HUNT, JAMES HENRY LEIGH, poet and essayist, was b. in London, Oct. 19, 1784, educated at Christ's hospital, and first attracted notice as a writer of theatrical and liter ary criticisms for the Examiner newspaper, which was started in 1805 by his elder brother John. At the age of 24 he became joint editor and proprietor of the Examiner. He was a liberal in politics before liberalism had become fashionable; and for one of his articles, reflecting on the obesity of the prince regent—" a fat Adonis of fifty," Hunt had called him—he was sentenced to pay a fine of £500, and to undergo two i years' imprisonment. Hunt was happy enough in his confinement; he hid the prison bars with flowers, and received visits from Byron, Shelley, and Keats.• On his release he published The Story of Rimini, which he had written in prison, and which gave hint a place among the poets of the day. Foliage appeared in 1818, and about the same time he started the Indicator, a serial suggested by the Spectator and littler. In 1828 he published Lord Byron and his Contemporaries, the record of a brief and not very pleasant companionship in Italy with his lordship, which gave great offense to Byron's friends. In the same year he started The Companion, a sequel to The Indicator, both of which were republished as one book in 1834. In 1833 he published a collected edition of his poetical works. In 1834 he started the London Journal, which he edited for two years. His principal works, besides those already mentioned, are: Captain Sword and Captain Pen (1835); Legend of Florence (1840); The Seer, a publication similar to The Indicator; The Palfrey (1842); Sir Ralph Esher, a novel (1844); Imagination and Fancy (1844); Wit and Humor (1846); Stories of the Italian Poets. with Lives (1846); Alen, Women,
and Books (1847); A Jar of ',Coney from Mount Hybla (1848); his Autobiography (1850); The Religion of the heart (1853); and The Old Court Suburb (1855). In 1847 he received from the crown a pension of £200. He died at Highgate, Aug. 28, 1859. A selection from his Letters and Correspondence was published by his son, Mr. Thornton Hunt, in 1862.
Hunt's reputation rests upon his poems and essays. The Story of Rimini is, on the whole, perhaps the finest narrative which has appeared since Dryden, and his Palfrey is delightful from its good spirits and bright sunny glimpses of landscape and character. As an essayist, he is always cheerful and fanciful, and he looks determinedly at the bright side of things. The sky may be gloomy, but if there is a bit of blue in it, Ile, with an admirable practical philosophy, constantly turns his eye to that. He delights to wreath the porch of the human dwelling with roses and honeysuckles. Among his poems are to be found several translations, which are the best things of the kind we possess. He transports the wine of Greece and Italy to England, and its color and flavor are rather improved than otherwise by the voyage.