LETTER 289. TO MR. MOORE.

"La Mira, Venice, July 10. 1817.

"Murray, the Mokanna of booksellers, has contrived to send me
extracts from Lalla Rookh by the post. They are taken from some
magazine, and contain a short outline and quotations from the two
first Poems. I am very much delighted with what is before me, and
very thirsty for the rest. You have caught the colours as if you
had been in the rainbow, and the tone of the East is perfectly
preserved. I am glad you have changed the title from 'Persian
Tale.'

"I suspect you have written a devilish fine composition, and I
rejoice in it from my heart; because 'the Douglas and the Percy
both together are confident against a world in arms.' I hope you
won't be affronted at my looking on us as 'birds of a feather;'
though on whatever subject you had written, I should have been very
happy in your success.

"There is a simile of an orange-tree's 'flowers and fruits,' which
I should have liked better if I did not believe it to be a
reflection on * * *.

"Do you remember Thurlow's poem to Sam--'_When_ Rogers;' and that
d----d supper of Rancliffe's that ought to have been a _dinner_?
'Ah, Master Shallow, we have heard the chimes at midnight.' But

"My boat is on the shore,