à vos amis seuls à éprouver vos maux, et à s'en inquiéter. Ah! ils rempliront trop bien cette fonction. Notre intérêt, nos vœux, vous environnent, et de notre terrasse nous voyons, nous regardons votre maison, et nous irons en ouvrir les portes et les fenêtres dès qu'on nous apprendra que vous revenez l'habiter. Vous avez rendu cet asile trop célèbre pour l'oublier, et le vif sentiment avec lequel nous entendons parler de vous, nous est un garant de votre retour.

Nous sommes à Lausanne depuis quelques jours, et nous avons depuis reçu plusieurs visites' de la cité. La rue du Bourg, ainsi que de raison, attend qu'on la previenne; mais moi, revenu des grandeurs de la terre, après avoir fait une visite de devoir au Seigneur Bailly, et au Seigneur Bourguemestre, et une de goût, et de reconnoissance à Madame de Sévéry, je me tiendrai clos dans mon manoir. Adieu, Monsieur, agréez, je vous prie, les assurances de mon inviolable attachement.

N° CCLXIV.

Rev. Dr. COOKE, Dean of Ely, and Provost of King's College, Cambridge, to Lord SHEFFIELD.

King's College, April 11th, 1796.

AND SO even nobles, it seems, can condescend to make their visits, after the mode of the good parsons in the West, with their wives behind them. I take leave to kiss both hands with all due respect and veneration, as proof of that perfect harmony and union, of which every friend must be happy

to

to have the assurance, which must ever result from equal good sense, good humour, and virtue, and be rather more close, more tender and delicate, than the most intimate connexion between author and editor. In making my acknowledgments, my most dear Lord, for your late very kind notice of me, you will suffer me to remark something of error: it was not to be supposed, that any thing should appear under your sanction which I should not eagerly possess myself of the first moment I could obtain it. Amidst all my interruptions, I have advanced considerably into the Extraits du Journal, and I admire him even more in them than in his History: such variety of reading, such justness of reflexions, such neatness and precision of expression, are not to be found in any of the Anas with which I am acquainted; nor am I aware

of

any publication that does equal honour to both the parties concerned in it, I have no doubt of your just title to the merit of the observation, that

Poets lose half the praise they would have got,
Did we but know what they discreetly blot,

It is indeed matter of sincere pleasure to me, as well on your Lordship's account as your friend's, that so little appears that can give offence. The great desideratum is, and a most wonderful one, that a professed historian, whose province it is to be guided by evidence, should not submit to the glaring evidences of our religion,-evidences, even at this day, of our senses,-and if examined, irresistible: the misfortune is, that they are not examined

VOL. II.

K K

and

and considered:-but this world cheats us of our immortal hopes. I beg pardon; I will not, and I trust I need not, preach. Your Lordship will kindly forgive my zeal, and be assured of my anxious, wishes of every happiness to yourself and all who are dear to you both now and for ever. My heart has been so full, as to have forgotten, I find, to express how highly honoured and gratified we shall be by the present you have so obligingly intimated.

I am ever, my dear Lord,
Under the strongest impression of all

favours,

your

Your most sincere, obliged, and
faithful and affectionate Servant,

N CCLXV.

WM. COOKE.

Rev. Dr. COOKE, Dean of Ely, and Provost of King's College, Cambridge, to Lord SHEFFIELD.

MY DEAR GOOD LORD,

April 26th, 1796.

THE precious volumes have safely reached us, and shall be deposited pari jugo, or cheek by jole, with the six of which we have long been possessed, and to which they make so very valuable an Appendix. I am at a loss indeed to say, whether the great historian of empires and of the changes and chances of the world in general, may be of more use and consequence than the faithful narrator, as he appears in your Lordship's representation, of the humbler incidents of private life, of the

occa

occasional reflexions that arise upon them, and the happiness of a sincere, long-continued, and uninterrupted friendship. The last I am sure come much more closely home to our personal businesses and bosoms, and must have a greater influence on our own immediate conduct; nor can I hesitate to affirm, in an allusion which Mr. Gibbon himself, if he could have known the posthumous care and attention to his fame and character, would have applied,

Fortunati ambo!

Nulla dies unquam memori vos eximet ævo

You will go down together to late posterity with as much just distinction as any of the memorable duets of antiquity. While I congratulate your Lordship on the close of your meritorious labour for one friend, let me intreat your intercession with Lady Sheffield for my not having particularly expressed the high sense I have of the honour of her Ladyship's late notice with which she so obligingly favoured me: nor will it be a slight gratification, if Miss Holroyd may retain any memory of a former admirer, or Miss Louisa, of the happiness. she communicated by a few transient interviews at Bath. May every blessing attend your Lordship, and all who are dear to you! so prayeth most heartily

Your ever most truly obliged and most

Faithful humble Servant,

WILLIAM Cooke.

N° CCLXVI. ·

The Rev. NORTON NICHOLLS to Lord SHEFFIELD.

Blundeston, June 2d, 1796.

I HAVE delayed so long to write to you, my dear Lord, not certainly from indifference to you or to the posthumous fame of Gibbon which owes so much to your friendly and judicious exertionsThe work more than answers my expectation; such a faithful, interesting, and agreeable portrait of a human mind endowed with the most extraordinary powers, enriched with all the treasures of learning, embellished with all the graces that good taste and polished society can bestow; impelled by an insatiable desire of knowledge to an activity in the pursuit of it, the eagerness and constancy of which has seldom been equalled; such a portrait has scarcely ever been given to the world, and never with such a curious and happy detail. As for his moral character, you have exhibited it in a new point of view even to me; till that admirable letter preceding his last departure from Switzerland I had no idea of the warmth and energy of his friendship; but the incomparable letters which you have published teem with proofs, most honourable to the heart and sentiments of their author. The account of his studies is as useful as it is singular, and may serve to point out to others the path to literature which so few pursue. Nothing ran through his mind; every subject worthy of attention was sifted, examined, and dissected. The ideas of others produced a new train in him which he

generally