me white's recollections. 281 



equivoque in ' Ingoldsby ' were well known to the brother 

 of Christopher North ; on past the Tower, with its gray 

 oyster-plastered bastions, and through the Pool with its 

 mazy life of ships, down to Greenwich with its noble hos- 

 pital and still more noble park. He was a delightful 

 talker. This evening his subjects were, Dun robin Castle 

 and the Duchess ; trout and salmon-fishing in Sutherland 

 with Dr Greville, J. P. Selby, and Sir William Jardine, 

 three Christian gentlemen like himself, and amongst his 

 oldest and staunchest friends ; and Doctors Neill and 

 Fleming, and the Edinburgh naturalists. We got on the 

 subject of James Hogg and William Wordsworth, and I 

 lamented that Christopher North had never written Hogg's 

 biography, for it was advertised. Great man as Words- 

 worth was, he did not believe in biography — a striking 

 proof this of his originality. Shakspeare and Milton, and 

 many other great men, are known by the biography breath- 

 ing in their works. Wordsworth wished no other memorial, 

 and, excepting Paxton Hood's enthusiastic tribute, and the 

 unsatisfying volumes of his nephew, it would seem as if 

 the poet were only to be made known by his works. But 

 from Mr Wilson's remarks, I could see that he was disap- 

 pointed that the brother bard, who used to live at Elleray, 

 and who was the first to praise in Blackwood and in all 

 companies Wordsworth's poetry, at a time when Jeffrey 

 and other critics were doing their best to run it down. 



