ance of £400 a-year. This, as yet, was the most profitable engagement he had entered into. He took an interest in the subject, and calculated that if it lasted two or three years his property in the Longmans' hands would clear itself, and he should be in a fair way of relieving himself from pecuniary uncertainties. The boldness of his views touching our policy in Spain, alarmed the timid acquiescence of "The Edinburgh Review," which recommended the most abject submission on the part of this country to the designs of the invincible Napoleon: and in somewhat strange discordance with its professions respecting the unlimited liberty of the press, it recommended the obnoxious journal for government prosecution, which hint, however, was wisely left unnoticed. This engagement was of short duration, as the affairs of the publisher rendered a discontinuance of the work imperative.
In the summer of 1811, a strange apparition appeared at the Lakes. Shelley, with his young wife, took up his abode there for a short time; and in his dreaming restlessness and Utopian enthusiasm, he seemed to Southey like the shadow of his wild former self. The two poets formed an acquaintance. The elder could sympathize with the younger, for he had himself passed through his agonizing phase; and Shelley, for the first time, fancied he had found one who could understand his nature. Like a meteor he flitted to disappear in other lands; but Southey watched his wanderings with charitable sorrow, and, notwithstanding angry words, and unjust accusations, always spoke of him with tenderness.
In 1813, Pye died. A semi-official offer of the laurel was made to Sir Walter Scott, who mentioned Southey as one who would adorn it by his talents, and to whom the additional income would be acceptable. A few years previously, Sir Walter had interested himself with his political friends, Mr. Canning and others, in favour of his brother
