DEAR Manning,—Having suspended my correspondence a decent interval, as knowing that even good things may be taken to satiety, a wish cannot but recur to learn whether you be still well and happy. Do all things continue in the state I left them in Cambridge?
Do your night parties still flourish? and do you continue to bewilder your company with your thousand faces running down through all the keys of idiotism (like Lloyd over his perpetual harpsicord), from the smile and the glimmer of half-sense and quarter-sense to the grin and hanging lip of Betty Foy’s own Johnny? And does the face-dissolving curfew sound at twelve? How unlike the great originals were your petty terrors in the postscript, not fearful enough to make a fairy shudder, or a Lilliputian fine lady, eight months full of child, miscarry. Yet one of them, which had more beast than the rest, I thought faintly resembled one of your brutifications. But, seriously, I long to see your own honest Manning-face again. I did not mean a pun,—your man’s face, you will be apt to say, I know your wicked will to pun. I cannot now write to Lloyd and you too, so you must convey as much interesting intelligence as this may contain, or be thought to contain, to him and Sophia, with my dearest love and remembrances.
By the by, I think you and Sophia both incorrect with regard to the title of the play. Allowing your objection (which is not
necessary, as pride may be, and is in real life often, cured by misfortunes not
directly originating from its own acts, as Jeremy
Taylor will tell you a naughty desire is sometimes sent to cure
it—I know you read these practical divines). But
allowing your objection, does not the betraying of his father’s secret
directly spring from pride?—from the pride of wine and a full heart, and a
proud over-stepping of the ordinary rules of morality, and con-
| 1799 | “JOHN WOODVIL” | 153 |
If you do not understand it so, it is my fault in not explaining my meaning.
I have not seen Coleridge since, and scarcely expect to see him,—perhaps he has been at Cambridge. [See page 965.]
Need I turn over to blot a fresh clean half-sheet? merely to say, what I hope you are sure of without my repeating it, that I would have you consider me, dear Manning, Your sincere friend,
What is your proper address?
