unfortunate young man had to sustain; for, in consequence of a recent and most iniquitous persecution of the quakers, he was apprehended at the funeral of a friend, and confined in the gaol of Aylesbury.

"But being now released," continues Ellwood, "I soon made a visit to him, to welcome him into the country.

"After some common discourses had passed between us, he called for a manuscript of his, which, being brought, he delivered to me, bidding me take it home with me, and read it at my leisure, and when I had so done, return it to him, with my judgment thereupon.

"When I came home, and set myself to read it, I found it was that excellent poem, which he entitled Paradise Lost.

"After I had, with the best attention, read it through, I made him another visit, and returned him his book, with due acknowledgment of the favor he had done me in communicating it to me. He asked me how I liked it, and what I thought of it; which I modestly and freely told him; and,

after some farther discourse about it, I pleasantly said to him, Thou hast said much here of Paradise Lost, but what hast thou to say of Paradise Found.' He made me no answer, but sat some time in a muse, then brake off that discourse, and fell upon another subject.

"After the sickness was over, and the city well cleansed, and become safely habitable again, he returned thither; and when afterwards I went to wait on him there (which I seldom failed of doing, whenever my occasions led me to London) he shewed me his second poem, called Paradise Regain'd, and in a pleasant tone, said to me,

This is owing to you, for you put it into my head, by the question your put to me at Chalfont, which before I had not thought of."

The personal regard of this ingenuous quaker for Milton, and his giving birth to a composition of such magnitude and merit as Paradise Regain'd, entitle him to distinction in a life of his great poetical friend, and I have, therefore, rather transcribed

than abridged his relation. My reader, I doubt not, will join with me in wishing that we had more sketches of the venerable bard, thus minutely delineated from the life, in the colors of fidelity and affection.

The last of Milton's familiar letters in Latin relates to this period; it speaks with devotional gratitude of the safe asylum from the plague, which he had found in the country; it speaks also with so much feeling of his past political adventures, and of the present inconvenience which he suffered from the loss of sight, that I apprehend an entire translation of it can hardly fail of being acceptable to the English reader. It is dated from London, August 15, 1666, and addressed to Heimbach, an accomplished. German, who is stiled Counsellor to the Elector of Brandenburgh. An expression in a former letter to the same correspondent, seems to intimate, that this learned foreigner, who visited England in his youth, had resided with Milton, perhaps in the character of a disciple-But here is the interesting letter:

*"If among so many funerals of my countrymen, in a year so full of pestilence and sorrow, you were induced, as you say, by rumour to believe that I also was snatched

* Ornatissimo Viro Petro Heimbachio, Electoris Brandenburgici Consiliario.

Si inter tot funera popularium meorum, anno tam gravi ac pestilenti, abreptum me quoque, ut scribis, ex rumore præsertim aliquo credidisti, mirum non est; atque ille rumor apud vestros, ut videtur, homines, si ex eo quod de salute meâ soliciti essent, increbuit, non displicet; indicium enim suæ erga me benevolentiæ fuisse existimo. Sed Dei benignitate, qui tutum mihi receptum in agris paraverat, et vivo adhuc et valeo; utinam ne inutilis, quicquid muneris in hac vita restat mihi peragendum. Tibi vero tam longo intervallo venisse in mentem mei, pergratum est; quamquam prout rem verbis exornas, præbere aliquem suspicionem videris, oblitum mei te potius esse, qui tot virtutum diversarum conjugium in me, ut scribis, admirere. Ego certe ex tot conjugiis numerosam nimis prolem expavescerem, nisi constaret in re arcta, rebusque duris, virtutes ali maxime et vigere: tametsi earum una non ita belle charitatem hospitii mihi reddidit: quam enim politicam tu vocas, ego pietatem in patriam dictam abs te mallem, ca me pulchro nomine delinitum prope, ut ita dicam, expatriavit. Reliquarum tameu chorus clare concinit. Pa

away, it is not surprising; and if such a rumour prevailed among those of your nation, as it seems to have done, because they were solicitous for my health, it is not unpleasing. for I must esteem it as a proof of their benevolence towards me. But by the graciousness of God, who had prepared for me a safe retreat in the country, I am still alive and well; and I trust not utterly an unprofitable servant, whatever duty there yet remains for me to fulfil. That you remember me, after so long an interval in our correspondence, gratifies me exceedingly, though, by the politeness of your expression, you seem to afford me room to suspect, that you

tria est, ubicunque est bene. Finem faciam, si hoc prius abs te impetravero, ut, si, quid mendose descriptum aut non interpunctum repereris, id puero, qui hæc excepit, Latine prorsus nescienti velis imputare; cui singulas plane literulas annumerare non sine miseriâ dictans cogebar. Tua interim viri merita, quem ego adolescentem spei eximia cognovi, ad tam honestum in principis gratiâ provexisse te locum, gaudeo, ceteraque fausta omnia et cupio tibi, et spero vale.

Londini, Aug. 15, 1666.