informing Southey of the principle upon which his biography had been compiled, It seems the publisher, with the wilfulness common to the class, had insisted on the necessity of their work being preceded by a life of its original author. In vain was it represented that there were no adequate materials for such a production. "What matters that?" said the pertinacious publisher. "Write it notwithstanding. Invent a little—invent—whether it's true or whether it's false, who'll take the trouble to inquire?" And upon this hint, wrote the lady, the work was accomplished.
A few years afterwards, he received a Dutch translation of a part of the same poem by Mrs. Bilderdijk, accompanied by a Latin letter from her husband, a veteran author of sixty years' standing. The work was dedicated to Southey, in some pathetic lines occasioned by the death of a son at sea, and she had applied some stanzas in his poem to herself before hearing of her loss. The circumstance induced Southey to decide upon a tour in Holland in the summer of 1825, purposing to visit Leyden, where his esteemed correspondent resided. He was accompanied by Neville White, Henry Taylor, and a young officer of the name of Malet. They crossed from Dover to Boulogne, visited Waterloo; and at Brussels Southey was delighted to find his old friend Verbeyst, the celebrated bookseller, thriving well in the world. He had purchased from him, on a former occasion, a copy of the "Acta Sanctorum," a light work of fifty-two folios for his evening reading, the arrival of which at Keswick formed an epoch in his life. He again roamed through his spacious shop of three hundred thousand volumes, selected his purchases, and quaffed the choice claret and Burgundy, the hospitable bibliopole produced in honour of his illustrious visitor.
A slight mishap interrupted his journey. His foot had
