258.--To Lord Holland.


September 30, 1812.


I send you the most I can make of it; for I am not so well as I was, and
find I "pull in resolution." [1]

I wish much to see you, and will be at Tetbury by twelve on Saturday;
and from thence I go on to Lord Jersey's. It is impossible not to allude
to the degraded state of the Stage, but I have lightened _it_, and
endeavoured to obviate your _other_ objections. There is a new couplet
for Sheridan, allusive to his Monody [2]. All the alterations I have
marked thus ],--as you will see by comparison with the other copy. I
have cudgelled my brains with the greatest willingness, and only wish I
had more time to have done better.

You will find a sort of clap-trap laudatory couplet inserted for the
quiet of the Committee [3], and I have added, towards the end, the
couplet you were pleased to _like_. The whole Address is seventy-three
lines, still perhaps too long; and, if shortened, you will save time,
but, I fear, a little of what I meant for sense also.

With myriads of thanks, I am ever, etc.

My sixteenth edition of respects to Lady H.--How she must laugh at all