My dear Clarke,—I want you both particularly tonight to stand by me in my readings to some new friends (very cordial people nevertheless). This is my second reading of my play, and I am to have a third, and I mix up new and old friends together when I read, though indeed of dear old friends I retain very few out of the claws of Death or distance, and those in Dean Street, despite of the perplexities of this beautiful world (which keep apart sometimes those who sympathize most), have ever been among the dearest to your affectionate friend,
