All who had the honor of the poet's friendship or acquaintance speak of the marvellous gift which gave to this illustrious man almost a character of inspiration. The wonderful eloquence of his conversation can be comprehended only by those who have heard him speak. It was sparkling at times, and at times profound; but the melody of his voice, the impressive solemnity of his manner, the radiant glories of his intellectual countenance, bore off, as it were, the thoughts of the listener from his discourse; and it was rarely that he carried away from the poet any of the gems that fell from his lips. Montgomery describes the poetry of Coleridge as like electricity, "flashing at rapid intervals with the utmost intensity of effect,"--and contrasts it with that of Wordsworth, like galvanism, "not less powerful, but rather continuous than sudden in its wonderful influence." But of his poems it is needless for me to speak; some of them are familiar to all readers of the English tongue throughout the world. Wilson, in the "Noctes," says, "Wind him up, and away he goes,--discoursing most excellent music, without a discord, full, ample, inexhaustible, serious, and divine"; and in another place, "He becomes inspired by his own silver voice, and pours out wisdom like a sea." Wordsworth speaks of him "as quite an epicure in sound." The painter Haydon speaks of his eloquence and "lazy luxury of poetical outpouring"; and Rogers ("Table-Talk") is reported to have said, "One morning, breakfasting with me, he talked for three hours without intermission, so admirably that I wish every word he uttered had been written down": but he does not quote a single sentence of all the poet said;[G] and a writer in the "Quarterly Review" expresses his belief that "nothing is too high for the grasp of his conversation, nothing too low: it glanced from earth to heaven, from heaven to earth, with a speed and a splendor, an ease and a power, that almost seemed inspired." (Nor did I ever find him incoherent, as some have pretended; but I agree with De Quincey, that he had the largest and most spacious intellect, the subtilest and the most comprehensive that has yet existed among men.) Of Coleridge, Shelley writes,-- "All things he seemed to understand, Of old or new, at sea or land, Save his own soul, which was a mist."