Adieu--I commit you to the care of the gods--Hindoo,
Scandinavian, and Hellenic!
P.S. 2d.--There is an excellent review of Grimm's _Correspondence_ and
Madame de Stael in this No. of the _E[dinburgh] R[eview]_ [12]. Jeffrey,
himself, was my critic last year; but this is, I believe, by another
hand. I hope you are going on with your _grand coup_--pray do--or that
damned Lucien Buonaparte will beat us all. I have seen much of his poem
in MS., and he really surpasses every thing beneath Tasso. Hodgson is
translating him _against_ another bard. You and (I believe Rogers,)
Scott, Gifford, and myself, are to be referred to as judges between the
twain,--that is, if you accept the office. Conceive our different
opinions! I think we, most of us (I am talking very impudently, you will
think--_us_, indeed!) have a way of our own,--at least, you and Scott
certainly have.
[Footnote 1: The fight, in which Harry Harmer, "the Coppersmith"
(1784-1834), beat Jack Ford, took place at St. Nicholas, near Margate,
August 23, 1813.
Francis Charles Seymour Conway, Earl of Yarmouth (1777-1842), succeeded
his father as second Marquis of Hertford in 1822. The colossal
libertinism and patrician splendour of his life inspired Disraeli to
paint him as "Monmouth" in 'Coningsby', and Thackeray as "Steyne" in
'Vanity Fair'. He married, in 1798, Maria Fagniani, claimed as a
daughter by George Selwyn and by "Old Q.," and enriched by both.
Yarmouth, as an intimate friend of the Regent, and the son of the
Prince's female favourite, was the butt of Moore and the Whig satirists.
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