“Darlington, June 3. 1815.

     “My Lord,

“I have lately purchased a set of your works, and am quite vexed that you have not cancelled the Ode to Buonaparte.  It certainly was prematurely written, without thought or reflection.  Providence has now brought him to reign over millions again, while the same Providence keeps as it were in a garrison another potentate, who, in the language of Mr. Burke, ‘he hurled from his throne.’  See if you cannot make amends for your folly, and consider that, in almost every respect, human nature is the same, in every clime and in every period, and don’t act the part of a foolish boy.—­Let not Englishmen talk of the stretch of tyrants, while the torrents of blood shed in the East Indies cry aloud to Heaven for retaliation.  Learn, good sir, not to cast the first stone.  I remain your Lordship’s servant,

“J.  R * *.” ]

* * * * *

LETTER 223.  TO MR. MOORE.

     “July 7. 1815.

“‘Grata superveniet,’ &c. &c.  I had written to you again, but burnt the letter, because I began to think you seriously hurt at my indolence, and did not know how the buffoonery it contained might be taken.  In the mean time, I have yours, and all is well.

“I had given over all hopes of yours.  By-the-by, my ’grata superveniet’ should be in the present tense; for I perceive it looks now as if it applied to this present scrawl reaching you, whereas it is to the receipt of thy Kilkenny epistle that I have tacked that venerable sentiment.

“Poor Whitbread died yesterday morning,—­a sudden and severe loss.  His health had been wavering, but so fatal an attack was not apprehended.  He dropped down, and I believe never spoke afterwards.  I perceive Perry attributes his death to Drury Lane,—­a consolatory encouragement to the new Committee.  I have no doubt that * *, who is of a plethoric habit, will be bled immediately; and as I have, since my marriage, lost much of my paleness, and—­’horresco referens’ (for I hate even moderate fat)—­that happy slenderness, to which, when I first knew you, I had attained, I by no means sit easy under this dispensation of the Morning Chronicle.  Every one must regret the loss of Whitbread; he was surely a great and very good man.

“Paris is taken for the second time.  I presume it, for the future, will have an anniversary capture.  In the late battles, like all the world, I have lost a connection,—­poor Frederick Howard, the best of his race.  I had little intercourse, of late years, with his family, but I never saw or heard but good of him.  Hobhouse’s brother is killed.  In short, the havoc has not left a family out of its tender mercies.

“Every hope of a republic is over, and we must go on under the old system.  But I am sick at heart of politics and slaughters;