It was during his apprenticeship to Mr. Page of Woodbridge that Crabbe made his first important efforts in poetry, publishing, in the year 1772, some fugitive pieces in _Wheble's Magazine_, and in 1775 "Inebriety, a poem, in three parts. Ipswich: printed and sold by C. Punchard, bookseller, in the Butter-market." While at Woodbridge, too, his friend Levett, a young surgeon of the neighborhood, took him over to Framlingham, introducing him to the families of that picturesque old town. William Springall Levett was at that time engaged to Alethea Brereton, a lady who, under the _nom de plume_ of "Eugenia Acton," wrote certain novels that created a sensation in their brief day. Amongst them were "Vicissitudes of Genteel Life," "The Microcosm," and "A Tale without a Title." The love-making of Mr. Levett and Miss Eugenia de Acton was put a stop to by the death of the former, in 1774. The following epitaph, transcribed from the History of Framlingham, the work of the able antiquarian, Mr. Richard Green, is interesting as one of Crabbe's earlier compositions. "What! though no trophies peer above his dust, Nor sculptured conquests deck his sober bust; What! though no earthly thunders sound his name, Death gives him conquest, and our sorrows fame! One sigh reflection heaves, but shuns excess, More should we mourn him, did we love him less." Subsequently Miss Brereton married a gentleman named Lewis, engaged in extensive agricultural operations. However brief her literary reputation may have been, her pen did her good service; for, at a critical period of her husband's career, it brought her sums of much-needed money. Mr. Levett's romance closed prematurely together with his life, but through him Crabbe first became acquainted with the lovely girl whom he loved through years of trial, and eventually made his wife. Sarah Elmy was the niece of John Tovell, _yeoman_, not _gentleman_--he would have scorned the title. Not that the worthy man was without pride of divers kinds, or that he did not hold himself to be a gentleman. He believed in the Tovells as being one of the most distinguished families of the country. A Tovell, by mere right of being a Tovell, could thrash more Frenchmen than any Englishman, not a Tovell, could. When the good man said, "I am nothing more than a plain yeoman," he never intended or expected any one to believe him, or to regard his words in any other light than as a playful protest against being deemed "a plain yeoman," or that modern hybrid, "a gentleman farmer." He was a well-made, handsome, pleasant fellow--riding a good horse with the hounds--loving good cheer--enjoying laughter, without being very particular as to the cause of it--a little too much addicted to carousing, but withal an agreeable and useful citizen; and he lived at Parham Lodge, a house that a peer inhabited after him, without making any important alterations in the place.