’Tis an excess of selfishness in me to write to you under my present feelings, as, except to detail my own

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misery, I have little else to say. To express my sense of your benevolence, of your affectionate attention to our dear, dear father, I cannot. I have been saved nothing in not being with you; I have not only strongly imagined every scene and moment of misery and sadness, but I have added to it all the horrors of suspense and anxiety. I have lived on from post to post, always hoping the best, fearing the worst, and not knowing what part to take or how to act. Still I thought this shock would prove like the last, though Morgan gave me no encouragement; but I believed, as he knew not the constitution the disease had to contend with, that he might have been mistaken. In short, it appeared to me impossible that my own dear father, who was my child as well as my father, could die—nor I don’t believe it yet! it is to me as if a curtain dropped before life. I can look neither to the past nor to the future without connecting everything with him, and the present is all, all him. The tie which existed between us was not the common tie of father and child. He was the object for which I laboured, and wrote, and lived, and nothing can fill up to me the place he held in my heart. My dearest Clarke, forgive me, but my tears, the first I have freely shed, are falling faster than I can write, and I scarcely know what I say. God knows, I want not to add to your sadness. Every body here is very good to me, and my dear husband supports, comforts, and devotes himself to me; but he could not know how endearing poor papa was, or how much out of the ordinary run of fathers. You knew

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him, and loved him, and were his child. I am very weak and ought not to write so.

They allow me to breakfast and dine in my own sitting-room, which is a great comfort, and I have not seen a creature since my misfortune, but Lady Abercorn, who is all affection and pity. They want me to drive to Derry, or somewhere, with Morgan; but where can I go that the image of my dead, dear papa, will not follow me? What trouble, what expence, what suffering and sadness you must have had? God bless you, for all; but goodness is of no avail. If my dearest, suffering Livy will not come to me, I will go to her, and this scene would be a change and a benefit to her.

My dearest Clarke, I remember buying or paying for a watch last summer, for poor, dear papa,—I wish you would wear it! I have just had a petition from a starving English actor and his family, travelling through here, that almost reconciled me to an event that put the object I loved beyond the reach of poverty or care. I am so altered in the course of three days you would not know me. Livy was such a blessing to the last to her poor father. Has Mrs. Doyle, the Lefanus, or any of her friendly friends been with her? Morgan, who is all tenderness, and goodness, and generosity, is bent on re-uniting me to Livy at any sacrifice. This business has fallen like a thunderbolt on me. I knew not what step to take. It is odd, that when Livy wrote word of papa’s talking of going to the theatre, Morgan said it was the worst symptom that had appeared yet,

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and when I laughed at him, he said we all deceived ourselves. I have not courage to ask you any particulars. I know all that could be done was done. God bless you for it. My eyes are so inflamed Morgan won’t allow me to write any more.

Your message to Sir Charles would have insured you an immediate answer to your letter, if there were no other inducement to write to you; and that you have

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not heard from me before arises from some mistake about being detained here or in Dublin; I have only this morning received it. Sir Charles desires me to say that, from all he hears and knows of you, he is become too much interested in your life not to feel anxious for its preservation and comfort, and that, as far as his knowledge and ability can contribute to either, they are devoted to your service. He says, however, that you have given too vague an account of your symptoms for him to form a correct judgment. He dare not risk an opinion without being more master of the subject. He wishes he was near you, and would be happy to do anything for you. He is very sensible of, and grateful for, the tenderness you express towards me, thus admitting him to the circle of your friends; and I believe you have had few more zealous candidates for the honour.

Everything that you say about Dublin is very seductive, but we really are in a pitiable state of hesitation at present. They have not the remotest idea that we can or will leave them as long as they remain in Ireland, and yet they talk of that being a year or two. If we (what they would call) desert them, we shall risk the loss of their friendship, which would indeed be a loss; but if we remain we lose time, and it is quite fit that Morgan should establish himself soon somewhere. Add to this that they, I believe, have a real affection for us; but we are dying to be in our own little shabby house, and are tired of solitary splendours, and of the eternal representation of high life, and you will then believe that we are rather in a

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puzzle. Morgan, in the end, will be solely guided by honour (leaving interest, and inclination, and even happiness out of the question), which he strains to a point of romantic refinement. We expect Lord and Lady Hamilton (another invalid). I showed Lord Aberdeen your critique on noble authors; he said, “had you judged differently, he would have formed a different judgment of you, from what he was inclined to do.” Arbuthnot, who is coming over as secretary, I know intimately; but I am sick of the idea of place-hunting or place-asking. I suppose, by this, you are at your Sabine Farm, at Glasnevin: would I were with you for a week! Mais pour aller à Corinthele désir ne suffit pas; but I should like to have you alone, that is, in the midst of your own family, for if you don’t patronize my Lords and Ladies Fiddle Faddle, I will vote your Miss Macguffins, and the rest of your twopenny Misses and Masters, and some few of your good Mistresses this, and worthy Misters t’others, dead bores! I, at least, have something for my pride, but the “Damn nigger you get for your money” is quite below purchase! Native worth and native genius (like your own) must always hold the ascendant in whatever circle it is to be found, and if you find not these amongst a certain class, you find something else with people of rank; you get the next best thing, education, which, with English people of fashion of the present day, you never fail to find. The young people of this family (including the son-in-law, Lord Aberdeen) have more acquirements and accomplishments, more literary and general savoir than (with the almost

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single exception of your own family), all the youth of Dublin put together. The women not only speak French and Italian as well as English, but are good Latin scholars, and unquestionably the best musicians I know; and yet I never heard the Ladies Hamilton particularly distinguished for their education above other girls of fashion. I never mean to say that the first class of society have more genius or more happiness than any other, I only insist that they have the next best things, and as I find it easier to get at a countess or a marchioness than at a Mrs. Lefanu, faute de mieux, I put up with their ladyships, cutting dead the Miss Macguffins and the Mistresses O’Shaughnessey’s, for whom (de loin) I have a great respect. The fact is, a dull worthy is not the less dull to me for being a worthy and not an earl! Lords or commons, a bore is a bore, and I think you will agree with me that a vulgar one is worse than a polished one, as an Irish diamond, though “a lustre-looking thing,” is best after it has received a little working. You who are a real brilliant, I am sure I should always have discovered your “original brightness” in whatever setting I should have found it. I know your intrinsic value, and prize it at its worth; meantime, let me prefer the rose diamonds of my Lord and Lady Fiddle Faddle to the Kerry stones of the Miss Macguffins; one, at least, has a polished surface, the other retains the “laste taste in life” of the clay! I have not left myself room to say Je vous aime de tout mon cœur. Love to all, Joe included.

“To each his suffering;” you have had your portion, and it would have been unfair and unjust to have written to you under the influence of my sadness, and have drawn from you an unavailing sympathy at the moment you have been so actively and beneficially engaged in soothing and comforting my dear Olivia, who feels your goodness in her “heart of hearts.” You are a true friend,—I have always thought so,—I have always said so, and every year of our friendship has given me fresh reason to confirm my opinion. The dearest and strongest tie, which time, nature, habit, and acts of reciprocal affection can form, has been wrenched from my heart; I ought long since to have been, and yet was not, prepared for it. It was a dreadful break up to the feelings; it is so much of life broken off. A host of dearly remembered events, feelings, and associations, are necessarily gone with it. Were it possible I could ever again love anything so well, I can never again love anything so long. The best point of existence with me is over, and new ties and new affections must be light in their hold, and feeble in their influence, compared to those “which grew with the growth and strengthened with the years.” My dear husband, Olivia, yourself, and one or two more objects

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are still left me, to whom I will cling. It is my intention to sacrifice for the rest of my life to the heart, and to live in Ireland, if those I love cannot live with me in England, where interest and ambition equally call Morgan and myself; he has no wish, scarcely any will, but mine, and is ready to make my country his, “my people his people.” As yet, our views are very misty; Lord and Lady Abercorn are very desirous we should remain with them, as long as they stay in Ireland, at least if not after; but as that will probably be for a year or two, it would be impossible. We have not, however, said so.

We have lately added to our party,

“The travelled Thane, Athenian Aberdeen,”

As Lord Byron calls him. He is reckoned among the “rising young men” of England, and is one of the virtuosi who purchased a farm at Athens, where he resided for some time. He was the husband of Lord Abercorn’s lately deceased and beautiful daughter. The meeting was very afflicting, and for some time threw a shadow over our circle.

What think you of the state of public affairs? our letters to-day, from England, say that the opposition still hold out, though offered six places out of twelve in the Cabinet, or seven out of fourteen. What a bouleversement in the state of things when stars and garters go a begging!! and commoner’s misses refuse to become princesses!!* The Cabinet remains empty

* Alluding to the gossip of the day that the Duke of Clarence had been refused by Miss Tilney Long, the luckless “great heiress” of the period.

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because no one thinks it worth their while to accept a place in it, and yet all this we have lived to see! If the opposition permit themselves in their condescension to be prevailed upon to govern an empire, your brother will find his own level, and you will have your levers et couchers, and we shall find with Louis the Fourteenth’s courtiers that Cuff Street “est faite pour n’être comparée à rien” (which, by-the-bye, and with deference to Mr. Lefanu, is more true than of the Louvre) and that “il ne plait pas à Glasnevin.” In the midst of all this political tourbillon, people still submit to be pleased and amused, and run after your comedy as they would have done in the prosperous and Augustan days of Queen Anne. Lady Abercorn tells me she has had great accounts of its success from all sides. As she knows your bonne fortune is mine, she indulges me with hearing of the good tidings. Livy says you think she could write a comedy; I think so too, she has an immense fund of true comedy in her own character, but writing is such a distinct thing from ourselves that no inference can be drawn from thence. Lord Byron, the author of delightful Childe Harold (which has more force, fire, and thought than anything I have read for an age) is cold, silent, and reserved in his manners,—pray read it if you have not. When I was in London, Lord G. Greville read me a poem of his own on the same subject as Childe Harold. The rival lords published their poems the same day; the one is cried up to the skies, the other, alas, is cried down to ——!

We expect Livy here, but she seems either unwilling or unable to leave home. We have no chance

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of going ourselves to Dublin till winter; by that time, every one that I have known and lived with (save yourself, the Atkinsons, and the Mason’s) will have left it; indeed they are almost all gone already. It is astonishing the changes that have taken place in the little circle of my intimacy within a few years, either by death or departure to England. Among my literary friends, dear Psyche (Mrs. Tighe), Cooper Walker, and Kirwin are no more!

Sir Charles’s desire to know you increases daily. Shall we ever all meet again and all be happy together? At least write to me, and under all changes and circumstances, believe I love you tenderly and sincerely.