Notwithstanding this unambitious declaration of the young author, he
had that within which would not suffer him to rest so easily; and the
fame he had now reaped within a limited circle made him but more eager
to try his chance on a wider field. The hundred copies of which this
edition consisted were hardly out of his hands, when with fresh
activity he went to press again,--and his first published volume, "The
Hours of Idleness," made its appearance. Some new pieces which he had
written in the interim were added, and no less than twenty of those
contained in the former volume omitted;--for what reason does not very
clearly appear, as they are, most of them, equal, if not superior, to
those retained.

In one of the pieces, reprinted in the "Hours of Idleness," there are
some alterations and additions, which, as far as they may be supposed
to spring from the known feelings of the poet respecting birth, are
curious. This poem, which is entitled "Epitaph on a Friend," appears,
from the lines I am about to give, to have been, in its original
state, intended to commemorate the death of the same lowly born youth,
to whom some affectionate verses, cited in a preceding page, were
addressed:--

"Though low thy lot, since in a cottage born,
No titles did thy humble name adorn;
To me, far dearer was thy artless love
Than all the joys wealth, fame, and friends could prove."

But, in the altered form of the epitaph, not only this passage, but
every other containing an allusion to the low rank of his young
companion, is omitted; while, in the added parts, the introduction of
such language as