SONNET. Written on seeing BEWICK's Chalk Drawing of the Head of HAZLITT. BY SHERIDAN KNOWLES. Thus HAZLITT looked! There's life in every line! Ah! in the gaze of that entranced eye, Humid, yet burning, there beams passion's flame, Lighting the cheek, and quivering through the frame; While round the lips, the odour of a sigh Yet hovers fondly, and its shadow sits And fire-clothed eloquence, which comes in fits By thee, in vain doth slander's venom'd dart Do its foul work 'gainst him. This head must own a heart. WHATEVER my ambition, it is not my present purpose to offer to the reader either a history of my father's mind, or a critical analysis of his works. I have too much respect for the name he has transmitted me to throw any gratuitous discredit upon it by attempting a task which, looking to the very high power essential to its due fulfilment, I fairly confess myself unequal to. So far, however, as the reader is concerned, I need not regret my inability. Some of those fine spirits with whom my father was associated in life have sanctioned my attempt by gracing it with the expression of their opinions of him, and these, with the eloquent tribute to his genius and character, which the youngest but one of the most estimated of his contemporaries, Mr Bulwer, has done me the kindness of sketching out, render all apology to the readers of the present paper superfluous. All that I propose to do is briefly to state the few and slightly diversified circumstances of my VOL. I. b |