86 DERMODY. excited their compassion, and profited by their generosity, than he neglected their advice.” He now acquired the patronage of Sir James Bland Burges, who interested himself greatly in his behalf, and procured him relief from the Literary Fund. Him, however, he offended, by paying him a visit when in a state of intoxication, and creating a disturbance in his house. From Sir James he was patronised by Mr. Addington, and through his means, produced another volume of poems as beautiful as the former. At length, after having run from one scene of low de pravity to another, until his constitution was undermined, and “reason was beginning to totter on her throne;” worn with disease, the inevitable consequences of habitual in temperance, death seized his victim with one hand, and opening the portals of eternity with the other, commanded the soul to escape from the earthly tenement, which had so long disgraced i t
dying a t a wretched hovel near Sydenham, July 15, 1802, i n the twenty-eighth year o f his age. He was one o f those unhappy young men, who pre ferred a life o f daring profligacy t o the dull and unvariable sameness of virtue; and the time that should have been occupied i n the cultivation o f his talents, was uselessly spent i n their display. He united a depth o f poetic in tellect, and a great harmony o f versification rarely t o b e met with i n the same individual; and could turn with equal facility “from grave t o gay, from sullen t o serene;” but i f we thus praise his excellence i n poetry, how shall we extol his classical attainments? Horace and Homer he was alike acquainted with, and could unabashed, before a large company, read a passage i n either
then put the book i n his pocket, and give a fine poetic translation o f the passage h e had just delivered; and likewise t o his credit b e i t recorded, that before h e had attained his fifteenth year, h e had acquired a competent knowledge o f the Greek, the Latin, the French, and Italian languages, and knew a little o f the Spanish.
