White," he says, "brought in the news of Boscawen's success off the
coast of Portugal, how did I leap for joy! When Hawke demolished
Conflans, I was still more transported. But nothing could express my
rapture when Wolfe made the conquest of Quebec."

The "Delia" to whom Cowper wrote verses was his cousin Theodora, with
whom he had an unfortunate love affair. Her father, Ashley Cowper,
forbade their marriage, nominally on the ground of consanguinity,
really, as Southey thinks, because he saw Cowper's unfitness for
business and inability to maintain a wife. Cowper felt the
disappointment deeply at the time, as well he might do if Theodora
resembled her sister, Lady Hesketh. Theodora remained unmarried, and,
as we shall see, did not forget her lover. His letters she preserved
till her death in extreme old age.

In 1756 Cowper's father died. There does not seem to have been much
intercourse between them, nor does the son in after-years speak with
any deep feeling of his loss: possibly his complaint in _Tirocinium_ of
the effect of boarding-schools, in estranging children from their
parents, may have had some reference to his own case. His local
affections, however, were very strong, and he felt with unusual
keenness the final parting from his old home, and the pang of thinking
that strangers usurp our dwelling and the familiar places will know us
no more.

Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more,
Children not thine have trod my nursery floor;
And where the gardener Robin, day by day,
Drew me to school along the public way,
Delighted with my bauble coach, and wrapp'd