5

spondents. Early in the year 1705, Mr. Wycherley had sent a copy of the Pastorals to Mr. Walsh', who had distinguished himself as the author of several poems, and, in the opinion of Dryden, was the best critic of his time. In his reply, dated April 20, 1705, that gentleman expresses a most favourable opinion of these early productions. "I have read them over several times," says he, "with great satisfaction. The preface is very judicious and very learned, and the verses very tender and easy. The author seems to have a particular genius for that kind of poetry, and a judgment that much exceeds the years you told me he was of. He has taken very freely from the ancients, but what he has mixed of his own with theirs, is not inferior to what he has taken from them. It is not flattery at all to say, that Virgil had written nothing so good at his age. I shall take it as a favour if you will bring me acquainted with him; and if he will give himself the trouble, any morning, to call at my house, I shall be very glad to read the verses over with him, and give him my opinion of the particulars, more largely than I can do well in this letter."

This attention on the part of Mr. Walsh led, as might be expected, to an immediate interview between him and Pope, which terminated in their mutual esteem and friendship, and Pope spent a good part of the summer of 1705 with Mr. Walsh, at his seat at Abberley". A correspondence afterwards took place between them, which is in many respects highly interesting. From this, Walsh appears to have been a general and elegant scholar, and to have been well acquainted with the Italian poets. So particularly delighted was he with their numerous authors of

5 William Walsh, Esq., of Abberley, in Worcestershire, Gentleman of the Horse in Queen Anne's reign.

6 Spence's Anec. p. 20. Malone's ed.

Pastoral Comedy, that he recommended to Pope to write an English one on the same model. The answer of Pope is a masterpiece of just criticism, and displays, even at that early age, the rare faculty of a sound and discriminating judgment. "I have not attempted," says he, "any thing of a pastoral comedy, because I think the taste of our age will not relish a poem of that sort. People seek for what they call wit, on all subjects and in all places, not considering that nature loves truth so well, that it hardly ever admits of flourishing. Conceit is to nature what paint is to beauty; it is not only needless, but impairs what it would improve. There is a certain majesty in simplicity, which is far above all the quaintness of wit; insomuch that the critics have excluded wit from the loftiest poetry, as well as from the lowest; and forbid it to the epic no less than to the pastoral." A still more decisive instance of the proficiency which Pope had made in his studies, and particularly in the niceties of English versification, may be found in another letter to Mr. Walsh, of the 22nd October, 1706, which contains many observations never before made on that subject, and may be considered, in some respects, as the prototype of the Essay on Criticism. This is the last letter that appears in their correspondence', Mr. Walsh having died in 1708, at forty-nine years of age. That the society and correspondence of Walsh were of essential service to Pope, not only by encouraging him to persevere in the studies to which he was devoted, but by suggesting to him many valuable observations, may sufficiently appear from the beautiful lines in

7 It seems probable that Pope paid a second visit to Mr. Walsh in the summer of 1707, as a letter of Walsh appears of the 21st July of that year, in which he says he expects to see him before the end of the month, and waits his commands to send a coach and horses for him to Worcester.

VOL. I.

Ꭰ

which Pope has celebrated his memory, at the close of his Essay on Criticism:

"Such late was Walsh, the Muses' judge and friend,
Who justly knew to blame or to commend;
To failings mild, but jealous for desert,
The clearest head, and the sincerest heart.
—This humble praise, lamented shade, receive,
This praise, at least, a grateful Muse may give ;
The Muse whose early voice you taught to sing,
Prescribed her heights, and pruned her tender wing,
Her guide now lost, no more attempts to rise,

But in low murmurs short excursions tries.”

year

The 1706 appears to have been passed by Pope in leisure and tranquillity, under his paternal roof at Binfield; but although this period affords but few memorials, either of his occupations or correspondence, it is sufficiently apparent that he availed himself of this opportunity for extending his knowledge, improving his taste, and exercising his intellectual powers. "Whenever," says he, "in my rambles through the poets, I met with a passage or story that pleased me more than ordinary, I used to endeavour to imitate it, or translate it into English; and this was the cause of my Imitations, published so long after." These Imitations, so well known to his readers, some of which were written as early as fourteen or fifteen years of age, exhibit a surprising specimen not only of the quickness of his apprehension, and the susceptibility of his mind, but of his powers of expression, and of the readiness with which he could, as it were, think in the manner and style of other writers. The authors thus imitated were Chaucer, Spenser, Waller, Cowley, the Earl of Rochester, the Earl of Dorset, and Dr. Swift. Of these, Dr. Warton conceives that "those of Waller and Cowley are the best;" but that “in his imitation of Rochester he discovers a fund of good sense and just observation on vice and folly, that are

very remarkable in a person so extremely young as he was at the time of composing it."

To nearly the same period of his life, we may also refer his versification, or rather, imitation of Chaucer's January and May, which he has himself informed us was done at sixteen or seventeen years of age; and this was followed shortly afterwards by the Wife of Bath's Prologue. These pieces are executed with a degree of freedon, ease, and spirit, and at the same time with a judgment and delicacy, which not only far exceed what might have been expected from so young a writer, but which leave nothing to be wished for in the mind of the reader. The humour of Chaucer is transfused into the lines of Pope, almost without suffering any evaporation.

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Dr. Johnson informs us, that " Pope having declared himself a poet, and thinking himself entitled to poetical conversation, began, at seventeen, to frequent Will's coffee-house, on the north side of Russell-street, in Covent Garden, where the wits of that time used to assemble, and where Dryden had, when he lived, been accustomed to preside." This, however, could only have been on Pope's occasional visits to London; although it is not improbable, that as he advanced in years and in reputation, these visits were more frequent. It was probably on one of these occasions that he formed an acquaintance with Mr. Henry Cromwell, a gentleman, who to a strong disposition towards gallantry and fashionable life, united some share of learning and a taste for polite literature. Of Cromwell, Johnson could only discover, "that he used to ride a hunting in a tye-wig;" to which important information the last editor of Pope has added a line from Gay, which characteristically describes him as

"Honest, hatless Cromwell, with red breeches,"

and remarks, "that he was an old beau, very ambitious

of being thought a successful gallant and general favourite with the ladies-a man of singularity—a quaint compound of the beau and the pedant." He also observes, that "Pope early caught the manners of his tutor, and something of his affectation, particularly in regard to the ladies, of whose acquaintance Cromwell was superlatively vain." If, however, we examine the correspondence which soon afterwards took place between Cromwell and Pope, we shall find, that although there are some occasional references to what may be called subjects of gallantry, and a few letters which ought to have been suppressed, from the consideration of their having been written confidentially, at so early a period of life, yet the general purport of the correspondence is literary discussion and criticism; and it cannot be denied that the letters contain many excellent remarks on a variety of subjects highly interesting to every reader of taste. It may also be observed, that Cromwell was the first of Pope's correspondents, to whom he could write on terms of freedom and equality; on which account his letters will be found to furnish some traits of his temper and character, and some account of his studies and occupations, not to be derived from any other quarter. That he was gratified by the society he met with in the metropolis, and that he now enlarged his knowledge of the world by participating in its society and amusements, is certain; yet it does not appear that this in any degree diminished his attachment to the country, or prevented his returning to his retirement at Binfield, with those feelings which are incident to a mind conscious of its own resources. In a letter to Mr. Cromwell, of the 18th March, 1708, he says, "I believe it was with me when I left the town, as it is with a great many men when they leave the world, whose loss itself they do not so much regret, as that of their friends whom they leave behind in it;