BIB_ID
419883
Accession number
MA 1352.15
Creator
Dickens, Charles, 1812-1870.
Display Date
London, England, 1841 December 14.
Credit line
Purchased with the assistance of the Fellows, 1951.
Description
1 item (2 pages) ; 18.2 x 11.5 cm + envelope
Notes
The letter is part of a collection, MA 1352, which consists of letters from Charles Dickens to the Baroness, to her companion Hannah (Meredith) Brown, or the latter's husband, William Brown; with 70 letters written by others to Miss Coutts or to Dickens in his capacity as her unofficial almoner; and a few others. See the collection-level record for more information.
Written from "Devonshire Terrace."
Written from "Devonshire Terrace."
Provenance
The letters formed part of the Burdett-Coutts sale (Sotheby, 17 May 1922); they were purchased for Oliver W. Barrett in whose collection they remained until it was sold by his son (Parke-Bernet, 31 October 1951).
Summary
Regretting that he cannot accept her invitation; saying "Every day this week I am engaged. As I shall have only a fortnight more when next Sunday comes, I have 'registered a vow' (in imitation of Mr. [Daniel] O'Connell) to pass those fourteen days at home, and not to be tempted forth. Having withstood your note and acted so manfully in this trying situation, which is a kind of reversal of Eve and the Serpent, I feel that I can be adamant to everybody else. This is the only comfort I have in the penmanship of these words. You will allow me, notwithstanding, to call upon you one morning before I go, to say good by'e, and to take your orders for any article of a portable nature in my new line of business - such as a phial of Niagara water, a neat tomahawk, or a few scales of the celebrated Sea Serpent, which would perhaps be an improvement on writing paper, for Miss Meredith's pillows."
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