About this time Elwood the quaker, being recommended to him as one who would read Latin to him, for the advantage of his converfation; attended him every afternoon, except on Sundays. Milton, who, in his letter to Hartlib, had declared, that to read Latin with an English mouth is as ill a bearing as Law French, required that Elwood should learn and practise the Italian pronunciation, which, he faid, was neceffary, if he would talk with foreigners. This feems to have been a task troublesome without use. There is little reason for preferring the Italian pronunciation to our own, except that it is more general; and to teach it to an Englishman is only to make him a foreigner at home. He who travels, if he speaks Latin, may fo foon learn the founds which every native gives it, that he need make no provision before his journey; and if strangers visit us, it is their business to practise fuch conformity to our modes as they expect from us in their own countries. Elwood complied with the direc tions, and improved himself by his attendance; for he relates, that Milton, having a curious ear, knew by his voice when he read

what he did not understand, and would ftop him, and open the most difficult paffages.

5,4 så and

In a fhort time he took a house in the Artillery Walk, leading to Bunbill Fields; the mention of which concludes the register of Milton's removals and habitations. He lived longer in this place than in any other.

He was now bufied by Paradife Loft. Whence he drew the original defign has been variously conjectured, by men who cannot bear to think themselves ignorant of that which, at laft, neither diligence nor faga city can difcover. Some find the hint in an Italian tragedy. Voltaire tells a wild and unauthorised story of a farce seen by Milton in Italy, which opened thus: Let the Rainbow be the Fiddlestick of the Fiddle of Heaven. It has been already fhewn, that the first conception was a tragedy or mystery, not of a narrative, but a dramatick work, which he is supposed to have begun to reduce to its prefent form about the time (1655) when he finished his difpute with the defenders of the king.

He

He long before had promised to adorn his native country by fome great performance, while he had yet perhaps no fettled defign, and was stimulated only by fuch expectations as naturally arofe from the furvey of his attainments, and the consciousness of his powers. What he should undertake, it was difficult to determine. He was long chufing, and began late.

While he was obliged to divide his time between his private studies and affairs of state, his poetical labour must have been often interrupted; and perhaps he did little more in that busy time than conftruct the narrative, adjust the episodes, proportion the parts, accumulatè images and fentiments, and treasure in his memory, or preferve in writing, fuch hints as books or meditation would fupply. Nothing particular is known of his intellectual operations while he was a statesman; for, having every help and accommodation at hand, he had no need of uncommon expedients.

Being driven from all publick stations, he is yet too great not to be traced by curiofity

to his retirement; where he has been found by Mr. Richardíon, the fondeft of his admirers, fitting before his door in a grey coat of coarfecl:th, in warm fultry weather, to enjoy the fresh air; and fo, as well as in his own room, receiving the vifits of people of diftinguished parts as well as quality. His vifitors of high quality must now be imagined to be few; but men of parts might reasonably court the conversation of a man fo generally illustrious, that foreigners are reported, by Wood, to have visited the houfe in Bread-street where he was born.

According to another account, he was seen in a small houfe, neatly enough dressed in black cloaths, fitting in a room hung with rusty green; pale but not cadaverous, with chalkftones in his hands. He said, that if it were not for the gout, his blindness would be tolerable.

In the intervals of his pain, being made unable to use the common exercises, he ufed to fwing in a chair, and fometimes played

upon an organ.

He

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He was now confeffedly and visibly employed upon his poem, of which the grefs might be noted by those with whom he was familiar; for he was obliged, when he had compofed as many lines as his memory would conveniently retain, to employ fome friend in writing them, having, at least for part of the time, no regular attendant. This gave opportunity to observations and reports.

Mr. Philips obferves, that there was a very remarkable circumftance in the compofure of Paradife Loft, " which I have a par"ticular reafon," fays he, "to remember; "for whereas I had the perusal of it from

66

the very beginning, for fome years, as I went from time to time to visit him, in parcels of ten, twenty, or thirty verses at

time (which, being written by whatever "hand came next, might poffibly want "correction as to the orthography and point“ing), having, as the fummer came on, "not been fhewed any for a confiderable "while, and defiring the reason thereof, was “ answered, that his vein never happily flowed but from the Autumnal Equinox to the

N 4

"Vernal;