Published Essay on Sepulchres; or, A Proposal for Erecting some Memorial of the Illustrious Dead on the Spot where their Remains have been interred, 1808. Lives of Edward and John Phillips, the nephews of Mandeville (novel), 1817. Treatise on Population, 1820. History of the Commonwealth of England, 1824-7. Cloudesley (novel), 1830. Thoughts on Man, 1831. Lives of the Necromancers, 1834. MARY WOLLSTONECRAFT, born 1759; died 1797. Published Thoughts on the Education of Daughters (pamphlet), 1786. Vindication of the Rights of Woman, 1791. Moral and Historical View of the French Republic, 1792. THOMAS HOLCROFT, born 1745; died 1809. Published Alwyn; or, The Gentleman Comedian (novel), 1780. The Road to Ruin, 1792 plays. Anna St. Ives, 1792. Hugh Trevor, 1794. Bryan Perdue, 1805. A Tour in Germany and France. Many Translations from the French and German. Mrs. ELIZABETH INCHBALD, born 1753; died 1821. Published Mogul Tale (farce); Such Things Are; The Married Man; The Wedding Day; The Midnight Hour; Every Man has his Fault; Wives as they were, and Maids as they are; Lovers' Vows (plays), from 1784. A Simple Story (novel), 1791. Nature and Art (novel), 1796. Edited by her British Theatre, 1806. Modern Theatre, 1809. Memoirs (posthumous), 1833. Miss ANNA MARIA PORTER, born 1780; died 1832. Published Artless Tales, 1793-5. Walsh Colville, 1797. Octavia, 1798. The Lakes of Killarney, 1804. A Sailor's Friendship and a Soldier's Love, 1805. Don Sebastian and the House of Braganza, 1809. The Recluse of Norway, 1814. The Feast of St. Magdalen, 1818. The Village of Mariendorpt, 1821. The Knight of St. John, 1821. Roche Blanche, 1822. Honor O'Hara, 1826. The Barony, 1830. Miss JANE PORTER, born 1776; died 1850. Published Thaddeus of Warsaw, 1803. The Scottish Chiefs, 1810. The Pastor's Fireside, 1815. Duke Christian of Luneburgh, 1824. Sir Edward Seaward's Diary, 1831. Mrs. RADCLIFFE, born 1764; died 1823. Published The Castles of Athlin and Dunbayne, 1789. The Sicilian Romance, 1790. The Romance of the Forest, 1791. The Mysteries of Udolpho, 1794. The Italian; or, The Confessional of the Black Penitents, 1797. Gaston de Blondeville; or, The Court of Henri III. resting in Ardennes St. Alban's Abbey (metrical) Poetical Pieces posthumous. WILLIAM HAZLITT, born 1778; died 1830. Published On the Principles of Human Action, 1805. Views of the English Stage The Round Table } 1817. The English Comic Writers, 1819. Characters of Shakspeare's Plays, 1817. The Dramatic Literature of the Time of Elizabeth, 1821. The Spirit of the Age, 1825. Notes of a Journey through France and Italy, 1825. The Plain Speaker, 1826. Life of Napoleon, 1828-30. Conversations of James Northcote, Esq., 1830. Rev. H. F. CARY, born 1772; died 1844. Published Sonnets and Odes, 1788. Ode to Kosciusko, 1797. Translation of the Inferno, 1805. Translation of the Divina Commedia, 1814. CHAPTER VI. THE COUNTRY. And IT is so difficult to follow a distinct classification in respect to the literary workers who are continually crossing each other's paths, appearing and reappearing in different links and windings of the same historical way, that some arbitrary mode of division is necessary. we think it better, having given such glimpses as we have been able of one section of the literary world in London, to pause for a little upon those who do not appear much in the centre of national life at all, before proceeding to the other greater and more showy region which touches the highest circles of the state, and belongs to what is called and has always been called "Society." The reign of the literary coteries in the provincial towns had begun to die out about the time of the new century; but yet we find many points of light all over the country, where men and women pursued their varied intellectual pursuits, with less delightful complacency indeed than that which distinguished the Swan of Lichfield, but still with a deeper sense of their own superiority and importance as enlighteners of the earth, than is general now among the unobtrusive professors of literature. So near London as Hampstead, Joanna Baillie, the most modest of women, but the most ambitious of female poets, lived for the greater part of a long life. We cannot feel that, great as her reputation was, and high as was the opinion expressed of her by many of her most distinguished contemporaries, we should be justified in leaving out that prefix and ranking her boldly among the poets without distinction of sex. That she was superior to many men of her time is no reason for claiming for her an approach to the circle of the greatest: and to name her with Wordsworth or with Coleridge would be folly, although there is now and then a Shakspearian melody in her blank verse which pleased the general ear more than the stronger strain of the Excursion, and stood no unfavourable comparison with the diction of Coleridge's dramas. It is evident that she herself aimed at a reputation not inferior to theirs, and that the consciousness of a lofty purpose, and the applause of "those qualified to judge," which she received in no stinted measure, and indeed the favour of the public, which demanded several editions of the first volume of her Plays on the Passions, gave her a certain dignified sense of merit, such as of itself impresses the reader, and disposes him to grant the claim so gravely and modestly put forth. Personally no one could be less disposed to plume herself upon her genius, or claim the applause of society; but that she seriously believed herself to have produced great works, which the world would not let die, is we think very clear. And so thought Scott, whose opinion has so much right to be received and honoured. A woman might well think much of her work of whom he had said that "the harp" had been silent "by silver Avon's holy shore" for two hundred years until— 66 -She, the bold enchantress, came Dreamed their own Shakspeare lived again!" |