You would have had the enclosed sooner, but I hoped, day after day, to have the pleasure of calling upon you, and have been twice in Piccadilly since you wrote to me. On one of the days, however, I was very late at dinner where I was engaged, and the other was a Sunday, when I thought you might choose to have one day out of seven to yourself and not be profanely interrupted. I am now going to say a word or two on the subject of the sale of my copyright, and ought indeed to have mentioned it before, but for a foolish disinclination I have to talk of these matters. Before I proceed any further I wish to say that I consider you, and you alone, as having possession of that copyright ultimately, from your having gone so far with it already in the publication, and treated me in so gentlemanly a manner; nor, in case it should be inconvenient to you to do what I am about to mention, shall I make use of the book in any other quarter, not that you might object perhaps to my so doing, but because, for my own gratification and convenience, I would much rather raise the money I want in another manner. There is no question therefore whatsoever on that point; all that I want to know is, whether you can do for me what I ask conveniently for your general speculations and the other demands upon you.
After a tedious recitation of his pecuniary troubles, Hunt concludes:
What I wanted to ask you then is simply this—whether,
in the first instance, you think well enough of the ‘Story of Rimini’ to make you bargain with
me for the copyright at once; or, in the second instance, whether, if you would
rather wait a little, as I myself would do, I confess, if it were convenient,
you have still enough hopes of the work, and enough reliance on myself
personally, to advance me £450 on security, to be repaid in case you do
not conclude
| 312 | MEMOIRS OF JOHN MURRAY |
