I thought you would come back to Nightingale-land!
Donne is better: and Spedding has at last (I hear) got his load of Bacon off his Shoulders, after carrying it for near Forty years! Forty years long! A fortnight ago there was such a delicious bit of his in Notes and Queries, [42] a Comment on some American Comment
on a passage in Antony and Cleopatra, that I recalled my old Sorrow that he had not edited Shakespeare long ago instead of wasting Life in washing his Blackamoor. Perhaps there is time for this yet: but is there the Will?
Pray, Madam, how do you emphasize the line—
‘After Life’s fitful Fever he sleeps well,’
which, by the by, one wonders never to have seen in some Churchyard? What do you think of this for an Epitaph—from Crabbe?—
‘Friend of the Poor—the Wretched—the Betray’d,
They cannot pay thee—but thou shalt be paid.’ [43]
This is a poor Letter indeed to make you answer—
as answer you will—I really only intended to tell you of Donne; and remain ever yours
E. F.G.