I have just received your second letter, and am quite delighted to find
that all is going on so vigorously, and that you are in such a
methodical, business-like, and energetic state. I shall come home by the
express on Saturday morning, and shall hope to be at home between eleven
and twelve.
We had a noble night last night. The room (which is the largest but one
in England) was crammed in every part. The effect of from thirteen to
fourteen hundred people, all well dressed, and all seated in one
unbroken chamber, except that the floor rose high towards the end of the
hall, was most splendid, and we never played to a better audience. The
enthusiasm was prodigious; the place delightful for speaking in; no end
of gas; another hall for a dressing-room; an immense stage; and every
possible convenience. We were all thoroughly pleased, I think, with the
whole thing, and it was a very great and striking success.
To-morrow-night, having the new Hardman, I am going to try the play with
all kinds of cuts, taking out, among other things, some half-dozen
printed pages of "Wills's Coffee House."
We are very pleasant and cheerful. They are all going to Matthew
Davenport Hill's to lunch this morning, and to see some woods about six
or seven miles off. I prefer being quiet, and shall go out at my leisure
and call on Elliot. We are very well lodged and boarded, and, living
high up on the Downs, are quite out of the filth of Bristol.
I saw old Landor at Bath, who has bronchitis. When he was last in town,
"Kenyon drove him about, by God, half the morning, under a most damnable
pretence of taking him to where Walter was at school, and they never
found the confounded house!" He had in his pocket on that occasion a
souvenir for Walter in the form of a Union shirt-pin, which is now in my
possession, and shall be duly brought home.
I am tired enough, and shall be glad when to-morrow night is over. We
expect a very good house. Forster came up to town after the performance
last night, and promised to report to you that all was well. Jerrold is
in extraordinary force. I don't think I ever knew him so humorous. And
this is all my news, which is quite enough. I am continually thinking of
the house in the midst of all the bustle, but I trust it with such
confidence to you that I am quite at my ease about it.
With best love to Georgy and the girls,
Ever, my dearest Kate, most affectionately yours.
P.S.--I forgot to say that Topham has suddenly come out as a juggler,
and swallows candles, and does wonderful things with the poker very well
indeed, but with a bashfulness and embarrassment extraordinarily
ludicrous.
[Sidenote: Mr. Eeles.]