Monday night

I beg a thousand pardons my dear Sir for trespassing again on your valuable time--but I am so anxious to do the best that my feeble power can do for this poor & so certain of improvement from your suggestions that I cannot resist the temptation of sending you the rough draft of the poisoning Catastrophe. Is it at all do you think what Mr. Macready intended? I am afraid not. And what shall I do to make it better? Is it too long? Too short? Should Erizzo be brought in? Should there be more rejoicing at first amongst the other characters & should Foscari himself forget in the first moments of joy that he carried death in his bosom? Should his end be quieter--with less of delirium & more of penitence? And is there the smallest chance that I may make it such as Mr. Macready would approve? Pray tell me frankly--You have no notion how much I desire to write such a death as may please him--the more so a thousand times for the fine gentlemanly spirit with which he left the alteration so completely at my option. The more I think of his kindness & of your's the more I feel that I never can deserve it. Do you think he would like the death by joy for Foscari? It would not be so good as the Doge's--but newer than this certainly--& perhaps in better keeping with the character--Shall I try it? At all events I shall make this Catastrophe as good as I possibly can [with your powerful aid] & write over the whole act with the necessary alterations so as to be sent to you early in next week forMr. Macreadys & your decision. I do not think the early part of the act will require so much altering--I think it may still open in the same way, only making Cosmo enquire of the Jailer reply that a servant had been with him twice, that he had just been with him twice, that he had just drank some wine & fallen asleep after a sleepless & delirious night &c--Will this do, do you think? The other alterations are obvious enough even for me. Or should the audience know of the poison?--Be so good as to send back my rough draft with your remarks enclosed to Coley--I will send there for it.--There is no end to the trouble I give you or to your goodness--& really Mr. Macready seems cast in the same mold--to be only two days in Town and to take the trouble of reading the Play!--but your kindness is catching my dear Mr. Talfourd--&people who keep you company become kind they don't know how. God bless you. I shall finish in the morning.

Pray shall you think me a thief if I keep Mr. Macready's letter? I hope not for I certainly shall keep it nevertheless--it is so exceedingly comforting--which is worth all the flattery in the world. I am afraid to look at my Catastrophe by daylight farther than to see that the writing as if in emulation is really far worse than his--for which I very humbly beg pardon. Is it not terribly disjointed that dying scene--far too full of transition? Be a severe critic for once in your life.

You would see by the Reading paper that the Purity of Election dinner is fixed for the Thursday after the January Sessions--they had an extra meeting to fix the day & chose the Tenth that they might be sure of you. Of course you have had an official notice of this They talk of very great company -- "an audience worth speaking to" as the dear Doctor once said -- Sir F. Burdett, Sir R. Wilson, Mr. Grey Bennett, Mr. Hume & others whose names I have forgotten. Oh I hope they will come! It will be quite delightful that they should hear you in your own Reading on subjects worthy of your powers & with an audience so zealous to admire--I hope they will come.

I have now gotten "the real Simon Pure" Not a quote but a colloquial reference to anything that is genuine, authentic. From Centlivre's (1717), in which the character Simon Pure appears, impersonated during part of the play by another character. the true recommended by Mr. Burgess, for before by some odd confusion I had only a volume of extracts & remarks -- & really it is a better way of getting at Sophocles than in an English version which affects to be poetical--one is sure of the sense here--which is the great thing & not confused & teased by a clatter of . Your comparison of the statues is perfect. I have only read the & -- Is not the last much the finest? You don't quite say so in your remarks, but I think you think so. I never read any thing so fine as the Philoctetes--& surely the other is overpraised--that plot, or that riddle seems to me to engross far too much of the play--the passions are lost in the story--& that story how intolerably & visibly artificial it is -- there is none of the looseness & freedom of nature. Things do not happen in such a circle. I remember many years ago feeling exactly this objection to that other cried up story . But I suppose I am wrong. I must thank you once again for the loan of the Talfourd contributed to the , started by Coleridge, a volume on the Greek poets. -- I have three times the delight in Sophocles & in reading him with your admirable remarks -- Those on Euripides are exquisite. But it is great presumption in me even to say so.

Adieu my dear Sir -- Kindest regards from my Father & Mother--Ever most sincerely & gratefully your's M.R. Mitford