I shall send another copy of the article on Bacon by another ship.

Yours very truly

T. B. MACAULAY.

Calcutta:  November 28, 1836.

Dear Napier,—­There is an oversight in the article on Bacon which I shall be much obliged to you to correct.  I have said that Bacon did not deal at all in idle rants “like those in which Cicero and Mr. Shandy sought consolation for the loss of Tullia and of Bobby.”  Nothing can, as a general remark, be more true, but it escaped my recollection that two or three of Mr. Shandy’s consolatory sentences are quoted from Bacon’s Essays.  The illustration, therefore, is singularly unfortunate.  Pray alter it thus; “in which Cicero vainly sought consolation for the loss of Tullia.”  To be sure, it is idle to correct such trifles at a distance of fifteen thousand miles.

Yours ever

T. B. MACAULAY.

From Lord Jeffrey to Macvey Napier, Esq.

May 2, 1837.

My dear N.,—­What mortal could ever dream of cutting out the least particle of this precious work, to make it fit better into your Review?  It would be worse than paring down the Pitt Diamond to fit the old setting of a Dowager’s ring.  Since Bacon himself, I do not know that there has been anything so fine.  The first five or six pages are in a lower tone, but still magnificent, and not to be deprived of a word.

Still, I do not object to consider whether it might not be best to serve up the rich repast in two courses; and on the whole I incline to that partition. 120 pages might cloy even epicures, and would be sure to surfeit the vulgar; and the biography and philosophy are so entirely distinct, and of not very unequal length, that the division would not look like a fracture.

FRANCIS JEFFREY.

In the end, the article appeared entire; occupying 104 pages of the Review; and accompanied by an apology for its length in the shape of one of those editorial appeals to “the intelligent scholar,” and “the best class of our readers,” which never fail of success.

The letters addressed to Zachary Macaulay are half filled with anecdotes of the nursery; pretty enough, but such as only a grandfather could be expected to read.  In other respects, the correspondence is chiefly remarkable for the affectionate ingenuity with which the son selects such topics as would interest the father.

Calcutta:  October 12 1836.

My dear Father, We were extremely gratified by receiving, a few days ago, a letter from you which, on the whole, gave a good account of your health and spirits.  The day after tomorrow is the first anniversary of your little grand-daughter’s birthday.  The occasion is to be celebrated with a sort of droll puppet-show, much in fashion among the natives; an exhibition much in the style of Punch in England, but more dramatic and more showy.  All the little boys and girls from the houses of our friends are invited, and the party will, I have no doubt, be a great deal more amusing than the stupid dinners and routs with which the grown-up people here kill the time.