How did he recompense all
this exertion and endurance oh his behalf? In after years, when living
(we believe) at Edinburgh, and pressed by debt, he did for once exert
himself to write, and what he wrote was an exposure of every thing about
the Wordsworths which he knew merely by their kindness. He wrote papers,
which were eagerly read, and, of course, duly paid for, in which
Wordsworth's personal foibles were malignantly exhibited with ingenious
aggravations. The infirmities of one member of the family, the personal
blemish of another, and the human weaknesses of all, were displayed, and
all for the purpose of deepening the dislike against Wordsworth himself,
which the receiver of his money, the eater of his dinners, and the
dreary provoker of his patience strove to excite. Moreover, he
perpetrated an act of treachery scarcely paralleled, we hope, in the
history of literature. In the confidence of their most familiar days,
Wordsworth had communicated portions of his posthumous poem to his
guest, who was perfectly well aware that the work was to rest in
darkness and silence till after the poet's death. In these magazine
articles DeQuincey, using for this atrocious purpose his fine gift of
memory, published a passage, which he informed us was of far higher
merit than any thing else we had to expect. And what was Wordsworth's
conduct under this unequaled experience of bad faith and bad feeling?
While so many anecdotes were going of the poet's fireside, the following
ought to be added: An old friend was talking with him by that fireside,
and mentioned DeQuincey's magazine articles.
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