o discriminating and so satisfactory. He considers praise a
perilous and a difficult thing. On this subject he often quotes his
lamented friend, Sir George Beaumont, whom, in his intercourse with men
of genius, literary aspirants, he describes as admirable in the modesty
which he inculcated and practised on this head.

The Oaks, Ambleside, July 11. 1844.

Mr. and Mrs. Wordsworth at dinner, along with our family party. Mr. and
Mrs. Price (from Rugby), two aunts of Mrs. P.'s, and her brother, Mr.
Rose, a young clergyman (a devout admirer of Wordsworth), joined us at
tea. A circle was made as large as our little parlour could hold. Mr.
Price sat next to Mr. Wordsworth, and by design or fortunate accident,
introduced some remark on the powers and the discourse of Coleridge. Mr.
Wordsworth entered heartily and largely on the subject. He said that the
liveliest and truest image he could give of Coleridge's talk was 'that
of a majestic river, the sound or sight of whose course you caught at
intervals, which was sometimes concealed by forests, sometimes lost in
sand, then came flashing out broad and distinct, then again took a turn
which your eye could not follow, yet you knew and felt that it was the
same river: so,' he said, 'there was always a train, a stream, in
Coleridge's discourse, always a connection between its parts in his own
mind, though one not always perceptible to the minds of others.' Mr.
Wordsworth went on to say, that in his opinion Coleridge had been spoilt
as a poet by going to Germany. The bent of his mind, which was at all
times very much to metaphysical theology, had there been fixed in that
direction. 'If it had not been so,' said Wordsworth, 'he would have
been the greatest, the most abiding poet of his age. His very faults
would have made him popular (meaning his sententiousness and laboured
strain), while he had enough of the essentials of a poet to make him
deservedly popular in a higher sense.'

* * * * *

Mr. Price soon after mentioned a statement of Coleridge's respecting
himself, recorded in his 'Table Talk,' namely, that a visit to the
battle-field of Marathon would raise in him no kindling emotion, and
asked Mr. Wordsworth whether this was true as a token of his mind. At
first Mr. Wordsworth said, 'Oh! that was a mere bravado, for the sake of
astonishing his hearers!' but then, correcting himself, he added, 'And
yet it might in some sense be true, for Coleridge