LETTER 100. TO LORD HOLLAND.
"September 27. 1812.
"I have just received your very kind letter, and hope you have met with a second copy corrected and addressed to Holland House, with some omissions and this new couplet,
"As glared each rising flash[52], and ghastly shone
The skies with lightnings awful as their own.
As to remarks, I can only say I will alter and acquiesce in any thing. With regard to the part which Whitbread wishes to omit, I believe the Address will go off quicker without it, though, like the agility of the Hottentot, at the expense of its vigour. I leave to your choice entirely the different specimens of stucco-work; and a brick of your own will also much improve my Babylonish turret. I should like Elliston to have it, with your leave. 'Adorn' and 'mourn' are lawful rhymes in Pope's Death of the unfortunate Lady.—Gray has 'forlorn' and 'mourn;'—and 'torn' and 'mourn' are in Smollet's famous Tears of Scotland.
"As there will probably be an outcry amongst the rejected, I hope the committee will testify (if it be needful) that I sent in nothing to the congress whatever, with or without a name, as your Lordship well knows. All I have to do with it is with and through you; and though I, of course, wish to satisfy the audience, I do assure you my first object is to comply with your request, and in so doing to show the sense I have of the many obligations you have conferred upon me. Yours ever, B."
