George Crabbe was born in 1754 at Aldeburgh, a somewhat squalid little fishing town on the coast of Suffolk, rejoicing, however, in the dignity of a corporation, and returning two members to Parliament. His father was saltmaster and general _factotum_ of the borough; a man, to all appearances, of rough manners, not improved by unfortunate circumstances; but sufficiently intelligent to recognise that in George he had a son who would repay a good education.[3] Not that with his narrow means he could do much; but he certainly did his best, and more than could be expected. George was intended for the medical profession; and it may be of interest to hear how a boy was educated to be a doctor in the eighteenth century. Young Crabbe was sent to school at Bungay, where he remained till his eleventh or twelfth year. He was next sent to a Mr. Richard Haddon at Stowmarket, where he showed considerable aptitude for mathematics, in which his father was also proficient. His master, to quote the biography, “though neither a Porson nor a Parr, laid the foundations of a fair classical education also.” But he soon had to return home and had to work in the warehouse of Slaughden Quay, piling up butter and cheese, duties which the poor boy--he was but thirteen, and was of a dreamy, meditative temperament--bitterly resented. But his father had not forgotten that George was to be a doctor, and seeing an advertisement, “Apprentice Wanted,” he sent him to Wickhambook, near Bury St. Edmunds. There he was treated as a mere drudge, slept with the ploughboy, worked on the farm, and learned his profession apparently by delivering medicine bottles to the neighbouring villages. In 1771, he removed to Woodbridge as apprentice to a Mr. Page, where he pursued his studies under more favourable circumstances. Here it was he met his future bride, Miss Elmy, at the neighbouring village of Parham, won a prize poem in the _Lady’s Magazine_ owned by a Mr. Wheble, on the subject of “Hope”; and later he published at Ipswich a poem entitled “Inebriety,” in the preface of which he apologises “for those parts wherein I have taken such great liberties with Mr. Pope.” And it was certainly to Pope that Crabbe owed his inspiration. Now to imitate Pope’s versification is easy, and to copy his mannerisms not impossible; but to gain a double portion of his spirit, to emulate his epigrammatic terseness, above all to acquire anything like his knowledge of life and human nature can only be done by a man who is even in a measure akin to him in genius. Whether Crabbe was, it must be our endeavour to decide. “Inebriety” did not catch on in Suffolk, a land which bears the epithet “silly” in two senses. I prefer the one which alludes to its numerous churches, “selig,” or pious. At any rate, no young author could expect an appreciative audience of clerics when he wrote thus: