e._, the night,--glorious, care-drowning
night, that heals all our wrongs, pours wine into our mortifications,
changes the scene from indifferent and flat to bright and brilliant? O
Manning, if I should have formed a diabolical resolution, by the time
you come to England, of not admitting any spirituous liquors into my
house, will you be my guest on such shameworthy terms? Is life, with
such limitations, worth trying? The truth is, that my liquors bring a
nest of friendly harpies about my house, who consume me. This is a
pitiful tale to be read at St. Gothard; but it is just now nearest
my heart.
[1] Patterdale.
XXXIX.
TO COLERIDGE,
_October_ 23, 1802.
I read daily your political essays. I was particularly pleased with
"Once a Jacobin;" though the argument is obvious enough, the style was
less swelling than your things sometimes are, and it was plausible _ad
populum_. A vessel has just arrived from Jamaica with the news of poor
Sam Le Grice's death. He died at Jamaica of the yellow fever. His course
was rapid, and he had been very foolish; but I believe there was more of
kindness and warmth in him than in almost any other of our
schoolfellows. The annual meeting of the Blues is to-morrow, at the
London Tavern, where poor Sammy dined with them two years ago, and
attracted the notice of all by the singular foppishness of his dress.
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