think nor in the eleventh line of Lucius Brutus should be not, and in the short quotation from Valerius Maximus the last word valuit should be maluit. I see no other mistakes you have not corrected. If those two I have mentioned are too late for the copy, they may be put in errata.
I have no doubt of the malignity of Steevens. I have always heard him described as the most malevolent of human beings. I hope you will not spare him, and I think your forte in writing is personality. You could not possibly have a more worthy subject for its exercise.
It gives me great concern to hear such a bad account of your sight: there is one certain way of preserving it, by abstaining from what has injured it; don’t go on poking into small crabbed manuscripts, or you will be as blind as Tiresias. Can’t you get some young lusty Epidaurian-eyed drudge to make out the text for you, and so save your own peepers? I agree with you entirely, that a man who has a relish for literature need never look to old age with despondency. It is that prospect which comforts me; and so long as there are books, and I keep my relish for them, time may be too short for me, but I shall never last too long for time. I know some worthy friends who depended upon field-sports for their amusement, and being now grown infirm, their existence is a load, because they have no substitute to fill up the space which was once devoted to bodily exercise.
It gives me the greatest satisfaction to hear that you have resolved upon getting engravings. Twenty, as you mention, will be sufficient. I shall be very impatient to see some specimens, and flatter myself you will not fail to send them to me with the earliest opportunity. They will make it look handsome, and with such paper, type, and engravings, the book will have at least the outside of a gentleman. I forgot in my distribution of copies in presents, two persons very material; one the Marquis of Townshend, the other the Prince of Wales. To the latter I wish you could contrive in my name to present it yourself, or consult Mr. Hamilton[1] what will be the most respectful and proper manner of doing- ↑ Right Honourable William Gerard Hamilton.
