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ED; E749|     45

 
EDL45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        [To William Hayley]

 
EDL45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        [28 May 1804]
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        Dear Sir,
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        I thank you heartily for your kind offer of reading, &c. I
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        have read the book thro' attentively and was much entertain'd and
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        instructed, but have not yet come to the Life of Washington.
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        I suppose an American would tell me that
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        Washington did all that was done before he was born, as the
L45.1Hayley5'04; E749|        French now

 
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        adore Buonaparte and the English our poor George; so the
L45.1ayley5'04; E750|         Americans will consider Washington as their god. This is only
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        Grecian, or rather Trojan, worship, and perhaps will be revised
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        [reversed?] in an age or two. In the meantime I have the
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        happiness of seeing the Divine countenance in such men as Cowper
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        and Milton more distinctly than in any prince or hero. Mr.
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        Phillips has sent a small poem; he would not tell the author's
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        name, but desired me to inclose it for you with Washington's
L45.1Hayley5'04; E750|        Life.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        Mr. Carr called on me, and I, as you desired, gave him a
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        history of the reviewing business as far as I am acquainted with
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        it. He desires me to express to you that he would heartily
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        devote himself to the business in all its laborious parts, if you
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        would take on you the direction; and he thinks it might be done
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        with very little trouble to you. He is now going to Russia;
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        hopes that the negotiations for this business is not wholly at an
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        end, but that on his return he may still perform his best, as
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        your assistant in it. I have delivered the letter to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        Mr. Edwards, who will give it immediately to Lady Hamilton.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        Mr. Walker I have again seen; he promises to collect numerous
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        particulars concerning Romney and send them to you; wonders he
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        has not had a line from you; desires me to assure you of his wish
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        to give every information in his power. Says that I shall have
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        Lear and Cordelia to copy if you desire it should be
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        done; supposes that Romney was about eighteen when he painted it;
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        it is therefore doubly interesting. Mr. Walker is truly an
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        amiable man; spoke of Mr. Green as the oldest friend of Romney,
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        who knew most concerning him of any one; lamented the little
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        difference that subsisted between you, speaking of you both with
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        great affection. Mr. Flaxman has also promised to write all he
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        knows or can collect concerning Romney, and send to you. Mr.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        Sanders has promised to write to Mr. J. Romney immediately,
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        desiring him to give us liberty to copy any of his father's
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        designs that Mr. Flaxman may select for that purpose; doubts not
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        at all of Mr. Romney's readiness to send any of the cartoons to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        London you desire; if this can be done it will be all that could
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        be wished. I spoke to Mr. Flaxman about choosing out proper
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        subjects for our purpose; he has promised to do so. I hope soon
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        to send you Flaxman's advice upon this article. When I repeated
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        to Mr. Phillips your intention of taking the books you want from
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        his shop, he made a reply to the following purpose: "I shall be
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        very proud to have Mr. Hayley's name in my books, but please to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        express to him my hope that he will consider me as the sincere
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        friend of Mr. Johnson, who is (I have every reason to say) both
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        the most generous and honest man I ever knew, and with whose
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        interest I should be so averse to interfere, that I should wish
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        him to have the refusal first of anything before it should be
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        offered to me, as I know the value of Mr. Hayley's connexion too
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        well to interfere between my best friend and him." This Phillips
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        spoke with real affection, and I know you will love him for it,
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        and will also respect Johnson the more for such testimony; but to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        balance all this I must, in duty to my friend Seagrave, tell you
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        that Mr. Rose repeated to me his great opinion of Mr. Johnson's
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        integrity, while we were talking concerning Seagrave's printing;
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        it is but justice, therefore, to tell you that I perceive a
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        determination in the London booksellers to injure Seagrave in
L45.2Hayley5'04; E750|        your opinion, if possible.

 
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Johnson may be very honest and very generous, too, where his own
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        interest is concerned; but I must say that he leaves no stone
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        unturn'd to serve that interest, and often (I think) unfairly; he
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        always has taken care, when I have seen him, to rail against
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Seagrave, and I perceive that he does the same by Mr. Rose. Mr
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Phillips took care to repeat Johnson's railing to me, and to say
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        that country printers could not do anything of consequence.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Luckily he found fault with the paper which Cowper's
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Life is printed on, not knowing that it was furnish'd by
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Johnson. I let him run on so far as to say that it was
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        scandalous and unfit for such a work; here I cut him short by
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        asking if he knew who furnish'd the paper. He answered: "I hope
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Mr. J. did not." I assured him that he did, and here he left off,
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        desiring me to tell you that the Life of Washington was
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        not put to press till the 3rd of this month (May), and on the
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        13th he had deliver'd a dozen copies at Stationer's Hall, and by
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        the 16th five hundred were out. This is swift work if literally
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        true, but I am not apt to believe literally what booksellers say;
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        and on comparing Cower with Washington, must
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        assert that, except paper (which is Johnson's fault),
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Cowper is far the best, both as to type and printing.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Pray look at Washington as far as page 177, you will
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        find that the type is smaller than from 177 to 308, the whole
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        middle of the book being printed with a larger and better type
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        than the two extremities; also it is carefully hot-pressed. I
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        say thus much, being urged thereto by Mr. Rose's observing some
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        defects in Seagrave's work, which I conceive were urged upon him
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        by Johnson; and as to the time the booksellers would take to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        execute any work, I need only refer to the little job which Mr.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Johnson was to get done for our friend Dally. He promised it in
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        a fortnight, and it is now three months and is not yet completed.
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        I could not avoid saying thus much in justice to our good
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        Seagrave, whose replies to Mr. Johnson's aggravating letters have
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        been represented to Mr. Rose in an unfair light, as I have no
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        doubt; because Mr. Johnson has, at times, written such letters to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        me as would have called for the sceptre of Agamemnon rather than
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        the tongue of Ulysses, and I will venture to give it as my
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        settled opinion that if you suffer yourself to be persuaded to
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        print in London you will be cheated every way; but, however, as
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        some little excuse, I must say that in London every calumny and
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        falsehood utter'd against another of the same trade is thought
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        fair play. Engravers, Painters, Statuaries, Printers, Poets, we
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        are not in a field of battle, but in a City of Assassinations.
L45.2Hayley504; E751|        This makes your lot truly enviable, and the country is not only
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        more beautiful on account of its expanded meadows, but also on
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        account of its benevolent minds. My wife joins with me in the
L45.2Hayley5'04; E751|        hearty wish that you may long enjoy your beautiful retirement,
L45.3Hayley5'04; E751|        I am, with best respects to Miss Poole, for whose health we
L45.3Hayley5'04; E751|        constantly send wishes to our spiritual friends,

 
L45.3Hayley5'04; E751|        Yours sincerely,
L45.3Hayley5'04; E751|        WILLIAM BLAKE
L45.4Hayley5'04; E751|        P.S.--Mr. Walker says that Mr. Cumberland is right
L45.4Hayley5'04; E751|        in his reckoning of Romney's age. Mr. W. says Romney was two
L45.4Hayley5'04; E751|        years older than himself, consequently was born 1734.
L45.5Hayley5'04; E751|        Mr. Flaxman told me that Mr. Romney was three years in
L45.5Hayley5'04; E751|        Italy; that he

 
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        returned twenty-eight years since. Mr. Humphry, the Painter, was
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        in Italy the same time with Mr. Romney. Mr. Romney lodged at Mr.
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        Richter's, Great Newport Street, before he went; took the house
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        in Cavendish Square immediately on his return; but as Flaxman has
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        promised to put pen to paper, you may expect a full account of
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        all he can collect. Mr. Sanders does not know the time when
L45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        Mr. R. took or left Cavendish Square house.
EDL45.5Hayley5'04; E752|        [From the Gilchrist Life]

 

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