TO THE REV. WALTER BAGOT.
Olney, Jan. 23, 1786.
My dear and faithful Friend,—
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The paragraph that I am now beginning will contain information of a kind that I am not very fond of communicating, and on a subject that I am not very fond of writing about. Only to you I will open my budget without any reserve, because I know that in what concerns my authorship you take an interest that demands my confidence, and will be pleased with every occurrence that is at all propitious to my endeavours. Lady Hesketh, who, had she as many mouths as Virgil's Fame, with a tongue in each, would employ them all in my service, writes me word that Dr. Maty, of the Museum, has read my "Task." I cannot, even to you, relate what he says of it, though, when I began this story, I thought I had courage enough to tell it boldly. He designs, however, to give his opinion of it in his next Monthly Review; and, being informed that I was about to finish a translation of Homer, asked her ladyship's leave to mention the circumstance on that occasion. This incident pleases me the more, because I have authentic intelligence of his being a critical character, in all its forms, acute, sour, and blunt, and so incorruptible withal, and so unsusceptible of bias from undue motives, that, as my correspondent informs me, he would not praise his own mother, did he not think she deserved it.
The said "Task" is likewise gone to Oxford, conveyed thither by an intimate friend of Dr. ——, with a purpose of putting it into his hands. My friend, what will they do with me at Oxford? Will they burn me at Carfax, or will they anathematize me with bell, book, and candle? I can say with more truth than Ovid did—Parve, nec invideo.
The said Dr. —— has been heard to say, and I give you his own words, (stop both your ears while I utter them,) "that Homer has never been translated, and that Pope was a fool." Very irreverend language, to be sure, but, in consideration of the subject on which he used them, we will pardon it, even in a dean.[320] One of the masters of Eton told a friend of mine lately, that a translation of Homer is much wanted. So now you have all my news.
Yours, my dear friend, cordially,
W.C.
TO LADY HESKETH.
Olney, Jan. 31, 1786.