Hayley-XII-13

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Sunday Morn
March 17 82

My dear Sister

It has mortified me not a little, that I have been unable to thank you for your kind paquet, & return the inclosed [sic] Letters with the celerity I wished.

a thousand perverse Circumstances have occasioned the delay, & particularly the very step, I took to accelerate my Answer: for on perusing the Correspondence between you & your Critical Physician, I must honestly confess, I thought you both in the Wrong; & immediately scribbled a pacific squib in the Hope of restoring Harmony between two children of Apollo, who ought to have a cordial esteem for each other.

I scribbled my Impromptu so hastily that I imagined you would not be able to read it, & as my Eyes were much harrassed with literary Business, I sent it to a Female Friend at Chichester, who is better acquainted with my Scrawls, entreating her to decypher & transcribe it – unfortunately

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She was too ill to bear such Employment, yet from the kind Hope of being able to do it in a day or two, detained my m.s. — She at length revived, tho not so soon as she expected, & I inclose you the Copy she has sent me – Behold a sad long History of a poor poetical Trifle; yet I will not abuse it, if it has any degree of success in producing that reconciliation , which I most heartily wish — Tell Boothby, If I had any jurisdiction in the Court of Parnassus, I would make Him the delegate to establish Amity between you & Darwin —

In Truth, my dear Sister, If I had any Leisure I should give you a long prosaic Lecture on a Subject, which Interests me not a little, for I think the Spirit of Animosity, which seems to prevail between you, must prove injurious to Both, & ought indeed to sink, as it arose

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on a most insubstantial Foundation –

Darwin's Letters to you are certainly unpolite [sic], but your reply is surely a little too vindictive – it is Queen Elizabeth giving Essex a Box on the Ear – observe that I consider Essex in the Light of a privy Counsellor to the virgin Queen & not in that of a Lover! —I hope however that your imperial Spirit cooled so far as to make you change that unworthy resolution of not sending Him a copy of your Poem, – the very Poem which He had joined in correcting!

O my dear irritable Sister, let us teach one another to bear with Philosophy the Severity, the Impertinence, the ill manners of Criticism - for if they do not learn to bear all this, what Poets may expect to sleep in Peace?– Darwin is sarcastick; but He has been long your Friend, & has many Virtues with great poetical Talents; surely it is better to smile at the

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Satirical Petulance of such a character than to treat it with serious Anger -

I think you perfectly right however in vindicating your own Genius from the charge of shining with borrowed rays, & on this account I most earnestly recommend it to you never to let any associate Whatever insert a Line in your Poetry – remember your Friend Lady M. W. Montague^s reply to Pope, when He proposed some corrections in her Verses! – No! Said she Pope: no touching! for then whatever is good for any thing will pass for yours & the rest for Mine"

I am yet to thank you for some Enchanting Verses, which want nothing but a better Subject — your remarks on the Critique on Jephson^s Play are perfectly just - I wish I had seen you & Boothby rehearsing—I hope it will lead to your writing a Tragedy in Concert — I have still a thousand things to say to you, but neither Eyes nor Time for I am unable to scribble except in short scraps & am still very far from having finished my Notes — adieu write soon

& believe me ever yrs - H

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Remember me kindly to your Father & Giovanni I am particularly anxious to hear some account of the latter & most sincerely hope your anxiety concerning his late Complaint has entirely vanished with the Source of it —

Eliza writes me word she is quite satisfied with the Opinions she has heard pronounced by the fashionable Critics on your Charming Elegy

What says Sir John to you?

The poor little Alphonso by playing abroad in these vilainous [sic] March Winds has got a cruel Inflammation in his Eyes which troubles me very much - yet He suppprots it marvellously well & continues his little Sports with undiminished vivacity

God bless you.

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Monitory Squib in this
letter

Miss Seward
Lictchfield

[?Mssee or Mfree
?Pomneneau?]