To Mrs. King. [477]
March 12, 1789.
My dear Madam,—I feel myself in no small degree unworthy of the kind solicitude which you express concerning me and my welfare, after a silence so much longer than I gave you reason to expect. I should indeed account myself inexcusable, had I not to allege, in my defence, perpetual engagements of such a kind as would by no means be dispensed with. Had Homer alone been in question, Homer should have made room for you: but I have had other work in hand at the same time, equally pressing and more laborious. Let it suffice to say, that I have not wilfully neglected you for a moment, and that you have never been out of my thoughts a day together. But I begin to perceive that, if a man will be an author, he must live neither to himself nor to his friends so much as to others, whom he never saw nor shall see.
My promise to follow my last letter with another speedily, which promise I kept so ill, is not the only only one which I am conscious of having made to you, and but very indifferently performed. I promised you all the smaller pieces that I should produce, as fast as occasion called them forth, and leisure occurred to write them. Now the fact is, that I have produced several since I made that fair profession, of which I have sent you hardly any. The reason is that, transcribed into the body of a letter, they would leave me no room for prose; and that other conveyance than by the post I cannot find, even after inquiry made among all my neighbours for a traveller to Kimbolton. Well, we shall see you, I hope, in the summer; and then I will show you all. I will transcribe one for you every morning before breakfast, as long as they last; and when you come down, you shall find it laid on your napkin. I sent one last week to London, which, by some kind body or another, I know not whom, is to be presented to the Queen. The subject, as you may guess, is the King's recovery; a theme that might make a bad poet a good one, and a good one excel himself. This, too, you shall see when we meet, unless it should bounce upon you before, from some periodical register of all such matters.
I shall commission my cousin, who lately left us, to procure for me the book you mention. Being, and having long been, so deep in the business of translation, it was natural that I should have many thoughts on that subject. I have accordingly had as many as would of themselves, perhaps, make a volume, and shall be glad to compare them with those of any other writer recommended by Mr. Martyn. When you write next to that gentleman, I beg you, madam, to present my compliments to him, with thanks both for the mention of Mr. Twining's[478] book, and for the honour of his name among my subscribers.
I remain always, my dear madam,
Your affectionate
W. C.