" He
inherited wealth, and lived a great part of his life at Florence, where
he died in 1864, in his ninetieth year. Dickens, who knew him at Bath,
in the latter part of his life, made a kindly caricature of him as
Lawrence Boythorn, in _Bleak House_, whose "combination of superficial
ferocity and inherent tenderness," testifies Henry Crabb Robinson, in
his _Diary_, was true to the life. Landor is the most purely classical
of English writers. Not merely his themes, but his whole way of thinking
was pagan and antique. He composed indifferently in English or Latin,
preferring the latter, if any thing, in obedience to his instinct for
compression and exclusiveness. Thus, portions of his narrative poem,
_Gebir_, 1798, were written originally in Latin and he added a Latin
version, _Gebirius_, to the English edition. In like manner his
_Hellenics_, 1847, were mainly translations from his Latin _Idyllia
Heroica_, written years before. The Hellenic clearness and repose which
were absent from his life, Landor sought in his art. His poems, in their
restraint, their objectivity, their aloofness from modern feeling, have
something chill and artificial. The verse of poets like Byron and
Wordsworth is alive; the blood runs in it. But Landor's polished,
clean-cut _intaglios_ have been well described as "written in marble.
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