fer sadly at the hand of their chronicler. Scott misrepresents
Napoleon, and Southey fails equally in his Memoirs of Cowper and of the
Wesleys. Friendship's colors are too bright for correct portraiture, and
prejudice equally forbids acuracy. Mr. Pierre M. Irving, though an
admirer of his distinguished kinsman, (and who that knew him could fail
of admiration?) avoids the character of a mere eulogist, while at the
same time he exhibits none of the obsequiousness of a Boswell,
fluttering like a moth about a huge candle. Being a man of independent
mind and of high culture, he brings out the character he portrays in
aspects true to life, and not exaggerated by excess of tone, while he
fully exhibits its exquisite finish.

Among the many incidents of deep interest which are contained in this
volume, the episode of Matilda Hoffman stands forth in most striking
relief. While lifting the veil which for a half-century covered the most
pathetic event in Irving's life, his biographer touches with a
scrupulous delicacy a theme so sacredly enshrined in a life-long memory.
In referring to this affair, which gave a tender aspect to Irving's
subsequent career, and in fact changed its whole tenor, we may remark
that the loves of literary men form a most interesting and, in some
cases, moving history. Some, like Petrarch, Earl Surrey, Burns, and
Byron, have embalmed the objects of their affection in the effusions of
their muse, while others have bequeathed that duty to others. Shakspeare
says but little about his sweetheart, while Milton, who was decidedly
unsuccessful in matters of the heart, seems to have acted on the motto,
'The least said, the soonest mended.' Poor Pope, miserable invalid
though he was, nervous, irritable, and full of hate and spleen, was not
beyond the power of the tender passion, and confessed the charms of the
lonely Martha Blount, who held the wretched genius among her conquests.
Swift, although an ogre at heart, had his chapter of love matters, which
never fail to give us the horrors when we bring them to mind, and the
episodes of Stella and Vanessa are among the minor tragedies in life's
great drama. Johnson had a great heart, and was born to love, though,
like the lion, he needed to have his claws pared, to fit him for female
society. What a tender attachment was that which he bore 'Tetty,' and
with what solemn remembrance he preserved her as his own, even after
death had robbed him of her presence!

The love