eminently attained, and by your example so powerfully recommended; to place in the fullest light the happiness attainable in all stations, where the various duties of domestic life are duly fulfilled; to cherish the tender affections on which those duties depend; and to enforce on all occasions the purest lessons of Christian virtue.

That YOUR MAJESTY may long enjoy the heartfelt delight, inseparable from the practice of every thing truly good and great, is the fervent prayer of

YOUR MAJESTY'S

most dutiful

and most grateful Servants,

THE AUTHOR'S SISTERS.

ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR.

As an extreme tenderness and liberality of brotherly affection formed the most striking feature in the character of the departed Author whose poems are here presented to the Reader, it is hoped that the Public will receive with indulgence a brief memorial of his life from the hand of a surviving Sister, who ventures to speak, not only for herself, but for three of her fellow-sufferers by his death. It is our united wish to render all the little honour in our power to his memory; for all of us have had abundant reason to contemplate the endearing character of the protector we have lost, with indelible gratitude and veneration. But it is not my intention to indulge myself in such praises of the deceased, as might appear likely to arise from the partiality of a Sister. I shall merely endeavour to record, as briefly as I can, the principal incidents of his life, and to illustrate his feelings, and his virtues, by selected passages from a few of his letters to the

illustrious object of his esteem and imitation, the Author of the Task.

The Rev. JAMES HURDIS was born at Bishopstone in the county of Sussex, in the year 1763. He was the third child, and only son, of James Hurdis, Gent. by his second wife, whom he married in the year 1759. His father dying, and leaving his mother in no affluent circumstances, with seven children, our Author was at her expense sent to school in the city of Chichester, at the age of eight years, first under the tuition of the Rev. Richard Tireman, an instructor whom he sincerely respected; and afterwards under the Rev. John Atkinson, for whose memory and literary abilities he had the highest veneration. And as a mark of Mr. Atkinson's esteem for his pupil, he bequeathed to him at his death a handsome legacy of valuable books. Here our Author also experienced the protection of his affectionate uncle, the Rev. Thomas Hurdis, D. D. Canon Residentiary of Chichester, and Canon of Windsor.

Being of a delicate frame and constitution, our Author seldom partook in the juvenile sports of his school-companions; but generally employed his hours of leisure in reading such books as are

more attractive to a youth who has an early passion for literature. His inclination to poetry soon made its appearance in many poetical compositions; among which was a tragedy of five acts, entitled Panthea, founded on the story in Xenophon's Cyropædia. This was afterwards transformed into a poem, a juvenile work, so long, that, with two other efforts which his partiality for his early productions afterwards induced him to publish, it has been thought prudent should be omitted in this collection.

Music was the only amusement which could induce him to relax from his study of books: the love of that enchanting science seems to have been naturally united with his disposition, even from an infant. As he advanced in life, he became a proficient upon almost every musical instrument: but the organ appears to have been his favourite; and during the time of his being at school, he nearly completed the building of a small one: a work interrupted by his quitting school for Oxford.

In 1780 he was entered a Commoner of St. Mary Hall, Oxford: and at the election in 1782 he was chosen a Demy of St. Mary Magdalen

College. Now finding himself freed from the restrictions of a school-boy, and a more ample field opening to the encouragement of his poetical taste, his application to books and poesy became almost unlimited.

His friends in Oxford were few and select, and only such as were endeared to him by good-nature, conformity of opinion, and fellowship in study. Among those who contributed to his support and encouragement, we must not omit to mention, with much respect, the Right Rev. George Horne, D. D. late Bishop of Norwich, and President of Magdalen College; the Rev. Dr. Routh, President of the same College; the Rev. Dr. Sheppard, of Amport and Basingstoke; and his esteemed friend and tutor at St. Mary Hall, the Rev. Dr. Rathbone, of Buckland.

At the commencement of every vacation, he returned to his mother at Bishopstone, and devoted this interval of relaxation from his own studies, to the assiduous instruction of his four younger sisters in those branches of literature which he thought might be most beneficial to them. To his application and industry they owe all which they have ever acquired.