“Ever,” &c.

[Footnote 45:  His servant had brought him up a large jar of ink, into which, not supposing it to be full, he had thrust his pen down to the very bottom.  Enraged, on finding it come out all smeared with ink, he flung the bottle out of the window into the garden, where it lighted, as here described, upon one of eight leaden Muses, that had been imported, some time before, from Holland,—­the ninth having been, by some accident, left behind.]

* * * * *

LETTER 196.  TO MR. MOORE.

     “August 13. 1814.

“I wrote yesterday to Mayfield, and have just now enfranked your letter to mamma.  My stay in town is so uncertain (not later than next week) that your packets for the north may not reach me; and as I know not exactly where I am going—­however, Newstead is my most probable destination, and if you send your despatches before Tuesday, I can forward them to our new ally.  But, after that day, you had better not trust to their arrival in time.

     “* * has been exiled from Paris, on dit, for saying the Bourbons
     were old women.  The Bourbons might have been content, I think, with
     returning the compliment.

“I told you all about Jacky and Larry yesterday;—­they are to be separated,—­at least, so says the grand M., and I know no more of the matter.  Jeffrey has done me more than ‘justice;’ but as to tragedy—­um!—­I have no time for fiction at present.  A man cannot paint a storm with the vessel under bare poles on a lee-shore.  When I get to land, I will try what is to be done, and, if I founder, there be plenty of mine elders and betters to console Melpomene.

“When at Newstead, you must come over, if only for a day—­should Mrs. M. be exigeante of your presence.  The place is worth seeing, as a ruin, and I can assure you there was some fun there, even in my time; but that is past.  The ghosts [46], however, and the gothics, and the waters, and the desolation, make it very lively still.

     “Ever, dear Tom, yours,” &c.

[Footnote 46:  It was, if I mistake not, during his recent visit to Newstead, that he himself actually fancied he saw the ghost of the Black Friar, which was supposed to have haunted the Abbey from the time of the dissolution of the monasteries, and which he thus describes, from the recollection perhaps of his own fantasy, in Don Juan:—­

    “It was no mouse, but, lo! a monk, array’d
      In cowl and beads and dusky garb, appear’d,
    Now in the moonlight, and now lapsed in shade,
      With steps that trod as heavy, yet unheard: 
    His garments only a slight murmur made: 
      He moved as shadowy as the sisters weird,
    But slowly; and as he pass’d Juan by,
      Glanced, without pausing, on him a bright eye.”