Autograph letter signed with initials : [Torquay], to Richard Hengist Horne, [1841 January].

Explaining the delay in her reply saying "I lost account of the time spent in delaying, took saturday for monday still, & built up so a dozing reputation...Half the day, all the morning, I am just able to read lazily in that low 'spiritless lack lustre state' which shows the quenched embers of opium & things of the sort, said to be necessary for me just now, - & the uncomfortable uncertain excitement before & afterwards though pleasanter as a sensation, is more congenial to dreaming ('dozing' if you please dear Mr. Horne.) than to any steady purpose of thought or fixed direction of faculty;" thanking him for his 'reproof from Hazlitt' and saying "More of us, you will admit, do harm by groping along the pavement with blind hands for the beggars brass coin, than do folly by clutching at the stars 'from the misty mountain top': And if the would be star catchers catch nothing, they keep at least clean fingers;" referring to her previous refusal to sign his petition involving the Drury Theatre and explaining the five shares ownership she has in it saying "The shares never reminded me of their being mine by one penny coming to my hands, nor are likely to do so - the national theatres being as empty of profit as of honor. But if it were otherwise, oh you could'nt suspect me of being warped by such a consideration;" putting forth suggestions for the form and subject of their collaborative writing project [Psyche Apocalypté] saying "My idea, the terror attending spiritual consciousness, the men's soul to the men, is something which has not I think been worked hitherto, & seems to admit of a certain grandeur & wildness in the execution. The awe of this self consciousness, breaking with occasional sudden lurid beats through the chasms of our conventionalities has struck me, in my own self observation as a mystery of nature - very grand in itself - & is quite a distinct mystery from conscience. Conscience has to do with action (every thought being spiritual action) & not with abstract existence. There are moments when we are startled at the footsteps of our own Being, more than at the thunders of God. Is it impracticable? too shadowy, too mystic, for working dramatically? Think of Faust...But you are judge as to what is to be done or tried. Say yes or no - & I am prepared for 'no', most;" asking, in a postscript, if he has asked Miss Mitford about his petition and saying that she is "...interested in theatres - has a play waiting to be acted: & I am sure she w'd sign the petition gladly."