ought to have done,' alluding, doubtless, to the rupture with Lloyd, and to his knowledge that Lamb was being alienated from him by Lloyd.

6

In March there had been talk of a third edition of Coleridge's poems, and on hearing of it Lloyd begged Cottle to 'persuade' Coleridge to omit his. This caused Coleridge to reply, smilingly, that no persuasion was needed for the omission of verses published at the earnest request of the author; and that though circumstances had made the Groscollian motto1 now look ridiculous, he accepted the punishment of his folly, closing his letter with the characteristically sententious reflection By past experience we build up our moral being.'2 The story is much obscured by Cottle. He mixes up with it the Higginbottom Sonnets of November 1797, and omits to supply his documents with dates, but it would seem that by June some sort of reconciliation between Lloyd and Coleridge had been patched up. 'I love Coleridge,' wrote Lloyd to Cottle,3 and can forget all that has happened'; but things must have gone wrong again, for Lloyd resumed, and too successfully, his attempt to poison Lamb's mind. On July 28, Lamb wrote thus to Southey: Samuel Taylor Coleridge, to the eternal regret of his native Devonshire, emigrates to Westphalia. "Poor Lamb" (these were his last words), "if he wants any knowledge, he may apply to me." . . . I could not refrain from sending him the following propositions, to be by him defended or oppugned (or both) at Leipsic or Göttingen'; and then come the Theses quædam Theologica. If any such speech was ever uttered by Coleridge, it must have been curiously misrepresented to have aroused in Lamb's gentle spirit the extreme bitterness manifested in the letter 5 he wrote to Coleridge conveying the Theses. In after-years Lamb told Coleridge that the brief alienation between them had been caused by Lloyd's tattle, adding that Lloyd's unfortunate habit had wrought him other mischief.* The quarrel must have been a source of much pain to Coleridge, who was doubtless conscious of having thought no evil of Lamb. His feelings towards Lloyd had by this time (July 1798) been embittered by the publication of Edmund Oliver, the novel in which, under the thinnest disguise, and in no particularly friendly spirit, Coleridge's enlistment and other adventures had been introduced. The irritation could not have failed to be increased by the circumstances, that the book was dedicated to Charles Lamb, and published by Cottle.

In May, Cottle was invited to Alfoxden and spent a week there. During this visit, arrangements were made for the publication of the Lyrical Ballads, and he carried off with him the MS. of The Ancient Mariner. The price of the copyright was fixed at thirty guineas, payable in the last fortnight of July-the money being necessary to our plan,' wrote Coleridge-the plan being doubtless the German one,

[Coleridge, in 1821] spoke in the highest terms of affection and consideration of Lamb. Related the circumstance which gave rise to The Old Familiar Faces. Charles Lloyd, in one of his fits, had shown to Lamb a letter, in which Coleridge had illustrated the cases of vast genius in proportion to talent, and predominance of talent in conjunction with genius, in the persons of Lamb and himself. Hence a temporary coolness, at the termination of which, or during its continuance, these beautiful verses were written' (Allsop's Letters, etc. p. 141). The Old Familiar Faces was first printed in Blank Verse (by C. L. and C. Ll.) 1798, and dated 'January 1798. As this date is probably correct, the 'friend of my

bosom' was certainly Coleridge; the friend whom Lamb had 'left like an ingrate,' Lloyd,—and Allsop's (or Coleridge's) recollection, therefore, as regards Lamb's verses, at fault.

1 See 'APPENDIX K,' IV. p. 539.

2 S. T. C. to Cottle, March 8, 1798, in Rem. p. 164.

3 Birmingham, June 7, 1798. In the same letter he mentions that Lamb had quitted him the day before after a fortnight's visit, and that he will write to Coleridge (Rem. p. 170). 4 Ainger's Letters of Lamb, i. 88.

5 Ainger's Letters of Lamb, i. 321.

6 See 'Note 113,' p. 600, and 'Note 116,' p. 607.

although its details had not then been finally arranged. It was probably with the view of consulting the Wedgwoods* that about the middle of June, Coleridge paid them a visit at Stoke d'Abernon, near Cobham,1 during which he learnt that Godwin was anxious to be reintroduced to him. Coleridge hopes to see him in the following week, but I do not think the meeting took place until 1800. On the 3rd August he was with the Wordsworths at Bristol, and wrote to Poole that he considered 'the realisation of the [German] scheme of great importance to his intellectual activity, and, of course, to his moral happiness.' 2 He is doubtful whether Mrs. Coleridge should accompany him, but inclined to think that as this would involve 'borrowing,' he had better go alone-at first, at all events. He begs for Poole's advice to be laid before him on his return to Stowey, in a week, after he has taken a 'dart into Wales.' The Wordsworths had quitted Alfoxden at Midsummer, and, after staying a week with the Coleridges, they walked to Bristol, where they took lodgings, and superintended the printing of the Lyrical Ballads. Before the end of August they were in London, in readiness for their journey.

We have no details, but during these weeks it must have been settled that Mrs. Coleridge should remain at Stowey, under the wing of Poole, and that Coleridge should take with him a young Stowey man named John Chester, of whom Hazlitt has left a graphic account in My first acquaintance with Poets. Coleridge met the Wordsworths in London about the 10th September, and spent a few hurried days. He arranged with Johnson (Cowper's publisher), in St. Paul's Churchyard, for the printing of the little quarto which contains Fears in Solitude, etc.,3 but unfor

* It may be as well, at this point, to clear away a misunderstanding with regard to the relations between the Wedgwoods on the one part, and Coleridge and Wordsworth on the other, in the matter of the cost of the German expedition. In her very interesting mélange, A Group of Englishmen (1871, p. 98), Miss Meteyard quotes from the accounts - current between the Wedgwoods and their Hamburg Agents, P. and O. Von Axen, entries of large payments to Coleridge and Wordsworth during the poet's residence in Germany. She jumps to the conclusion, which unfortunately has been accepted by biographers of both, that (1) Wordsworth's expenses came out of the Wedgwoods' pockets, and (2) that this was the case also with Coleridge's, over and above his annuity. I know nothing at all about the matter as regards Wordsworth, but I would submit that nothing could well be more improbable than that he received any pecuniary assistance from the Wedgwoods, with whom he was never on any specially intimate terms. He needed none, his narrow means being strained no more by residence in Germany than at Alfoxden. I have no doubt that Wordsworth simply banked with Von Axens under an ordinary 'Letter of Credit' issued, for due consideration, by the Wedgwoods. In Coleridge's case there could have been no 'consideration,' and he seems to have been

allowed to overdraw the instalments of his annuity, but I know that all such overdrawings were debited to it, and that no extra allowance was granted to him over and above. Whether he ever repaid these overdrawings, I cannot say, but I know nothing to the contrary. In Dec. 1799 he told Southey that he was striving hard to clear himself, his German expenses having necessitated the anticipation of the whole of his annuity for the year 1800. There are other allusions to the same effect in his correspondence with Poole. There are also several indications that the amounts appearing to Coleridge's debit in the Von Axens' accounts include Chester's expenses as well as his own.

† He describes Chester as having been attracted to Coleridge's discourse as bees in swarming-time to the sound of a brass pan, and as following the poet about as a faithful collie. Coleridge makes no allusion to Chester in his published letters from Germany, but Carlyon (Early Years and Late Reflections, i. 131) speaks of him as one whose honest good nature had made him a favourite with us all.' He remained with Coleridge in Germany and returned with him.

1 T. Poole and his Friends, i. 271.

2 Ib. i. 272.

3 See APPENDIX K,' V. p. 544, post.

tunately he found no time for his most important call-that on Daniel Stuart respect-ing promised contributions to the Morning Post. The party left London on the 14th, and, having taken packet at Yarmouth on the 16th, reached Hamburg on the third day after.

The volume of Lyrical Ballads, with a few other Poems, had been published a few days before. It was anonymous, and in the preface ('Advertisement') no hint was given that more than one author was concerned. Coleridge's contributions were :-The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere (p. 512; see also 'Note 112,' p. 593); The Foster-Mother's Tale (p. 83); The Nightingale: a Conversation Poem (p. 131; see also 'Note 121,' p. 611); and The Dungeon (p. 85). The reception accorded to the little volume was far from being enthusiastic, but, everything considered, was not altogether discreditable to the reviewers. If they were shocked by the Ancient Mariner, so were Southey and Lloyd, and so, a little, was William Wordsworth. They saw merit in Goody Blake and in The Thorn and in The Idiot Boy, but only Southey, among them all, took the least notice of Lines at Tintern Abbey. He was likewise alone in noticing the Lines left on a Yew-tree Seat; and not even he was attracted by 'It is the first mild day of March,' or 'Written in Early Spring,' or by the exquisite close of Simon Lee-plain evidence of the small extent to which the sweet influences of Cowper and Burns had up to that time affected the dry places of metropolitan criticism. The sale of the volume was slow, but the poets heard nothing at all about it during their absence, except a cheerful report from Mrs. Coleridge that the Lyrical Ballads are not liked at all by any.'1

V. GERMANY

The passage from Yarmouth and the events of the early days spent by the united party at Hamburg, are amusingly described by Coleridge in his Satyrane's Letters.' 2 In Hamburg they greatly enjoyed themselves in simple tourist fashion. They met Klopstock and had discussions, of greater length than importance, with him on the literatures of their respective countries. After four days' junketing, Coleridge went off by himself to Ratzeburg, carrying a letter of introduction to the Amtmann (Magistrate) of that town, who introduced him to a pastor, with whom he arranged to live (himself and Chester) en pension. He then returned to Hamburg, said good-bye to the Wordsworths, and on the 1st October departed again for Ratzeburg, remaining there for the next four months. The early separation from the Wordsworths has never been explained, and has given rise to unfounded suspicions, such as those which seized on Charles Lamb when he heard the news 3 that the poets had quarrelled. The only allusion to the reasons

1 T. Poole and his Friends, i. 301. Cottle wrote to neither. The account he gives of his dealings with the book (Rem. pp. 257-258) must be untrue, and the letter from Wordsworth (p. 258) is garbled. The original is in the Forster Library.

2 Spenser's Satyrane (F.Q. I. vi.)—

'Who far abroad for strange adventures sought.' The Letters were first printed in The Friend

C

for Nov. 23, Dec. 7, and Dec. 21, 1809. They were reprinted in the Biog. Lit. vol. ii. Coleridge, I believe, saw Klopstock only on the first occasion, and the whole of the account of the conversations must have been taken from Wordsworth's notes, for the language used was French, which was unintelligible to Coleridge.

3 Lamb to Southey, Nov. 28, 1798 (Ainger's ed. i. 98).

d

Year

with which I am acquainted is contained in a letter from Poole,1 which apparently reflects Coleridge's account of the matter. The Wordsworths have left you-so there is an end of our fears about amalgamation, etc. I think you both did perfectly right. It was right for them to find a cheaper situation; and it was right for you to avoid the expense of travelling, provided you are where pure German is spoken.' He adds, 'You will, of course, frequently hear from Wordsworth,'-which proves that the separation took place under no shadow even of momentary unfriendliness. On the day on which the Wordsworths left Hamburg for Goslar (vid Brunswick), William wrote to Poole: 'Coleridge has most likely informed you that he and Chester have settled at Ratzeburg. Dorothy and I are going to speculate further up the country.' They went further only to fare worse, for at Goslar they were nearly frozen to death, and saw little or nothing of German society, and learnt little or nothing of the language 2 or literature. Wordsworth, however, did better, for he wrote some of his best poetry, though of course he could have done that under more comfortable circumstances in England. Correspondence with Coleridge was kept up,3 and in February the brother and sister seem to have visited him at Göttingen. 4 They also spent a day or two with him, in April, on their way home.5

Coleridge's purpose in remaining at Ratzeburg was to acquire a thorough knowledge of German. 'It was a regular part of my morning studies for the first six weeks of my residence at Ratzeburg, to accompany the good and kind old pastor with whom I lived, from the cellar to the roof, through garden, farm-yard, etc., and to call every, the minutest thing, by its German name. Advertisements, farces, jestbooks, and the conversation of children while I was at play with them, contributed their share to a more home-like acquaintance with the language than I could have acquired from works of polite literature alone, or even from polite society.' 6. By the end of those six weeks he 'amazes' his Stowey friends by his report of progress; and vexes them by the accounts of his home-sickness. 'You say you wish to come home,' responds Poole, and advises him to be of good cheer and think of nothing but the accomplishment of the object of his exile. He adds that Stuart is anxiously expecting the promised contributions to the Morning Post-contributions which never came.7

Coleridge certainly wrote warmly affectionate and home-sick letters to his wife and to Poole, but my impression is that he had distractions. He made little excursions into the adjoining country; the nobility and gentry' of the little town paid him much attention, for he was Coleridge, and Englishmen were naturally popular in a town which fired a salute of twenty-one guns in honour of the battle of the Nile. But the mails were very irregular, and he no doubt fretted sometimes-especially when news came that little Berkeley's inoculation had been swiftly followed by an attack of smallpox which spoiled his fair beauty. He tried total abstinence from fermented liquors, and ate little animal food, but after three months' experience of the regimen, found that though his digestion was improved and his spirits more equable, sleeplessness had been induced. With what he considered a sufficient stock

1 To Coleridge, Oct. 8, 1798. T. Poole and his Friends, i. 278.

2 The little dictionary they used lies before me-his autograph on the title-page, and some pencilled additions to the vocabulary of the second part in Dorothy's hand. It is a little Leipsic Taschenwörterbuch- Französich-Deutsches and Dsch.-Fr., costing eighteen groschen

say half-a-crown.

3 Knight's Life, i. 184. See also Hexameters, p. 137, and 'Note 125,' p. 614; and Ad Vilmum Axiologum, p. 138.

4 Knight's Life, i. 183.
5 Ib. i. 193.

6 Biog. Lit. 1817, i. 201 n.

7 T. Poole and his Friends, i. 282.

of German, he left Ratzeburg on Feb. 6 for Göttingen, where he arrived on the 12th. He matriculated at the University, where he found three Cambridge men, including two Parrys, elder brothers of the Arctic explorer. He attended the lectures 1 of Blumenbach on Physiology and Natural History; those of the rationalising Eichhorn on the New Testament 2 he studied at second-hand from a student's notes. But my chief efforts were directed towards a grounded knowledge of the German language and literature,' and he went deep into the earlier forms of the language-Gothic, etc. All this he did, and, in addition, he read and made collections for a history of the belles lettres in Germany, before the time of Lessing, and made very large collections for a life of Lessing.' 3 For these last four months,' he adds, I have worked harder than, I trust in God Almighty, I shall ever have occasion to work again: this endless transcription is such a body-and-soul wearying purgatory. I shall have bought thirty pounds' worth of books, chiefly metaphysics, and with a view to the one work, to which I hope to dedicate in silence the prime of my life; but I believe, and indeed doubt not, that before Christmas I shall have repaid myself.' On the 22nd March Carlyon arrived at Göttingen fresh from Pembroke College (Cambridge) with a travelling fellowship. With him came one or two other young men, so that there was then a friendly little band of Englishmen, with Coleridge for its centre, if not its leader. For he, we are assured, was 'the noticeable Engländer.' From Carlyon's rather dreary farrago of a book,4 thrown together when he was an old man, we learn that, as at Ratzeburg, so at Göttingen, Coleridge was not without distractions. Of course he talked he never wearied of talking, and frequently over the heads of his companions, for he tried to make metaphysicians of them. He was the life and soul of an excursion to the Harz Mountains, the outcome of which was the Lines written in the Album at Elbingerode (p. 145) and Home-sick (p. 146), and a picturesque letter to Mrs. Coleridge ('Notes' 145 and 147, pp. 620, 621). dressed badly, but I have heard him say, fixing his prominent eyes upon himself (as he was wont to do whenever there was a mirror in the room), with a singularly coxcombical expression of countenance, that his dress was sure to be lost sight of the moment he began to talk, an assertion which, whatever may be thought of its modesty, was not without truth.'

He

He had, however, fits of depression, especially when the intervals between home letters were prolonged. He describes himself as languishing for hours together in vacancy. Love, he cries out, is the vital air of his genius,5 and in Germany he has seen no one to love. A sad blow fell on him in the first days of April. Letters from Mrs. Coleridge and from Poole reached him with news that little Berkeley was dead. They were dated March 15, but the child had died on the 10th of February. Poole's letter reveals the reason of the delay 6-he feared to disturb Coleridge's mind, and would have kept him in ignorance until his arrival in England. Mrs. Coleridge seems to have shared Poole's notion, but both must have seen that they could not write at all without mentioning the sad news, and so, in a month, their hand was forced. So far from having never forgotten herself,' as Poole feigned, Mrs.

1 Biog. Lit. 1817, i. 202.

2 'Coleridge, an able vindicator of these important truths [Christian Evidences], is well acquainted with Eichhorn, but the latter is a coward, who dreads his arguments and his presence.' Parry, a fellow-student with Coleridge at Göttingen in 1799, quoted in CARLYON, i. 100 n. 3 Letter to J. Wedgwood, May 21, 1799, in

Cottle's Rem. p. 427.

4 Early Years and Late Reflections, vols. i. ii. iii. 1856; vol. iv. 1858.

5 See The Pains of Sleep, 11. 51, 52 (p. 171), and 'Note' thereon, p. 632, post.

6 Poole's letter is very interesting. See T Poole and his Friends, i. 290-295.