in prose
more sought after and better paid for." This is, no doubt, the reason
that his verse bears so small a proportion to his other writings. Yet it
is by the former, added to the few works of imagination which he has
left besides, that he will be known to posterity. His histories will
probably be superseded by more skilful or more accurate compilations; as
they are now read by few who can obtain information nearer to its
original sources.

In the natural manner of telling a short and humorous story, he is
perhaps surpassed by no writer of prose except Addison. In his Essays,
the style preserves a middle way between the gravity of Johnson and the
lightness of Chesterfield; but it may often be objected to them, as to
the moral writings of Johnson, that they present life to us under a
gloomy aspect, and leave an impression of despondence on the mind of the
reader.

In his poetry there is nothing ideal. It pleases chiefly by an
exhibition of nature in her most homely and familiar views. But from
these he selects his objects with due discretion, and omits to represent
whatever would occasion unmingled pain or disgust.

His couplets have the same slow and stately march as Johnson's; and if
we can suppose similar images of rural and domestic life to have
arrested the attention of that writer, we can scarcely conceive that he
would have expressed them in different language.

Some of the lines in The Deserted Village are said to be closely copied
from a poem by Welsted, called the _[Greek: Oikographia]_; but I do not
think he will be found to have levied larger contributions on it, than
most poets have supposed themselves justified in making on the neglected
works of their predecessors.

The following particulars relating to this poem, which I have extracted
from the letter of Dr. Strean before referred to, cannot fail to gratify
that numerous class of readers with whom it has been a favourite from
their earliest years.

The poem of The Deserted Village took its origin from the circumstance
of General Robert Napper (the grandfather of the gentleman who now lives
in the house within half a mile of Lissoy, and built by the General),
having purchased an extensive tract of the country surrounding Lissoy,
or _Auburn_; in consequence of which, many families, here called
_cottiers_, were removed to make room for the intended improvements of
what was now to become the wide domain of a rich man, warm with the idea
of changing