Young as I was, I suspected there was an old and intractable leaven in human nature that would effectually frustrate these airy schemes of happiness, which had been projected in every age, and always with the same result. At first the disclosure so confounded my understanding, that I almost fancied myself transported to some new state of things, while images of patriarchal and pristine felicity stood thick around, decked in the rain-bow's colours. A moment's reflection, however, dissolved the unsubstantial vision, when I asked him a few plain questions. "How do you go?" said I. My young and ardent friend instantly replied, "We freight a ship, carrying out with us ploughs, and other implements of husbandry." The thought occurred to me, that it might be more economical to purchase such articles in America; but not too much to discourage the enthusiastic aspirant after happiness, I forebore all reference to the accumulation of difficulties to be surmounted, and merely inquired who were to compose his company? He said that only four had as yet absolutely engaged in the enterprise; Samuel Taylor Coleridge, from Cambridge; (in whom I understood the plan to have originated;) Robert Southey and George Burnet, from Oxford, and himself. "Well," I replied, "when do you set sail?" He answered, "Very shortly. I soon expect my friends from the Universities, when all the preliminaries will be adjusted, and we shall joyfully cross the blue waves of the Atlantic." "But," said I "to freight a ship, and sail out in the high style of gentlemen agriculturists, will require funds. How do you manage this?" "We all contribute what we can," said he, "and I shall introduce all my dear friends to you, immediately on their arrival in Bristol." Robert Lovell (though inexperienced, and constitutionally sanguine) was a good specimen of the open frankness which characterizes the well-informed members of the Society of Friends; and he excited in me an additional interest, from a warmth of feeling, and an extent of reading, above even the ordinary standard of the estimable class to which he belonged. He now read me some of the MS. poems of his two unknown friends, which at once established their genius in my estimation.[2] My leisure having been devoted for many years to reading and composition, and having a small volume of Poems at that time in the press, I anticipated great pleasure from an introduction to two poets, who superadded to talents of a high order, all the advantages arising from learning, and a consequent familiarity with the best models of antiquity. Independently of which, they excited an interest, and awakened a peculiar solicitude, from their being about so soon to leave their father land, and to depart permanently for a foreign shore. * * * * * [Illustration: Portrait.] * * * * *