ung cousins and I went down with him to wait for
the mail in the marketplace. We found Mr. Wordsworth walking about
before the post-office door in very charming mood. His spirits were
excited by the bright morning sunshine, and he entered at once on a full
flow of discourse. He looked very benevolently on Henry as he mounted on
the top of the coach, and seemed quite disposed to give an old man's
blessing to the young man entering on an untried field, and then (nowise
interrupted by the hurrying to and fro of ostlers with their smoking
horses, or passengers with their carpet bags) he launched into a
dissertation, in which there was, I thought, a remarkable union of his
powerful diction, and his practical, thoughtful good sense, on the
subject of college habits, and of his utter distrust of all attempts to
nurse virtue by an avoidance of temptation. He expressed also his entire
want of confidence (from experience he said) of highly-wrought religious
expression in youth. The safest training for the mind in religion he
considered to be a contemplating of the character and personal history
of Christ. 'Work it,' he said, 'into your thoughts, into your
imagination, make it a real presence in the mind.' I was rejoiced to
hear this plain, loving confession of a Christian faith from Wordsworth.
I never heard one more earnest, more as if it came out of a devoutly
believing heart.

[247] The close of Lady Richardson's 'Reminiscences' here in the
_Memoirs_ is not given, as being more fully introduced under December
1841, p. 438. The repetition of the same sentiments in 1843, however, is
noticeable. For a vivid and sweetly toned paper on Wordsworth by Lady
Richardson--based on the _Memoirs_--see _Sharpe's London Magazine_ for
March 1853, pp. 148-55. G.

The Oaks, March 5. 1844.

On our way to Lancrigg to-day, we called at Foxhow. We met Mr.
Wordsworth there, and asked him to go with us. It was a beautiful day,
one of his very own 'mild days' of this month. He kindly consented, and
walked with us to meet the carriage at Pelter Bridge. On our drive, he
mentioned, with marked pleasure, a dedication written by Mr. Keble, and
sent to him for his approval, and for his permission to have it prefixed
to Mr. Keble's new volumes of Latin Lectures on Poetry delivered at
Oxford. Mr. Wordsworth said that he had never seen any estimate of his
poetical powers, or more especially of his aims in poetry, that appeared
to him s