THE LIFE OF COWPER. THE visit of Lady Hesketh, to Olney, led to a very favorable change in the residence of Cowper. He had now passed nineteen years in a scene, that was far from suiting him. The house, he inhabited, looked on a market place, and once, in a season of illness, he was so appre hensive of being incommoded by the bustle of a fair, that he requested to lodge, for a single night, under the roof of his friend Mr. Newton; and he was tempted by the more comfortable situation of the vicarage, to remain fourteen months in the house of his benevolent neigh bour. His intimacy with this venerable divine was so great, that Mr. Newton has described it in the following remarkable terms, in memoirs of the poet, which affection induced him to begin, but which the troubles and infirmities of very advanced life have obliged him to relinquish. For nearly twelve years we were seldom separated for seven hours at a time, when we "were awake, and at home:-The first six I passed in daily admiring, and aiming to imitate him: during the second six, I walked pensively with him in the valley of the sha"dow of death." '' Mr. Newton records, with a becoming satisfaction, the evangelical charity of his friend: "He loved the poor," says his devout memorialist: "He often visited them in their cot 66 66 66 tages, conversed with them in the most con descending manner, sympathized with them, "counselled and comforted them in their distresses; and those, who were seriously dis"posed, were often cheered and animated by "his prayers!" After the removal of Mr. Newton to London, and the departure of Lady Austen, Olney had no particular attractions for Cowper; and Lady Hesketh was happy in promoting the project, which had occurred to him, of removing, with Mrs. Unwin, to the near and pleasant village of Weston. A scene highly favorable to his health and amusement! For, with a very comfortable mansion, it afforded him a garden, and a field of considerable extent, which he delighted to cultivate and embellish. With these he had advantages still more desirableeasy, perpetual access to the spacious and tran |
