DEAR SIR,

I cannot be offended by your opinion that my talents are not adequate to
the requisites of matter and manner for the _Quarterly Review,_ nor
should I consider it as a disgrace to fall short of Robert Southey in
any department of literature. I owe, however, an honest gratification to
the conversation between you and Mr. Gillman, for I read Southey's
article, on which Mr. Gillman and I have, it appears, formed very
different opinions. It is, in my judgment, a very masterly article.
[Footnote: This must have been Southey's article on Parliamentary Reform
in No. 31, which, though due in October 1816, was not, published until
February 1817.] I would to heaven, my dear sir, that the opinions of
Southey, Walter Scott, Lord Byron, Mr. Frere, and of men like these in
learning and genius, concerning my comparative claims to be a man of
letters, were to be received as the criterion, instead of the wretched,
and in deed and in truth mystical jargon of the _Examiner_ and
_Edinburgh Review_.

Mr. Randall will be so good as to repay you the £50, and I understand
from Mr. Gillman that you are willing to receive this as a settlement
respecting the "Zapolya." The corrections and additions to the two first
books of the "Christabel" may become of more value to you when the work
is finished, as I trust it will be in the course of the spring, than
they are at present. And let it not be forgotten, that while I had the
utmost malignity of personal enmity to cry down the work, with the
exception of Lord Byron, there was not one of the many who had so many
years together spoken so warmly in its praise who gave it the least
positive furtherance after its publication. It was openly asserted that
the _Quarterly Review_ did not wish to attack it, but was ashamed to say
a word in its favor. Thank God! these things pass from me like drops