“Aug. 2, 1839.
“Acting on the opinion contained in your first letter that the matter then published would make eight numbers, I promised four additional ones. Since then I have written one and a half of the new monthly numbers, and find that the whole only makes eight in all, which is a terrible overthrow of all my plans regarding it. The material I have still by me will not by any arrangement extend to more than two numbers. I fear to prolong it beyond that would greatly injure the book as a whole and weaken any interest it may have excited, by what would be called a falling-off. I cannot say how much this has vexed and annoyed me. But I am disposed to doing the best under the circumstances. First, I shall conclude the affair in ten numbers, making you any compensation for the omitted two you think fair, either in money or in any future dealing; secondly, I will write the two additional numbers as well as I can, which will, however, involve a change of plot, &c., &c, that I cannot but deprecate as regards the fortune of the book as a whole.”
To Mr James M’Glashan.
“Aug. 6,1839.
“The more I think of it, the more I feel persuaded that we had better close [‘Lorrequer’] with ten numbers. The plot will be original, the effect not weakened, the volume sufficiently large, and the public less disposed to grumble, which, for all our sakes, is something. I have had so much worry here with sick brats and patients of all kinds, that I am fairly knocked up. Besides that, there is not an old fool sent by that arch-charlatan Grenville to drink Spa waters in Germany, who does not expect me to have an analysis of every dirty spring or fetid puddle from Pyrmont to the Pyrenees; and my whole mornings are passed discussing chalybeates and sulphurets with all the scarlet and pimpled faces that Harrogate and Buxton have turned off incurable. There is only one comfort in all this. However imaginary the ills they suffer on leaving England, by the time they reach Brussels on their way back, few of them boast constitutions strong enough not to be suffering from the fat, grease, filth, and acidity of German cookery, and they all, more or less, are in need of me before they get their passports from Antwerp. The English who travel—God bless them!—are an amiable class, and they seldom fail to bring along with them for the journey some family ailment which French wines and high living combine to make troublesome. A constant influx of these pleasant people keeps me here, but if I can manage it I mean to bolt soon. Every table d’hôte in this city swarms with the most unlicked cubs of our country, speaking neither German nor French—a few English. They disgust me for the false impression they convey to foreigners of what English gentlemen really are. What they come for, and where they go, I cannot say. It is impossible that they can be escaping for debt, for no one could possibly trust them; and they cannot be swindlers, for swindlers are men of captivating address and prepossessing manners. I rejoice to think that they are poisoned by the living, sent wrong in diligences, cheated by the money-changers, and bullied by the police.”
To Mr James M’Glashan.
“Brussels, Aug. 90,1839.
“Your letter of the 24th has arrived, together with the packet containing the review of Marryat, dated 8th ult., since which date it has been following his Excellency the Ambassador through the Highlands, and enjoying the sports of the season at the Duke of Athol’s.
“I have just arranged about the portrait.* You shall have the sketch next week, and had better get it engraved. He will be much more Harry Lorrequer than Charles Lever. However, that will be all the better.
* This was not the portrait prefixed to ‘Jack Hinton,’ but a
vignette finally condemned.—E. D.