Chapter 42

"Newstead Abbey, Septembers. 1814.

"I am obliged by what you have sent, but would rather not see any thing of the kind[47]; we have had enough of these things already, good and bad, and next month you need not trouble yourself to collect even the _higher_ generation--on my account. It gives me much pleasure to hear of Mr. Hobhouse's and Mr. Merivale's good entreatment by the journals you mention.

"I still think Mr. Hogg and yourself might make out an alliance. _Dodsley's_ was, I believe, the last decent thing of the kind, and _his_ had great success in its day, and lasted several years; but then he had the double advantage of editing and publishing. The Spleen, and several of _Gray's_ odes, much of _Shenstone_, and many others of good repute, made their first appearance in his collection. Now, with the support of Scott, Wordsworth, Southey, &c., I see little reason why you should not do as well; and, if once fairly established, you would have assistance from the youngsters, I dare say. Stratford Canning (whose 'Buonaparte' is excellent), and many others, and Moore, and Hobhouse, and I, would try a fall now and then (if permitted), and you might coax Campbell, too, into it. By the by, _he_ has an unpublished (though printed) poem on a scene in Germany, (Bavaria, I think,) which I saw last year, that is perfectly magnificent, and equal to himself. I wonder he don't publish it.

"Oh!--do you recollect S * *, the engraver's, mad letter about not engraving Phillips's picture of Lord _Foley_? (as he blundered it;) well, I have traced it, I think. It seems, by the papers, a preacher of Johanna Southcote's is named _Foley_; and I can no way account for the said S * *'s confusion of words and ideas, but by that of his head's running on Johanna and her apostles. It was a mercy he did not say Lord _Tozer_. You know, of course, that S * * is a believer in this new (old) virgin of spiritual impregnation.

"I long to know what she will produce[48]; her being with child at sixty-five is indeed a miracle, but her getting any one to beget it, a greater.

"If you were not going to Paris or Scotland, I could send you some game: if you remain, let me know.

"P.S. A word or two of 'Lara,' which your enclosure brings before me. It is of no great promise separately; but, as connected with the other tales, it will do very well for the volumes you mean to publish. I would recommend this arrangement--Childe Harold, the smaller Poems, Giaour, Bride, Corsair, Lara; the last completes the series, and its very likeness renders it necessary to the others. Cawthorne writes that they are publishing _English Bards in Ireland:_ pray enquire into this; because _it must_ be stopped."

[Footnote 47: The reviews and magazines of the month.]

[Footnote 48: The following characteristic note, in reference to this passage, appears, in Mr. Gifford's hand-writing, on the copy of the above letter:--"It is a pity that Lord B. was ignorant of Jonson. The old poet has a Satire on the Court Pucelle that would have supplied him with some pleasantry on Johanna's pregnancy."]

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