460 
and chirping as merrily as such a scene of 
things as this will permit. p 
*¢ Tam happy that my poems have pleased 
you. My volume has afforded me no such 
pleasure at any time, either while ] was writ- 
mg it, or since its publication, as I have. de- 
rived from yours, and my uncle’s opinion of 
it. I make certain allowances for partiality. 
and for that.peculiar quickness of taste, with 
which you both relish what youlike, and af- 
ter all draw-backs upon those accounts duly 
made, find myself rich in the measure of your 
approbation that still remains. But above 
at honour John Gilpin, since it was he 
who first encouraged you to write. I made 
him on purpose to laugh at, and he served 
his purpose well; but Tam now in debt to 
him fora more valuable acquisition than all 
the laughter in the world awounts to, the re- 
covery of my intercourse with you, which is 
to.me inestimable. My benevolent and ge- 
nerous cousin, when I was once asked if I 
wanted any thing, and giyen delicately enough 
to understand that the enquirer was ready to 
supply all my occasions, I thankfully and ci- 
villy, but positively declined the favour. I 
neither alien; nor have suffered any such in- 
conveniencies as I had not much rather en- 
dure, than come under obligations of that 
sort to a person comparatively with yourself 
a stranger to me. But to you I answer other- 
wise. J know you thoroughly, and the li- 
berality of your disposition; and have that 
consummate confidence in the sincerity of 
your wish to serve me, that delivers me from 
all awkward constraint, and from all fear of 
trespassing by acceptance. ‘To you, there- 
fore, I reply, yes. Whensoever, and what- 
soever, and in what manner soever you please ; 
and add moreover, that my affection for the 
giver is such, as will encrease to me tenfold 
the satisfaction that I shall have in receiving. 
It is necessary however that I should let you 
2 little into the state of my finances, that you 
may not snppose them more narrowly cir- 
eumscribed than they are. Since Mrs. Un- 
win-and I have lived at Olney, we have had 
but one purse ; although during the whole of 
that time, till Jately, her income was nearly 
double mine. Her revenues indeed are now 
in some measure reduced, and do not much 
exceed my own ; the worst consequence of 
this is, that we are forced to deny ourselves 
some things which hitherto we have been 
better able to afford, but they are such things 
as neither life, nor the well being of life de- | 
pend upon. My ownincome has been better 
than it is, but when it was best, it would not 
have enabled me tolive as my connexions de- 
manded that I should, had it not been com- 
bined with a better than itself, at least at this 
end of the kingdom. Of this I had full 
roof during three months that I spent in 
odgings at Hantingdon,, ia’ which time by 
the help of good management, and a clear 
nation of economical matters, I contrived to 
spend the income of a twelve mouth. Now, 
‘BIGBRAPHY. 
my heloved cousin, you are in possession of — 
the whole case as it stands. Strdinno points 
to your own inconvenience, or hurt, for there 
is no need of it ; but indulge yourself in;com-, — 
municating (no matter what) that you can 
spare without missing it, since by so doing 
you will be sure to add to the comforts of my 
life, one of the sweetest that I can enjoy, 2 
token and proof of your affection.” ; 
Every subsequent letter expresses in- 
creasing pleasure in this renewed con- 
nexion, which was soon to be augmented 
by the lady’s personal presence. How 
sweetly tender and playful is the follow- 
ing, just before her arrival ! 
« Ah! my Cousin, you begin already to 
fear and quake. What a hero am I, com- 
pared with you. I have no fears of you. 
On the contrary, Iam as bold asalion. E 
wish. that your carriage were eyen now at 
the door You should soan see with how 
much courage I would face you. But what 
cause have you for fear? Am I not your 
cousin, with whom you have wandered in 
the fields of Freemantle, and at Bevis’s Mount? 
Who used to read to you, to laugh with you, 
till our. sides have ached, at any thing, or 
nothing? And am [ in these respects at alk 
altered? Yau will not find me so, but just 
as ready to laugh and to wander as you ever 
knew me. A cloud perhaps may come over 
me now and then, for a few hours, but from 
clouds I was never exempted. And are not 
you the identical Cousin with whom IT have 
performed all these feats? The very Harrict 
whom I saw, forthe first time, at De Grey’s, 
in Norfolk Street? (it was ona Sunday, when 
you came with my Uncle and Aunt to drink 
tea there, and I had dined there, and was 
just going back to Westminster.) If these 
things are so, and I am sure that you cannot 
gainsay a syllable of them all, then this con- 
sequence follows ; that I donot promise my= 
self more pleasure from your company than 
I shall be sure to find. Then you are my 
Cousin, in whom I always delighted, and in 
whom I doubt not that I shall delight, even 
to my latesthour. But this wicked coach- 
maker has sunk my spirits. 
ble thing it is to depend, in any degree, for 
the accomplishment of a wish, and that wish 
so fervent, on the punctuality of a creature, 
who I suppose was never punctual in his 
Tite Pay ( 
quicken him, that if he performs his pro- 
mise, he shal] make my coach when I want 
one, and that if he performs it not, I will 
most assuredly employ some other man.” ~ 
By Lady Hesketh’s means, Cowper | 
with Mrs. Unwin were removed from 
Olney to a much more eligible sittation, 
at the neighbouring village of Weston, 
where he seems to have passed the haps 
piest years of his declining life, occupied — 
with his translation of Homer, ‘and in — 
What a miseras — 
Do tell him, my dear, in order to ~ 
