itching face."

The circumstances of the young poets were far from affluent. Campbell
particularly felt the pressure of poverty. He came hastily one morning
to the lodgings of his friend to request his opinion of some verses;
they were immediately printed, and the copies sold to his
fellow-students for a halfpenny each. So Paul sometimes told his
friends, quoting the following lines as all he could remember of the
production:--

"Loud shriek'd afar the angry sprite,
That rode upon the storm of night,
And loud the waves were heard to roar
That lash'd on Jura's rocky shore."

After several sessions of attendance at college, Paul became tutor to a
family in Argyleshire, and Campbell obtained a similar situation in the
island of Mull. They entered into a humorous correspondence in prose
and verse. "Your verses on the Unfortunate Lady," writes Campbell to
his friend, "I read with sweet pleasure; for there is a joy in grief,
when peace dwelleth in the breast of the sad.... Morose as I am in
judging of poetry, I could find nothing inelegant in the whole piece. I
hope you will in your next (since you are such a master of the
plaintive) send me some verses consolatory to a hermit; for my
sequestered situation sometimes stamps a firm belief on my mind that I
am actually an anchorite. In return for your welcome poetical effusion,
I have nothing at present but a chorus of the Jepthes of Buchanan,
written soon after my arrival in Mull:--

"Glassy Jordan, smooth meandering
Jacob's grassy meads between,
Lo! thy waters, gently wandering,
Lave thy valleys rich and green.

"When the winter, keenly show'ring,
Strips fair Salem's holy shade,
Then thy current, broader flowing,
Lingers 'mid the leafless glade.

"When, O! when shall light returning
Gild the melancholy gloom,
And the golden star of morning
Jordan's solemn vault illume?

"When shall Freedom's holy charmer
Cheer my long benighted soul?
When shall Israel, proud in armour,
Burst the tyrant's base control?" &c.

"The similarity of the measure with that of your last made me think of
sending you this piece. I am much hurried at present with my comedy, the
'Clouds of Aristophanes.' I have already finished my translation of the
Choephoroe of AEschylus. I dreamt a dream about your being before
Parnassus upon your trial for sedition and contumacy. I thought Thalia,
Clio, &c. a