with Meeta, the wife of Klopstock; with Miss Mulso, afterwards the didactic Mrs. Chapone; with Dr. Delaney, the old name so familiar in the verses of Swift; with Mrs. Sheridan, the mother of Richard Brindsley-authoress of Sidney Biddulph-and wife of Thomas Sheridan, the actor and elocutionist; with ladies of quality, of whom Ladies Erskine and Bradshaigh were the most unfortunate; and with a number of the clerical body, numbering one bishop and several clergymen; one of whom, a Mr. Skelton, is a hero, after the pattern of Amory's heroes. The characteristic traits of Richardson, was a certain prudence, which was yet warmed by generosity, and a tenderness of feeling, that, nevertheless, was subdued by an austere manner. His character was a good deal formed by circumstances, and undoubtedly much affected by the circle of which he was the centre. "He lived in a kind of flowergarden of ladies," who were at once his models and critics. He drew the character of his heroines from the characters he saw around him, and subjected his writings to the judgments of that body of his readers, whom he thought best fitted to appreciate them. Women, he thought-not always correctly-the best judges of female character. Dr. Johnson gives another reason for his being surrounded with women, that he loved superiority, and hated contradiction; but he has left out another point, that our author really loved their society for its own sake, and for sympathy. His own nature was somewhat feminine, and like Marmontel, and Hume, and Cowper, he found the society of virtuous women most congenial to his mind. Wordsworth is a rare instance of a man, living for years chiefly in the society of his sister and wife, whose writings exhibit few or no traces of the influence of female conversation. Authors who have honestly enjoyed the delights of a home, and the affec tions of wife and children, have, in most cases, been apt to express their sincere gratification in lively colors, and to modify their views of life and human nature by the influences a fortunate home can alone exercise. Such passages are read with pleasure in Hunt, and Lamb, and Jean Paul, and Goethe. A variety of slight anecdotes gives us sufficient clues to the true character of Richardson: he was fond of children—always a good trait-and carried sugar-plums and candies about with him for them, as Burchell carried ginger-bread. In proof of his vanity, so much and so severely, as we think, charged against him, there is the story of his giving Speaker Onslow's servants larger veils than ordinary, in order to command their respectful deportment. This tells, at least, as much against their master as against Richardson; and, after all, may be only an envious exaggeration. He was always a liberal man, and may have been profuse to the servants from no other feelings that those of generosity. It is true, Richardson liked attention, as who does not, who deserves it? It is true his correspondents indulge freely in compliments, and sometimes in extravagant praises. His works generally formed the subject of conversation, when he was present. But then we are to consider the novelty of the form of writing he originated, its unprecedented success, that it was to woman he devoted his talent, and from women expected his praises; that his great and general reputation threw a lustre over his private life; that he was, moreover, a man of acute sensibility, and such men are generally vain and generous, the two passions appearing to take their rise in a complexional temperament, and peculiar intellectual constitution, and finally running very much into each other. Richardson always had about him a number of young women, whom he treated as daughters, and whom he appears to have been more attached to than to his children. His girls, he called them. They were at one period Miss Mulso, afterwards Mrs. Chapone; Miss Highmore, sister to the painter, and afterwards Mrs. Duncomb, marrying a gentleman she met at Richardson's; a niece to Secker, the Bishop, to whom Pope gave "a heart;" Miss Prescott; Miss Fielding; Miss Collier. These ladies constituted a sort of virtuous harem, where the main business done, was listening to the letters fresh from the pen of Richardson, and proceeding in their criticisms as he read. When we consider the way of life of Richardson, in the midst of his admiring coterie, and contrast it with a Turk's seraglio, we are at once reminded of the lines of Congreve's two lovers, one of whom thus addresses the other: You take her body, I her mind- Richardson seems to have resolved this question for himself, by choosing the latter, An odious feature, we had almost forgotten to remark, in Richardson, and which we will dismiss now very briefly, is his mean jealousies of his rivals, Fielding and Sterne; of both he speaks with great, and we hope, ignorant contempt. He speaks of that "brat," Tom Jones; of its run being over "with us;" of its not being tolerated in France; of almost every character in it, with scornful disdain. Amelia comes off little better. He can read only the first volume. It is all so low. Parson Adams he appears to regard as a pure burlesque. He allows Fielding low humor, but nothing else. He can see nothing but indecencies and irreligion in Sterne: to his finest strokes he is wholly indifferent. The correspondence of Richardson forms a voluminous collection, to the entire perusal of which we would, by no means invite the reader, but would particularly urge a reading of the very interesting biographical account of Mrs. Barbauld; a discriminating production. The fullest portion is the correspondence of Mrs. Bradshaigh, the history of which contains a strange mixture of absurdity and romance. She wrote, for a long time, under the assumed name of Mrs. Belfour, entirely a stranger to Richardson, and after revealing her name, and making an appointment to meet our author in the Park; to enable her to recognise him, he sent her a minute description of his gait, and personal appearance, and manner in the street. She several times disappointed him. He, an old man, with a large family, patrolled the public walks daily to see her, with all the ardour of a youthful lover; which anxiety, she, with a coquetry natural to her sex, kept in suspense for some time. Her letters, and his answers, turn either almost wholly on a discussion of the characters of his novels, or of topics incidentally touched upon. and most attractive, correspondence, to our whole collection, is that of Klopstock's wife, of which the least praise we can give it is, that it is worthy of a wife of a poet. It seems she was first attracted to Richardson by his novels, then, and we believe still, very popular with the Germans. She gives him a history of her engagement with Klopstock, how she first became attached to him, how he won upon her by his noble aspirations and purity, how she venerated him—then a mere youth,—how she lived so happily; her thoughts of him during his absence, and her continued joy in his presence. All this is told in a charming style, a vein of simple tenderness, which a crude critic will be sure to call lackadaisical, but which a genuine critic will read with The very best minds, in the pleasure. She calls upon Richardson, in what certainly reads a little extravagantly, to paint an Angel, since he has done all that can be done for humanity. From the characters of the writers, generally, we may gather the tenor of their letters. Those of Richardson himself, have a very unpleasant formality about them. He is somewhat, it must be confessed, of a proser, and if not writing to those who solicited his correspondence, would have been regarded as no great accession to a list of letter-writing friends. He has sense, but no vivacity: his lively attempts are very awkward. He is a clumsy humorist, and by no means a refined sentimental writer. The sources and occasions of his sympathy are always palpable, and meagerly expressed. His style is loose and bald, and nowhere shows the close thinker, nor accurate author. Thus much of Richardson, the familiar correspondent; we hope to be able to say more of the author of Clarissa Harlowe. XXV. THOMAS MOORE. THE present century has produced many able writers, some brilliant critics and essayists, careful and scrutinizing authors in history and philosophy, a few men of real wit, one or two true humorists, many sweet, lively versifiers, and, fewest of all, a band of genuine poets. But in the list which includes Byron, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, and Shelley, posterity will not place the name of Moore, who, at the present moment enjoys, perhaps, a more varied and general, not to say |