second winter following this event, which deeply afflicted the most
affectionate of parents, I was born. She had afterward two sons:
William, who died at the age of six years; and George, who is now a
respectable merchant at Leghorn, in Tuscany.

All the offspring of my parents were, in their infancy, uncommonly
handsome, excepting myself. The boys were fair and lusty, with auburn
hair, light blue eyes, and countenances peculiarly animated and lovely,
I was swarthy; my eyes were singularly large in proportion to my face,
which was small and round, exhibiting features peculiarly marked with
the most pensive and melancholy cast.

The great difference betwixt my brothers and myself, in point of
personal beauty, tended much to endear me to my parents, particularly to
my father, whom I strongly resembled. The early propensities of my life
were tinctured with romantic and singular characteristics; some of which
I shall here mention, as proofs that the mind is never to be diverted
from its original bent, and that every event of my life has more or less
been marked by the progressive evils of a too acute sensibility.

The nursery in which I passed my hours of infancy was so near the great
aisle of the minster that the organ, which reechoed its deep tones,
accompanied by the chanting of the choristers, was distinctly heard both
at morning and evening service. I remember with what pleasure I used to
listen, and how much I was delighted whenever I was permitted to sit on
the winding steps which led from the aisle to the cloisters. I can at
this moment recall to memory the sensations I then experienced--the
tones that seemed to thrill through my heart, the longing which I felt
to unite my feeble voice to the full anthem, and the awful though
sublime impression which the church service never failed to make upon my