in Ratisbon when the French and Austrian treaty saved it from bombardment.

In Germany Campbell made the friendship of the two Schlegels, of many of the first literary and political characters, and was fortunate enough to pass an entire day with the venerable Klopstock, who died just two years afterwards. The proficiency of Campbell in the German language was rendered very considerable by this tour, and his own indefatigable perseverance in study. His travels in Germany occupied him thirteen months; when he returned to England, and, for the first time, visited London. He soon afterwards composed those two noble marine odes, The Battle of the Baltic, and Ye Mariners of England, which, with his Hohenlinden, stand unrivalled in the English tongue; and though, as Byron lamented, Campbell has written so little, these odes alone are enough to place him unforgotten in the shrine of the Muses.

In 1803 the poet married Miss Sinclair, a lady of Scottish descent, and considerable personal beauty, but of whom he was deprived by death in 1828. He resided at Sydenham, and the entire neighbourhood of that pleasant village reckoned itself in the circle of his friends; nor did he quit his suburban retreat until, in 1821, literary pursuits demanded his residence in the metropolis. It was at Sydenham, in a house nearly facing the reservoir, that the poet produced his greatest work, Gertrude of Wyoming, written in the Spenserian stanza. About the same time Campbell was appointed Professor of Poetry in the Royal Institution, where he delivered lectures which have since been published. He also undertook the editorship of Selections from the British Poets, intended as specimens of each, and accompanied with critical remarks.³

Soon after the publication of his "Specimens," he revisited Germany, and passed some time in Vienna, where he acquired a considerable knowledge of the Austrian court and its manners. He remained long at Bonn, where his friend, W.A. Schlegel, resides. Campbell returned to England in 1820, to undertake the editorship of the New Monthly Magazine, and coupled with his name, it has risen to a very extensive circulation. In 1824, Campbell published his "Theodric, a Domestic Tale," the least popular of his works.

By his marriage Campbell had two sons. One of them died before attaining his twentieth year; the other, while in the University of Bonn, where he was placed for his education, exhibited symptoms of an erring mind, which, on his return to England soon afterwards, ripened into mental derangement of the milder species. After several years passed in this way, during which the mental disease considerably relaxed, so that young Campbell became wholly inoffensive, and his father received him into his house. The effect of this upon a mind of the most exquisite sensibility like the poet's, may be readily imagined: it was, at times, a source of the keenest suffering.

We must now allude to an event in Campbell's life, which will ensure him the gratitude of ages to come: we mean as the originator of the London University. Four years before it was made public, the idea occurred to him, from his habit of visiting the Universities of Germany, and studying their regulations. He communicated it at first to two or three friends, until his ideas upon the subject became matured, when they were made public, and a meeting upon the business convened in London, which Mr. Campbell addressed, and where the establishment of such an institution met the most zealous support. Once in operation, several public men of high talent, headed by Mr. Brougham, lost not a moment in forwarding the great and useful object in view. The undertaking was divided into shares, which were rapidly taken; but Mr. Campbell left the active arrangements to others, and contented himself with attending the committees. With unexampled rapidity the London University has been completed, or nearly so, and Campbell has had the satisfaction of seeing his projected instrument of education almost in full operation in less than three years after he made the scheme public. Although one of the most important,⁴ this is not the only public-spirited event of this description, in Mr. Campbell's life; for he was instrumental in the establishment of the Western Literary Institution, in Leicester Square; and at the present time he is, we believe, in conjunction with other eminent literary men, organizing a club to be entitled the Literary Union, whose lists already contain upwards of 300 men of talent, including Sir Walter Scott and all the principal periodical writers of the day.

Campbell, as has already been observed, was educated at Glasgow, and received the honour of election as Lord Rector, three successive years, notwithstanding the opposition of the professors, and the excellent individuals who were placed against him; among whom were the late minister Canning, and Sir Walter Scott. The students of Glasgow College considered that the celebrity of the poet, his liberal principles, his being a fellow-townsman, and his attention to their interests, entitled him to the preference.

In person, Mr. Campbell is below the middle stature, well made, but slender. His features indicate great sensibility; his eyes are particularly striking, and of a deep blue colour; his nose aquiline; his expression generally saturnine. His step is light, but firm; and he appears to possess much more energy of constitution than men of fifty-two who have been studious in their habits, exhibit in general. His time for study is mostly during the stillness of night, when he can be wholly abstracted from external objects. He is remarkable for absence of mind; is charitable and kind in his disposition, but of quick temper. His amusements are few; the friend and conversation only; and in the "flow of soul" there are few men possessing more companionable qualities. His heart is perhaps one of the best that beats in a human bosom: "it is," observes a biographer, "that which should belong to the poet of Gertrude, his favourite personification."

To exhibit the poet in the social circle, as well as to introduce a very piquant portrait, drawn by a friend, we subjoin a leaf or two from Leigh Hunt's Lord Byron and some of his Contemporaries⁵—displaying all the graphic ease for which Mr. Hunt is almost without a rival:—

I forget how I became acquainted with Mr. Hill, proprietor of the Monthly Mirror; but at his house at Sydenham I used to meet his editor, Mr. Dubois, Mr. Campbell, who was his neighbour, and the two Smiths, authors of The Rejected Addresses. Once or twice I saw also Mr. Theodore Hook, and Mr. Matthews, the comedian. Our host (and I thought him no older the other day than he was then) was a jovial bachelor, plump and rosy as an abbot: and no abbot could have presided over a more festive Sunday. The wine flowed merrily and long; the discourse kept pace with it; and next morning, in returning to town, we felt ourselves very thirsty. A pump by the road side, with a plash round it, was a bewitching sight.

"They who know Mr. Campbell only as the author of Gertrude of Wyoming and the Pleasures of Hope, would not suspect him to be a merry companion, overflowing with humour and anecdote, and any thing but fastidious. These Scotch poets have always something in reserve: it is the only point in which the major part of