regaling myself, in my unscholarly way, with Mr.
Munro's admirable Lucretius. Surely, it must be one of the most
admirable Editions of a Classic ever made! I don't understand the Latin
punctuation, but I dare say there is good reason for it. The English
Translation reads very fine to me: I think I should have thought so
independent of the original: all except the dry theoretic System, which I
must say I do all but skip in the Latin. Yet I venerate the earnestness
of the man, and the power with which he makes some music even from his
hardest Atoms; a very different Didactic from Virgil, whose Georgics,
_quoad_ Georgics, are what every man, woman, and child, must have known;
but, his Teaching apart, no one loves him better than I do. I forget if
Lucretius is in Dante: he should have been the Guide thro' Hell: but
perhaps he was too deep in it to get out for a Holiday. That is a very
noble Poussin Landscape, v. 1370-8 'Inque dies magis, etc.'

I had always observed that mournful '_Nequicquam_' which comes to throw
cold water on us after a little glow of Hope. When Tennyson went with me
to Harwich, I was pointing out an old Collier rolling by to the tune of

Trudit agens magnam magno molimine navem. [iv. 902.]

That word '_Magnus_' rules in Lucretius as much as 'Nequicquam.' I was
rejoiced to meet Tennyson quoted in the notes too, and my old Montaigne
who discourses so on the text of

Pascit amore avidos inhians in te, Dea, visus. [i. 36.]

Ask Mr. Munro, when he reprints, to quote old Montaigne's Version of

Nam verae voces tum demum, etc. [iii. 57.]

'A ce dernier rolle de la Mort, et de nous, il n'y a plus que feindre, il
faut parler Francais; il faut montrer ce qu'il y a de bon et de net dans
le fond du pot.' {219a} And tell him (damn my impudence!) I don't like
my old Fathers '_dancing_' under the yellow and ferruginous awnings.
{219b} . . .

There is a coincidence with Bacon in verses 1026-9 of Book II.
(Lucretius, I mean).

_To John Allen_.

MY DEAR ARCHDEACON,

I have little else to send you in reply to your letter (which I believe
however was in reply to one of mine) except the enclosed from Notes and
Queries: which I think you will like to read, and to return to me.

I think I will send you (when I can lay hand on it) two volumes of some
one's Memorials of Wesley's Family: which you can look over, if you do
not read, and return to me also. I wonder at your writing to me that I