"Thank you," he wrote in 1808, "for _Marmion_, which I have read with lively pleasure.

I think your end has been attained.

That it is not in every respect the end which I should wish you to purpose to yourself, you will be well aware, from what you know of my notions of composition, both as to matter and manner."[272] When, in 1821, Chantrey was about to exhibit together his busts of the two poets, Scott wrote: "I am happy my effigy is to go with that of Wordsworth, for (differing from him in very many points of taste) I do not know a man more to be venerated for uprightness of heart and loftiness of genius.

Why he will sometimes choose to crawl upon all fours, when God has given him so noble a countenance to lift to heaven, I am as little able to account for as for his quarrelling (as you tell me) with the wrinkles which time and meditation have stamped his brow withal."[273] These remarks upon Wordsworth and Coleridge touch merely the fringe of the subject, and indeed we do not find that Scott exercised any such sublimated ingenuity in appreciating these men as has often been considered essential.

We can see that he admired certain parts of their work intensely, but we look in vain for any real analysis of their quality.