LANDON, LETITIA ELIZABETH (1802-1838)

—Poete , dau. of an army agent, was b. in London. She was a prolific and, in her day, remarkably popular writer, but she wrote far too easily and far too much for permanent fame. Many of her poems appeared in the Literary Gazette , and similar publications, but she pub. separately The Fate of Adelaide (1821), The Improv is at rice (1824), The Troubadour (1825), The Venetian Bracelet (1829), etc. She also wrote a few novels, of which Ethel Church ill was the best, and a tragedy Castruccio Castracani (1837). She m. a Mr. Maclean, Governor of one of the West African Colonies, where, shortly after her arrival, she was found dead from the effects of an overdose of poison, which it was supposed she had taken as a relief from spasms to which she was subject. She was best known by her initials, L.E.L., under which she was accustomed to write.