siasm before referred to is also shown in apostrophes to Lincoln Cathedral, and to the Roman arch in the same city "Stern relic of the strength of sterner men." "The Backslider" was afterwards (with a justice and liberality by no means rare) applied to Mr. Cooper by the Rev. Mr. Holland, in a conversation with Montgomery upon the newly-published 'Purgatory of Suicides," as illustrating his own fearful lapse from godliness" and "awful backsliding.' 66 66 Shortly before he attained the age of thirty Thomas Cooper removed to Lincoln, which city he appears to have already known, and established a school there. He joined the Mechanics' Institute, under the presidency of Lord Yarborough, then prospering greatly, and having Mr. John Boole (father of the late Professor) for curator. He knew the Booles earlier however--the future mathematician as a boy of fourteen, "even then a prodigy," nearly six years before his settlement in Lincoln; and married a cousin of the Professor's--the "lorn-dove" of his prison-rhyme, whose noble and intelligent companionship is still, after all trials, preserved to him. "George Boole was as good as he was great," is the testimony Mr. Cooper bears. At the Institute he conducted, gratuitously, Latin and French classes, and projected a choral society, of which he was for four years the devoted secretary. "My mind thus became familiar with the choral majesty of Handel, the sweetness of Haydn, the varied richness of Mozart, and the sublimity of Beethoven."+ A casual question addressed to his bookseller led to Mr. Cooper's reporting some chemical lectures for the Stamford Mercury, and ultimately to a permanent attachment to the staff of that journal, first as local correspondent at a yearly salary of £20 (raised to £100), and then as assistant editor, at Stamford (whither he removed), upon £300 yearly. Some humorous, yet, from the character of the ultimate influence such scenes exert, painful sketches, written in this capacity, of a local quarrel between a cleric and his parishioners, leading to the existence and rivalry of two clerks, are embodied in "Wise Saws and Modern Instances," under the title of "Signs of the Times." At length Mr. Cooper left Stamford, in consequence of some family troubles, and went to London, depending upon promises of influence on his behalf. Lincoln had then for M.P. a literary baronet, whose cause Mr. Cooper had effectively supported, and by the baronet's own request a romance was entrusted to his care. For some weeks it was retained on the pretence that it was in the hands of the baronet's own publishers. This afterwards proved to be false, and the manuscript was returned. Mr. Cooper subsisted for eleven months on such occasional work as he could obtain, in writing for the magazines and in copying at the British Museum, * British Controversialist, Aug., 1865. "Address to Jury," p. 14. and by the sale, volume after volume, of a choice library which he had gathered. Reminiscences of this period are vividly embodied in "London 'Venture," another sketch in 66 "Wise Saws and Modern Instances." It may be noted that the marriage of Queen Victoria took place on the 10th February, 1840. Mr. Cooper was then in London, and joined in the acclamations of the crowd as the youthful sovereign and her high-minded consort passed through Whitehall. To this he refers in book vii., stanza 7, of the "Purgatory," and in succeeding lines calls upon Victoria to remember and help her poor. He was reduced to such straits that his cloak was about to follow his cherished books, when an offer came of the editorship of the Greenwich Gazette. Experiences in connection with this position were doubtless the basis of another amusing paper, entitled, "The 'Intellectual Lever' that wanted a Fulcrum."* His salary here was but £3 weekly, and the paper had sunk so low in point of circulation, that it soon proved hopeless to attempt its preservation. Another interval, happily short, of non-employment succeeded, suddenly terminated by the providential offer of a situation as reporter to the Leicestershire Mercury. Leicester was his birthplace, and would bring him nearer to his now aged and failing mother. The paper, too, was democratic, like his own principles. He therefore accepted the post, and settled in Leicester in 1840. Early in 1841, Mr. Cooper was requested to report a Chartist lecture, by Mr. John Mason of Newcastle. Up to this time he had not knowingly seen or heard a Chartist in his life. But he found the views expressed by the lecturer to correspond with those he had held from early youth. In agricultural Lincolnshire the strife between master and man had been but little known, and he doubted the reality of the alleged distress in manufacturing parts. On this evening its intensity became better realized. The meeting closed at about eleven o'clock, and as, going home, he remarked, on hearing the whirr of the stocking-frames along the streets, the hour was late for such a sound, he was told that the people were glad to work so late if they could get employment, and that their earnings were in the gross seven shillings, from which three shillings were deducted for frame-rent and charges. "Four shillings daily," Mr. Cooper said, "is not bad wages," but he was informed that four shillings per week was the intended meaning and the actual truth. From that hour he became a Chartist. ""Twas gnawing hunger's pain I saw your lank and fainting forms reveal- Weaving rapt fancies in pursuit of Fame's reward. * "Wise Saws," &c. average The Essayist. THE POETRY OF JOHN KEBLE. (Continued from page 66.) Of WITHOUT Waiting now to trace out the allusive beauty of this sonnet, let us proceed to direct attention to some of the principal characteristics which distinguish Keble as a sacred poet. these, one of the most marked and striking is the manner in which he blends and interfuses the lessons of nature with the lessons of grace, nature appearing to his eyes transfigured, as it were irradiated with the light of Christianity. "He is pre-eminently the Christian interpreter of Nature. He sees glimpses of the infinite meaning of her various and changeful moods, and strives in living words to utter the thing he sees. He is a devout student of her many mysteries, and he stands humbled by her great and glorious presence: 'Of the bright things in earth and air, 'Mine eye unworthy seems to read 'I cannot paint to memory's eye The scene, the glance I dearest love; "In vain with dull and tuneless ear "Tis misty all, both sight and sound- "It is to such reverent worshippers Nature unveils her hidden sweetness, and tells her holiest secrets. In all his poems we can easily see that Keble was remarkable for an overflowing, almost passionate affection for Nature; he yielded to her subduing influences until they penetrated and impregnated every thought. He could not be happy without her. He watched for the 'tender lights' which ' dawn or die, on her beloved features, as fondly as ever enraptured lover gazed into his mistress's eyes. But it was not only for himself; he beheld, noted, and interpreted for us 'the stormy lights on mountain streams wavering and broken," the richest glow which ever sets around the autumnal sun,' the tender flower 'Embosomed in the greenest glade, So frail a gem, it scarce may bear "In lines like the following we learn how capable the poet's gentle heart was of sympathizing with the fiercest tumult of storms : They know th' Almighty's love, Who, when the whirlwinds rock the topmost grove, The tumult with a deep exulting fear; How, in their fiercest sway, Curbed by some power unseen, they die away Like a bold steed, that owns his rider's arm, Proud to be checked by that o'ermastering charm.' 'But Keble was more than a word-painter of landscapes; visible and familiar scenes were, to him, types of spiritual, invisible realities. Through the medium of his imagination he beheld nature as a parable, rich with eternal truth, and attempted to expound the intimate connection of human emotion with the transitory or more permanent beauties displayed in the material world. Sometimes their lessons were a stern rebuke, at other times a glowing reflex of common thoughts and moods. The verses for the first Sunday after Epiphany give us a clear idea of the soothing influence exerted on the poet's own nature by what he so exquisitely depicts. It is said that the scenery described in this poem is that around Burthorpe and East Leech, two parishes of which he had the charge shortly after obtaining orders."* * The British Quarterly Review (July 1, 1867), art. IV.—“ Herbert and Keble." In this poem, beginning with the line "Lessons sweet of spring returning," the lowly willow springing by the watercourse is made to teach a lesson of contentment. "See the soft green willow springing "Though the rudest hand assail her, Ready to give thanks and live On the least that. Heaven may give." Again, the nightingale singing by the wayside-the bleak, barren wayside, cheering with its notes the weary traveller on his journey -is made to teach a lesson of trust and thankfulness to the toiler on the path of life : "If the quiet brooklet leaving, For the shades I leave behind, "Where the thickest boughs are twining Hardly will they fleet aloof; So they live in modest ways, Trust entire, and ceaseless praise." Of this love of nature-nature contemplated in the light of Christianity-with which Keble's poetry is instinct, evidences abound in all his works. Everywhere are its traces discernible. To take a few examples as they occur. The following poem from the |