“Will you also ask M’G. what times of payment will be arranged for ‘The Dragoon,’ as although I leave the thing to his convenience, it will suit mine much to have some definite knowledge on the subject.
“I have thrown physic to the dogs, for really there is nothing to do. I think, entre nous, I must go farther—perhaps to Florence or Naples.
“I have dedicated ‘Lorrequer’ to Sir H. Seymour, by his special request, which at the same time interferes with my original wish and determination to inscribe it to Lord Douro, who [? half] expects it.
“Since I wrote last I have been laid up with gout in my wrist and knuckles and both feet, and now can only walk with cloth shoes and a stick.... The ‘Irish Dragoon’ has been shelved these twelve days.”
To Mr Alexander Spencer.
Jan. 17, 1840.
“A most absurd blunder has induced a certain Charles O’Malley, Esq., barrister-at-law, and leader of the Western Circuit, to suppose that my new book under that name is meant to be his Life, &c. And the consequence is that a meeting of the Bar has taken place at Litton’s, and resolutions entered to compel a change of title.
“Now as I never heard of this gentleman, nor with a very widespread acquaintance do I know of one single Mr O’Malley, I have refused point-blank. My book is already advertised in all the London papers, and if I changed the name for another, any individual bearing the newly-adopted one would have—what Mr O’Malley has not—just and sufficient ground of quarrel with me.
“All my friends here—military, diplomatic, and literary—agree in this view, Lord Lennox, Ranelagh, Suffield, &c, saying that it would be a very weak thing indeed to yield, and one which would undoubtedly reflect both upon my courage and judgment.
“I write these few hurried lines to put you en courant to what is going on....