ceivable things; and liked nothing better than to
have an intelligent, or failing that, even a silent and patient human
listener. He distinguished himself to all that ever heard him as at
least the most surprising talker extant in this world,--and to some
small minority, by no means to all, as the most excellent.

The good man, he was now getting old, towards sixty perhaps; and
gave you the idea of a life that had been full of sufferings; a life
heavy-laden, half-vanquished, still swimming painfully in seas of
manifold physical and other bewilderment. Brow and head were round,
and of massive weight, but the face was flabby and irresolute. The
deep eyes, of a light hazel, were as full of sorrow as of inspiration;
confused pain looked mildly from them, as in a kind of mild
astonishment. The whole figure and air, good and amiable otherwise,
might be called flabby and irresolute; expressive of weakness under
possibility of strength. He hung loosely on his limbs, with knees bent,
and stooping attitude; in walking, he rather shuffled than decisively
steps; and a lady once remarked, he never could fix which side of the
garden walk would suit him best, but continually shifted, in corkscrew
fashion, and kept trying both. A heavy-laden, high-aspiring and surely
much-suffering man. His voice, naturally soft and good, had contracted
itself into a plaintive snuffle and singsong; he spoke as if
preaching,--you would have said, preaching earnestly and also hopelessly
the weightiest things. I still recollect his "object" and "subject,"
terms of continual recurrence in the Kantean province; and how he sang
and snuffled them into "om-m-mject" and "sum-m-mject," with a kind of
solemn shake or quaver, as he rolled along. No talk, in his century or
in any other, could be more surprising.

Sterling, who assiduously attended him, with profound reverence, and
was often with him by himself, for a good many months, gives a record
of their first colloquy. [8] Their colloquies were numerous, and he
had taken note of many; but they are all gone to the fire, except this
first, which Mr. Hare has printed,--unluckily without date. It contains
a number of ingenious, true and half-true observations, and is of
course a faithful epitome of the things said; but it gives small idea
of Coleridge's way of talking;--this one feature is perhaps the most
recognizable, "Our interview lasted for three hours, during which he
talked two hours and three quarters." N