which after a probation of two years, he quitted for the Public Grammar School of Reading, presided over by Dr. Valpy.

It was here that he abandoned the ranks of the Dissenters and openly joined the Church of England, to whose doctrines he had for some time inclined, on account of the superior toleration of its discipline. It has been said that he was chiefly moved to this step by his love for drama, which was unequivocally prohibited by the Dissenters. It was also at this academy that he first displayed his liberal tendencies in politics, which was evidenced by his publishing in the Statesman newspaper some verses to Sir Francis

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Burdett, on his liberation from the Tower of London. Under the fostering and correcting influence of his schoolmasters, he published a small volume of poems on various subjects. This comprised the "Indian Tale," "The Offering of Isaac, a sacred drama," specimens of a didactic poem on "The Union and Brotherhood of Mankind." The most striking verses in the volume were some written "On the Education of the Poor," on the occasion of a visit to that establishment by the celebrated "Joseph Lancaster."

In 1813 he came to London, and placed himself with Chitty, the well known jurist: with him he continued four years, and it is said materially helped him with his celebrated work on "Criminal Law." This is, however, doubtless an exaggeration, and takes its source from the fact, perhaps, of the young and officious lawyer having occasionally volunteered to correct the proofs. We all know what a vain-glorious man may make out of this simple service; it reminds us of a story told of a self-important friend of Wordsworth; he had asked the great sonneter (for really in sonnets Wordsworth is great) to let him look over the proofs to save the eyesight of the old bard from that mechanical drudgery. When the volume appeared in its chocolate-colored title, the infinitesimal editor of misprints said, upon hearing some person recite with great gusto the famous

sonnet to

"The world is too much with us late or soon."

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He cried out " Ah, that is a fine sonnet, if you like, I helped him there!" "You interest me," said the reciter; "did you help Mr. Wordsworth in that magnificent burst? What part did you contribute?" 'Why, sir," said the other, "I added the semicolon at the close of the tenth line." "Good Lord-what would the thing be worth without that semicolon ?"

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In the same year he wrote for a publication called the "Pamphleteer " a paper entitled "An Appeal to the Protestant Dissenters of Great Britain on behalf of the Roman Catholics," to this succeeded his reply to Cobbett, who had objected to the Unitarian Relief Bill, then agitated in Parliament. "Strictures on Capital Punishment on the nature of justice-the legitimate design of penal institutions-observations on 'the pillory-and a strong protest against the act for regulating royal marriages.”

But the most interesting production of his was a paper he published in 1815, entitled "An Estimate of the Poetry of the Age." In this he claims for Mr. Wordsworth the honor of being the first of the modern poets. Considerable merit is due to the youthful critic for the boldness of this article, for it appeared at a time when the full tide of popularity ran dead against the author of Peter Bell, and Talfourd claims the merit of being the first to openly recognise his great claims on the public.

When he quitted Mr. Chitty, in 1817, he became a contributor to the Retrospective Review, and to the Encyclopædia Metropolitana. The papers on "Homer, the great tragedian," and the "Greek Lyric Poems," are by him. He amused the leisure hours of his life from 1820 to 1832 in writing for the New Monthly Magazine, the Edinburgh Review, and the London Magazine. The life of Mr. Radcliffe, prefixed to his posthumous works in 1826, was also from his pen. It was about this time that he edited an edition of "Dickenson's Guide to the Quarter Sessions."

We ought to have named that, in 1821, he was called to the Bar by the Society of the Middle Temple, and after four or five years of successful practice as a pleader, he joined the Oxford Circuit and Derbyshire Sessions, and obtained a valuable practice. In 1833 he was made sergeant-at-law, with a patent of precedence; he also became Recorder of Banbury.

In 1822 Talfourd married Rachel, the daughter of John Towell Rutt, and he has a numerous family by her; although nothing can be more unlike than their dispositions, they live together in the happiest possible state. The sergeant enjoys, perhaps, the largest circle of literary acquaintances of any man of the day.

We now approach the great literary event of Talfourd's life, the publication of his classical drama of "Ion;" he had been for many years engaged on this subject, which is taken from Euripides. Towards the close of 1834 he had it "printed for private circulation," and took his stand as an author. When it is borne in mind that the learned sergeant was in his fortieth year, it might naturally be expected after so long a gestation, and at his mature years, his genius, if he had any, would have produced something better than a diluted Greek poem, although the execution should be so correct as to mislead the critics into a belief of its being "classical." It is somewhat amusing to hear how the epithet of "classical" is bandied about! It is a common trick of half educated men to call very tame writing, if tolerably grammatical, by that name; it would seem that in their estimation all that was required to be classical was to have a total absence of force and poetical spirit; in their dictionary the word means tame, cold, spiritless, correct-in short, level writing, according to Lindley Murray; they forget that the great gods of classical literature are Eschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Anacreon, among the Greeks;-and Virgil, Horace, Catullus, Titullus, &c. among the Romans. How far the amiable author of "Ion" partakes of these great writers, we must leave

the critics.who dub him classical to demonstrate. We do not make these remarks out of any captious wish to derogate from the merit of "Ion," which is really what Mr. Wordsworth once described a "very pretty tragedy;" although we might remark, by the way, that the distinguishing characteristic of tragic writing is not prettiness, but rather the reverse; in a word, it is the highest merit of a tragedy not to be pretty.

An elaborate review of this work appeared in the Quarterly Review, which was eminently favorable, and on the 26th May, 1836, it was produced under the evasive aspect of being performed for Mr. Macready's benefit at Covent Garden Theatre; he subsequently produced the "Athenian Captive," and "Glencoe," but with very moderate success. The admirable acting of Macready will always render these plays endurable, but their artificial nature, both of manner and matter, will never allow them to take hold of the public mind. His most readable works are "Vacation Rambles," and his "Life and Letters of Charles Lamb."

As a pleader, he is an ornament to the legal profession; no witness can accuse him of bullying and badgering; no client can say he took the fee like Sir William Follett, and many others, and then forgot to work the case. No lawyer can charge him with lending his great talents to a villany; he has been known to refuse a brief, if he suspected foul play; and in his addresses to the jury he has never been known to asperse the character of his opponent, or of any witness, without he was compelled by the self-evident turpitude of the party. As a lawyer, we have been told he was as sound as most of his brethren, although his reputation as a poet, we have reason to state, has prevented many a brief from reaching his hand. It seems to be an infatuation with the lower orders of human mind, when a man shows himself to be capable of doing something above their peculiar handicraft, that they immediately have a suspicion of his inadequacy for the lower profession.

One of the most felicitous instances of pleading in modern times was his defence of Macready against Mr. Bunn. That trickey manager had engaged the eminent tragedian, at a large salary, for fifty nights. After a few performances, finding he was losing money, he resolved to annoy Macready by every means in his power, fully trusting that the actor's well known irritability would lead him to break the contract. He commenced on a petty scale, such as placing only one common, dim-looking candle in his dressing-room, and by a variety of trifling annoyances of a like character; finding these had no effect, he resolved on a larger sphere of action.

He put his name down in the "Taming of the Shrew" as an afterpiece, playing a farce before it. Mr. Macready at first remonstrated, but suspecting the villany of the lessee, he consulted Mr. Forster, and the sergeant, who advised him to play the character of Petruchio even under these provoking circumstances.

Mr. Bunn finding this had no effect, hit upon a scheme which he resolved to put in practice the next night. Mr. Macready was performing "Richard III," and had gone through the first four acts in his usual manner, reserving his energies for the close of that magnificent drama. Mr. Macready at the end of the fourth act had retired to his dressing-room, and was sitting, waiting the call-boy, enrapt in a pleasing reverie as to the effect he was about to produce on the audience in the next act.

Time flew on, when to his surprise the orchestra commenced the overture to the pantomime. Starting up, the mimic tyrant went to the door of his dressing-room and demanded the reason. Presently a man came with a message from Mr. Bunn, saying, with his compliments, that there was not time for the fifth act of the tragedy, as the pantomime was so long; and that if Mr. Macready would look into the playbills issued that morning, only four acts of the play had been promised. There, true enough, in infinitesimal type, was the trick artfully drest out: Macready's rage was intense; he saw he