Page:Lives of Poets-Laureate.djvu/317

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WILLIAM WHITEHEAD.
303

the aged professor in his dotage, and quite incapable of lecturing. They therefore proceeded to Dresden, and visited some of the German Courts, spending the summer of 1755 at Hanover, when George II. paid his last visit to his Electorate. Here they met Mason, who had taken orders and was with Lord Holdernesse, the Secretary of State, as his domestic chaplain. They next visited Vienna, and passed on to Italy, crossed the Alps, and travelled in Switzerland, Germany and Holland, but did not visit France, on account of the declaration of war. During his absence, Whitehead corresponded with his friends and wrote some poems on subjects suggested by the scenes through which he passed. On his return, he published an ode to the Tiber, and several elegies on classical scenes and subjects. The ode has no line that is sublime in it. There are no thoughts that breathe—no words that burn. There is in it, and the other effusions, a level smoothness and affected classicality. Since "Childe Harold" has become a handbook for the continent, and Rogers and Sotheby have poetically journalized in Italy, we grow fastidious in judging verses on the "yellow Tiber," and the Coliseum. He published among them some lines to a sick friend, the perusal of which could by no means have accelerated his convalescence.

During his absence, Lady Jersey procured for him the office of Secretary and Registrar of the Order of the Bath. He must have merited, by his conscientious discharge of his duties as their son's tutor, and by his amiable and gentle manners, the affection of this noble family, to whose interest he also owes his appointment to the Laurel, and who insisted, after the education of Lord Villiers was completed, on his tutor being a constant inmate of their house. This plan Whitehead consented to for