“That’s right, and splendid, and becoming a publisher
of high degree. Mr. Concanen (the translator)
will be delighted, and pay his washerwoman; and in reward for your bountiful behaviour
in this instance, I won’t ask you to publish any more for Drury-lane, or any lane
whatever again. You will have no tragedy or any thing else from me, I assure you, and
may think yourself lucky in having got rid of me, for good and all, without more damage.
But I’ll tell you what we will do for you,—act Sotheby’s
Ivan, which will succeed; and then your
present and next impression of the dramas of that dramatic gentleman will be expedited
to your heart’s content; and if there is any thing
| A. D. 1815. | LIFE OF LORD BYRON. | 629 |
“Sotheby has got a thought, and almost the words, from the Third Canto of the Corsair, which, you know, was published six months before his tragedy. It is from the storm in Conrad’s cell. I have written to Mr. Sotheby to claim it; and, as Dennis roared out of the pit, ‘By G—d, that’s my thunder!’ so do I, and will I, exclaim, ‘By G—d, that’s my lightning!’ that electrical fluid being, in fact, the subject of the said passage.
“You will have a print of Fanny Kelly, in the Maid, to prefix, which is honestly worth twice the money you have given for the MS. Pray what did you do with the note I gave you about Mungo Park?
