"Michael Angelo," Cowper seems never to have been imbued with the belief that his skill in drawing would ever be above the ordinary. In commissioning Unwin to purchase for him some Indian ink, a few brushes, and a pencil or two, he limits him to the sum of five shillings, observing, "I do not think my talent in the art worth more."

The drawing mania lasted nearly a year, and might have extended even longer, only he found it hurtful to his eyes. He told Mrs. King (October 11, 1788):

Many figures were the fruit of my labours, which had at least the merit of being unparalleled by any production either of art or nature. But, before the year was ended, I had occasion to wonder at the progress that may be made, in despite of natural deficiency, by dint alone of practice; for I actually produced three landscapes, which a lady thought worthy to be framed and glazed. I then judged it high time to exchange this occupation for another, lest, by any subsequent productions of inferior merit, I should forfeit the honour I had so fortunately acquired."

The lady in question was Lady Austen. An engraving from one of these drawings may be seen in the Gentlemen's Magazine for June, 1804. The poet gave up drawing, but " Michael Angelo" continued to paint and to carve until 1817, when they laid him to rest in the churchyard he had so loved to adorn, and put over his head a stone with a wheatsheaf on it—a fitting emblem of the fecundity of his invention. Another of the poet's amusements was carpentering. "There is not a squire in all this country," he says, "who can boast of having made better squirrel-houses, hutches

for rabbits, or bird-cages, than myself; and in the article of cabbage-nets I had no superior."

The carpentering, however, was even more injurious to his eyes than the drawing. "In the character of a carpenter, indeed," says he, "I almost put them out." So this occupation had to be abandoned also.

71. Cowper's "Whisking Wit."

Even before he commenced drawing Cowper had done a little again at versifying, his first attempts after his derangement having been four political pieces. One was suggested by the defeat of the French admiral D'Estaing at St. Lucia (in December, 1778), another by the repulse of the same at Savannah (October, 1779). Of these two Cowper was "rather proud;" but as they contained prophecies of "an illustrious consummation" of the American War, which subsequent events did not verify, he was fain to destroy them. The other two, "On the Trial of Admiral Keppel," and an address to the mob "On the occasion of the late Riot at the House of Sir Hugh Palliser," though apparently thrown aside as being not of much account, have been preserved. Both Keppel and his viceadmiral, owing to mutual recriminations, had been put on their trials, before courts-martial, for dereliction of duty. "Each was declared to have conducted himself like a brave man, while the populace showed its versatility by first abusing Keppel, and then, on his acquittal, forcing open Palliser's house, destroying his furniture, and hanging him in effigy, as the persecutor of Keppel."

The Universal Review for June, 1890, in which these poems were first printed, also contains another poem that had not previously been published-namely, "The Bee and the Pine-apple," which commences:

"A bee, allured by the perfume

Of a rich pine-apple in bloom."

The well-known poem, "The Pine-apples and the Bee" (commencing "The Pine-apples in triple row "), was written on the same paper, and entitled, " Another on the same." In December, 1779, In December, 1779, in consequence of a letter from Unwin, Cowper had written the humorous lines entitled, "The Yearly Distress; or, Tithing Time, at Stock, in Essex ;" and now (February, 1780) his "whisking wit" produced the fable of the "Nightingale and Glowworm," founded on a statement in the Register that the glowworm is the nightingale's food. Another poem of this year was "A Fable," commencing, "A raven, while with glossy breast," the bird in question being one that had built a nest in one of the trees of Guinea Field.

Among these offshoots of his whisking wit must also be numbered the lost poem alluded to in his letter to Lady Hesketh of January 1, 1788, in which he speaks of it as having been written some ten years previously. He does not even mention the subject, but he certainly manages to rouse our curiosity when he declares that neither Mrs. Unwin nor he ever laughed more at any production of his, "perhaps not even at 'John Gilpin."" "But," continues the poet, "for all this, my dear, you must, as I said, give me credit, for the thing itself is gone to that limbo of

vanity where alone things lost on earth are to be met with. Said limbo is, as you know, in the moon, whither I could not at present convey myself without a good deal of difficulty and inconvenience."

Of these morceaux Cowper sent more to Mr. Unwin than to Mr. Newton, and upon the latter intimating his knowledge that such was the case, Cowper made the observation: "You may think perhaps that I deal more liberally with Mr. Unwin in the way of poetical export, than I do with you, and I believe you have reason; the truth is this-if I walked the streets with a fiddle under my arm, I should never think of performing before the window of a privy councillor or a chief justice, but should rather make free with ears more likely to be open to such amusement. The trifles I produce in this way are indeed such trifles that I cannot think them seasonable presents for you. Mr. Unwin himself would not be offended if I was to tell him that there is this difference between him and Mr. Newton, that the latter is already an apostle, while he himself is only undergoing the business of incubation, with a hope that he may be hatched in time. When my Muse comes forth arrayed in sables, at least in a robe of graver cast, I make no scruple to direct her to my friend at Hoxton" (July 30, 1780).

One of his small pieces, however, he in this letter sent to Newton-namely, his riddle commencing, "I am just two and two."

On the occasion of sending Unwin the "Verses on a Goldfinch starved to Death in a Cage," he said (November 9, 1780): "I wrote the following last summer. The tragical occasion of it really happened at the next

house to ours. I am glad when I can find a subject to work upon; a lapidary, I suppose, accounts it a laborious part of his business to rub away the roughness of the stone; but it is my amusement, and if, after all the polishing I can give it, it discovers some little lustre, I think myself well rewarded for my pains.

"I shall charge you a halfpenny apiece for every copy I send you, the short as well as the long. This is a sort of afterclap you little expected, but I cannot possibly afford them at a cheaper rate. If this method of raising money had occurred to me sooner, I should have made the bargain sooner; but am glad I have hit it at last. It will be a considerable encourageupon ment to my Muse, and act as a powerful stimulus to my industry."

72. A Head once endued with a Legal Periwig.

When Newton was in Olney, knowing that Cowper had formerly been connected with the law, he occasionally asked his advice upon certain matters connected with his parishioners. For example, on January 14, 1775, he wrote: "I have drawn up a clause to be inserted in Mrs. 's will, which my dear friend Mr. Cowper has looked over and approves, and says it will pass very well as to the forms of law."

The knowledge of this having got abroad, the good people of Olney, who, with commendable shrewdness, always prefer not paying for a thing when it can be had for nothing, hit upon the happy expedient of turning the poet to account. Consequently, when law