That must resolve to do what did itself of yore.
God bless you, and your ever affectionate
S. T. Coleridge.
T. Allsop, Esq.
P.S. To my great surprise and delight, Mr. Anster came in on us this afternoon, and in perfect health and spirits.[133]
It was about this time that Coleridge wrote his beautiful Youth and Age,[134] in which occurs the fine designation of Friendship as “a Sheltering Tree.”
The following opinion of Coleridge by Mrs. Gillman is taken from The Bright Side of Life by Dr. Prentiss, an American, who visited Mrs. Gillman in 1842, and will fittingly close this chapter:
“In speaking of Coleridge personally and as a member of her family Mrs. Gillman’s testimony was to this effect:
“‘I do assure you that through all the years he lived with us, I do not remember once to have seen him fretful or out of humour; he was the same kindly, affectionate being from morning till evening, and from January till December. He delighted to reconcile little differences, and to make all things go smoothly and happily. He was always teaching the Beautiful and the Good, while his own daily life was the best illustration of the good and beautiful which he taught. You know how the world sometimes misrepresented and ill-treated him, and he felt it now and then very keenly; but he bore it all with the sweetest patience. As I have said, I never saw him in what could be called an ill-temper during the nineteen years he was under our roof,—never! The servants in the house idolized him; and when he died it seemed as if their hearts would break. We all had one feeling toward him: we all loved him alike, each in our own way; and we all alike wept when he died. Love was the law of his nature. He clothed his friends, to be sure, in the colours of his own fancy, and sometimes, perhaps, the colours were too bright; but it was his goodness of heart, quite as much as his imagination, that was at fault.’”