was sent to drink goat's fey in 1795-6, in consequence of a threatened decline after the scarlet 'fever. But I am gossiping, so, good night-and 'the gods be with your dreams!

Pray, present my respects to Lady Scott, who may perhaps, recollect having seen me in town in '1815.

I see that one of your supporters (for like Sir Hildebrand, I am fond of Guillin) is a mermaid; it is my crest too, and with precisely the same curl of tail. There's concatenation for you!-I am building a little cutter at Genoa, to go a cruising in the sum'mer. I know you like the sea too.'

"Try back the deep lane," till we find a publisher for "the Vision ;" and if none such is to be found, print fifty copies at my expense, distribute them amongst my acquaintance, and you will soon see that the booksellers will publish them, even if we opposed them. That they are now afraid is natural; but I do not see that I ought to give way on that ' account. I know nothing of Rivington's "Remonstrance" by the "eminent Churchman;" but I suppose he wants a living. I once heard of a preacher ' at Kentish Town against " Cain." The same outcry 'was raised against Priestley, Hume, Gibbon, Vol'taire, and all the men who dared to put tithes to the ' question.

I have got S--'s pretended reply, to which I

*This letter has been already published, with a few others, in a pe riodical work, and is known to have been addressed to the late Mr. Douglas Kinnaird,

' am surprised that you do not allude. What remains 'to be done is, to call him out. The question is, 'would he come? for, if he would not, the whole thing would appear ridiculous, if I were to take a 'long and expensive journey to no purpose.

You must be my second, and, as such, I wish to • consult you.

'I apply to you, as one well versed in the duello, or monomachie. Of course I shall come to England ' as privately as possible, and leave it (supposing that I was the survivor) in the same manner; having no 'other object which could bring me to that country except to settle quarrels accumulated during my

'absence.

By the last post I transmitted to you a letter upon some Rochdale toll business, from which there are moneys in prospect. My agent says two thousand pounds, but supposing it to be only one, or even one ' hundred, still they may be moneys; and I have lived 'long enough to have an exceeding respect for the 'smallest current coin of any realm, or the least sum, 'which, although I may not want it myself, may do 'something for others who may need it more than I.

They say that "Knowledge is Power;"-I used 'to think so; but I now know that they meant ""money:" and when Socrates declared, "that all 'he knew was, that he knew nothing," he merely in' tended to declare, that he had not a drachm in the 'Athenian world.

The circulars are arrived, and circulating like the ' vortices (or vortexes) of Descartes. Still I have a 'due care of the needful, and keep a look out ahead, as my notions upon the score of moneys coincide

'with yours, and with all men's who have lived to 'see that every guinea is a philosopher's stone, or at least his touch-stone. You will doubt me the less, 'when I pronounce my firm belief, that Cash is Virtue.

'I cannot reproach myself with much expenditure: my only extra expense (and it is more than I have spent upon myself) being a loan of two hundred and fifty pounds to ; and fifty pounds' worth of 'furniture, which I have bought for him; and a boat ' which I am building for myself at Genoa, which will 'cost about a hundred pounds more.

But to return. I am determined to have all the moneys I can, whether by my own funds, or succession, or lawsuit, or MSS., or any lawful means what

ever.

I will pay (though with the sincerest reluctance) my remaining creditors, and every man of law, by 'instalments from the award of the arbitrators.

'I recommend to you the notice in Mr. Hanson's letter, on the demands of moneys for the Rochdale 'tolls.

Above all, I recommend my interests to your 'honourable worship.

Recollect, too, that I expect some moneys for the ' various MSS. (no matter what); and, in short, “Rem, quocunque modo, Rem!"—the noble feeling ' of cupidity grows upon us with our years.

'Yours ever, &c.'

Attacks upon me were to be expected, but I per'ceive one upon you in the papers, which I confess

that I did not expect. How, or in what manner, 'you can be considered responsible for what I pub'lish, I am at a loss to conceive.

"If "Cain" be "blasphemous," Paradise Lost is blasphemous; and the very words of the Oxford gentleman, "Evil, be thou my good," are from that very poem, from the mouth of Satan, and is there 'anything more in that of Lucifer in the Mystery? 'Cain is nothing more than a drama, not a piece of

argument. If Lucifer and Cain speak as the first 'murderer and the first rebel may be supposed to speak, surely all the rest of the personages talk also according to their characters-and the stronger pas'sions have ever been permitted to the drama.

'I have even avoided introducing the Deity as in 'Scripture (though Milton does, and not very wisely either), but have adopted his angel as sent to Cain instead, on purpose to avoid shocking any feelings ' on the subject by falling short of what all uninspired men must fall short in, viz., giving an adequate 'notion of the effect of the presence of Jehovah. The old Mysteries introduced him liberally enough, ' and all this is avoided in the new one.

'The attempt to bully you, because they think it 'won't succeed with me, seems to me as atrocious an attempt as ever disgraced the times. What! when 'Gibbon's, Hume's, Priestley's, and Drummond's pub'lishers have been allowed to rest in peace for seventy years, are you to be singled out for a work of fiction, 'not of history or argument? There must be something at the bottom of this-some private enemy of your own it is otherwise incredible.

'I can only say, "Me, me; en adsum qui feci; " 'that any proceedings directed against you, I beg,

may be transferred to me, who am willing, and ought, 'to endure them all ;-that if you have lost money by 'the publication, I will refund any or all of the copy' right;—that I desire you will say that both you and 'Mr. Gifford remonstrated against the publication, as ' also Mr. Hobhouse ;-that I alone occasioned it, and 'I alone am the person who, either legally or other'wise, should bear the burden. If they prosecute, I 'will come to England-that is, if, by meeting it in my own person, I can save yours. Let me know. You 'shan't suffer for me, if I can help it. Make any use ' of this letter you please. 'Yours ever, &c.

'P.S. I write to you about all this row of bad passions and absurdities with the summer moon (for here our winter is clearer than your dog-days) lighting the winding Arno, with all her buildings and bridges, so quiet and still!-What nothings are we before the least of these stars!'

'Pisa, February 19th, 1822. 'I am rather surprised not to have had an answer 'to my letter and packets. Lady Noel is dead, and it is not impossible that I may have to go to England to 'settle the division of the Wentworth property, and what portion Lady B. is to have out of it; all which ' was left undecided by the articles of separation. But I hope not, if it can be done without,-and I have written to Sir Francis Burdett to be my referee, as he 'knows the property.

Continue to address here, as I shall not go if I can ' avoid it at least, not on that account. But I may on another; for I wrote to Douglas Kinnaird to convey a message of invitation to Mr. Southey to