182—to Francis Hodgson
Newstead Abbey, Sept. 9, 1811.
Dear Hodgson,—I
have
been a good deal in your company lately, for I have been reading
Juvenal
and
Lady Jane
, etc., for the first time since my return. The Tenth Sat'e has always been my favourite, as I suppose indeed of everybody's. It is the finest recipe for making one miserable with his life, and content to walk out of it, in any language. I should think it might be redde with great effect to a man dying without much pain, in preference to all the stuff that ever was said or sung in churches. But you are a deacon, and I say no more. Ah! you
will
marry and become lethargic, like poor Hal of Harrow
, who yawns at 10 o' nights, and orders caudle annually.
I wrote an answer to yours fully some days ago, and, being quite alone and able to frank, you must excuse this subsequent epistle, which will cost nothing but the trouble of deciphering. I am expectant of agents to accompany me to Rochdale, a journey not to be anticipated with pleasure; though I feel very restless where I am, and shall probably ship off for Greece again; what nonsense it is to talk of Soul, when a cloud makes it
melancholy
and wine makes it
mad
.
Collet of Staines, your "most kind host," has lost that girl you saw of his. She grew to five feet eleven, and might have been God knows how high if it had pleased Him to renew the race of Anak; but she fell by a ptisick, a fresh proof of the folly of begetting children. You knew Matthews. Was he not an intellectual giant? I knew few better or more intimately, and none who deserved more admiration in point of ability.
Scrope Davies has been here on his way to Harrowgate; I am his guest in October at King's, where we will "drink deep ere we depart." "
Won't
you, won't you, won't you, won't you come, Mr. Mug?"
We did not amalgamate properly at Harrow; it was somehow rainy, and then a wife makes such a damp; but in a seat of celibacy I will have revenge. Don't you hate helping first, and losing the wings of chicken? And then, conversation is always flabby. Oh! in the East women are in their proper sphere, and one has—no conversation at all. My house here is a delightful matrimonial mansion. When I wed, my spouse and I will be so happy!—one in each wing.
I
presume
you are in motion from your Herefordshire station
, and Drury must be gone back to Gerund Grinding. I have not been at Cambridge since I took my M.A. degree in 1808.
Eheu fugaces!
I look forward to meeting you and Scrope there with the feelings of other times. Capt. Hobhouse is at Enniscorthy in Juverna. I wish he was in England.
Yours ever,
B.
Footnote 1:
See
Letters
, vol. i. p. 195,
note
I. [Footnote 1 of Letter 102]
Footnote 2:
For Henry Drury, see
Letters
, vol. i. p. 41,
note
2. [Footnote 1 of Letter 14]
Footnote 3:
Byron may possibly allude to "Matthew Mug," a character in Foote's
Mayor of Garratt
, said to be intended for the Duke of Newcastle. In act ii. sc. 2 of the comedy occurs this passage—
"Heel-Tap. Now, neighbours, have a good caution that this Master Mug does not cajole you; he is a damn'd palavering fellow."
But there is no passage in the play which exactly corresponds with Byron's quotation.
Footnote 4:
Hodgson was staying with his uncle, the Rev. Richard Coke, of Lower Moor, Herefordshire.
