re than I
would. So much for 'dearest friend.'"

* * * * *

LETTER 138. TO MR. MOORE.

"Sept. 9. 1813.

"I write to you from Mr. Murray's, and I may say, from Murray, who,
if you are not predisposed in favour of any other publisher, would
be happy to treat with you, at a fitting time, for your work. I can
safely recommend him as fair, liberal, and attentive, and
certainly, in point of reputation, he stands among the first of
'the trade.' I am sure he would do you justice. I have written to
you so much lately, that you will be glad to see so little now.

"Ever," &c. &c.

* * * * *

LETTER 139. TO MR. MOORE.

"September 27. 1813.

"Thomas Moore,

"(Thou wilt never be called '_true_ Thomas,' like he of
Ercildoune,) why don't you write to me?--as you won't, I must. I
was near you at Aston the other day, and hope I soon shall be
again. If so, you must and shall meet me, and go to Matlock and
elsewhere, and take what, in _flash_ dialect, is poetically termed
'a lark,' with Rogers and me for accomplices. Yesterday, at Holland
House, I was introduced to Southey--the best looking bard I have
seen for some time. To have that poet's head and shoulders, I would
almost have written his Sapphics. He is certainly a prepossessing
person to look on, and a man of talent, and all that, and--_there_
is his eulogy.

"* * read me part of a letter from you. By the foot of Pharaoh, I
believe there was abuse, for he stopped short, so he did, after a
fine saying about our correspondence, and _looked_--I wish I could
revenge myself by attacking you, or by telling you that I have
_had_ to defend you--an agreeable way which one's friends have of
recommending themselves by saying--'Ay, ay, _I_ gave it Mr.
Such-a-one for what he said about your being a plagiary, and a
rake, and so on.' But do you know that you are one of the very few
whom I never have the satisfaction of hearing abused, but the
reverse;--and do you suppose I will forgive _that_?

"I have been in the country, and ran away from the Doncaster races.
It is odd,--I was a visiter in the same house which came to my sire
as a residence with Lady Carmarthen, (with whom he adulterated
before his majority--by the by, remember, _she_ was