"August 4. 1814.
"Not having received the slightest answer to my last three letters,
nor the book (the last number of the Edinburgh Review) which they
requested, I presume that you were the unfortunate person who
perished in the pagoda on Monday last, and address this rather to
your executors than yourself, regretting that you should have had
the ill luck to be the sole victim on that joyous occasion.
"I beg leave, then, to inform these gentlemen (whoever they may be)
that I am a little surprised at the previous neglect of the
deceased, and also at observing an advertisement of an approaching
publication on Saturday next, against the which I protested, and do
protest for the present.
"Yours (or theirs), &c.
"B."
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