen who does his work well in his own