that he found delight and
advantage; for he continued his name in the book ten years, though he
took no degree. After the first four years he put on the civilian's
gown, but without showing any intention to engage in the profession.

About the time when he went to Oxford, the death of his grandmother
devolved his affairs to the care of the reverend Mr. Dolman, of Brome,
in Staffordshire, whose attention he always mentioned with gratitude.

At Oxford he employed himself upon English poetry; and, in 1737,
published a small miscellany, without his name.

He then for a time wandered about to acquaint himself with life, and was
sometimes at London, sometimes at Bath, or any other place of publick
resort; but he did not forget his poetry. He published, in 1741, his
Judgment of Hercules, addressed to Mr. Lyttelton, whose interest he
supported with great warmth at an election: this was next year followed
by the Schoolmistress.

Mr. Dolman, to whose care he was indebted for his ease and leisure, died
in 1745, and the care of his own fortune now fell upon him. He tried to
escape it awhile, and lived at his house with his tenants, who were
distantly related; but finding that imperfect possession inconvenient,
he took the whole estate into his own hands, more to the improvement of
its beauty, than the increase of its produce.

Now was excited his delight in rural pleasures, and his ambition of
rural elegance: he began, from this time, to point his prospects, to
diversify his surface, to entangle his walks, and to wind his waters;
which he did with such judgment and such fancy, as made his little
domain the envy of the great, and the admiration of the skilful; a place
to be visited by travellers, and copied by designers. Whether to plant a
walk in undulating curves, and to place a bench at every turn where
there is an object to catch the view; to make water run where it will be
heard, and to stagnate where it will be seen; to leave intervals where
the eye will be pleased, and to thicken the plantation where there is
something to be hidden; demands any great powers of mind, I will not
inquire: perhaps a surly and sullen speculator may think such
performances rather the sport than the business of human reason. But it
must be at least confessed, that to embellish the form of nature is an
innocent amusement; and some praise must be allowed, by the most
supercilious observer, to him who does best what such multitudes are
contending