I cannot leave your letter unanswered, because I am really anxious that
you should understand why I cannot comply with your request.
Scarcely a week passes without my receiving requests from various
quarters to sit for likenesses, to be taken by all the processes ever
invented. Apart from my having an invincible objection to the
multiplication of my countenance in the shop-windows, I have not,
between my avocations and my needful recreation, the time to comply with
these proposals. At this moment there are three cases out of a vast
number, in which I have said: "If I sit at all, it shall be to you
first, to you second, and to you third." But I assure you, I consider
myself almost as unlikely to go through these three conditional
achievements as I am to go to China. Judge when I am likely to get to
Mr. Watkins!
I highly esteem and thank you for your sympathy with my writings. I
doubt if I have a more genial reader in the world.
Very faithfully yours.