Letter from the Ærial.
When this sheet was going to press a letter was received; which, being properly authenticated, is here subjoined, with the words in italics as marked in the original.
To the Editor of the Every-Day Book.
Sir,
November 16, 1825.
I conceive that nothing but my “death,” or at least “the beautiful leg,” will atone to the world for my little indiscretions. If you expect me to appeal to the public, I answer, that I have been without father and mother eleven years nearly, though now only twenty-five years old, and measuring five feet two inches and a half, and in the hands of guardians, though not wanting money, four of whom it took to put me in the watchhouse, and I answer that I would rather be hanged if “the most liberal nation of the earth” wishes it.
You have observed that the company shrieked with laughter and amazement. Now I say I was the only one who shrieked with laughter, as I should at another hoax on the public. You might have spared me the trouble of answering you, if you had not introduced a most immutable picture of my conduct. You have represented me as the individual courting excessive censure or praise; but I must here be puppy enough to talk of general opinion, and say, that notwithstanding the pretended christian burial of me by the newspapers, it still appears by each and every of them that in the end the magistrate had no just cause to hate me. Besides acquiring experience from disappointment, and Mr. Chantry who sent for me, I had a dream which clearly convinced me I should not part with the cast.
I have no occasion to mention the author of the following quotation:—
“Let Hercules himself do what he may,
The cat will mew, the dog will have his day.”
I am, Sir,
Your most obedient servant,
Joseph Leeming.