I have this moment received your two letters and enclosures. The latter I will get set up in type, and correct before I leave town. I think it good and amusing; but I fancy Colburn will be frightened to death at its boldness.

I have written to Count Porro. Ugo Foscolo is in quod, cut by his friends and countrymen, after diddling Lord John Russell out of a thousand pounds. I dined yesterday with Harry Storks; he was talking of some reprobate Roman Catholic who would eat a horse on Ash-Wednesday, upon which, says I, “not unless it was a fast horse!” “Ah, ah, ah.” (This is for Livy’s tender ear) there never was Clarke’s equal on the floor of creation; it is a great misfortune he has never turned his mind to the philosopher’s stone, I am sure his perseverance would discover whether such a thing is catalogued on the book of nature or no. The children shall have new silver nothings of some sort.

Oh this London! thus London!! here have I been on my legs all day, like a penny-postman. I went to Lydia White’s last night, who was lying on the same

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sofa, in the same drawing-room, with the same blue furniture and blue hangings as usual—she was precisely what you know her. I only spoke to her and Moore, and went away in half-an-hour, in the blue devils. Moore is rapidly undergoing that transformation which will qualify him for a place in Hallam’s book. He is not going to Ireland. On Saturday, I dined at home, and went to the Opera. I have just opened a new mine for magazine writing; but this is a secret. Colburn wants me to write a political novel—for God’s sake make me out a canevas, and I shall try my hand at it. I have just got a kind note from Madame Patt., wanting me to fix a day for dining with her; but I do not think I shall have one to spare. I did not tell you how Pasta charmed me in the Borneo the other night. She sang “Ombra adorata” divinely. They played, also, an act of Teobaldo ed Isolina, in which Velluti sang “Notte tremenda,” in a style of which had no idea, still, however, he does not please me. The ballet, La Naissance de Venus, was better, and I believe now I have done with operas. You must not mind that lying old witch Madame de Genlis’ attack on you in her book. I thought she would not let you off easily; you were not only a better, and younger (and I may say prettier) author than herself, but a more popular one.

I have seen the Charlemonts, the Charlevilles, and the old lady of Burlington Street, and most of your friends, and am charged all over with kindness to you, and regrets that you are not with me. Parliament will be up in a few days, and then all will be off. Here goes my tenth day, and that is half-way through

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this tiresome job. I think you may begin to feed the calf, as I shall be off the moment my business is settled. Oh this cursed wilderness of a town; you may guess how bad it is when a man sits down to write to his wife, à l’heure qu’il est, Regent Street like a carnival. Now I’ll trouble you to guess what I am going to tell you; but I’ll be d——d if you do, so to save you the trouble of making a judy of yourself, I may as well tell you at once that Capel is going into Parliament to teach the Premier his “reading made easy” and set the finance at rest. He is to represent Queensborough with its mayor and freemen. These old boys beat us hollow. Think of his encountering the heat and fatigue of late House of Commons work? By-the-bye, I met at breakfast, in the coffee-room, this morning, our old Italian friend, Dr. Clarke. He is a good specimen of our good Italians. He told me news of many of our old friends at Rome and Naples, which I shall keep for you till we meet. Fashions!! heavens if I have not forgotten to tell you, from that queen of fashion, Mrs. M’Neil! bonnets the size of my umbrella; your gigot sleeves as full as you can make them. I am reading Vivian Grey, at night, and in bed in the morning. Colburn gets twelve hundred pounds per annum for the Sunday Times, eighteen hundred pounds on the New Monthly, and shared eleven hundred pounds this year on the Literary Gazette.

October 27.—Poor Talma!! one of the earliest and kindest of my French acquaintance. The account of his death has just reached me. Of all the eminent men I knew in Paris in 1816, there now only remain Lafayette, Jouy, and Humboldt. Talma died of intestinal schirrus. Monsieur Du Puytren was desirous to perform an operation which he was convinced would have saved him if he had had strength enough to undergo it, but he was deterred from resorting to it by the extreme weakness to which he was reduced. The Archbishop of Paris repeatedly called at his house, but Talma declined to see him. Talma did not suffer any acute pain, he only complained of having a cloud before his eyes. Talma refused to see the Archbishop or any priest, saying that he would not deny the forty brightest years of his life, nor separate his cause from that of his comrades, nor acknowledge them to be infamous. The present Archbishop has endeavoured to obtain the repeal from the Court of Rome of the excommunication pronounced against actors. Talma was born in Paris, in January, 1760. His father was a dentist, who afterwards exercised his profession in London with great success.

October 30.—A ballad singer was this morning singing beneath my window, in a voice most unmusical

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and melancholy; my own name caught my ear, and I sent Thomas out to buy the song, here is a stanza:—

“Och, Dublin city there’s no doubtin’ Bates every city upon the say; Tis there you’ll hear O’Connell spoutin’, An’ Lady Morgan making tay; For ’tis the capital of the finest nation, Wid charming pisantry on a fruitful sod, Fighting like divils for conciliation, An’ hating each other for the love of God.”

Just received the following note from Archibald Rowan, sending me the history of the “United Irishmen” for my “O’Briens and O’Flaherties.”