dants he treated as children, but the children were commanding
the great man! YOUNG, whose satires give the very anatomy of human
foibles, was wholly governed by his housekeeper. She thought and acted for
him, which probably greatly assisted the "Night Thoughts," but his curate
exposed the domestic economy of a man of genius by a satirical novel. If I
am truly informed, in that gallery of satirical portraits in his "Love of
Fame," YOUNG has omitted one of the most striking--his OWN! While the
poet's eye was glancing from "earth to heaven," he totally overlooked the
lady whom he married, and who soon became the object of his contempt; and
not only his wife, but his only son, who when he returned home for the
vacation from Winchester school, was only admitted into the presence of
his poetical father on the first and the last day; and whose unhappy life
is attributed to this unnatural neglect:[B]--a lamentable domestic
catastrophe, which, I fear, has too frequently occurred amidst the ardour
and occupations of literary glory. Much, too much, of the tender
domesticity of life is violated by literary characters. All that lives
under their eye, all that should be guided by their hand, the recluse and
abstracted men of genius must leave to their own direction. But let it not
be forgotten, that, if such neglect others, they also neglect themselves,
and are deprived of those family enjoyments for which few men have warmer
sympathies. While the literary character burns with the ambition of
raising a great literary name, he is too often forbidden to taste of this
domestic intercourse, or to indulge the versatile curiosity of his private
amusements--for he is chained to his great labour. ROBERTSON felt this
while employed on his histories, and he at length rejoiced when, after
many years of devoted toil, he returned to the luxury of reading for his
own amusement and to the conversation of his friends. "Such a sacrifice,"
observes his philosophical biographer, "must be more or less made by all
who devote themselves to letters, whether with a view to emolument or to
fame; nor would it perhaps be easy to make it, were it not for the
prospect (seldom, alas! realised) of earning by their exertions that
learned and honourable leisure which he was so fortunate as to attain."

[Footnote A: For some account of this place, see the chapter on "Literary
Residences" in vol. iii. p. 395, of "Curiosities of Literature."]

[Footnote B: These facts