To John Johnson, Esq.
Weston, July 31, 1790.
You have by this time, I presume, answered Lady Hesketh's letter? if not, answer it without delay, and this injunction I give you, judging that it may not be entirely unnecessary, for, though I have seen you but once, and only for two or three days, I have found out that you are a scatter-brain.[548] I made the discovery perhaps the sooner, because in this you very much resemble myself, who, in the course of my life, through mere carelessness and inattention, lost many advantages; an insuperable shyness has also deprived me of many. And here again there is a resemblance between us. You will do well to guard against both, for of both, I believe, you have a considerable share as well as myself.
We long to see you again, and are only concerned at the short stay you propose to make with us. If time should seem to you as short at Weston, as it seems to us, your visit here will be gone "as a dream when one awaketh, or as a watch in the night."
It is a life of dreams, but the pleasantest one naturally wishes longest.
I shall find employment for you, having made already some part of the fair copy of the Odyssey a foul one. I am revising it for the last time, and spare nothing that I can mend. The Iliad is finished.
If you have Donne's poems, bring them with you, for I have not seen them many years, and should like to look them over.[549]
You may treat us too, if you please, with a little of your music, for I seldom hear any, and delight much in it. You need not fear a rival, for we have but two fiddles in the neighbourhood—one a gardener's, the other a tailor's: terrible performers both!
W. C.
Mrs. Newton was at this time in very declining health. It is to this subject that Cowper alludes in the following letter.