With respect to myself, I am sorry I cannot have the pleasure of taking leave of you in person, before I go into perpetual exile. I sincerely wish you all health and happiness. In whatever part of the earth it may be my fate to reside, I shall always remember with pleasure, and recapitulate with pride, the friendly intercourse I have maintained with one of the best men, and undoubtedly the best writer of the age; if any judgment in distinguishing either character or capacity may be allowed to, dear sir, your very humble servant,
Ts Smollett.
Nos patriam fugimus: tu, Tityre, lentus in umbra,
Formosam resonare doces Amaryllida silvas.[419:1]
Hume to Tobias Smollett.
"Ragley,[419:2] September 21, 1768.
"My dear Sir,—I did not see your friend, Captain Stobo, till the day before I left Cirencester, and only for a little time; but he seemed to be a man of good sense, and has surely had the most extraordinary adventures in the world. He has promised to call on me when he comes to London, and I shall always see him with pleasure.
"But what is this you tell me of your perpetual exile, and of your never returning to this country? I hope that as this idea arose from the bad state of your health, it will vanish on your recovery; which, from your past experience, you may expect from those happier climates to which you are retiring; after
which the desire of revisiting your native country will probably return upon you, unless the superior cheapness of foreign countries prove an obstacle, and detain you there. I could wish that means had been fallen on to remove this objection; and that at least it might be equal to you to live any where, except where the consideration of your health gave the preference to one climate above another. But the indifference of ministers towards literature, which has been long, and indeed always, the case in England, gives little prospect of any alteration in this particular.
"I am sensible of your great partiality, in the good opinion you express towards me; but it gives me no less pleasure than if it were founded on the greatest truth, for I accept it as a pledge of your good will and friendship. I wish an opportunity of showing my sense of it may present itself during your absence. I assure you I should embrace it with great alacrity, and you need have no scruple, on every occasion, of having recourse to me. I am, my dear sir, with great esteem and sincerity, your most obedient, and most humble servant," &c.[420:1]