OF ROBERT LESLIE ELLIS. xxxi 



In producing his knowledge he was much assisted by the 

 strength and clearness of his memory. All his knowledge 

 seemed to be as it were in hand; it was not merely that he 

 knew where to look for information, although that is a great 

 thing and as much as many clever men are satisfied to accom- 

 plish ; but information upon the most various subjects, the most 

 trivial and the most important, seemed to be at call upon all 

 occasions. His long painful illness had no apparent effect upon 

 this faculty. On one occasion, some years after he had been 

 confined to the house, he wished to describe a certain picture 

 in a room which he had only once entered, and that merely for 

 a morning call : to my astonishment he mentioned the pictures 

 one after another as they hung on the wall, and so identified 

 that to which he desired to refer. 



Ellis was very fond of expressing his thoughts in verse. 

 Some of his notebooks are full of poetical scraps, generally 

 somewhat melancholy in their tone, but expressing (I have no 

 doubt) the feelings of his mind at the time of writing. I will 

 produce two or three of these scraps in this place: it will be 

 seen that they all belong to the period preceding his last long 

 illness. 



i. 



E'en in the days when life is dear 

 And we would fain live on for aye, 

 Then let it not forgotten be 

 That death draws near. 



2. 



And when we fall on sadder hours, 

 And gladly would lie down and die, 

 Remember that we live to do 



God's will ; not ours. 

 DINANT, 1846, 



Written April g. 



The two following were written, I presume, in Trinity 

 College-. 



