“I was very sorry to have missed seeing you in London; but there was no address on the card which you left a day or two before my departure, and I had no means of finding you, or I should certainly have called.
“I had intended not to have troubled the world with any more of my scribblings, feeling that I have done enough, and was getting old; but circumstances induced me to change this resolution, and I am again about to venture into the literary arena. In periodical literature I have done nothing for a long time—so long that I fear that my hand has lost its cunning, if it ever had any.
“Captain Marryat lately told me that he had agreed to write for a new paper called the “Era,” edited by Frank Mills, but that he objected vehemently to see the walls plaistered with his name, feeling it to be infra dig. In this I agree with him, but if it will oblige you, I will endeavour to send you up a paper, though I do not exactly know what sort of contribution you require.
| LITERARY AND PERSONAL. | 209 |
“Poor Hill is gone at last, and it seems to have surprised every body, the world seeming to think he could not die. The papers state him to have been eighty-one.
“Did I not feel myself to be growing old in various ways I should be reminded of it by my three girls, who are now, at least two of them, almost as tall as myself. Thank heaven we are all in good health and spirits—disposed to make the best of every thing, and to enjoy the world as well and as long as we can.
