expression been added also—if he had been a poet? Feelings which now fed upon his own heart, would then have found a channel, and in their flow have made a bond between him and his fellow-men; the sorrow that parts in music from the lip often dies to its own singing, and the ill-starred love of its song goes on its way, soothed by the comrades it has called up, vanity and sympathy. The poet dies not of the broken heart he sings; it is the passionate enthusiast, the lonely visionary, who makes of his own hopes, feelings, and thoughts the pyre on which himself will be consumed. The old proverb, applied to fire and water, may, with equal truth, be applied to the imagination—it is a good servant, but a bad master.
Algernon[1] was just nineteen when a warmer climate was imperatively ordered; and a few weeks saw Algernon[2] and his tutor settled in a villa near Naples—the one happy in the novelty, loveliness, and associations of Italy—the other delighted with their vicinity to a convent rich in curious old manuscripts, and to which he had obtained free access.
It was one of those glorious evenings which crowded the whole wealth of summer into one
