LORD  BYRON  and  his  TIMES
Byron
Documents Biography Criticism
A Memoir of the Reverend Sydney Smith
Letters 1821
Sydney Smith to Lady Grey, 1 November 1821
INTRODUCTION & INDEXES
DOCUMENT INFORMATION
GO TO PAGE NUMBER:
Author's Preface
Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Index
Editor’s Preface
Letters 1801
Letters 1802
Letters 1803
Letters 1804
Letters 1805
Letters 1806
Letters 1807
Letters 1808
Letters 1809
Letters 1810
Letters 1811
Letters 1812
Letters 1813
Letters 1814
Letters 1815
Letters 1816
Letters 1817
Letters 1818
Letters 1819
Letters 1820
Letters 1821
Letters 1822
Letters 1823
Letters 1824
Letters 1825
Letters 1826
Letters 1827
Letters 1828
Letters 1829
Letters 1830
Letters 1831
Letters 1832
Letters 1833
Letters 1834
Letters 1835
Letters 1836
Letters 1837
Letters 1838
Letters 1839
Letters 1840
Letters 1841
Letters 1842
Letters 1843
Letters 1844
Creative Commons License

Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
Produced by CATH
 
Foston, Nov. 1st, 1821.
My dear Lady Grey,

Pray tell me how you are, and if you are making a good recovery. I have long thought of writing, but feared you would be plagued by such sort of letters.

An old Aunt has died and left me an estate in London; this puts me a little at my ease, and will, in some degree, save me from the hitherto necessary, but unpleasant, practice of making sixpence perform the functions and assume the importance of a shilling.

Part of my little estate is the Guildhall Coffee-house, in King-street, Cheapside. I mean to give a ball there. Will you come?

I am very sorry for poor Sir Robert Wilson. If he has been guilty of any indiscretion, I cannot see the necessity of visiting it with so severe a punishment. So much military valour might be considered as an apology for a little civil indiscretion; but if no indiscretion has been committed, why, then publish in the
220MEMOIR OF THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH.
papers a narrative of his whole conduct, from his getting up on that day, to his lying down. Let him pledge his word for its accuracy, and challenge denial and contradiction. This would turn the tables immediately in his favour.

How is Lord Grey? Is he good friends with me? If he is, give him my very kind regards, and if he is not; for I never value people as they value me, but as they are valuable; so pray send me an account of yourself, and whether you have got out of sago and tapioca into rabbit and boiled chicken. God send you may be speedily advanced to a mutton-chop!

Sydney Smith.