I was on the point of writing to you, when I received
Mr. Blackwood’s letter.
Elphinstone’s ‘Cabul’ has been, since
the day of publication, in the hands of Mr.
Barrow, whose article upon it is in progress, and will appear in
our next number. I hope, therefore, that Lord
Meadowbank will not feel disappointed; but allow us to hope for
the favour of his valuable assistance on some other work, in which we would
prefer to anticipate, rather than to follow the Edinburgh Review. I was
about to tell you that Croker was so
pleased with the idea of a Caledonian
article from you, that he could not refrain from mentioning it to
the Prince Regent, who is very fond of the
subject, and he said he would be delighted, and is really anxious about it.
Now, it occurs to me, as our Edinburgh friends choose on
many occasions to bring in the Prince’s name to
| 288 | MEMOIRS OF JOHN MURRAY |
I was with Lord Byron yesterday. He enquired after you, and bid me say how much he was indebted to your introduction of your poor Irish friend Maturin, who had sent him a tragedy, which Lord Byron received late in the evening, and read through, without being able to stop. He was so delighted with it that he sent it immediately to his fellow-manager, the Hon. George Lamb, who, late as it came to him, could not go to bed without finishing it The result is that they have laid it before the rest of the Committee; they, or rather Lord Byron, feels it his duty to the author to offer it himself to the managers of Covent Garden. The poor fellow says in his letter that his hope of subsistence for his family for the next year rests upon what he can get for this play. I expressed a desire of doing something, and Lord Byron then confessed that he had sent him fifty guineas. I shall write to him to-morrow, and I think if you could draw some case for him and exhibit his merits, particularly if his play succeeds, I could induce Croker and Peel to interest themselves in his behalf, and get him a living.
Your interesting letter respecting poor Park’s family is at present with Whishaw, who desires me to assure you that he will try all his means to effect your benevolent object; though the chances of at least immediate success are lessened at this time by the complete derangement of all our landholders. You will have noticed, perhaps, in the Gazette, the appointment of our friend Hammond as one of the Commissioners for arranging the claims of the British in France; and he sets out for Paris in a fortnight, so that I lose my chief 4 o’clock man. Have you any fancy to dash off an article on ‘Emma’? It wants incident and romance, does it not? None of the author’s other novels have been noticed, and surely ‘Pride and Prejudice’ merits high commendation.
