of the advantages of education than his brothers for he never attended school above three ths and though his mother him to read whole stock of literature till he was years of consisted in the knowledge of his her � ey s meditations the gentle shepherd an occasional number of the magazine and a large store of but these he knew thoroughly and and it may be questioned if any man alive i more thoroughly acquainted witli the sacred � than himself the searching eye of a soon marked his talent for and she used to to him my mm gang ben the house and make mc a sang while she proposed a subject for his muse how he succeeded in these we have not yet the � � j m � w� ing a mind may be t s of poetry that nature had in b� � k � ii rot xi i i i i i and of l poverty nor nor neglect nor even the til critic could ever or he was soon deprived of tottering of of th� kindest of mothers ami the most original of ni for hi were then struggling with worldly difficulties in h in f and were obliged to him to when he was little above seven of md hit t and youth were in the solitude of with no other moral guardian than principles which they hid into his mind and his own and no guide th nature he grew up to manhood in a of but in him it produced no degradation and could press the noble of a generous mind conscious of its value leaning with confidence on its resources and feeling equal to great tlie of his did not injure the strong independence of a that seemed to in to the that pressed upon it and he enjoyed a which he could not have had in any si while hb flocks were wandering on the of the mountains or in the bosom of a he had the d of looking on nature freed from the mists of prejudice or the of books where she is seldom in forms and natives hues it was not with him as is too often tb ease the study of poetry that led him to the study of nature it was i nature green and fresh and that in him with j a passionate admiration of her untouched grandeur and au of singing her glories and he would have been a l if no i one had ever existed before him all the various shows of the visible universe all the doings of the elements were familiar to his imagination reflected on them its own into existence a creation of its own of such beauty and mu as never appeared but in the eye of lo a situation all his dreams w and we have often heard him e mountain with such and beauty and shadowy grandeur as to convince us that as m paint cr he would had no rival all his organs indeed arc acute and all his of such uncommon and leave such complete pictures we were he to apply to i art his paintings in truth and originality of conception at least would be equal to his these circumstances have render f him above all men the of the mountains he never approaches but his takes wing and like the wheels and with a and of in native the object of this essay is to the assisted nature in the formation of mr s were chiefly the tales and of his country i and the and solitude of its scenery and the impression of or other of w on a i� of poetry he the ba � iv c tt to vi � i� � i i� i a g and as ct to rule as the men whose tt wn led to the j fancy of it man nature bud richly gifted hi t mind and and were alike favourable to the development of peculiar nor if had been searched for the purpose would il have possible to find a woman better qualified than h to discover the early sparks of his genius and to into an after the death of the old man above mentioned she became the great re m i or of the border able to almost every line that to be found in the of the border mid many others which were by her death to the world she possessed a soul of great and a voice ever in with its movements and in her which resembled the of immediate inspiration rather than the repetition of the ideas of others she tile tone the piece in its of rapidity and grandeur rude lays of our forefathers contain hardy adventures and of men who spent their lives the and dangers of a warfare i � their and in making and an attack � their love of glory and contempt of death � the song of the triumph and the of the � and to each of these she gave an appropriate emphasis and action rising into the of possession or melting into an tenderness such were the effects r r that when her son saw these poems printed of which her had delighted him so much he not believe they were the same his mind was early with these cm them his taste was formed and the mountain bard ur professed imitation of them in his of the progress of the genius of t ie poet rather than the life of the man it would be not to mention the family of mr t of here he wan received rather m a son at the house of his father than a servant yet this respectable man is mentioned not so much on account of the kindness received under his roof as the means he there enjoyed of his mind and improving his poetical tide nt 