36. "MY DEAR Friend, Whitby, Aug. 19, 1768. "We arrived at the end of our long journey the evening before last all well. The weather continued remarkably pleasant all the time we were on the road. We reached Baldock the first night, after making a long visit to my friend Scott at Amwell, who is more resigned than at first to the awful event that has happened in his family. The second day we got to Stamford, a large town in Lincolnshire. The third we got in good time to Scatherig Moor, where an elegant inn is lately built, and at which we lodged. From Scatherig Moor to Ferrybridge we had an easy day's journey; and we made some stay at York. distance from York to this place is fifty miles, and the ride for twenty miles was over a bleak and barren moor, almost impassable till the inhabitants of this town entered into a subscription to render the way safe and expeditious by making the present road; part of this is extremely good, though the other part cannot be commended.

"Your most affectionate friend,

The

J. C."

Whitby, Sept. 10, 1768.

37. "MY DEAR FRIEND, "We have had but unfavourable weather almost ever since our arrival here; we propose to leave this place the beginning of next week. It was once our design to have prolonged the tour, and visited Stokesby and Stockton in our return; but the indifferent road and the shortening days are obstacles which guage; from which they were soon after translated into German, French, and Italian. In 1781 the Baron went again to Russia, to inoculate the two sons of the Grand Duke, viz. Prince Alexander, afterwards Emperor, and his brother Constantine. On his route through Brussels Baron Dimsdale was received by the Emperor Joseph with the kindest assurances of regard; and on his arrival at St. Petersburgh, was welcomed by the Empress and the Grand Duke with every testimony of unabated favour and esteem; and, after having succeeded in both inoculations, was again liberally remunerated by her Imperial Majesty. For further particulars of this eminently useful and amiable character, who was M. P. for the borough of Hertford from 1784 to 1790, and died at the close of 1800 at the age of eighty-nine, the reader is referred to Chalmers's Biographical Dictionary, or Clutterbuck's History of Hertfordshire. In the latter work, vol. II. p. 35, will be found a pedigree of the Dimsdale family, which has been highly respected in the County of Hertford for several generations from the number of members it has furnished to the important professions of surgery and medicine. Like many other of Mr. Cockfield's connections, they were attached to the Society of Friends. Robert Dimsdale, grandfather of the Baron, is memorable for having visited America with William Penn in 1684; and Joseph Dimsdale, M. D. the Baron's third son, who died a Physician in Bloomsbury-square in 1784, married in 1776 Mary widow of Joseph Beck of Bristol, apparently the brother of Mr. Cockfield's first wife. In the Gentleman's Magazine, vol. LXXXI. ii. 585, is recorded a still more intimate connection between the families, in the marriage Dec. 5, 1811, of Joseph Dimsdale, Esq. of London, with the only daughter of the writer of the present correspondence.

happen to hinder this intention; we shall therefore see York, and from thence proceed to the environs of London.

"Mr. Wildmam, the celebrated Bee-master, has been lately in this neighbourhood; some of the inhabitants of this town (and a relation of mine in particular) were spectators of his amazing performances. It is pity his book (or rather Dr. Templeman's book) was not afforded to the public at an inferior price; the poor cottager might then have availed himself of his surprising discoveries, who now most possibly must remain in total ignorance of them.

"I have heard but once all this time from my afflicted friend at Amwell. The sudden demise of his amiable wife has made impressions on his mind which will not be soon erased, and he has now fresh cause of affliction; his poor infant lay (when he last wrote) at the point of death. I never,' says he in his letter, had any extravagant fondness for this child, being well apprised of the uncertainty of its life; but I was taught to love it as my own, and the thought that it was a pledge of love left me by the dearest and best of women increased my attachment to it, more, I believe, than otherwise would have been the case; but I am like to lose it, and hope I shall be enabled to bear the loss with patience and resignation, and only say with the good old Patriarch, after many afflictions, If I am bereaved of all, I am bereaved.'

"I imagine the buildings discovered near Gatton are subterraneous. A ploughman at Eskdale, a romantic valley near this place, some years ago had the good fortune to discover in the course of his rural labour a large quantity of silver coin in an earthen pot, which he sold to his no small emolument; a young man who was his servant had several of the pieces for his share. I met with him yesterday at Ewe Cote, and he showed me one of them: the letters were almost obliterated, but traces enough remained to evince the rest, had antiquity in coin been any part of my study.

"I have been more diligent in my researches into botany since my arrival than ever. Indeed botany is a most pleasing amusement; even the barren waste and mossy bog are not without their peculiar plants. The hill is almost inaccessible on horseback; the fenny banks of the stream yield to the diligent herbalist a number not easy to recount :

"On every thorn delightful wisdom grows,

In every rill a sweet instruction flows.

"A friend of mine here, who has been my companion in the fields, a man of good understanding and sincere piety, is a great admirer of the Teutonic theosopher Jacob Behmen, and his late friend (I call him so, though perhaps not with strict propriety,) Mr. Law. Though in a low station of life, he has purchased the most considerable of their works; and his chief pleasure seems

to be the perusal of them, and the cultivation of a small garden replete with native and exotic flowers. Most of Jacob's opinions seem inexplicable to human comprehension; but so indeed are the most common things in material creation, and we should not condemn hastily what we cannot understand. The divine Thomas à Kempis is by the generality of readers censured as a visionary, though his book seems to be composed with no other view than to the furtherance of human felicity; and many of those martyrs, who witnessed a good confession and sealed the testimony of Jesus with their blood, have been deemed by prejudiced men wild enthusiasts; of such the voice of inspiration formerly declared the world was not worthy.' A rigid and partial orthodoxy is ever ready to censure; but when we indulge that unbenevolent propensity, our hearts are no longer warmed with that divine love which is the chiefest characteristic of the heavenly Christian religion. We should remember that the more we practice that love, the nearer we are assimilated to the sacred society on high; human beings then indulge the sensations of angels, and have some faint conception (for faint are our conceptions on earth indeed) of that communion we hope one day to experience. J. C."

38.

"Upton, Oct. 10, 1768.

"I pretend not to make botany my study, but it is to me a pleasing amusement in rural solitude. Did a certain friend of mine profess any fondness for herbarizing, I would trouble him for an account of the plants common in his neighbourhood. As this study is certainly rational, so the Redeemer of mankind in his unequalled Sermon on the Mount seems to excite us to it: 'Consider,' says the blessed Messiah, the lilies of the field! they toil not, neither do they spin, and yet I say unto you, Solomon in all his glory is not arrayed like one of these.'

"The Discourse on Catholicism* I have seen, but hear nothing as yet of the publication of Parkhurst's Greek Lexicon, so long promised to the public, and so long unaccountably delayed. The Vicar of this parish has lost his father; his fate has verified his own observation, that arthritic complaints are never to be totally cured. Mr. W.† was here the other day, but it was not whilst I was at home; his behaviour appeared quite frank and sociable, and indeed he is generally esteemed by his parishioners.

"I hope Dr. Templeman (for I think the Doctor is the editor) will give us speedily the Treatise on Bees in a volume of octavo size, and he will then do a great piece of kindness. The principal part of the volume seems to be translations from Reaumur and Madame Vicart; the lady just mentioned, whilst the gene

"Popery inconsistent with the natural rights of men in general, and of Englishmen in particular, a Sermon preached in Charlotte-street Chapel, Pimlico, by William Dodd, LL. D. 1768," 8vo.

+ Mr. Warner; see before, p. 159.

rality of her sex dissipate their time in idle fashionable diversions, has employed hers to wiser purposes. The accuracy of the all-wise Author of nature in every department of his vast creation is wonderful, and doubtless claims our attention and praise. Of bees one may indeed say with the sweet Bard of Mantua,

"In tenui labor, at tenuis non gloria. Georg. lib. iv. "I should be glad to know what gentleman is employed in forming a grotto; perhaps it may be in my power to contribute some small gift or other for its decoration.

"Mr. Dorrien is one of my best neighbours; he often obliges me with a visit. I am informed a young clergyman of his and my acquaintance is ere long expected to give the inhabitants of West-ham a discourse, but am not certain whether there is any truth in this rumour. I could recommend to the gentleman a text, but there are so many that contain the whole substance of religion that I shall decline the task.

"I ask pardon for detaining such a time the manuscript, but hope one day or other to make some improvements to it. If this sorry season should prompt you to an early removal, we will one day or other meet at the Museum, which meeting perhaps the good Dr. Gifford will facilitate; mean time favour me with a line, directed as heretofore, for I shall be impatient to hear news from Whitton. I am sincerely, &c. J. C."

39. Upton, Nov. 7, 1768. "I defer mentioning my opinion of the Discourse against the Apostate Church of Rome until we meet. Though I venerate and applaud many writers of that communion, who, amid the observance of divers superstitions, practised love to God and love to man, who, in the language of a superior intelligent spirit, died in the Lord, and rest from their labours,' I have no intention to turn a gloomy devotee and sequester myself in the unfrequented retreats of the abbey, to pore over beads and pass my days with missals and crucifixes. More happy those, who in the polite circle practice Christian mortification and learn the precepts of their self-denying Master, even in crowds where the busy hum of men' is heard continually.

"I have read lately Mulso's Callistus and Sophronius, which I hope will not be published in vain; how serene and cheerful is the latter in the near prospect of eternity, whilst the former is all gloom and despair on the bed of death. The style is good, and upon the whole the work afforded me a melancholy kind of pleasure *.

My friend Scott has been kind enough to pass a couple of days at Upton, and I hope this visit upon the whole has not been

* Of Mr. Mulso, brother to that elegant authoress Mrs. Chapone, a memoir will be found in the "Literary Anecdotes," vol. IX. p. 492.

unserviceable to him*; he is now returned to his solitary residence, solitary indeed! for in less than two years he has lost both his parents, his amiable wife, and little infant. Omniscience dispenses the bitter cup in supreme wisdom, and fallible human beings should acquiesce in His disposals with uncomplaining submission and humility.

My friend Warner has lost his father, and his family are coming to reside at the parsonage-house. J. C."

40. "MY DEAR FRIEND,

Dec. 5, 1768.

"I am concerned to hear of poor Mr. D▬▬'s loss, and sincerely sympathize with him, as I have with two of my friends lately, Messrs. Langhorne and Scott, on these melancholy occasions. The last named gentleman has not resumed his polite and pathetic pen hitherto, but the formert has bewailed his loss in an elegant Monody written at Sandgate Castle. I thought to have had an opportunity of seeing him whilst in town, but have been by one disagreeable occurrence or other deprived of that satisfaction. There is a high panegyric on the lady in the papers; and indeed the loss of such persons in these times is a sufficient subject of lamentation.

"My friend Dorrien, whose kindness and regard I have experienced ever since we were acquainted, yesterday gave me an invitation to dinner, which it was out of my power to comply with, having a previous engagement. I was informed a common friend of ours was again to preach at West-ham, but as this gentleman chooses to be wholly silent on this matter or to express himself in an ambiguous manner, it may be impertinent to say more on the subject +.

*He thus alludes to it in bis Ode to Mr. Cockfield:

'Twas when Misfortune's stroke severe

And Melancholy's presence drear

Had made my Amwell's groves displease,

That thine my weary steps receiv'd,
And much the change my mind reliev'd,

And much thy kindness gave me ease;
For o'er the past as thought would stray,
That thought thy voice has oft retriev'd
To scenes that fair before us lay.

Scott's Poetical Works, p. 198. "In the same month that proved fatal to this amiable person (Mrs. Scott) died also in childbirth the first wife of the late Dr. Langhorne. This gentleman, to whom a copy of Mr. Scott's Elegy (noticed hereafter, p. 802) had been sent, writing to a friend, mentions it in these words: Mr. Scott's Poem came so near my own feelings, that it hurt my peace of mind; and while I pitied the man, I saw my own miseries in the strongest point of view.' This similarity of circumstance and congenial affliction gave rise to a friendship between the two Poets, which, though they rarely corresponded and more rarely met, continued without abatement till the death of Dr. Langhorne." Hoole's Life of Scott, p. xliii.

The report was well-founded; but, as Mr. Butler's ability to fulfil