may be
most to the taste of the intellectual vision. In a former letter you
mention Francis Edgeworth. He is a person not to be forgotten. If you be
in communication with him pray present him my very kind respects, and
say that he was not unfrequently in my thoughts during my late poetic
rambles; and particularly when I saw the objects which called forth a
Sonnet that I shall send you. He was struck with my mention of a sound
in the eagle's notes, much and frequently resembling the yelping and
barking of a dog, and quoted a passage in Eschylus where the eagle is
called the flying hound of the air, and he suggested that Eschylus might
not only allude by that term to his being a bird of chase or prey, but
also to this barking voice, which I do not recollect ever hearing
noticed. The other day I was forcibly reminded of the circumstances
under which the pair of eagles were seen that I described in the letter
to Mr. Edgeworth, his brother. It was the promontory of Fairhead, on the
coast of Antrim, and no spectacle could be grander. At Dunally Castle, a
ruin seated at the tip of one of the horns of the bay of Oban, I saw
the other day one of these noble creatures cooped up among the ruins,
and was incited to give vent to my feelings as you shall now see:

'Dishonoured Rock and Ruin! that by law
Tyrannic, keep the Bird of Jove imbarred,
Like a lone criminal whose life is spared.
Vexed is he and screams loud:--The last I saw
Was on the wing, and struck my soul with awe,
Now wheeling low, then with a consort paired,
From a bold headland their loved aery's guard,
Flying, above Atlantic waves,--to draw
Light from the fountain of the setting sun.
Such was this prisoner once; and, when his plumes
The sea-blast ruffles as the storm comes on,
In spirit, for a moment he resumes
His rank 'mong free-born creatures that live free;
His power, his beauty, and his majesty.'

You will naturally wish to hear something of Sir Walter Scott, and
particularly of his health. I found him a good deal changed within the
last three or four years, in consequence of some shocks of the
apoplectic kind; but his friends say that he is very much better, and
the last accounts, up to the time of his going on board, were still more
favourable. He himself thinks his age much against him, but he has only
completed his 60th year. But a friend of mine was here the other day,
who has rallied, and is hims