Towards the end of January 1820, the Rev Mr. Holland of Northborough, the minister already referred to, called upon Clare with the joyful news that his poems had been published, and that the volume was a great success. Next day a messenger arrived from Stamford with an invitation to the poet to meet Mr. Drury and Mr. Gilchrist. They confirmed the favourable report made by Mr. Holland, and at length Clare had an opportunity of seeing the book which had caused him so many anxious days and sleepless nights. He made no attempt to conceal the honest pride he felt on receiving the congratulations of his friends, and acknowledged his obligation to Mr. Taylor for the editorial pains he had taken to prepare his manuscripts for the press, but he was deeply mortified at the tone of the "Introduction" in which Mr. Taylor dwelt, perhaps unconsciously, on Clare's poverty as constituting his chief claim to public notice. The success of the "Poems" could scarcely be overstated. The eager curiosity of the public led to the first edition being exhausted in a few days, and a second was promptly announced. "The Gentleman's Magazine," the "New Monthly Magazine," the "Eclectic Review," the "Anti-Jacobin Review," the "London Magazine," and many other periodicals, welcomed the new poet with generous laudation. Following these came the "Quarterly Review," then under the editorship of the trenchant Gifford. To the astonishment of the reading public, the "Quarterly," which about this time "killed poor Keats," admitted a genial article on the rustic bard, and gave him the following excellent advice:-- "We counsel, we entreat him to continue something of his present occupations, to attach himself to a few in the sincerity of whose friendship he can confide, and to suffer no temptations of the idle and the dissolute to seduce him from the quiet scenes of his youth (scenes so congenial to his taste) to the hollow and heartless society of cities, to the haunts of men who would court and flatter him while his name was new, and who, when they had contributed to distract his attention and impair his health, would cast him off unceremoniously to seek some other novelty. Of his again encountering the difficulties and privations he lately experienced there is no danger. Report speaks of honourable and noble friends already secured: with the aid of these, the cultivation of his own excellent talents, and a meek but firm reliance on that good Power by whom these were bestowed, he may, without presumption, anticipate a rich reward in the future for the evils endured in the morning of his life." The estimate formed by the writer of the liberality of Clare's patrons was exaggerated, and instead of there being no danger of his ever again having to encounter difficulties and privations he was scarcely ever free from them until the crowning privation had placed him beyond their influence. EXAMPLES