_Shepherd_. Leigh Hunt truly loved Shelley.
_North_. And Shelley truly loved Leigh Hunt. Their friendship was
honourable to them both, for it was as disinterested as sincere; and I
hope Gurney will let a certain person in the City understand that I
treat his offer of a reviewal of Mr. Hunt's _London Journal_ with
disdain. If he has anything to say against us or against that gentleman,
either conjunctly or severally, let him out with it in some other
channel, and I promise him a touch and taste of the Crutch. He talks to
me of Maga's desertion of principle; but if he were a Christian--nay, a
man--his heart and head too would tell him that the Animosities are
mortal, but the Humanities live for ever--and that Leigh Hunt has more
talent in his little finger than the puling prig, who has taken upon
himself to lecture Christopher North in a scrawl crawling with forgotten
falsehoods. Mr. Hunt's _London Journal_, may dear James, is not only
beyond all comparison, but out of all sight, the most entertaining and
instructive of all the cheap periodicals; and when laid, as it duly is
once a week, on my breakfast table, it lies there--but is not permitted
to lie long--like a spot of sunshine dazzling the snow.--_Aug_., 1834.