About fourteen months ago Mr. Chorley collected and published in the London Athenæum some deeply interesting reminiscences of Mrs. H. of which the volumes now before us are an extension. A variety of materials, afforded him by friends, has enabled him to continue his notices beyond the period of his own personal acquaintance, and, by linking correspondence and anecdote, to trace out, with great facility and beauty, the entire progress of the mind of the poetess. He has exclusively confined himself, however, to this one object, and refrained from touching upon such occurrences is her private life as were not actually necessary in the illustrations of her mental and literary existence. The “Memorials” therefore, it is right to state, lay no claim to the entire fulness of Biography. The following brief personal notice is to be found in the opening pages: Felicia Dorothea Browne—the second daughter and the fourth child of a family of three sons and three daughters—was born in Duke-street, Liverpool, on the 25th of September, 1794. Her father was a native of Ireland, belonging to a branch of the Sligo family; her mother, a Miss Wagner, was a descendant of a Venetian house, whose old name, Veniero, had in the course of time been corrupted into this German form. Among its members were numbered three who rose to the dignity of Doge, and one who bore the honorable rank of commander at the battle of Lepanto. In the waning days of the Republic, Miss Browne's grandfather held the humble situation of Venetian consul in Liverpool. The maiden name of his wife was Haddock, a good and ancient one among the yeomanry of Lancashire; three of the issue of this union are still surviving. To these few genealogical notices it may be added that Felicia Dorothea was the fifth bearing that christian name in her mother's family, that her elder sister, Eliza, of whom affectionate mention is made in her earliest poems, died of a decline at the age of eighteen; and that her brother Claude, who reached manhood, died in America several years ago. Two brothers older than herself, and one sister, her junior, are therefore all that now survive. It must not be supposed from what we say that Mr. Chorley has given us nothing of personal history. The volumes abound delightfully in such anecdotes of the poetess as go to illustrate her literary peculiarities and career. These indeed form the staple of the book, and, in the truly exquisite narration of Mr. Chorley, are {723} moulded into something far more impressive than we can imagine any legitimate biography. We cannot refrain from turning over one by one the pages as we write, and presenting our readers with some mere outlines of the many reminiscences which the author has so beautifully filled up. We shall intersperse them with some of Mr. C's. observations, and occasionally with our own.