e side looked like a jungle in the hills, but was rich in
colour and perfume. The gates were open and they could see the
slatternly negro servants moving languidly about the rooms on the
ground floor, while two slept under the banana tree. A gallery
traversed the second story, its pillars covered with dusty vines. All
of the rooms of this story evidently opened upon the gallery, but
every door was closed. The general air of neglect and decay was more
pathetic to Anne, accustomed to exemplary housekeeping, than anything
she had yet heard of the poet. He was uncomfortable and ill-cared for,
no doubt of that. The humming-birds were darting about like living
bits of enamel set with jewels. The stately palms glittered like
burnished metal. Before the house, on the deep blue waters of the bay,
was a flotilla of white-sailed fishing-boats, and opposite was the
green and gold mass of St. Kitts, an isolated mountain chain rising as
mysteriously from the deep as the solitary cone of Nevis. She could
conceive of no more inspiring spot for a poet, but she sighed again as
she thought of the slatterns that miscared for him.

Lord Hunsdon echoed her sigh as they walked on. "Even here he
disappears for days at a time," he resumed. "Of course he does not
drink steadily. No man could do that in the tropics and live. But
spirits make a madman of him, and even when sober he now shuns the
vicinity of respectable people, knowing that they regard him as a
pariah. Of course his associates--well, I cannot go into particulars.
For a time I did not believe these stories, for each year brought a
volume from his pen, which showed a steady increase of power, and a
divine sense of beauty. Besides I have been much absorbed these last
few years. There seemed no loosening the hold of the Whigs upon the
destinies of England and it was every patriot's duty to work with all
his strength. You followed, of course, the tremendous battle that
ended in last year's victory. I was almost worn out with the struggle,
and when I found that these stories about Warner were persistent I
came out to investigate for myself. Alas! I had not heard the half. I
spent three months with him in that house. I used every argument,
every more subtle method I could command, to bring him to see the
folly and the wickedness of his course. I might as well have addressed
the hurricane. He did not even hate life. He was merely sick of it. He
was happy only when at work upon a new poem--