You see nothing of my allies, Scrope Davies and Matthews [6]--they don't suit you; and how does it happen that I--who am a pipkin of the same pottery--continue in your good graces? Good night,--I will go on in the morning.
Dec. 9th.--In a morning I am always sullen, and to-day is as sombre as myself. Rain and mist are worse than a sirocco, particularly in a beef-eating and beer-drinking country. My bookseller, Cawthorne, has just left me, and tells me, with a most important face, that he is in treaty for a novel of Madame D'Arblay's, for which 1000 guineas are asked! [7] He wants me to read the MS. (if he obtains it), which I shall do with pleasure; but I should be very cautious in venturing an opinion on her whose _Cecilia_ Dr. Johnson superintended. [8]
If he lends it to me, I shall put it in the hands of Rogers and Moore, who are truly men of taste. I have filled the sheet, and beg your pardon; I will not do it again. I shall, perhaps, write again; but if not, believe, silent or scribbling, that I am,
[Footnote 1: See p. 75, 'note' 1. In the application to Coleridge of the phrase, "Manichean of poesy," Byron may allude to Cowper's 'Task' (bk. v. lines 444, 445):
"As dreadful as the Manichean God, Adored through fear, strong only to destroy."]
[Footnote 2: William Wellesley Pole Tylney Long Wellesley (1788-1857), one of the most worthless of the bloods of the Regency, son of Lord Maryborough, and nephew of the Duke of Wellington, became in 1845 the fourth Earl of Mornington. He married in March, 1812, Catherine, daughter and co-heir, with her brother, of Sir James Tylney Long, Bart., of Draycot, Wilts. On his marriage he added his wife's double name to his own, and so gave a point to the authors of Rejected Addresses:
"Long may Long-Tilney-Wellesley-Long-Pole live."
For Byron's allusion to him in 'The Waltz', see 'Poems', 1898, vol. i. p. 484, note 1. Having run through his wife's large fortune by his extravagant expenditure at Wanstead Park and elsewhere, he was obliged, in 1822, to escape from his creditors to the Continent. There (1823-25) he lived with Mrs. Bligh, wife of Captain Bligh, of the Coldstream Guards. His wife died in 1825, after filing a bill for divorce, and making her children wards of Chancery. Wellesley subsequently (1828) married Mrs. Bligh; but the second wife was as ill treated as the first, and he left her so destitute that she was a frequent applicant for relief at the metropolitan police-courts. He died of heart-disease in July, 1857, a pensioner on the charity of his cousin, the second Duke of Wellington.]