arrived at a work which closes the series I contemplated from the first, it is possible that this may be the only opportunity afforded me of expressing that high, that just, that affectionate admiration with which you have inspired me in common with all your cotemporaries, and which a French writer has not ungracefully termed "the happiest prerogative of genius." I seize this occasion, then, not as the best, but lest I should lose the last. As a Poet, and as a Novelist, your fame has attained to that height in which praise has become superfluous; but in the character of the writer, there seems to me a yet higher claim to veneration than in that of the writings. The example your genius sets us, who can emulate?—the example your moderation bequeaths to us, who shall forget? It is a great lesson to all cultivators of letters, to behold one who, in winning renown, has at last conquered envy, and
