From the time he was quite a child he had the fixed idea that he must be a literary man. In his twenty-first year (1844) he published a volume of poems, entitled ‘The Witch of Endor, and other Poems.’ The poetry in this little volume—long since out of print—was held to give promise of genius. It was, of course, the production of youth, and in after years the author was fully conscious of its defects. But even though some critics (and none could be a harder critic of his own work than himself) might point out an ‘overcrowding of metaphor’ and a ‘want of clearness,’ others could instance evidences of ‘high poetical capability’ and ‘happy versification.’ But at the time it was thought desirable that the young poet should turn his attention to prose composition with the same earnestness. With that object his father proposed to him the study of the writings of Origen, with a view to an article on the subject in the _British Quarterly Review_. When just twenty-two the author finished this task, his first solid contribution to the literature of the day. The article showed signs of diligence and patient research in gaining a thorough knowledge of the opinions of the great thinker with whom it dealt. ‘It is nobly done,’ Judge Talfourd wrote. ‘If there is some exuberance of ornament in the setting forth of his (Origen’s) brilliant theories, it is only akin to the irregular greatness and the Asiatic splendour of the mind that conceived them.’ And the words of the late Sir James Stephen were not less flattering: ‘If I had been told that the writer of it (the article) was a grandfather, I should have wondered only that the old man had retained so much spirit and been able to combine it with a maturity of judgment so well becoming his years.’ We believe it is no presumption to say that the article has not ceased to be useful to those who wish to gain an idea of the character of one whose name has often been the subject of bitter wordy war between Christian men. In 1846, a dramatic piece by Alfred Vaughan, entitled ‘Edwin and Elgiva,’ appeared in the _London University Magazine_. The subject was one of a most sensational character, and was treated accordingly. Dunstan and his companions are painted in very black colours, and any doubts as to the reality of the cruelties alleged to have been practised on the unhappy Queen are not entertained. Two poems, the ‘Masque of Antony’ and ‘Disenchantment,’ though not published until later, were written about the same date.