l life are, _per se_, less fitted for the
purposes of poetry than those of nature, and than the passions
of the human heart. In this controversy, as well as in some
after-skirmishes,--in his letters to Lord Brougham, "On the Position and
Incomes of the Cathedral Clergy,"--in a letter to Sir James Mackintosh,
on the Increase of Crime,--and in a sharp fight with the Rev. Edward
Duke, F.S.A., on the Antiquities of Wiltshire--Bowles displayed amazing
PLUCK, and no small controversial acuteness and dexterity. Like another
Ajax, he took enemy after enemy on his single shield, and by his
pertinacity and perseverance, he succeeded in beating them all. He stood
at first alone, and had very formidable opponents. But he bated not one
jot of heart or hope; and, by and by, Southey, _Blackwood's Magazine_,
and others, came to his aid, and, finally, William Hazlitt saw, with his
inevitable eye, the real merits of the case, and (substantially
inclining to the Bowles side) settled, by a paper in the _London
Magazine_, the question for ever. As a controversialist, Bowles is
rather noisy, flippant, and fierce; and his reply to Byron, while
superior to the noble bard's letter in argument, is far inferior in easy
and trenchant vigour of style. His writings on the Pope controversy
consist of "A Letter to Thomas Campbell," "Two Letters to Lord Byron,"
"A Final Appeal to the Public relative to Pope," and (more last words!),
"Lessons in Criticism to William Roscoe, and Farther Lessons to a
Quarterly Reviewer." All are exceedingly readable and clever.

It is curious contrasting the spirit of Bowles' prose--his severity--his
pugnacity--his irritability, with the mild qualities of his poetry. The
leading element in all his poetical works is sentiment,--warm, mellow,
tender, and often melancholy sentiment. He has no profound thought--no
powerful pictures of passion--no creative imagination--but over all his
poetry lies a sweet autumnal moonlight of pensive and gentle feeling. In
his larger poems, he is often diffuse and verbose, and you see more
effort than energy. But in his smaller, and especially in his sonnets,
and his pieces descriptive of nature, Bowles is always true to his own
heart, and therefore always successful. How delightful such sonnets as
his "Morning Bells," "Absence," "Bereavement," and his poems entitled,
"Monody at Matlock," "Coombe-Ellen," "On Hearing the 'Messiah,'" _etc._!
We trust that many, after reading these and the others