occurrence. This was no less than his being appointed
joint-proprietor and editor of the newspaper by a wealthy individual,
who, noticing the abilities of the young shopman, purchased the
copyright with the view of placing the management entirely in his hands.

The first number of the newspaper under the poet's care, the name being
changed to that of _The Sheffield Iris_, appeared in July 1794; and
though the principles of the journal were moderate and conciliatory in
comparison with the democratic sentiments espoused by the former
publisher, the jealous eye of the authorities rested on its new
conductor. He did not escape their vigilance; for the simple offence of
printing for a ballad-vender some verses of a song celebrating the fall
of the Bastile, he was libelled as "a wicked, malicious, seditious, and
evil-disposed person;" and being tried before the Doncaster Quarter
Sessions, in January 1795, was sentenced to three months' imprisonment
in the Castle of York. He was condemned to a second imprisonment of six
months in the autumn of the same year, for inserting in his paper an
account of a riot in the place, in which he was considered to have cast
aspersions on a colonel of volunteers. The calm mind of the poet did not
sink under these persecutions, and some of his best lyrics were composed
during the period of his latter confinement. During his first detention
he wrote a series of interesting essays for his newspaper. His "Prison
Amusements," a series of beautiful pieces, appeared in 1797. In 1805, he
published his poem, "The Ocean;" in 1806, "The Wanderer in Switzerland;"
in 1808, "The West Indies;" and in 1812, "The World before the Flood."
In 1819 he published "Greenland, a Poem, in Five Cantos;" and in 1825
appeared "The Pelican Island, and other Poems." Of all those
productions, "The Wanderer in Switzerland" attained the widest
circulation; and, notwithstanding an unfavourable and injudicious
criticism in the _Edinburgh Review_, at once procured an honourable
place for the author among his contemporaries. He became sole proprietor
of the _Iris_ in one year after his being connected with it, and he
continued to conduct this paper till September 1825, when he retired
from public duty. He subsequently contributed articles for different
periodicals; but he chiefly devoted himself to the moral and religious
improvement of his fellow-townsmen. A pension of L150 on the civil list
was conferred upon him as an acknowle