"We have received all your songs, and are vastly pleased with them. You
misunderstood me as to the hautboy song; I had not the least intention
to fix on '_Bel idol mio_,' However, I think it is particularly
well adapted, and, I doubt not, will have a great effect...."

An allusion which occurs in these letters to the prospect of a
reconciliation with his father gives me an opportunity of mentioning a
circumstance, connected with their difference, for the knowledge of
which I am indebted to one of the persons most interested in remembering
it, and which, as a proof of the natural tendency of Sheridan's heart to
let all its sensibilities flow in the right channel, ought not to be
forgotten. During the run of one of his pieces, having received
information from an old family servant that his father (who still
refused to have any intercourse with him) meant to attend, with his
daughters, at the representation of the piece, Sheridan took up his
station by one of the side scenes, opposite to the box where they sat,
and there continued, unobserved, to look at them during the greater part
of the night. On his return home, he was so affected by the various
recollections that came upon him, that he burst into tears, and, being
questioned as to the cause of his agitation by Mrs. Sheridan, to whom it
was new to see him returning thus saddened from the scene of his
triumph, he owned how deeply it had gone to his heart "to think that
_there_ sat his father and his sisters before him, and yet that he
alone was not permitted to go near them or speak to them."

On the 21st of November, 1775, The Duenna was performed at Covent
Garden, and the following is the original cast of the characters, as
given in the collection of Mr. Sheridan's Dramatic Works:--