pale at such philosophic draughts), or reciting Homer in his Greek,
or Pindar--while the walls of the old Grey Friars re-echoed to the
accents of the _inspired charity-boy_!--Many were the "wit-combats,"
(to dally awhile with the words of old Fuller,) between him and C.V.
Le G----, "which two I behold like a Spanish great gallion, and an
English man of war; Master Coleridge, like the former, was built far
higher in learning, solid, but slow in his performances. C.V.L., with
the English man of war, lesser in bulk, but lighter in sailing, could
turn with all tides, tack about, and take advantage of all winds, by
the quickness of his wit and invention."

Nor shall thou, their compeer, be quickly forgotten, Allen, with the
cordial smile, and still more cordial laugh, with which thou wert wont
to make the old Cloisters shake, in thy cognition of some poignant
jest of theirs; or the anticipation of some more material, and,
peradventure, practical one, of thine own. Extinct are those smiles,
with that beautiful countenance, with which (for thou wert the _Nircus
formosus_ of the school), in the days of thy maturer waggery, thou
didst disarm the wrath of infuriated town-damsel, who, incensed by
provoking pinch, turning tigress-like round, suddenly converted by
thy angel-look, exchanged the half-formed terrible "_bl----_," for a
gentler greeting--"_bless thy handsome face_!"

Next follow two, who ought to be now alive, and the friends of
Elia--the junior Le G---- and F----; who impelled, the former by
a roving temper, the latter by too quick a sense of neglect--ill
capable of enduring the slights poor Sizars are sometimes subject to
in our seats of learning--exchanged their Alma Mater for the camp;
perishing, one by climate, and one on the plains of Salamanca:--Le
G----, sanguine, volatile, sweet-natured; F----, dogged, faithful,