ticularly suffered under the assaults of political economy and useful knowledge-a Fairy Tale, the last, we suppose, that will ever be written in England, and unique in its kind. It is neither German nor French. It is what it is pure as a crystal in diction, tinted like an opal with the hues of an everspringing sunlit fancy.' And speaking of the fine metrical skill shown in one of the poems, the reviewer remarks, "These surely are lines which would have pleased the ear of Collins-or of the Coleridge." (Article on "British Poetesses,'' vol. 67, p. 411.) The death of Coleridge, in 1834, brought to his daughter a new set of literary duties, first shared with her husband, and then fulfilled by herself alone. The filial work occupied her whole authorship during the remainder of her life-though much was done, which, it is hoped, will appear in the form of literary remains. Her husband was Coleridge's literary executor, to whom was committed the delicate trust of collecting and arranging for publication the scattered remains of that remarkable mind. Mr. H. N. Coleridge was, however, not only a man of letters and an author, but was occupied in a responsible and laborious profession; and it is reasonable to suppose valuable assistance was given to him by his wife, in the compilation of her father's literary remains, and in the editing of his works. During the decline of her husband's health, she was his helpmate also in his professional labors; and when it is mentioned that she was his amanuensis in copying papers for him as a chancery-barrister, it will be seen that her pen, fit as it was for creative or poetic service, was ready, for her husband's help, to do the mechanical drudgery of the most technical and unattractive copying. The last ten years of Mrs. Coleridge's life were years of widowhood; for her marriage vow was such as, in Spenser's phrase, "would endless matrimony make," and when her wedded happiness on earth was over, it left sorrowing memories of the past, and Christian hope of its restoration in the life to come. To this subject I have found allusion made by Mrs. Coleridge, once, and once only, and then with a delicacy and depth of emotion very expressive in its reserve, and characteristic of a nature in which the powers of thought and the susceptibilities of affection were so well adjusted. In a soul so constituted, the memory of the dead husband, and all the feelings which clung to it, were things too sacred for any sentimental soliciting of sympathy; they belonged to the silence of self-communing thought. The passage referred to is in one of the notes to her edition of the "Biographia Literaria," in which she replies to some remarks of Mr. Dequincey's on the infelicity of the marriages of men of letters, and his sarcastic comment on the happy phrase, “social silence," which had been used by Coleridge. The whole note is very interesting, and in Mrs. Coleridge's best vein, but the sentences which, for my present purpose, I must tear from their context, are as follows: * "On the domestic part of the subject, Mr. Dequincey expresses opinions rather different from those which my experience has led me to form; I pity the man who cannot enter into the pleasure of 'social silence,' and finds nothing in Mr. Coleridge's description of a literary man's evening but a theme of sarcasm. Somewhere else Mr. Dequincey eloquently declares that, 'every man who has once dwelt with passionate love on the fair face of some female companion through life, must have commended and adjured all-conquering Time, there at least, and upon that one tablet of his adoration, "To write no wrinkle with his antique hand.' "There is a tenderness of feeling in this, but a still better feeling is displayed in strains like those of Mr. Wordsworth, which, not content with drily exposing the emptiness of any such rebellion against the laws that season all things for the inexorable grave,' supply reflections whereby, even in this life, Time may be set at defiance-grace and loveliness may be discerned in every age, as long as the body continues to be a translucent tenement of the mind. But without contending any longer on behalf of those whose charms of youth are departed or transmuted, I do maintain that a wife, whether young or old, may pass her evenings most happily in the presence of her husband, occupied herself, and conscious that he is still better occupied, though he may but speak with her and cast his eyes upon her from time to time; that such evenings may be looked forward to with great desire, and deeply regretted when they are passed away forever." (Appendix Note O.) The literary labors of Mrs. Coleridge, during the ten years of her widowed life, were devoted to one pursuit-the completion of what her husband had begun—the editorial care of her father's writings, and the guardianship of his character as a poet, a critic, and most of all, as a Christian philosopher. These labors had a moral impulse in the genial sense of duty to the memory of both her father and her husband. It was fit filial and conjugal work; and intellectually it gave full scope to her genius and learning in following the footsteps of her father. There was, too, extraordinary unselfishness in it; for the work was necessarily immethodical and desultory; and thus there have been expended, in the fragmentary form of notes, and prefaces, and appendices, an amount of original thought and an affluence of learning, which, differently and more prominently presented, would have made her famous. But it was her father's fame, and not her own, that was foremost in her thoughts; and it is this that puts her character in such fine contrast with the self-considering temper of common authorship. There is not one woman in a thousand, nor one man in ten thousand, who would be content to be thus prodigal of the means of celebrity. Mrs. Coleridge's editorship comprehended first, the "Biographia Literaria" (which her husband had commenced), then the "Aids to Reflection," and afterward the "Notes on Shakspeare and the Dramatists," the "Essays on his own Times," and other of her father's works. In her notes and other additions are proved respectively her powers of criticism and of reasoning, especially in theology. The "Essay on Rationalism," involving a discussion of the subject of Baptismal Regeneration, though in form simply a prefatory note to the "Aids to Reflection," is a treatise which, as the composition of a woman, may be pronounced unparalleled: there is no instance in which a woman has traveled so far and so firmly into the region of severe study or sustained such continuous processes of argumentation-the subject demanding, too, extensive research in doctrinal theology. A beautiful proof of her genius and of her varied power, both as a writer of prose and as a poet, occurs in one of the notes, when, in answer to a theological dogma, in support of which a passage from "The Christian Year" had been quoted, she first treats the truth she is contending for as a question of strict logic and theological authority, and then turning, as it were, to the great living master of sacred song, who had been cited, she appeals to him in a strain of verse which is comparable to his own-as song in the service of the highest truth. The most attractive of Mrs. Coleridge's writings, in connection with her editorial labors, will be found in her criticisms-especially those on poetry. Her comment on "The Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle" may be mentioned as one of the choicest pieces of criticism in the language. In comment-at once imaginative and analytical (and such must be the best criticism on art in any of its forms)-upon poetry, she possessed much of her father's peculiar ability, and some powers, in which, perhaps, she excelled him. One of her most remarkable editorial enterprises was the work to which she gave the title of "Essays on his own Times, by S. T. Coleridge." This required her to identify and collect her father's contributions to the London newspaper press during some of the early years of this century—a task of peculiar difficulty to which no hand but one strengthened by filial zeal such as hers would have been equal. This undertaking carried Mrs. Coleridge into the sphere of political history; and the original introductory "Sections" are no less noticeable than her writings on literature, art, or theology. The two chapters devoted to a comparison of British and American civilization, contain the most judicious and impartial discussion of the social and intel lectual condition of the two countries which has been written. In the last letter which she wrote to a friend in this country, she spoke of America as "a land in which she would never cease to take an interest." Of the spirit with which, throughout her editorial writings, Mrs. Coleridge advocated her father's character-as a man, an author, and a philosopher-it is enough to say that it was a daughter's love and a woman's strong sense of truth blended together-filial piety and earnest truthfulness in perfect harmony. On this subject it will be far better to cite her own words-both prose and-what she could at need command-a strain of exquisite moral verse. "I have not striven" (she said) "to conceal any of my natural partialities, or to separate my love of my father from my moral and intellectual sympathy with his mode of thought. I have endeavored to give the genuine impressions of my mind respecting him, believing that if reporters will but be honest, and study to say that, and that alone, which they really think and feel, the color which their opinions and feelings may cast upon the subject they have to treat of, will not finally obscure the truth. Of this I am sure, that no one ever studied my father's writings earnestly, and so as to imbibe the author's spirit, who did not learn to care still more for truth than for him, whatever interest in him such a study may have inspired. "These few lines are an attempt to bring out a sentiment which my father once expressed to me on the common saying that 'Love is blind': "Passion is blind, not Love: her wond'rous might Informs with three-fold power man's inward sight;- And better none its stains of frailty know, Than they who fain would see it white as snow." -Biog. Lit. (ed. of 1847) p. clxxxiv. Thus finely versified and vivified with imagination is set forth a moral truth-precious in the study alike of character and of liter ature. Mrs. Coleridge took a cordial delight in correspondence with those who enjoyed her friendship; and should her letters be collected for publication, her genius and learning, and the strength and gentleness of her nature, will be seen in a very pleasing form. It is no exaggeration to say that the literature of familiar letterwriting has produced nothing which can compare with them. It is not only that they are highly intellectual, and even learned com. positions, but they are genuine letters withal-genuine specimens of what a woman excels in. Her letters are remarkable, indeed, for activity and reach of thought, and for varied and extensive |