-

she is ignorant monstrous in her behaviour, flying out in all directions — calling people such names that. I was forced lately to make use of the term Minx - this is I think not from any innate vice, but from a penchant she has for acting stylishly-I am however tired of such style and shall decline any more of it. She had a friend to visit her lately-you have known plenty such her face is raw as if she was standing out in a frost; her lips raw and seem always ready for a Pullet she plays the Music without one sensation but the feel of the ivory at her fingers. She is a downright Miss without one set off - We hated her and smoked her and baited her and I think drove her away. Miss B. thinks her a Paragon of fashion, and says she is the only woman she would change persons with. What a stupe - She is superior as a Rose to a Dandelion. When we went to bed Brown observed as he put out the Taper what a very ugly old woman that Miss Robinson would make at which I must have groaned aloud for I'm sure ten minutes. I have not seen the thing Kingston again - George will describe him to you I shall insinuate some of these Creatures into a Comedy some day—and perhaps have Hunt among them

Scene, a little Parlour. Enter Hunt Gattie - Hazlitt-Mrs. Novello - Ollier. Gattie. Ha! Hunt, got into your new house? Ha! Mrs. Novello: seen Altam and his Wife? - Mrs. N. Yes (with a grin), it's Mr. Hunt's, is n't it? - Gattie. Hunt's? no, ha! Mr. Ollier, I congratulate you upon the highest compliment I ever heard paid to the Book. Mr. Hazlitt, I hope you are well. Hazlitt. Yes Sir, no Sir.- Mr. Hunt (at the Music), 'La Biondina,' etc. Hazlitt did you ever hear this? 6 La Biondina,' etc. Hazlitt. O no Sir I never. Ollier. Do, Hunt, give | it us over again divine. Gattie. Divino - Hunt, when does your Pocket-Book come out? Hunt. What is this absorbs me quite?' O we are spinning on a little, we

shall floridise soon I hope. Such a thing was very much wanting - people think of nothing but money getting-now for me I am rather inclined to the liberal side of things. I am reckoned lax in my Christian principles, etc. etc. etc.

[December 29.]

It is some days since I wrote the last page and what I have been about since I have no Idea. I dined at Haslam's on Sunday with Haydon yesterday, and saw Fanny in the morning; she was well. Just now I took out my poem to go on with it, but the thought of my writing so little to you came upon me and I could not get on so I have began at random and I have not a word to say and yet my thoughts are so full of you that I can do nothing else. I shall be confined at Hampstead a few days on account of a sore throat - the first thing I do will be to visit your Mother again. The last time I saw Henry he show'd me his first engraving, which I thought capital. Mr. Lewis called this morning and brought some American Papers I have not look'd into them - I think we ought to have heard of you before this — I am in daily expectation of Letters - Nil desperandum. Mrs. Abbey wishes to take Fanny from School - I shall strive all I can against that. There has happened a great Misfortune in the Drewe Family old Drewe has been dead some time; and lately George Drewe expired in a fit- on which account Reynolds has gone into Devonshire. He dined a few days since at Horace Twisse's with Liston and Charles Kemble. I see very little of him now, as I seldom go to Little Britain because the Ennui always seizes me there, and John Reynolds is very dull at home. Nor have I seen Rice. How you are now going on is a Mystery to me - I hope a few days will clear it up.

[December 30.]

I never know the day of the Month. It is very fine here to-day, though I expect a

Thundercloud, or rather a snow cloud, in less than an hour. I am at present alone at Wentworth Place. - Brown being at Chichester and Mr. and Mrs. Dilke making a little stay in Town. I know not what I should do without a sunshiny morning now and then it clears up one's spirits. Dilke and I frequently have some chat about you. I have now and then some doubt, but he seems to have a great confidence. I think there will soon be perceptible a change in the fashionable slang literature of the day it seems to me that Reviews have had their day — that the public have been surfeited there will soon be some new folly to keep the Parlours in talk- What it is I care not. We have seen three literary Kings in our Time Scott, Byron, and then the Scotch novels. All now appears to be dead - or I may mistake, literary Bodies may still keep up the Bustle which I do not hear. Haydon show'd me a letter he had received from Tripoli - Ritchie was well and in good Spirits, among Camels, Turbans, Palm Trees, and Sands. You may remember I promised to send him an Endymion which I did not - however he has one-you have one. One is in the Wilds of America - - the other is on a Camel's back in the plains of Egypt. I am looking into a Book of Dubois's - he has written directions to the Players one of them is very good. In singing never mind the music - observe what time you please. It would be a pretty degradation indeed if you were obliged to confine your genius to the dull regularity of a fiddler. horse hair and cat's guts no, let him keep your time and play your tune dodge him.' I will now copy out the Letter and Sonnet I have spoken of. The outside cover was thus directed, 'Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, (Booksellers), No. 93 Fleet Street, London,' and it contained this:

'Messrs. Taylor and Hessey are requested to forward the enclosed letter by some safe mode of conveyance to the Author of Endymion, who is not known at Teignmouth: or if they have

I turn'd over and found a £25 note. Now this appears to me all very properif I had refused it I should have behaved in a very bragadochio dunderheaded manner--and yet the present galls me a ittle, and I do not know whether I shall not return it if I ever meet with the donor after, whom to no purpose I have writter. 1 have your Miniature on the Table Gerge the great it's very like - though not quite about the upper lip. I wish we hd a better of your little George. I must nt forget to tell you that a few days since went with Dilke a shooting on the heath and shot a Tomtit. There were as many guns abroad as Birds. I intended to have been at Chichester this Wednesday — but on account of this sore throat I wrote him (Brown) my excuse yesterday.

Thursday [December 31].

(I will date when I finish.) — I received a Note from Haslam yesterdayasking if my letter is ready- now this is only the second sheet notwithstanding all my promises. But you must reflect what hindrances I have had. However on sealing this I shall have nothing to prevent my proceeding in a gradual journal, which will increase in a Month to a considerable size. I will insert any little pieces I may write – though I will not give any extracts from my large poem which is scarce began. I want to hear very much whether Poetry and literature in general has gained or lost interest with you · - and what sort of writing is of the highest gust with you now. With what sensation do you read Fielding?

- and do not Hogarth's pictures seem an old thing to you? Yet you are very little more removed from general association than I am recollect that no Man can live but in one society at a time—his enjoyment in the different states of human society must depend upon the Powers of his Mind-that is you can imagine a Roman triumph or an Olympic game as well as I can. We with our bodily eyes see but the fashion and Manners of one country for one age and then we die. Now to me manners and customs long since passed whether among the Babylo- | nians or the Bactrians are as real, or even more real than those among which I now live - My thoughts have turned lately this way-The more we know the more inadequacy we find in the world to satisfy us

this is an old observation; but I have made up my Mind never to take anything for granted - but even to examine the truth of the commonest proverbs This however is true. Mrs. Tighe and Beattie once delighted me now I see through them and can find nothing in them but weakness, and yet how many they still delight! Perhaps a superior being may look upon Shakspeare in the same light — is it possible? No-This same inadequacy is

discovered (forgive me, little George, you know I don't mean to put you in the mess) in Women with few exceptions - the Dress Maker, the blue Stocking, and the most charming sentimentalist differ but in a slight degree and are equally smokeable. But I will go no further — I may be speaking sacrilegiously and on my word I have thought so little that I have not one opinion upon anything except in matters of taste I never can feel certain of any truth but from a clear perception of its Beauty and I find myself very young minded even in that perceptive powerwhich I hope will increase. A year ago I could not understand in the slightest degree Raphael's cartoons - now I begin to

read them a little And how did I learn to do so? By seeing something done in quite an opposite spirit— I mean a picture of Guido's in which all the Saints, instead of that heroic simplicity and unaffected grandeur which they inherit from Raphael, had each of them both in countenance and gesture all the canting, solemn, melodramatic mawkishness of Mackenzie's father Nicholas. When I was last at Haydon's I looked over a Book of Prints taken from the fresco of the Church at Milan, the name of which I forget — in it are comprised Specimens of the first and second age of art in Italy. I do not think I ever had a greater treat out of Shakspeare. Full of Romance and the most tender feeling — magnificence of draperies beyond any I ever saw, not excepting Raphael's. But Grotesque to a curious pitch - yet still making up a fine whole - even finer to me than more accomplish'd works there was left so much room for Imagination. I have not heard one of this last course of Hazlitt's lectures. They were upon Wit and Humour,' 'the English comic writers.'

as

Saturday, Jan. 2nd [1819]. Yesterday Mr. and Mrs. D. and myself dined at Mrs. Brawne's — nothing particular passed. I never intend hereafter to

spend any time with Ladies unless they are handsome -you lose time to no purpose. For that reason I shall beg leave to decline going again to Redall's or Butler's or any Squad where a fine feature cannot be mustered among them all - and where all the evening's amusement consists in saying 'your good health, your good health, and YOUR good health—and (O I beg your pardon) yours, Miss ,' and such thing

not even dull enough to keep one awake With respect to amiable speaking I can read-let my eyes be fed or I'll never go out to dinner anywhere./ Perhaps you may have heard of the dinner given to Thos. Moore in Dublin, because I have the account here by me in the Philadelphia democratic paper. The most pleasant thing that occurred was the speech Mr. Tom made on his Father's health being drank. I am afraid a great part of my Letters are filled up with promises and what I will do rather than any great deal written - but here I say once for all—that circumstances prevented me from keeping my promise in my last, but now I affirm that as there will be nothing to hinder me I will keep a journal for you. That I have not yet done so you would forgive if you knew how many hours I have been repenting of my neglect. For I have no thought pervading me so constantly and frequently as that of you— my Poem cannot frequently drive it away you will retard it much more than you could by taking up my time if you were in England. I never forget you except after seeing now and then some beautiful woman but that is a fever- the thought of you both is a passion with me, but for the most part a calm one. I asked Dilke for a few lines for you - he has promised them - I shall send what I have written to Haslam on Monday Morning — what I can get into another sheet to-morrow I will- There are one or two little poems you might like. I have given up snuff very nearly quite Dilke has promised to sit with me this evening, I wish he would come this minute

for I want a pinch of snuff very much just now - I have none though in my own snuff box. My sore throat is much better to-day - I think I might venture on a pinch. Here are the Poems- they will explain themselves as all poems should do without any comment

[The poem entitled 'Fancy,' pp. 124, 125, is here inserted.]

I did not think this had been so long a Poem. I have another not so long-but as it will more conveniently be copied on the other side I will just put down here some observations on Caleb Williams by Hazlitt― I meant to say St. Leon, for although he has mentioned all the Novels of Godwin very freely I do not quote them, but this only on account of its being a specimen of his usual abrupt manner, and fiery laconicism. He says of St. Leon

'He is a limb torn off society. In possession of eternal youth and beauty he can feel no love; surrounded, tantalised, and tormented with riches, he can do no good. The faces of Men pass before him as in a speculum; but he is attached to them by no common tie of sympathy or suffering. He is thrown back into himself and his own thoughts. He lives in the solitude of his own breast-without wife or child or friend or Enemy in the world. This is the solitude of the soul, not of woods or trees or mountains - but the desert of society-the waste and oblivion of the heart. He is himself alone. His existence is purely intellectual, and is therefore intolerable to one who has felt the rapture of affection, or the anguish of woe.'

As I am about it I might as well give you his character of Godwin as a Romancer:

'Whoever else is, it is pretty clear that the author of Caleb Williams is not the author of Waverley. Nothing can be more distinct or excellent in their several ways than these two writers. If the one owes almost everything to external observations and traditional character, the other owes everything to internal conception and contemplation of the possible workings of the human Mind. There is little knowledge of the world, little variety, neither an eye for the picturesque nor a talent for the humorous

in Caleb Williams, for instance, but you cannot doubt for a moment of the originality of the work and the force of the conception. The impression made upon the reader is the exact measure of the strength of the author's genius. For the effect both in Caleb Williams and St. Leon is entirely made out, not by facts nor dates, by blackletter, or magazine learning, by transcript nor record, but by intense and patient study of the human heart, and by an imagination projecting itself into certain situations, and capable of working up its imaginary feelings to the height of reality.'

These are specimens of a sort of rondeau which I think I shall become partial to because you have one idea amplified with greater ease and more delight and freedom than in the sonnet. It is my intention to wait a few years before I publish any minor poems—and then I hope to have a volume of some worth- and which those people will relish who cannot bear the burthen of a long poem. In my journal I intend to copy the poems I write the days they are written - There is just room, I see, in this page to copy a little thing I wrote off to some Music as it was playing ['I had a dove and the sweet dove died,' p. 125].

Sunday [January 3].

I have been dining with Dilke to-day – He is up to his Ears in Walpole's letters. Mr. Manker is there, and I have come round to see if I can conjure up anything for you. Kirkman came down to see me this morning-his family has been very badly off lately. He told me of a villainous trick of his Uncle William in Newgate Street, who became sole Creditor to his father under pretence of serving him, and put an execution on his own Sister's goods. He went in to the family at Portsmouth; conversed with them, went out and sent in the Sherriff's officer. He tells me too of

abominable behaviour of Archer to Caroline Mathew-Archer has lived nearly at the Mathews these two years; he has been amusing Caroline - and now he has written a Letter to Mrs. M. declining, on pretence of inability to support a wife as he would wish, all thoughts of marriage. What is the worst is Caroline is 27 years old. It is an abominable matter. He has called upon me twice lately-I was out both times. What can it be for? - There is a letter to-day in the Examiner to the Electors of Westminster on Mr. Hobhouse's account. In it there is a good character of Cobbett -I have not the paper by me or I would copy it. I do not think I have mentioned the discovery of an African Kingdomthe account is much the same as the first accounts of Mexico-all magnificence There is a Book being written about it. I will read it and give you the cream in my next. The romance we have heard upon it runs thus: They have window frames of gold-100,000 infantry-human sacrifices. The Gentleman who is the Adventurer has his wife with him-she, I am told, is a beautiful little sylphid woman her husband was to have been sacrificed to their Gods and was led through a Chamber filled with different instruments of torture with privilege to choose what death he would die, without their having a thought of his aversion to such a death, they considering it a supreme distinction. However he was let off, and became a favourite with the King, who at last openly patronised him, though at first on account of the Jealousy of his Ministers he was wont to hold conversations with his Majesty in the dark middle of the night. All this sounds a little Bluebeardish—but I hope it is true. There is another thing I must mention of the momentous kind; - but I must mind my periods in it- Mrs. Dilke has two Cats a Mother and a Daughter now the Mother is a tabby and the daughter a black and white like the spotted child. Now it appears to me, for the doors of both houses