ents,
felicitous epigrams--but it is too allusive, too fantastic; neither has
it the balance and justice required for so serious and comprehensive a
task. At the same time the learning it displays is extraordinary. It was
written almost without books of reference, and out of the recollections
of a man of genius, who remembered all that he read, and considered
reading the newspaper to be one of the first duties of life.

Cory's other writings are few. Two little educational books are worth
mentioning: a book of Latin prose exercises, called _Nuces_, the
sentences of which are full of recondite allusions, curious humour, and
epigrammatic expression; and a slender volume for teaching Latin lyrics,
called _Lucretilis_, the exercises being literally translated from the
Latin originals which he first composed. _Lucretilis_ is not only, as
Munro said, the most Horatian verse ever written since Horace, but full
of deep and pathetic poetry. Such a poem as No. xxvii., recording the
abandoning of Hercules by the Argonauts, is intensely autobiographical.
He speaks, in a parable, of the life of Eton going on without him, and
of his faith in her great future:

"sed Argo
Vela facit tamen, aureumque

"Vellus petendum est. Tiphys ad hoc tenet
Clavum magister; stat Telamon vigil,
Stat Castor in prora, paratus
Ferre maris salientis ictus."

After some years in Madeira, he came back to England and settled in
Hampstead; his later days were clouded with anxieties and illness. But
he took great delight in the teaching of Greek to a class of girls, and
his attitude of noble resignation, tender dignity, and resolute interest
in the growing history of his race and nation is deeply impressive. He
died in 1892, on June II, of a heart-complaint to which he had long been
subject.

In person William Cory was short and sturdy; he was strong and vigorous;
he was like the leader whom Archilochus desired, "one who is compact of
frame, showing legs that bend outward, standing firm upon his feet, full
of courage." He had a vigorous, massive head, with aquiline nose,
and mobile lips. He was extraordinarily near-sighted, and used strong
glasses, holding his book close to his eyes. He was accustomed to bewail
his limited vision, as hiding from him much natural beauty, much human
drama; but he observed more closely than many men of greater clearness
of sight, making the most of his limited resources. He depended much
upon a hearing which was pret