but a
loan, the repayment of which may be exacted at the very moment,
perhaps, when we are forgetting in its possession the precarious
tenure by which alone it is ours.

My dear father and mother have both been very unwell; the former is
a little recovered, but the latter is still in a sad state of
bodily suffering and mental anxiety. Our two boys are well and
happy, and I am very well and not otherwise than happy. I regret to
say Mrs. Henry Siddons will leave London in a very short time; this
is a great loss to me. I owe more to her than I can ever repay; for
though abundant pains had been bestowed upon me previously to my
going to her, it was she who caused to spring whatever scattered
seeds of good were in me, which almost seemed as if they had been
cast into the soil in vain.

My dear H----, I am going on the stage: the nearest period talked
of for my _debut_ is the first of October, at the opening of the
theater; the furthest, November; but I almost think I should prefer
the nearest, for it is a very serious trial to look forward to, and
I wish it were over. Juliet is to be my opening part, but not to my
father's Romeo; there would be many objections to that; he will do
Mercutio for me. I do not enter more fully upon this, because I
know how few things can be of interest to you in your present state
of feeling, but I wished you not to find the first notice of my
entrance on the stage of life in a newspaper. God bless you,
dearest H----, and grant you better hopes.

Your most affectionate
FANNY.

My father not acting Romeo with me deprived me of the most poetical and
graceful stage lover of his day; but the public, who had long been
familiar with his rendering of the part of Romeo, gained as much as I
lost, by his taking that of Mercutio, which has never since been so
admirably represented, and I dare affirm will never be given more
perfectly. The graceful ease, and airy sparkling brilliancy of his
delivery of the witty fancies of that merry gentleman, the gallant
defiance of his bearing toward the enemies of his house, and his
heroically pathetic and humorous death-scene, were beyond description
charming. He was one of the best Romeos, and incomparably _the_ best
Mercutio, that ever trod the English stage.