at this place, I told him the avenue and bishop's walk by the
river side, the public precincts of the moated episcopal domain, had
become my favourite morning and evening lounge. I told him, indeed,
merely the fact, omitting all commentary attached to it, for often
had I then, and oftener have I since, in a solitary stroll down the
avenue, thought of him, regretting the wide chasm in our intercourse,
and musing upon human events."

There is a regret expressed by Colman that he kept no copy of his answer,
"which," he adds, "was written in the 'flow of soul,' and at the impulse
of the moment?" Mr. Lowth wrote in reply to Colman, detailing in a most
amusing manner his having, in the pursuit of two Cockneys, who had made
an attack upon a grove of Orleans plum-trees in his grounds, taken cold,
which confined him to his room.

"But for this _inter poculum et labra_," continued Mr. Lowth, "it was
my intention to have made you my first _post restante_, with,
perhaps, a walk down the old avenue, in my way to town, that
identical day; and, still hoping to accomplish three miles and back,
I have hoped from day to day, but I cannot get in travelling
condition, even for so short a journey. Therefore I hope you will
send me word by my new Yorkshire groom lad, that you will take
pot-luck with me on Sunday as the most likely day for you to
suburbise."

Colman accepted the invitation, believing from the length of Mr. Lowth's
letter (three pages), and the playfulness of his old friend's
communication, that nothing more than an ordinary cold was the matter
with him. A note, however, which followed from one of Mr. Lowth's
daughters, stated that the meeting proposed by her father must be
postponed, that he "had become extremely unwell, that bleeding and
cupping had been prescribed," and the most perfect quiet enjoined.

On the day after the receipt of this note, Colman sent over to Grove
House, Chiswick, to make inquiries as to Mr. Lowth's health, when the
reply given by an elderly female at the gate, after considerable delay,
was that "her master was no more."

A letter from Dr. Badeley to Colman, dated 22d August, 1822, confirmed
the melancholy intelligence, which he had at first hesitated to believe.
It stated that "the decease of Mr. Lowth took place on Sunday evening,"
the very evening appointed by him for their anticipated happy reunion;
and that his remains were to