friend; but early want of success in his academical exertions rendering
him melancholy, this by sympathy was soon imparted to his friend. After
Middleton's departure, the keen desire which Coleridge previously felt
for the possession of honours abated, and he became indifferent to
them--he might at this time have been idle, but never vicious. The men
who often appear to be the gayest and lightest of heart, are too
frequently melancholic; and it is a well-known fact, that the best comic
actors are the greatest sufferers from this malady, as if it seemed an
essential qualification for that department of histrionic excellence, in
which the greatest animal spirits are personated and successfully
imitated. Coleridge, at this period, delighted in boyish tricks, which
others were to execute. I remember a fellow-collegiate recalling to his
memory an exploit of which he was the planner, and a late Lord
Chancellor the executor. It was this: a train of gunpowder was to be
laid on two of the neatly shaven lawns of St. John's and Trinity
Colleges, in such a manner, that, when set on fire, the singed grass
would exhibit the ominous words, Liberty and Equality, which, with able
ladlike dexterity, was duly performed.

The writer of the College Reminiscences in the Gentleman's Magazine,
December, 1834, a first-form boy with Coleridge at Christ's Hospital,
was well acquainted with his habits, and speaks of his having gained the
gold medal in his freshman's year for the Greek Ode, but does not notice
his having been locked up in his room for that purpose.

"In his second year he stood for the Craven scholarship--a university
scholarship, for which under-graduates of any standing are entitled to
become candidates. This was in the winter of 1792. Out of sixteen or
eighteen competitors, a selection of four were to contend for the
prize, and these four were Dr. Butler, late head-master of Shrewsbury,