lish all our
best things in that way."

* * * * *

In the Journal entitled "Detached Thoughts," I find the tribute to his
genius which he here mentions, as well as some others, thus
interestingly dwelt upon.

"As far as fame goes (that is to say, _living_ fame) I have had my
share, perhaps--indeed, _certainly_--more than my deserts.

"Some odd instances have occurred to my own experience, of the wild and
strange places to which a name may penetrate, and where it may impress.
Two years ago (almost three, being in August or July, 1819,) I received
at Ravenna a letter, in _English_ verse, from _Drontheim_ in Norway,
written by a Norwegian, and full of the usual compliments, &c. &c. It is
still somewhere amongst my papers. In the same month I received an
invitation into _Holstein_ from a Mr. Jacobsen (I think) of Hamburgh:
also, by the same medium, a translation of Medora's song in The Corsair
by a Westphalian baroness (_not_ 'Thunderton-Tronck'), with some
original verses of hers (very pretty and Klopstock-ish), and a prose
translation annexed to them, on the subject of my wife:--as they
concerned her more than me. I sent them to her, together with Mr.
Jacobsen's letter. It was odd enough to receive an invitation to pass
the _summer_ in _Holstein_ while in _Italy_, from people I never knew.
The letter was addressed to Venice. Mr. Jacobsen talked to me of the
'wild roses growing in the Holstein summer.' Why then did the Cimbri and
Teutones emigrate?

"What a strange thing is life and man! Were I to present myself at the
door of the house where my daughter now is, the door would be shut in my
face--unless (as is not impossible) I knocked down the porter; and if I
had gone in that year (and perhaps now) to Drontheim (the furthest town
in Norway), or into Holstein, I should have been received with open arms
into the mansion of strangers and foreigners, attached to me by no tie
but that of mind and rumour.

"As far as _fame_ goes, I have had my share: it has indeed been leavened
by other human contingencies, and this in a greater degree than has
occurred to most literary men of a _decent_ rank in life; but, on the
whole, I take it that such equipoise is the condition of humanity."

Of the visit, too, of the American gentleman, he thus speaks in the same
Journal.

"A young American, named Coolidge, called on me not many months ago. He
was intelligent, very handsome, and not more than