_Tait_ as part of the Autobiographic Series, but, practically, it
stood as an independent paper. The touching personal passage in this
article reveals the misery caused by the unbridled scurrility of
certain notorious publications of the last generation.

The paper on _The German Language_ appeared in _Tait_ in June 1836,
and the _Brief Appraisal of Greek Literature_ in December 1838 and
June 1839.

* * * * *

Two long and valuable papers on _Education; Plans for the Instruction
of Boys in Large Numbers_, which appeared in _The London Magazine_ for
April and May, 1824, were duly authenticated by the following
characteristic letter from DE QUINCEY to CHRISTOPHER NORTH. It appears
in _Professor Wilson's Life_, written by his daughter, MRS. GORDON:--

'_London, Thursday, February 24th, 1825._

'MY DEAR WILSON,

'I write to you on the following occasion:--Some time ago, perhaps
nearly two years ago, Mr. Hill, a lawyer, published a book on
Education, detailing a plan on which his brothers had established a
school at Hazlewood, in Warwickshire. This book I reviewed in the
_London Magazine_, and in consequence received a letter of thanks from
the Author, who, on my coming to London about midsummer last year,
called on me. I have since become intimate with him, and, excepting
that he is a sad Jacobin (as I am obliged to tell him once or twice a
month), I have no one fault to find with him, for he is a very clever,
amiable, good creature as ever existed; and in particular directions
his abilities strike me as really very great indeed. Well, his book
has just been reviewed in the last _Edinburgh Review_ (of which some
copies have been in town about a week). This service has been done
him, I suppose, _through_ some of his political friends--(for he is
connected with Brougham, Lord Lansdowne, old Bentham, etc.),--but I
understand _by_ Mr. Jeffrey. Mr. Hill, in common with multitudes in
this Babylon--who will not put their trust in Blackwood as in God
(which, you know, he ought to do)--yet privately adores him as the
Devil; and indeed publicly too, is a great _proneur_ of Blackwood.
For, in spite of his Jacobinism, he is liberal and inevitably just to
real wit. His fear is--that Blackwood may come as Nemesis, and compel
him to regorge any puffing and cramming which Tiff has put into his
pocket, and is earnest to have a letter addressed in an influential
quarter to prevent this. I alleged to him