“I have a request to make, which I confess at once is hardly a fair one, but throw myself on your good-nature.
“Hood, in the
‘Literary Gazette,’
is poaching sadly on a preserve of mine. I take it for granted it is he who
wrote the very clever verses on Carving. Now it so happens that I wrote for the
‘N[ew] Times,’ more
than two years ago, some hundred and fifty lines on the same subject, and if
you will take the trouble of looking over the file (which is to be
| DR. MAGINN. | 87 |
“And what consequence, you will say, is this? Not much; but that, at Murray’s request, I have just finished the poem. I have run it to twelve hundred lines, and he wishes to publish it as a ‘nice little book.’ Having in me not the slightest literary ambition, I do not care if all the critics in England say that this poem of mine is abominable, or pronounce me a base follower of Hood, but I do care about the coin of the realm, and if Hood goes on, it may be some 50l. or more out of my pocket. I scarcely know him; but as all clever fellows ought to be good fellows, I hope you will prevail on him to turn his pen to some other subject for three weeks. After that time he may go on, and I am perfectly content to play second fiddle.
“I feel I am depriving your Gazette of a great attraction, but I have honestly told you the reason. I consider myself some dozen columns of squib-work in your debt if you accede to my request.
