"Diodati, Sept. 30. 1816.
"I answered your obliging letters yesterday: to-day the Monody
arrived with its _title_-page, which is, I presume, a separate
publication. 'The request of a friend:'--
'Obliged by hunger and request of friends.'
I will request you to expunge that same, unless you please to add,
'by a person of quality,' or 'of wit and honour about town.' Merely
say, 'written to be spoken at Drury Lane.' To-morrow I dine at
Copet. Saturday I strike tents for Italy. This evening, on the lake
in my boat with Mr. Hobhouse, the pole which sustains the mainsail
slipped in tacking, and struck me so violently on one of my legs
(the _worst_, luckily) as to make me do a foolish thing, viz. to
_faint_--a downright swoon; the thing must have jarred some nerve
or other, for the bone is not injured, and hardly painful (it is
six hours since), and cost Mr. Hobhouse some apprehension and much
sprinkling of water to recover me. The sensation was a very odd
one: I never had but two such before, once from a cut on the head
from a stone, several years ago, and once (long ago also) in
falling into a great wreath of snow;--a sort of grey giddiness
first, then nothingness, and a total loss of memory on beginning to
recover. The last part is not disagreeable, if one did not find it
again.
"You want the original MSS. Mr. Davies has the first fair copy in
my own hand, and I have the rough composition here, and will send
or save it for you, since you wish it.
"With regard to your new literary project, if any thing falls in
the way which will, to the best of my judgment, suit you, I will
send you what I can. At present I must lay by a little, having
pretty well exhausted myself in what I have sent you. Italy or
Dalmatia and another summer may, or may not, set me off again. I
have no plans, and am nearly as indifferent what may come as where
I go. I shall take Felicia Heman's Restoration, &c. with me; it is
a good poem--very.
"Pray repeat my best thanks and remembrances to Mr. Gifford for all
his trouble and good nature towards me.
"Do not fancy me laid up, from the beginning of this scrawl. I tell
you the accident for want of better to say; but it is over, and I
am only wondering what the deuce was the matter with me.
"I have lately been over all the Bernese Alps and their lakes. I
think many of the scenes (some of which were not those usually
frequented by the English) finer than Chamouni, which I visited
some time before. I have been to Clarens again, and crossed the
mountains behind it: of this tour I kept a short journal for my
sister, which I sent yesterday in three letters. It is not all for
perusal; but if you like to hear about the romantic part, she will,
I dare say, show you what touches upon the rocks, &c.
"Christabel--I won't have any one sneer at Christabel: it is a fine
wild poem.
"Madame de Staël wishes to see the Antiquary, and I am going to
take it to her to-morrow. She has made Copet as agreeable as
society and talent can make any place on earth. Yours ever,
"N."
* * * * *
From the Journal mentioned in the foregoing letter, I am enabled to give
the following extracts:--