other things, to incline her to poetry. Hazlitt says that Wordsworth's
face, notwithstanding his constitutional gravity, sometimes revealed
indications of dry humor. And once, at a morning visit, I heard him give
an account of his having breakfasted in company with Coleridge, and
allowed him to expatiate to the extent of his lungs. "How could you permit
him to go on and weary himself?" said Rogers; "why, you are to meet him at
dinner this evening." "Yes," replied Wordsworth; "I know that very well;
but we like to take the _sting_ out of him beforehand."

About a year after Lamb's first knowledge of Manning, his small stock of
friends was enlarged by the acquisition of Mr. John Rickman, one of the
clerks of the House of Commons. "He is a most pleasant hand" (writes
Lamb), "a fine rattling fellow, who has gone through life laughing at
solemn apes; himself hugely literate, from matter of fact, to Xenophon and
Plato: he can talk Greek with Porson, and nonsense with me." "He
understands you" (he adds) "the first time. You never need speak twice to
him. Fullest of matter, with least verbosity." A year or two afterwards,
when Rickman went to Ireland, Lamb wrote to Manning, "I have lost by his
going what seems to me I never can recover--_a finished man_. I almost
dare pronounce you never saw his equal. His memory will come to me as the
brazen serpent to the Israelites." Robert Southey also, when writing to
his brother (in 1804), says, "Coleridge and Rickman, with William Taylor,
make my Trinity of living greatness." A voluminous correspondence took
place between Southey and Rickman, ranging from 1800 to 1839, in the
course of which a variety of important subjects--namely, History,
Antiquities, Political Economy, Poor Law, and general Politics were
deliberately argued between them. From this it appears that Southey, whose
reading was very extensive, must have had great trust in the knowledge and
judgment of Rickman.