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a twenty. When I thought he was going to enact Argus, he bit away the backside of my breeches, and never would consent to any kind of recognition, in despite of all kinds of bones which I offered him. So, let Southey blush, and Homer too, as far as I can decide upon quadruped memories.*

"I humbly take it, the mother knows the son that pays her jointure a mistress her mate, till he ** and refuses salary—a friend his fellow, till he loses cash and character, and a dog his master, till he changes him.

"So, you want to know about Milady and me? But let me not, as Roderick Random says, 'profane the chaste mysteries of Hymen'f-damn the word, I had nearly spelled it with a small h. I like Bell as well as you do (or did, you villain!) Bessy-and that is (or was) saying a great deal.

"Address your next to Seaham, Stockton-on-Tees, where we are going on Saturday (a bore, by-the-way) to see father-in-law, Sir Jacob, and my lady's lady-mother. Write-and write more at length-both to the public and "Yours ever most affectionately, "B."

LETTER CCLVI.

TO MR. MOORE.

"Seaham, Stockton-on-Tees, Feb. 2, 1815. "I have heard from London that you have left Chatsworth and all the women full of entusymusy' about you, personally and poetically; and, in particular, that 'When first I met thee' has been quite overwhelming in its effect. I told you it was one of the best things you ever wrote, though that dog Power wanted you to omit part of it. They are all regretting your absence at Chatsworth, according to my informant- all the ladies quite, &c. &c. &c.' Stap my vitals!

LETTER CCLVII.

TO MR. MURRAY.

"Seaham, Stockton-upon-Tees, Feb. 2, 1815. "You will oblige me very much by making an occasional inquiry at Albany, at my chambers, whether my books, &c. are kept in tolerable order, and how far my old woman* coutinues in health and industry as keeper of my old den Your parcels have been duly received and perused; but I had hoped to receive 'Guy Mannering' before this time. I won't intrude further for the present on your vocations professional or pleasurable, but am, as usual,

"Very truly, &c."

LETTER CCLVIII.

TO MR. MOORE.

"Feb. 4, 1815

"I enclose you half a letter from ** which will explain itself-at least the latter part-the former refers to private business of mine own. If Jeffrey will take such an article, and you will undertake the revision, or, indeed, any portion of the article itself (for unless you do, by Phoebus, I will have nothing to do with it,) we can cook up, between us three, as pretty a dish of sour-crout as ever tipped over the tongue of a book-maker. * "You can, at any rate, try Jeffrey's inclination. Your much better proser and scholar than I am, and a very late proposal from him made me hint this to **, who is a superior man indeed. Excuse haste-answer this. "Ever yours most,

*

*

*

"B." "P. S, All is well at home. I wrote to you yesterday.

LETTER CCLIX.

гO MR. MOORE.

"MY DEAR THOM,

"Feb. 10, 1815.

"Well, now you have got home again-which I dare say is as agreeable as a 'draught of cool small beer to the scorched palate of a waking sot-now you have got home again, I say, probably I shall hear from you. Since I wrote last, I have been transferred to my father-in-law's, "Jeffrey has been so very kind about me and my damnwith my lady and lady's maid, &c. &c. &c. and the treacle-able works, that I would not be indirect or equivocal with moon is over, and I am awake, and find myself married. him, even for a friend. So, it may be as well to tell him My spouse and I agree to—and in-admiration. Swift that it is not mine; but that, if I did not firmly and truly says 'no wise man ever married;' but, for a fool, I think it the most ambrosial of all possible future states. I still think one ought to marry upon lease; but am very sure I should renew mine at the expiration, though next term were for ninety and nine years.

"I wish you would respond, for I am here 'oblitusque meorum obliviscendus et illis.' Pray tell me what is going on in the way of intriguery, and how the w―s and rogues of the upper Beggar's Opera go on-or rather go off-in or after marriage; or who are going to break any particular ommandment. Upon this dreary coast, we have nothing but county meetings and shipwrecks; and I have this day dined upon fish, which probably dined upon the crews of several colliers lost in the late gales. But I saw the sea once more in all the glories of surf and foam,—almost equal to the Bay of Biscay, and the interesting white squalls and short seas of Archipelago memory.

"My papa, Sir Ralpho, hath recently made a speech at a Durham tax-meeting; and not only at Durham, but here, several times since, after dinner. He is now, I believe, speaking it to himself (I left him in the middle) over various decanters, which can neither interrupt him nor fall asleep, -as might possibly have been the case with some of his audience. "Ever thine, "B."

"I must go to tea-damn tea. I wish it was Kinnaird's brandy, and with you to lecture me about it."

• Don Juan, canto 3, stanza 29, letter 92.

The letter H is blotted in the MS.

1 It was thus that, according to his account, Mr. Braham, the celebrated sinter and actor used frequcully to pronounce the word "enthusiasm.”

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"Curse catch me if I know what H✶✶ means or meaned about the demonstrative pronoun,† but I admire your fear of being inoculated with the same. Have you never found out that you have a particular style of your own, which is as distinct from all other people, as Hafiz of Shiraz from Hafiz of the Morning Post?

"So you allowed B * * and such like to hum and haw you, or, rather, Lady Jersey out of her compliment, and me out of mine. Sunburn me but this was pitiful hearted. However, I will tell her all about it when I see her.

"Bell desires me to say all kinds of civilities, and assure you of her recognition and high consideration. I wild tell you of our movements south, which may be in about threa weeks from this present writing. By-the-way, don't en gage yourself in any travelling expedition, as I have a plan of travel into Italy, which we will discuss. And then, think wherewithal we should overflow from Venice poesy

of the

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Vesuvius, to say nothing of Greece, through all whichGod willing-we might perambulate in one twelvemonth. If I take my wife, you can take yours; and if I leave mine, you may do the same. Mind you stand by me, in either case, Brother Bruin.' "B."

“And believe me inveterately yours,

LETTER CCLX.

TO MR. MOORE.

"Feb. 22, 1815.

"Yesterday, I sent off the packet and letter to Edinburgh. It consisted of forty-one pages, so that I have not added a line; but in my letter, I mentioned what passed between you and me in autumn, as my inducement for presuming to trouble him either with my own or * *'s lucubrations. I am any thing but sure that it will do; but I have told Jeffrey that if there is any decent raw material in it, he may cut it into what shape he pleases, and warp it to his baking.

I

"So you won't go abroad, then, with me,-but alone. ully purpose starting much about the time you mention, and alone, too.

"I hope Jeffrey won't think me very impudent in sending only; there was not room for a syllable. I have avowed as the author, and said that you thought or said, when I met you last, that he (J.) would not be angry at the coalition (though, alas! we have not coalesced,) and so, if I have got into a scrape, I must get out of it-Heaven knows how. "Your Anacreon* is come, and with it I sealed (its first impression) the packet and epistle to our patron.

"Curse the Melodies, and the Tribes to boot. Braham is to assist or hath assisted--but will do no more good than a second physician. I merely interfered to oblige a whim of Kinnaird's, and all I have got by it was 'a speech' and a receipt for stewed oysters.

You

"I feel merry enough to send you a sad song.* once asked me for some words which you would set. Now you may set or not, as you like, but there they are, in a legible hand, and not in mine, but of my own scribbling; so you may say of them what you please. Why don't you write to me? I shall make you 'a speech'‡ if you don't respond quickly.

"I am in such a state of sameness and stagnation, and so totally occupied in consuming the fruits-and sauntering -and playing dull games at cards-and yawning-and trying to read old Annual Registers and the daily papersand gathering shells on the shore-and watching the growth of stunted gooseberry bushes in the garden-that I have neither time nor sense to say more than

Yours ever,

"B.

"P. S. I open my letter again to put a question to you. What would Lady Cork, or any other fashionable Pidcock give, to collect you and Jeffrey and me to one party? 1 have been answering his letter, which suggested this dainty query. I can't help laughing at the thoughts of your face and mine; and our anxiety to keep the Aristarch in good humour during the early part of a compotation, till we got drunk enough to make him 'a speech. I think the critic would have much the best of us--of one, at least-for I don't think diffidence (I mean social) is a disease of yours."

LETTER CCLXII.

TO MR. MOORE.

"March 8, 1815

"An event the death of poor Dorset-and the recol. lection of what I once felt, and ought to have felt now, but could not-set me pondering, and finally into the train of thought which you have in your hands. I am very glad you like them, for I flatter myself they will pass as an imitation of your style. If I could imitate it well, I should have no great ambition of originality-I wish I could make "Not meet-pray don't say so. We must meet some-you exclaim with Dennis, 'That's my thunder, by G-d! ere or somehow. Newstead is out of the question, being wrote them with a view to your setting them, and as a early sold again, or, if not, it is uninhabitable for my spouse. present to Power, if he would accept the words, and you did Pray write again. I will soon. not think yourself degraded, for once in a way, by marrying them to music.

"P. S. Pray when do you come out? ever, or never? I hope I have made no blunder; but I certainly think you said to me (after Wordsworth, whom I first pondered upon, was given up) that ** and I might attempt ***. His length alone prevented me from trying my part, though should have been less severe upon the Reviewée.

I

I

"Sunburn Nathan! why do you always twit me with his vile Ebrew nasalities? Have I not told you it was all K.'s doing, and my own exquisite facility of temper? But thou wilt be a wag, Thomas; and see what you get for it. Now for my revenge.

Your seal is the best and prettiest of my set, and I thank "Depend and perpend-upon it that your opinion of you very much therefor. I have just been-or, rather,**'s Poem will travel through one or other of the quintuple ought to be very much shocked by the death of the Duke correspondents, till it reaches the ear and the liver of the of Dorset. We were at school together, and there I was author. Your adventure, however, is truly laughable; but passionately attached to him. Since, we have never met -but once, I think, since 1805-and it would be a paltry affectation to pretend that I had any feeling for him worth the name. But there was a time in my life when this event would have broken my heart; and all I can say for it now tha—it is not worth breaking.

"Adieu-it is all a farce."

LETTER CCLXI.

TO MR. MOORE.

"March 2, 1815.

how could you be such a potato? You, 'a brother' (of the quill) too, 'near the throne,' to confide to a man's own publisher (who has 'bought,' or rather sold, 'golden opinions' about him) such a damnatory parenthesis! 'Between you and me,' quotha, it reminds me of a passage in the Heir at Law-Tête-à-tête with Lady Duberly, I suppose Notête-à-tête with five hundred people, and your confidential communication will doubtless be in circulation to tha amount, in a short time, with several additions, and in several letters, all signed L. H. R. O. B. &c. &c. &c.

• The verses enclosed were those melancholy ones, now printed in his works, "There's not a joy the world can give like that it taken away.” Poems, p. 194.

The MS. was in the handwriting of Lady Byron.

These allusions to "a speech" are connected with a little incident,

worth mentioning, which had amused us both when I was in town was rather fond (and had been always so, as may be seen in his early letters) of thus harping on some conventional phrase or joke.—Moore. He here alludes to a circumstance which I had communicated to him

"MY DEAR THOM, Jeffrey has sent me the most friendly of all possible let-not ters, and has accepted * *'s article. He says he has long He liked not only, &c. &c. but my 'character.' This must be your doing, you dog-ar'n't you ashamed of yourself, know-in ing me so well? This is what one gets for having you for enough to form a more intimate connexion,) I had said confidentially, (as a father confessor.

a preceding letter. In writing to one of the numerous partners of

well-known publishing establishment, (with which I have since been lucky

I thought,) in reference to a Poem that had just appeared," between you and me, I do not much admire Mr.'s Poem." The letter being chiefly upon business, was answered through the regular business chaunel, and, to my dismay, concluded with the following words :-We are very

• A seal, with the head of Anacreon which Mr Moore had given him.sorry that you do not approve of Mr.'s new Poem, ad are your ↑ See Hours of idleness

obedient, &c. &: L. H. R. O. &c. &c."-Moore,

"We leave this place to-morrow, and shall stop on our way to town (in the interval of taking a house there) at Col. Leigh's, near Newmarket, where any epistle of yours will find its welcome way.

that his property, amounting to seven or eight thousand a year, will eventually devolve upon Bell. But the old gentleman has been so very kind to her and me, that I hardly know how to wish him in heaven, if he can be comfortable "I have been very comfortable here, listening to that d-d on earth. Her father is still in the country. monologue, which elderly gentlemen call conversation, and "We mean to metropolize to-morrow, and you will adin which my pious father-in-law repeats himself every eve-dress your next to Piccadilly. We have got the Dutchess ning, save one, when he played upon the fiddle. However, of Devon's house there, she being in France. they have been very kind and hospitable, and I like them "I don't care what Power says to secure the property of and the place vastly, and I hope they will live many happy the Song, so that it is not complimentary to me, nor any months. Bell is in health, and unvaried good-humour and thing about 'condescending' or 'noble author'—both 'vile behaviour. But we are all in the agonies of packing and phrases,' as Polonius says. parting; and I suppose by this time to-morrow I shall be stuck in the chariot with my chin upon a bandbox. I have prepared, however, another carriage for the abigail, and all he trumpery which our wives drag along with them. "Ever thine, most affectionately,

LETTER CCLXIII.

TO MR. MOORE.

"B."

"March 27, 1815.

'I meant to write to you before on the subject of your loss; but the recollection of the uselessness and worthlessness of any observations on such events prevented me. I shall only now add, that I rejoice to see you bear it so well, and that I trust time will enable Mrs. M. to sustain it better. Every thing should be done to divert and occupy her with other thoughts and cares, and I am sure all that can be done will.

"Now to your letter. Napoleon-but the papers will have told you all. I quite think with you upon the subject, and for my real thoughts this time last year, I would refer you to the last pages of the Journal I gave you. I can forgive the rogue for utterly falsifying every line of mine Cae-which I take to be the last and uttermost stretch of human magnanimity. Do you remember the story of a certain abbé, who wrote a Treatise on the Swedish Constitution, and proved it indissoluble and eternal? Just as he had corrected the last sheet, news came that Gustavus III. had destroyed this immortal government: 'Sir,' quoth the abbé, 'the king of Sweden may overthrow the constitution, but not my book!! I think of the abbé, but not with him.

Once fairly set out on his party of pleasure,
Taking towns at his liking and crowns at his leisure,
From Elba to Lyons and Paria he goes,

*

*

*

"Pray, let me hear from you, and when you mean to be in town. Your continental scheme is impracticable for the present. I have to thank you for a longer letter than usual, which I hope will induce you to tax my gratitude still farther in the same way.

"You never told me about 'Longman' and 'next winter, and I am not a 'milestone.'"*

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"It will give me great pleasure to comply with your request, though I hope there is still taste enough left among us to render it almost unnecessary, sordid and interested as, it must be admitted, many of 'the trade' are, where circumstances give them an advantage. I trust you do not permit yourself to be depressed by the temporary partiality of what is called 'the public' for the favourites of the mo ment; all experience is against the permanency of such impressions. You must have lived to see many of these pass away, and will survive many more-1 mean personally, for poetically, I would not insult you by a comparison.

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"If I may be permitted, I would suggest that there never was such an opening for tragedy. In Kean, there is an actor worthy of expressing the thoughts of the characters which you have every power of imbodying; and I cannot but regret that the part of Ordonio was disposed of before his appearance at Drury-lane. We have nothing to be mentioned in the same breath with 'Remorse' for very "Making every allowance for talent and most consum- many years; and I should think that the reception of that mate daring, there is, after all, a good deal in luck or destiny.play was sufficient to encourage the highest hopes of author He might have been stopped by our frigates-or wrecked and audience. It is to be hoped that you are proceeding in the gulf of Lyons, which is particularly tempestuous-or in a career which could not but be successful. With my -a thousand things. But he is certainly Fortune's fa- best respects to Mr. Bowles, I have the honour to be, vourite, and Your obliged and very obedient servant, "BYRON." "P. S. You mention my 'Satire,' lampoon, or whatever you or others please to call it. I can only say, that it was You must have seen the account of his driving into the been a thorn in my side ever since; more particularly as written when I was very young and very angry, and has middle of the royal army, and the immediate effect of his almost all the persons animadverted upon became subse pretty speeches. And now, if he don't drub the allies, there quently my acquaintances, and some of them my friends, is 'no purchase in money.' If he can take France by him- which is 'heaping fire upon an enemy's head,' and forgiving self, the devil's in't if he don't repulse the invaders, when me too readily to permit me to forgive myself. The part backed by those celebrated sworders-those boys of the applied to you is pert, and petulant, and shallow enough; blade, the Imperial Guard, and the old and new army. It is impossible not to be dazzled and overwhelmed by his character and career. Nothing ever so disappointed me as his abdication, and nothing could have reconciled me to him but some such revival as his recent exploit; though no one could anticipate such a complete and brilliant renovation.

Making balls for the ladies, and bows to his foes.

"To your question, I can only answer that there have been some symptoms which look a little gestatory. It is a Bubject upon which I am not particularly anxious, except that I think it would please her uncle, Lord Wentworth, and her father and mother. The former (Lord W.) is now in town, and in very indifferent health. You perhaps know!

• The death of his fan goddaughter, Olivia Byron Moore

but, although I have long done every thing in my power to regret the wantonness or generality of many of its attempte suppress the circulation of the whole thing, I shall always

ed attacks."

LETTER CCLXV.

TO MR. MURRAY.

"April 9, 1815. "Thanks for the books. I have great objection to your

I had accused him of having entirely forgot that, in a preceding letter, had informed him of my intention to publish with the Messrs. Longmu in the ensuing winter, and added that, in giving him this information, I found I had been-tu use an elegant Irish metaphor," whistling Jigs to a milestone -Moore.

proposition about inscribing the vase, which is, that it ful, that I made no mention of the drawings,* &c. when I would appear ostentatious on my part; and of course I must had the pleasure of seeing you this morning. The fact is send it as it is, without any alteration.

LETTER CCLXVI.

TO MR. MOORE.

"Yours, &c."

"April 23, 1815. "Lord Wentworth died last week. The bulk of his property (from seven to eight thousand per ann.) is entailed on Lady Milbanke and Lady Byron. The first is gone to take possession in Leicestershire, and attend the funeral, &c. this day.

"I have mentioned the facts of the settlement of Lord W.'s property, because the newspapers with their usual accuracy, have been making all kinds of blunders in their statement. His will is just as expected-the principal part settled on Lady Milbanke (now Noel) and Bell, and a separate estate left for sale to pay debts (which are not great,) and legacies to his natural son and daughter.

that till this moment I had not seen them, nor heard of their
arrival: they were carried up into the library, where I have
not been till just now, and no intimation given me of their
coming. The present is so very magnificent, that-in short
I leave Lady Byron to thank you for it herself, and merely
send this to apologize for a piece of apparent and uninten-
tional neglect on my own part.
"Yours, &c."

LETTER CCLXVIII.

TO MR. HUNT.

13 Piccadilly Terrace, May-June 1, 1815. "MY DEAR HUNT,

"I am as glad to hear from as I shall be to see you. We came to town what is called late in the season; and since that time, the death of Lady Byron's uncle (in the first place) and her own delicate state of health, have prevented either of us from going out much; however, she is now better, and in a fair way of going creditably through the whole process of beginning a family.

Mrs. **'s tragedy was last night damned. They may bring it on again, and probably will; but damned it was,— "I have the alternate weeks of a private box at Drury. Bot a word of the last act audible. I went (malgré that I lane Theatre; this is my week, and I send you an ad. ought to have staid at home in sackcloth for unc., but I mission to it for Kean's nights, Friday and Saturday next, could not resist the first night of any thing) to a private and in case you should like to see him quietly: it is close to the quiet nook of my private box, and witnessed the whole stage, the entrance by the private-box door, and you can go process. The first three acts, with transient gushes of without the bore of crowding, jostling, or dressing. I also applause, oozed patiently but heavily on. I must say it enclose you a parcel of recent letters from Paris; perhaps was badly acted, particularly by **, who was groaned you may find some extracts that may anfuse yourself or upon in the third act,-something about 'horror-such a your readers. I have only to beg you will prevent your horror' was the cause. Well, the fourth act became as copyist, or printer, from mixing up any of the English names muddy and turbid as need be; but the fifth-what Garrick or private matter contained therein, which might lead to a used to call (like a fool) the concoction of a play-the fifth discovery of the writer; and as the Examiner is sure to act stuck fast at the King's prayer. You know he says, travel back to Paris, might get hnn into a scrape, to say 'he never went to bed without saying them, and did not nothing of his correspondent at home. At any rate I hope like to omit them now.' But he was no sooner upon his and think the perusal will amuse you. Whenever you knees, than the audience got upon their legs-the damn-come this way, I shall be happy to make you acquainted able pit-and roared, and groaned, and hissed, and whis-with Lady Byron, whom you will find any thing but a fine tied. Well, that was choked a little; but the ruffian scene lady, a species of animal whom you probably do not affect -the penitent peasantry-and killing the Bishop and the more than myself. Thanks for the 'Mask; there is not Princess-oh, it was all over. The curtain fell upon un- only poetry and thought in the body, but much research heard actors, and the announcement attempted by Kean and good old reading in your prefatory matter. I hope for Monday was equally ineffectual. Mrs. Bartley was you have not given up your narrative poem, of which I Bo frightened, that, though the people were tolerably quiet, heard you speak as in progress.-It rejoices me to hear the Epilogue was quite inaudible to half the house. In of the well-doing and regeneration of the 'Feast,' setting shert, you know all. I clapped till my hands were skin-aside my own selfish reasons for wishing it success. I fear less, and so did Sir James Mackintosh, who was with me you stand almost single in your liking of 'Lara,' it is nain the box. All the world were in the house, from the tural that I should, as being my last and most unpopular Jerseys, Greys, &c. &c. downwards. But it would not effervescence: passing by its other sins, it is too little nardo. It is, after all, not an acting play; good language, but rative, and too metaphysical to please the greater number of readers. I have, however, much consolation in the exception with which you furnish me. From Moore I have not heard very lately; I fear he is a little humorous, be cause I am a lazy correspondent; but that shall be mended. "Ever your obliged

no power.

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*

Women (saving Joanna Baillie) cannot write tragedy; they have not seen enough nor felt enough of life for it. I think Semiramis or Catherine II. might have written (could they have been unqueened) a rare play.

*

It is, however, a good warning not to risk or write tragedies. I never had much bent that way; but, if I had, this would have cured me. "Ever, carissime Thom. "Thine, B."

and very sincere friend, "BYRON "P. S. 'Politics" The barking of the war-dogs for their carrion has sickened me of them for the present."

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A large sepulchral vase of silver, presented by Lord Byron, through Mr. Murray, to Sir Walter Scott. It was full of dead men's bones, and had inscriptions on two sides of the base. One ran thus-The bones contained in this urn were found in certain ancient sepulchres within the band walls of Athens in the month of February, 1811." The other face bears the lines of Juvenal:

"Expende-quot libras in duce summo invenies.

LETTER CCLXIX.

TO MR. MOORE.

"13, Piccadilly Terrace, June 12, 1815. "I have nothing to offer in behalf of my late silence, except the most inveterate and ineffable laziness; but I am too supine to invent a lie, or I certainly should, being ashamed of the truth. Kinnaird, I hope, has appeased your magnanimous indignation at his blunders. I wished

• Mr. Murray had presented Lady Byron with twelve drawings, by -Mara sola fatetur quantula hominum corpuscula."-Juv, x. | Stothard, from Lord Byron's Poems.

and wish you were in Committee, with all my heart.* It tell him that I am the laziest and most ungrateful of seems so hopeless a business, that the company of a friend mortals?

LETTER CCLXX.

TO MR. MOORE.

would be quite consoling, but more of this when we meet. "A word more;-don't let Sir John Stevenson (as an In the mean time, you are entreated to prevail upon Mrs. evidence on trials for copyright, &c.) talk about the price Esterre to engage herself. I believe she has been written of your next Poem, or they will come upon you for the to, but your influence, in person, or proxy, would probably Property Tax for it. I am serious, and have just heard a go farther than our proposals. What they are, I know long story of the rascally tax-men making Scout pay for not; all my new function consists in listening to the despair his. So, take care. Three hundred is a devil of a de of Cavendish Bradshaw, the hopes of Kinnaird, the wishes duction out of three thousand. of Lord Essex, the complaints of Whitbread, and the calculations of Peter Moore,-all of which, and whom, seem totally at variance. C. Bradshaw wants to light the theatre with gas, which may, perhaps, (if the vulgar be believed,) poison half the audience, and all the Dramatis Persona. Essex has endeavoured to persuade Kean not "July 7, 1815. to get drunk, the consequence of which is, that he has never "Grata superveniet,' &c. &c. I had written to you been sober since. Kinnaird, with equal success, would again, but burnt the letter, because I began to think you have convinced Raymond that he, the said Raymond, had seriously hurt at my indolence, and did not know how the too much salary. Whitbread wants us to assess the pit buffoonery it contained might be taken. In the mean time another sixpence,-a d-d insidious proposition,-which I have yours, and all is well. will end in an O. P. combustion. To crown all, Robins, "I had given over all hopes of yours. By-the-by, my, the auctioneer, has the impudence to be displeased, be-'grata superveniet' should be in the present tense; for I cause he has no dividend. The villain is a proprietor of perceive it looks now as if it applied to this present scrawl shares, and a long-lunged orator in the meetings. I hear reaching you, whereas it is to the receipt of thy Kilkenny he has prophesied our incapacity, a foregone conclusion,' epistle that I have tacked that venerable sentiment. whereof I hope to give him signal proofs before we are done.

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*

*

"Poor Whitbread died yesterday morning,—a sudden and severe loss. His health had been wavering, but so fatal an "Will you give us an Opera? no, I'll be sworn, but I wish attack was not apprehended. He dropped down, and, I you would. believe, never spoke afterward. I perceive Perry attributes "To go on with the poetical world, Walter Scott has his death to Drury-lane, a consolatory encouragement to gone back to Scotland. Murray, the bookseller, has been the new Committee. I have no doubt that **, who is of cruelly cudgelled of misbegotten knaves, 'in Kendal green,' a plethoric habit, will be bled immediately; and as I have at Newington Butts, in his way home from a purlieu dinner since my marriage, lost much of my paleness, and,-'hor. -and robbed,-would you believe it?-of three or four resco referens' (for I hate even moderate fat)-that happy bonds of forty pounds apiece, and a seal-ring of his grand- slenderness, to which, when I first knew you, I had attained father's worth a million! This is his version,-but others I by no means sit easy under this dispensation of the Morn opine that D'Israeli, with whom he dined, knocked him ing Chronicle. Every one must regret the loss of Whitdown with his last publication, 'the Quarrels of Authors,' bread; he was surely a great and very good man. -in a dispute about copyright. Be that as it may, the newspapers have teemed with his 'injuria forma,' and he has been embrocated and invisible to all but the apothecary

ever since.

"Lady B. is better than three months advanced in her progress towards maternity, and, we hope, likely to go well through with it. We have been very little out this season, as I wish to keep her quiet in her present situation. Her father and mother have changed their names to Noel, in compliance with Lord Wentworth's will, and in complaisance to the property bequeathed by him.

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"Paris is taken for the second time. I presume it, for the future, will have an anniversary capture. In the late battles. like all the world, I have lost a connexion,-poor Frederick Howard, the best of his race. I had little intercourse, of late years, with his family, but I never saw or heard but good of him. Hobhouse's brother is killed. In short, the havoc has not left a family out of its tender mercies.

"Every hope of a republic is over, and we must go on under the old system. But I am sick at heart of politics and slaughters; and the luck which Providence is pleased to lavish on Lord * *, is only a proof of the little value the "I hear that you have been gloriously received by the gods set upon prosperity, when they permit such ***s as Irish, and so you ought. But don't let them kill you with claret and kindness at the national dinner in your honour, which, I hear and hope, is in contemplation. If you will tell me the day, I'll get drunk myself on this side of the water, and waft you an applauding hiccup over the Channel.

"Of politics, we have nothing but the yell for war; and Castlereagh is preparing his head for the pike, on which we shall see it carried before he has done. The loan has made every body sulky. I hear often from Paris, but in direct contradiction to the home statements of our hirelings. Of domestic doings, there has been nothing since Lady D**. Not a divorce stirring, but a good many in embryo, in the shape of marriages.

"I enclose you an epistle received this morning from know not whom; but I think it will amuse you.

writer must be a rare fellow.

I

The

"P.S. A gentleman named D'Alton (not your Dalton) has sent me a National Poem called 'Dermid.' The same cause which prevented my writing to you operated against my wish to write to him an epistle of thanks. If you see him, will you make all kinds of fine speeches for me, and

The Committee of Managers of Druryane Theatre.

he and that drunken corporal, old Blucher, to bully their betters. From this, however, Wellington should be excepted. He is a man, and the Scipio of our Hannibal. However, he may thank the Russian frosts, which destroyed the real élite of the French army, for the successes of Waterloo.

"La! Moore-how you blasphemes about 'Parnassus' and 'Moses! I am ashamed for you. Won't you do any thing for the drama? We beseech an Opera. Kinnaird's blurier was partly mine. I wanted you of all things in the Committee, and so did he. But we are now glad you were wiser; for it is, I doubt, a bitter business.

(late Milbanke-he don't promise to be late Noel in a hurry)

"When shall we see you in England? Sir Ralph Noel

finding that one man can't inhabit two houses, has given his place in the north to me for a habitation; and there Lady B. threatens to be brought to bed in November. Sir R. and my Lady Mother are to quarter at Kirby-Lord Wentworth's that was. Perhaps you and Mrs. Moore will pay us a visit at Seaham in the course of the autumn. If so, you and I (without our wives) will take a lark to Edirburgh and embrace Jeffrey. It is not much above one hundred miles from us. But all this, and other high mat

See Childe Harold, Canto III-stanze £9.

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