etermination to hold on in his own
path undisturbed. Its effect in retarding the sale of his poems, and
thus depriving him of the legitimate fruits of his industry, was a
favorite topic with him in his later years; but the absence of general
appreciation, and the ridicule of what he considered his best and most
distinctive work, contributed in all probability to a still more
unfortunate result--the premature depression and deadening of his
powers. He schooled himself to stoical endurance, but he was not
superhuman, and in the absence of sympathy not only was any
possibility of development checked, but he ceased to write with the
spontaneity and rapture of his earlier verse. His resolute industry
was productive of many wise, impressive, and charitable reflections,
and many casual felicities of diction, but the poet very seldom
reached the highest level of his earlier inspirations.

Wordsworth was appointed poet-laureate on the death of Southey, in
1843. His only official composition was an ode on the installation of
the prince consort as chancellor of Cambridge University, in 1847.
This was his last writing in verse. He died at Rydal Mount, after a
short illness, on April 23, 1850, and was buried in Grasmere
Churchyard.

WASHINGTON IRVING

(1783-1859)

[Illustration: Washington Irving.]

Washington Irving, the first American who obtained a European
reputation merely as a man of letters, was born at New York, April 3,
1783. Both his parents were immigrants from Great Britain, his father,
originally an officer in the merchant service, but at the time of
Irving's birth a considerable merchant, having come from the Orkneys
and his mother from Falmouth. Irving was intended for the legal
profession, but his studies were interrupted by an illness
necessitating a voyage to Europe, in the course of which he proceeded
as far as Rome and made the acquaintance of Washington Allston. He was
called to the Bar upon his return, but made little effort to practice,
preferring to amuse himself with literary ventures. The first of these
of any importance, a satirical miscellany entitled "Salmagundi,"
written in conjunction with his brother William and J. K. Paulding,
gave ample proof of his talents as a humorist. These were still more
conspicuously displayed in his next attempt, "Knickerbocker's History
of New York" (1809). The satire of "Salmagundi" had been principally
local, and the original design of "Knickerbocker's Hist