g anecdote:--

"'_Sirrah, I'll flog you_,' were words so familiar to him, that
on one occasion some _female_ friend of one of the boys," (who
had come on an errand of intercession,) "still lingering at the
door, after having been abruptly told to go, Bowyer
exclaimed--'Bring that woman here, and I'll flog her.'"

To this horrid incarnation of whips and scourges, Coleridge, in his
_Biographia Literaria_, ascribes ideas upon criticism and taste, which
every man will recognise as the intense peculiarities of Coleridge.
Could these notions really have belonged to Bowyer, then how do we
know but he wrote _The Ancient Mariner_? Yet, on consideration, no.
For even Coleridge admitted that, spite of his fine theorizing upon
composition, Mr Bowyer did not prosper in the practice. Of which he
gave us this illustration; and as it is supposed to be the only
specimen of the Bowyeriana which now survives in this sublunary world,
we are glad to extend its glory. It is the most curious example extant
of the melodious in sound:--

"'Twas thou that smooth'd'st the rough-rugg'd bed of pain."

"Smooth'd'st!" Would the teeth of a crocodile not splinter under that
word? It seems to us as if Mr Bowyer's verses ought to be boiled
before they can be read. And when he says, '_Twas thou_, what is the
wretch talking to? Can he be apostrophising the knout? We very much
fear it. If so then, you see (reader!) that, even when incapacitated
by illness from operating, he still adores the image of his holy
scourge, and invokes it as alone able to smooth "his rough-rugg'd
bed." Oh, thou infernal Bowyer! upon whom even Trollope (_History of
Christ's Hospital_) charges "a discipline _tinctured_ with more than
due severity;"--can there be any partners found for thee in a
quadrille, except Draco, the bloody lawgiver, Bishop Bonner, and Mrs
Brownrigg?

The next pet was Sir Alexander Ball. Concerning Bowyer, Coleridge did
not talk much, but chiefly wrote; concerning Bell, he did not write
much, but chiefly talked. Concerning Ball, however, he both wrote and
talked. It was in vain to muse upon any plan for having Ball
blackballed, or for rebelling against Bell. Think of a man, who had
fallen into one pit called Bell, secondly falling into another pit
called Ball. This was too much. We were obliged to quote poetry
against them:--

"Letters four do form his name;
He came by stealth and unlock'd my den;
And the nightmare