ly yours.

[Sidenote: Mrs. Cowden Clarke.]

GREAT MALVERN, _29th March, 1851._

MY DEAR MRS. COWDEN CLARKE,

Ah, those were days indeed, when we were so fatigued at dinner that we
couldn't speak, and so revived at supper that we couldn't go to bed;
when wild in inns the noble savage ran; and all the world was a stage,
gas-lighted in a double sense--by the Young Gas and the old one! When
Emmeline Montague (now Compton, and the mother of two children) came to
rehearse in our new comedy[45] the other night, I nearly fainted. The
gush of recollection was so overpowering that I couldn't bear it.

I use the portfolio[46] for managerial papers still. That's something.

But all this does not thank you for your book.[47] I have not got it yet
(being here with Mrs. Dickens, who has been very unwell), but I shall be
in town early in the week, and shall bring it down to read quietly on
these hills, where the wind blows as freshly as if there were no Popes
and no Cardinals whatsoever--nothing the matter anywhere. I thank you a
thousand times, beforehand, for the pleasure you are going to give me. I
am full of faith. Your sister Emma, she is doing work of some sort on
the P.S. side of the boxes, in some dark theatre, _I know_, but where, I
wonder? W.[48] has not proposed to her yet, has he? I understood he was
going to offer his hand and heart, and lay his leg[49] at her feet.

Ever faithfully yours.

[Sidenote: Mr. Mitton.]

DEVONSHIRE TERRACE, _19th April, 1851._

MY DEAR MITTON,

I have been in trouble, or I should have written to you sooner. My wife
has been, and is, far from well. My poor father's death caused me much
distress. I came to London last Monday to preside at a public
dinner--played with little Dora, my youngest child, before I went--and
was told when I left the chair that she had died in a moment. I am quite
happy again, but I have undergone a good deal.

I am not going back to Malvern, but have let this house until September,
and taken the "Fort," at Broadstairs.

Faithfully yours.

[Sidenote: Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton.]

DEVONSHIRE TERRACE, _Monday, 28th April, 1851._

MY DEAR BULWER,

I see you are so anxious, that I shall endeavour to send you this letter
by a special messenger. I think I can relieve y